by Joan Wolf
“You can help me by keeping out of my way, Georgiana,” Lady Winterdale replied grimly.
Very briefly, my eyes met Catherine’s and we both looked away.
“Yes, ma’am,” I said, and began to eat my eggs.
After luncheon Betty brought a basin of heated water to my room and we washed my hair. After the fourth rinse with fresh heated water, she pronounced it clean of soap, and I wrapped it in a towel and dried it as best I could. Then I put a dry towel around my shoulders and combed my hair so that it fell rain-straight halfway down my back. There was nothing more to be done until it dried.
I went next to Catherine’s room and found her undergoing the same procedure at the hands of Melton, Lady Winterdale’s dresser. Melton was one of those superior servants who have a very exaggerated sense of their own worth, and she had begun by treating me as if I were less than the dirt beneath her feet. I do not take kindly to such treatment, however, and Melton and I had had words. We had since achieved a kind of truce; neither of us liked the other, but we were icily polite.
I sat down in a chair and waited for Catherine to be finished. Unlike mine, her hair had curl and I thought that she would look well in one of the new shorter styles. Lady Winterdale liked her hair bunched in front of her ears, however. I thought it only called attention to the thinness of Catherine’s face and took attention away from her best feature, which was her eyes.
Catherine would have liked to cut her hair also, mainly because it would require less trouble to arrange. Unfortunately, this was one more issue on which she was not able to stand up to her mother.
Once Catherine was done, I suggested, “Why don’t we go down to the green drawing room and you can play the piano for me while our hair dries?”
The girl’s face lit to beauty. “Oh Georgie, that would be wonderful.” Then the light died out. “But Mama said I was to take a nap.”
“You can’t nap with a wet head,” I said practically. “And besides, your mother is so busy that she won’t even notice what you’re doing.” I got up from the small silk-upholstered chair that was placed before Catherine’s fire. “Let’s go.”
The drawing room was damp and chilly, and I had one of the servants add some coals and stoke up a nice warm fire for us. Then I pulled one of the tapestry chairs over in front of the fireplace and settled down to listen to Catherine play.
She played for three hours and while I listened I thought about many things. I thought about home, about Anna, about Frank, about the ball. About Lord Winterdale. Both Catherine and I had perfectly dry hair by the time Lady Winterdale finally came hustling in to shoo Catherine upstairs so that she could get dressed. A number of very important people were to dine with us before the ball, two of whom were patronesses of Almack’s, and Lady Winterdale was most anxious for Catherine to make a good impression.
It also became clear to me that she was apprehensive about Lord Winterdale’s behavior. “I hope Philip makes an effort to converse with at least a semblance of politeness,” she said to me as Catherine put away her music. “He is the host this evening, and it will behoove him to exert himself to show a degree of civility to his guests.”
“Surely Lord Winterdale will be polite in his own house, ma’am,” I said in surprise.
“Who knows how far Philip will go to embarrass me,” Lady Winterdale replied acidly. Her pointy nose quivered, and the uncomfortable idea occurred to me that his aunt was not the only person whom Lord Winterdale might like to see embarrassed this evening.
Good God, I thought with momentary panic, could his willingness to host this ball have been part of a diabolical plan to get revenge on Lady Winterdale and me? Was he going to do something tonight to humiliate the both of us?
Surely not, I answered myself. Surely no one would go to such expense just to cause embarrassment to someone else.
“Come along, Catherine,” Lady Winterdale said. She turned to me as a definite afterthought. “You too, Georgiana. Time to think about getting dressed. I am sure that Betty will help you.”
“She has said that she would,” I returned. I didn’t leave the room immediately, however, but went over to close the cover of the pianoforte. I was standing there, staring worriedly at the instrument and thinking of Lady Winterdale’s words about her nephew, when I heard someone at the door. I looked up and saw him standing there watching me.
“Miss Newbury,” he said. His eyes flicked over me, lingering on my loose hair. By now it was perfectly dry and hung around my shoulders like a mantle.
I could feel myself flush. “Catherine and I had our hair washed for the ball and then we came down here so that Catherine could play the piano while it dried,” I explained.
He nodded and advanced slowly into the room. I stood with my back against the piano and watched him approach me. He stopped perhaps two feet away and said, “I presume that my estimable aunt has everything well in train for this evening?”
Raindrops sparkled on his black hair and the shoulders of his caped driving coat.
“Yes.” My voice sounded oddly breathless, and I cleared my throat. “I see that it has not yet stopped raining.”
“No, it has not.”
Then he did a shocking thing. He reached out, took a strand of my hair and ran his fingers along the length of it, all the way from my ear to its evenly cut ends. His touch was frighteningly enjoyable. “Your hair feels like silk,” he said.
“It doesn’t curl,” I babbled. “Not even a curling iron works on it.”
“What does that matter?” he said. “It is beautiful the way it is.” My heartbeat began to accelerate dangerously. He was looking at me out of narrowed blue eyes and I pressed back harder against the piano. I could feel the top of it digging into my backbone.
“My lord,” I said a little desperately, “I think it is time for me to go upstairs and get ready for dinner.”
He was close enough to me that I could smell the dampness of rain on his skin and hair. After what seemed to be a long time, he nodded and stepped back, giving me room to get by him.
“Certainly,” he said indifferently.
As I climbed the stairs, I wasn’t sure what bothered me the most about our encounter: his attention or his indifference.
* * *
I had picked out my ball gown myself, and it was beautiful: an ivory-colored high-waisted frock trimmed with a bias fold of pink satin up each side of the front. The epaulet sleeves were also edged with pink satin and fastened in front of the arm with small satin buttons. The decolletage of the neckline was certainly lower than what I was accustomed to, but I thought it made me look quite satisfactorily sophisticated.
Betty was very helpful, getting me into the dress and doing up all the back-fastenings. Then she fixed my newly washed and shining hair into an intricate arrangement of braids on the top of my head.
I had a small string of pearls that had belonged to my mother and a matching pair of pearl earrings, and these I put on. I was standing in front of the cheval glass, admiring myself unashamedly, when there came a knock on the door. Betty went to answer it and returned carrying a bouquet of pink roses.
“’Tis from his lordship, Miss Newbury,” Betty told me with glee.
I should not have been so thrilled. I told myself that I would be expected to be carrying a bouquet, that he was only playing his role in sending it, but the fact of the matter was, I was thrilled with those roses.
Betty came over to give me the bouquet and while she was doing that Melton came to my door and announced that Lady Winterdale would like me to come downstairs to be ready to greet the dinner guests.
I turned away from the mirror, drew a long breath to unfluster myself, and went out into the passageway.
Lady Winterdale and Catherine were just ahead of me, walking toward the stairs. I caught up with them at the landing and Catherine turned to look at me.
“Georgie!” she said. “You look beautiful.”
I smiled at her. “Thank you, Catherine. So do you.”
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br /> Her dress was a white frock with blue satin trim and I noticed that she was carrying a bouquet of white roses tied with bouquet blue satin ribands. The white did not really become her, and the dress’s decolletage made her look too thin.
I wished that I and not Lady Winterdale had been able to choose Catherine’s dress.
Lady Winterdale was regarding me with tightened lips. “Did you paint your cheeks, Georgiana?” she asked ominously.
“Of course not, Lady Winterdale,” I replied in surprise. “If I am rather flushed, it must be from excitement.”
She did not look as if she believed me.
We began to go down the stairs, Lady Winterdale and Catherine side by side with me trailing along behind them. When we reached the second floor the ballroom doors were flung wide open and for the first time I was able to see the magic that Lady Winterdale had wrought.
The room was banked with white roses. She must have scoured all the greenhouses in the vicinity of London in order to get the enormous amounts of roses that bedecked that room. They were gathered in huge vases along the walls and in smaller vases around the ten elegant white columns that marched around the room. The ballroom had two magnificent crystal chandeliers and a polished oak floor and the circular columns were trimmed with gilt. Tonight the Mansfield House ballroom looked and smelled like a summer garden.
“Oh, my lady,” I said reverently. “It is magnificent.”
“I think it will be remembered,” she replied with justifiable complacency. “Now, come along down to the front drawing room girls. Our dinner guests will be arriving shortly.”
We turned back to the staircase and went down to the first floor of the house, where the dining room had been set for dinner. There would be a supper served later during the ball, but that would be laid out upstairs on the ballroom floor in one of the drawing rooms.
Lord Winterdale was standing at the window looking out at the rain when we came into the drawing room. He turned when he heard us.
“Ah,” he said, “good evening, ladies. You are all looking in great beauty tonight.”
His blue eyes went from his aunt, to Catherine, to me. They did not linger on me, and I suppressed a stab of disappointment. I had thought I looked particularly nice.
“I must thank you, Cousin Philip, for the bouquet,” Catherine was saying shyly. “It is very pretty, and it matches my dress perfectly.”
He gave her a brief nod. “I am glad you like it, Catherine.” He paused, then added, “It becomes you.”
She gave him a doubtful look.
I said, “I, too, must thank you for my bouquet, my lord.” I succumbed to curiosity. “How did you know what colors our dresses were?”
“I asked my aunt,” he replied briefly.
The sound of the knocker on the front door reverberated clearly into the drawing room. Lady Winterdale drew herself up, and the image of a knight girding himself to go into battle flashed into my mind. I repressed a smile and my eyes went to Lord Winterdale. He, too, was looking at his aunt, but the expression in his eyes was not at all humorous.
Once again I felt a flash of apprehension about how Lord Winterdale would conduct himself this evening.
* * *
The most important part of any dinner is the food, of course, and Lady Winterdale and Cook had spent many hours in deep discussion before coming up with the following menu, which was served the evening of the Winterdale Ball. I reprint it in full for those who are interested in such things:
SOUPE A LA BONNE FEMME
LE POTAGE A LA BEAUVEAU
LE TURBOT, SAUCE AU HOMARD
LE DOREY GARNI D’EPERLANS FRITS
LE SAUMON A LA GENEVOISE
LES POULARDES A LA CONDE
LE DINDIN A LA PERIGUEUX
LES FILETS DE PERDREAUX SAUTES
A LA LUCULLUS
LE JAMBON DE WESTPHALIE A L’ESSENCE
LE CUISSEAU DE PORC A DEMI SEL
GARNI DE CHOUX
HAUNCHE DE VENAISON
PETITS PUITS D’AMOUR, GARNIS DE CONFITURES
LES GLACES
LES FRUITS
All of this food was served by eight footmen wearing the green-velvet livery of Lord Winterdale, and as the various courses were served and removed, the guests conversed politely with the dinner partners whom Lady Winterdale had placed upon either side of them.
I was seated between an elderly gentleman, who ate as if he had never seen food before in his life, and Lord Henry Sloan, my knight-errant of Madame Tussaud’s. Lord Henry was looking very elegant in his evening wear, and we had a very pleasant time chatting about the various activities that I might enjoy during my stay in London.
The surprise of the night, however, was Lord Winterdale, who proved himself to be an absolutely delightful host. The ladies on either side of him were utterly undone by his seemingly effortless charm. I watched as his black head bent toward Lady Jersey, one of the patronesses of Almack’s. He said something, and she laughed and gave him a look that could only be described as coquettish. His eyes gleamed a pure sapphire blue.
As I watched he gave her a devastating smile, then he turned his attention to the lady on his other side, the Countess Lieven, another of the all-important patronesses. The Countess was well-known for her haughtiness, but it took less than a minute before she, too, fell a victim of Lord Winterdale’s deliberately wielded magnetism.
How clever he was, I thought. And how dangerous.
Once more the predatory image of a panther slipped into my mind.
At last dinner was over and we went upstairs for the ball itself. Lord and Lady Winterdale and Catherine and I formed a receiving line at the top of the stairs, and people were introduced to Catherine and me before they proceeded into the brilliantly lit ballroom.
It soon became clear that Lady Winterdale’s ball was going to be one of the great successes of the social season. People were packed onto the staircase waiting to get up to the second floor, and word came to us that the entire of Grosvenor Square was lined with carriages waiting to reach the front door so that their occupants could alight.
Lady Winterdale beamed as she said again and again, “Allow me to introduce you to my daughter, Lady Catherine Mansfield, and to my nephew’s ward, Miss Georgiana Newbury.” Catherine and I curtsied and curtsied and smiled and smiled. It was delightful.
Then it was time for us to enter the ballroom and open the dancing. I had another shock as I came in the door and saw the room packed with people in full evening regalia. The smell of the roses and of the many different perfumes the women were wearing assailed my nostrils so intensely that I almost stepped back. All of the wall sconces were lit and the huge crystal chandeliers shed the light from hundreds of candles onto the dance floor.
Lord Winterdale took Catherine out to the floor and some earl I had never heard of escorted me. The line formed up behind us, the music started, I curtsied to my partner, and the dancing began.
Everything about the ball went perfectly until after supper, which I ate with Lord Henry Sloan and a few other young people in the yellow drawing room. I had looked around for Catherine to see if she wanted to join us, but she had been nowhere in sight, so we had gone along to the supper room without her.
After the dinner I had eaten I hadn’t thought I would want to eat again, but the lobster patties were delicious and I actually found myself hungry. I had some punch with the patties and Lord Henry drank champagne, which he pronounced to be of the finest quality.
Not for the first time it occurred to me that this ball must be costing Lord Winterdale a fortune.
After we had finished supper we returned to the ballroom. I was standing with Lord Henry and another young gentleman when Lady Winterdale approached me with a rather heavyset, middle-aged gentleman.
“Georgiana,” she said, “allow me to introduce Mr. George Asherton to you.”
The name immediately set off an alarm bell in my head. Mr. Asherton was one of Papa’s victims.
Mr.
Asherton bowed, and I distinctly heard the creak of a corset. “Miss Newbury,” he said. “I was a friend of your late father. I wonder if I might have the honor of this dance.”
It had never occurred to me that I might meet one of Papa’s victims in the course of my London stay. I had certainly no intention of seeking any of them out, and I had assumed that none of them would desire to meet me.
Evidently I had been wrong.
“Certainly,” I said a little nervously, and allowed Mr. Asherton to lead me to the floor.
It was a country dance fortunately, and consequently there was little opportunity for us to talk. The next dance was a waltz, however, and since I could not dance the waltz, I was forced to stand in front of one of the ballroom columns with Mr. Asherton and listen to him talk.
He began by saying, “I received your communication, Miss Newbury.”
“Mr. Asherton,” I interrupted. “Please believe me when I say that there is no need for us to discuss this matter further. I can only deplore what my father did to you and assure you that the incriminating papers have been destroyed. The matter is over.”
His round chubby face seemed oddly unlined for a man his age. It was also very pink. He said, “I would much have preferred to receive the papers back, Miss Newbury. It is a little disturbing to have to rely on your word that they are destroyed.”
I bristled, and said a little grandly, “I can assure you, Mr. Asherton, that my word can be trusted.”
“Perhaps it can be, but you must confess that my experience with your family has not been a positive one,” Mr. Asherton replied grimly. “Certainly it has not inclined me to trust anyone bearing the name of Newbury.”
