h I might believe you! Do you mean to abjure the fashionable life?’
She threw him a smouldering look. ‘You may laugh at me, but I warn you, Cardross, I am determined to marry Jeremy, do what you will to prevent me!’
He replied only with an ironical bow; and after staring defiantly at him for an instant, she swept from the room with an air of finality only marred by the unfortunate circumstance of her shutting a fold of her gown of delicate lilac muslin in the door, and being obliged to open it again to release the fabric.
Twenty minutes later Nell came softly into the room. The Earl looked up impatiently, but when he saw his wife standing on the threshold his expression changed, and he smiled at her, saying in a funning tone: ‘How do you contrive, Nell, always to appear prettier than I remembered you?’
She blushed adorably. ‘Well, I did hope you would think I looked becomingly in this gown,’ she confessed naïvely.
‘I do. Did you put it on to dazzle me into paying for it?’
This was said so quizzically that her spirits rose. It had taken a great deal of resolution to bring her to the library that morning, for a most unwelcome missive had been delivered by the penny post. Since the Earl paid five shillings to the General Post Office every quarter for the privilege of receiving an early London delivery Madame Lavalle’s civil reminder to her ladyship that a court dress of Chantilly lace was still unpaid for had lain on Nell’s breakfast-tray. It was not an encouraging start to the day. It had quite destroyed Nell’s appetite, and had filled her with so much frightened dismay that for an unreasoning hour she could think of no other way out of her difficulties than to board the first mail-coach bound for Devonshire, and there to seek refuge with her mama. A prolonged period of reflection, however, showed her the unwisdom of this course, and convinced her that since it was extremely unlikely that a thunderbolt would descend mercifully upon her head there was nothing for it but to make a clean breast of the matter to Cardross, devoutly trusting that he would understand how it had come about that she had forgotten to give him Madame Lavalle’s bill with all the others which he had commanded her to produce.
But the more she thought of it the less likely it seemed that he could possibly understand. She felt sick with apprehension, recalling his stern words. He had asked her if she was quite sure she had handed all her bills to him; he had warned her of the awful consequences if he found she had lied to him; and although he had certainly begged her, later, not to be afraid of him, it was not to be expected that he would greet with equanimity the intelligence that his wife had overlooked a bill for three hundred and thirty-five guineas. It even seemed improbable that he would believe she really had overlooked it. She herself was aghast at her carelessness. She was so sure that she had given the bill to Cardross with all the others collected from a drawer crammed with them that her first thought on seeing Madame Lavalle’s renewed demand was that that exclusive modiste had erred. But an agitated search had brought the previous demand to light, wedged at the very back of the drawer. It was by far the heaviest single item amongst her debts, casting into the shade the milliner’s bill which had staggered Cardross. What he would say she dared not consider, even less what he might do. At the best he must believe her to be woefully extravagant (which, indeed, she knew she had been), and he would be very angry, though forgiving. At the worst – but to speculate on what he might do at the worst was so fatal to resolution that she would not let herself do it.
With a childlike hope of pleasing him, she had arrayed herself in a gown which she knew (on the authority of that arbiter of taste, Mr Hethersett) became her to admiration. It had instantly won for her a charming compliment, and she was now able to reply, not without pride: ‘No, no, it is paid for!’ She added honestly, after a moment’s reflection: ‘You paid for it!’
‘It is a great satisfaction to me to know that I didn’t waste my money,’ he said gravely, but with laughter in his eyes.
This was a much more promising start to the interview than she had expected. She smiled shyly at him, and was just about to embark on a painful explanation of her new embarrassment when he said: ‘Are you Letty’s envoy, then? I own, I might listen with more patience to you than to her, but on this subject I am determined to remain adamant!’
Not sorry to be diverted from her real errand, she said: ‘Of course, I do see that it would be throwing herself away quite shockingly, but I believe you will be obliged, in the end, to consent. Well, I thought myself that it was just a fancy that would pass when she had seen more of society, and had met other gentlemen, but it isn’t so, Cardross! She hasn’t swerved from her devotion to Mr Allandale, even though she has been made up to by I don’t know how many others – and all of them,’ she added reflectively, ‘of far greater address than poor Mr Allandale!’
‘Nell!’ he interrupted. ‘Can you tell me what she perceives in that dead bore to dote upon?’
She shook her head. ‘No, there is no accounting for it,’ she replied. ‘She doesn’t know either, which is what makes me feel that it is a case of true love, and certainly no passing fancy.’
‘They are totally unsuited!’ he said impatiently. ‘She would ruin him in a year, what’s more! She is as extravagant as you are, my love!’ He saw the stricken look in her face, the colour ebbing from her cheeks, and instantly said: ‘What an unhandsome thing to say to you! I beg your pardon: that is all forgotten – a page which we have stuck down, and shan’t read again. My dear Nell, if you could but have heard that absurd young man addressing me in flowing periods this morning! Do you know that he proposed in all seriousness to carry Letty off to Brazil?’
Her thoughts were very far from Letty’s affairs, but she answered mechanically: ‘Yes, she told me of his appointment.’
He regarded her with a slight crease between his brows. ‘You are looking very troubled, Nell. Why? Are you taking this nonsense to heart?’
Now, if ever, was the moment to tell him that the page had not yet been stuck down. The words refused to be uttered. She said instead: ‘I can’t help but be sorry for them. I know it is a bad match, and indeed, Cardross, I understand what your sentiments must be.’
‘I imagine you might! To be wishing Letty joy of a shockingly bad bargain would be fine conduct in a guardian! To own the truth, I wish I were not her guardian – or that I had never permitted her aunt to take charge of her. That woman wants both manner and sense, and, as far as I can discover, reared her own daughters as well as my sister in a scrambling way, encouraging them in every extravagant folly, and allowing them to set up their flirts when they should have been in the schoolroom!’
‘Well, yes,’ admitted Nell. ‘I don’t like to abuse her, for she is always very civil and goodnatured, but she does seem to be sadly shatterbrained! But I can’t suppose that she encouraged Mr Allandale, for she doesn’t at all wish Letty to marry him, you know. She talked to me about it the other evening, at the Westburys’ drum, and she seemed to feel just as she ought.’ She paused, considering this. ‘At least,’ she amended, ‘just as you think she ought, Cardross.’
He was amused. ‘Indeed! But not as you think, I collect?’
‘Well, not precisely,’ she temporized. ‘I must say, it has me quite in a puzzle to understand how it comes about that such a lively girl should fall in love with Mr Allandale, for he is not at all sportive, and he doesn’t seem to have more than common sense, besides having such very formal manners, – but – but there is nothing in his disposition to make him ineligible, is there? I mean, it isn’t as if she wished to marry someone like Sir Jasper Lydney, or young Brixworth. And one wouldn’t have felt the least surprise if she had, because they have both been dangling after her ever since she came out, and no one can deny that they have very engaging manners, in spite of being such shocking rakes! You would not have liked her to marry either of them!’
‘I should not, but there is a vast gulf between Brixworth and Allandale, my love! As for eligibility, though there may be nothing in Allandale’s disposition to dislike, there is nothing in his circumstances to recommend him. He has neither rank nor fortune.’
‘Letty doesn’t care for rank, and she has fortune,’ Nell pointed out.
‘Unequal marriages rarely prosper. Letty may imagine she doesn’t care for rank: she doesn’t know how it would be to marry a man out of her own order.’
Nell wrinkled her brow over this. ‘But, Giles, I think she does know!’ she objected. ‘For it is not as if she had been accustomed all her life to move only in circles of high fashion. Mrs Thorne is perfectly respectable, but not at all exclusive, and you yourself told me that Letty’s mama was not of the first rank.’
‘You are a persuasive advocate, Nell! But I must hold to my opinion – and to what I conceive to be my duty. I have said that I won’t withhold my consent, if both are of the same mind when Allandale returns from Brazil, and that must suffice them. I shan’t conceal from you that I hope Letty, by that time, will have transferred her affections to some more worthy object.’
‘You want her to make a good match, don’t you?’
‘Is that so wonderful?’
‘Oh, no! Perhaps, if she doesn’t see Mr Allandale for some years, she will do so. Only – only – it would be so very melancholy!’