‘He was not eligible?’ Kitty ventured to ask.
‘Oh, no! I daresay he has not twopence to rub together, poor man!’
‘But you liked him, perhaps?’
‘No, but he would have been very glad to have married me, even though I have no fortune, because his housekeeper is lately dead, and he does not know how to go on, and I can dress meat neatly and cheaply, besides being able to sew, and to iron better than the washerwoman.’
The vision of an impoverished but romantic young lover died still-born. Daunted, Kitty said: ‘And was there no one else! No one at all? I declare, it must be as dull as my own home, and I had thought that nothing could be!’
‘Only young Mr Drakemire,’ said Olivia. ‘He is rather stout, but very genteel. He stood up twice with me at the Assembly, but the Drakemires, you must know, live at the Big House, and Lady Drakemire did not at all like his seeming to admire me, so he did not take me out driving as he said he would. Mama scolded, but indeed it was not my fault! I said everything she told me to, but it wouldn’t serve.’
‘I have sometimes thought,’ said Kitty, tentatively, and after a short pause, ‘that nothing could be more disagreeable than to marry a gentleman for whom one feels no strong attachment.’
‘No, indeed!’ Olivia sighed.
‘I could not do it. In fact, I would liefer by far die unwed!’
‘Would you?’ said Olivia wistfully. ‘But, then, dear Miss Charing, our circumstances are so different! You have all the comfort and consequence of fortune—’
‘No, I assure you I have not! I am wholly dependant upon the generosity of my guardian! I do not exaggerate when I say that I have not a penny in the world!’
‘Yes, but your guardian is rich, is he not? Mama, you see, is not rich at all, and I have three sisters,’ said Olivia unanswerably. ‘I must be married. Oh, how vexed Mama would be if she was obliged to take me home again, and all the money she saved for this visit spent to no purpose!’
She looked so really frightened that Kitty said quickly: ‘Of course you will be married, and to a man you can esteem, too! Good gracious, don’t tell me you have not a great many admirers already, for I shall certainly not believe you! Indeed, I think everyone who sees you must admire you, for you are by far the prettiest girl in London!’
Olivia coloured, and averted her face. ‘Don’t—pray! Gentlemen do sometimes admire me, but—but they do not offer to marry me. Situated as I am—the manners of my cousins—so very free!—I have met with a want of propriety in—in some whom I believed to be so very gentlemanly!’
‘I know what you mean, I daresay,’ said Kitty, wisely, but in blissful ignorance of Miss Broughty’s meaning. ‘You are now and then judged by your company, and you find yourself treated with that kind of high-bred insolence which I have frequently noticed in London, and which I do not consider high-bred at all, but, on the contrary, excessively ill-bred!’ She added frankly: ‘Forgive me, but I could not but notice that you were not quite pleased to meet Mr Westruther in Berkeley Square! If you should have thought that he was not civil to you when you met him previously, I assure you he does not mean to offend! He has sometimes a little height in his manner: Lady Buckhaven rallies him on it, saying he sets up people’s backs. He is never formal, you know—indeed, I fancy he treats no one with particular distinction!’
‘Oh, no!’ breathed Olivia. ‘I did not mean—I should not have mentioned—Such a very distinguished man! His air and address so exactly—’ She broke off in confusion, and quickly directed Kitty’s attention to a clump of purple crocuses.
Some inkling of the truth began to dawn on Kitty. It was apparent to her that the magnificence of Mr Westruther had had its inevitable effect upon Miss Broughty. She did not wonder at it; she would indeed have found it hard to believe that any female could be ten minutes in Mr Westruther’s company without falling under the spell of his charm. But her sojourn in London, short though it had been, had convinced her that those who called Jack a shocking flirt spoke no less than the truth. It was, of course, reprehensible, but the failing did not diminish his charm: rather, it added to it, Kitty admitted to herself, a little guiltily. Nor was it just, she thought, to censure him too heavily, for the many ladies who blatantly set their caps at him gave him every encouragement to persist in his evil ways. But Kitty had quite a shrewd head on her shoulders, for all her country innocence, and somewhere, at the very back of her mind, not consciously acknowledged, lurked the conviction that Jack would never marry to his own disadvantage. None knew better than she what havoc he could create in female breasts; it would be dreadful if he (unwittingly, of course) scarred Olivia’s tender heart. She said impulsively: ‘Yes, Freddy—Mr Standen—calls him a buck of
the first head! He is precisely the hero every schoolroom-miss dreams about—as I have told him! I have known him all my life, you must understand: we have been as cousins.’
‘Yes,’ Olivia said, still with her eyes fixed on the crocuses. ‘I collected, when he came in—I was not previously aware of the relationship.’
‘Oh, in fact there is none!’ Kitty interrupted. ‘I call all my guardian’s great-nephews my cousins! Yes, what a splendid patch of colour, to be sure! Another day will see them in full bloom, but we shall take cold if we stand still in this sharp wind!’
They walked on, the path soon leading them to the promenade flanking the carriage-way. It was not long before a most unwelcome sight assailed Miss Broughty’s eyes. She said, under her breath: ‘Sir Henry Gosford! I implore you, dear Miss Charing, do not desert me!’
Kitty had not the smallest intention of deserting her, being wholly unacquainted with the tactics adopted by her cousins, the misses Scorton; but she had no time to reassure her: that time-worn beau, Sir Henry Gosford, had already swept off his hat, and was executing a bow before them. ‘Venus, with Attendant Nymph!’ he uttered.
An involuntary gurgle of mirth drew his eyes towards the Attendant Nymph. He raised his quizzing-glass with an air of hauteur, but speedily allowed it to fall again. No quizzing-glass, however magnifying its lens, could avail against Miss Charing’s clear, unwavering gaze. From the crown of his jauntily-poised beaver to the toes of his polished boots, Miss Charing surveyed him, critically, but with indulgence. For a horrid moment it seemed to him that she detected the tight corsets he wore; and knew that the glowing chestnut hue of his curled and oiled locks could only be ascribed to the exertions of his barber. In the agitation of this moment, he failed to assimilate the introduction stammeringly performed by Miss Broughty. A lifetime of self-satisfaction came to his rescue; he realized that the Attendant Nymph’s rapt gaze could only spring from admiration of so complete a Bond Street Lounger; favoured her with a nod, and a smile not pronounced enough to disturb the maquillage which so cleverly hid the wrinkles in his face, and turned his attention to Miss Broughty. ‘Fair Amaryllis!’ he said. ‘It is not too much to say that you adorn the spring! All our beauties are cast into the shade, I protest!’
‘No, that’s not right, sir,’ said the well-read Miss Charing, painstakingly helpful. ‘“To sport with Amaryllis in the shade,” and quite ineligible!’
Sir Henry sustained a severe shock. His jaw dropped, and he groped again for his quizzing-glass, and raised it, this time with every intention of depressing pretension. Miss Charing’s wide gray eyes observed this manœuvre with interest. The glass dropped; Sir Henry said, showing all his excellent, if not genuine, teeth in an unloving smile: ‘Very witty, Miss—er—Scorton!’
‘You cannot have been attending, sir,’ said Kitty reprovingly. ‘I am Miss Charing, not Miss Scorton.’
‘Oh, I beg pardon! I did not immediately perceive—! Ah, exactly so! You are not Miss Broughty’s cousin, ma’am! Ten thousand pardons! My dear Miss Broughty, you are unattended—you have no footman—no maid! You must allow me to escort you!’
Olivia, thrown into the greatest discomfort, knew not how to counter this. Her companion was made of sterner stuff. ‘Unattended, Sir Henry? When you yourself knew me for an Attendant Nymph!’ exclaimed Miss Charing. ‘Indeed, we shall not put you to so much trouble!’
He protested that he could know no greater pleasure, talked archly of the distinction of having a lovely lady on either arm, and interspersed these compliments with broad hints to Kitty to take herself off, so that there seemed to be no possibility of getting rid of him. But when they had walked a few hundred yards salvation appeared in equestrian guise. Kitty, idly looking at the carriages and the horsemen, suddenly perceived her French cousin, trotting towards them on a brown hack. She waved; he saw her; and at once drew up, sweeping off his hat, and bowing. ‘My cousin! But what a coup de bonheur! They tell me that to be gent du monde in England I must ride in the Park, so behold me, mounted, à grands frais, upon a slug! I have my reward, cependant quoi qu’il en soit!’ He laughed down into Kitty’s eyes, saw in them an unmistakeable message, glanced at Sir Henry, and at once swung himself lightly out of the saddle, twitching his bridle over the hired hack’s head, and saying: ‘You will permit me to go with you, cousin?’
Much pleased with this swift, Gallic comprehension, Kitty said: ‘Oh, we shall be delighted to have your escort, Camille! Sir Henry here—oh, let me make you known to my cousin, the Chevalier d’Evron, Sir Henry!—has been so obliging as to turn his steps aside to accompany us, but now that you are come we need no longer trespass upon his good-nature!’ She then turned, and held out her hand to Sir Henry, adding brightly: ‘Goodbye! It was so kind in you!’