by M C Beaton
“No,” said Alice in a small voice.
“In that case we shall retire to the drawing room.”
Alice meekly allowed herself to be led through to the drawing room. She could not understand why she felt so sad and depressed. He was not going away. He was to stay with her. That was all she had longed and prayed for. Wasn’t it?
“The night is chilly for summer,” said the Duke. “I shall light a fire. Ah! I do not have to light my own fires anymore.” He moved to ring the bell for a servant.
“Don’t,” said Alice. “I told the servants they could retire after we had finished our supper.”
“Did you not think of my pleasure?” he demanded.
“I thought only of the servants,” said Alice quietly. “It is not so long since I was one myself.”
“And we are never, ever going to be allowed to forget it,” snapped the Duke, bending over the fireplace and at the same time wondering why he was being so harsh with the girl. He busied himself lighting the fire while his mind turned over the problem. He decided it was the responsibility of taking care of Alice that irked. He came to the conclusion that his behavior was, however, at fault. And so in the manner of his kind of aristocrat, he decided to apologize sincerely and openly to Alice.
He swung around on his heels and smiled up at her. “I have been in the devil of a temper this evening,” he said. “I think perhaps my spleen is disordered.”
“Damn your spleen, sir!” cried Alice, “and damn you.”
He stood up slowly and towered over her, his eyes like chips of blue ice. “You guttersnipe,” he said, slowly and carefully enunciating each syllable. “I make you a handsome apology and all you can do is scream at me like a fishwife.”
Alice stared at him, her wide eyes dark and amazed. “That was an apology?” she exclaimed. Then she buried her face in her hands and turned her back on him.
He stood looking at her in baffled rage. He noticed her shoulders were shaking and suddenly his rage died as quickly as it had sprung up.
The Duke moved forward and put his hands on her shoulders and turned her gently around, holding her slim shaking body against his own.
“There now,” he said, tilting up her chin and then glaring down at her in amazement. For Alice was laughing—not crying as he had believed. Her bright eyes were sparkling and she was shaking with mirth. “Oh, y-you are s-so f-funny,” she gasped when she could. “An apology, indeed.”
The Duke held her a little away from him, looking down at her. All of a sudden a mocking smile lit up his blue eyes and he slowly pulled her close to him again and bent his head.
“No!” whispered Alice, closing her eyes.
She trembled against him, all laughter gone. She could feel his long fingers biting into her shoulders and smell the musky perfume he wore. Then one hand released one shoulder and came under her chin and pushed her head up and his lips met hers in a long exploring kiss, deeper and deeper and biting, parting her lips, his tongue sliding into her mouth, darting and searching. She felt her body burning and throbbing and melting until she was almost too weak to stand. His hand released her chin and dropped to her breast and she gave a plaintive little sigh of surrender and wound her arms around his neck, standing on tiptoe, and returning passion with passion.
And then quite suddenly he raised his head and put her firmly away from him, turning his face away so that she could not read the expression in his eyes.
“Odd’s Life!” he said lightly. “’Tis near incest, is it not? Making merry with thine uncle.”
“You are not my uncle,” whispered Alice.
“No. Only a phantom. I should not have punished you so, Alice. We will forget about it, shall we not? Tomorrow evening we shall start our search for a husband. It is well that these balls and parties go on all night or I should find difficulty in helping you.”
Alice stared at him desperately. “Oh, Gervase,” she cried. “I l…”
He quickly put a hand over her mouth to stifle the words.
“No,” he said. And again, “No. You are tired, my child. You must not take spirits such as myself seriously. We are nothing but air and fancy. See! I disappear. A new accomplishment.”
He began to fade before her eyes.
“Please,” begged Alice. “Please stay.”
“Till tomorrow,” came a faint mocking voice from somewhere near the ceiling.
Alice sat down and stared at the flickering flames of the fire. “I don’t want a husband,” she said fiercely into the silence of the room. “I want…”
But she did not know what she wanted apart from peace and security. Her strange, tumultuous feelings when he had kissed her she put down to a sort of supernatural power emanating from him.
Then she thought bleakly of the morrow which would bring a new companion. “She will be horrible, I just know it,” Alice told the uncaring walls.
Miss Cassandra Fadden arrived at three o’clock the next afternoon. Alice entered the room, trying to hide her nervousness. She was determined to send this new companion packing. She did not trust the Duke’s taste in companions.
At first she thought the drawing room was empty. Then someone gave a quiet little cough. Miss Fadden was seated in a high-backed chair in the comer, her feet barely touching the floor. She was a gray little woman—gray face, gray hair, gray shapeless dress, even her eyes were a washed-out gray. She wore a gray velvet turban which seemed too big for her small head. All her clothes, in fact, looked as if they had once belonged to a much bigger woman. Her shoes flopped at the end of her wrinkled gray stockings, her gloves hung from her elbows, and her false front of gray curls hung down on her forehead, leaving about an inch of skin between the curls and the hairline.
She looked harmless enough but Alice was determined to assert herself in case this gray ghost of a woman should turn out to be another Miss Snapper.
Alice patted her curls in the looking glass and then turned round and faced Miss Fadden. “Miss Fadden,” she began and then said as sternly as she could, “Alors, mademoiselle, you are supposed to stand when I address you.”
“I am standing,” said Miss Fadden timorously. Alice blinked. Miss Fadden was indeed standing before her, having somehow moved from her chair. She was so small that it was like looking down at a child.
“I beg your pardon,” said Alice. “My uncle suggested we might deal suitably together. Have you had experience as a companion before?”
“No, my lady,” said Miss Fadden in such a quiet little voice that Alice had to lean forward to catch the words. “I am the daughter of a curate. Papa died two months ago and I was at my wits end as to what to do. I was sitting in the churchyard, crying, and suddenly this splendid gentleman appeared before me—quite like the Angel Gabriel, you know, except that I think his coat was made by Weston—no room for wings there—and he asked me why I was in such distress and I told him. He said his niece was in need of a lady-companion so here I am,” she finished rather breathlessly.
Alice looked at her rather doubtfully. Miss Fadden looked quite old and frail. “Please sit down, Miss Fadden,” said Alice in a gentle voice. “You would be expected to keep very late nights—very late,” added Alice thinking of her ghost’s restrictions. “Admittedly we would sleep a good part of the day, but I wonder whether you might not find the rigors of a round of balls and parties too exhausting.”
“Oh no,” pleaded Miss Fadden. “I should find it monstrous exciting. I have never been to a party in my life. Papa said such occasions were sinful. I’m glad he’s dead,” she added vaguely. “He will be so much more comfortable in Heaven, you know. He was not a good preacher, I am afraid. He always managed to make virtue sound like a threat.”
Alice bent her head to hide a smile. Miss Fadden was undoubtedly eccentric but she seemed gentle and kind.
“Miss Fadden,” said Alice tentatively, “I had reason to dismiss my previous companion. To put it bluntly, she bullied me.”
Miss Fadden waved her little gloved hand i
n protest so energetically that one of her overlarge gloves fell off and rolled on the floor. “Dear me, my lady!” she exclaimed. “I could not even bully the house cat.”
Alice quickly made up her mind. “Then we shall deal extremely well together, I think. When would it be convenient for you to commence your duties?”
“Now,” said Miss Fadden simply. “I am in modest lodgings in London and I have not paid the rent. They will be glad to see me go.”
“Very well, Miss Fadden. I will send a footman for your belongings so as to spare you any embarrassment, and my man of business will settle your rent. Now, there is one thing I must make clear. My uncle, he has many affairs to attend to during the day so he is not free to escort us until the hours of darkness. We shall be setting out for our social occasions very late indeed. I do not wish this strange fact to be discussed in public.”
“Oh, no!” breathed Miss Fadden. “My lips are sealed as with fish glue and they may torture and torment me but never a word will I breathe.”
“Tiens!” exclaimed Alice. “It is not so serious as that.”
“What is our first engagement, my lady?”
“My uncle has chosen the affairs to which we are to attend. He will inform us this evening of his plans. The first thing we are going to do, Miss Fadden, is to supply you with a wardrobe.”
Miss Fadden clasped her hands together and stared at Alice as if she could not believe her ears. “Clothes. For me?” she said. “Oh, my lady, do I have to wear mourning? I have only these gray clothes since Papa deemed it seemly wear for a lady of my years. I had not enough money to buy black but I do so long to wear a color and no one in society knew Papa so they won’t know I am supposed to be in mourning because, it is a sad fact my lady, but I do not mourn. He was such a good man, you see. And it is so hard to feel affection for people who are really good. Once he lost his sermon and kicked the cat and I felt a genuine rush of affection for him but he spoiled it all by praying over the cat and apologizing most humbly to it and for so long that the poor animal walked away in disgust.”
“You can have all the colors you want,” laughed Alice. “Come! Allez-vous en!”
Chapter 6
Late that evening, Miss Fadden sat in Alice’s drawing room in a state of silent rapture. If she had not been so overwhelmed, so ecstatic over her shot-silk ball gown and her new coiffure, she would have noticed something odd in her mistress’s behavior.
Alice was nervously pacing up and down the room, dreading the Duke’s arrival and longing for it at the same time. Had that kiss meant nothing to him? Of course it hadn’t, she told herself severely. He was a philanderer and, by all accounts, had been one when he was alive. But would he notice her new ball gown of silver net worn over a silk slip of palest rose? Would he notice her black curls à la Grecque? Oh, horrid thought! Perhaps he would not come at all!
All at once she became aware that little Miss Fadden had arisen and was dropping a deep curtsy—so deep that she sank lower and lower onto the carpet.
“Uncle Gervase!” cried Alice, turning instinctively toward the fireplace. And there he was, in full evening dress, his jewels blazing in the candlelight. Did his eyes hold a new warmth as he looked at her?
Alice moved gracefully toward him, the silver gauze of her overdress floating out from her slim body. “I am so glad to see you,” she said, trying to read the expression in his eyes.
He made as if to take her hand and then his blue eyes took on a mocking look. “My child,” he said, “how charmingly you look. But I fear we should assist Miss Fadden.”
Alice looked around and found that Miss Fadden had been unable to rise out of her curtsy and was lying on the carpet. With a sharp feeling of impatience at her companion’s ill-timed gaucherie, Alice rushed forward and assisted that lady to her feet.
“Thank you, my lady,” babbled Miss Fadden in great confusion. “What a bad beginning! What you must think of me. I shall try again…”
“No, don’t!” cried Alice and the Duke in unison, but Miss Fadden was already sinking down. There was a sharp, embarrassing cracking sound from her knees, but somehow, with many grimaces, she managed to heave her small body upright. “There!” she cried triumphantly.
The Duke looked at her doubtfully and then said, “Miss Fadden. Pray excuse us. I wish to have a word in private with my niece.”
Miss Fadden moved slowly to the door, her shoulders bent.
“Madam!” said the Duke, looking at her drooping figure impatiently. “Had my niece any doubts as to your suitability, I am sure she would not have engaged you. You are being sent from the room so that I may discuss some matters which do not concern you or anything about you.”
Miss Fadden gave him a relieved smile and tiptoed out, closing the double doors behind her.
The Duke waited, his head cocked to one side, listening. At last he turned to Alice.
“What is it you wish to discuss?” she asked nervously.
“Why, your companion, of course. Miss Fadden. I fear she is not at all suitable.”
“Oh, but she is so pleasant and so grateful!” cried Alice. “I simply could not turn her out-of-doors. She has never been a companion before, you see. I am sure she will learn very quickly. Oh, please let me keep her!”
“My child, if that is what you want, you may have it,” replied the Duke, much amused. “Now, to our evening’s engagement. We are to attend a ball at the Duke and Duchess of Haversham’s.”
Alice blenched. “What if they recognize me?” she cried. “I avoided them during the Season.”
“We do not have to go to Wadham,” he said. “The ball is to be held at their town house. I doubt if either of them ever set eyes on you before.”
“But the servants,” pleaded Alice. “They take some of the upper servants with them when they go to town. Mr. Bessant, for example…”
“He will hardly recognize the scullery maid Alice in the fascinating and beautiful young French Countess. Behave yourself! Odd’s Life! I swear I can hear your knees knocking.”
“I would rather not go,” said Alice stubbornly.
“Then find a husband on your own,” he snapped. “I shall go back to Wadham and continue my memoirs.” His figure began to shimmer and fade before her eyes.
“No! Don’t go!” capitulated Alice. “I will attend the ball.”
“Then let us leave,” he said quietly. “You have nothing to fear. Society is thin of social events in high summer. There is not much to choose from.”
“But he will recognize you!” said Alice suddenly. “The present Duke, that is.”
He shook his head. “I think not. I was not in these modern clothes when I appeared to haunt him.”
“The resemblance is nonetheless there. You look rather like him.”
“He will not notice, my child. No man really knows what he looks like. Let us summon Miss Fadden and be off.”
The Duke had seen to it that Alice had a splendid equipage in which to drive out. It was a yellow carriage with panels emblazoned with a well-executed shield and armorial bearings and drawn by two richly caparisoned horses. The Jehu on the box was dressed in a coat of many capes, a powdered wig and gloves à la Henri Quatre. Two spruce footmen in scarlet and silver livery with long canes in their hands completed the entourage.
Little Miss Fadden sighed with pleasure and gazed out of the carriage windows with the wide-eyed interest of a child.
Alice sat silently at her side, the Duke facing her. She thought miserably that the whole business was a sad farce—being escorted to a ball by a ghost to meet a marriageable young man. Alice decided that she did not really like high society, despite the fact, that with the exception of Webb, she had so far avoided its major pitfalls. She had steered clear of the harpylike dowagers who were only too anxious to befriend a seemingly friendless and attractive girl as bait to lure men to the side of their bony and incoherent daughters. She had avoided the censure of the middle-aged dandies with their large appetites and weak digestions w
ho hated so many and abused so many as they sat together in the bow window of White’s Club in St. James’s. She had received vouchers for Almack’s—that center of snobbery—during the Season, and had danced in those famous Assembly Rooms without once having fallen foul of the all-powerful patronesses.
