Danse De La Folie

by Sherwood Smith

  On the other side of the theater, Devereaux listened to Brummel’s sallies with only half an ear. ”He might, were he inclined toward wit, term that style ‘A Night at the Opera’ for really it belongs on the stage,” Brummel said in an undertone.

  Everyone uttered a well-bred laugh at the expense of the Prince Regent and his lamentable taste in waistcoats, as the curtain rose.

  Mr. Devereaux had not missed the sudden smile followed by the equally sudden stiffening of self-consciousness on Lady Kitty’s part (for so he found himself thinking of her, though he would never trespass out loud), that in its turn led to the quick glance at his cousin. Her behavior had all the air of second thoughts, as if someone had said something disobliging to her.

  Clarissa? No, that was not in her nature. And yet... he recalled remarks he’d let fall over the years, in particular judgments both harsh and toplofty of rural misses, especially those who employed their wiles to entrap him. These words had been those of a young man who had grown up accustomed to privilege and praise. He had since repented of his callowness, but Clarissa might, in good conscience, have warned her friend off to protect her. He should be grateful. He should let be.

  And yet he knew he couldn’t permit Lady Kitty to return home believing him to be a coxcomb.

  The remainder of the opera was as good as the beginning, for those who attended to it.

  As soon as the final curtain came down, Lord Wilburfolde said, “I am informed by my parent, whose tastes can be relied upon for delicacy and moral rightness, that the farces that usually follow were unfit to be seen by young ladies. Shall we call for the coach?”

  Lady Chadwick had been looking forward to this very thing. She said with more animation than she usually displayed, “I believe I may be trusted to determine what is unfit for my daughters and our guest.”

  Lord Wilburfolde looked disconcerted. “My apologies, Lady Chadwick. I myself have never witnessed any of the entertainments in question, for my estimable parent has been very careful about my education. But if you have no objections, then I must, in politeness, abide by your decision.” And he sat back, uncomfortably aware that he had failed in his duty—and yet he was curious.

  The farce engendered gusts of laughter from the audience. Lord Wilburfolde was startled into mirth by an unexpected pun or two, followed instantly by guilt. His mother considered puns vulgar at any time, no matter how innocent. But then he had also never heard his mother laugh.

  When the evening was over, he walked out in a brown study, partly resentful that he had been put into this position — for he knew what his mother would say — but partly bewildered, because he had never before heard Clarissa laugh until now. The oddest part of it was that she had laughed at jokes he considered indelicate, whereas the puns that had so entertained him had only raised a smile. He did not know what to make of it.

  James had the coachman leave Lord Wilburfolde at his lodging first. Thus he soon sat down to his desk to report on the evening to his mother like a dutiful son.

  The others began to talk the moment he left the coach. When Kitty and Amelia got involved in discussing the singers, the marquess turned to Clarissa to say quietly, “I wish to thank you on my sister’s behalf. I have never seen her so happy, and she keeps telling me that it is all due to you.”

  Clarissa stammered a disjointed disclaimer.

  “Lord Arden has been introducing us around,” he continued, “and thus we have received an invitation to Lady Castlereagh’s rout al fresco Tuesday next. If his lordship does not claim all your dances, may I ask for one?”

  She knew that she should say no. But being angry with herself had resulted in her present position. She was not yet married. Until she was, she would make precious memories, which would suffice for a lifetime.

  “Yes, thank you,” she said.

  TWENTY-TWO

  The marquess had called twice upon Lucretia, first to be told that she was elsewhere, and then that she was unwell.

  Lady Bouldeston informed her eldest daughter that when the gentleman called again, she would neither be away nor unwell. “Take care what you are about,” she warned Lucretia. “You have treated St. Tarval as if he were in your pocket, and while I applaud your desire to make a better marriage, you would do well not to drive him completely off.”

  “Of course I can do better.” Lucretia tossed her head, thinking of Lucasta and her stupid Mr. Aston.

  “I should hope you can do better, but Lucretia, the truth is that you have not done so. And though I had higher hopes for you, St. Tarval is a very good title. A marchioness is a marchioness.”

  “Except what is the use of being a marchioness if one is stuck forever in a ramshackle house? There would be no London—I am certain he’s only here to see his sister. He is also dull. Has not a thing to say beyond his horses and pigs and canals, or worse, books.”

  Lady Bouldeston shrugged. “These airs and graces are all very well for those who can afford them. We cannot. If your sister gains her poet, this will be the last year we will spend in Mount Street. At least until your father’s affairs come about. You have had four years of London. Perhaps you would do better in our own neighborhood, if you cannot find someone to suit. There is always the vicar’s brother, and the squire’s son.”

  Lucretia fled to her room, sobbing in fury. How selfish they all were—Lucasta most of all! What business did she have, throwing herself at the first fool who looked back at her? She was barely eighteen!

  Lucretia scowled and dried her eyes. Since she had no allies, she must simply form better plans, and exert herself to carry them through. Titles! What use were they without beautiful town houses and wealth to match? Even better, when the man who offered all these things was counted among society’s leaders?

  Tears burned her eyes at the memory of Mr. Devereaux at the opera last night, sitting in the box surrounded by everyone who was important. Lucretia could see herself, ever so clearly, seated next to him, every eye in the place comparing his height and breadth of shoulder to herself all in the palest rose. For it must be rose; she could hear the admiring whispers, “Brummel himself told her she should wear nothing else. It is above all things romantical, but no more romantical than the circumstances of their marriage...”

  She just had to arrange those circumstances.

  Yes, and that brought to mind another troubling observation. He had smiled once, not at any of the important people in his box, but at someone in the boxes on the other side of the theater, above where the Bouldestons were sitting.

  She’d had to resort to subterfuge in order to discover that the box directly above her contained none other than Lady Chadwick and her party.

  Lucretia flung her fan down in anger. Perhaps Catherine was trying to draw attention to herself in a desperate attempt to catch his attention? But his smile had not been the mirth one exhibits at a vulgar or preposterous display.

  She was brooding about that when the door knocker sounded below. Lucretia ran to the door and listened. When she heard Carlisle’s voice asking for her, and her mother’s pointed, “She is upstairs in the young ladies’ parlor,” she had time to arrange herself accordingly, her toes just peeping out from under her hem, a piece of delicate sewing that she kept for these occasions in her lap.

  The fiction of the young ladies’ parlor was an agreed-on thing: the upstairs room served them all as occasion warranted. She would not be interrupted, alas. Mama would see to that.

  So she just had to see to it that Carlisle could not cry off.

  St Tarval’s heart sank when Lady Bouldeston sent him upstairs. He knew he had to end this pretence with Lucretia, but he had hoped to put it off. Or that she would be merciful and end it for him, preferably with an advertisement of her coming marriage to someone else, inserted into the newspaper.

  Lucretia was alone. She gave a false little start of surprise, and he suppressed a spurt of irritation at this habit of hers, and wondered if he could bear a lifetime of that little round mouth and the girli
sh “Oh!”

  He closed off that thought. These little tricks must be the way young ladies were trained to act. No doubt Kitty would gain similar habits. Though he’d never seen anything like that from Clarissa in those brief days at Tarval Hall...

  “Lucretia,” he said. “I hope I see you well.”

  “Vastly, I assure you. And you are looking so well that I need not ask. A new coat? May I ask, did you come into a legacy?”

  “No, merely a piece of business ended better than expected, and so Ned and I thought to visit Kitty in town. I hoped to have a few moments of privacy with you.”

  She began, “You know Mama is very strict with us girls, and reposes the greatest trust in us...”

  A satiric glance reminded her of that day in the garden, which it had taken her an entire summer to engineer. She blushed, turned her head, and daubed at her eyes with her handkerchief, giving her eyelids a scrub or two to help them pinken.

  Carlisle said, “Lucretia, we were sixteen, and can, I think, be forgiven the boy-and-girl gesture of affection. Nobody knows about it but us. The truth is, you do not really want to marry me, do you?”

  Lucretia pressed the handkerchief to her eyes, and gave a shuddering sob.

  “Lucretia...”

  “How could you say that?” she demanded, and then, “Catherine has maligned me to you. Is that it?”

  “What? Where did you get that idea?”

  His genuine astonishment, followed by the tone of exasperation made it clear that this tack, which had sounded so good in her head, was entirely wrong.

  He went on, “You yourself said that you have so many interested suitors, I naturally thought—”

  She quickly brought out her next line. “I have remained constant, but you wish to throw me over for Another?”

  This was so near the truth that he was silenced.

  She missed the regret tightening his face as her lacy handkerchief was still hiding her eyes, which remained stubbornly dry. So she let out a beautifully modulated wail of anguish, and fled from the room, leaving him to make his excuses as best he might, and depart with a choking sense of failure.

  o0o

  Kitty entered the parlor to discover Amelia bent over an old, dusty book.

  “What is that, Amelia?”

  “I can make neither heads nor tails of it.” Amelia sighed. “Oh, why am I so stupid?”

  “What are you trying to read, pray?”

  “It is this play. Mr. DuLac said it is about Shylock, and toleration, but I can make no sense of these words. However, there is not a thing about the evils of liquor.”

  Kitty held her breath so she would not laugh, then said with care, “Did you mean temperance?”

  “No, that is Lord Wilburfolde’s word,” Amelia declared in disgust. “I’ve heard it a thousand times. Toleration, Mr. DuLac was speaking of, and he said that Shakespeare argued for it these two hundred years ago, and so I got down the plays, but I cannot understand a word.”

  “Here, let me help you. As it happens, I had to tutor Ned in this very one, when he was at Eton, and you know, I had nothing else to do, so I happen to be fairly versed in Shakespeare.”

  “And yet you are so very fashionable,” Amelia said wonderingly.

  Kitty smiled, and gave Amelia credit for the true intent of the compliment. “So let us begin with the story of the play...”

  They were still at it when Lady Chadwick sent Eliza up to fetch them. “Remember, you are to go to the Pantheon Bazaar to shop for the duke’s masquerade?” Eliza plopped on the sofa, scowling. “I should so love to attend a masquerade. Only who gives them anymore?”

  “The Duchess of Norcaster, silly,” Amelia said, setting the book aside. “Thank you, Lady Kitty. It is beginning to make sense, and you know, it isn’t altogether horrid, in parts.”

  Lord Chadwick, happening to pass by on his way downstairs to take his leave for his club, overheard this remark, and was puzzled enough to put a question to his wife.

  “What is Amelia doing that she expected to be horrid?”

  “Nothing less than reading Shakespeare.”

  “What?”

  “Lady Kitty is helping her to it. What’s more, she seems to be taking some of it in. Which is more than I ever got her to do with that succession of governesses.”

  “Hey day,” Lord Chadwick exclaimed in wonderment, as he picked up his hat. Then he bethought himself of another extraordinary circumstance, and said, “Would this be owing to that young parson she was making eyes at in church the other day?”

  “Mr. DuLac? I believe so.”

  “My daughter, chasing a parson?” He shook his head. “If she did not look like the rest of ’em…”

  Lady Chadwick caught his meaning, and gave a scandalized laugh; though she dearly loved a flirtation, she had never ventured beyond, a fact of which he was well aware, and so his joke remained just that.

  She sent a quick glance at the door to make certain the younger girls had not been by, and said, “Mr. DuLac comes of an excellent family, and as Clarissa said to me just now, anyone who can get Amelia to look inside a book cannot be discounted as a possible husband.”

  Lord Chadwick grabbed his gloves, shaking his head as he descended the steps.

  Before long the ladies were on their way to the bazaar in order to get ideas for their masquerade costumes. “Only the dull will wear dominos,” Amelia stated, not knowing that Lord Wilburfolde had faithfully relayed his mother’s preferences for setting an example of taste and breeding with the wearing of dominos in a subdued color. “I think I will be beautiful and tragic as Mary Stuart, in white lace, with a red ribbon round my neck.”

  “You will be taken for Marie Antoinette,” Clarissa said. “The poor thing having been guillotined scarce years ago, people are bound to think of her first.”

  “I do not want to be Marie Antoinette, for that requires a great wig, and one of those hideous gowns like in the pictures at your Grandmother Norcaster’s, with the skirt wider than a door. And that horrid white powder, like the old people wear.”

  “What would you like to be?” Kitty asked Clarissa.

  “I have not thought about it,” Clarissa said untruthfully. She knew that she ought to do what Lord Wilburfolde asked. But she wanted to order an extravagant costume. Something beautiful and romantic... so that someone would see it.

  She would not permit herself to name the Someone.

  She was still trying not to think of Someone when the family departed for Lady Castlereagh’s rout, and found Lord Wilburfolde awaiting them, full of anxious little worries for protecting Clarissa’s health.

  The Castlereaghs’ gardens were lit by quantities of decorated lamps, and pretty fairy lights floating in the ponds. Guests drifted in and out of the large, golden-lit house, the soft air of late spring carrying the sounds of laughter, and of violins scraping.

  Everyone of the first rank was there, and a great many who weren’t.

  Lady Bouldeston was not in Lady Castlereagh’s circles, but Lucretia had foreseen that, begging and flattering her friend Sophia Fordham, who was connected to the hostess, for an invitation. Miss Fordham was sufficiently intrigued by the prospect of Lucretia’s intentions to comply.

  From the very first it appeared her expectations would be met, for Lucretia sought her out, then said, “Oh my dear Miss Fordham, I am in your debt forever. But to be in this company, it makes me so very shy, I must look out the quietest and most out-of-the-way corner.”

  Having said this, she proceeded to tiptoe through the entire house, scanning thoroughly. Miss Fordham had a silent wager going with herself that Mr. Devereaux was the target. Sure enough, she spotted him seated with the Earl of Chatham, Pitt’s brother, and Lords Delamere, Apsley, and Malvers. The latter’s brother, the elegant Mr. Pierrepont, was in the middle of retailing the latest anecdote of Mr. Brummel.

  “Here is a good place, away from the hideous press,” Lucretia declared, sitting down as near to them as she could get.

&
nbsp; Miss Fordham hid her amusement. “Are you not afraid of drawing attention from that party of gentlemen?”

  “I pay no heed to them. It is giving them too much notice,” Lucretia declared with a toss of her head.

  Miss Fordham wondered how Lucretia was going to gain the attention of the gentlemen. Even if she didn’t capture that of Mr. Devereaux, there were several rich and single lords here. And she had no objection to Lucretia Bouldeston making a fool of herself. Would she not appear the better by comparison?

  But before either of them could execute these amiable plans, Lady Castlereagh appeared from the other direction, and confronted the gentlemen. “It is too bad of you to hide here,” she scolded, “when we are entirely in want of partners in the other room. Come! Do your duty, or I shall bring the dancers out here.”

  The gentlemen complied with a laugh and a compliment. Miss Fordham counted to herself, and had scarcely reached thirty before Miss Bouldeston began to quarrel with her place. It was too cold—too dark—there might be insects. She could not hear the music, and no one was more partial to excellent music than she.

  They reached the ballroom as a dance was ending. Across the room, the Chadwick party had arrived, and Mr. Devereaux and his neighbor Lord Arden paused to talk to them. Miss Fordham was too busy watching Lucretia to notice Mr. Devereaux’s manner as he greeted the newcomers. But Lucretia watched as the gentleman performed his bows. Was there a significant pause, a significant smile, for Catherine?

  It couldn’t be—and yet there was Catherine grinning up at him in the most vulgar manner, and dressed so ostentatiously in silver gauze with green trim. She probably thought it brought out the color of her eyes.

  Lucretia was thoroughly disgusted. She could tell others that he laughed at Catherine—she could tell herself that—but she could not be certain it was true, and she had to be certain.

  She walked in that direction, catching their voices as Amelia Harlowe was saying, “... already promised this dance.”