Nothing, thought Judith, could have been more opportune! Lucy was far too unaffected to have purposely placed herself beside a plain young female in a dress of particularly harsh puce, but the effect could not have been more advantageous to her. How right she had been to advise the child to wear her white satin! It was no wonder that she had caught Charles’s eye. She replied in a careless tone: ‘Oh, that is a young friend of mine, a Miss Devenish.’
‘Will you present me?’
‘Why, certainly! She is pretty, is she not?’
‘Pretty!’ repeated the Colonel. ‘She is the loveliest creature I ever beheld in my life!’
Prejudiced as Judith was in Miss Devenish’s favour, this encomium seemed to be to her somewhat exaggerated. Charles sounded quite serious too: in fact, oddly serious. She turned her head, and found to her surprise that he was not looking in Miss Devenish’s direction, but towards the big double doorway.
‘Why, Charles, whom can you be staring at?’ she began, but broke off as her gaze followed his. It was quite obvious whom Colonel Audley was staring at. He was staring at a vision in palest green satin draped in a cloud of silver net. The Lady Barbara Childe had arrived, and was standing directly beneath a huge chandelier, just inside the ballroom. The candlelight touched her hair with fire, and made the emerald spray she wore in it gleam vividly. The heavy folds of satin clung to her form, and clearly revealed the long, lovely line of a leg, a little advanced beyond its fellow. Shoulders and breast were bare, if you ignored a scarf of silver net, which (thought Lady Worth) was easily done. Any woman would have agreed that the bodice of the wretched creature’s gown was cut indecently low, while as for petticoats, Lady Worth for one would have owned herself surprised to learn that Barbara was wearing as much as a stitch beneath her satin and her net.
A glance at Colonel Audley’s face was enough to inform her that this disgraceful circumstance was not likely to weigh with him as it should.
His hand came up to grasp her elbow, not ungently, but with a certain urgency. ‘Miss Devenish, did you say?’
‘No, I did not!’ replied Judith crossly. She recollected herself, and added with an attempt to conceal her annoyance: ‘You are looking at the wrong lady. That is Barbara Childe. I daresay you may have heard of her.’
‘So that is Barbara Childe!’ he said. ‘Are you acquainted with her? Will you present me?’
‘Well, really, Charles, my acquaintance with her is of the slightest. You know, she is not quite the thing. I will allow her to be excessively handsome, but I believe you would be disappointed if you knew her.’
‘Impossible!’ he replied.
Judith looked wildly round in search of inspiration, and encountered only the mocking eyes of her lord. She met that quizzical glance with one of entreaty not unmixed with indignation. The Earl took snuff with a wonderful air of abstraction.
Help came from an unexpected quarter. Those standing by the door fell back; the orchestra struck up William of Nassau; the King and Queen of the Netherlands had arrived.
There could be no question of performing introductions at such a moment. As the ushers came in, the crowd parted, till an avenue was formed; their Majesties were announced; every lady sank in a deep curtsy; and in walked King William, a stout gentleman, with his stout Queen beside him, and behind him his two sons.
Majesty was in an affable mood, smiling broadly, ready to have any number of presentations made, and to be extremely gracious to everyone; but the Princes attracted more attention. The younger, Frederick, was a fine young man, with not inconsiderable pretensions to good looks. He bore himself stiffly, and favoured his acquaintances with an inclination of the head, accompanied by a small, regal smile.
His brother, the Prince of Orange, though arrayed in all the magnificence of a general’s dress uniform, was a much less impressive figure. He was very thin and held himself badly, and his good-humoured countenance bore a slight resemblance to that of a startled faun. His smile, however, was disarming, and a marked tendency to wink at cronies whom he observed in the crowd could not but endear him to his more unceremonious friends. When he caught sight of Colonel Audley, an expression of delight leapt to his rather prominent eyes, and he waved to him; and when the Duke of Wellington, having bowed punctiliously over the King’s hand, turned to pay his respects to him, he frustrated any attempt at formality by starting forward, and taking the Duke’s hand with all the reverence of a junior officer honoured by a great man.
‘I hope I see your Royal Highness in good health?’ said the Duke.
‘I am so glad to see you, sir,’ stammered his Royal Highness. ‘I would have reported at your house this morning, but I did not know—I was at Braine-le-Comte—you must forgive me!’
The Duke’s face relaxed. ‘I shall be happy to see your Highness tomorrow, if that should be convenient to you.’
‘Yes, of course, sir!’ his Highness assured him.
Majesty, listening indulgently to this interchange, intervened to draw the Duke’s attention to his younger son. The
Prince of Orange seized the opportunity to efface himself, and would have slipped away in search of more congenial companionship had not the signal for the dancing to begin been given at that moment. He was obliged to lead the opening quadrille with the Duchesse de Beaufort, and to dance a couple of waltzes with Madame d’Ursel and Madame d’Assche. After that, he considered his duty conscientiously performed, and disappeared from the ballroom into one of the adjoining rooms where refreshment and kindred spirits were to be found.
He entered between looped curtains to find a small but convivial party assembled there. Lord March, a fresh-faced young man with grave eyes and a quick smile, was leaning on a chair back, adjuring Colonel Audley, seated on the edge of the table, and Colonel Fremantle, lounging against the wall, to make a clean breast of their doings in Vienna. The fourth member of the group was Sir Alexander Gordon, a young man with a winning personality, who was engaged in filling his glass from a decanter.
‘Charles!’ cried the Prince, coming forward in his impetuous style. ‘My dear fellow, how are you?’
Colonel Audley stood up. ‘Sir!’ he said.
The Prince wrung his hand. ‘Now, don’t, I beg you! I am so pleased you are here! Do not let us have any ceremony! This is like Spain: we need only Canning, and Fitzroy to walk in asking, “Where’s Slender Billy?” and we are again the old family.’
‘That’s all very well, but you’ve become a great man since I saw you last,’ objected Colonel Audley. ‘I think—yes, I think a Royal Tiger.’
A general laugh greeted this old Headquarters’ joke. The Prince said: ‘You can’t call me a Tiger: I am not a visitor to the camp! But have you seen the real Tigers? Mon Dieu, do you remember we called the Duc d’Angoulême a Royal Tiger? But, my dear Charles—my dear Fremantle—the Duc de Berri! No, really, you would not believe! You must see him drilling his men to appreciate him. He flies into a passion and almost falls off his horse. But on my honour!’
‘No, sir!’ protested March.