Arabella (16 page)

Not for several hours did her mind recover its tone, but she was both young and optimistic, and after a hearty burst of tears, followed by a period of quiet reflection, she began insensibly to be more hopeful. Something would happen to unravel her difficulties; the odious Frederick would scotch the rumour; people would gradually grow to realize that they had been mistaken. Mr. Beaumaris and Lord Fleetwood would no doubt write her down as a vulgar, boasting miss, but she must hope that they had not actually told everyone that it was she who had been responsible for the rumour. Meanwhile there was nothing to be done but to behave as though nothing were the matter. This, to a naturally buoyant spirit was not so hard a task as might have been supposed: London was offering too much to Arabella for her to be long cast-down. She might fancy all her pleasure destroyed, but she would have been a very extraordinary young woman who could have remembered her difficulties while cards and floral offerings were left every day at the house; while invitations poured in to every form of entertainment known to ingenious hostesses: while every gentleman was eager to claim her hand for the dance; while Mr. Beaumaris took her driving in the Park behind his match-grays, and every other young lady gazed enviously after her. Whatever the cause, social success was sweet; and since Arabella was a very human girl she could not help enjoying every moment of it.

She expected to see some considerable diminution in her court once Lord Bridlington had let it be known that her fortune had been grossly exaggerated, and braced herself to bear this humiliation. But although she knew from Lady Bridlington that Frederick had faithfully performed his part, still the invitations came in, and still the unattached gentlemen clustered round her. She took fresh heart, glad to find that fashionable people were not, after all, so mercenary as she had been led to think. Neither she nor Frederick had the smallest inkling of the true state of affairs: she because she was too unsophisticated; Frederick because it had never yet occurred to him that anyone could doubt what he said. But he might as well have spared his breath on this occasion. Even Mr. Warkworth, a charitably-minded gentleman, shook his head over it, and remarked to Sir Geoffrey Morecambe that Bridlington was doing it rather too brown,

“Just what I was thinking myself,” agreed Sir Geoffrey, scrutinizing his neck-tie in the mirror with a dissatisfied eye. “Shabby, I call it. Do you think this way I have tied my cravat has something of the look of the Nonpareil’s new style?”

Mr. Warkworth directed a long, dispassionate stare at it. “No,” he said simply.

“No, no more do I,” said Sir Geoffrey, said but unsurprised. “I wonder what he calls it? It ain’t precisely a Mail-coach, and it certainly ain’t an Osbaldeston, and though I did think it had something of the look of a
Trone d’amour
,
it ain’t that either. I can tie every one of
them.
”

Mr. Warkworth, whose mind had wandered from this vital subject, said, with a frown: “Damn it, it is shabby! You’re right!”

Sir Geoffrey was a little hurt. “Would you say it was as bad as that, Oswald?”

“I would,” stated Mr. Warkworth. “In fact, the more I think of it the worse it appears to me!”

Sir Geoffrey looked intently at his own image, and sighed. “Yes, it does. I shall have to go home and change it.”

“Eh?” said Mr. Warkworth, puzzled. “Change what?

Good God, dear boy, I wasn’t talking about your neck-tie! Wouldn’t dream of saying such a thing to my worst enemy! Bridlington!”

“Oh, him!” said Sir Geoffrey, relieved. “He’s a gudgeon!”

“Oughtn’t to be gudgeon enough to think everyone else is one. Tell you what: wouldn’t do him any good if he did hoax everybody with the bag of moonshine! She’s a devilish fine girl, the little Tallant, and if you ask me she wouldn’t have him if he were the only man to offer for her.”

“You can’t expect him to know that,” said Sir Geoffrey. “I shouldn’t wonder if he hasn’t a suspicion he’s a dead bore: in fact, he can’t have! Stands to reason: wouldn’t prose on as he does, if he knew it!”

Mr. Warkworth thought this over. “No,” he pronounced at last. “You’re wrong. If he don’t know he’s a dead bore, why does he want to frighten off everyone else? Havey-cavey sort of a business: don’t like it! a man ought to fight fair.”

“It ain’t that,” replied Sir Geoffrey. “Just remembered something: the little Tallant don’t want it to be known she’s as rich as a Nabob. Fleetwood told me: tired of being courted for her money. They were all after her in the north.”

“Oh!” said Mr. Warkworth. He asked with vague interest: “Where does she come from?”

“Somewhere up north: Yorkshire, I believe,” said Sir Geoffrey, inserting a cautious finger into one of the folds of his neck-tie, and easing it a trifle. “I wonder if that’s better?”

“Well, that’s a queer thing. Saw Clayton the other day. He comes from Yorkshire, and he don’t know the Tallant.”

“No, and Withernsea don’t either. Mind you, I won’t swear it was Yorkshire! Might have been one of those other devilish rural places—Northumberland, or something. Know what I think?”

“No,” said Mr. Warkworth.

“Shouldn’t be surprised if she’s the daughter of some merchant or other, which would account for it”

Mr. Warkworth looked shocked. “No, really, dear old boy! Nothing of that sort about the girl! Never heard her utter a word that smelled of the shop!”

“Granddaughter, then,” said Sir Geoffrey, stretching a point. “Pity, if I’m right, but I’ll tell you one thing, Oswald! I wouldn’t let it weigh with me.”

Upon consideration, Mr. Warkworth decided that he would not either.

Since these views were fairly representative, Arabella was not destined to suffer the mortification of seeing her usual gallants hang back when next she attended the Assembly at Almack’s. Lord Bridlington was escorting his mother and her guest, for besides being very correct in such matters, he liked Almack’s, and approved of the severity of the rules imposed on the club by its imperious hostesses. A number of his contemporaries said openly that an evening spent at Almack’s was the flattest thing in town, but these were frippery fellows with whom Lord Bridlington had little to do.

His politeness led him to engage Miss Tallant for the first country-dance, a circumstance which made the unsuccessful applicants for her hand exchange significant glances. They saw to it that he should have no further opportunity of standing up with her. Not one of them would have believed that he had no desire to do so, much preferring to stroll about the rooms, telling as many people as could be got to listen to him all about his travels abroad.

The waltz, which was still looked at askance by old-fashioned persons, had long since forced its way into Almack’s, but it was still the unwritten law that no lady might venture to take part in it unless one of the patronesses had clearly indicated her approval. Lady Bridlington had taken care to impress this important convention upon Arabella’s mind, so she refused all solicitations to take the floor when the fiddles struck up for the waltz. Papa would certainly not approve of the dance, she knew: she had never dared to tell him that she and Sophia had learnt the steps from their friends the Misses Caterham, a very dashing pair. So she retired to a chair against the wall, beside Lady Bridlington’s, and sat fanning herself, and trying not to look as though she longed to be whirling round the floor. One or two more fortunate damsels, who had watched with disfavour her swift rise to popularity, cast her glances of such pitying superiority that she had to recollect a great many of Papa’s maxims before she could subdue the very improper sentiments which entered her breast.

Mr. Beaumaris, who had looked in midway through the evening—in fact, a bare ten minutes before the doors were relentlessly shut against late-comers—apparently for no other purpose than to entertain the wife of the Austrian Ambassador, saw Arabella, and was amused, guessing her emotions correctly. Suddenly he cast one of his quizzical looks at Princess Esterhazy, and said: “Shall I ask that chit to dance?”

She raised her delicate black brows, a faint smile flickering on her lips. “
Here
,
my friend, you are not supreme! I think you dare not.”

“I know I dare not,” said Mr. Beaumaris, disarming her promptly. “That is why I ask you, Princess, to present me to the lady as a desirable partner.”

She hesitated, glancing from him to Arabella, and then laughed, and shrugged. “Well! She does not put herself forward, after all, and I find her style excellent. Come, then!”

Arabella, startled to find herself suddenly confronted by one of the most formidable patronesses, rose quickly.

“You do not dance, Miss Tallant. May I present Mr. Beaumaris to you as a very desirable partner?” said the Princess with a slightly malicious smile cast at Mr. Beaumaris.

Arabella could only curtsy, and blush, and be sorry to find that she was so ill-natured as to be conscious of feelings of ignoble triumph over the ladies who had been kind enough to look pityingly at her.

Mr. Beaumaris led her on to the floor, and encircled her waist with one arm, taking her right hand in a light clasp. Arabella was naturally a good dancer, but she felt extremely nervous, partly because she had never attempted the waltz, except in the Misses Caterham’s old schoolroom, and partly because it was so strange to be held in such close proximity to a man. For several turns she answered Mr. Beaumaris very much at random, being preoccupied with her feet. She was so much shorter than he that her head only just reached his shoulder, and since she felt shy she did not look up, but steadfastly regarded the top of his waistcoat. Mr. Beaumaris, who was not in the habit of devoting himself to such very young ladies, found this bashfulness amusing, and not unattractive. After he thought she had had time to recover from it a little, he said: “It is a nice waistcoat, isn’t it, Miss Tallant?”

That did make her look up, and quickly too, her face breaking into laughter. She looked so lovely, and her big eyes met his with such a frank, ingenuous expression in them, that he was aware of a stir of something in his heart that was not mere amusement. But he had no intention of going to dangerous lengths with this or any other pretty chit, and he said, in a bantering tone: “It is customary, you know, to exchange polite conversation during the dance. I have now addressed no fewer than three unexceptionable remarks to you without winning one answer!”

“You see, I am minding my steps,” she confided seriously.

Decidedly this absurd child was a refreshing change from the generality of damsels! Had he been a younger man, he reflected, he might easily have succumbed to her charm. It was fortunate that he was thirty, and no longer to be caught by a pretty face and naive ways, for he knew well that these would pall on him, and that he wanted something more in the lady whom he would one day marry. He had never yet found just what he was looking for, did not even know what it might prove to be, and was perfectly resigned to his bachelordom.

“It is not at all necessary,” he said. “You dance delightfully. You do not mean to tell me that this is the first time you have waltzed?”

Miss Tallant certainly did not mean to tell him anything of the sort, and was already regretting her impulsive confidence. “Good gracious, no!” she said. “The first time at Almack’s. however.”

“I am happy to think, then, that mine was the honour of first leading you on to the floor. You will certainly be besieged by every man present now it is seen that you have no objection to the waltz.”

She said nothing, but fell to studying his waistcoat again. He glanced down at her, a hint of mockery in the smile that hovered about his mouth. “How does it feel, Miss Tallant, to be the rage of town? Do you enjoy it, or have your northern triumphs given you a. distaste for this sort of thing?”

She raised her eyes, and her chin too. “I am afraid, Mr. Beaumaris, that you betrayed what I—what I begged you not to speak of!”

There was a distinctly sardonic look in his eye, but he replied coolly: “I assure you, ma’am, I have mentioned your circumstances to one person only: Lord Fleetwood.”

“Then it is he who—” She broke off, flushing.

“Very probably,” he agreed. “You must not blame him, however. Such things are bound to leak out”

Her lips parted, and then closed again. He wondered what she had so nearly said: whether he was to have been treated to her society manners, or whether she had been about to tell him the truth. On the whole, he was glad that she had thought better of it. If she took him into her confidence, he supposed he would be obliged, in mercy, to bring this game to a close, which would be a pity, since it was providing him with a great deal of entertainment. To have elevated an unknown provincial to the heights of society was an achievement which only one who had no illusions about the world he led could properly appreciate. He was deriving much enjoyment too from observing the efforts of his devoted copyists to win the provincial’s hand. As for Arabella herself, Mr. Beaumaris shrugged off a momentary compunction. She would no doubt retire in due course to her northern wilds, marry some red-faced squire, and talk for the rest of her life of her brilliant London season. He glanced down at her again, and thought that it would be a pity if she were to retire too soon. Probably, by the end of the London season he would be only too thankful to see her go, but for the present he was very well satisfied to gratify her by a little flirtation.

The music ceased, and he led her off the floor, to one of the adjoining rooms, where refreshments were served. These were of a very simple nature, the strongest drink offered being a mild claret-cup. Mr. Beaumaris procured a glass of lemonade for Arabella, and said: “You must let me thank you for a delightful few minutes, Miss Tallant: I have seldom enjoyed a dance more.” He received only a slight smile, and an inclination of the head in answer to this which were both so eloquent of incredulity that he was delighted. No fool, then, the little Tallant! He would have pursued this new form of sport, in the hope of teasing her into retort, but at that moment two purposeful gentlemen bore down upon them. Arabella yielded to the solicitations of Mr. Warkworth, and went off on his arm. Sir Geoffrey Morecambe sighed in a languishing way, but turned his rebuff to good account by seizing the opportunity to ask Mr. Beaumaris what he called the arrangement of his neck-cloth. He had to repeat the question, for Mr. Beaumaris, watching Arabella walk away with Mr. Warkworth, was not attending. He brought his gaze to bear on Sir Geoffrey’s face, however, at the second time of asking, and raised his brows enquiringly.