Read The Magnificent Masquerade Online
Authors: Elizabeth Mansfield
The Magnificent Masquerade (3 page)
So why on earth had she been sent for? Kitty
wondered. The dyed hair episode (when she'd persuaded all five uppe rschool
girls to wash their hair with henna dye, and all six had appeared at morning
prayers with identical red heads) had already been atoned. (She'd been forced
to spend the weekend writing the history of the War of the Roses in original
blank verse, while the others were made to wash their hair every morning and
evening for ten days. And Miss Marchmont couldn't possibly have discovered the
little puppy she'd hidden away in the tool shed at the back of the rose garden.
Had someone shown the headmistress the manuscript for the play Kitty had
written, which mocked the mannerism of all the teachers-including Miss Marchmont
herself-quite unmercifully? It wasn't very likely; it was not yet in rehearsal,
and very few people knew of its existence. Besides, there was only one copy,
and that, she was sure, was safely locked in her bed-chest. "I can't
imagine what I've done that she could've discovered," she said as they
approached Miss Marchmont's office door, "but I'm certainly in the
suds." She glanced over her shoulder at Emily in unaccustomed humility.
"Are you sure I look presentable?"
"Neat as wax, miss, on my honor," Emily
assured her. "Thank you." Kitty stared nervously at the gold letters
on the door which read MISS MARCHMONT, HEAD MISTRESS. "You're not
frightened, are you, miss?" Emily asked. "You needn't be, you know.
Miss Marchmont isn't nearly as forbidding as she looks."
"Me, frightened? Not on your life! Kitty
Jessup doesn't frighten so easily." To prove her point, she raised her
hand to the opaque glass inset in the door and rapped smartly.
"Come in," came a voice from within
the office. "Shall I wait for you?" Emily offered.
"I should say not! I'm not a baby. Thanks,
Emily, for doing my hair. Now run along!" And she squared her shoulders,
took a deep breath, and marched forward to meet her doom.
Chapter Two
Lord Birkinshaw did not expect his wife to fall
into paroxysms of delight when he informed her of his intention to wed their
daughter to Lord Edgerton's younger brother, but neither did he anticipate an
enraged opposition. The violence of her reaction took him by surprise. Hermione
Jessup, Lady Birkinshaw, had already retired for the night when he burst in on
her with the news, and the fact that he'd awakened her just as she was drifting
off into sleep only exacerbated her fury. "Toby Wishart? You intend to
shackle our daughter to Toby Wishart?" she all but shrieked, sitting up so
abruptly that wispy tendrils of her hair, which had escaped from beneath her
nightcap, trembled. "How did you ever come by such an addle-brained
scheme? Not only is the fellow completely lacking in prospects, being a younger
son, but he's known far and wide as a ramshackle scapegrace!"
His lordship opened his mouth to respond, but
his lady would not be silenced. Now. wide awake, she launched on an impassioned
diatribe, her plump cheeks shaking like blancmange and her still-beautiful eyes
flashing fire. It was typical of her husband, she declared vehemently, to come,
without taking a moment for consultation with his wife, to such a thoughtless,
hasty decision. "In our twenty-odd years of marriage you've made more than
a thousand impulsive decisions -most of which, I might point out, proved to be
completely foolish!-but for sheer idiocy this one outdoes them all!"
"Oh, is that so?". was his lordship's
brilliant response. "So you say!"
"Of course so I say! What else can I say
when my green headed husband plans to shackle my only daughter to a penniless
loose screw!"
"Penniless?" Lord Birkinshaw demanded
gleefully, pouncing upon the cue she'd provided for him to play his trump card.
"You consider twenty thousand pounds penniless?"
Lady Birkinshaw gaped. "Twenty thousand-?
Whatever are you babbling about?"
His lordship chortled triumphantly. "You
heard me." His lady threw off her comforter and rose from the bed, looking
awesomely threatening despite the demure innocence of her long-sleeved white
nightgown. With arms akimbo and hands on her hips, she peered closely at his
leering face and demanded, "Thomas Jessup, are you soused?"
"Sober as you, my dear," he answered
with a self-satisfied smirk.
"I very much doubt that. Anyone who can claim
that a ne'er-do-well like Toby Wishart possesses a fortune must be raddled ...
or at least tiddly."
"I am neither soused, raddled, nor tiddly,
ma'am. And I did not say the boy has a fortune now. But he will have it on the
day he marries our Kitty. Edgerton himself gave me his word on it."
Her ladyship sank down on the bed, silenced.
Twenty thousand pounds! A sum of that size changed the picture completely. It
was perhaps not the most enormous fortune of anyone now on the marriage mart,
but it certainly wasn't a sum to be casually tossed aside. Lady Birkinshaw
realized at once that the situation was now one she had to reconsider.
"Good God," she muttered, "if word gets round that Edgerton
means to be so generous to Toby, every matchmaking mama in
"Won't make no difference," her
husband assured her complacently. "Kitty's to have him. Edgerton and I
shook hands."
But his wife hardly heard him. Her mind was
busily occupied in weighing the advantages of the proposed match against the
difficulties. That there were many advantages was now indisputably clear. For
one thing, it was unlikely that their Kitty, attractive and spirited though she
was, would find very many suitors of better-or even equal-prospects. Among the
eligibles, there were only three or four at most whose fortunes were greater;
on the other hand, there were dozens of young bachelors circulating among the
ton who couldn't lay claim to half such wealth. And Kitty was so contrary that
she might, if given a choice, attach herself to one of the latter.
Like her husband, Lady Birkinshaw considered
her daughter to be quite unmanageable. She had been dreading for years the
troublesome necessity of bringing her daughter out. Although she was a fond
mother and was second to none in her admiration of her daughter's looks,
coloring, charm, wit, and spirit, she knew in her bones that Kitty would be
rebellious and perverse during the come-out season. Kitty was the sort who
would resent the rigid propriety that was expected of young ladies during their
"presentations." The girl would certainly balk at having to go to
fittings, she would want to choose shocking ball gowns in dreadful colors, she
would fall into scrapes at just the times when her behavior should be irreproachable,
and she was certain to make her poor mother's life a purgatory. It would be a
decided advantage to be able to avoid the entire experience.
Her ladyship threw her husband a speculative
look. "I've been thinking, my dear," she admitted reluctantly,
"that there may be some merit in your plan. The boy is a handsome devil,
his family is among the best in
and with a fortune of that size he must be considered a good catch."
"That is my view exactly." Her
husband grinned, sitting down beside her on the bed. "We might go through
a whole season without her getting herself a better offer." "Knowing
Kitty's propensity for contrariness, we have to consider the possibility that
she might do a great deal worse," Lady Birkinshaw agreed.
His lordship, having won the day, puffed his
chest up proudly. "A great deal worse," he seconded. Then, taking his
wife's hand in his, he added with a mischievous glint, "Do you know what
else occurred to me, Hermione, my love?"
"What?" she asked, glancing up at
him.
"If we marry her off now, we wouldn't have
to bring the girl out! Save ourselves months of storm and strife."
Her ladyship giggled guiltily. "Yes, I
thought of that, too. If we go through with our plan, we'd avoid months of
tension. If we had to bring her out, we'd have quarrels about everything. About
gowns, and bonnets, and hairdressings-"
Her husband nodded knowingly. "-about
dressmakers and milliners..."
"-about what invitations to accept .. “
“-and whom to refuse . . . "
“-and we'd have to be always making up excuses
for Kitty when she forgot appointments ..."
"-and soothing the ruffled feathers of
those she'd offended ..."
“-and explaining away her excesses. . `-and
greeting callers at all hours ..."
"-and arguing over whom to invite to our
own ball .. `-and sending out cards ..."
“-and making up menus and buying extra linen
and plate ..."
“-and turning the house topsy-turvy.. `-and
dealing with all the tradesmen ..
“-and paying all the bills!" His lordship
rubbed his pudgy fingers over his forehead as if wiping away all the imaginary
strain. "Won't it be glorious not to have to go through any of that?"
Laughing, her ladyship reached up, pulled down
her husband's head, and kissed him. "We're a dreadful pair of parents,
Thomas," she muttered into his shoulder.
"I wouldn't say that," he demurred,
chuckling. "It's for her own good, after all. If we do some good for
ourselves in the process, I see nothing reprehensible in it."
Lady Birkinshaw shook her head in reluctant
admiration. "You're quite right," she said, undoing his neckcloth and
nuzzling him fondly. "The more I think about it, the more I realize that
my totty headed husband has, for once, done something sensible."
Thus the matter was settled. They were agreed.
In the spring Kitty would be wed to Toby Wishart, will-she or nill-she. Now all
they had to do was convince the girl. That, Lord and Lady Birkinshaw knew,
would not be easy. Kitty would fight their decision tooth and nail. They were
certain to be met with tears and tantrums, not one bit of which they wanted to
face. So Lord Birkinshaw suggested they avoid facing the girl altogether. All
they needed to do, he said to his wife next morning, was send Kitty off to
school. Why put themselves through the agony of dealing with her at home?
"Let the chit spend a fortnight or so at
the Edgerton estate becoming acquainted with her betrothed. I'll arrange it
with Edgerton first thing tomorrow. By the time the fortnight's passed, she'll
have grown accustomed to the idea." Lady Birkinshaw nodded in shamefaced
agreement.
It was perhaps not the most courageous
way of handling their daughter, but it was certainly the most expedient. If
they wrote a letter to the school and sent her off to the country with
dispatch, the girl would have no opportunity to enact a scene. The next
afternoon, with his wife standing over him, Lord Birkinshaw sat down at his
desk to compose two letters—one to his daughter, and one to the headmistress of
the school. The letter to Miss Marchmont was businesslike and terse.
The instructions within (written in so pedantic
and formal a style that a reader might easily have assumed they'd been composed
by his solicitor) were quite explicit: his daughter, Miss Katherine Jessup,
spinster, at the moment residing at the Marchmont School, was "herewith
withdrawn" from that institution for the purpose of preparing herself for
a marriage to The Honorable Tobias Wishart, "said marriage to take place
six weeks following the first reading of the banns at our parish church this
Sunday." In the meantime, the said Miss Jessup, having been graciously
invited by Lord Edgerton to spend a fortnight at his estate in
betrothed couple with each other, was to pack up her things at once.
On the very next day ("before she'll have
time," Lord Birkinshaw explained to his wife, "to concoct a scheme to
make mischief") a carriage would arrive to convey her to the Edgerton
estate. She was to remain there in
parents, shall arrive to escort her home to embark on the wedding
preparations."
Lord Birkinshaw added a post scriptum to Miss
Marchmont in which he wrote that he would be "eternally obliged" to
her if she would take the trouble to provide for his daughter a suitable
abigail to accompany her on the journey and to stay with her throughout the
visit.
The letter to Kitty conveyed the same basic
information and-to ensure that Kitty would take the news seriously had the same
firmness of tone. But Lord and Lady Birkinshaw were at heart quite loving
parents (despite the fact that the letter might have seemed to an impartial
observer impressive evidence to the contrary), and they couldn't bring
themselves to dispatch the letter without enclosing some sign of their
affection. Thus his lordship appended a post scriptum to Kitty as well,
informing her that a large trunk, in which her mother would place many charming
new bits of finery for Kitty to wear in the country and in which he would tuck
twenty guineas for pocket money, would be strapped atop the carriage he was
sending to convey her to Suffolk. With these provisions, he wrote, he hoped he
had anticipated all her needs.
"There!" he said to his wife when his
labors over the letters had been completed. "That should do the job well
enough." Lady Birkinshaw sighed guiltily. "Poor Kitty. Don't you
think she'll find it rather cold?"
His lordship ran his eyes over the sheet in
concern. "Perhaps it is rather cold," he agreed, taking up his quill
again. He chewed the tip thoughtfully for a long moment and then smiled as the
solution came to him. Laboriously he added one more sentence: Your mother and I
desire, of course, to express our very best wishes for your happiness.
Chapter Three
Kitty inched her head round the door fearfully
and peered inside. But there was nothing frightening about the head mistress's
study; in fact, the room's atmosphere seemed permeated with a blessed
stillness. The afternoon sunlight poured in through the room's huge window in glistening
streaks, covering the mahogany desk, the carpet before it, and the very motes
in the air with gold. But the chair behind the desk was empty. To the nervous
girl in the doorway it seemed like the setting of a scene in a play, the chair
in the center of the spotlight awaiting the entrance of the villainess. But she
soon saw that the villainess was already on stage. Miss Marchmont was standing
at the window reading a lengthy, closely written letter. The headmistress's
appearance was, as always very intimidating, especially to the young and the
guilty. She was painfully gaunt; six feet tall, she was appropriately called
Betty Beanstalk by the pupils when they spoke of her behind her back. She had
hollow cheeks, a high forehead, and a prominent nose, and the corkscrew curls
which framed her face did little to soften its hawk like masculinity. The look
of a hawk was especially noticeable at this moment, for Miss Marchmont was
peering at her letter with a particularly angry frown.