Born to Be Wilde

by Eloisa James

  Lavinia nodded. “It took most of the day,” she said wryly. “It’s a miracle we finished that gown at all.”

  “You listened to her. I didn’t think it right to tell you before, but that night Tabitha burst into tears at the supper table downstairs. She’s been sewing for four years, and no one has ever listened to her. No one ever made her stop sewing when the light was gone. No one ever asked her what she thought.”

  “Oh . . .” was all Lavinia could manage; she had no idea how to respond.

  “It’s not just that,” Annie said. “You thought they should be brass buttons, remember, and it was Tabitha who thought they should be cloth, and they are cloth. You had the idea of a violet feather in Lady Betsy’s headdress.”

  “Mary didn’t agree.”

  “And you took Mary’s idea and now the pouf has two blue feathers, rather than one violet.”

  “I saw that her idea was better than mine,” Lavinia explained.

  Annie nodded. “You’re brilliant, and we all know it. If you hadn’t been born a lady, you could be the best modiste in the whole of Britain.”

  “That is very great praise, although unwarranted,” Lavinia said, a smile stretching over her face, “but I am so grateful for it. Thank you.”

  “It’s not just me,” Annie said. “That’s a fact, miss. Everyone knows it. You worked for weeks without once losing your temper. You didn’t dismiss Mary when she accidentally cut that ruffle. We couldn’t scarcely believe that.”

  “Goodness,” Lavinia said. “I would never dismiss her for something so trivial.”

  “Trivial? It took seven hours to redo,” Annie reminded her. “Believe me, there are those as would have docked her pay for the entire week to make up. You didn’t even chide her.”

  Lavinia smiled again, not knowing what to say. She’d been so happy in the last few weeks, the secret knowledge of her betrothal to Parth humming along under her joy at working with fabric and lace and gowns.

  “My point is that I would never leave you, miss, unless you sent me away,” Annie concluded.

  Lavinia’s smile wobbled, and Annie quickly added, “We’ll be old ladies someday, doubtless arguing over the placement of fichus, and I don’t care if we’re doing it in Norway or England.”

  “You’ll want me to expose my wrinkly bosom,” Lavinia said, reaching out and squeezing her hand.

  “That’s right!” Annie beamed. “Gentlemen of that age are just as lustful as the young ones, at least my grandfather was. He got to be a handful in his eighties, snatching at any woman who entered his bedchamber—even the vicar’s wife.”

  She launched into a story about her grandfather. And Lavinia let Annie ease her sense of humiliation and pain . . . because that was what friends did for each other.

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Lavinia hadn’t known quite what to expect of her mother’s private hospital, but when she alighted from the carriage upon arrival, she was surprised to find that they had drawn up before a fine country manor, one that could easily have belonged to a squire. It was mellowed brick, with wings on either side and lawns bordered by lilac bushes. She could see a lake in the distance.

  “I shouldn’t mind suffering a nervous complaint here,” Annie said, looking around.

  The front door opened and a stout woman came toward them with a smile. “Miss Gray,” she said. “A groom from Lindow rode here and informed us of your visit. I am Mrs. Aline, the matron of Gooseberry Manor. May I show you to a chamber where you might refresh yourself?”

  “It has been less than an hour’s drive,” Lavinia said, feeling unexpectedly nervous. “Would it be acceptable if I spent the night? Lady Knowe seemed to believe—”

  “I expected it!” Mrs. Aline motioned to a footman, who leapt to take the portmanteau from Annie. “Gooseberry Manor is designed so that families can stay for indefinite periods with their loved ones.”

  Lavinia followed her through the doorway, feeling apprehensive. What would her mother say to her? Lady Gray had been so angry the last time they spoke, alternately screaming at her and sobbing. A cowardly part of Lavinia wanted to turn around and run back to the carriage.

  “How is my mother?” she asked.

  “Lady Gray is doing as well as might be expected,” Mrs. Aline replied. “I did not know her in her previous life, of course, but it is quite normal for family to find a patient nervous and jumpy at this stage in the recovery.”

  “Are there many patients here now?” Lavinia asked.

  “Generally, we have four patients, but your mother is the only person here this week; I have one open bed, and two patients are visiting their families. Now, your mother has spent most of the fall in the gardens,” Mrs. Aline continued, ushering Lavinia toward the door that led to the back of the house. “On chilly days she can be found in the orangerie.”

  Lavinia couldn’t remember an occasion when her mother had enjoyed being outside, even declining to attend the fashionable Parisian picnics held in the Tuileries Gardens.

  “Lady Gray tires easily,” Mrs. Aline said. “Perhaps a short visit, and then if she feels well enough, you might share a light meal later?”

  Lavinia nodded, and followed the matron into a spacious glass conservatory attached to the back of the manor. Five tall, arched windows admitted whatever sun there was to be had; although the sky had grown overcast, the room still managed to be bright. A row of potted trees stood along the windows among great baskets of fragrant apples and a profusion of potted herbs and other growing things.

  Lavinia saw her mother across the room, her back turned as she bent over a large flowerpot.

  “She’s probably pinching back the withered blossoms,” Mrs. Aline said. “I jest with Her Ladyship that I shall have to let one of my gardeners go because she has made him redundant.”

  Despite herself, Lavinia gave the matron an incredulous look.

  “Come,” Mrs. Aline said, smiling.

  As they crossed toward her, Lady Gray straightened and dropped a handful of wilted flowers into a wicker basket at her side. Lavinia put a hand on her nervous stomach, conscious of an absurd wish that Parth was with her.

  “Lady Gray,” Mrs. Aline called, “I have a surprise for you!”

  Lavinia’s mother turned at the salutation. For a long moment they just stared at each other, and then Lady Gray’s face crinkled into a smile and she held out her hand. Lavinia ran to her and kissed her cheek. Her first impression was that her mother’s face was hollow, but her eyes were bright.

  Her second was that Lady Gray was grimy. She wore no gloves, and her fingernails were dirty. This, when her mother had always been quick to retire to her room with a nervous spasm if a servant even brushed against her.

  There had been other reasons to retire to her chamber, of course. Those soothing drops.

  With a gentle jingle of keys, Mrs. Aline withdrew, and they were alone.

  “I’m so glad you have come. Do come sit with me, dear,” Lady Gray said, leading Lavinia toward a wooden bench. The windows faced the gardens. Beyond them, great chestnut trees reared against the afternoon sky.

  “How are you, Mother?” Lavinia asked.

  “As well as could be expected,” Lady Gray replied.

  After that, they sat in silence for some moments.

  At length, Lady Gray said, “We have both become unnaturally slim. Have you been ill, dear?”

  Now that Lavinia was finally here, sitting with her mother, she found to her horror that she was in the grip of fast-rising, involuntary anger that caught at the back of her throat. “Merely an influenza,” she replied.

  They lapsed into another silence. Her mother’s smile had fallen away, but Lavinia could think of nothing charming or light to coax it back. Nothing came to mind but incoherent, bitter words.

  “I’m sorry,” Lady Gray said, finally. “I have thought of you often. I fear I made a poor job of being a mother.”

  Lavinia decided it was best not to agree.

  “I intend to s
ell the country house,” Lady Gray said. “It will replace your dowry.”

  Lavinia cleared her throat. “Isn’t it more important to repay Willa and Diana?”

  “As I understand it, you have done that already,” her mother said. “Lady Knowe has written to me weekly since I entered Gooseberry Manor. I received your letters as well, and was grateful for them.” Her smile was still beautiful, even on her wan face. “Lavinia, I beg you to forgive me for not answering your letters. I have not been myself.”

  “I know,” Lavinia said.

  “I wrote one letter, a short one to the duke, enclosing a diamond ring that your father gave me. It was the only ring I never sold. I asked His Grace to use it to pay for my room and board here.”

  “I’m glad,” Lavinia managed. “I thought . . .”

  “Laudanum is the sort of drug that leaches away all moral resolve,” her mother said. “You are right. I would have accepted charity from the duke, as easily as I stole the set of emeralds belonging to my own relative.”

  “After which Diana was obliged to work as a governess.”

  Her mother took a deep breath. “Yes.”

  A shaft of sunlight broke through the clouds and slanted into the room near where they sat.

  “It will take time for you to forgive me,” Lady Gray said. “You may never forgive me. But you shall have your dowry again, Lavinia. You will be able to go to London and buy as many beautiful gowns as you wish.”

  Lavinia winced. Her mother’s opinion of her was in precise agreement with Parth’s.

  “Unless you have already found someone to marry,” her mother added.

  “I have declined every proposal I received.”

  “Lady Knowe seemed to believe that Mr. Sterling had caught your fancy. A man who owns a bank, by her account.”

  “I refused him as well.”

  “Because of me?”

  “No, not at all.”

  “Lady Knowe thinks the world of the man.”

  “He believes I am frivolous and spend too much on clothing,” Lavinia said wearily.

  “He’s right,” her mother said. “We ladies are all frivolous. One could argue, I suppose, that we do spend too much money, inasmuch as we earn none at all. But society does not permit us to do anything of substance other than adorn ourselves.”

  Lavinia’s mouth fell open. “I agree!”

  “I used to tell your father as much.” Lady Gray smiled into the distance. “He was of the opinion that ladies could run the House of Lords better than the lords did. You must find a man who is more like your father,” she said firmly. “All this . . . this nothingness is bearable with the right man at your side.”

  “I have been introduced to a Norwegian prince,” Lavinia said. “He may well become a king one day, of Norway or Denmark.”

  “‘Princess’ is a very agreeable title,” her mother said, betraying no sorrow at the proposition that Lavinia would have to live in another country.

  Faced with the likelihood that she might ask her mother for something Lady Gray could not give—or worse, that she would start crying—Lavinia stood. “Mrs. Aline cautioned me that we should have only a short visit, Mother. I don’t want to weary you. I promise to seriously consider accepting Prince Oskar’s hand.”

  “Oskar? Oh, dear,” Lady Gray said. “Well, I suppose the man can’t be blamed for the idiocy of his parents, any more than you can. ‘Oskar’ is a better name than ‘Parth.’” She came slowly to her feet, pushing herself up with obvious effort.

  “Shall I fetch your basket?” Lavinia asked. And then, unable to stop herself, “What’s the matter with the name ‘Parth’?”

  “No gentleman should sound like a hearth,” her mother stated. “No, don’t bother with the basket, dear. Someone will throw away the vegetation. There’s any number of servants wandering around the place, most of them tasked with keeping the patients from fleeing.”

  “I see,” Lavinia said, although she didn’t.

  “Yes, indeed,” Lady Gray said serenely as she went toward the door. “Polite society is a prison as well, isn’t it? You’ll do well to get away, Lavinia. You might be a trifle chilly in Norway, but you can wear extra layers. It would be worth any number of woolies never to be caught in a snarl of carriages around Blackfriars.”

  “Will I see you at supper?” Lavinia asked.

  “I’m afraid not. I am exhausted by this fond reunion,” her mother said, drifting into the corridor and disappearing without another word.

  Lavinia stood, stock-still, listening to her mother’s soft footsteps receding.

  She had never felt more alone in her life.

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  October 29, 1780

  Lavinia woke the next morning after a restless night. Through sheer force of will, she banished the memory of her dream about Parth from her mind. She was going to marry a Norwegian prince and live with him in his country.

  After dressing, she went looking for her mother, whom she found in her chamber, sitting up and drinking tea. “Good morning,” Lavinia said, bending to kiss her cheek. “How are you feeling today?”

  Her mother cocked her head. “Imagine you were a very ripe bilberry and you ruptured . . . it feels like that.”

  “Willa always made fun of me for imaginative descriptions. I have a suspicion that I inherited that from you.”

  “I am not exaggerating about the bilberry. I always covered up the feeling with my drops.” The last word sounded like a caress.

  “I wish I’d known they were dangerous,” Lavinia said.

  Her mother started fiddling with a hairpin. “I don’t know if you’re expecting me to accompany you to London for the upcoming Season.”

  “I am not,” Lavinia said gently.

  Lady Gray’s thin hands twisted the hairpin this way and that. “I took the drops to cover up the nervous spasms. I still feel it would be better to take laudanum than to endure this agony.”

  Lavinia took one of her restless hands in hers. “If you take too many drops, you might never wake up.”

  “I know it.” Lady Gray nodded. “I do know it.” Her eyes were the faded blue of skimmed milk. “Sometimes I don’t care.”

  “I see,” Lavinia said. The desperately sad, sinking feeling that gripped her was no surprise. It was familiar. She’d felt it in her bones for years, but she hadn’t known why.

  “It doesn’t mean I don’t love you. I don’t believe I can leave this place yet.” Her hand escaped Lavinia’s clasp in order to retrieve her dropped hairpin.

  “Mrs. Aline seems an excellent woman. Why would you want to live elsewhere?”

  “I should take you to London. I should make sure you marry properly. I should go to balls.” She dropped the hairpin over the side of the bed; Lavinia glanced down and saw a small pile of mangled pins on the floor. “I meant to love you better.”

  Lavinia flinched, not sure how to answer that.

  “Christmas, for example, was always such an exhausting day,” her mother said fretfully. “I used to mean to have you down from the nursery to sing a carol or whatever it is one is supposed to do with children, but it was so much more pleasant to take some drops and relax. Your father never understood how hard holidays were on my nerves.”

  Lavinia had spent all her holidays in the nursery, but without understanding that she could have been loved better.

  “Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,” her mother sang in a thin soprano. “Humpy Dumpty had a great fall.” She looked up at Lavinia. “I don’t mean to suggest that it would take royal assistance to put me back together again. Did I ever tell you that His Majesty complimented my nose?”

  Lavinia shook her head.

  “It was back when he was a stripling and I a mere girl,” her mother said, pleating the sheet. “My mother always said that beauty was skin deep, but it isn’t as if a man falls in love with a woman because she has a stout liver. Which I do have. Mrs. Aline says that for all the years I’ve been taking drops, I should have a liver l
ike a piece of lace, but mine seems to be functioning well.”

  Lady Gray settled back on her pillows. “I would like drops now.” Her voice roughened. “It’s the only thing I can think about just at this moment. It is most shameful.”

  “Oh, dear.” Lavinia searched for the bellpull. “Would you like me to summon Mrs. Aline?”

  “I would like to be alone.” Lady Gray reached out and picked up another hairpin from the bedside table.

  “I wish there was something I could do for you,” Lavinia said.

  “You paid back those emeralds,” her mother said, twisting the hairpin. “I fretted about them in the middle of the night, and what a relief it was to think no one will know.” She dropped the hairpin and reached for Lavinia’s hand. “Did I say thank you?”

  “Yes,” Lavinia lied. “Yes, you did.”

  “I just can’t take you to London for the Season,” her mother said, returning to that topic. “I don’t—”

  Lavinia interrupted. “I have decided to marry Prince Oskar Beck, Mother.”

  “Have you?” Her mother’s faded eyes brightened. “Have you truly?”

  Lavinia nodded.

  “You must tell this prince that the proceeds from the country house will be entirely his.”

  “I will.”

  Outside the window, snowflakes were drifting through morning sunshine, though the sky had a frosty sheen to it.

  “I’m so glad you will be a princess, Lavinia. ‘Mrs. Sterling’ is not a desirable title.” She picked up another hairpin. “Lady Knowe seems to consider Mr. Sterling akin to the Second Coming, but no one knows his parents. You will be much happier as a princess. Princess Lavinia. It has a nice ring.”

  “I agree.”

  “I suppose you refused Mr. Sterling quite firmly?”

  “Yes,” Lavinia said, wondering what she meant.

  Lady Gray nodded toward the open door.

  Lavinia turned her head. Parth stood in the doorway. Of course. If he had followed her all the way from London, why had she not imagined he would follow her now? The man was protective to an extreme.