by M C Beaton
“Miss Henrietta Bascombe,” they all murmured.
Lord Charles, following his brother’s gaze, cried, “Why, there she is, over in that comer!”
Henrietta blushed with embarrassment and hung her head as every curious eye in the room turned in her direction.
The beautiful lady seated next to the earl broke the silence that followed Lord Charles’s announcement.
“Well, it is for eating, isn’t it?” she demanded.
“Lady Clara, it is much too beautiful to touch,” protested Mr. Clifford.
“Nonsense,” said Lady Clara. She rose gracefully to her feet and walked over to the centerpiece. “See!” she cried, picking up the Duke of Wellington. “I shall let you all know if our Iron Duke tastes of iron or sugar.” She bit off the little figure’s head.
Almost everyone laughed, got to his or her feet and started snatching at pieces of the confection.
Lady Clara who? thought Henrietta. Miss Hissop will know.
Henrietta, sensing that the people in the room had forgotten her existence once more, felt more at ease than she had earlier. She carefully observed Lord Charles and Mr. Clifford. They did not seem at all interested in any of the ladies present. They had not rushed to help destroy the centerpiece, nor had the earl. Of course, this was not really seeing society at its best, thought Henrietta charitably. A great number of them, the ladies as well as the gentlemen, were in varying stages of intoxication. And why should she, Henrietta Bascombe, take such a fierce dislike to that Lady Clara?
My centerpieces are for eating, Henrietta told herself firmly.
The earl rose to his feet once more and announced that dancing would begin in the ballroom upstairs. The guests began to leave the dining room, first in large groups, then one by one, until Henrietta was left alone, except for the servants who were clearing away the plates.
She got to her feet and walked across the room and looked down at the ruin of her centerpiece. One tiny little Spanish lady stood amid the wreck of sugar, marzipan, and caramel, her tiny bouquet held up to where the figure of the duke had been.
“I do not know how they could bear to eat even a bit of it,” said a voice behind her. “It was so beautiful.” Henrietta turned around and found Mr. Clifford had come back into the room.
“Usually I do not witness their destruction, Mr. Clifford,” she said. “But imagine if people could not bear to eat any of my confects. I should soon go out of business.”
“How is Miss Archer… and Mrs. Webster?” asked Mr. Clifford.
“Very well. They are asleep by now. Poor things! They are beginning to feel the strain of all those weeks of hard work.”
Mr. Clifford glanced over his shoulder nervously. “Miss Bascombe,” he said, “since Bascombe’s is your business, I feel you are responsible for Miss Archer. May I have your permission to call on her?”
“Yes,” smiled Henrietta.
“And, oh, I say…” Again that nervous look over the shoulder. “Charles—I mean, Lord Charles—well, he begged me to ask you on his behalf. If he could call on Mrs. Webster, that is.”
“Perhaps Lord Carrisdowne would not approve,” said Henrietta cautiously.
“If he didn’t know about it, he wouldn’t have to worry about it,” said Mr. Clifford.
The earl’s voice, giving orders to the servants, came from the hall outside.
“Please, Miss Bascombe,” said Mr. Clifford urgently.
How ridiculous to be so afraid of the disapproval of one’s best friend, thought Henrietta. Aloud she said, “You and Lord Charles may come for dinner next Sunday—at four.”
The Earl of Carrisdowne walked into the room.
Mr. Clifford pleaded with his eyes for Henrietta’s silence, and Henrietta gave him a slight nod to signify assent.
The earl looked from one to the other suspiciously.
“I am just leaving,” said Mr. Clifford hurriedly. “Your servant, Miss Bascombe.” He bowed and left. The earl swiveled and looked after him.
“Dear me, one would think Guy was making an assignation.”
“With me? No. We were just admiring the last survivor.” Henrietta held up the sugar figure of the Spanish lady.
“Yes.” He took it from her and turned it around in the light. “I must confess my heart sank when they started tearing into it like wolves. Perhaps I was too conscious of your clear gaze looking upon my friends, for I confess they seemed a shabby lot to me this evening.”
“I know most of them by sight,” said Henrietta. “They are my customers. They are all very pleasant and quite witty. I had not, however, seen Lady Clara before.”
“But you know of her?”
“No. I heard her name mentioned.”
“She is Lady Clara Sinclair, daughter of the Earl of Strathbane.”
“Oh.”
“She is this season’s beauty.”
“Ah.”
“She is accounted a wit.”
“Mm.”
“As you so cynically remark, ‘Mm’ indeed. Lady Clara told a very funny story at supper that went on for quite half an hour. It was about Lord Trumpington, who was asked to lay a foundation stone at a new printing works in Kensington. He was given a silver trowel to perform the ceremony. He expected to keep the trowel as a present but, to his fury, the printers demanded it back. He was, says Lady Clara, very mortar-fied.”
Henrietta laughed dutifully.
“Don’t force yourself,” he drawled. “I cannot stand puns either. My face is stiff with forcing smiles onto it. Can I persuade you to come and watch the dancing?”
A shadow crossed Henrietta’s face. Of course he could not ask her to dance with him.
“No, thank you, my lord,” she said. “It is time I returned to my shop. The baking for tomorrow has still to be done.”
He looked down at her, noticing for the first time the violet shadows of fatigue under her eyes. “I would you did not have to work so hard,” he said. “Come driving with me on Sunday, Miss Bascombe.”
“I cannot,” said Henrietta, with a faint blush. “I am entertaining guests for dinner.”
He looked at her sharply.
“Female guests?”
“I must go,” said Henrietta, not answering his question.
“Where is your servant?”
“In bed.”
“You cannot walk unescorted through the streets in the middle of the night. I shall send a footman with you. No, I shall go with you myself.”
“My lord… your guests.”
“So busy polishing their puns, they will not miss me.”
Henrietta enjoyed a novel sensation of power. It was very pleasant to think she could make the earl leave his guests.
To her surprise the earl, as he had done when he escorted her to church, elected to walk. This was decidedly odd behavior in an age when one traveled by carriage even to the next street.
“Tell me about yourselves,” said the earl. “Where did all of you come from?”
Henrietta hesitated. For the sake of Josephine’s safety, she did not wish to mention the name of the village. She still did not trust the earl.
“We all come from the same village in the country,” she said. “My father was a doctor, who died leaving me hardly any money. Miss Hissop is a retired schoolmistress. We decided to pool our small savings and share a house. A certain landowner who had been attended by my father during his lifetime and had never paid his bills left me a sum of money in his will. I decided to go into trade. The landowner’s chef had trained me in the confectioner’s art. Mrs. Webster is an army widow with practically no money at all. She is only twenty-two years of age. Miss Archer has a brutal father who beat her every time he was drunk. They elected to join me in my enterprise.”
“And what draws Mr. Clifford and Lord Charles to your shop? Yourself?”
“I think gentlemen of the ton enjoy the sweetmeats and the comfortable atmosphere,” said Henrietta.
“That is not answering my question. What was G
uy talking to you about?”
“He was regretting the destruction of my centerpiece.”
“And that was all?”
“Lord Carrisdowne, you must not quiz me about who said what to me. I am too tired.”
“Do not encourage them,” he said in a serious voice. “Marriage is out of the question.”
Henrietta rounded on him. “May I suggest you run your own life and stop meddling in affairs that do not concern you!”
Henrietta was shaken by fury and bitterness. He had more or less told her she was not worth considering when it came to marriage. He had told her as much before but, oh how it hurt this time. Her eyes filled with tears, and the parish lamps became a flickering blur.
He stopped and swung her round to face him. He took out a handkerchief and gently dried her eyes. “Ah, no, Henrietta,” he said softly, “you must not cry. It was your evening of triumph.” He bent and kissed her cheek.
Henrietta trembled, looking at him wide-eyed.
He wanted to pull her into his arms and kiss her breathless. He wanted to do just that with an intensity of feeling that shook him. Instead he tucked her hand under his arm and started to walk again.
“How did you know my Christian name?” asked Henrietta.
“I asked someone. It is not a deathly secret, you know. The other ladies in the shop call you Henrietta frequently.”
They had reached the shop.
Henrietta turned and faced him. His diamonds glinted in the faint light thrown by the parish lamp outside the door of Bascombe’s. But his face was in shadow and she could not read the expression in his eyes.
“I did not like to see you sitting in that corner while I entertained much less talented people,” he said. “Allow me to entertain you to dinner tomorrow night.”
“I cannot go to your house alone,” said Henrietta, backing away.
“Then bring your dragon, what is her name… Miss Hissop.”
Henrietta was about to refuse. But it was so very tempting—tempting only because it would be wonderful to be waited on for a change.
“Yes, my lord,” she said. “At what time?”
“Seven o’clock. I shall send the carriage for you.”
He raised her hand to his lips, and his kiss seemed to bum through her glove. Then he stood back and waited until she had unlocked the shop door before walking away.
I only think I am enchanted with her because I see so little of her, thought the earl. Tomorrow evening she will be out of place and gauche, a country girl out of her depth. That should cure these odd feelings she arouses in me.
Henrietta nearly fell over Esau, who was sleeping like a dog on the floor of the shop behind the door. “I waited for you, miss,” said Esau, jumping to his feet. “I got something to show you.”
He led the way into the kitchen. There on the table was a sugar dragoon on a sugar horse. The horse was excellent. The figure on its back was somewhat lumpy.
“It is very good, Esau,” said Henrietta. “Very good indeed.”
She leaned forward, studying the figure closely while her mind worked busily. Here was surely Esau’s future. If she could manage to get Josephine and Charlotte settled comfortably, then Esau could be trained to take over the business.
“You need some lessons, all the same,” said Henrietta slowly. “As soon as the business settles down, I shall begin to train you to be a confectioner.”
“Oh, thank you, miss. You should ha’ let me come to fetch you. Don’t do to walk the streets alone.”
“I was not alone,” said Henrietta vaguely, her mind full of plans. “Lord Carrisdowne escorted me.”
“Oh,” said Esau, turning away. “He did, did he?”
Chapter Seven
Henrietta’s casual remark that she and Miss Hissop were invited to the Earl of Carrisdowne’s for dinner that evening burst upon the confectioner’s shop like a bombshell the next morning. And when Henrietta added that Lord Charles Worsley and Mr. Guy Clifford were to be their guests at dinner the coming Sunday, excitement reached fever pitch.
Respectability at last! Josephine and Charlotte dreamed of a triple wedding—Josephine to Mr. Clifford, Charlotte to Lord Charles, and Henrietta to the Earl of Carrisdowne.
Miss Hissop was incoherent with excitement. “To think that I… Ismene Hissop… should dine at a lord’s table! He means well… wouldn’t have invited me otherwise. Dear Henrietta… who knows what social peaks we may scale! Why, one could even be buried in Westminster Abbey!”
The only one depressed by the great news was Esau. His active conscience told him he should wish the best for his mistress, but it was shouted down by his terror at having to return to the workhouse.
Henrietta made such an effort with her appearance that evening that Esau felt she was removing herself even more from the shop, from him. Henrietta in her apron and cap was a world apart from the grand lady who now stood at the shop door with Miss Hissop, waiting for the earl’s carriage. Josephine had said that she hoped Henrietta would order some gowns for herself, for now that she had hopes of being taken out by Mr. Clifford, she would need all her own gowns.
Henrietta was wearing a dress of white leno, trimmed with a narrow edging of lace. A scarf of pink Italian gauze was tied on the left shoulder with gold cord, the gold tassels hanging nearly to the feet. She had little white kid shoes with gold roses on her feet and long gloves of white kid. Her dark brown hair was braided into a little coronet on top of her head and decorated with a single pink-silk rose.
Miss Hissop had dipped into Josephine’s wardrobe herself and had chosen a brown-silk gown and a handsome paisley shawl. Charlotte’s pearls were about her neck, and one of her more elaborate caps, freshly laundered and starched, covered her head.
“There is the carriage,” said Henrietta, feeling quite sick with excitement. She kissed Josephine and Charlotte and then followed Miss Hissop out of the shop.
Miss Hissop exclaimed over the elegance of the carriage, at the wine-colored upholstery, at the hot bricks that had been placed on the floor for their feet. The journey was all too short—along Half Moon Street, up Curzon Street, along South Audley Street, past Grosvenor Square, and round into Upper Brook Street.
Henrietta hoped they would not be the only guests. If the earl presented her to some of his friends and showed them she was a welcome guest in his house, Henrietta felt it would set the seal on her respectability. But, as they were ushered into the Green Saloon, it soon transpired they were, in fact, the only guests. It was this fact that made Henrietta silent and awkward.
The earl put her uneasiness down to the fact that she was overawed by her surroundings. It was just as he had expected.
But over dinner Henrietta became a different lady entirely. To put her at her ease, for he was feeling sorry for her, the earl politely asked her about her late father’s profession.
Henrietta, at first hesitantly and then with enthusiasm, described her father’s work. “He was wont to say,” said Henrietta, “that a fifth-century Greek probably had a better chance of recovery under Hippocrates than the people of today. How he had battled with prejudice and superstition and antiquated ideas! He had vaccinated the whole village against the smallpox, and mostly at his own expense. He had also written letters to Parliament and to the newspapers complaining about the window tax. By bricking up his windows, a householder could save a great deal on tax, but in doing so he shut out the sun and fresh air. Then the villagers would dose their children with Dr. James’s Powder, and it is a wonder so many survived. My father analyzed the powder and found it contained antimony.” Her soft voice went on, and her eyes glowed with enthusiasm.
She should have been a man, thought the earl. Why could she not have waited until she was married before indulging her odd tastes for independence. Married ladies were allowed great license. Not that such license included going into trade, he reminded himself firmly.
He realized with a start that Henrietta was not at all overawed by her surroundings. On the co
ntrary, she seemed very much part of them.
Miss Hissop, seeing his startled look, decided he was shocked that Henrietta should discourse at length on medicine, a subject that should only be debated by gentlemen. She gave a little cough, and when Henrietta stopped talking and turned an inquiring gaze on her, Miss Hissop launched into speech. “Your admiration of your dear papa does you credit, Henrietta. But to hear you speak, one would think your pretty head was full of naught but serious matters. My lord could not guess how many happy hours we have spent discussing the latest romance from the circulating library, or how we avidly study the latest fashion.”
“My dear Miss Hissop,” said Henrietta, “we were so busy keeping body and soul together when we were in… in the country, that we had no time to talk about such things. All we ever talked about then was food. All we ever talk about now is the shop. Since my lord disapproves of trade, he must be grateful that I confine my conversation to medicine.”
“I like hearing about the shop,” protested the earl, much to his own surprise. “Have you made ices yet?”
“Yes, at last. The first few tries were unsuccessful. I hate to waste materials. My one main problem at the moment is how to get people to pay for their centerpieces.”
“Henrietta!” exclaimed Miss Hissop.
“But it is the truth. Here is a society that does not believe in paying shopkeepers, tailors, or jewelers until the duns come to the door. How can I make them pay?”
“It is a difficult question,” he agreed, reflecting that he had not yet paid Henrietta’s modest bill himself either.
“Now dressmakers do not have quite the same problem since they call on the lady of the house. Provided their fashions are in demand, the lady in question becomes afraid that if she does not pay, then she will lose her favorite dressmaker,” the earl continued.
“Now, you, Miss Bascombe, could request the money in advance. Say firmly that you wish to buy the best of materials and cannot do that without money in hand. At the moment, it is fashionable to have one of your centerpieces rather than one of Gunter’s. Society will always pay to be the fashion. It is rumored that Mr. Brummell once paid his tailor.”
