by M C Beaton
The duchess had just told them all about her invitation to Aunt Mabel and that she now regretted it.
“I don’t see why you are frightened,” said Peter Firkin with a puzzled look. “Old bird, ain’t she. I mean to say, tells gels what to do about their lovelife, what. Anything the matter with your lovelife, Duchess? Haw, haw, haw!”
“Not mine,” said the duchess, much flustered. “I don’t want to tell you why I invited her, but I was at my wit’s end, and it seemed the thing to do, but now I don’t want this stranger here. She’ll probably fix me with a gimlet eye and search out the secrets of my soul.”
“Oh, I say,” said Peter Firkin awkwardly, running a finger around his collar.
“Balderdash!” said Mrs. Stuart roundly. “Give her tea and send her packing.”
The duchess moved her small, curved body restlessly on the chair. Everything about Her Grace was curved, from the droop of her eyelids to her thin-lipped mouth and well-upholstered body. She had heavy masses of pure white hair, which she wore fashionably dressed low on her forehead. It was the only remaining relic of her once considerable beauty.
The duke was unconcerned about his wife’s forthcoming guest. He detested houseparties and slept through as much of them as possible. His head was hidden behind the Times, which rose and fell with each gentle snore.
“Too late,” said Miss Wyndham with a light laugh. “I hear a carriage outside.”
Everyone sat in silence, listening.
The double doors at the end of the room were thrown open, and the butler announced in a pained voice, “Aunt Mabel of Home Chats.”
Sally stood and blinked behind the plain glass of her gold-rimmed spectacles. The room seemed to stretch for miles and miles, punctuated at intervals by bodies with staring eyes.
The duchess gave a little sigh of relief. There was nothing at all intimidating about Aunt Mabel. From her white hair to her neat boots, she looked the picture of mild English spinsterhood. Her eyes, behind their barrier of spectacles, looked surprisingly youthful and candid. Apart from that, she was certainly amazingly old and wrinkled, and that reassured the duchess even more.
She bustled forward and took Aunt Mabel’s mittened hands in her own. “So glad you have arrived, my dear. We will have a little chat. You must have some tea. I shall introduce you to everyone later. Ah, but you simply must meet Margery—Miss Wyndham. Margery, do come over and say hullo to Aunt Mabel.”
Sally turned slightly. A vision in blond lace was gliding toward her. Margery Wyndham was twenty-one and looked somewhat older because of her poise and classic beauty. She had heavy fair hair, caught in a thick coil at the back of her neck.
Her complexion was flawless and her expression sweet. She had large, well-shaped blue eyes. Her tea gown must have cost a small fortune in priceless lace, and the heavy rope of pearls around her neck reached to her knees.
She murmured a conventional greeting, and then Sally was borne off by the duchess. “We will go into the morning room,” said that lady, “for now that we have met I cannot wait to unburden myself. I am a great admirer of your column. So sensible! So forthright! I am sure you will be able to tell me exactly what to do.”
The duchess’s rather high, penetrating voice echoed around the marble entrance hall as she led Sally across it.
I should possibly develop a penetrating voice myself, thought Sally, if I lived in these gigantic rooms.
The morning room, which was at the end of a chain of passages, was reassuringly small. Its French windows were open to a view of the ornamental lake at the back of the house, and the sunlight sent water patterns wavering over the pretty gilt furniture and brocade curtains.
The occasional tables and mantelshelf were crammed with priceless porcelain. A coy tiger by Johann Gottlieb Kirchner leered up at Sally with its white porcelain eyes, and an indiscreet harlequin by Kaendler clutched the china bosom of his Columbine with frivolous unconcern.
Two maids in long white starched aprons and frilly lace caps entered silently and set the tea things on a round marble table.
Sally began to relax. The duchess was not formidable after all. The palace was rather overpowering, but with luck she would not have to stay for long. She settled back while the duchess dismissed the maids and busied herself among the teacups. To Sally’s amazement the duchess proved to be a “miffer.” The miffers, as any good etiquette book will tell you, are those socially unacceptable women who put the milk in first when serving tea—the milk-in-firsts. But she assumed after some hard thought that duchesses, being born at the very top of the social tree, did not have to labor over etiquette books.
Sally wondered if she should remove her mittens. She knew—etiquette books again—that one was supposed to keep one’s gloves on except when eating bread and butter, and there was no bread and butter, only cucumber sandwiches, seedcake, plum cake, and scones.
But the duchess’s opening remarks drove all thoughts of etiquette from Sally’s mind.
“Now,” began Her Grace, after slurping tea with all the elegance of a coal heaver, “my problem concerns my little boy, Paul. Of course, he’s not little anymore, being quite grown up. He has become enamored of that Margery girl. And it won’t do.
“Perhaps she is a trifle old for him,” ventured Sally in her quavery Aunt Mabel voice.
“Not at all,” said the duchess in a forthright manner, spreading seedcake liberally with jam and butter before stuffing it in her mouth.
Sally took the opportunity to eat a cucumber sandwich herself while her mind worked furiously. She glanced around quickly and then out of the French windows, where the formal gardens ran down to the lakeside. It must cost a fortune to run a place like this. That must be it! Miss Wyndham did not have money.
“Is Miss Wyndham… er… not very rich?” suggested Sally.
“Oh, yes, I mean, she is,” said the duchess. “Pots and pots.”
“Perhaps she is mean and unkind?”
“Sweet and thoughtful.”
“Well, then,” said Sally, beginning to feel exasperated, “you had better tell me why you don’t like Miss Wyndham.”
“She’s too good for him… Paul… my son.”
Sally looked wise while her brain seemed to consist of nothing more than a row of question marks. The most she could hope for was that the duchess would explain.
“You see,” went on Her Grace, “she would bore Paul. He’s always liked women with a bit of vice in them. Goodness knows, he’s kept a stable of them.”
Sally was beginning to feel completely out of her depth. At first she had thought of Paul as a pimply young adolescent, now she decided he must be a young rake. Probably one of those young men who were sent down from Oxford and who settled down to making their parents’ lives as uncomfortable as possible.
Stable of women indeed! The silly boy was probably trying just to alarm his mother.
“You must be tired,” said the duchess sympathetically. “Paul is having dinner with friends this evening and will not be back until late. If you could perhaps see him then? Say you had a little nap now?”
Sally nodded, all at once glad of a chance to escape. Her skin was itching under its coat of rubber wrinkles, the unaccustomed spectacles felt heavy on her nose, and her wig felt hot and heavy. She felt very young and rather scared.
The duchess, to Sally’s relief, began to discuss fashions while Sally finished her tea. What did Sally think of the latest Nell Gwyn hat, the Camille Clifford coiffure, the Billie Burke shoe, and the Trilby overcoat? Sally murmured innocuous remarks between bites and then took refuge in her supposed age, saying she was too old to keep up with the modes. In fact, she had been too busy being simply Aunt Mabel since her arrival in London that the world of fashion had passed her by.
All of a sudden Sally found herself thinking of Miss Wyndham’s tea gown. It must be simply marvelous to wear something like that.
At last she was free to retire. A servant conducted her to her room, which was in fact more of a y
oung apartment, boasting a sitting room and bathroom as well as a bedroom.
The lace curtains at the windows floated in a light breeze. Down below, a swan cruised majestically over the watered silk of the lake.
Sally undressed and took off her heavy whalebone corsets and gave herself a good scratch, which was what she had been longing to do since she left London.
At first she did not want to lie down at all, but the bedroom looked very cool with its blinds pulled down and the bed itself tempting with its pretty white lace canopy. A pile of French novels, their pages uncut, lay on a table beside the bed.
She lay down on the bed and picked up one of the novels and stared at it, unseeing. Suddenly the effort of reaching for the paper knife and cutting the pages seemed too much, and in no time at all she was fast asleep.
Sally awoke with a guilty start just as the dressing gong rang somewhere in the great house. She scrambled from the bed to find that a maid had entered while she was asleep and had carefully taken away her dinner gown, had it pressed, and laid it out.
Well, it was a bit hard to put on frumpish lilac silk of an antique cut, ornamented with swirls of jet embroidery, and step back into that pouter pigeon corset. It would have been so splendid to have worn something really pretty and to have gone as herself.
Dinner was a surprising affair. In the first place, the food was remarkably pedestrian, considering this was a ducal mansion and this the heyday of the gourmet. It reminded Sally forcibly of her nursery days as she worked her way through courses consisting of such delights as stewed mutton, watery cabbage, boiled potatoes, shriveled smelts, and treacle pudding.
Across the table from Sally, Miss Margery Wyndham blazed in all her glory. Her beauty was almost luminous, decided Sally, and her large, expressive eyes were shining with dreams.
I believe she is in love, thought Sally. Drat it! If the duchess’s son wants her, then I can’t see her refusing him.
Miss Wyndham was dressed in apricot silk, cut low to reveal an excellent pair of white shoulders. Her hair that evening was fashionably dressed and frizzed and threaded with apricot silk roses.
Sally was flanked on one side by Peter Firkin and on the other by Sir Sydney Chelmsford. Sir Sydney was a taciturn gentleman who gave his whole attention to his food. Peter Firkin addressed a few almost unintelligible remarks to Sally and then devoted his attention to Mrs. Stuart, who was placed on his other side.
She soon lost interest in the general conversation, which concerned people she did not know and had never heard of. Sally studied the room instead. Its walls were decorated with delicately painted panels, and Sally’s wandering eyes rested on one of them, and then she felt herself begin to blush.
It was a peculiarly graphic portrayal of the Rape of Lucrece. Lucrece’s large bosom spilled over the tanned and ravishing hands of Sextus, son of Tarquinius Superbus.
Sally hurriedly averted her eyes and stared at another panel. In it Iphigeneia was dying in all her voluptuous naked glory, sacrificed at the altar to Artemis, so that the Greek ships should have a fair wind to the Trojan war.
So she stared at her plate instead.
She wondered what the Watch Committee would make of it all. But then art and antiquity excused all.
“Jolly good that, what?” said Peter Firkin suddenly, pointing with his fork at the sacrifice of Iphigeneia. “Jolly ships, what? Look as if they could sail right out of the picture, don’t you know, eh, what?”
“It is a very bold subject,” said Sally in her most repressive Aunt Mabelish voice.
“Eh, what?” Peter stared blankly at the picture. “Oh, yes, haw, haw, haw. Hot stuff!” He let out a great bray of laughter, turned beet red, and buried his nose in his wineglass.
He’s rather old to be a friend to Paul, thought Sally, observing him out of the corner of her eye with some irritation. She began to wonder about her forthcoming interview. She wondered what this rakehell young man would make of having Aunt Mabel brought in to advise him against marriage to the beautiful Miss Wyndham.
And how could she possibly put it into words? As the duchess had done? Miss Wyndham is too good for you?
All too soon the ladies rose to leave the gentlemen to their port. The duchess immediately drew Sally aside. “Come with me,” she whispered. “Paul is home. I will have him sent to you.”
With a rapidly beating heart, Sally followed the duchess back through a bewildering array of rooms and found herself in an enormous library, which looked down the drive at the front of the palace.
It smelled slightly of leather, potpourri, and stale tobacco. Serried ranks of books mounted up to the painted ceiling. Sally quickly lowered her eyes from the ceiling. Goodness knew what might be up there getting raped or sacrificed.
A footman came in silently after them and set a decanter of whisky and a soda siphon on a low table near the windows, which were flanked by two high-backed easy chairs.
“Now,” said the duchess, with a surprisingly girlish giggle, “I will send my bad boy along. Won’t he be surprised!”
“But doesn’t he know…?” began Sally desperately, but the duchess had fluttered off.
Sally clasped her hands together. Outside on the terrace a peacock strutted past silently. A faint smell of thyme drifted in from the gardens.
What shall I say to him? wondered Sally. Her Grace has planned this as a surprise. He’ll probably sneer most dreadfully. And what rank does a duke’s only son hold anyway? Marquess, I think.
The door opened, and Sally remained where she was, quite still, seated in one of the armchairs beside the long windows looking out into the darkness of the gardens.
“Surprise!” came the duchess’s voice from the door. “Paul, darling, this is Aunt Mabel of Home Chats. Aunt Mabel, my son, Paul, Marquess of Seudenham. I’ll leave you two together!”
Sally tried to struggle to her feet, but a deep voice said, “Please, don’t. I shall join you.”
Resplendent in black-and-white evening dress, the Marquess of Seudenham sank into the armchair opposite.
Sally gazed at him, unbelieving. He was the handsomest man she had ever seen, from his thick black hair to his bright, mocking blue eyes, set in a tanned face, to his lithe, muscular body. And he was no adolescent. She judged him to be in his middle thirties.
The marquess looked curiously at the little old lady who was staring at him so intently. Her face looked rather stiff and odd, he thought, and she was very wrinkled indeed. Only her large gray eyes seemed to be alive. He helped himself to a whisky and soda, frowning as he realized no other refreshment had been set out suitable to an old lady like Aunt Mabel.
He waited for her to speak, but she was still gazing at him helplessly, so he said, “Aunt… er… Mabel? Which side of the family?”
“Home Chats,” croaked Sally.
“Home…? Oh, no! You’re not one of those ladies who give advice to the lovelorn?”
“Yes,” mumbled Sally, suddenly helping herself to a whisky and soda.
“Mama has really gone too far this time… er… Aunt Mabel. Who am I supposed to be lovelorn over?”
“Miss Wyndham.”
“Really? My mother knows more about it than I do. Does she want me to marry the girl?”
Sally took a large gulp of her drink and looked at him shyly. “The duchess doesn’t want you to marry her at all.”
“Your words surprise me. Miss Wyndham is young and beautiful and rich. All the things to gladden a mother’s heart. What’s up with her?”
“Nothing,” said Sally weakly and then again, “Nothing,” in a stronger voice as she gathered the mantle of Aunt Mabel about her. “Your mother thinks she is too good for you. Her Grace thinks you need a lady with a little more vice in her.”
He put down his glass and leaned back in his chair and laughed loud and long while Sally stared at him with adoring eyes.
At last he finished laughing, and Sally adjusted her expression to one—she hoped—of rather prim wisdom.
“And so the decision, I gather, is to be left to you? I think that must be why Mama sprang this surprise on me.”
“I should think so,” quavered Sally, very much Aunt Mabel.
What is your decision?”
Sally bent her head and appeared to concentrate. Actually she had made a lightning decision. This handsome marquess should really marry no one else but Miss Sally Blane. How it was to be achieved, she could not even begin to imagine. But she had wanted to work on Fleet Street—and she did. All things were possible if the modern Edwardian career woman put her mind to it.
“I think you should only marry for love,” she said.
He raised his eyebrows. “And what makes you think I am not in love with Miss Wyndham?”
“You are too detached,” said Sally.
“Love, in my opinion,” said the marquess, “is only a fleeting fancy. I am heading rapidly for middle age. I am thirty-five years old, which must not seem much to you”—Sally winced—“nonetheless, it is time I settled down.”
“Have you never been in love?” asked Sally curiously.
“Oh, hundreds of times.” He paused, momentarily taken aback by the strange look of pain in the expressive eyes of the old lady opposite, who was now gulping her whisky as if it were water. “It never lasted. Can I get you another drink? Perhaps something milder? Sherry, perhaps?”
“No,” said Aunt Mabel grimly, “whisky will do very well” Made bold by the spirit, she addressed him earnestly. “My dear lord, I have had great experience in matters of the heart. If you marry some girl simply because you think she will make a suitable wife, then your marriage will be doomed from the start. And then think of the children—the sticky, jammy, screaming, awful children,” said Sally with sudden drunken fervor, thinking of Emily’s noisy brood.
He crossed one elegantly tailored leg over the other and leaned back in his chair. Sally studied his handsome profile in the lamplight and sighed.
“I am beginning to think you do not approve of marriage at all,” he said. “Are you, or have you been, married yourself?”