As there were quite a number of them, they were still listening and laughing when the door of the study was suddenly thrown open and Zia came running in.
At that moment the Marquis was standing with his back to the fireplace while Harry and Lord Charles were sitting deep in leather armchairs.
She therefore saw only the Marquis and ran across the room to him saying,
“Look! I must show you, your Lordship, my new gown. I have never owned anything so beautiful before and there are dozens coming later for me to try on!”
She drew in her breath and went on,
“And what do you think? I have been asked to a ball tonight – my first ball and your grandmother has accepted for us all to dine with the Duchess of Bedford!”
“Then you must certainly promise me the first dance,” Lord Charles said from behind her.
He obviously knew that he was behaving provocatively and he looked at the Marquis mischievously as he rose to his feet.
“Oh, I am sorry,” Zia said. “I did not know that there was anybody else here.”
“Let me introduce Lord Charles Fane,” the Marquis said, “but I order you to disbelieve every word he speaks!”
“Now that,” Lord Charles exclaimed, “is breaking every one of the Queensberry Rules! I can assure you, Miss Langley, I am a very truthful man when I say that you are the most beautiful girl I have ever seen.”
For a moment Zia looked surprised.
“Thank you, my Lord,” she said demurely, “but I always obey my Guardian.”
They all laughed at this and then she said,
“I must now go and have tea with her Ladyship, but I did want you to see my gown.”
“You look very nice in it,” the Marquis told her.
She smiled at him and then ran from the room as Lord Charles expostulated,
“Nice? I ask you! A more inadequate word I have never heard! Surely, Rayburn, you have some poetry in your soul?”
“I have already told you not to spoil Zia,” the Marquis replied, “and I too am now going to have tea with my grandmother and warn my Ward once again against listening to you.”
“The fact that she is in your house gives you a most unfair advantage,” Lord Charles complained.
But the Marquis was already leaving the room and walking down the corridor.
He had actually reached the hall when he realised that Lord Charles and Harry were behind him.
He therefore stopped just in case Lord Charles took it into his head to follow him into the drawing room where he knew that Zia would be with his grandmother.
Lord Charles was, however, taking his top hat, his gloves and his cane from the footmen and, as the butler opened the front door, he said,
“Goodbye, Rayburn, I shall see you tonight and I will certainly claim that first dance with your Ward!”
He walked out through the door without waiting for an answer and the Marquis looked at Harry.
“He is hopeless, but what can we do about him?”
“Nothing,” Harry answered, “and I am sure that Zia has enough sense not to believe everything he will say to her.”
The Marquis, however, was still frowning as he started to climb up the stairs.
“We have to make certain that she does not have her head turned by flibbertigibbets like Charles, but really does meet the right sort of man to make her a good husband.”
There was silence as they walked up a few more stairs.
Then Harry said,
“I should have thought the answer to that was quite obvious and would certainly solve your problem,”
“What are you saying?” the Marquis demanded.
“If you want me to put it into plain English,” Harry replied, “the sooner you marry the girl yourself the better!”
*
Zia thought that the ballroom of the Duchess of Bedford’s house was the most beautiful scene she could ever have imagined.
The ladies in their full-skirted gowns with jewels on their heads and around their necks looked like Fairy creatures who had stepped out from a picture book.
The gentlemen were resplendent in knee breeches and silk stockings and their long-tailed coats blazing with decorations were also very impressive.
Because it was so exciting and at the same time so beautiful, she had no idea that she herself was attracting a great deal of interest and attention.
It was impossible for the Marquis, as he was so handsome, to go anywhere without being noticed.
When he entered the ballroom with Zia at his side, there was a little gasp that seemed to go up from the Dowagers sitting together who were watching the dancers.
The gentlemen standing at the end of the room deciding who should be their next partner drew in their breath when they looked at Zia.
She was wearing a gown that fortunately had required little alteration, but even so had only arrived about fifteen minutes before she had to put it on.
It was white, as was expected of a debutante, but ornamented with flowers that were studded with diamanté.
They encircled her décollétage and decorated not only her bustle but also the hem of her skirt so that she glittered with every movement she made.
The Dowager Marchioness had lent her a good number of diamond stars, which had been arranged in her hair by a skilful hairdresser.
Every man who looked at her thought that there were stars in her eyes as dazzling as those that shone amongst her shining curls.
When she came downstairs before they had left for the ball, the Marquis had admitted to himself that she was lovelier than any girl he had ever seen.
She was also, he thought, different in every way from what he expected in somebody so young.
But he told himself that Harry’s idea that he should marry her was absurd and something he had no intention of doing.
While he was dressing for dinner, he had thought that Harry’s suggestion of marriage was in fact quite clever.
Of course the only way he could really scotch the rumours that Yasmin was spreading about him would be to let the world know that he was to be married.
If he did announce his engagement, it would be quite fruitless after that for Yasmin to continue with her lie about carrying his child and it was doubtful in the circumstances if anyone would believe her.
Even if they did, the woman was always blamed if she was foolish enough to get into trouble without first ensuring that the man concerned would do the honourable thing and marry her.
The whole Social world was expecting the Marquis sooner or later to choose a wife.
Someone who would be a commendable Marchioness to entertain for him in the same brilliant way that his mother and grandmother had entertained the Beau Monde.
It was incredible that Yasmin should try so desperately to blackmail him into marriage.
Of course the Marquis was intelligent enough to realise that she could make things very uncomfortable for him if he had no direct answer to her accusations.
Harry had indeed realised very shrewdly that the only unassailable answer would be his marriage to someone else.
*
Although the Marquis had made it a rule never to dance if he could possibly help it, he started to dance with Zia as soon as they reached the ballroom.
He saw Lord Charles moving over the ballroom to take possession of her and it was something that he was determined to prevent.
“This is very exciting!” Zia enthused as they moved slowly to the music of a romantic waltz.
She did not understand why but she felt a little thrill run through her breast because the Marquis was so close and holding her.
“I thought that you would enjoy it,” the Marquis replied. “Equally you will understand that you must not dance more than once with the same man and, as soon as each dance is over, you return to my grandmother and sit beside her.”
“I can see through the window that there are fairy lights in the garden,” Zia remarked.
Without his intending i
t, the Marquis’s hand tightened for a moment on her small waist.
“No! No! No!” he declared firmly. “You will not go into the garden with anybody do you understand?”
“Of course I understand what you are telling me, my Lord, but there is no need to sound so ferocious about it!”
She smiled up at him as she spoke and the Marquis then felt that he had somehow over-reacted to the situation.
“I do not want you to gain a bad reputation at your very first ball!” he stressed.
“Your grandmother has told me how I am to behave,” Zia said, “and I promised her I would be very good.”
“I hope you will keep your promise.”
“It might be – difficult if one of my – partners is very – persuasive.”
For a moment the Marquis glared at her and then he realised that she was teasing him.
“For goodness sake, Zia, do be sensible,” he urged her. “You must be aware that, as you are new to London and also my Ward, people will be watching and talking about you.”
“Will they really?” Zia asked in surprise. “How thrilling! Was it not lucky that your grandmother and I found this beautiful gown in Bond Street?”
She lowered her voice as she added,
“Your grandmother said that I was not to tell anybody, but actually it was commissioned as a bridal gown for a Spanish Princess and now the poor seamstresses will have to sit up all night in order to create another one in time for her Wedding!”
“I expect they will be well paid for doing so,” the Marquis commented cynically.
He realised as he spoke that Zia was not listening to him.
She was glancing round the room and then she said in a whisper that only he could hear,
“You are – quite right. We are being – watched! I think it’s not only my gown but because – you are dancing with – someone as – unimportant as me!”
“Who has been talking to you?” the Marquis enquired.
Zia laughed.
“Your grandmother, the housekeeper, all the maids who look after me as well as Captain Blessington!”
“What has Harry been saying?” the Marquis asked sharply.
“I shall not tell you because I am sure that it would make you conceited,” Zia answered, “but I do – realise that I am very – very privileged to be your Ward.”
There was nothing that the Marquis could say to this and, when the dance was over, he took Zia back to his grandmother.
He had intended to go to the card room, but somehow he found it impossible not to stay in the ballroom to see what Zia was doing.
That she was a wild success at the ball was indisputable.
He noticed that every bachelor in the room was attempting to fill in her dance card, but there were many more partners than dances.
What surprised him was that unlike other debutantes, and there were a number of them present, Zia was talking and laughing with her partners.
Apparently their compliments were not making her feel shy.
Driving home in the carriage later with the Marquis and his grandmother she said,
“Thank you – thank you for the most – enchanting evening I have – ever spent.”
“You were certainly a great success, my dear,” the Dowager Marchioness answered. “I am quite sure that tomorrow there will be a great pile of invitations to similar balls and to many other entertainments.”
“How – could this – happen to me?” Zia asked in a low voice. “I was so – miserable until his Lordship rescued me that I kept wondering – how I could – d-die.”
“You promised me not to even think about it,” the Marquis said.
“How can I help it – when I seem to have stepped into a new – world that is just like Heaven?”
“That is what I hope you will go on thinking,” the Dowager Marchioness smiled.
“Do you know,” Zia exclaimed as if she had just remembered, “three gentlemen, and I cannot even remember their names, asked if they could call and see me tomorrow and said that they particularly wanted to talk to me alone.”
The Dowager Marchioness glanced across the carriage at her grandson.
In the light of the candle-lantern she saw that he was scowling.
“If any of them propose marriage to you,” he said sharply, “you are not to accept them without asking me first.”
“Propose marriage?” Zia enquired in astonishment. “Why should they do that?”
“You have to remember,” the Marquis said in a hard voice, “that you have an unusually large fortune!”
There was silence for a long moment and then Zia said in a very small voice,
“I never – thought of that. Is that the reason why – so many men wanted to – dance with me?”
“No, no, of course not!” the Dowager Marchioness said quickly. “You were without exception the most beautiful and best-dressed girl in the room and they wanted to dance with you for yourself. What my grandson is telling you is that marriage is a very different thing to simply finding that you suit each other on the dance floor.”
“Of course it is, but I cannot believe – any man would want to marry a girl he had – seen only once.”
Again the Dowager Marchioness glanced at the Marquis.
“I think you will have so much shopping to do that you will not have time to see any of these impetuous gentlemen,” he said slowly, “and I will tell the servants to turn them away.”
Zia gave a little cry.
“Oh, no, please let me hear a proposal! I have often wondered what a man would say and if he really does go down on his knees as they do in novels.”
The Dowager Marchioness laughed.
“You are not to be too strict as her Guardian, Rayburn. I remember my first proposal was from an elderly Colonel who was a friend of my father’s and he was so emotional over it that his moustache wobbled and all I wanted to do was laugh.”
The Marquis said nothing and the Dowager Marchioness added,
“Zia has to learn to handle her own affair and, when she says ‘no’, she must make the gentlemen, however ardent they are, believe that is what she definitely means.”
As she spoke, the carriage drew up outside Oke House and the Marquis, as he was sitting on the small seat, was obliged to alight first.
As he walked into the house, he was scowling again.
*
Sister Martha heard somebody opening her bedroom door and, as she then turned from the window, she saw to her surprise that it was Zia.
“Are you awake already?” she exclaimed. “When I was told how late you came in last night, I thought that you would sleep until luncheontime.”
“That is what the Dowager Marchioness expected,” Zia replied, “but I am too excited to sleep and I wanted to tell you all about the ball last night.”
“And I am longing to hear about it,” Sister Martha said, “but first I have a confession to make to you. “
Zia looked at her curiously.
“A confession?”
“I was thinking about it last night and praying just now that I can be brave enough to tell you the truth.”
“What is it?” Zia asked. “What is wrong?”
“I have lied to you,” Sister Martha said and her tone was piteous.
“I – don’t understand.”
“I cannot go on pretending! I am not a nun and I only pretended that I was one when Father Proteus came to – the Convent.”
“Is that all?” Zia asked. “Well, I think it was a very sensible thing to do.”
“Do you really? You are not shocked?”
“No, of course I am not.”
“I was afraid when he appeared and said that he was taking over the Convent that if I was not a nun he might send me away like the poor old women.”
“It is the sort of thing he would do,” Zia said.
“I had nowhere to go and Father Anthony agreed that I could stay there, but I was not to take the veil as I told him I wanted to do until I wa
s twenty-one.”
“So you thought that Father Proteus would not interfere if he believed you to be a nun.”
“It was a lie and I am so ashamed of it,” Martha admitted. “Father Anthony was too ill for me to explain to him what Father Proteus was doing, so I just put on the wimple and the veil of one of the nuns who was always ill in bed.”
She gave a little sob that was very pathetic.
“After that everybody called me ‘Sister Martha’ and sometimes I forgot myself that I was just – plain Martha whom nobody wanted.”
“You are not to say that again,” Zia protested. “I want you and now it makes it very much easier for you to do what the Marquis suggested and teach at the school on his estate.”
“When he – hears I have lied – he may not want me,” Martha pointed out nervously.
“I don’t think he really understands about nuns and whether they have taken the veil or not. I suppose if you were a proper nun it might be difficult, but as it is, you have just like me to forget about Father Proteus and start a new life.”
Martha wiped away the tears that threatened to run down her cheeks as she answered,
“Oh, Zia, you are so kind to me and, if I could start all over again somewhere quite different, it would be very wonderful!”
“That is exactly what you are going to do.”
Zia thought for a moment before she went on,
“I have a marvellous idea!”
“What is it?”
“It is only nine o’clock and the Dowager Marchioness is not being called until eleven. His Lordship has gone riding, as I asked my maid where he was when I was getting dressed.”
Martha was looking at her while she spoke almost to herself and then she said,
“What we are going to do now is to go shopping! I am going to fit you out in the clothes you will wear as your real self and you can throw away that hideous garment, just as I threw away the one I had to wear.”
Martha gave a little gasp and Zia went on,
“Take it off! Take it off quickly! I will give you something to wear and I will order the carriage.”
She ran from the room as she spoke and came back a few minutes later with the gown that the Captain had bought for her at Falmouth.
A Very Special Love Page 9