Sylvia Or The Moral High Ground

by Catherine Bowness

  It was almost noon before Lady Wey appeared the day after the ball and, when she did, she put a firm veto on Sylvia’s suggestion that she should call upon Lady Barnaby to see how Lord Marklye did.

  “We will go together, my dear, and leave a message.”

  But when they reached the Barnaby residence they were informed that his lordship had risen early, insisted that he felt perfectly well and left.

  They were invited in and offered refreshment, which meant that they could not leave until a full half hour had passed, during which niceties and apologies were exchanged.

  Lady Barnaby felt the need to apologise for poor Miss Holmdale having undergone such a frightening experience in her house: the gunman had been in her garden and she felt responsible. Miss Holmdale apologised for having been shot at – and also apologised for his lordship’s having been hit – for, if she had not been standing on the terrace with him, the incident would not have been able to take place. Much speculation was indulged in as to who the target might have been – surely neither Miss Holmdale nor Lord Marklye – but eventually Lady Barnaby assured them that, apart from his lordship’s injury – which was trifling – no harm had been done and she believed, indeed, that the evening could be accounted a success.

  Sylvia realised that, as the success of a party depended upon the amount of gossip and speculation it sparked, as well as the length of time that such tittle tattle remained a focus of Society’s attention, it would probably be rated the party of the Season. She did her best not to say too much beyond issuing her apology, assuring Lady Barnaby that she was quite recovered from the shock, and expressing the hope that the ball had not been quite ruined for Miss Barnaby.

  “You acquitted yourself very well,” Lady Wey observed comfortably as they drove away.

  “Thank you. I tried to keep my lips closed in case I should give away something which might stoke the fires of gossip.”

  Lady Wey laughed at this. “Very wise – and a valuable lesson in managing Society: the less one says the better, particularly if one is unmarried and beautiful. You are bound to make enemies amongst females; the best you can hope for is that they judge you insipid.”

  “Is that the impression I gave?” she asked, startled.

  “Not precisely; your looks are so excessively dramatic that people are bound to notice you.”

  “So silence is my best defence?”

  “Absolutely. Now, let us go home.”

  “Should we not call upon Lord Marklye?”

  “No. It would be most improper for us to call upon a single gentleman who is not related to either of us.”

  “Improper even for you – a married lady?”

  “Yes. I will write him a note when I get home and will mention your concern, but you should not write to him yourself – and you most definitely must not call upon him.”

  “If he writes to me, may I reply?”

  “Yes, indeed; it would be uncivil not to do so.”

  Chapter 30

  When they reached home they found that a number of letters had been delivered together with a quantity of posies addressed to Sylvia.

  “There, you see what an impression you have made!” Lady Wey observed with satisfaction.

  “Good Gracious!” Sylvia exclaimed, overjoyed to find herself the recipient of so many tokens of appreciation.

  Lady Wey’s correspondence included several invitations for her and her cousin to attend this party and that rout as well as a masked ball out in Richmond, but there was nothing from either Lord Marklye or from the Duke.

  The latter arrived in person shortly after nuncheon.

  “I am delighted to see that neither of you has suffered any ill effects from the drama of last night,” he began, kissing his sister on the cheek and bowing coldly to Sylvia.

  “No, we are quite well,” Marianna replied quickly before Sylvia could speak. “We are but recently returned from calling upon Lady Barnaby. She apologised for her garden having harboured a gunman.”

  “Very proper!” the Duke said, amused. “And did you apologise for bringing the sort of guest who attracts gunmen?”

  “I apologised for being that sort of guest,” Sylvia interrupted, “but Lady Barnaby did not seem altogether displeased with the evening. She seemed to think that such fantastic events would serve to distinguish her ball from all the other insipid parties.”

  “It may turn out to be only the first of many now that you are in town, Miss Holmdale. When and where is your next social appearance?”

  “I have no notion. I do what I am bid and go where I am escorted by your sister. Do you want to know in order to be sure that your gunman is in place to make another attempt?”

  “I always think it a mistake to repeat the same method,” he said smoothly. “I shall try something different next time.”

  “Pray do not be absurd!” the Countess interrupted. “You do not truly suppose Robert to be behind the shooting, do you?”

  “No,” Sylvia admitted in a disappointed tone. “I should think the whole thing was a mistake.”

  “There I think you are wrong,” the Duke said. “Although I am relieved that you absolve me from being behind it, I do not think it was a mistake. A man does not lurk in the garden of a house where a ball is taking place until a particular person appears on the terrace when he fires two shots. I suppose you were standing very close to each other at the time, were you?”

  “We were about to go back inside,” Sylvia said loftily. “We were not embracing, if that is what you are trying to discover.”

  “If I had been, I should have asked a direct question. Are you in the habit of embracing men to whom you are not related?”

  “Certainly not, but there have been occasions recently when I have been forcibly embraced by a man who later made a false claim to be related to me.”

  “Occasions?”

  “One.”

  “The others have been with your consent, have they?”

  She raised her eyebrows. “There have been no others but, during the brief period when I was engaged to be married, I was from time to time embraced by my betrothed – with my consent. I do not know why I have to answer such an impertinent question,” she added with some irritation and a flushed face.

  Neither had noticed that the Countess had slipped out of the room, leaving them alone; both were far too intent on arguing with each other.

  “Did you not embrace the lover for whom you threw me over?” he asked.

  “What?”

  “Or did he, too, briefly become your fiancé? Why did you break with him?”

  “What in the world are you talking about? There never was another man. I never was engaged to anyone but you.”

  “Indeed? I suppose he did not come up to scratch in spite of the embraces. That must have been a disappointment; no wonder you have expunged him from your memory.”

  “Who told you such a story?” At first outraged at his accusations, she quite suddenly saw some small portion of the misunderstanding under which both had laboured for so long and asked in a different voice, “Is that why I never heard from you? I have always wondered why you did not reply; you did get my letter?”

  “Yes; I received it the day I embarked for the Peninsula and began one in reply as we travelled but, because I was wounded almost as soon as I set foot in Spain and could not immediately set pen to paper, it was neither finished nor posted until I returned to England some time later. Indeed, before I completed it, I received one telling me of your new lover.”

  “From whom? It was a lie. I have never had another lover.”

  “I do not know. The letter was anonymous.”

  “And you believed it? How could you?” she cried in anguish, remembering their murmured promises to each other, the way they had gazed upon each other’s faces, their kisses.

  “What did the letter you wrote in reply to mine say?” she asked in a small voice when he did not speak.

  “I cannot remember precisely: it was, in a sense, two
letters. The beginning tried to explain my position – I suppose it was defensive; it was full of apologies for my past, so far as I can recall, and it ended by begging you to reconsider. The second half began in an angry spirit, accusing you of deceit. I daresay I ranted and raved a good deal but I know that, although when I began it, I intended to heap coals of fire upon your head for your infidelity, by the end I expressed myself ready to forgive you for flirting with another and was once more begging you to reconsider, to remember our promises and so on. I don’t doubt it was a maudlin affair and cannot blame you for casting it into the fire.”

  “I would never have done that. I did not receive it.”

  “No? Well, it is all in the past.” His voice was dull. “I came to report on your present admirer.”

  She turned away, unable to bear his indifference. He had ceased to love her and the wild hope that had sprung up in her breast at the knowledge that he had replied – and that someone had turned him from her with their wicked lies - was dashed. For a moment she had believed that reconciliation was possible; now she knew that it was not.

  “You already know that he returned home this morning,” he went on. “I called upon him and found, you will be relieved to hear, that he had not been badly injured. He had one arm in a sling but assured me that this was only upon the insistence of the doctor as he had sustained only a slight flesh wound.

  “When I raised the subject of the parcel, he denied that he had seen it, although he acknowledged that he had spoken to you last night and was aware that I had attempted to return it to him. He rang for his valet, who admitted that he had received it. Marklye had apparently been out of town when it was delivered and the valet put it on the mantelpiece in the library and forgot about it. He assumed from its shape that it was an unwanted gift from a female.

  “Marklye only returned from the country a few hours before the Barnabys’ ball and the valet was entirely taken up with getting him dressed, which was, he explained, how he came to forget to mention the parcel.

  “In any event, when requested, he fetched it. It certainly looked like the same parcel. Marklye opened it in front of me.”

  The Duke paused but, as Sylvia said nothing, he was forced to continue. “Inside was a red box.”

  Sylvia nodded. “Did he read my letter?”

  “Yes. I did not like to speak while he did so. He smiled at one point and laid it on a table beside where he was sitting.”

  The Duke paused again. “He sat for some time without speaking, his gaze fixed upon the box. Then he asked me to open it. He said he could not on account of his injury. I asked whether he was certain that he did not mind my seeing the contents. He said that it was all one to him and that he believed I knew all about it in any case. I assured him that I did not, that I had not looked at it and had not received a description from you. He seemed so cast down that I told him that I believed you had admired the diamonds but felt that you could not keep such a valuable gift. He said, ‘Indeed; that is what she says. I was afraid that it would be so. They would look so very lovely on her.’”

  Here the Duke looked up at Sylvia, who still stood some distance away at the window.

  “I would find it easier to tell you the last part if you would come a little closer. I feel as though I am declaiming from a stage. Do you think you could bring yourself to sit down – there?” he pointed to a chair facing his.

  Sylvia did as she was bid. The Duke looked at her critically, as though sizing her up. His lips were folded into a thin line and his eyes were fixed, with the sharpness of a gimlet, on hers.

  “I opened the box.”

  She waited as he paused, his eyes still holding hers. She felt like a mouse transfixed by the gaze of a cat.

  “What did you do with the diamonds?” he shot at her.

  “What do you mean? I did nothing with them. I only once took them out of the box and immediately returned them. I dared not touch them again lest I succumb to temptation. What are you saying?”

  “There were no diamonds. The box contained a cheap glass necklace, a comb made of bone and a pair of trumpery earrings.”

  “What?”

  The Duke stood up and removed an ill-wrapped parcel from his pocket. “Is this, to your knowledge, the paper and string you used?”

  She nodded. “It looks like it.”

  He unwrapped the parcel and revealed the red box, opening the lid with a snap. Sylvia, leaning forward, gasped and stared in disbelief as her eyes fell upon the contents.

  “But what …? What has happened to the diamonds?”

  “I have no notion. Is this what you wished me to give to Lord Marklye?”

  “No, of course it is not. The diamonds were there when I wrapped up the box. What has happened to them? Could your man have stolen them – or the valet?”

  “Marklye questioned his valet in my presence and to my mind he was entirely truthful when he swore that he had not opened the box. I told him that I was equally certain that my man would not have substituted these worthless trinkets. But I went home before I came here and interrogated him minutely. Do you recognise these objects?”

  “Yes; the necklace is one I was used to wear as a child. It is indeed worthless glass, as you say, but I love it dearly.” She leaned forward and lifted it out of the box, holding it so that it fell over her fingers and the beads caught the light. “See how pretty it is; I used to pretend that they were real stones and that it was made of rubies, emeralds, diamonds and sapphires. I would never have substituted it for the priceless diamonds that Lord Marklye gave me. Oh, what has happened? Who has done this?” Her eyes had filled with tears, which began to roll down her cheeks unheeded.

  “It is pretty,” the Duke agreed. “Does it still fit?”

  “Yes - just.” She undid the clasp and put the necklace around her throat, doing it up with fingers which knew just how the hook fitted into the clasp. When she had done, she put her hands in her lap and stared helplessly at the Duke.

  He nodded, his eyes fixed on the necklace and the way it encircled a little too closely the still slender neck of a grown woman. “Does it not constrict your breath?”

  “No, but I am conscious of it all the time, like a collar.”

  “What of the other objects?”

  “The comb is mine. I have had that too since I was a child. The earrings were given to me by Melissa the first Christmas I spent with the Sullingtons; she was ten. I love them too because they were a gift from a little girl - although they are indeed trumpery in terms of cost. I value all these things and would never give them away. I certainly would not do something so base as to substitute them for the valuable gift he sent me – and write him the letter I did! You have not seen that, but I tried to be tactful and kind: I did not want to hurt his feelings. What sort of a person would do something so – so cruel?”

  “One who wished to insult his lordship, I imagine.”

  “Did you think I would do that?”

  “I am at a loss to see who else would have been able to do such a thing. Who knew you had them or, once you had given them to me, that I had them? And who had access to your childish treasures other than you? I own that it did cross my mind that a woman who could deceive me with another lover as soon as my back was turned would be capable of such an act. I do not know what has passed between you and Marklye or why you might wish to wound him.”

  “But I did not deceive you; and I am not a thief!”

  “I did not accuse you of that; they were your diamonds; Marklye gave them to you and I suppose you were at liberty to dispose of them as you pleased.”

  She did not answer immediately, thinking that her resisting of temptation and her, admittedly somewhat shaky, adherence to the moral high ground, appeared to have availed her nothing. On the contrary, the correctness of her conduct seemed to have led directly to what she perceived would be her ruin; she would be accused of theft as well as deception; she began to wonder if she would have preferred to have been labelled a light woman rathe
r than a criminal.

  “How did Lord Marklye react to the sight of these meagre substitutes?” she asked eventually.

  “He did not say a great deal but he appeared as though stunned. I can only suppose that he thought, as I did, that he had misjudged you, that he had given his heart – for there is no doubt in my mind that he has – to a worthless and greedy woman. Neither of us spoke for some time. Then he asked me how long I had known you and I told him, without embellishment, something of our history: that we had briefly been engaged to be married.

  “I had the impression that the fact that I too had suffered at your hands comforted him a little. I believe his first shock was that his judgment seemed to have been so wildly awry; he had fallen in love with you on account of what he perceived to be your unimpeachable character and he had been mistaken. You had ‘taken him for a fool’ and he was embarrassed to discover that he had fallen for a very old female trick.”

  “Trick? What in Heaven’s name do you mean? I am too simple to be capable of such a thing.”

  “Indeed? I was younger than he when the scales fell from my eyes. You have retained that air of innocence, that look of absolute honesty, which can deceive a man in a moment. I daresay that is almost beyond your control relying, as it does, upon the arrangement of your features, the apparent openness of your regard and what I can only describe as your heart-stopping smile, although I do feel, now that you are not quite so young, that you could try to look a trifle more knowing: it would give a man a chance, so to speak. The downtrodden governess wrings the withers and is almost as appealing as the naïve seventeen-year-old.”

  “I cannot help the cast of my countenance but protest that I would not know how to achieve what you call a ‘knowing’ look since I know no more than I did when I was seventeen. But I suppose that it must be accounted a good thing that I no longer present as a downtrodden governess. Dressed as a lady of fashion, do I leave your withers unwrung?”