Deception (Daughters of Mannerling 3)

by M C Beaton

  Lord Burfield had remarked the startling likeness of the Beverley twins, and yet felt he would be able to tell Abigail from Rachel quite easily. Abigail had the more dominating personality. Rachel was quieter, more subdued, quite shy.

  He found Prudence a pleasant sort of lady, just the sort he ought to marry. She would run his home well, and she was past the first blush of youth and would therefore be more sensible than any flighty young girl.

  He had not really meant to ask Abigail for the supper dance but somehow he found himself doing just that. He performed a country dance with her, noticing how light and graceful she was. When he led her to the supper room, she seemed very much at ease with him, and that caused him a slight feeling of pique. He wondered what it would take to make Miss Abigail Beverley aware of him as a man.

  When they had been served with food and wine, Abigail asked, ‘Did you leave the army before the start of the Peninsular Wars?’

  ‘No, I served there as well.’

  ‘Is there a great deal of hardship for such as you, marching so long and fighting so hard?’

  ‘It varies, Miss Abigail. Sometimes it was hard to find a dry place to pass the night. I remember when a Colonel Freemantle was sent ahead during the retreat of the army from Burgos to find accommodation for Wellington himself. All he could find was a simple hut. He had a fire lit and then scrawled a message on the door that the hut was reserved for Wellington, but when he returned later to the hut, he found an officer warming himself by the fire and refusing to move, “not even for Wellington, not even for Old Nick himself.” The officer, however, moved when he was threatened with arrest. The story was repeated at White’s, where our celebrated Beau Brummel exclaimed to Freemantle, “If I had been in your place, Freemantle, I should have rung the bell and had the fellow kicked downstairs by the servants,” which shows how little some of our dandies know about campaigning. But tell me something of yourself, Miss Abigail. Do you go to London?’

  ‘I shall never see London again,’ said Abigail gloomily. ‘We used to go when Isabella was making her come-out and I loved the theatres and plays, the parks and the people. It must be fine to be able to visit London, particularly in the winter. The nights are so long and dark, and we have to be abed so early.’

  ‘And why is that?’

  ‘To save candles.’ Abigail bit her lip and blushed, cursing her mother’s parsimony in her heart. What would he think of a family who saved candles like the veriest peasant?

  ‘I saw a very good performance of Falstaff when I was last in London,’ he said quickly. ‘Kean was playing him and was quite brilliant. He caught the finest shades of the character.’

  ‘I feel some actors forget that Falstaff, although a man of vulgar soul, is still by habit and inclination a practised courtier,’ said Abigail eagerly, ‘and the coarseness he often assumes in the prince’s company is at least as much intentional acting, employed by him to amuse the prince, as to gratify his own humour.’

  ‘You have the right of it,’ said Lord Burfield, signailing to a footman to pour more wine for them. ‘The way Kean portrayed him, at first you see a facetious man, ludicrously fat, but a man of dignified and gentlemanlike air, always a joker, it is true, but good ton. In the second stage, he allows himself to take all sorts of freedoms but with every care to exalt the prince and to assume only the privilege of a court fool who apparently may say all that comes into his head. In the last stage, we see Falstaff in complete ‘negligé’, after he has thrown off all regard to good appearances, and yet he still remains original and excites more laughter than disgust. Shakespeare’s genius never fails to amaze me. As Sir Walter Scott so prettily puts it, “I can only compare Shakespeare with that man in the Arabian Nights who has the power of passing into any body with ease, and imitating its feelings and actions.”

  ‘But back to the play. It concluded with a melodrama in which a large Newfoundland dog really acted admirably. He defended a banner for a long time, pursued by the enemy, and afterwards came on the stage wounded, lame and bleeding, and died in the most masterly manner, with a last wag of his tail, which was really full of genius.’

  ‘The dog did not really die?’ asked Abigail anxiously.

  ‘No, that animal was as fine an actor as Kean. Besides, the audience would not have minded a human being, or a bear or a bull actually dying on the stage, but not a dog like that.’

  ‘How exciting and wonderful it all sounds,’ said Abigail wistfully. ‘Miss Trumble reads us the plays of Shakespeare and we often act the parts, but it is not the same as seeing one. Do you have a busy social life in London?’

  ‘I do what everyone does,’ said Lord Burfield, meaning every man in society. ‘I rise late, read three or four newspapers at breakfast. I look in my visiting book to see what calls I have to pay, and either drive to pay them in my curricle, or ride. At this time of year, I am sometimes startled by beauty even in dingy London. The struggle of the blood-red sun with the winter fogs can often produce wild and singular effects of light. I return when it is dark, work a little at my papers, dress for dinner, which is now at seven or eight, and then usually spend the evening at the theatre or at some small party or rout, but usually I avoid routs. One hardly finds standing room and is pushed and pulled in a hothouse atmosphere. But small parties are not very enlivening either. There is no general conversation. Each gentleman singles out the lady of his choice and talks to her all evening. Everyone talks French “tant bien que mal,” but this annoys the ladies after a time and any gentleman who sticks to English can be sure of a good reception.’

  ‘And do you often find a lady who pleases you enough to sit with her all evening?’ asked Abigail, her motive for asking the question owing all to curiosity and none to flirtation.

  He smiled into her eyes, ‘Not until this very night, Miss Abigail.’

  The compliment was insincere, but then so were most of the compliments bandied about society. Seeing the little flicker of disappointment in him in her large blue eyes, he was about to try to reclaim her good opinion when he realized the lady on his other side was trying to catch his attention. He turned reluctantly towards her. Abigail turned her attention to the gentleman on her other side and appeared, thought Lord Burfield a little sourly, to be keeping him well amused.

  From across the room, Prudence flirted and charmed her companion while, from under her lashes, she covertly watched Lord Burfield and felt a sense of relief when he finally turned away to speak to the lady on his other side. She had not liked the way that he and Abigail Beverley had been talking. She could not hear a word they had been saying, but she sensed a rapport between them.

  Lord Burfield had danced two whole dances with her and therefore could not ask for another. Then she remembered that she and her parents were supposed to stay with Lady Evans only until after the ball. Lord Burfield was staying longer. She must get her parents to suggest they stay longer themselves. She bit her lip. Lord Burfield had danced with Abigail and had taken her in to supper. Therefore he would call on her the following day to pay his respects. In town, gentlemen often sent a servant with a card instead. But this was the country.

  There must be some way she could stop him from going. But what? If she locked him in his room, all he had to do was to ring the bell or shout for the servants. Her mother had a bottle of laudanum. She could drug him so that he would sleep through the day. Perhaps that was the answer. But what opportunity would she have? Perhaps when the ball was finally over and the guests had departed, she could suggest the tea-tray be brought in. Too difficult. ‘Oh, sir, you do flatter me so,’ she said to the gentleman next to her, only dimly having heard a compliment.

  Perhaps, her mind raced, she could ask him later in the evening to fetch her a glass of lemonade. There was another room off the ballroom where maids served light snacks, sandwiches, and refreshments of all description right throughout the ball. She had noticed that gentlemen usually brought themselves a glass of champagne or wine at the same time as they fetched a drink
for the lady. If she could then introduce laudanum into his glass, he would be forced to retire and sleep too long the next day to go on calls.

  As soon as the supper was over, she slipped upstairs to her mother’s room and seized the bottle of laudanum and slipped it down the front of her dress.

  She danced with partner after partner, all the while covertly watching her quarry. When she was promenading after a cotillion which she had been dancing but Lord Burfield had not, she saw him standing outside the refreshment room. She murmured to her partner that she must go and repair a rent in her gown. Instead she made her way to Lord Burfield’s side and said, ‘I am so very thirsty. Would you be so kind as to fetch me a glass of lemonade?’

  ‘Your servant,’ he said, bowed and went off to the refreshment room. Prudence took a quick look around and fished the bottle out of her corsage. But one person was watching her curiously. Lizzie, tired of dancing, was sitting quietly on a little chair behind a marble statue in a corner of the room. This was more interesting than dancing, thought Lizzie. Why should that lady look so furtive? Why had she taken that little green bottle out of the neck of her gown and concealed it in her hand?

  Lizzie saw Lord Burfield come back with a little tray which held two glasses of lemonade. She saw him say something to Prudence, although she did not yet know their names, and then the couple walked together to where there were two seats in front of the statue behind which Lizzie was seated. Lizzie edged her chair to the side until she could see the couple. The man set the little tray on a small table beside them. The lady suddenly gave a shriek of laughter and said ‘Do but look at that quiz over there, Lord Burfield!’

  ‘Where, Miss Makepeace?’

  ‘Why, over there by the fireplace near the entrance!’

  Lord Burfield raised his quizzing-glass. Prudence quickly emptied most of the contents of the little bottle into his glass.

  Lizzie stared wide-eyed. Was this Miss Makepeace trying to poison this Lord Burfield? Or was it a love potion?

  She did not want to make a scene. But she left her seat, leaned round the statue, and in a moment had turned the little tray around.

  ‘Your lemonade, Miss Makepeace,’ said Lord Burfield.

  Prudence drank hers with a long gulp, anxious to show that she had really been thirsty. He sipped his, looking as if he did not like it very much.

  But then Prudence began to feel groggy. At first she was bewildered, wondering whether her stays had been lashed too tight, but with the last of her wits she realized she had drunk the glass with the laudanum in it. She got to her feet. Lord Burfield rose as well. ‘Excuse me,’ muttered Prudence. He watched her anxiously as she swayed off, colliding with some of the guests.

  ‘Now what have I done?’ said a conscience-stricken little voice at his elbow.

  He looked down into the face of the youngest of the Beverley sisters. ‘What have you done?’

  ‘That lady with you,’ said Lizzie earnestly, ‘took a bottle out of her corsage and poured the contents into your glass, so I turned the tray around. I thought it was a love potion. But what if it was poison?’

  He remembered with alarm Prudence’s odd exit from the ballroom. ‘I had better find out,’ he said.

  He could hardly believe this odd little girl’s strange story, but he approached Mrs Makepeace and said she should find her daughter, for he feared she was unwell. ‘Perhaps she has gone to her room,’ said Mrs Makepeace anxiously. She hurried off and Lord Burfield followed her as she made her way through the twisting passages of the old house and then up the staircase to the bedrooms. Mrs Makepeace went into her daughter’s bedroom. Prudence was lying face down on the bed. She turned her over. A small snore sounded. Mrs Makepeace could not believe that Prudence had actually fallen asleep. She was about to ring for the maid to come and undress her daughter when she noticed a little bottle lying next to Prudence’s open hand. She picked it up and recognized the laudanum bottle. What had the child been about to take laudanum? Nothing could be done until the girl woke up and could be questioned.

  She rang for the maid and said tetchily in a voice that carried to Lord Burfield’s listening ears, ‘Miss Prudence for some reason has taken a draught of laudanum. Be so good as to undress her.’ She went out of the bedroom and nearly collided with Lord Burfield.

  ‘Oh, my lord,’ she said, colouring guiltily. ‘I am afraid my Prudence must have been overcome by the excitement of the ball. She is such a sensitive and delicate child. She is fast asleep! Pray return with me below stairs.’

  Lord Burfield followed her back to the ballroom, his mind racing. Why had Prudence tried to drug him? He saw the small red-haired Beverley girl watching him anxiously and went to join her. ‘Laudanum,’ he murmured, ‘but let it be our secret. Which Beverley are you?’

  ‘Lizzie.’

  ‘Then, Miss Lizzie, I am very much in your debt. I am Burfield.’

  ‘I know who you are,’ said Lizzie. ‘I asked Miss Trumble, my governess.’

  ‘You did not tell her the reason for your curiosity?’

  ‘No, I was so afraid, you see, that it might have been poison.’

  ‘Well, let us say no more about it.’

  ‘Some ladies are, I believe,’ said Lizzie, her green eyes glittering like emeralds, ‘monstrous addicted to laudanum.’

  ‘That may be the case.’

  ‘But then, why would she put it in your glass?’

  ‘I shall find out on the morrow, believe me.’

  ‘And if I keep your secret, will you tell me? You will be calling on Abigail, no doubt.’

  ‘I promise.’

  ‘Perhaps that is the reason she may have tried to drug you.’

  ‘What reason, pray?’

  ‘To stop you calling on Abigail.’

  ‘I am sure that cannot be the case. Who would go to such lengths?’

  Perhaps Prudence Makepeace, thought Lizzie, but she did not say so aloud.

  THREE

  The ennui, which seizes me in such an indifferent state of mind, is too clearly written on my undiplomatic face not to extend to others as contagiously as yawning.

  PRINCE PÜCKLER-MUSKAU

  Abigail began to wonder when her mother intended to leave. The ballroom was beginning to become thin of company but Lady Beverley sat on, talking to a group of chaperones and dowagers with more animation than she had shown in some time. The clock on one of the walls showed it was four in the morning. The footmen were beginning to look jaded. Little Lizzie was sitting on her own in a corner, her eyes drooping. Abigail’s feet in their white kid dancing slippers were aching.

  She finished promenading with her partner and was crossing the floor to join Lizzie when Lord Burfield came up to her. ‘The honour of another dance, Miss Abigail?’

  ‘If I must.’

  He raised his eyebrows. ‘You are ungracious.’

  ‘I am so very tired, my lord, and Mama shows no sign of leaving.’

  ‘Dance with me and then I will persuade Lady Evans to send you and your family on your way.’

  She smiled up at him. He put his hand at her waist and led her into the steps of the waltz. Abigail did not experience any of the delicious sensations a young lady should feel when waltzing with the most handsome man in the room. All she knew was that she felt comfortable with him, as if she had known him for a long time. She was so weary she was unaware of the speculative looks being cast in their direction. Three dances with the same young lady was considered tantamount to a proposal of marriage.

  One of the fires had begun to smoke and the candle-light and colours of the jewels and gowns glimmered through the resultant dreamlike haze. When the waltz was over, she placed one gloved hand on Lord Burfield’s arm and walked round the room with him. ‘Please, please try to get us to leave,’ she whispered. ‘I do not want to dance again.’

  ‘And after waltzing with you, every other dance would be an anticlimax,’ he said.

  She looked up at him, slightly puzzled, and then her face clear
ed. ‘Oh, you are flirting. I am so sorry. I am too tired to flirt.’

  So much for my famous charm, thought Lord Burfield wryly. He pressed her hand. ‘Go and join your little sister, who is hiding in the corner, and I will talk to Lady Evans.’

  Abigail went up to Lizzie and sat down on a chair beside her. ‘Are we never going to leave?’ said Lizzie, stifling a yawn.

  ‘It will be all right soon,’ said Abigail. ‘Lord Burfield has gone to talk to Lady Evans and she will persuade Mama to take us away.’

  ‘Lord Burfield is charming and handsome, is he not?’

  ‘I suppose he is.’

  ‘We are supposed to be looking for husbands,’ said Lizzie. ‘Had you not thought of him in that light?’

  ‘No,’ said Abigail truthfully. ‘It is because of Mannerling.’

  ‘Oh, no. Not Mannerling still!’

  ‘I mean, we have been such fools over that place, always hoping to marry to reclaim it, and now that I no longer think about the place, I cannot really, this early, begin to think of anything else. Also, I appear to lack romanticism in my character. When I think of marriage now, I feel a great weariness, a sort of oh-I-suppose-I-must. Believe me, were we still in funds, I might contemplate a future of spinsterhood with equanimity. You are still too young, Lizzie, to feel the pressures of needing to wed.’

  ‘I dream of having a place of my very own,’ said Lizzie. ‘The husband is always a shadowy figure. But I do dream of a trim house, with a pony and some dogs and perhaps children.’

  ‘There is Mama looking for us, and Miss Trumble,’ said Abigail. ‘She is saying something to Miss Trumble and Miss Trumble has that closed look on her face she always has when she is upset.’

  The reason for Miss Trumble’s upset became all too apparent when they were all in the carriage and on the journey home. ‘Miss Trumble will be leaving us tomorrow,’ said Lady Beverley. ‘You girls no longer need a governess.’