Byron's Child (20 page)

Too late, Jodie thought of a thousand words of comfort and advice. Perhaps it was just as well she had no chance to utter them. Confused herself she was in no position to advise Emily. After all, Jodie had sat in the privacy of that same dark conservatory with Giles, and he had not kissed her.

How easy it would be to tell Emily to communicate her feelings to Charles Thorncrest. Yet Jodie had no intention of telling Giles she loved him, not until she had some inkling whether he returned her feelings.

Chapter Seventeen

The men in Jodie’s and Emily’s lives were notable by their absence the next morning. Giles had received a note informing him of Harry Font’s arrival in town late last night and he had gone off early to Dover Street, bearing a dinner invitation from Charlotte. Lord Thorncrest, who might have been expected to call the morning after requesting a formal betrothal, did not turn up.

Chaperoned by Charlotte, Jodie and Emily listlessly entertained those gentlemen who did have the manners to pay a courtesy call after dancing with them at the ball. While these included the Duke of Devonshire, to Jodie’s relief Lord Alfred Barnes was not among them.

Lady Bestor’s footman brought a dinner party acceptance from Cassandra and Harry.

“For tonight,” Charlotte exclaimed, hurriedly folding her needlework. “I left the choice of day to them, and it seems Lord Font is taking Mrs. Brown and Lady Bestor down to Font Hall tomorrow. Oh dear, we are uneven numbers. I shall invite Lord Thorncrest.”

“Pray do not,” Emily begged. “If he does not choose to visit, I would not have him imagine I care.”

“Nonsense, he is your betrothed, not a suitor. He is the only person who knows the whole, and as he is soon to be one of the family he will not be offended by the short notice. I hope,” she added optimistically.

“Shall I write the invitation for you?” Jodie offered. “Then he will just regard the lack of proper notice as one of my peculiarities.”

“Yes, please do. I must speak to Cook at once. Poor Mrs. Brown is such a very long way from home, I want everything to be just right for her.”

Charlotte went off happily about her domestic duties. Jodie wrote a note to Lord Thorncrest and sent Frederick out with it. The footman returned an hour later to report that the earl was not at home and not at his club, and his people did not know where else he might be found.

“So I left the message at his lordship’s house, miss,” he concluded.

That meant that Thorncrest still might accept the invitation, so Charlotte could not ask anyone else to balance her table. She began to look flustered.

“I promise Cassandra will think nothing of it,” Jodie soothed her. “It is not important in our time. Besides, it will be much more comfortable tonight if there are only people who know about us.”

“Roland does not,” Charlotte pointed out. “Heavens, are Mrs. Brown and Lord Font aware of that?”

“I am not sure. You are right, that could be awkward,” Jodie agreed. “I had best send Frederick to Dover Street with a note to Giles.”

Not until after five did Lord Thorncrest’s footman appear with an acceptance. The earl himself arrived at a quarter past seven, when everyone was dressing for dinner. Frederick ran upstairs and passed on to Dinah a request that Miss Emily would grant his lordship a few minutes of private conversation before the arrival of the other guests.

Emily rushed to Jodie’s chamber. “He wants to cry off!” she wailed.

“Fustian. He wants to apologize for not calling this morning.”

“I am not dressed yet.”

“Then you will just have to keep him waiting until you are.”

“I cannot see him alone. Pray go with me.”

“I shall bring Charlotte to rescue you precisely five minutes after you go down. Off you go now and dress.”

With Dinah and Matty scurrying backwards and forwards from bedchamber to dressing room and back, the three ladies were all ready in short order. They met at the head of the stairs. Emily was pale, but otherwise pretty as ever in her favourite cowslip-yellow with a gold locket about her neck.

“Five minutes,” promised Charlotte.

“Honestly, you would think she was going to the guillotine,” Jodie said as they watched her descend to the hall.

“I put his lordship in the book room,” they heard Potter say in a fatherly tone, “being as he wanted a private word with you, Miss Emily.”

With one nervous backward glance, Emily disappeared from sight.

“I suppose we cannot go and listen at the door,” Jodie sighed.

“Gracious no,” said Charlotte, shocked, then she giggled. “At least, not with Potter waiting in the hall.”

Precisely five minutes later the rescuers marched down the stairs and into the book room. Emily and Thorncrest, standing by the fireplace, turned towards them. Jodie was relieved to see that Emily’s face was alight with pleasure.

“Look!” she cried, putting one hand to her throat. “Look what Charles has given me.”

Her locket had been replaced with a double strand of pearls alternating with tiny gold beads, from which depended a gold filigree flower with pearl petals and a cabochon-cut yellow stone twinkling in the center.

“I had the very deuce of a time finding a yellow star sapphire,” the earl explained his absence as Charlotte and Jodie exclaimed over the necklace. “Diamonds are too hard and glittering for Emily, and topaz too common. And when I found it I did not care for the setting.” He put his hand in his pocket and drew forth two small, velvet-covered boxes. “Lady Faringdale, Miss Judith, I hope you will accept these small tokens as a remembrance of our betrothal.”

While they were trying on the identical rings, set with seed pearls, Roland and Giles came in.

Roland voiced his approbation. “I call that very handsome of you, Thorncrest. There’s nothing like a little jewellery to please the ladies.”

Jodie caught a fleeting look of guilt crossing the earl’s face and she recalled that, according to Lord Alfred, he had paid off his inamorata with a diamond bracelet. Still, he had undoubtedly gone to much more trouble over Emily’s gift. She had no intention of giving him away.

Cassandra and Harry arrived a few minutes later. Over dinner, the talk was mostly of their plans for experimental market-gardening. Unexpectedly, Lord Thorncrest was enthusiastic.

“Three of my tenants grow soft fruit and vegetables for the London market,” he said.

Jodie was surprised that he even knew what his tenants grew, let alone took an interest in it. She was beginning to like the man, and to think him almost worthy of Emily.

As the ladies were withdrawing at the end of the meal, Roland said jovially to Harry, “If you don’t mind talking business over your port, I should like to discuss the possibility of investing in your scheme.”

Cassandra at once returned to the table. “I’ll stay then,” she said, resuming her seat.

Jodie turned back to watch the drama.

Roland was thoroughly disconcerted. “Business, ma’am,” he spluttered.

“Mrs. Brown is my partner as well as my future wife,” said Harry, looking harassed.

“In that case,” Lord Thorncrest put in smoothly, “we shall certainly want to hear her views. I too am interested in investing.”

“Hear her…but…. Ah, I had forgot, Mrs. Brown is an American lady.” Roland managed to back down gracefully. He was to be further tried.

Emily stepped forward and said in a small but determined voice, “I should like to stay also.”

Lord Thorncrest pulled out the chair beside him. “Of course, my dear. After all,” he said to Roland, a hint of malice in his tone, “Emily is my future wife and I value her opinion.”

Roland’s mouth opened and closed twice without a sound emerging. Charlotte seized Jodie’s hand and fled.

“I could not let him think I too wanted to join in,” she was explaining to Jodie when Giles followed them into the drawing room.

“Very wise,” he said, looking gloomy.

“What is wrong?” Jodie asked.

“Wrong? Nothing. I just find it depressing that a first-rate physicist is in there discussing the cultivation of asparagus and cucumbers.” He slouched over to the piano and began to play moodily.

Jodie agreed. It was almost as depressing as that a talented mathematician, Ada Lovelace, should waste her abilities on an unappreciative nineteenth century and die young of a preventable disease.

She knew that Giles was also worrying that he might yet find himself abandoning physics for farming. He had told her when he came home to change for dinner that the outcome of their calculations was not yet certain. A few hours more would give them the answer. In fact, they could have reached it tonight had they not decided that Charlotte’s invitation must take precedence. Jodie was glad Roland intended to invest in Harry’s enterprise. Nonetheless, she could not help wishing the three scientists had stayed with their equations until they could tell her whether she would ever see her home again.

She forced herself to listen with sympathy to Charlotte’s delight at having done Mrs. Brown and Lord Font a good turn.

~ ~ ~

Giles went early to Dover Street the next day. Jodie was restless with anticipation. She did not want to leave the house in case she was out when he came back, but she could settle to no occupation. When Charlotte and Emily went out to pay some morning calls, she decided to keep her fingers busy by tidying Charlotte’s work-basket, no easy task as it was already in apple-pie order.

Fortunately Giles returned before she had reorganized it in such a logical arrangement that Charlotte would never be able to find her favourite needle.

“We’ve done it,” he said nonchalantly, entering the parlour with a jaunty stride.

“Done it? We can go home?” Jodie squealed, and flung herself into his arms. “When?” she demanded as they danced a sort of jig around the furniture.

He deposited her in a chair and dropped into the one opposite. “I’m not absolutely sure yet. The final calculations won’t take long but we have to build a battery with the right voltage, collect all the equipment, and get it all to Waterstock. I’ll have to go down to Font Hall with Harry and Cassandra and Aunt Tavie.”

“They’re going today, aren’t they?”

“This afternoon. They’re going to be married on Easter Monday. I’m hoping we’ll be gone by then.”

“Yes, we don’t want to intrude on newly-weds. Today’s Saturday. That gives us nine days?”

“At most. I’ll write from Font as soon as I know what’s what. I must go and pack now.”

Taking Dinah, Jodie went with him to Dover Street to say goodbye to Cassandra, in case she did not see her again. Despite her obvious joy at her coming wedding, the physicist’s reserve almost broke down on taking leave of the only woman who truly understood what she was giving up. Once again Jodie was sorry she had not made more effort to befriend Cassandra.

They stood on the pavement, watching Harry help Aunt Tavie into her huge, resplendent travelling carriage. Painted blue with red and gold trim, it was emblazoned with a coat of arms and pulled by six horses.

“I know you have no family at home,” Jodie said. “If you ever come back, for any reason, you must call me. Here, I wrote down my parents’ phone number and I’ll tell them about you. They’ll always know how to get in touch with me and if there is anything I can do to help, you have only to ask. We’d have been stuck without you.”

“I don’t have a quarter for a phone call.” Cassandra smiled though her eyes were bright with unshed tears.

“Ten p in this country, but call collect. Reverse charges, rather. I’ll tell Mom and Dad to accept the call.”

“Bless you.”

They hugged each other as Harry turned to collect his bride. Jodie saw the tenderness in his eyes.

“He loves you,” she whispered.

Would Charles Thorncrest ever look that way at Emily? Would she ever see that expression in Giles’s eyes, meant for her alone?

“You should hear from me by Tuesday, Jodie,” he said, following Harry into the carriage. “Don’t get into too much trouble while I’m gone. Cassandra, just how much difference do you think the precise latitude and longitude will make?”

Reminded of the career Cassandra was abandoning, Jodie stuck her head in at the window. “Giles, I want to take Ada Byron with us.”

“Impossible. Harry, we mustn’t forget to take your sextant and chronometer.”

As the heavy coach rumbled away, Jodie was very much tempted to thumb her nose at it in the contemporary gesture of scorn.

When she and Dinah reached Grosvenor Street, Charlotte and Emily had just returned. They were pleased that she was going to be able to go home, sad at the prospect of losing her. A few tears were shed, interrupted by the footman bringing in an invitation.

“At least you will have one more party before you go,” Charlotte said, reading the engraved card. “Lady Jersey and Madame de Lieven are holding a private assembly at Almack’s on Monday.”

“Is that April 8
th
?” Jodie asked. “I would not miss it for the world. At last I shall see Lord Byron.”

“Oh no, I doubt he will go. They say he does not go out in public for fear of the hissing of the mob.”

“He will be there,” said Emily. “Jodie knows what will happen, do you not, Jodie?”

“Yes, but I shall not tell you. Nothing too shocking, I promise you.”

“Do not tell Roland that Lord Byron will be there,” Emily advised, “or he will probably decide we should not go.”

Jodie kept to herself the fact that the unhappy poet’s scandalous half-sister was also going to be present.

~ ~ ~

The assembly rooms in King Street were already crowded with chattering fashionables when the Faringdales and Lord Thorncrest arrived. By now Jodie could put names to many of them and she saw that most of the leaders of the Ton were there. It was kind of Lady Jersey to go to such an effort to rehabilitate Lord Byron.

Whatever the gentlemen and matrons were gossiping about, it was Princess Charlotte’s romantic betrothal to Prince Leopold that as usual occupied the tongues of the young ladies. Jodie could not join in, knowing that eighteen months hence the popular heir to the throne would die in childbed. She found herself constantly glancing worriedly at the princess’s namesake, wishing she had reminded Cassandra of her promise to keep an eye on Charlotte’s pregnancy.