Friday's Child (29 page)

So the Viscount gratified his wife and all his well-wishers by appearing with staggering regularity at the Assemblies, causing even leading optimists, like Lady Sefton, to prophesy that his marriage would be the making of him.

Another gentleman who had taken to patronizing Almack’s more than was usual was that ladies’ favourite, Sir Montagu Revesby. Blackballed he might have been by his fellow-men at Watier’s, but for all their exclusiveness the patronesses of Almack’s were not proof against air, manner, and the easy address which characterized Sir Montagu. Had he been of plebeian birth, of course, no amount of air or manner would have availed him in those august eyes, but happily for himself his lineage was irreproachable. Such censorious remarks as were made by Mr Fakenham, and others of his kidney, were generally ascribed to jealousy, and not much heeded; and it was only the older and soberer members amongst the ladies who viewed with disapproval Sir Montagu’s increasing attentions towards Miss Milborne.

For there could be no doubt that Sir Montagu’s sudden predeliction for dancing had its root in his admiration of the Incomparable. Until his entry into the lists, the knowledgeable had considered Lord Wrotham to be his Grace of Severn’s most serious rival. But Wrotham had never succeeded in walking away with Miss Milborne from under his grace’s nose, and this was what Sir Montagu in the easiest manner possible contrived to do. It may have been that the Beauty did not altogether relish the certainty with which Severn claimed her hand for the German waltz; it may have been that she found Sir Montagu’s light touch a relief after the passionate earnestness of her young admirers; certain it was that she bestowed her hand on him for the waltz, and left his grace discomfited. His self-consequence was too great to allow of his following George’s example of folding his arms and gloweringly watching Miss Milborne’s progress round the room. He led another lady out to dance, but his manoeuvres on the floor to keep Miss Milborne under observation were extremely diverting to several persons who had been watching the little comedy, notably my Lord Sheringham, who gave a spurt of laughter and bade his wife, with whom he was dancing, watch Monty cutting Severn out with the Incomparable! His grace was too pompous to be popular with the greater number of his contemporaries, and the notion of cutting him out himself occurred to Sherry. He entered into a wager with his cousin Ferdy that he would do it, backing himself for a handsome sum, and engaging not to make the attempt until the Duke was again soliciting Miss Milborne’s hand. He surrendered Hero to Mr Ringwood, who had come with them to the Assembly Room, and bore down upon Miss Milborne just as the Duke made her a formal bow, and began to say: “May I hope, ma’am—?”

" 'Evening, Severn!” interrupted his lordship cheerfully. “My dance, Bella, I think!”

The Duke eyed him frostily. “I was about to beg Miss Milborne to do me the honour of bestowing her hand upon me,” he said. “Ma’am—”

His most mischievous smile danced in Sherry’s eyes, drawing an answering gleam from Miss Milborne. “Oh, I was before you in the lists!” he said outrageously. “For old times’ sake, Bella, my sweet life!”

“Sherry, how can you?” she said, a tremor of laughter in her voice. But she gave him her hand and let him lead her on to the floor. “You are quite shameless!” she told him, as they began to circle round the room. “I had not thought what a long time it is since I danced the waltz with you!”

“Too long, by Jove!” responded his lordship promptly. “Ah, Bella, you should never have refused me! What a couple we must have made!”

She laughed up at him. “I never liked you as well until you gave up wanting me to marry you, Sherry!”

“I? Good God, don’t I carry a broken heart in my breast?”

“You hide it admirably! Wretch! You did not wear the willow for my sake for as much as one day!”

His arm tightened round her waist; he smiled down into her eyes. “If there weren’t so many people watching, do you know what I would do, Bella? I’d kiss you! Dashed if I ever saw you look more beautiful!”

“For shame, Sherry! Remember, you are a sober married man now!”

“Lord, yes, so I am!” He glanced round the room. “What has become of Kitten? I left her with Gil, and I’d give a pony to see the old fellow waltzing! No, by Jupiter, he’s ratted! She’s dancing with George.”

“Yes,” said Miss Milborne, losing her sparkle. “How well they suit, to be sure! I am happy to see George in better spirits.”

“Kitten always can contrive to cheer the poor fellow up,” said his lordship unconcernedly.

The poor fellow was saying at that moment: “I should like to know what the deuce Sherry means by making Isabella laugh like that! Yes, and he made her blush a moment ago! I saw her!”

“Do not look at them!” said Hero. “If I were you, I would not let Isabella see that I cared whom she danced with, George!”

“Well, I do care,” he replied unnecessarily. “Besides, I don’t see what should get into Sherry to make him flirt with her when he is married to you! For that is what he is doing, Kitten! There’s no getting away from it!”

“Well, if I do not mind it I am sure you need not.”

His brilliant, dark eyes glanced down into hers. “Do you not mind it?” he asked forthrightly.

She sighed faintly. “Only a very little, George. If we went into the other room we need not see them, and you could bring me a glass of orgeat, and we should be comfortable, don’t you think?”

He led her off the floor. “No. There is no comfort for either of us!” he said, with suppressed passion.

However, a certain measure of comfort was found in the refreshment saloon, for they discovered Mr Ringwood and Ferdy there, and Ferdy at once disclosed the nature of the wager which he had lost. Hero was a good deal amused, and George’s brow lightened for a moment. But it soon clouded again when he recalled that when he had made just such an attempt as Sherry’s earlier in the evening, it had not met with a like degree of success. When Sherry presently brought Miss Milborne in the saloon in search of iced lemonade, he bore down upon them instantly, and, ignoring Sherry, earnestly besought the Beauty to dance the next waltz with him. She excused herself, and would have joined the group round Hero had he not barred the way.

“You shall not fob me off so!” he said in a vibrant voice. “Why will you not so much as dance one waltz with me? What have I done to offend you? Answer me, Isabella!”

“Good gracious, nothing in the world!” she replied. “It is merely that I am engaged to dance—”

“With Severn! It will not do! You will scarcely dance every waltz with him! You use me as though—”

“For God’s sake, do not make a scene, my lord! Remember where you are, I beg of you! We are attracting attention!”

“I care nothing for that! Will you dance with me?”

“The next country dance, then, if you will but conduct yourself towards me with more propriety!”

He was obliged to be satisfied, but nothing could have been more disastrous than the dance so grudgingly granted to him. He attempted every time the movement of the dance brought them together to continue a conversation which soon developed into a lively quarrel; and as Miss Milborne disliked being made to look ridiculous, and was well aware of the amused eyes upon them, she came near to losing her temper, and said some cutting things, which she did not mean, but which George took in very bad part.

“Dashed if I ever thought I should be so diverted at one of Almack’s Assemblies!” said Sherry frankly. “All the same, Kitten, I think we’ll be off before George comes off the floor, or I shall have you kissing him again as like as not, for he’ll certainly need comfort from the looks of it. Are you coming, Gil?”

Mr Ringwood expressed his readiness to leave the rooms, and as Ferdy wandered up at that moment, the Viscount invited them both to return with him to Half Moon Street for some more invigorating refreshment than was to be found at Almack’s. The Sheringhams’ carriage was called for, and the entire party withdrew, falling in with Sir Montagu Revesby in the vestibule downstairs, and leaving the building in his company. Sherry naturally begged him also to repair to Half Moon Street, but before Sir Montagu had time to reply to this invitation an interruption of an entirely unexpected nature occurred. A figure which had been standing motionless alongside the house started forward, and was seen in the light of a street lantern to be a young woman, clasping in her arms a bundle wrapped in a shawl. If she had not been so haggard, she would have been remarkably pretty, but her face was deathly pale, and there was such a distraught look in her eyes that they seemed scarcely sane. She paid no heed to Hero, descending the steps of the house on Sherry’s arm, but put herself in Sir Montagu’s way, and said in a low, imploring voice: “They told me at your lodging that you would not see me, that you was come here, but I must, I must speak with you! For God’s sake, do not cast me off! Again and again I have been to your lodging, but it is always the same answer which I get! I am desperate, Montagu, desperate!”

There was a moment’s appalled silence. Everyone stood still, Ferdy goggling at the stranger, and Revesby holding himself tense, his hand clenched on his walking-cane. He looked suddenly pale, but it might have been the uncertain lamplight which made him appear so. His voice broke the silence. “My good young woman, you are making a mistake,” he said languidly. “I fancy I have not the pleasure of your acquaintance.”

A moan burst from the girl. “Cruel! Cruel!” she uttered. “Acquaintance! Oh, my God! You shall not cast me off so, you dare not! I will follow you wherever you go! Have you no pity, no compassion? Will you disown your own child? Look! Can you see this innocent, and be unmoved by the ruin you have brought on me?” She opened the shawl as she spoke and disclosed a sleeping infant.

“Good God!” said Mr Ringwood.

“I never saw you before in my life,” said Revesby, still smiling, “You are certainly mad, and I must suppose you to have escaped from Bedlam.”

“Mad! No! Yet if I am not it is small thanks to you!” she cried wildly. “You said it should be well with me, you promised me—you swore to me—”

“For the lord’s sake, Sherry, get your wife out of this!” said Mr Ringwood, in an urgent under-voice. “We shall have a crowd about us in a trice!”

Sherry, who had been standing transfixed by amazement, pulled himself together. “Yes, by God!” he said. “Here, Kitten, into the carriage! Can’t be dawdling here all night!”

But Hero had withdrawn her hand from his arm. “Oh, the poor creature!” she exclaimed pitifully, and ran down the remainder of the steps to the distracted girl.

"Now we are in the basket!” muttered Sherry. “Good God, Gil, what’s to be done? What a damned thing!”

“Think I’ll be going home, Sherry, dear old boy,” said Ferdy in a very cowardly manner. “Won’t be needing me!”

“No, Ferdy!” said Mr Ringwood firmly. “Can’t rat on Sherry. Devilish awkward situation!”

“You know what, Gil?” Ferdy confided in his ear. “Always said the fellow was a commoner! Proves it!”

“Well, I don’t like him: never did: but dash it, I’m deuced sorry for any fellow in a fix like this!” responded Mr Ringwood frankly.

“Yes, by God!” agreed Ferdy, struck most forcibly by this point of view.

Hero, meanwhile, had put her arm round the stranger. “Oh, pray do not—! There, let me cover up the dear little baby! Don’t cry! Only tell me what it is, and indeed I will help you!”

“Kitten! No, really, Kitten! Dash it, you can’t—Not our affair!” expostulated Sherry.

For once she paid no heed to him; the girl was speaking in a panting voice. “Ask him if he dare deny his own child! Ask him if he did not promise me marriage! Ask him if I was not an honest maid when he saw me first? O God, what is to become of me?”

“No, Kitten, for heaven’s sake—!” said Sherry quickly, as Hero turned towards Revesby. “You can’t ask Monty—Why the devil don’t you do something, Monty, instead of standing there?”

“I beg Lady Sheringham will not allow herself to be imposed upon,” Revesby said, his voice a little strained. “The unfortunate female appears to be out of her senses. I recommend she should be escorted to the nearest Roundhouse.”

A moan from the girl made Hero clasp her more securely in her arms, and say indignantly: “How dare you? Have you no compassion for the poor soul? Is this dear little baby indeed yours?”

“His! his!” cried the girl. “Look, is she not like him?”

Ferdy, peering at the unconscious infant, said dubiously: “Queer thing, the way females can see a likeness in a baby. Well, what I mean is they don’t look like anything much. Remember thinking so when my sister Fairford’s eldest was born. She and my mother would have it it was the image of poor Fairford. Mind you, I’m not saying he isn’t a plain-looking fellow, Fairford, but—”

“Oh, be quiet, Ferdy!” interrupted Sherry, quite exasperated. “Yes, I thought as much! Now we are beginning to attract a crowd! Ten to one, someone will be leaving Almack’s at any moment, too, and a pretty set of gudgeons we must look—For God’s sake, Monty, take the girl away!”

“My dear Sherry, I have already stated that I never set eyes on her before in my life. I must decline any responsibility in this affair. If you are wise, you will summon the Watch and have the wench removed.”

All this time the Sheringhams’ footman had been standing holding open the door of the barouche, apparently deaf and blind to what was going on. A couple of sedan chair bearers, who had lounged over from the opposite side of the street, now showed an inclination to take up the cudgels in defence of the deserted girl; the door of the Assembly Rooms opened and voices sounded. Revesby turned abruptly on his heel and strode off down the street. A despairing cry from the girl made Mr Ringwood shudder, and goaded Sherry into desperate action.

“Here, for the lord’s sake get into the carriage!” he said, pushing both women towards it.

“Yes, do pray come with me!” Hero said to her protégée. “The baby will take cold in this horrid, draughty street, and I promise we will look after you, won’t we, Sherry?”

“Yes. I mean—well, never mind that now!” replied her harassed husband. “Drive home, John!”