Sylvia Or The Moral High Ground

by Catherine Bowness

  “Oh, dear,” Sylvia murmured. “In that case I do not suppose that your feelings towards me can be precisely warm.”

  “No, they were not,” Lady Wey admitted, “at least not after you called off the engagement and broken my brother’s heart. But I cannot deny that I felt a deal of curiosity. You were – are – something quite out of the ordinary, Miss Holmdale: a chit of a girl, daughter of an obscure parson, who dared to reject the heir to a dukedom out of principle.”

  “I was a sanctimonious little prig,” Sylvia confessed.

  “Yes, you were,” Lady Wey agreed. “But I cannot say that I am surprised. You were brought up in a God-fearing household with no pretensions, so far as I know, to belonging to the Upper Ten Thousand. I daresay you were shocked to the core by the idea of a young man keeping a mistress in full view of Society. I assume that’s why you broke off the engagement – out of moral outrage. Or was it for less principled but more understandable reasons: that you were jealous of the woman you assumed to be your rival? She never was, you know. She is a good deal older than Robert and seduced him when he was a schoolboy – quite shocking, really. He was an idiot!” she added coolly.

  “Why do you think that?” Sylvia asked, answering the last point and uncertain whether his sister considered the Duke’s youthful idiocy related to his choice of bride or to his conduct when he was a schoolboy.

  “Did you never hear from him again after you wrote your sanctimonious letter?”

  “No. Did you see my letter?”

  “I did not. He received it on the day he embarked for Spain, so far as I understand, and refused to show it to me, although I asked to see it. I thought that, if I read it, I could perhaps offer him advice. If you ask me, he deserved to live with a broken heart all this time for he made not the least push to change your mind, did he?”

  “No. I did not expect him to.”

  “Did you not? Were you so very definite in your letter that there was no arguing with your decision?”

  Sylvia opened her mouth in a sort of silent scream. “I wished, oh how I wished, for so long, that he had tried to persuade me to change my mind, but he did not, and – and there was nothing I could do, having acted so hastily.”

  “Of course there was,” her ladyship exclaimed quite sharply. “You could have written another, saying that you had made a dreadful mistake and you loved him so much that you were perfectly prepared to forgive a youthful peccadillo.”

  “He would probably have told me it was too late. I felt it so, in any event. You may say that he was an idiot but, at bottom, I daresay you think him above reproach – he is, after all, your brother - but he has become perfectly odious. He has not forgiven me and bears such resentment towards me that I am positively afraid of him. I am convinced that he means to hurt me if he can. I daresay he has not changed his character, only, when I was in love with him, I did not recognise it.”

  “Was? Are you no longer in love with him?”

  “After seven years?”

  “Yes, after seven years. Why are you still unmarried if not because you have been carrying a torch for him all these years?”

  “Nobody else has made me an offer,” Sylvia snapped.

  The Countess smiled. “Would you have accepted if they had?”

  “I have no notion; I have met no one else.”

  Chapter 22

  “Indeed.” It was not a question, more a reinforcement of the Countess’s earlier point with which Sylvia had had the temerity to argue, albeit merely by implication.

  Lady Wey leaned forward and took another cake, biting into it with small, even, white teeth. The deliberation of her movements, together with the speed with which the cake disappeared, put Sylvia in mind of her ladyship’s brother. Both siblings appeared to be equipped with everything a predator needs: quick minds, sharp teeth and supreme confidence when they made a move.

  “I apologise,” she said, swallowing the last morsel of cake. “I am being cruel to you and you will think me as disagreeable as my brother. I came here to ask if you would do me the honour of coming to stay with me, here in London, for a few weeks before you run off back to Cornwall. I should like to get to know you better.”

  It was Sylvia’s turn to stare. “Is it not a little late for that? Why are you so curious to know more of a priggish female whom you must be glad your brother did not marry?”

  “Because you have had such a remarkable effect upon him. To be frank, his dealings with women are peculiar, to say the least. He was seduced by that wretched woman when he was fifteen years old – fifteen! He has not, so far as I can gather, kept himself only unto her, as you might say, but she has lived quite comfortably at his expense for a number of years. I have not, of course, met her, but I gather that she is a great beauty and was once a débutante, ruined, as I understand it, by a singularly unpleasant man.

  “Robert has dallied with any number of married women and dangled after a good many unmarried ones, but has, to my knowledge, evinced no serious interest in any female since you threw him over. He has become what you accused him of: a man whose morals, so far as our sex is concerned, are much to be condemned. He has grown cynical and proud, neither of which character traits I applaud.

  “But it is my belief that the heart which you broke has never recovered its equilibrium. I have never seen him so happy as when he told me of you and confided that you were to be married the next time he came on leave. A few days later, when he received your letter, he was a different man; his spirits were at the lowest ebb that I have ever seen them.

  “He was badly wounded almost as soon as he set foot on the Peninsula and was nursed in a field hospital until it was considered safe to send him back to England. When he left hospital, he resumed his connexion with the same mistress – did you know that at the time? Every year, when the new crop of marriage mart hopefuls appears, he looks them over, desultorily pursues one or two but soon loses interest. Now that he is past thirty, it is becoming increasingly important that he should marry. He has no more brothers and, if he should die without an heir, the dukedom will go somewhere else.”

  Sylvia listened to this recital in silence; she felt it as an indictment of her: it was she who had caused the wretched man to become cynical and she who had left him with a heart so damaged that he seemed unable to bestow it elsewhere.

  “He is – or has been - dangling after a female now with a view to marriage,” she said defensively. “Miss Sullington, whose governess I was until I was dismissed yesterday. He informed me that he intended to offer for her, although I think her mother’s conduct may have changed his mind.”

  “I shouldn’t think his mind needed changing, particularly after he had seen you again. He probably said that to annoy you. He came to visit me last night and told me of Lady Sullington’s attack upon you. He held himself to blame – quite rightly I imagine - since I understand that he was kissing you in the street when that harridan drove past and struck him with her whip. He is in no doubt she intended to hit you. And then I gather she threw a heavy vase at you. It was fortunate that she missed.”

  “She did not, altogether, but it was not a direct hit. If you think that his kissing me proves that he still holds me in affection, I feel I should disabuse you of that belief, my lady. He has been at pains to show the world that I am merely a ‘bit of fluff’ – I suppose to make me feel the sting of being accused of loose habits - and kissed me in public to demonstrate my moral turpitude to anyone who might have been passing. Lady Sullington was quite taken in.”

  The Countess seemed neither surprised nor shocked. “No doubt he was so hurt by your accusation of his depravity that he wanted to serve you as he had been served. It is outrageous but I hope that, in time, you will be able to forgive him.”

  Sylvia was aghast at this explanation, betraying, as it did, not only Rother’s cruel nature but his sister’s acceptance of it as perfectly normal behaviour. “I should think that most unlikely, Lady Wey. If you have come to intercede on his behalf, I am af
raid you have had a wasted journey. He has acted towards me with shocking malice. Ever since we came upon each other in Bond Street, he has left no stone unturned to humiliate and hurt me.”

  “He is a perfect fool – and so I told him,” her ladyship retorted. “If you cannot forgive him, which I consider unchristian – and not at all what your papa would approve of – I am disappointed but not particularly surprised. Let us put him out of our minds. I would still like you to come to stay with me. I have two daughters, still in the schoolroom, and shall be obliged to bring them out in a few years’ time. It would be of inestimable benefit to me if you would allow me to take you into Society, introduce you to the ton, and perhaps even find you a husband so that you do not have to wear horrid hats ever again. You are by far too pretty to be a governess. Did not the older Sullington boys try to seduce you? You cannot be much older than the eldest.”

  Sylvia, no longer called upon to defend herself, relaxed and even laughed as she remembered the two callow youths and their fawning manner towards her when she had first arrived. “Yes, of course they did – and so did my lord. But my tendency to sanctimoniousness proved useful: I was quite able to deal with them. The eldest boy declared that he wanted to marry me – he was no more than seventeen at the time. I hope I managed to reject him without causing him to bear a grudge for years to come.”

  “It is not quite the same though, is it? You did love Robert once – or you said you did. Will you throw caution and pride to the winds for a while and let me introduce you to Society? I own I look forward to seeing Lady Sullington’s nose put out of joint when you appear, suitably gowned and coiffed, at a fashionable gathering. Would you not enjoy that?”

  Sylvia, feeling that she was being sucked into displaying a worrying lack of sensibility, agreed, “Yes, I own I should, although I am ashamed to admit it. But I am not convinced that it would be wise for how could I bear to go back to being a governess if once I had been to the ball?”

  “You will not have to go back unless you find you particularly wish to. You are excessively pretty: there will be any number of swains eager to conduct you to the altar by the end of the Season. Will you do it? It will be such fun!”

  “I could not afford the expense,” Sylvia muttered, knowing that this was an excuse wholly unworthy of a person who prided herself upon acting on principle.

  “No, probably you could not, but I shall pay – not Robert - I. And I will do so because I wish to practise my skills as a chaperone. I assure you that I shall hardly notice the expense; in any event, I shall vastly enjoy outfitting you. Your colouring is so very different from mine that I shall be able to order all sorts of clothes which would not in the least become me. Oh, pray say ‘yes’ and let us set the town afire! He said you looked like Snow White – and you do. There will be a whole heap of women hearing depressing messages from their mirrors when you appear.”

  Sylvia admitted, “I own I am sorely tempted but I am dreadfully afraid that, once begun on such a course, I shall end positively depraved.”

  “No, you will not; I shall not allow it. And, if it will make you feel better, when we come to the end of the Season – and if you have not contracted to marry anybody – you shall pay me back by becoming governess to my children. Will that square your conscience? You will be able to remind yourself that, whatever enjoyment you derive from the experience, you are only undergoing wearing pretty dresses and dancing at balls in order to secure a job at the end.”

  Sylvia thought that it would; indeed she was fairly certain that such an arrangement would completely spoil most of her pleasure. If Lady Wey were to become her employer, she would never be free of the Duke and, if he were to marry another, she would be obliged to see him happy from a position of what she imagined would feel like the bottomless pit of hell.

  “Did Robert suggest it?” she asked.

  “No, not precisely. He asked my advice. He knows that he has behaved badly, that it was his fault you lost your employment, and he knows too that you will accept nothing from him. It was my idea to bring you to the attention of the ton, and, when I suggested it, he was delighted. Sylvia – may I call you that? – if, at the end of the Season you have not – and he has not – recovered from any lingering feelings either of you may harbour towards the other – and if, as a consequence, you cannot bear to stay within my family, I will engage to find you another job. Now will you accept?”

  “Would you be prepared to do that?”

  “Yes, of course I would. I should not like to see either you or him chafing against the knowledge that the other was so painfully close – and yet not quite close enough. Let us not concern ourselves too much with the future; let us simply enjoy the present. The Season has only just begun: I will acquire vouchers for Almack’s and add your name to the list of débutantes to be presented and we shall be away in no time.”

  Sylvia smiled and, ignoring her conscience and the warnings which flashed before her mind’s eye, said, “You are very kind – and your offer is too tempting for me to turn down. I own I should like it hugely. To see Lady Sullington’s face – that is something of which I should be ashamed, but which I cannot deny will be sweet revenge for all the years of her domination.”

  Lady Wey’s face lit with joy at the other’s acquiescence. She jumped up from her chair, pulled Sylvia to her feet and enclosed her in a warm, scented embrace.

  “Let us waste no more time but be on our way to the shops at once. Have you much baggage?”

  “No. I have a trunk, which Rother ordered to be delivered here but which has not yet arrived, and a portmanteau, which I left with the housekeeper before I came in here just now.”

  Chapter 23

  After Sylvia had made the decision to take what she was afraid would prove to be only the first of many steps from the moral high ground towards depravity, Lady Wey, who believed in striking while the iron was hot and was determined not to allow her new friend time to change her mind, ordered her carriage to be brought at once to the door, issued instructions concerning Miss Holmdale’s trunk and, graciously allowing Sylvia to pay the suspiciously modest sum which the hotel requested for her night’s lodging, swept her out and into the carriage in the twinkling of an eye.

  In a few minutes they arrived at my lady’s house, the shabby portmanteau was borne upstairs and Sylvia herself conducted into a small dining room at the back of the house.

  “We will recruit our forces with a modest nuncheon,” her ladyship announced. “For I arrived so scandalously early at Mivart’s that I had not time for breakfast and daresay you did not either. Then we will sally forth without further delay to repair your wardrobe.”

  Sylvia, uncertain whether she was upon her head or her heels, sat down obediently before a collation of cold meats and fruit.

  The Countess, picking at a few grapes, told her guest, “I will lend you one of my dresses for our expedition for, if you arrive at the modiste’s in that fright of a gown, she will wonder if I have taken leave of my senses.”

  “It is very kind of you, my lady,” Sylvia began although she could not help feeling insulted by her ladyship’s description of her dress. Certainly it was neither fashionable nor becoming but somehow to have one’s almost best dress described as a ‘fright’ had the effect of making her exceedingly uncomfortable and not a little annoyed.

  “Pray do not call me ‘my lady’. We were once to be sisters; now we are cousins so you shall call me Marianna, if you please. I can see that you do not like me to call a spade a spade so far as your gown is concerned but you must own that it is not a thing of beauty. I can only suppose you chose it to disguise your looks but I can tell you that it does not do so any more than the way you tie up your hair – I cannot call it a style – prevents anyone from seeing that you are a remarkably pretty young woman.”

  Sylvia, softened by the compliment and recognising the accuracy of the Countess’s analysis of her motives for both the dress and the hairstyle, smiled. “Well, when I applied for the post I was
barely eighteen and feared that I would not be given the job if I looked my age. I found this dress in the attic.”

  “Do you mean to tell me you have been wearing it for seven years? Why, it is quite an antique!”

  “Not every day; it has been washed from time to time, I promise you.”

  “Well, given its extreme age and provenance, I will make certain that I treat it with the respect it deserves. You must pack it up and return it to the attic whence it came the next time you are in that part of the world. In the meantime, since it is altogether inappropriate for the person who is about to emerge from the shadows and burst upon London Society, you had better borrow one of mine until we have procured you another.”

  “Thank you,” Sylvia replied meekly.

  “Hmm,” her ladyship muttered, setting her small teeth into another grape. “I think you should eat a little more for even one of my tighter dresses will hang upon your frame. Pray have another slice of bread and butter. I should not have indulged in those pretty cakes at Mivart’s for I am not as slender as I was. My cook is too good.”

  Sylvia smiled. “I am probably a little thin,” she offered by way of consolation.

  “When it comes to wearing clothes with style,” her ladyship opined, regarding her guest with her head on one side, “thin is usually preferable to plump. It is a great deal easier to pad a meagre figure than to suppress a larger one. It is impossible to tell what your figure is like at present, but we shall see what Madame Blanche can achieve. Marston – she is my dresser – will be able to do something with your hair; and your face: well, my dear, I do not think anything or anyone could improve upon nature.”