Deirdre and Desire

by Beaton, M. C.

  Lady Wentwater received them in the drawing-room. There were no signs of the fracas of the night before. All was dark and gloomy and quiet. Sunlight filtered through the fluttering ivy leaves which cloaked most of the windows, creating a subterranean effect.

  ‘I’m glad you’ve called,’ wheezed Lady Wentwater, her small currant eyes the only thing alive in the doughy mass of her face. ‘It’s gone so quiet since Guy left, although I should be glad of that. Why, the noise he and his friends made carousing till all hours! Not that I heard them, I sleep so sound, but my maid told me the servants thought an army had invaded, it got so bad, and at one point she thought she heard a woman’s voice, but that can’t be the case since there are no lightskirts around here, except Maggie Trumper, who everyone knows is no better than she should be. But Guy had told them all, the servants that is, not to interfere when he was entertaining, but my maid said at one point they heard one of the guests crying blue murder for help and it was as much as they could do to stop themselves from running in to see what the matter was.’

  ‘Mr Wentwater has gone?’ asked Deirdre, her lips feeling numb and stiff.

  ‘Yes. Off he went this morning. I’ll miss the lad but I wish he’d keep better company. Those friends of his! Such a mess. Faces all beaten up. But they will fight among themselves when they’re in their cups.’

  ‘Did he say anything about . . . about me?’ asked Deirdre in such a soft voice that Lady Wentwater had to strain to hear her.

  ‘Nary a word,’ said Lady Wentwater maliciously. ‘But he sent his regards to Miss Emily up at the Hall.’

  She turned and engaged Lord Harry in conversation while Deirdre sat in a daze.

  She was free! Free from public humiliation. By a series of strange coincidences, she had escaped. One of Lady Wentwater’s servants must have found the bandboxes and sent them to the vicarage without saying a word.

  What a miracle!

  She sat on in a daze of relief until it was time to go, barely noticing when Lady Wentwater offered her congratulations on their engagement.

  When they were driving sedately along the road again, Lord Harry’s first words hit her with the effect of a bucket of cold water.

  ‘I would like to be married very soon,’ he said.

  ‘Oh,’ faltered Deirdre. ‘I am afraid I rushed you into things. Perhaps you don’t want to marry me at all.’

  Indeed I do,’ he laughed. ‘So much so that if you were to go back on your word, I would sue you for breach of promise.’

  ‘Nonsense,’ said Deirdre, forcing a laugh. ‘Only ladies do that. Only a lady is allowed to sue.’

  ‘Then I shall make legal history,’ he said with great good humour.

  ‘We can at least wait until my sisters return from Paris,’ said Deirdre.

  ‘Oh, why?’

  ‘I would like them to be there when I am married.’

  ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘So long as you promise to marry me as soon as they return.’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said Deirdre. Something would arise to save her before then. For had not Minerva said they would not be returning until the following spring?

  ‘In that case, my love,’ he said easily, ‘I will take myself off to Town today. I have trespassed on your family’s good nature long enough.’

  He reined in his horses at a quiet bend in the road and kissed her gently and passionlessly. ‘You will not break your promise?’ he said, his voice unusually serious.

  She looked up into his clear blue eyes, childlike, innocent, candid eyes, and realized there was no escape.

  ‘No, I will not break my promise,’ she said.

  ‘Remember,’ he said lightly as he set his team in motion again, ‘should I not be wed when my uncle dies, then I inherit nothing.’

  ‘Where does the money go? I mean who inherits it?’ asked Deirdre, although she barely heard the answer since she was still hoping that some miracle would happen so that she need not be kept to her promise.

  ‘Oh, some distant relative. Very unpleasant. Silas Dubois.’

  They drove on in silence.

  ‘Hey, what’s this?’ asked Lord Harry cheerfully. ‘Your home is all a-bustle.’

  The short driveway was blocked by two magnificent travelling carriages. Liveried servants were bustling here and there.

  The door of the vicarage flew open.

  Minerva and Annabelle stood on the step, their arms held out in welcome. Deirdre’s older sisters had come home.

  So she would need to marry Lord Harry Desire.

  She despised the man. Oh, he was pleasant enough. But she, Deirdre Armitage, who had prided herself on being the most intelligent of the sisters, was to be tied for life to a handsome fool.

  Minerva must do something. Minerva had always been able to solve any problem.

  But two minutes of her sisters’ company shattered her hopes. They were delighted with her choice of husband. They thought Lord Harry was the finest young man on the London scene. Her elegant brothers-in-law, the Marquess of Brabington and Lord Sylvester Comfrey, had also emerged from the vicarage and were thumping Lord Harry on the back and welcoming him to the family.

  The vicar stood behind a curtain in the study, watching Deirdre’s face.

  She looked miserable. She looked trapped.

  He cursed himself. Despite his fears, Lord Sylvester had come across with a hefty sum of money and without even one mumble of reproach.

  So there had been no need to sacrifice his daughter.

  But she had promised to marry the man.

  So what was he to do?

  SIX

  The Armitage girls were becoming famous for good marriages and short engagements.

  In the months preceding her wedding, Deirdre saw much of her two elder sisters and had ample opportunity to unburden herself.

  But Annabelle and Minerva had become so fashionable, so mondaine, that to confide her infatuation for Guy seemed impossible. The six sisters were all rivals in a way. Annabelle had grown fonder of Minerva than she had ever been, but the old rivalry was still there. Minerva had produced a son, a lusty, adorable baby boy, while Annabelle, as yet, showed no signs of blessing her husband with an heir. And so she envied Minerva and was apt to sympathize with Minerva overmuch about the sad existence of a mother being kept away from the joys of society by a small baby – carefully ignoring Minerva’s advantages of having a nanny, a wet-nurse, and a large staff of adoring servants.

  Deirdre in her turn had always been jealous of Annabelle’s glorious golden beauty. She was also jealous of Minerva’s stately manner. But she had always consoled herself with the fact that she, Deirdre, was the brains of the Armitage family? How could The Brains confess to such a piece of stupidity. How could she say, ‘I fell in love with a villain, and only agreed to marry Lord Harry to get myself out of a humiliating mess’?

  Then not marrying Lord Harry meant staying at home with Papa, and Deirdre still detested the vicar and considered hirn the worst of men: vulgar, posturing and bullying.

  Deirdre was much in Town, as her two elder sisters threw themselves enthusiastically into the arrangements for the wedding.

  But a visit to Lord Harry’s family was impending and Deirdre knew she not put it off any longer. Lord Harry’s father, the Earl of Carchester, had estates to the north of London.

  Perhaps Lord Harry, sensing her reluctance, had decided that more than an afternoon’s visit would be too much for her, or perhaps it was because a longer visit would entail inviting the rest of the Armitages, but it transpired that he and Deirdre would call on the Earl of Carchester and family for tea, and return to London the same day.

  Deirdre was dreading the visit. She imagined a whole family of Lord Harrys, stupid, amiable, dressed to perfection.

  She had not been alone with him since Hopeworth. He had seemed amazingly content to see her in the company of others, and although there were occasions when he could have contrived to see her alone, he did not make use of them.

  Deird
re had rehearsed a whole series of conversations with which to while away the time on the journey. Silence was too intimate a thing.

  She dreaded his making any more of those warm advances. Sometimes, she imagined herself struggling to protect her virtue in some quiet lane, which showed the frantic state of Deirdre’s mind that she could even consider such an elegant and languid man as Lord Harry Desire wishing to deflower her under the eyes of two footmen at a damp roadside when he could have her in a warm bed in only a few months’ time.

  So it was with great relief and surprise that Deirdre found out at the last moment that Lady Godolphin was to accompany them.

  Deirdre was dressed in a gown of jaconet muslin made with a gored bodice finished with a tucker of fine embroidery. Over it, she wore a cambric pelisse with long sleeves falling over her hands. A bonnet of white sarsnet with raised spots, bound and trimmed with Danish blue satin, ornamented her head.

  Lady Godolphin was also dressed in her finest – or what she considered her finest. Because of the youthful years of her lover, Mr Anstey, Lady Godolphin had blossomed out in girlish fashions.

  Her muslin gown was a miracle of pink and white gores and tucks and flounces. Her flaxen wig gleamed like the sun above, and rouge burnished her withered cheeks like the autumn russet bloom on fallen crab apples.

  It was embarrassing to Deirdre to find out that Lady Godolphin’s search for youth did not stop at her appearance. She tittered and giggled and slapped Lord Harry’s wrist with her fan and referred to herself and Deirdre as ‘we girls’.

  Lord Harry smiled vaguely at all Lady Godolphin’s sallies and then fell asleep in a corner of the carriage.

  They were using his travelling carriage. The day was cold and brisk but Deirdre longed to open one of the windows since Lady Godolphin’s perfume was worse than the Reverend Armitage’s, being a mixture of musk, lavender water, rose water, Joppa Soap, sweat, garlic, and Something That a Lady Does Not Talk About.

  ‘It’s all very romantical,’ sighed Lady Godolphin, smiling on the sleeping Lord Harry. ‘Such a beautiful young man. Ain’t got much in his cock-loft, but then that’s all to the good. He has got good legs.’

  Deirdre blushed and turned her head away.

  ‘I said, his legs are good,’ went on Lady Godolphin cheerfully. ‘Can’t abide a man with skinny legs. Now, Mr Anstey ain’t well-endowed in that direction. Arthur has lovely legs, but he’s so old.’

  ‘Do you mean Colonel Brian?’ asked Deirdre faintly.

  ‘Yes. Him. I told him I didn’t want to be calloused, but that we were obviously not meant for each other. Of course . . . well!’

  Lady Godolphin’s eyes were bulging from her head as she stared out of the carriage window. The horses had slowed down as they negotiated the steep slope of Highgate Hill. Deirdre leaned forwards to see what had caught Lady Godolphin’s attention.

  Outside a hostelry on a rustic bench in the chilly sunlight sat Mr Anstey and Lady Chester – the octogenarian Lady Chester.

  Lady Godolphin leaned back quickly, biting her lips. ‘No, I won’t go and ask him what he’s doing,’ she said aloud, although obviously talking to herself. ‘It’s a chance redervows. He’s sorry for the poor old bat, that’s all.’

  She began to fan herself vigorously, looking the picture of misery.

  Deirdre felt dreadfully embarrassed and wished Lord Harry would wake up. A large tear rolled down Lady Godolphin’s cheek, turning red as it rolled down through a patch of rouge.

  Picking up her parasol, Deirdre stabbed Lord Harry in one of his delicious legs.

  ‘Ouch!’ said his lordship, rubbing his leg. His summer-blue gaze came to rest on Lady Godolphin’s distressed face.

  ‘You should not become so exercised, ma’am,’ he said gently. ‘It quite ruins your unique beauty. What is wrong?’

  ‘I am a trifle sick from the motion of the carriage,’ said Lady Godolphin, looking woebegone.

  He pulled a silver vinaigrette from out of his pocket and handed it to her.

  ‘So I am not the only one who is too cowardly to talk of my folly and humiliation,’ thought Deirdre.

  She gave Lady Godolphin’s hand a squeeze, her own eyes filling with sympathetic tears. Did Guy really hate her so much? Oh, if only by some miracle he would appear again and tell her he had been insane with drink and that he was dying with love for her! Sometimes the weight of shame seemed too much to bear.

  She often started from her dreams with the sound of his jeering voice in her ears.

  Lord Harry looked hopefully at Lady Godolphin as if waiting for something, but she soon sniffled herself into silence and then nodded off.

  Deirdre looked out of the window, hoping he had not noticed her own distress.

  To her relief, he went to sleep again.

  She fell to wondering about his family. He had said he had three younger brothers and two little sisters. His brothers were called William, Paul and Jonathan. The girls, Amy and Elizabeth. The brothers were not married. That made it all very unnerving. Perhaps they would think Lord Harry had been trapped and would talk him out of marrying her – which would serve her ends but be a very uncomfortable operation all the same.

  In her mind’s eye, she could see them now, all lined up to meet her; all beautifully dressed, exquisitely mannered, and impenetrably stupid.

  At last, the carriage turned into a driveway and began to bowl along a well-kept road through pretty parkland.

  The name of the Earl of Carchester’s residence was Archer Hall. Deirdre wondered whether Archer was an old family name.

  Archer Hall turned out to be a fairly modern edifice, built only about sixty years before when aristocratic families had started moving their saloons and drawing-rooms from the first floor to the ground floor and putting in french windows, the better to enjoy the sylvan beauties of the countryside.

  Clouds covered the sun as they swept around under the portico and an icy wind rattled the bare branches of the trees. A mournful, moulting peacock screamed harshly at them before it turned and walked away.

  Lord Harry came as neatly and quickly awake as he had fallen asleep. Lady Godolphin rallied bravely as she was helped down from the carriage, although she looked as if she would like to have a good cry.

  Some ten minutes later, Deirdre was studying the Carchester family and searching their faces in vain for some resemblance to Lord Harry.

  They were all remarkably dark and squat and ugly. The Countess of Carchester, Lord Harry’s mother, was a massive, brooding woman with a heavy moustache and a sallow complexion. Her rather wet brown eyes surveyed her eldest son and his fiancée with suspicion. Deirdre was to learn later that the Countess always looked like that.

  His father, the earl, was also squat and sallow, but where his wife was generously endowed with hair in all the wrong places, he had none in the right places, being as bald as a coot.

  Lord Harry’s three brothers, and two ‘little’ sisters – they were more or less the same age as Deirdre – were all squat and dark, like so many trolls.

  What they lacked in looks, they made up for in exuberance, laughing loudly at family jokes which were unintelligible to the outsider.

  They made no effort to engage Deirdre in conversation. The whole afternoon’s conversation revolved around when Uncle Jeremy would die and leave his money bags to Harry. Lord Harry’s sisters did seem, at one point, to become aware of Deirdre’s presence by agreeing it was a shame poor Harry had to marry to get the money.

  Deirdre, whose amour propre had been pretty much wrecked by Guy Wenrwater, was now made to feel a positive dowd by the Carchesters. Without precisely saying so, Lord Harry’s family all seemed to consider it a marriage of convenience. They seemed to quite hero-worship this one Adonis in their ugly brood and perhaps would not have considered any female good enough for their beautiful brother.

  But Deirdre felt herself growing smaller and uglier by the minute, and tried to console herself with a fantasy that a party of simply dashing youn
g men would arrive, and each and every one of them would promptly fall head over heels in love with her.

  Time is a strange thing. Sometimes it seems to race along and sometimes it seems to stand still. Deirdre was quite convinced a whole hour had passed and nearly burst into tears when she realized she had only been sitting enduring the company of her future in-laws for ten minutes.

  Lady Godolphin was out of sorts. She refused tea and demanded brandy. She insisted on giving Lady Carchester a recipe for a depilatory which used an incredible amount of slaked lime.

  Lady Godolphin seemed fascinated by the Countess’s moustache and kept returning to the subject. She told a story of how the Earl of Albemarle, ambassador extraordinary to Paris in 1752, had managed to persuade a ‘celebrated artist’ to cross over to England and pay a professional call on the Duchess of Newcastle, wife of the Secretary of State. This barber successfully shaved her Grace’s upper lip. ‘The performance lasted but one minute and three seconds.’ The Duke was so pleased that he settled four hundred pounds a year on the Frenchman for life.

  Then she went on to recommend another depilatory by Marcus Hyams – ‘a composition for shaving without the use of razor, soap or water.’

  Most of this fell on stony ground since Lady Godolphin did not say ‘depilatory’ but ‘debilatory’ and confusion was added to confusion when the earl decided she was talking about aids to sexual potency and silenced her by saying it was not a fit subject for the drawing-room.

  At last it was time to leave.

  Lord Harry took casual but affectionate farewell of his doting and horrible family. Deirdre curtsied low, hoping they had all taken her in such dislike that they would forbid the marriage.

  But, on the other hand, if they did, she would have to return home. Impossible to suggest to Annabelle and Minerva that she come to live with one of them since she could not stand père Armitage. Minerva would be shocked to the depths of her Christian soul, and Annabelle would laugh and tell her she was being ridiculous.

  Lady Godolphin grumbled on about the strange and incalculable ways of men to an uncomprehending but sympathetic Lord Harry and Deirdre affected to fall asleep. Soon the act became reality and she dozed off.