Debutantes

by Charlotte Bingham

‘Because of our respective patrons? Yes, the same thought had occurred to me, Miss Tradescant. We won’t really be able to address each other in public, will we?’

  ‘Only in the most formal way, I fear. But there is nothing to stop us continuing our friendship in private. Do you ride every day?’

  ‘I would die if I did not,’ Emily replied.

  ‘Very well, then so shall I. And this way we can ensure our friendship remains secret since at least when we are horsed we are free of our maids. The only thing we must beware of is not to greet each other in the stable yard and not to return together. We can meet under those trees back there where we stopped. Do you agree, Miss Persse?’

  ‘Wholeheartedly, Miss Tradescant. I shall look forward to seeing you tomorrow.’

  With a broad smile and a wave Emily was gone, riding ahead into the stables while Portia took a turn to allow her enough time. While she did she reflected on her good fortune, making friends with such a wonderful person as Emily Persse and thinking she was just the sort of companion she had always prayed she might have, full of character and good humour. But then somewhat more realistically she also knew she should consider what chances such a friendship as theirs promised to be had of lasting through the long months ahead until the Season was over, and when she did give it her consideration she grew extremely thoughtful. After all, for everyone concerned there seemed to be so very much at stake.

  THE FIRST BALL

  Daisy was being dressed for the first ball of the Season, and in spite of the many contradictory feelings which beset her at the moment, her frustration concerning Captain Peter Pilkington, her concern about the conduct of her protégée Emily, the boredom she suffered at the hands of her ancient martinet of a husband, and most of all her dread of having to spend most of the coming three months in the company of dowagers and chaperones on a succession of increasingly uncomfortable gilt chairs, none the less Daisy found as happened every single year that once again she absolutely thrilled to the thought of attending the Duke of Salisbury’s ball at Wilsford House on Grosvenor Square, the dance which was to open the social proceedings proper.

  ‘I fink it must be ancestral, do you know, Jenkins?’ she asked her maid as she herself lay flat on her back on her vast bed with its tapestry backdrop depicting her family coat of arms behind her head while her maid pulled on Daisy’s silk stockings. ‘Yes, I really fink vat’s what it is, it is ancestral to look forward to ve opening ball of each Season, and to wearing all one’s simply wonderful new gowns. It has to be part of whatever it is we’re made of to feel vis sense of utter elation at the prospect of making everyone’s heads turn as one comes in ve door, do you not fink?’

  ‘I’m sure as I don’t know, my lady,’ Jenkins replied, having now successfully completed the first part of her enterprise, namely the perfect fitting of her mistress’s new white silk stockings on her mistress’s famously elegant legs. ‘All I know is to look at you I can’t believe another year has gone.’

  ‘Oh,’ Daisy sighed theatrically, as she rose naked from her bed except for her newly fitted stockings. ‘You are such a glumpot, Jenkins, really you are. Somehow you always manage to drag time into everyfing. Yes of course anuvver year has gone by. We would not be here had it not, you silly woman. But look – I defy you to tell that is so by looking at me.’

  Daisy stood and allowed her maid to appraise her naked form, standing with her arms raised from her sides and her feet placed in the first ballet position. ‘Well?’ she demanded.

  ‘We might have a bit of a struggle with the lacing tonight, my lady,’ Jenkins replied from behind Daisy. ‘When did you order your ball gown from Mr Worth?’

  Daisy breathed in and out very slowly and very pointedly to show her maid how impatient the remark had made her, handing over her underclothes at the same time for Jenkins to fit. The wretched woman knew perfectly well when she had ordered the gown from Paris, Daisy thought, remaining silent while Jenkins pulled on her fresh linen and carefully fastened it for her. At the same time she eyed the saffron ballgown which had been laid out for her on her chaise just a little nervously because what Jenkins had spoken was the truth. It had to be admitted that over the last few weeks a little avoirdupois had indeed been added to her famous waistline but it had come from frustration. When the dress had been fitted by Worth she had only just met her dashing captain prior to their journey to Ireland together and so extreme had been her desire that she had resisted all temptations at the table and stayed as slender as a wand, whereas over the last few weeks when she had been deprived of his company she had compounded her frustration by giving in to too many of the wrong foods and far too much champagne.

  ‘Ve new French corset should do it, Jenkins, now vat we have worn it in,’ Daisy declared now she was dressed in her underthings. ‘Even if you have to put one of your enormous great feet in my back. Come along.’

  She handed her maid the new corset which had also been made for her especially in Paris and which sported suspenders, the latest fashionable accessory which no right-thinking woman could be without, and then raising her arms above her head she prepared herself to be laced into it. Almost religiously, Jenkins wrapped the garment around her mistress from behind, Daisy holding it in place at the front with both hands on her stomach while her maid set about the lacing. When she began there was a gap of three or four inches at the back but by the time Jenkins had carefully worked her way down the laces from the top to the very bottom of the corset which finished over the top of Daisy’s thighs there was no longer any sight whatsoever of the pale flesh underneath.

  Daisy held her breath as long as she could while Jenkins worked, finally breathing in and out in as shallow gasps as she could manage. The only words she uttered were whispers to her maid to pull the laces ever tighter, because whatever happened she must fit into that wonderful saffron satin ballgown which lay awaiting her like the robes of someone about to be crowned. As the corset grew tighter and Daisy’s body was suffused with that familiar and not at all unpleasant hugging sensation, in her head Daisy could hear the whispers she always heard whenever dressed up in all her finery she made her eagerly awaited entrance at a ball. Look! they all whispered. That’s her! That’s Daisy Lanford! Isn’t she a picture! And that is what they would whisper again that very evening, Daisy was determined on it, as her waist grew ever smaller and her posture ever more upright.

  She was still known as Daisy Lanford rather than Daisy Evesham by tout Londres, which was what she greatly preferred, although as she well knew it was none too popular with the old fool who was her husband. But when one had achieved such national fame, that was the way things were. People knew one by the name by which one had become known and even Jenkins frequently forgot herself so much as to address her mistress as Lady Lanford, one of the few incorrect things she did for which she did not get roundly scolded in return.

  ‘There we are, my lady,’ she said, having finished with the lacing. ‘What’s done is done and cannot be undone.’

  As usual Daisy groaned at Jenkins’s attempted jocularity, for her jokes were as unfunny as her aphorisms were unenlightening. Still, Daisy thought to herself as reflected in her dressing mirror she saw the wonderful hourglass shape she now was, there was some comfort to be derived from Jenkins’s very monotony, from the way that she always said precisely the same things in the same way. It meant one did not really have to respond other than to murmur how true or now there’s a thing while still continuing to daydream. This evening, however, Daisy decided on a different response, because so long had the lacing of her corset taken that she had drifted off into a full-blooded fantasy as to what she and Captain Peter Pilkington might do once she had him married off to her apparently dim-witted protégée, and such was the power of her imagination that Daisy was suddenly afraid she might lose control of herself.

  ‘I really do not know where you hear half ve fings you come out wiff, Jenkins, really I do not,’ she said hastily, moving away from her maid to take another full turn in
front of the mirror before picking up her tape measure from the dressing table.

  ‘You must surely know that quotation, my lady,’ Jenkins replied, taking the measure from her mistress and placing it around her waist. ‘That is the Bard. That is from one of Shakespeare’s plays.’

  ‘Yes, yes, so it is of course,’ Daisy replied, much more interested in the result of Jenkins’s careful measuring which was about to be announced. ‘Well?’

  ‘Twenty-two inches exactly, my lady.’

  Daisy gave a smile of triumph. ‘Vare,’ she exclaimed. ‘Now let vem say anyfing different.’

  ‘What should they say, my lady?’ Jenkins wondered as she carefully guided her mistress’s feet over the petticoats which she had made ready for her to step into. ‘All they could say is that there still is no-one in the whole of the country to match your looks. Now the gauze – and then we are ready for the gown itself.’

  Having placed a large square of gauze over her mistress’s head to protect her hair while the gown was being fitted, Jenkins then raised the magnificent dress high in the air with the aid of two long dressing sticks before lowering it carefully down over Daisy’s head, first sliding the sleeves onto her mistress’s upheld arms and then gently easing the dress down until Daisy’s head emerged through the neck. Finally she slid the dress all the rest of the way down over her mistress’s bust and hips until it was in place, with its magnificent tulle diamond-encrusted train arranged perfectly behind. Jenkins’s last task was then carefully to fasten the dress shut with a seemingly endless series of tiny hooks and eyes which the maid did without speaking and hardly drawing a breath. ‘There,’ she said when she had at last finished. ‘Wait until you see.’

  ‘Wonderful, Jenkins,’ Daisy said, as she looked at her reflection. ‘You have dressed me to perfection. How you do it so well wivout assistance always defeats me.’

  ‘As you know I prefer to work alone, my lady,’ Jenkins replied. ‘No-one else can dress you like I can. No-one else knows you as well. And you know what they say about too many cooks.’

  ‘All too well, thank you, Jenkins,’ Daisy said quickly, not wishing to hear the rest of the tired truism. That was the trouble with Jenkins, she thought. She is all but indispensable. She could be a pain in the neck, but no-one could dress her hair the way Jenkins could, no-one was as expert at powdering her shoulders and adding a little touch of the forbidden rouge, not to mention pressing equally forbidden papier poudres over the nose and forehead before departure. Daisy well knew that Jenkins had made Daisy dependent on her, which was why Daisy gave a deep and private sigh at this very moment of triumph, and which was why she always had to put on a show of bad temper towards her maid at least once or twice a week, to keep Jenkins striving after further perfection in case her mistress should choose to dismiss her. There was no doubt that such a tactic seemed to work perfectly, because Jenkins was forever working at her craft and trying to do even better than she had done the day before.

  ‘Wonderful,’ Daisy said once more, delighted with the image she could see in her glass. ‘Now take off the gauze and bring me my jewels.’

  First came the magnificent six-strand pearl choker, then over her evening gloves which Jenkins smoothed carefully up to and over the elbows was fixed an equally stunning six-strand pearl bracelet. Finally came the pièce de résistance as from a locked leather box which she undid with a small gold key Jenkins produced the tiara. This was not the Evesham tiara but Daisy’s own family’s, a superb new creation fashioned from her mother’s old one, redesigned and made by Garrard so that the middle section came apart allowing it to be worn as the stunning centre of a choker, or as part of a corsage. The sides, roses for England, thistles for Scotland, and the centre an ivy leaf from Daisy’s family crest were all sprung so that they moved slightly when the wearer moved, making the diamonds wink and blink and bedazzle the onlooker.

  ‘Purely sensational, wouldn’t you fink, Jenkins? It has an elegance all of its own, and originality to boot.’

  ‘It is truly magnificent, my lady,’ Jenkins replied, ‘It beggars all description.’

  ‘Fank heavens for vat, Jenkins!’ Daisy laughed, making the smallest of adjustments to the tiara. ‘For I should hate to hear such an exquisite fing as vis traduced by some wretchedly inappropriate simile.’

  ‘No, my lady,’ Jenkins agreed, unable to take her eyes off the famous piece of jewellery. ‘In fact all that may fairly be said is that it is as if your head has been sprinkled with stardust.’

  ‘Oh, vat’s not too bad, Jenkins, not for you at least,’ Daisy replied. ‘I have always rarver liked ve idea of stardust. Good. Yes, vis is so much better van ve Old Fool’s family fender. Vat really is a monstrous piece. And ve gown, Jenkins. Are we quite happy wiff ve gown, do you fink?’

  Jenkins knew as well as her mistress that they were both more than happy with the gown Mr Worth had so lovingly built for the Countess of Evesham. It was undoubtedly one of his great creations, superbly cut and embroidered as it was with great clusters of seed pearls. Each cluster was about the width of a small hand and shaped into a crescent which stood proud from the saffron satin upon which they had all been sewn so intricately. Even Daisy was aware that each of the crescents must have taken many hours to sew since each was made up of so many tiny pearls.

  ‘The gown is a triumph, my lady,’ Jenkins announced. ‘And if I may make so bold so too are you.’

  ‘I take vat as a compliment, Jenkins, alvough for the life of me I’m not at all sure quite what you meant by it.’ Daisy took one last look at herself and then turned to leave her boudoir. ‘I take it Lady Emily is ready, Jenkins? You did tell her maid that I am not to be kept waiting?’

  ‘I did indeed, my lady,’ Jenkins assured her, following her mistress out of the room with her train carefully draped over one arm. ‘There should be no reason for any delay because after all Lady Emily has but a tenth of the task you have had in getting prepared.’

  ‘She had better not keep me waiting even so, Jenkins,’ Daisy said. ‘I cannot abide a moment’s delay when I am ready to leave.’

  * * *

  Emily had been ready to leave for half an hour and the only thing that was preventing her from making her way downstairs was her inability to stop herself from feeling sick and to find some way of bringing some colour to her deathly white cheeks.

  ‘Put your head between your knees, Lady Emily,’ Minnie her young maid advised her. ‘My mum says that if you feel faint—’

  ‘It isn’t faint that one is feeling, Minnie,’ Emily moaned, still managing in spite of her state of extremis to remember her newly acquired accent. ‘It is purely sick that one is feeling and one cannot descend unless one is absolutely sure it is utterly safe to move.’

  ‘Fresh air,’ Minnie suddenly suggested. ‘P’raps if we was to open a window, Lady Emily—’

  ‘And blow one’s carefully prepared hair to pieces? No, I can’t for one moment imagine Lady Evesham being pleased to see me coming down looking like a scarecrow. No, I think if I stand up—’ Emily slowly rose and looked at herself in the mirror. ‘Heavens, but one looks a fright,’ she said. ‘One looks as though one’s seen a spook.’

  ‘Try pinching your cheeks again, Lady Emily. Nice and ’ard. That brought some colour to ’em good and proper before.’

  Emily sighed once more, and having taken several deep breaths did as her maid instructed and squeezed both her paled cheeks as hard as she could between her forefingers and thumbs. ‘Ouch,’ she said. ‘All that does is hurt.’

  Minnie suddenly frowned, and putting a finger to her lips hurried to the door to listen. ‘Quick!’ she said, turning back to Emily. ‘You can’t wait any more, Lady Emily. I can ’ear ’em goin’ down now, ’cos I can ’ear Jenkins prattling away, so we’d best get a move on or we’ll be in real trouble.’

  As Minnie stood at the now open door, Emily took one last look at herself, at the same time doing her best to combat the most recent wave of nausea to sweep up from h
er stomach. If she wasn’t feeling quite so ill she might have been pleased with the way she looked, and the way Minnie had so diligently helped her prepare. Her wonderful auburn hair was beautifully coiffured, without a strand out of place and piled high into a perfectly made chignon, and her pure white silk dress fitted her tall, shapely figure perfectly. Besides a single strand of pearls at her neck she wore no other adornment except for an exquisitely arranged corsage of tiny flowers, the only splash of colour anywhere other than the russet of her hair and the green of her eyes.

  ‘One looks quite mortified, Minnie,’ she sighed. ‘If only one could ride there on one’s horse.’

  Minnie giggled and then beckoned her mistress to hurry on. Even when she was feeling so obviously unwell Lady Emily Persse still somehow had the ability to make her maid laugh, particularly with her anglicized Irish, although of course Minnie had no idea that was what amused her so. She just adored the wonderful, tall and beautiful young woman for whom she now worked, and wished that she could work for her always.

  ‘We really must hurry now, Lady Emily,’ she said, handing her young mistress both her reticule and her fan. ‘The countess does not like it if she is kept waitin’.’

  The main reason why Daisy did not like to be kept waiting was that she preferred to be the last person to make an appearance on the staircase before leaving. She would rather all eyes were on her, even if as was the case that night they were only the eyes of the senior servants who were gathered and waiting to see their famous mistress off first to keep her dinner engagement and then to go on to the Duke of Salisbury’s ball. As Daisy had descended the stairway, looking if it were possible even more magnificent than her loyal staff had ever seen her look before, her maids had bobbed their curtseys and her butler had solemnly called for a round of applause to accompany her progress. In return Daisy made the very most of her descent, although as she did so she noticed with well-concealed irritation that her protégée had not preceded her down. So much did Daisy consider this to be a breach of her private etiquette that had the occasion not been such an all-important one she would have allowed Jenkins to put her into her evening cloak and departed alone, leaving the wretched Emily to follow on in a separate and much less significant carriage. However, knowing that such a move would not be in her best interests that evening Daisy did her best to preserve her soul in patience while awaiting her protégée’s tardy arrival.