The two men escorted her as far as the wood and, when she was on the Duke’s land, they raised their hats and she rode on alone.
She knew that Clint Wilbur was safeguarding her reputation even from the servants at The Castle.
Later in the evening she could not help thinking a little wistfully of the jokes they would be exchanging as they dined at Marshfield House while she was alone in the quiet and gloom of The Castle.
She fell asleep thinking that tomorrow would not come soon enough, but she knew that it was here now.
For the first time she wondered how much Clint Wilbur was enjoying himself with his guests.
They would have arrived the night before and he had told her a little about the preparations he had made for their visit.
First of all, it seemed incredible, he had hired a special train to bring them from London to the nearest Railway Station to Marshfield House after the performance at The Gaiety was over.
Alita had never been on a private train, but her father had told her how comfortable they were.
The special train that the Prince of Wales travelled in on his visits to the country was, he had said, decorated like a luxurious house.
Servants in livery waited on the guests, even providing a seven or eight course dinner exactly as if they had been in their own home.
‘There will be flowers and champagne,’ Alita thought to herself.
But who could deserve it more than Nellie Farren?
There was no need for Clint Wilbur to tell her that ‘little Nellie’ had been the idol of London for years. But while Nellie Farren was one thing, Miss Wadman was certainly another.
It was she who was Clint Wilbur’s special friend and over and over again Alita found herself repeating in her mind what she had read about Miss Wadman.
She thought that there had been a warmth in Clint Wilbur’s voice when he spoke of her, and now, riding towards Marshfield House, she told herself that perhaps he was in love with his countrywoman.
Why else would he have made such very extensive preparations for her visit? Why else a performance in the riding school that would obviously intrigue and flatter her?
The idea was a pain that was worse than anything Alita had felt before, worse even than the thought of the loneliness to come when everything was over.
‘He would be bound to love someone like that,’ Alita thought, ‘beautiful and, of course, vivacious.’
It was not surprising that someone as intelligent and indeed as brilliant as Clint Wilbur would find Englishwomen dull.
‘How little I know,’ Alita thought, ‘and Hermione, although she is beautiful, is ignorant on almost every subject that Clint Wilbur is interested in.’
She thought of how well he played the piano and wondered if Miss Wadman ever sang for him in the voice that had been extolled by the critics.
He would like that, she was sure, and she wondered suddenly if it was too late for her to turn back and not go through with the performance that lay ahead of her.
Then she told herself that to do such a thing would be insulting rather than disappointing to a man who had shown her nothing but kindness.
‘At least,’ Alita told herself almost defiantly, ‘I have been with him, I have talked to him, we have laughed together and there has been no one else there.’
She reached the stables at Marshfield House and carried out the instructions that had been given to her in detail by Clint Wilbur.
She left Flamingo with the grooms and went into the house by a side door that opened onto the staircase that led her directly up to the first floor.
“I don’t want anyone to see you until the curtain goes up,” Clint Wilbur had said. “Go to the bedroom you have used before. Everything will be waiting for you.”
Alita obeyed him and, when she walked into the room, she saw at first glance that her two habits, one black and the other grey, were lying on the bed.
Waiting for her was a middle-aged woman.
“Good evening!” Alita said.
“Good evening, miss,” the woman replied. “I’m Miss Farren’s dresser.”
Alita looked at her in surprise and she went on,
“Mr. Wilbur has asked that I arrange your hair for you and help you into your clothes.”
“That is very kind,” Alita said, “but I don’t like to put you to any trouble.”
“It’s no trouble, miss, and Miss Nellie Farren was only too pleased to agree, when Mr. Wilbur suggested it, that I should make you look the part, so to speak!”
She laughed at her own joke and added,
“You get undressed, miss. I’ve a wrap here for you to wear while I sees to your hair.”
She held out a delectable silk wrap trimmed with lace, but Alita was too shy to ask if it belonged to Nellie Farren.
Instead she quickly took off her old habit and her petticoats, which had been patched a dozen times, then put on the robe and sat down at the dressing table.
Because she wanted to look her best, she had washed her hair first thing that morning and used, as the milliner had suggested, the yolks of eggs as a rinse.
When it fell over her shoulders, the dresser said as she picked up a brush,
“You’ve got very pretty hair, miss. I see you’ve washed it today.”
“I am afraid it may make it difficult to handle,” Alita said apologetically.
“I can handle any sort of hair,” the dresser replied with a smile. “Miss Farren’s hair is soft and sometimes difficult to get into shape, but then she’s so frequently playing a boy’s part that she prefers to have it cut short, as it’ll be in our new show, Little Jack Sheppard.”
“I hope it will be a huge success,” Alita said.
“Oh, it will be, with Miss Farren in the lead!” the dresser replied.
“I have always longed to see her.”
“And she’s anxious to see you, hearing what Mr. Wilbur’s been telling her.”
“I can hardly believe that!” Alita answered. “My father used to tell me about the vast crowds waiting outside the stage door to see her leave at night just because everybody had loved her performance!”
She smiled.
“My father once said that Nellie Farren was like an electric spark.”
“That’s true enough, miss,” the dresser agreed, “but how she maintains her tremendous vitality has always been a mystery to me. She hardly eats anything but bread and butter. I suppose the fact is, she lives on her nerves.”
She gave a laugh and added,
“The applause of her public is a tonic to her and that’s a fact!”
As she went on brushing Alita s hair in a manner that seemed almost to make sparks fly from it, she continued talking.
She told Alita how Nellie Farren’s public took care of her.
“She has to pass through some rough parts on her way home, so a party of men has formed a bodyguard for her and every evening after the performance they run beside her carriage.”
“How wonderful!” Alita exclaimed. “Does she know them?”
“Oh, no, miss. They’re just her admirers and, when they’ve escorted her carriage through the bad streets, they just fade away.”
“It’s the most flattering thing I have ever heard!” Alita exclaimed.
“They don’t ask for thanks,” the dresser went on, “but it’s people like that as fills the gallery night after night.”
The dresser was still talking as she waved Alita’s hair with curlers like those she had seen her mother use.
They were heated over a small burner filled with methylated spirits. Then the dresser swept Alita’s long hair round her head somewhat in the manner worn by the Princess of Wales.
It not only made her look quite different, but there were no wisps or ends to fall untidily round her cheeks and neck as there always had been in the past.
Then, almost before she realised what was happening, the dresser had taken out a pair of scissors and cut her a small fashionable fringe.
; It softened her face and also seemed in some strange way to make her eyes look bigger and more expressive than they had ever appeared before.
“I don’t look like myself any longer,” Alita said almost to herself.
“Wait till you get your new habit on and your hat,” the dresser said. “Then you’ll see a difference! It’s the black one first, Mr. Wilbur said.”
The Empress of Austria might have been sewn into her habit, but Alita thought that nothing could fit tighter or more perfectly than the one that the tailor had made for her.
She had never realised before that she had such a tiny waist and the perfect figure the bodice-habit gave her would, she knew, be accentuated even more when she was riding a horse.
The top hat was set at exactly the right angle on her exquisitely dressed hair and was, with its gauze veil falling behind her head, very becoming.
She looked at herself in astonishment, feeling that no one and certainly not her uncle or her aunt, would recognise her at this moment.
The dresser looked at the clock on the mantelpiece.
“If we were in the theatre,” she said with a smile, “there would be someone knocking on the door right now to say, ‘Time, please, Miss Blair!’”
“I must go downstairs now,” Alita said quickly. “And thank you! Thank you!”
She picked up her new riding gloves, which had been laid on the bed beside her habit and a whip that she had never seen before with a silver handle.
Then, in her new boots, which she thought made her feet look tiny, she hurried down the passage.
Clint Wilbur had agreed that they should meet in the stables and mount their horses outside the big doors that opened into the riding school.
When she saw him waiting for her beside Rajah, she suddenly felt shy.
She saw his eyes flicker over her as if appraising her appearance and then he looked directly at her face.
As if he realised that she felt embarrassed by his scrutiny, he said with a smile,
“Rajah will be proud of you!”
A stable boy held Rajah while Clint Wilbur lifted her onto the saddle.
As he arranged her skirt over the brightly polished toe of her boot in what she saw was a silver stirrup, she guessed that it was because Rajah was a black stallion that Clint Wilbur had ordered the first habit she wore to be black too.
She knew that, even in the hunting field with the smart Society ladies who rode with the Quexby, she would be outstanding.
But she could not help feeling that it was a little sad that this should be a one-night performance only and that no one would ever see her looking like this again.
Then she told herself that it was not a moment for regrets but for enjoyment, even though she was nervous of what lay ahead.
As if he knew that she felt butterflies dancing in her stomach, Clint Wilbur put his hand on hers.
“You will be sensational, as you always are!” he encouraged her. “Burt will break in the ice by making them laugh.”
Even as he spoke, Alita heard a great roar of laughter coming from the riding school.
She realised that she had been so intent on looking at and listening to Clint Wilbur that she had not noticed that there was music in the background and the performance had begun.
She was tense and yet at the same time she was confident that however frightened she might be. Rajah would not let her down as she rode in through the big double doors.
For a moment she could see nothing but a glow of golden light and the first fence ahead.
Then gradually, as Rajah took his jumps one after another without a fault, she became aware that there were a larger number of people than she had expected behind the bank of flowers on the balcony.
Only when she had finished two rounds and took Rajah into the centre to salute those sitting above her, did she have a quick glimpse of an attractive piquant face with eyes as blue as the sea and an enticing red-lipped smile.
Nellie Farren was clapping ecstatically with both hands, as were a number of gentlemen who were standing or sitting beside several other women in the comfortable velvet seats.
Somehow, and Alita knew that it was stupid of her, she had thought that Nellie Farren and Miss Wadman would be Mr. Wilbur’s only guests.
She had not anticipated that there would be at least twenty people on the balcony and the noise of their applause seemed almost deafening as she turned and rode out through the doors at the end of the school.
She passed Clint Wilbur as he was riding in on King Hal and he said just one word,
“Perfect!”
Then she was outside and King Hal was leaping over the jumps.
She found Burt Ackberg waiting for her and she saw the admiration in his eyes before he remarked in his drawling voice,
“No wonder you laid them in the aisles!”
“They were laughing,” Alita said. “I wish I could have seen what you were doing.”
“Just making a clown of myself,” he replied. “It’s a habit of mine.”
They had not been alone together before and, as they waited side by side for Clint Wilbur to come from the riding school, Alita asked curiously,
“Have you known Mr. Wilbur for many years?”
“Almost since we both arrived in this wicked world,” Burt Ackberg replied. “You mean he hasn’t told you that our ranches are side by side in Texas? Or rather there’s only about five miles between them.”
“Five miles is considered a long way over here,” Alita remarked.
“That’s because this is such a small island,” he replied. “I could almost put it in my pocket and take it home.”
“You are forgetting our far-flung Empire!” Alita retorted.
“We could pack it all into America and there’d be nothing drooping over the sides,” he answered.
She laughed and then said,
“Are you going to stay with Mr. Wilbur for long?”
“He wants me to hunt here with him,” Burt Ackberg answered, “and it will be a new experience for me.”
Alita thought privately that it would also be a new experience for the members of the Quexby Hunt, but she did not say so.
A moment later Clint Wilbur came from the riding school with the applause of his guests following him like the roar of the sea.
He joined them to say,
“Now for our race. You go first, Burt. Someone is explaining the rules and will start the clock.”
This was an enormous clock, which Alita had already seen, that had been erected so that the guests could watch the seconds tick by and know exactly who was in the lead.
It is all so professional, she thought, and, as Burt Ackberg rode away, she turned her head to say to Clint Wilbur,
“I am beginning to think that you could produce a show at The Gaiety without any difficulty, although I have always understood that it is a very hard thing to ensure a theatrical success.”
“I might try it one day,” Clint Wilbur replied. “Are you suggesting yourself for the lead?”
“Oh, no, of course not!” Alita said, laughing. “Who could compete with Nellie Farren?”
“I agree, she is amazing!” Clint Wilbur said. “And she and Miss Wadman will ensure that Little Jack Sheppard is a roaring success.”
Again Alita felt a pain that she told herself was envy.
Then, before she could say anything more, Burt Ackberg’s round was finished and it had been planned that she should go next.
Rajah realised what was expected of him and he moved quicker, Alita thought, than he had ever done before in his whole life.
She and Rajah seemed to fly over the fences and the applause for their performance started even before they took the last fence.
Then, as she rode breathlessly through the doors, Alita heard Burt Ackberg saying something to her, but she knew that she had no time to stop and hear what it was.
Instead she slipped down from Rajah’s back and ran through the door that led into the house and up the stairs to the
bedroom.
Nellie Farren’s dresser had obviously been told how little time Alita had in which to change and therefore the dresser had everything ready.
She seemed to Alita to whisk her habit from her and then she was wearing the grey one almost before she could count to ten!
She changed her hat and picked up a different pair of gloves and then once again she was running down the stairs and out into the yard, where Flamingo was waiting for her.
It was when she was in the saddle that she realised, almost as if she were seeing it with a spectator’s eyes, how clever Clint Wilbur had been in choosing that particular tone of grey for her habit.
She made an ensemble with Flamingo that was not only theatrically but also aesthetically perfect.
The audience obviously thought the same thing, for, as she entered the riding school, there was a burst of applause even before she had started to show them what Flamingo could do.
Then, as she took him into the centre of the school, to make his bow to those sitting in the balcony, she was aware that unseen hands were pulling aside the fences to give her more room for what she had taught Flamingo to do.
The band began to play a waltz from Der Rosenkavalier and she took him round slowly in a circle. Then his head lifted, his neck arched and his forefoot went out in an arrogant beautiful movement.
He began to dance in the way that Alita had taught him, waltzing, walking, then waltzing again and then back to the centre to bow, again a little arrogantly, as if he was conscious of his own achievement.
The music changed and now he rose, rearing magnificently and in time to the melody that was being played.
It was part of the Airs Above Ground, which were the complicated traditional steps performed by the Lipizzaner horses in the Spanish Riding School.
They were difficult, but Flamingo’s movements were proud, quiet and soberly controlled and yet to those who watched them, he seemed to be enjoying himself and to understand exactly the intricate pattern his movements made.
When the music came to an end, Alita took him once more to the centre where he bowed, and then went down on one knee, his head touching the ground while she remained sitting straight, only raising her whip to her forehead in a proud salute.
The Race For Love Page 11
