“Feathers. He sent you to watch over me.”
Plum cocked his fez to a more rakish angle. “What if he did? It gave me a chance to dine with my two favourite sisters. Ooh, is that crab?”
He applied himself to the fish course and we talked of various things for the rest of the meal. Or rather, Portia talked—almost entirely about the baby—and Plum and I listened.
After the sweet course was cleared, we withdrew to the drawing room for tea and spirits, and Nanny Stone appeared, dressed in severe black bombazine and carrying the infant Jane.
“It is time, my lady,” she said to Portia. She settled Jane the Younger into Portia’s lap and took herself off with an air of satisfaction.
“What was all that about?” Plum asked.
Portia primmed her mouth. “Nanny Stone has apparently been chatting with the other nannies in the park. She has discovered that it is customary to have one evening off per fortnight and has decided to take it. And Sunday afternoons.”
“Good God, don’t tell me the nannies of London are organising,” Plum put in waggishly. “Do you think they will strike like the dockworkers?”
I rolled my eyes at Plum. “Those poor fellows have only just gone back to work. It is far too soon to jest about it.” The dockworkers had spent five weeks on strike in order to protest their abhorrent working conditions. Before them had been the gasworkers and before them the match-girls. It seemed all of London was protesting something, and I for one seldom read the accounts in the newspapers anymore. Their stories were simply too awful to contemplate, and I knew Portia felt the same.
“Of course the nannies are not organising,” Portia snapped. “It is simply that Nanny Stone is entitled to some private time and we mutually decided that she should be employed under the same terms as other nannies.”
It was unlike Portia to be so prickly, and as I stared at her furrowing brow, a terrible suspicion began to creep over me.
“Portia, dearest, have you ever actually been alone with the baby before?”
She muttered something unintelligible and I poked at her knee.
“Very well! No. I have never actually been alone with her. I do not know what the trouble is. I adore her, of course. I am her mother. But infants are difficult and I am not entirely certain of what needs be done when.”
“Of course not,” I soothed. “We all know how much you adore her. That is not even a matter for discussion. But most mothers have many months to prepare for motherhood. Yours was a more sudden attachment.”
“Precisely,” she said, her brow relaxing a little. The child squirmed in her arms, and Portia slid her smallest finger into the baby’s mouth. Jane the Younger began to suckle greedily.
“I know it looks awful, but she’s bringing out a tooth,” Portia apologised. “She likes it when I rub at her gums.”
“See there? You do know how to take care of her. Doesn’t she, Plum?” I demanded, fixing him with a piercing stare.
“What? Erm, yes, of course. Lovely mother, one of the best,” he put in hastily.
“There now. Even Plum sees it. And we will be here this evening should you need moral support,” I promised.
Portia had just shot me a grateful smile when the door fairly flew back on its hinges to reveal our youngest brother, Valerius. He entered like a whirlwind, tossing off his overcoat and kissing his sisters. He gave a nod to Plum and threw himself onto a sofa.
“Julia, what the devil did you do to set Father off? I went to dine with him and he was savaging a plate of ortolans.”
One could always tell the state of Father’s temper by his table manners. If he was feeling upset, he liked nothing better than to apply himself to something he could tear into rather brutally—something like a plate of ortolans. I felt a pang of pity for the little songbirds, then reminded myself better them than me.
“I am surprised you have not heard the full story,” I said, plucking at an arrangement of flowers upon the low table.
“Julia has gone and got herself in the newspaper,” Portia supplied.
Val’s eyebrows rose. “Really? I don’t think one of the March ladies has done that since Aunt Tamora rode her horse into the House of Lords as a protest against fox-hunting.”
I pulled a face at him. “Don’t be absurd. Bee was written up in every paper in London when she was caught smoking at a garden party at Buckingham Palace with the Earl of Bowes-Ruthven’s heir.” We fell silent a moment, musing on our second-eldest sister and her eventful coming-out. The queen had not been at all amused, and Bee had found herself struck from every guest list in society, which had rather been the point. She was already besotted with a reclusive Arthurian scholar and had made up her mind to avoid the formality of a season by becoming notorious at the first possible opportunity.
“Didn’t Father disinherit her for that?” Val asked. He had still been in the nursery when Bee achieved her aims and scarcely remembered her. Her marriage had taken her off to Cornwall and she seldom came to town.
“Yes, but only until he realised Bowes-Ruthven’s heir had tried something most ungentlemanly behind the potted palms. Then Father was outraged Bee hadn’t struck the fellow,” Portia supplied.
“It was the talk of the season, as I recall,” Plum went on. “Father challenged the pup to a duel. The queen got wind of it and boxed Father’s ears for even suggesting it. She’s quite fond of the old goat. Didn’t they share a drawing master when they were children or some such?”
“Dancing master,” I corrected.
We were all laughing by then, imagining our scapegrace elderly father learning to waltz with the future queen in his arms. In spite of her reputation for primness, the queen did appreciate a good joke, and she always said that Hector March was the liveliest boy she ever knew. She ordered the Bowes-Ruthven heir to apologise and the matter was settled without bloodshed after Father made a tremendous donation to one of her pet charities. It had been quite the scandal at the time, and I suppressed a pang of irritation that what was sauce for the goose was so seldom sauce for the gander, even in our outrageous family.
“This will pass,” Portia assured me, correctly assessing my mood.
“Of course it will,” Plum added. “You’re just feeling gloomy because you are Father’s favourite and you aren’t accustomed to feeling the full weight of his displeasure.”
“I am not his favourite!” I protested. “If he has a favourite, it is Val. Val is the baby, and besides, none of the rest of us would have got our way if we had wanted to study medicine. Clearly Val is his pet.”
Val spluttered into his cup of tea. “I most certainly am not. He cut me off four times and I still am not permitted to live at March House. He hates that I make my livelihood with my own two hands as much as he hates the fact that Bellmont has ended up a Tory. At least I know our eldest brother is no competition for the title of favourite,” he jested.
The remark cut too near the bone. Without thinking, I leapt to his defence. “Bellmont is not so awful. He has given Adelaide and the children a very comfortable home for these many years. His constituency are very fond of him, too. They have returned him every election since he was twenty-two. He has been in service to them and to his country for the whole of his adult life, with little thanks and less affection. We have made him the butt of our jokes and sniggered at him behind his back, and we ought to be ashamed of ourselves.”
I broke off to find my siblings staring at me in astonishment. Plum had paused with a muffin halfway to his mouth, Portia was open-mouthed, and even Jane the Younger was regarding me with something akin to reproach.
“Good God, Julia, it was just a joke. And since when have you been such a devotee of Bellmont’s? He used to play your nerves as much as anyone’s,” Val managed.
“He still does,” I admitted, smoothing my skirts. “It’s just that we so often make him the butt of our jests that I think we forget he does have some good qualities.” I broke off again. I had said too much already, and any more of this spi
rited rebuttal would only lead to further questions. I had surprised myself. Bellmont had irritated me so thoroughly and so often that I did not realise I harboured such affection for him. I wondered if it would pass.
I hurried on. “But perhaps you are right, Val. You are not Father’s favourite. I think it must be Plum. I would lay money upon it.”
Plum snorted. “I have done nothing with my life except execute some painfully mediocre art and take up employment as an enquiry agent. I am in his black books as much as Julia at present. No, his favourite is most certainly Portia.”
Portia blinked. “You must be joking. He fussed at me for quite quarter of an hour last week because I would not sell him my cow. Julia is decidedly the favourite.”
“But you have the baby,” I retorted. It was a palpable hit. Father doted upon all of his grandchildren, showing not a particle of difference in his affections for Portia’s adopted daughter as he did for those born to his own children. As if on cue, Jane the Younger began to stretch and fuss a little.
“Poor little mite,” Plum said. “Does she need to be dandled on Uncle Plummy’s knee?” Plum’s devotion to babies was a trifle unnerving. He was the one uncle who always delighted in them as infants, proving surprisingly adept at soothing tempers and bringing up wind. But his attentions were short-lived. Once they were able to walk and eat meat, he lost interest entirely. Fortunately, with so many sisters and sisters-in-law constantly producing children, there was never a shortage of wee ones for him to cuddle.
Portia passed the baby to Plum, who cradled her expertly, and we spent a very pleasant half an hour engaged in domesticity. Portia poured out tea and Val toasted muffins upon the hearth while I slathered them in butter and handed them round. Plum amused the baby with verses of nonsense, calling forth delighted coos of laughter, and for that short while, I forgot Madame and the séance and the scandal I had wrought with my own two hands.
Just as I rang for more muffins there was a commotion in the hall, and the four of us turned expectant eyes towards the door. A moment of breathless silence, and then the door opened to reveal a thoroughly unexpected sight.
“Lady Felicity!” I cried.
She stood, hesitating in the doorway, turning appealing eyes to Portia.
“I am so sorry to intrude. I did not know where else to go.”
Plum made to stand and suddenly realised he was still holding the infant Jane.
“Oh, do not disturb yourself!” she said, shrinking back a little. She was very clearly distressed, and it was equally apparent that whatever trouble beset her had come quickly. She was dressed formally, in a gown of primrose-coloured silk, a vile choice for so pale a blonde, but the cut was good—if a year out of date—and the fabric expensive. She was pleating the silk with her gloved fingers, very nearly shredding the stuff, and I think it was that small gesture of uncertainty that roused Portia’s sympathies.
She rose and went to Felicity. “Come and sit by the fire. It is cool this evening and you have come out without a wrap.”
“Oh, I had a cloak, but your butler took it,” Felicity corrected. “I did not think he was going to admit me, so I slipped out of it and ran to the first room where I saw a light under the door.”
“Very clever of you,” Portia said soothingly. “But there was no call for such theatrics. Granger knows to send in every card.”
“But I came away without my cards,” Felicity demurred. She let Portia guide her to a chair near the fire. Valerius had straightened his posture to something more upright now that we were no longer a family party, and Plum was still suspended in an awkward half-crouch, holding Jane the Younger at a precarious angle until she gave a roar of disapproval and he righted himself.
Portia poured out a cup of tea for Felicity and added a healthy dollop of whisky. The girl took it and drank deeply. She gave a heaving cough and her face went white then red. “Oh, spirits,” she said breathlessly.
“Whisky is restorative,” Portia told her firmly. And after a moment of sipping, this time more cautiously, Felicity did look greatly recovered from her distress.
“You’re very kind,” she murmured as Portia pressed another cup upon her.
“We are, naturally, delighted to see you, but to what do we owe the pleasure of your call, Lady Felicity?” I asked.
She put her cup onto the saucer with a sharp click and placed the saucer upon the table. Then she folded her hands in her lap and said, quite calmly, “I have run away from home.”
The room went very still, and for an instant there was no sound save the popping of the gas fire and a breathy sigh from Jane the Younger.
It was Portia who recovered her tongue first. “And you came here? How kind of you to permit us to help you.” Her tone was perfectly serious, but Felicity’s lips twitched, and I realised she was on the verge of hysterical laughter.
“Oh, Lady Bettiscombe, I am sorry! I went first to Brook Street. I thought to find Lady Julia or Mr. March,” she said with a nod to each of us, “but they were not at home, and Lady Julia’s butler was kind enough to tell me where they had gone. I had no thought save finding them and throwing myself upon their mercies.”
I darted a look at Plum, but he kept his eyes firmly fixed upon the infant in his lap. “What precisely can we do for you, Lady Felicity?”
She began to pleat her silk again, folding the fabric between her fingers this way and that, creasing it irreparably.
“I thought you might suggest a haven for me,” she said with admirable frankness. “I am afraid I did not think this out very well. It was only after I left my father’s house that I realised I had no decisive plan of action. And then I thought of Mr. March and it occurred to me that the ladies of your family—” she broke off here, stumbling a little over her words “—well, that is to say, the March ladies—”
“Get into enough trouble that the men in our family ought to know how to get them out?” Valerius guessed.
To her credit, Felicity flushed deeply and gave me an apologetic look. “I did see the newspaper this morning.”
I flapped a hand. “Do not worry about giving offence, my dear. I daresay you are quite right. Now, what precisely is your situation? Have you left home for good? Have you any money?”
“Julia!” Plum’s voice was a strangled hiss. I had no doubt he would have liked to have shouted at me, but concern for the baby on his lap prevented him.
I shrugged. “We must know the facts if we are to help Lady Felicity formulate a plan. So, I ask again, what are the facts? Have you broken irreparably with your family?”
“Irreparably,” she said stoutly. “My father revealed his true character to me this evening, and I will not be sheltered under the roof of such a man, not even for a single night more.”
I hazarded another glance at Plum, but he was still ignoring me. I wondered if Felicity had discovered some new duplicity in her father with regards to his finances. But that was a business matter, and many ladies turned a blind eye to the business dealings, however dubious, of their menfolk. Was it something that touched Felicity directly then?
My suppositions must have been writ upon my face, for Felicity lifted her chin and looked me directly in the eye, her own gaze calm as a millpond. “My father wished me to marry where I do not love and cannot esteem simply for his own financial advantage.”
“How dreadful,” I murmured, but I was deeply conscious of Plum’s abruptly stiffened posture. So was the baby. She roared again, and Portia clucked at him.
“If you are going to flinch, give her back. I do not want her shouting down the house.”
Plum gave her a nasty look and soothed the baby. I glanced at Felicity to find her eyes lingering upon the pair of them, her expression soft.
“So the breach is irreparable,” I said, guiding her back to the subject at hand.
“Indeed. I will marry where I wish, or not at all,” she said firmly.
“As you should. Now, in the meanwhile, you must have a roof over your head and food up
on your plate.”
I paused and she had the grace to colour slightly. “I do have some means. My mother left me an annuity. Father cannot touch it, and the funds are paid me directly by the bank. I can keep myself.”
“Excellent. A woman should always be able to keep herself,” I said roundly. “But even if we think you should be able to do so, society does not. If you take a house alone, you will be cut off from all polite society and any chance of a marriage you might like to make for yourself one day. You must live with someone respectable,” I finished. “Have you any elderly female relations?”
“None.” Her voice had lost some of its crispness, as if she had only just begun to realise the magnitude of what she had done.
For a quarter of an hour, we put up names, suggesting various ladies of our acquaintance who might take Felicity in and rejecting them just as quickly. At each barrier, Felicity’s spirits seemed to sink a little lower, until she finally fell into a reverie, staring at the flames. When she spoke, her voice was distant.
“It’s absurd, this time we live in. A woman is Queen of England, mistress of all our destinies, and yet as a spinster I cannot so much as take a house with my own money without society destroying me for it,” she said, and every word was laced with bitterness.
“It is absurd,” Portia agreed. “But it is the truth, and it is also true that only the veneer of respectability need be maintained.”
Felicity looked up. “What do you mean?”
Portia smoothed her skirts. “I mean, that you ought to come and live here. I am neither society’s most discreet nor most conservative member, but I am a member nonetheless. Your reputation would not be ruined completely if you lived here, at least the damage would be far less than what you would suffer if you lived alone. What say you?”
I opened my mouth to object, but Felicity had flushed deeply, her eyes suddenly shimmering with unshed tears. “Do you mean it, Lady Bettiscombe?”
“Of course I mean it,” Portia assured her. “I live alone, save for the staff and the baby, and I have far too many rooms here. You can come and go as you please until such time as you choose to make other arrangements.”
The Dark Enquiry Page 18