by Sandra Heath
She smiled. “Oh, I’m sure that you’re forgiven already, sir, for it’s most kind of you to assist us when I know that society is constantly at your door.”
He beamed. “My dear, it is a pleasure to be of assistance to friends of Henry Parkstone. He and I were at Cambridge together and I flatter myself that I am his oldest friend. I trust that from this moment on I will be regarded as your friend also.”
She smiled, liking him. “I’m honored, sir.”
He patted her hand, still beaming. “Nonsense. But now, to work.” He turned back to Richard. “I will attend to all that we have agreed, sir, and in the unlikely event of there being any queries or problems, I will contact you straightaway.”
“Very well, Mr. Green.”
The two men shook hands and a moment later Charlotte and Richard emerged into the sunny square once more, where the landau was waiting.
Charlotte halted on the pavement, facing him. “Why did you want me to be there? I know that I hadn’t seen the house, but if that was your reason, why didn’t you simply say so? What are you up to?”
“A niece ain’t supposed to quiz her uncle!” he protested, grinning a little sheepishly. “All right, I admit to an ulterior motive.”
“What motive is that?”
“Clothes.”
She stared at him, “I beg your pardon?”
“Clothes. Or at least, your lack of them.” He took her hands, smiling into her puzzled eyes. “Charlotte Wyndham, I may have been away for five years, but I can still read you like a book. You’re fretting about your unfashionable wardrobe, aren’t you? Don’t deny it, I can see it in your eyes each time you’re with Sylvia. She looks bang up to the mark all the time, whereas you feel dowdy and unmodish. Am I right?”
She nodded. “Yes, I suppose you are.”
“Am I also right that that is the real reason why you hesitated about accepting Sir Maxim’s invitation?”
She looked quickly away. “Well, not exactly….”
“But it has a great deal to do with it, doesn’t it? Don’t deny it, Charlotte, for I know I’m correct. So, I’ve made it my business to find out what can be done about the situation in so short a time. In fact, I was out very early this morning, while you were still asleep. Actually it was something Sylvia said in passing that gave me the notion. I’ve heard all about the duel Sir Maxim had with Lord Westington, and it seems that his lordship is so displeased with his errant wife that he canceled a substantial order for a new wardrobe she had been expecting from Madame Forestier. I was so bold as to steal a gown from your room while you were asleep, and I took it to Madame’s premises in Oxford Street to see if by any good fortune you and Lady W. were the same size. You are; in fact, you are perfectly matched in that respect, and if you wish it, the whole wardrobe can be yours within the hour.”
Her breath caught. A whole wardrobe by Madame Forestier? Just as she had had at Kimber Park. Why, it was a dream come true! “Oh, Richard,” she breathed, her eyes shining, but then her delight faded and she bit her lip. “But it will cost a small fortune. No, I couldn’t possibly impose upon you to that degree.”
He still held her hands and now he squeezed her fingers. “Charlotte, when I wrote to you about returning from America, I said that I was in more than a position to return you and your mother to the status you had enjoyed in the past. I meant every word. I’m a very wealthy man, and the cost of a wardrobe from Madame Forestier is a drop in the ocean to me. I want you to be happy, and if a few fashionable rags will help achieve that, then I will be happy too. Now, then, do you want Lady Westington’s lost prizes or don’t you?”
She smiled. “Of course I want them.”
“Then it’s settled. We’ll go there straightaway.” He escorted her to the landau and instructed the coachman to drive to the couturiere’s premises almost opposite the Pantheon in Oxford Street.
It was a short drive, and Charlotte felt quite strange to be once again drawing up outside in a handsome carriage, and to be welcomed into the exclusive rooms by Adam, the dressmaker’s liveried black footman, who showed them both up the red-carpeted stairs to the rooms on the first floor where Madame Forestier herself waited to greet them.
The showroom was just as cluttered as Charlotte remembered, with a number of cheval glasses set at strategic points, and countless beautiful garments hanging from the picture rail. There were bolts of cloth, cards of lace, trimmings, and other fashionable bits and pieces scattered everywhere. Only one chair was left clear, and Richard was conducted to this.
The couturiere was French, as her name suggested, which was a little unusual, since it was quite the thing for English dressmakers to adopt French names. She was a petite person with an olive skin, and her dark hair was tugged back into a knot at the back of her head. Her eyes were the darkest of browns and her accent very heavy indeed. She wore gray taffeta that rustled almost as much as Mrs. White’s aprons crackled, and she used a rather heady scent that wafted over Charlotte in waves as she led her into an adjoining room to commence trying on the first garment.
For the next hour or more Charlotte was in the seventh heaven of delight as gown after gown was slipped over her. There were sheer muslins, sprigged, spotted, and spangled for evenings, soft lawns, delicate silks, rich taffetas, and brightly colored tartans, all as up-to-date as any lady of fashion could desire. The hems were short to reveal her ankles, and stiffened to make the skirts stand out in the A shape that had become all the rage this summer. The dressmaker also showed her pelisses, spencers, and mantles, and an array of millinery, bonnets, and hats to satisfy any need, and there were even shoes, little bottines, evening slippers, and ankle boots for every occasion imaginable. The wayward Lady Westington had evidently been most thorough about her new wardrobe, but it was to be Charlotte Wyndham who benefited.
She gazed at herself in the cheval glasses, watched by a smiling Richard as she came out, turning this way and then that to show each gown off to best advantage. Now the gown she had so painstakingly altered for the forthcoming ball could be set aside, for she had a breathtaking choice of dazzling ball gowns from which to choose. And the state opening of Waterloo Bridge could be enjoyed far more if one were clad in clothes perfect for the occasion, as were so many of the combinations of gowns and pelisses or spencers she had been shown today.
But it was the visit to Kimber Park the next morning that was of more immediate importance. She had already decided what she would wear: a particular cream muslin dress was the ideal choice. Made of very fine Indian cloth, sprigged with little flowers the identical shade of dark red as her hair, it had a dainty mock-Tudor ruff and full sleeves gathered at the wrists. Its hem was padded and deliciously stiff, and its waist very high and trimmed with dark-red satin ribbon. With it she would wear a wide-brimmed gypsy bonnet tied on with satin ribbons again of the same dark red; and if the weather was uncertain, there was a dark-red pelisse of a close-enough match to be more than satisfactory. If the weather was fine, then she would content herself with one particular cashmere shawl that had caught her eye, for it too was patterned in dark red. Yes, that was what she would wear, and in such togs she would feel so much more able to carry off the day.
She looked at herself in the mirror again. Carry off the day? Could she do that? Could she really push to the back of her mind all the things she had heard Max Talgarth accused of? She wanted to, she wanted to be able to ignore all that and simply enjoy herself.
Richard was glancing at his fob watch. “Charlotte, I realize that this is paradise to you, but we really should be on our way. Mrs. White’s luncheon will not wait an eternity.”
She smiled at him, twirling once more in the lilac-and-white silk evening dress she was wearing. “Forgive me, I hadn’t realized how long I was taking. I’ll go and change straightaway.” She hurried back into the little room where Madame Forestier’s assistant was waiting. The thought of putting on her old clothes again was not to be borne, and it was with great delight that she chose a frilled blue la
wn dress and white spencer in which to drive back to Henrietta Street.
As the assistant helped her to change for the last time, she could hear Richard and Madame Forestier in the showroom, settling the financial side of things and arranging for the entire wardrobe to be delivered. Suddenly the assistant gave a startled gasp, stopping what she was doing. Puzzled, Charlotte turned to see what was wrong. Her heart sank and her skin felt suddenly cold, for the door into the little changing room from the outer passage was open: Judith stood there, her green eyes ice cold. The dyed yellow plumes springing from her golden velvet hat streamed angrily as she jerked her head at the assistant to leave them. The assistant hastened to comply, scuttling out and closing the door behind her, leaving Charlotte and her enemy alone.
Judith’s yellow clothes were dazzling in the poorly lit room, and her skirts hissed a little as she came closer, her eyes glittering with that frozen dislike Charlotte knew so well from all the occasions in the past when they’d come face to face.
Charlotte raised her chin a little challengingly. “Yes, my lady?”
“No doubt these fripperies are for tomorrow. Oh, you think you’re so clever, don’t you? Well, let me warn you, Miss Wyndham, Max Talgarth belongs to me, and I’m not about to relinquish him to the likes of you. Go to Kimber Park tomorrow and you’ll be sorry. Is that clear?”
“You don’t frighten me, and since I have been invited by Sir Maxim, who is the owner of Kimber Park, and since you are his mistress, not his wife, I don’t see why I should take any notice at all of what you say.”
“Because your uncle has returned and brought his wealth with him, you think you are returned to favor, don’t you? You’re wrong, Miss Wyndham. The Wyndhams are nothing, and you are the least of them. Stay away from Max, and stay away from Kimber Park. Defy me and I’ll make you pay.” She turned and walked out, leaving the door open so that Charlotte could hear the swish-swish of her skirts.
Richard and the couturiere were approaching from the adjoining showroom, and Charlotte took a deep breath to steady herself. Hastily doing up the final buttons on the gown and donning the white spencer, she was tying on a bonnet and smiling as she bade them enter.
Madame Forestier was all smiles; indeed, she had had as excellent a morning as Charlotte, not only at last ridding herself of an expensive wardrobe that had seemed likely to remain on her hands indefinitely, but also acquiring a further lucrative order to clothe Mrs. Wyndham. The dressmaker was well-pleased with herself, promising to bring several items to the house in Henrietta Street for Mrs. Wyndham to inspect.
As the landau conveyed them back to the house, Charlotte tried not to think of Judith, but of her new clothes instead. It was as if she’d been reborn. She felt a little foolish for having taken such a delight in trying everything on, but she had enjoyed it all so much that even now she couldn’t stop smiling. She glanced at Richard. “I don’t know how to thank you for this.”
“Your happy smile and bright eyes are reward enough for me. You looked lovely in everything you tried on today, Charlotte, I don’t think you’ve any notion at all how beautiful you are.”
“Beautiful?” She gave a rueful laugh. “Now you’re being too flattering, for no one with a mouth as wide as mine—”
“That mouth gives you a smile quite beyond compare,” he interrupted gently. “You don’t do yourself justice, Charlotte. You’re a very lovely young woman, and I’m right when I say that Sir Maxim Talgarth admires you.”
She looked quickly out of the window and said nothing more.
When they reached the house, she went upstairs to put her new white spencer away in her wardrobe. Her glance fell on her manuscript, hidden away at the back; tomorrow she would be spending the day with the man who was the original of Rex Kylmerth…. Quickly she closed the wardrobe and hurried downstairs again, for her mother was more than a little cross that luncheon had been delayed for such a disgracefully long time, although she was mollified by the news of Madame Forestier’s impending visit.
As Charlotte neared the foot of the staircase, she paused, for the door to the kitchen had been left ajar and she could hear Mrs. White and Polly talking as they prepared to serve the meal.
“Well, now, Polly Jenkins,” the cook was saying, “and who was that fine lady I saw you talking with on the corner earlier?”
“Fine lady?” The maid’s reply was very guarded.
“Oh, don’t come the innocent with me, my girl, I saw you chitter-chattering away as if you had all the time in the world, when in fact you’d been far too long already purchasing those vegetables from the Oxford market. What was it all about, then, eh? Wanted you for her personal maid, did she?” This last was uttered with heavy sarcasm.
“No, of course she didn’t,” replied the maid, “for who’d want someone like me for a lady’s maid?”
“Who indeed?” agreed the cook dryly. “Well? Who was she?”
“I—I don’t know.”
“Well, whoever she was, she was a lady of rank, that’s for sure. Only someone very rich could have afforded clothes like that, all so beautifully matched in the same shade of yellow, and her carriage, so magnificent and so startling in the same color. Oh, yes, a lady of rank and of fashion, and she chose to halt her carriage to speak to the likes of you. What did she want?”
“Nothing.”
“Really,” declared the cook, “you must take me for a nitwit at times, Polly Jenkins. Do you honestly expect me to believe that she went to the trouble of stopping her carriage and addressing you so that she could say nothing?”
“She only wanted directions to Regent Street,” said the maid quickly, and more than a little lamely.
The cook gave an irritated sigh and said nothing more.
Charlotte remained where she was at the foot of the stairs. The lady in yellow with a yellow carriage could only be Judith Taynton, who most definitely knew the way to Regent Street and to every other thoroughfare of importance in London. Charlotte had to admit to sharing Mrs. White’s curiosity about the incident. Why, indeed, had Judith gone to the trouble of speaking to Polly? And why wasn’t Polly prepared to admit to what really happened?
Quite suddenly Charlotte recalled Judith’s words of warning at Madame Forestier’s: “Stay away from Max, and stay away from Kimber Park. Defy me and I’ll make you pay.”
Chapter Eleven
When it was almost time for Max to arrive the next morning, Mrs. Wyndham and Richard suddenly realized the impropriety of allowing Charlotte to spend so much time alone with him. To solve the problem, Mrs. Wyndham’s maid, Muriel, was hastily dragooned into service, being sent scuttling to her room on the top floor to change into her best clothes in order to be Charlotte’s chaperone for the day. Charlotte felt unaccountably embarrassed by all this. Had she been spending the day with any man other than Max Talgarth, she would have accepted that a chaperone was indeed necessary for the protection of her character, but somehow the fact that it was Max made a subtle difference. Perhaps, she reflected as she waited nervously in her room for him to arrive, it was because she knew he was bound to wonder if the maid was there as much because of all the rumors Sylvia had been spreading about him as because of the accepted need to at all times observe the proprieties where a lady’s reputation was concerned.
Last-minute doubts and uncertainties beset her, and her heart almost stopped when at last she heard his carriage outside. Looking discreetly from the window, she saw him alight. He wore a rust-colored coat and Bedford cord trousers. His neckcloth was of brown silk, and his waistcoat a similar shade. A tasseled cane swung in one gloved hand, while with the other he tipped his top hat back on his tangle of dark hair. She could see the scar on his cheek and the penetrating blue of his eyes.
He made no comment about Muriel’s presence; indeed, he hardly seemed to notice she was there. As he and Charlotte emerged from the house to climb into the waiting carriage, she was conscious of a sense of disappointment, for when he had seen her in her fashionable new clothes,
there had been nothing in his glance or words to signify that he was particularly aware of the change in her.
The carriage set off at a smart pace, with Muriel pressed into a corner seat as if she was trying to appear invisible. Very little was said as they left London behind and drove along the road that had once meant going home to Charlotte. She had not driven along it since leaving Kimber Park the previous year, and how different things were now. Then she and her mother had been in the depths of grief and despair, and the weather had been more than a match for their sorrow; now the future again looked bright, and the weather matched this optimism. The sun shone down from a cloudless sky, and the air was warm and still, with hardly a breath of breeze to stir the hedgerows as London faded farther and farther into the distance behind them.
Because the day was so warm, she had decided against wearing a bonnet and had chosen instead to follow the pretty fashion of draping a lace veil over the back of her head. A shawl rested lightly over her arms and she carried a marquise parasol tilted back to shade her head just a little from the sun while at the same time revealing her face. The steady pace of the carriage fluttered the parasol’s fringe and made her gown’s cream-and-dark-red muslin sleeves move softly against her arms. She could smell honeysuckle and wild roses in the hedgerows, and there was something almost lulling about the carriage’s gentle rhythm.
Judith’s threats and actions the day before were a great deal on her mind, and she wondered what Max would say if he knew about them. She wondered too exactly what it was that Judith would do now that her warning had been so deliberately disregarded. The ultimatum delivered at Madame Forestier’s had been unpleasant enough, but the secret approach to Polly was disturbing. What did she have in mind? And what was there anyway that Polly could possibly tell her? Charlotte took a deep, slow breath. Polly didn’t know anything, because there wasn’t anything to know. She tried to reassure herself with this, but somehow the deep unease continued.
