Tall windows along one wall let in light from outside, and the other walls were covered with shelves bearing what looked like hundreds of volumes. The books began at ankle height and ascended far above the heads of the patrons, so that the tops of the highest books met the ceiling. Two crescent-moon counters commanded the center of the room, the clerks behind them busy with customers; above curved a glass dome, letting in still more light from the sky. There was a wide, intriguing staircase to one side, with what appeared to be still more books at the top.
“How does one even know where to begin?” I said.
Miss Amherst let out her delightful bellow of a laugh and clapped her hands. “I knew you would like it. How could you fail to?” She took my arm and tucked it through hers. “It is said to be the largest bookshop in the world,” she said, walking me toward the shelves. “And the cheapest.”
“So I saw,” I said faintly. I ran my fingers along the leather spines before me.
“Have you truly read nothing but sermons?” Miss Amherst said.
“I read The Seasons, once. Well, several times, really. But I had to return it to its owner.”
She made a face. “We can do better than that. Poetry then, do you think? Or a novel?” She studied me, as if the answer might be written on my countenance, then said, “Wait here,” and made her way to the enormous counter.
I watched her go. Her hair was so bright—not fashionable, perhaps, but it suited her well. Better than I thought, when we were first introduced. Her figure, too, was perhaps a touch stout for fashion, but there was an appealing energy in the way she moved, and her gowns were cut to flatter her fullness. I glanced down at myself and thought that my clothes did not flatter me nearly so well.
Turning back to the shelves, I collected courage enough to pluck a book from one of them at random. A history of some sort; I turned the pages carefully, scanning a few lines here and there. It should probably have interested me more than it did. I replaced it and took down another, for the pleasure of browsing with neither Mamma nor Mrs. Jenkinson—nor even Miss Hall—watching me.
A light touch on my elbow, and I looked up. Miss Amherst held a book out in front of her. Waverley, it read; or, ’Tis Sixty Years Since.
“It is a sensation,” she said. “There are so very many novels I could recommend, but I do not know your tastes yet so well as I hope to. Waverley is enjoyed by both the ladies and gentlemen of my acquaintance. The author is a fine poet as well—though he pretends to be anonymous, it is difficult to remain so when your work is already so well loved. I can lend you some of his poetry, too, if you like.”
“And you liked this novel as well?” I said.
“Of course!” She held it out, and then added two more volumes on top of it, the second and third parts of the story. I tucked them under one arm and opened Volume One, though I was too conscious of her regard to take in a single word. It was too warm in the shop; I wished I could take off my outer garments, which hung from me, heavy and smothering.
“Are you all invited to Lady Clive’s ball?” she said as I pretended to read. “Mamma managed to winkle an invitation, though heaven knows how.”
“I’ve no idea,” I said. “Mrs. Fitzwilliam knows all our engagements; she merely tells me where we are to go each day.” This outing, I realized, was in fact the first since I arrived in London that I had chosen entirely for myself.
“Ah.” Miss Amherst turned to the shelves, running one hand along them, her eyes roving over the titles. She wore white kid gloves embroidered with red flowers and improbable purple birds; they were as fine as everything else she wore, but their whimsy made me smile.
“Well, if you are going to be there,” she went on, “I would be glad of it. I shan’t know a soul other than Mamma and Julia—and I am sure no one will ask me to dance. Which is a pity; I am an excellent dancer.” She looked at me over her shoulder, her grin disarming.
I could not fathom why words I could easily imagine coming from my mother’s lips sounded so different from hers. “Mrs. Fitzwilliam has not mentioned it. I do not like to attend balls in any case; but if I ever change my mind, I shall keep you company as a wallflower. I never dance.”
“What—not at all?”
“I never learned,” I said, and now my face was so hot it must rival her hair for color. What must she think of me—I’d read nothing interesting, I could not dance. “I was . . . sickly. As a child. And . . . well, for most of my life, really. Dancing was considered too vigorous an activity, so I never had a dancing master.”
“And are you still too—unwell—for such vigorous activity?” she said, her voice rich with curiosity.
“No—I think not. If I were, I could never have walked half so much before as I have since coming to London.” I dropped my eyes to the novel I held. “I have always wanted to learn to dance.”
“Then I shall teach you,” she said, and my eyes leaped to her face. “Not everything,” she added. “But I could teach you one or two simple dances, at least. Perhaps not enough to ensure your full enjoyment of a ball, but it would be a start.”
I realized I was staring, and pulled my eyes away; they careened wildly from wall to ceiling, from ceiling higher still to the great cupola at the top, and down again. No one ever—save Mr. Watters, but his motives, I feared, were becoming clear enough—chose to spend so much time with me before, nor seemed to find so much genuine enjoyment in my company. Not even kind, dutiful John. I could not understand why Miss Amherst was being so generous with her time and attention.
“Well?” she said, after a moment. When I looked at her again, she was smiling, but uncertainly, as if the smile might slip from her lips at any moment.
“I would be—much obliged,” I said. I raised the book a little. “I will buy it. It looks—very interesting.”
“Oh, I’m so glad. As I said, if you like it, I have purchased some of his poetry, and I will happily share.” She linked our arms again and led me toward the counter. “Mamma quite despairs of me; my inclination to spend most of my pocket money on books cannot possibly make me more attractive to eligible men. Though if she and Papa were not generous in furnishing our wardrobes, I daresay I would be torn between books and bonnets, for I have a weakness for both.”
A sudden thought made me tug on Miss Amherst’s arm to halt our forward momentum. “So I . . . just ask to open an account?” And then, before she could answer, “I feel so stupid; I know this must be a simple matter. But I have never—”
“This is a great season for first experiences, Miss de Bourgh,” she said, quite gently. But she dropped my arm entirely a moment later, her hands covering her mouth. “Heavens,” she said, a little muffled. “I did not think—I would call myself stupid, if I ever let anyone speak of me so meanly.” The light reproach registered as she dropped her hands. “I am terribly sorry, but I should have taken you to another establishment. It is only—this shop is very impressive, is it not? I suppose I rather wanted to impress you.”
“It is impressive, yes—”
“But the writing outside, the proclamation about their prices. It is only possible because they never take credit—only coin. The thought simply went out of my head.”
“Oh.” I looked down at the volumes in my hands; moments ago I could not concentrate well enough to read a coherent line, but now I found my fingers did not want to let them go. How foolish; it was only a book. There were—demonstrably, even just within this shop—hundreds, thousands more in the world.
“I will buy them,” Miss Amherst said, and reached to take them from me. I shook my head, my fingers still gripping the bindings fiercely.
“I could never—”
“Please—this is my fault entirely. I told you, I always spend my pocket allowance on books.”
I’d no experience with gifts, except those Papa brought back to me from Town; but I did not think I should allow so costly a gift as a book from an acquaintance—friend?—of such short standing. Miss Amherst looked quite determined
, however, and I closed my mouth. Her fingers curled around Volume One at the opposite end to mine.
But before I relinquished it, I said, “You must let me buy you something in return, somewhere where I can open an account. A bonnet, perhaps? A weakness for a weakness?”
She was all surprise; we paused there, each grasping the book, looking into one another’s faces. Then—of course—she laughed.
“Very well,” she said, and took the book from me before I could think of further protests. Then she raised an eyebrow until I handed over the other two volumes, as well.
Chapter Twenty-One
The butler showed Miss Amherst into the drawing room, then bowed and left us. She was smiling when she greeted me, and wearing her new bonnet. It suited her very well, with a wide brim lined in embroidered net lace, which complemented the roundness of her face, and a spray of charming blue silk flowers. She looked like Rosings’s woods in bluebell season, the carpet of flowers rolling right out to the edges of the trees, where I could see it when I drove my ponies down the lane.
“I thought you might like to see how well it matches my blue dress, as I said it would,” Miss Amherst said; but there was a question in her voice, and her head tipped sideways. I folded my lips and curled my fingers into my palms, caught looking too long.
“Yes,” I said, my voice catching like a snagged skirt. She smiled a little hesitantly, taking the bonnet off and setting it on a little round table.
“I—told Mrs. Fitzwilliam I would join them at Lady Clive’s ball,” I said in a rush.
“Oh!” Miss Amherst smiled more fully. “How wonderful—and all the more reason for you to learn now.” She looked around the room, as if deciding how to make space for us, but then pressed her lips together and straightened her shoulders, as if preparing for some unpleasant thing.
“Miss de Bourgh,” she said slowly, turning back to me. “I . . . I am terribly afraid that I am going to offend you very badly, but I just—please, do not take my words amiss.”
I looked back at her, baffled.
“It is only—I find I like you very much, Miss de Bourgh; and I would like to offer you any help it is within my power to give. I fear you’ll find me very presumptuous but . . . may I take you shopping?”
My mouth opened and shut and opened again, without a single intelligible sound coming out of it.
Miss Amherst ducked her head. “I apologize. I don’t mean any offense—your gowns are . . . very beautifully tailored.” She stopped, biting the corner of her mouth.
I felt strangely calm, suddenly, in the face of her clear uncertainty. “But?” I said.
Her eyes darted over my form, and then to my face. She smiled, just a little. “But . . . this yellow—it simply . . . well, it does not flatter you as it ought. And the style—”
But here she stopped again.
Yellow was one of Mamma’s favorite colors; yellow and red. Many of my gowns were one color or the other. I turned, just a little, so I was facing the large, silver-framed looking glass on the wall behind the pianoforte.
All my clothes were fine—the finest that could be bought in Hunsford, certainly—and Mamma always had the seamstresses do everything they could to disguise my smallness. I was swathed in ruffles—buried in them. Instead of disguising the narrowness of my frame, they overwhelmed it. And now, suddenly, I could see what I never quite did before—they made me absurd.
“No!” Miss Amherst said when I said this; but yet again, she stopped herself. Standing behind me, she met my eyes in the glass and put her hands on my shoulders. Very slowly, as if I were a horse that might startle, she moved her hands down the length of my arms from shoulder to wrist, and I shivered; and then she took my wrists loosely in each of her hands, drawing my arms up and away from my body. In the glass, she looked over my form with a critical eye.
“You have such a neat figure,” she said at last. “It seems a shame to hide it with so many frills. Something simpler, I think, would suit you well.”
“Yes,” I said, a little strangled, my own eyes on her gown of blue sprigged cotton. “Please—I would like that very much. Your help, I mean.”
Her breath came out in a gust of relief. “Ah. Good.” She grinned at me once more, then, dropping my arms, said, “All right—if we go to the draper’s tomorrow, we should have time enough to choose fabric and have a gown made up for you before Lady Clive’s ball. But for now . . .” A tilt of her head; a raised brow. “Shall we begin?”
“One-two-three, very quickly—right foot to left to right,” Miss Amherst said, and then, laughing, “lightly, Miss de Bourgh! On the toes, like so.”
I could not achieve lightness, for all my smallness of figure. We had pushed the sofa and chairs away from the center of the room; they sat at tipsy angles, like watchful wallflowers. I stepped back to watch Miss Amherst demonstrate the step again. She was not a small woman, but her body was not the encumbrance to her that mine was to me. Her back was straight, head lifted, a graceful line from crown to heel. Her feet in their thin slippers arched just so as she hopped onto her right foot, shifted her weight onto her left, and then, so quickly it looked like one light, fluid movement, onto her right once more. She hopped to her left foot and then shifted to right, and back again. Like everything else she tried to teach me, the step looked very simple when she performed it, but when she gestured to me to try again, I felt like a grasshopper trying to hop to an unnatural rhythm, all awkward angles.
“Poise and ease, Miss de Bourgh, poise and ease,” Miss Amherst said in an affected, deep voice, then laughed explosively at her own words. “That is what our dancing master always shouted at us,” she said.
“I do not think I am capable of either one,” I said, and tried to smile away my disappointment. “I suppose I am too old to learn properly; it was a silly whim.”
“Nonsense! If nothing else, if you master a few simple steps and figures you will be able to dance at small parties, even if you do not feel equal to standing up at a public assembly. I think a small private dance among friends is more enjoyable anyway. All those prim rules at larger balls sometimes eliminate any sense of fun.”
My mouth twisted, and she reached over, taking my hands. Hers were very soft and warm.
“Here—sometimes it is better to try the steps in a proper figure. Let us try this one together.”
I mastered the promenade, at least, my hands clasped in Miss Amherst’s, our arms crossed before us like woven threads. I was aware of every part of us that touched: palms, forearms, fingertips. Our hips bumped occasionally together. With the movement of her body beside mine, the unaccustomed heat of her skin where it pressed against my own, it was somehow easier to find the rhythm of the steps, to achieve the lightness that was lacking before.
All the figures we tried together seemed simpler, in fact; the steps that felt so unnatural when I performed them alone in the center of the room coming with greater ease the more we practiced them together. Though I would not call myself proficient—not in the least—I could at least manage a passable chassé, and when Miss Amherst murmured each coming step in the figure, I was able to follow her instructions without getting too muddled.
We were hot and laughing when she said, “If only we had someone to play for us—you cannot truly get the feel for the steps without music.”
“Perhaps you could play, Miss Amherst,” came a voice at the doorway, “and I could lead Miss de Bourgh through the figures.”
I turned, dropping one of Miss Amherst’s hands in my haste, to find Mr. Watters standing there, smiling. He leaned against the doorframe, ankles crossed; I had a dreadful feeling that he had been there for some time, watching us.
Miss Amherst’s fingers tightened around mine, a little spasm. I glanced at her; her face was flushed from our exertions. Then she released my other hand and stepped back. “Of course, sir, if Miss de Bourgh does not object.”
But I was stepping back, too, taking space only for myself, though I nearly reached out to pull Mis
s Amherst back with me. My palms, empty now, prickled. “Perhaps another time,” I said. “I am not accustomed to so much exercise; I think I will . . . sit for a little.”
Mr. Watters bowed. “But of course. Perhaps this evening? We could make a merry little party of it with Harriet and Fitzwilliam. I think we have no engagements tonight, and you can hardly expect to fully understand the figures if there is only one couple dancing.”
“Yes,” I said, and wished he would go away. His eyes pressed like thumbs. “Of course.”
He smiled, bowed to Miss Amherst, and obliged my unspoken wish a moment later.
John and his wife were happy enough to indulge Mr. Watters when he suggested dancing after dinner, and to my consternation he was right, the figures made more sense with another couple to form a too-small set. The housekeeper, to my astonishment, played for us, and they were all very patient with my fumbling, for without Miss Amherst murmuring the steps to me I had trouble remembering them. I was stiffer, too, with Mr. Watters as my partner, my feet inflexible as stone. When our hands clasped, my fingers were quite limp.
He seemed not to mind; he said what a treat it is to see a woman like me at last able to take part in something so essential, so enjoyable as dancing. “For you were ill a long time, I understand,” he said, holding one hand out to me, another to his sister. John took my other hand, and we circled in time to the song. “There is nothing better than dancing for invigoration, or to smooth the way to better acquaintance.”
I caught John’s eye; he looked between Mr. Watters and myself with something like amusement. Then I stumbled, having missed a cue in the music, and tucked my lips together, flushed not with pleasure and exercise, as I had been this afternoon, but with embarrassment.
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