by M C Beaton
It had been a long hard winter followed by a brief, icy, squally spring.
At long last, on this very eve of the London Season, the weather had decided to favor the top ten thousand by turning warm and balmy. A pale green sky stretched high above Manchester Square. In hundreds of bedrooms nearby, young ladies were getting ready to plunge into the Marriage Market and emerge with a husband. What other ambition was there for a properly brought up young miss? Orchestras tuned up, hothouse flowers were banked against walls, elegant suppers prepared, flambeaux lit—and hearts trembled with excitement as girls armed themselves for the all-important battle to come with all their weapons at the ready—fan, smelling salts and seductive smile.
But for Alice, each evening as the blue shadows garnered at the end of the streets and the lamplighter made his rounds with his oil can, was another little death, as night after night she lost hope that he would come.
She felt sad and tired and badly dressed and Miss Snapper irritated her beyond reason. Now the fact that Miss Snapper was beginning to irritate the meek Alice should have been a sign to the girl that she was slowly coming back to life. But she was unaware of this and simply began to tap her foot as Miss Snapper’s intense voice grated in her ears.
“You must sparkle a little more, Alice. You want animation. You should not be vulgar, of course, and put yourself forward. Your so dear uncle would agree with me, I am sure. We both know what is best for you.”
“My uncle,” said Alice with a rare flash of spirit, “would not approve of your calling me by my Christian name instead of my title.”
Miss Snapper studied this spark of rebellion with avid interest and then proceeded to stamp it out.
“Tish, child,” she cried, tripping forward and winding one long bony arm around Alice’s waist. “Are we not the dearest of friends? Don’t I dote on you? You are frightened because it is the opening ball of the Season. But you shall come about. Let us descend to the drawing room and await the carriage. What think you of my gown?”
“Very fine,” said Alice in a flat voice. She actually thought it would surely be better if they exchanged gowns, Miss Snapper’s sprig muslin being more suited to a young girl, and Alice’s ornate ball gown being more flattering on a woman of mature years and sallow complexion.
As they descended the elegant curved staircase into the small tiled hall, and thence through into the green and gold drawing room with its fashionably backless sofas and striped upholstery, Alice suddenly felt something strange happening to her mind. It was as if a great black weight of despair had been lifted from it. All at once, she knew her ghost was dead to her, that he no longer thought of her. She felt empty and light, a feeling which persisted right to the august doors of the Duchess of Courtland’s town house where the flambeaux hissed and flared in their iron brackets against the wall.
Alice was vividly aware of being alive, vividly conscious of each sight and scent, of the splendor of the gowns and jewels, of the tantalizingly sweet strains of a waltz drifting across the warm air.
She was young and would be pretty again once she had crept from under the domineering shadow of her companion. There were many handsome men about. Why had she not noticed them before?
Alice sat sedately enough beside Miss Snapper, but her large eyes had begun to sparkle and there was a delicate blush on her cheeks.
“I say,” said Lord Harold Webb, raising his quizzing glass, “ain’t that the little Frenchie who was at Haversham’s ball?”
His friend, Harry Russell, followed his gaze and then sniggered. “Damme, if it ain’t,” he said cheerfully. “Pon rep, you was bosky that night. Said to me she and her friend melted through the wall.”
“Stow it,” said Webb brutally, an angry expression marring his handsome features. “Pretty little chit, all the same. Tell you what. Ask her for a dance. Bound to be impressed.”
Lord Harold Webb was very handsome, being fair with dark brown eyes and a high complexion. He was tall and well built and his clothes had been tailored by the hand of a master. He had been complimented on his good looks since the day he was born. He was possessed of a handsome fortune and he delighted in the pleasures of the London Season, for he knew he was much sought after. The fact that men, with the exception of his unlovely friend Mr. Russell, did not seem to seek his company much, held no sway with the ladies who appeared to adore him one and all.
He had several times been on the point of popping the question but had always drawn back at the last minute. For the lady of his choice always seemed… well… too independent and not conscious enough of the great favor that he was about to bestow on her.
Mr. Russell’s restless gaze had swung away from Alice, but Webb continued to stare. Alice looked up and saw his eye, hideously enlarged by the quizzing glass, glaring at her from the other side of the ballroom and gave an involuntary chuckle.
That was when Harold Webb moved forward to ask her to dance.
Relieved of the depression which had been darkening her days, Alice danced as lightly as she had at the ball with the Duke, and talked just as lightly in her charming French accent. She did not hear a word Lord Harold addressed to her. She was pleasurably conscious of the envious glances she was receiving from the other debutantes and experienced a heady feeling of success for the first time.
“Making a cake of yourself over Frenchie,” sneered Mr. Russell when Webb had at last reluctantly surrendered Alice to her next partner.
“Her name,” said Webb stiffly, “is Alice, Comtesse de la Valle-Chenevix and I’ll thank you to refer to that gel with respect in future, Harry.”
“So! Here we go again,” laughed Harry. “All set for the altar and then you get cold feet at the last minute. I don’t see me ever being your best man. What’s so special about this Comtesse? Them French émigrées are ten a penny.”
“She has a feminine sweetness unusual in our modern gel,” said Webb pompously. “The lady I would wish to be my wife should be someone pliant, who could be moulded…”
“Bullied, rather,” said Harry.
“Nonsense. Everyone knows the male is the superior sex. Women with too much to say for themselves do not make good wives.”
“Funny how the female of the species don’t seem to have got hold of that idea,” mocked Harry. “Your Comtesse may have other interests.”
“Other than me?” said Lord Harold, his fine eyes sparkling with amazement. “My dear chap, no woman wishes for any other man an she is blessed with my company.”
That did, in fact, seem to be the case, although Harry thought to himself that no woman had really been in his friend’s company long enough to find the pompous ass who lay underneath that handsome exterior. Harry did not really like Lord Harold Webb, but one had to have a companion, and no one else seemed anxious to fill that role.
Alice’s newfound animation had attracted more than Lord Harold Webb to her side, and Miss Snapper sat with the chaperones and watched Alice with flat, black eyes. It was the first time that Miss Snapper had been made to feel the paid companion she actually was, for usually a very meek and mild Alice sat at her side throughout the evening, only rarely being asked to dance.
“She is become too bold,” thought Miss Snapper. “I must speak to her very sternly.”
Miss Snapper’s restive mind turned to Alice’s uncle, as it frequently did. He had not said he would return, but surely he would visit London again some time to see how his niece fared. He had said he planned to make an extended stay on the Continent, but what French anti-Bonapartist wanted to be anywhere on the Continent at such a time?
A little smile played around Miss Snapper’s thin lips. She felt sure a certain attraction had sprung up between herself and Alice’s uncle. Now, if Alice were to become married, Miss Snapper would lose her position. But, her busy mind raced, Alice would need his permission to marry, and surely he would return for the wedding. Miss Snapper closed her eyes and gave herself up to a blissful dream of Alice’s wedding where she, Miss Snapper, would sta
nd beside Alice’s uncle, the Comte, receiving the guests. “This marriage has put ideas in my head, Miss Snapper,” he whispered, pressing her hand in a feverish grip. By the time Miss Snapper emerged from this particular dream, she was convinced that Alice’s uncle had been well and truly smitten with the fair Miss Snapper and had not received enough encouragement.
Alice was dancing with Harold Webb a second time and they seemed to be getting along famously.
“Ye… e… es,” thought Miss Snapper, observing the couple through narrowed eyes. “A marriage. That is what is needed to bring him home.”
It was with pleasure that Miss Snapper, therefore, gave Webb permission to take Alice driving at the fashionable hour next day. It was with less pleasure that she discovered she had a rebel on her hands. Webb was due to call for Alice at five in the afternoon. Miss Snapper, rising late, discovered that Alice had left much earlier with her lady’s maid to go shopping.
She fretted and fumed until Alice returned, her carriage laden with parcels.
“What have you done?” cried Miss Snapper as two footmen carried in the parcels. “Such extravagance! What your dear uncle would…”
“I have no time to talk to you, Miss Snapper,” said Alice firmly. “I am awaiting the court hairdresser, Monsieur Antoine. Tiens! How red your face has become, Miss Snapper. A soupçon less rouge, I pray.”
And with that Alice swept on up the stairs, leaving Miss Snapper glaring impotently after her.
But Emily Snapper was not easily defeated. Taking a deep breath, she mounted the stairs to Alice’s bedroom and stared in dismay at the array of silks and satins spread about the room. “That is not all, madam,” said Alice gaily. “The rest, they come later. The ones that are being made specially.”
“You must give me your uncle, the Comte’s, direction,” said Miss Snapper firmly. “He would not approve. Only see this gown! It is nigh transparent.”
“It is, how you say, all the crack,” said Alice. “But it is useless asking me for mon oncle’s direction since I do not know. I can furnish you, however, with the name and address of my man of business, Monsieur Bower. He will assure you I have sole control of my fortune.”
Miss Snapper thought rapidly and decided a strategic retreat was best. She would catch young Alice when she was in a more vulnerable mood.
Alice heard the closing of the door and sighed with relief. She was sure her small stock of courage had been about to run out. She could not believe she had already been so brave. But she was to drive out with the handsomest man in London. She would be the envy of the ladies of the ton and young Alice was human enough to relish that idea.
At precisely five o’clock, she descended the stairs, wearing a sprigged muslin gown with small puffed sleeves and deep flounces at the hem. Her long black hair had been cut à la victime and the saucy crop made her face seem more piquant and her eyes larger and brighter.
Seemingly oblivious to Miss Snapper’s disapproving silence, she tied a chip straw bonnet on her head and picked up a lacy parasol as Lord Harold Webb’s high-perch phaeton drew up outside the door.
Hyde Park at the fashionable hour was a wonderful spectacle. Glossy horses, silks and laces, taffeta and feathers, uniforms and quizzing glasses and curving top hats. The warm sun blazed down on the high gloss of the carriages, on the spun glass wigs of the coachmen, on the rich color and embroidery of hammer cloths. Clouds of dust sailed up into the summer air making the whole moving, shifting scene seem unreal, as if the whole panorama were being viewed through gauze.
Webb’s voice was like music in Alice’s ears. He told her what should be worn in society and what should not be worn. He told her that Mr. Brummell, that famous leader of fashion, was nothing more than a popinjay. That the Prince Regent was a disgrace to the country and his extravagances were shocking, and that he, Harold Webb, had told his Royal Highness just that.
“Fact!” he declared, under Alice’s awed stare. “Walked right up to him at Carlton House t’other day and I said, ‘Prinny,’ I said, ‘You’re a disgrace.’”
“Weren’t you afraid?” breathed Alice.
“Pooh!” he said, deftly edging his phaeton through the press. “A Webb is never afraid.”
A shadow crossed Alice’s little face. “Not even of ghosts?” she asked in a low voice.
“No,” he said stoutly. “And Harold Webb can tell you why, for Harold Webb has seen one! Fact! With these here eyes.”
“Please tell me,” said Alice urgently. Oh, the relief of finding she was not alone with her phantoms!
“Well, it was like this,” he said, vastly pleased at her interest. He reined in under a stand of trees and settled back slightly to make the most of it.
“I was at Lord Framont’s place, down Surrey way, with my friend, Mr. Russell. Deuced old barn of a place it was. Very damp. Harry—that’s my friend, Mr. Russell—he says, he says we would catch the ague. ‘Webbs never catch the ague,’ says I. ‘Place is bound to be haunted,’ says he. ‘There ain’t no such thing as ghosts,’ says I. But one night after we’d been playing piquet with Framont and some friends, we didn’t finish until the small hours and Harry—that’s my friend, Mr. Russell, the thin chappie who was at the ball t’other night—and I shared a candle up to bed. All of a sudden, there comes this great wailing. ‘What the devil’—beg pardon, Countess—says Harry, that’s Mr. Russell, my friend, ‘is that?’ ’Fore the words were out of his mouth, this great thing all in a cursed sheet and chains and things, comes flying across the room. Harry—that’s my friend—he turns as pale as things. But me, now I’m a Webb, and us Webbs don’t take count of anything, no matter which side of the grave it’s on.
“‘Get thee hence,’ says I, ’cos I’d read that somewhere in a vastly entertaining book and that’s the sort of thing one says to ghosts according to this book, that is. And Harry—Mr. Russell—he says, ‘By George! You’ve done it. It worked!’ And as sure as I’m standing here—hem, sitting here, it had!”
“I wasn’t thinking of that kind of ghost,” said Alice sadly. Almost involuntarily her mind reached out, trying one more time to call her ghost, but there was nothing there, nothing at all.
He leaned forward and pressed her hand. “I have frightened you with my talk of ghosts,” he said softly. Alice blushed rosily, taken aback by the unexpected familiarity and delighted at the same time to have this extremely handsome man paying court to her.
“I had better take you back to the crowd,” he said, looking down at her roguishly, “or I shall quite forget myself. I was saying to Harry—that’s my friend—only t’other night. I said, ‘That Comtesse is a deuced fine gel!’ There! That’s what I said,” declared Webb, noticing with great complacency, the ebb and flow of blood mantling Alice’s cheeks.
Harold Webb was always plagued with a nagging fear that one day he might “lose his touch,” that he might no longer be able to make a pretty girl blush and tremble.
As he tooled his carriage back to the throng, he kept giving Alice little sidelong glances. She was almost beautiful, he decided. Quite the way she looked when he had first seen her.
“That fellow with the yaller hair,” he said abruptly. “Friend of yours?”
“I’m afraid I don’t…” began Alice.
“The one at Wadham Hall.”
Alice went very still, very rigid. “Alors, m’sieu,” she said slowly, her French accent very marked. “I fear you are mistake.”
“No. No. It was you,” said Lord Harold. “At the Christmas ball.”
Alice almost visibly relaxed. “Oh, that was my uncle, Gervase. He is on the Continent en ce moment.”
“Y’know,” he went on, “talking of ghosts. ’Fraid I must have had too much to drink at that ball. I could have sworn, you and that uncle vanished right into the wall.” He leaned back and roared with laughter, oblivious that Alice had turned quite pale.
Alice suddenly longed for the security of that little secret room and then banished the thought resolutely from her mi
nd. Those days were gone, never to return. She was young and rich and free and the handsomest man in London was paying court to her.
Now, had Alice been more alive on all suits, she would undoubtedly have found Webb a crashing bore, but she had only been used to the conversation of the kitchens and, until the evening before, had not much listened to what anyone said on her social outings in London. Her witty ghost, she discounted, because he was a sort of god to her and she did not expect any mortal to achieve his magnificent standards.
And so it was a very grateful Alice who allowed herself to be courted by Webb. An Alice so grateful that she did not realize she had blossomed into a great beauty. She could not quite throw off the yoke of Miss Snapper’s bullying and derogatory remarks although she stuck grimly to her own mode of dress.
