Danse de la Folie (37 page)

“That was very odd,” Amelia said. “I noticed it as well.”

“At least it is over,” Bess said with an air of casting off
a great burden. “Now we may be comfortable.”

As Kitty and Clarissa walked upstairs toward their
bedchambers, Kitty looked with worry at her friend, who had not spoken a single
word since their arrival home. She said tentatively, “I do so hope your
headache is gone by tomorrow.”

Clarissa looked up in an absent manner. “Tomorrow?”

Kitty stared. “We are to accompany your cousin to Hampstead.”

Clarissa’s indifference astounded Kitty when she said, “Is
that tomorrow, already? I had forgotten.”

Kitty wished her a good night and passed into her
bedchamber, not knowing what to think. She had fully intended, now that
Clarissa was free, to encourage Clarissa and her cousin. For days she had thought
out every aspect of this prospective outing, but always with the idea of
self-sacrifice so that the other two might be alone to speak.

She knew that Clarissa would be hurt if she suspected they
shared, besides friendship, a ... Kitty dared not call it love. Outside of the
impassioned words of romance, she was not quite certain what love truly
was
. Call it a shared
regard
for Mr. Devereaux.

I am going to enjoy this
outing
, she decided as she climbed into bed.
But I will not put on my new carriage dress, in preference to the old.
I do not want to be noticed.

The next morning, Clarissa appeared to have woken in a
better frame of mind. She had put on her new royal blue carriage dress, the one
Kitty had talked her into buying. It looked well with her pale complexion and
brought out the warm tones in her hair under the pretty ribboned hat. A pair of
tan gloves completed a modish toilette.

For Clarissa had remembered the idea that had once occurred
to her, to be forgotten in the wake of other events. A little guilt had
attended the realization that Kitty demonstrated more interest in a mere
carriage ride than one might warrant, but then Clarissa had never set herself
up for penetration into secrets and motives after the sometimes cruel, and
often vulgar, manner she often heard around her.

There had been no dramatic awakening here, no vows to perish
under violent passions, but Clarissa had learnt on her own part that love could
warm one’s life as gradually and as softly as the sun appearing over the
horizon. When she thought back, she suspected that Kitty’s interest in Cousin
Philip had kindled into a genuine regard, and what’s more, Clarissa suspected
that it was in some wise returned. Why else would he break his invariable rule,
and attend so many events where he was sure to meet them?

She sent a covert glance at Kitty as she helped herself to
eggs. Kitty wore her favorite green carriage dress, instead of the new one that
Amelia and Clarissa had insisted she could carry off. However, the green
brought out the shade of her eyes, and contrasted with her dark curls. Though
it was not the dashing dress of blue and white stripes with the caped lapel a
la Menèrve, the green one was if anything more flattering to Kitty’s charming
figure.

The younger girls were chattering away. Eliza said
presently, “Lady Kitty. You have got on your carriage dress. Are we going out
for an airing?”

Clarissa watched Kitty blush as she said, “We were invited
on an expedition to Hampstead.”

“Dull!” Eliza stated.

Any more conversation was forestalled when the knocker resounded,
and Mr. Devereaux was announced,

“Oh,
Philip
,” Bess
Devereaux exclaimed in accents of disapprobation the moment the gentleman
appeared. “What are
you
doing here?
Why are you come? Is all well with Mama?”

“She was when last I heard. I am not here to see you at all,
but to give your cousin and her guest a respite from a household that must by
now resemble Bedlam.”

Bess bridled. “Wretch! And I have been so
very
good, have I not, Cousin Clarissa?
Lady Kitty?” She gave the latter a look of patent admiration, and said, “For you
must know that Lady Kitty has played Charades with us, and asked her own maid
to put up my hair when we attended Lucasta’s soiree, but do not think I have
pestered her, for she said she enjoyed it, and I have not got myself into any
scrapes, either, for I have been
much
too busy.”

“Permit me to depart, then, and you may return to your
dissipations,” Mr. Devereaux said to his sister. “Are you ready, ladies? Or
shall I have the horses walked?”

“Our hats are by the door,” Clarissa said, as Kitty’s cheeks
bloomed yet again.

Clarissa was thinking, as Pobrick’s nephew Kelson handed her
up into the curricle, that life had become interesting again.

Kitty found herself on one side of the gentleman, Clarissa
on the far side. She was so surprised at the new sensations caused by such
proximity to a gentleman that at first she was scarcely aware of the city
streets they drove through.

But gradually her awareness extended outward. James’s style
was the heedless speed called neck-or-nothing, putting pedestrians, carts, and
animals at risk if they did not get out of the way. Ned probably would have
driven much the same, if their older brother had not trained it out of him.

Kitty would have disliked it very much if Mr. Devereaux had endangered
the population of London in order to show off the speed of his matched pair of bays.
But he did not. If anything, he demonstrated greater skill by the way he
managed to conduct the curricle smoothly through all the hazards of traffic,
endangering no one.

Mr. Devereaux could not see Kitty’s face, only the edge of
her bonnet as she gazed straight forward. But he found himself distracted by
the entrancing curve of shoulder to waist, the line of her neck above the
lace-edged collar, and he noted the subtle tightening and twitches of her gloved
hands, which suggested unconscious responses to handling reins.

There was little conversation until they reached the
outskirts of the city, and a gradual cessation of traffic. Once he had a clear
view of the road, Mr. Devereaux dropped his hands, and permitted the horses to
spring.

A chuckle of enjoyment from under the bonnet at his right
inspired him to give the animals a good gallop, pulling them up to keep them
from becoming overheated in the warm day. They preceded sedately up the
pleasant valley between Clerkenwell and Holborn, slowing when the Fleet River,
so unpleasant in its proximity to the city, ran clear in pretty streams.

As always, Clarissa’s spirits rose when they reached the
countryside. Problems seemed to fall behind with the noise of the city.

Kitty diligently tried to pay attention to the wildflowers
and bubbling brooks, but she was distracted by Mr. Devereaux’s strong hands on
the reins and the outline of a fine legs in their buckskins—all that was
visible at the edge of her bonnet. She dared not lift her head.

The horses slowed to a walk to cool down, then Mr. Devereaux
guided them to a stream whence they could drink safely. After that, he pulled
up under an oak, saying, “We might give the animals some time in the shade
before returning. If anyone wishes to walk down this path to inspect the
river—for this is the origin of the Fleet—I can tend to the horses.”

“There is no need,” Clarissa said. “I would prefer to sit
right here in the shade. I even came equipped.” She pulled from her reticule
the slim volume of Wordsworth’s poetry. “If you will entrust me with the reins,
I would consider myself well occupied, sitting here reading, and watching the
butterflies, so you two may refresh yourselves by walking about.”

Kitty gazed at her helplessly. This was not what she had
planned!

Clarissa turned her way. “I have been here before. It would
be a great pity not to see the stream, which is exceptionally pretty, while you
have the chance.”

Mr. Devereaux turned a smile up at Kitty, and held out a hand.
She placed her hand on his to be helped from the curricle, her heart beating
unaccountably fast.

One last glance toward Clarissa, but she was already reading
her book.

That was
not
the
countenance of a woman in love.

Mr. Devereaux led the way down the path, Kitty nearly giddy
as she tried to properly admire the delicate white flowering cherry, bell-shaped
lavender foxglove, and sun-yellow celandine, but mostly aware of the crunch of
footsteps at her side.

Mr. Devereaux said, “I was in the habit of driving two of my
cousins up here frequently, when I was still a schoolboy: Clarissa and a mutual
cousin who now lives in Surrey. Both came from noisy households, and craved
verdure. I, being an arrogant schoolboy, favored any excuse to be showing off
my horses and driving.”

He went on in this manner, in an ordinary voice, about
ordinary matters, gradually winning from Kitty more responses, until it
occurred to her that she must be a trying companion. How could Lucretia accuse
her of throwing herself at someone who had to do all the work to make polite
conversation?

She responded more naturally, and the conversation flowed
along. The countryside—wildflowers—”Are you fond of gardening, Lady Catherine?”

“Well, no,” she said a little guiltily. “That is, I like to
pick fresh flowers for the table when they are in bloom, but I do not much care
for tending shrubs.”

“What do you do to fill the time, then?”

Her tried to see her face, but only caught the edge of a
blushing cheek. “There are myriad chores that must be done in aid to my
brother, who acts as his own steward. That fills the day.”

“Do you find it tedious, then?”

“Oh, not at all. But it can be time-consuming. It is not
only the household. In truth, Mrs. Finn is a most admirable housekeeper,
leaving me little to do in that regard. I spend more time visiting the tenants
on our land, when my brother is otherwise occupied. One cannot just stop, but
must go in, and drink some cowslip wine, and listen to tidings of the parish as
if it were all new, but I rather like it more than not. Each person sees things
differently, and it’s rather like living in a story, which is good for writing—”

“Writing?”

“Letters—and things,” she said hastily.

“May I inquire how you get about on these parish visits? Do
you drive?”

“I do. My brother taught me to handle our gig when I turned
twelve. Later, he entrusted me with his team when I had to go farther than was
comfortable for our old pony. But of course a female can drive about along in
the countryside,” she added hastily, “in one’s own land.”

“Should you like to take the reins, then, for a time on our
return?”

Extremely gratified, Kitty closed at once with his offer,
and that thawed the remainder of her shyness. Once again they talked as they
had at Almack’s that first night, cementing his conviction that her constraint
was not natural to her.

When they wandered back up the path toward the spreading
oak, he made a reference to Clarissa’s favorite, Wordsworth, and ventured a
question on the topic of reading. He had already suspected that Lady Kitty was
at least as well-read as Cousin Clarissa.

“My brothers and I often read plays together at home, during
the winter. When we can agree on one,” she said.

“You all have different tastes?”

“Vastly. My younger brother has two tastes, either horrific
ones, with ghosts, and madmen, and duels, or comic plays. My elder brother
prefers the tragedies, the more high-flown the better, and I must confess a
preference for the more romantical comedies.”

“I have a fondness for Congreve myself,” he said. “Though I
am assured by many that his plays are thought outmoded.”

“My favorite of his is
Love
for Love
.”

“Mine is
The Way of
the World
.”

“That was Papa’s favorite. I quite like the valet Jeremy, in
particular the way my brother Edward reads him. He, Ned, that is, makes the
most famous Jeremy, and his Sir Sampson is as pompous and as nasty as you can
stare.”

“It sounds a pleasant pastime, reading plays aloud,” he
said. “I have not participated in such an activity since I was a schoolboy, and
then of course one holds the wisdom and vision of the poets cheaply.”

“It is entertaining only if everyone in company is a good
reader,” she said. “It can be otherwise if someone is slow, or reads in a dead
tone.”

Though the conversation was quite ordinary—nothing the poets
would acclaim—they found one another’s utterances bewitching, perhaps the more
because they were true. Neither made extravagant claims, nor changed their
opinion to flatter the other; they even argued in a friendly manner, Kitty
insisting that Mrs. Haywood’s works were superior to those by either Fielding
or Richardson, and he holding his opinion in favor of Richardson.

They quite agreed that nothing was to be made of Sterne’s
Sir Tristram Shandy
, Kitty offering her
brother’s theory that the printers had dropped the pages upon the floor and
picked them up anyhow. When Devereaux suggested that the author had made up a
novel from one of his dreams, mixed up with a lot of Burton, Bacon, and
Rabelais, Kitty admitted that she had read nothing by any of these three gentlemen.

They had to turn back, and here too soon was the carriage
once again. But it was time to return.

He kept his promise, handing her the reins for the first
stretch of road. Kitty proved to be an excellent driver, with a care to the
horses as well as to the comfort of her fellow passengers. Mr. Devereaux was
almost sorry when they began to see other people on the road, and they must
trade places, Kitty feeling as if she moved in a dream.

Mr. Devereaux acknowledged that he must abandon his pretence
of indifference. It was done by the time they reached Camden.