But she soon discovered snow was far preferable to the sleet following a few weeks later, driving everyone indoors and turning the ground to slush. Even the miracle of spring was tempered by showery, overcast weather. She longed for some hot, Australian sun to banish the pervading damp. Oh God, how she hated England!
Yet it was a miracle to see the stark skeleton trees begin to bud and then suddenly burst forth into new leaf, to see the first spring flowers creep through and the brown earth begin to assume a sparse carpet of green. And to witness the joy of the cattle and sheep as they were released from the barns that had housed them for the winter. Even the staid old dairy cows frisked and galloped like newborn calves.
With the coming of more clement weather the family’s social life was resumed. Mrs Ashford took her two daughters to Exeter to purchase the basics of their Season wardrobes. Additional gowns would be ordered from a more fashionable Regent Street dressmaker when they reached London.
Caroline was full of her coming out. After all those dreary years in the schoolroom the anticipation of the balls and dinner parties ahead had her in a state of perpetual excitement. She delighted in the shopping sprees with her mother and was forever persuading her maid to arrange her hair differently, often with ridiculous results. Louise grew tired of her sister’s insipid prattle. Caroline made her feel world-weary and jaded and the three years that separated them in age often seemed more like thirteen.
At least it was easier now she was finished with the secrecy and humiliation of her pregnancy. Although the loss of her baby son was a nagging ache inside her, she no longer fretted as much over his day-to-day welfare. She’d grown to trust Mrs Evans’ reports that he was being nurtured with as much love and care as any natural mother might show her child.
Even her memories of Lloyd had dimmed. Thinking of him was like trying to recapture a dream, shadowy and insubstantial. She would try to recall the exact timbre of his voice, the way he sat his horse, the way he smiled, or the way he walked...and find it all eluded her. It was almost a year since she’d last seen him.
~*~
Harry Ashford had rented a house in London for the Season. It was situated in a fashionable area and although comfortably furnished and roomier than its narrow facade suggested, was overshadowed by the town houses of the nobility in the next street. They had taken only a few servants with them from Fenham Manor, but these were enough to keep the household functioning smoothly.
London was dirty, smelly and oppressive. Louise had always preferred the country and in the time she’d spent with the Barclays and the Jamiesons, she’d grown more rustic than ever.
Her whole being rebelled at the formality that governed polite society. The tedious business of leaving calling cards, the stilted calls on the ladies her mother considered it beneficial to know, the continual fostering of the right connections–she abhorred it.
Before she and Caroline could appear in society, they were presented to the Prince and Princess of Wales at one of the four Drawing Rooms at Buckingham Palace. The Queen, still mourning her beloved Prince Albert, seldom appeared in public these days. As Louise waited for what seemed hours with her train draped over her arm, she was thankful this was something she would only experience once in her life.
After curtsying to the stout, bearded Prince of Wales and his longsuffering Princess Alexandra, she was required to retire backwards out of their presence without tripping over her train. The difficulty of performing this feat was exacerbated by her fear that someone must see through the facade of purity and innocence and recognise her as an imposter, a fallen woman. It would require only a whisper of the truth to ostracise her from society and destroy Caroline’s chances of making a good marriage.
Louise wasn’t an instant success at her first ball. She was different from the other debutantes; at twenty –years-old a young woman midst the girls just out of the schoolroom. Fortunately two or three of the young men seemed to admire this tall, grave-faced girl from the Colonies and she wasn’t quite abandoned to that humiliating fate of becoming a wallflower.
‘It is your complexion, Louise!’ her mother complained in the carriage on their return. ‘Too much Australian sun...oh, I know you’re as white as a ghost now, but the damage has been done. Why, there are even freckles on your nose and with your dark hair. I purchased some creams yesterday for you to try. I shall bring them to your room later.’
Louise sighed. ‘I doubt if they will be of any use, Mama, any more than the lemon juice and rose-water were. Besides, you know that isn’t the true problem.’
‘If you would only smile a little more...’
‘What is there to smile at?’
Mrs Ashford glanced at Caroline, flushed and triumphant at the conquests of her first outing and seemed to bite back the retort she’d been about to make.
Caroline looked at her older sister pityingly. ‘You’re too tall and thin, Louise. No gentleman wants to dance with a girl as tall as he is. Besides, you’re older than the rest of us and everyone thinks you’ve been left on the shelf.’
‘And what would you know about it, Miss? You’ve been cosseted and protected all your life; you know nothing of the outside world. I received two proposals of marriage before I came to England, so I certainly don’t consider myself left on the shelf.’
‘I think it’s time we ceased this conversation,’ cut in Mrs Ashford coldly. ‘Shame on you, Louise, for mentioning a past we would all prefer to forget.’
Louise didn’t attempt to reply. She turned her face to the window of the closed landau, staring out at the grimy street. It was raining–again–but the thoroughfare was as busy as ever, with barouches, broughams, phaetons, hackneys, carts and a brewery wagon all jostling for space in the narrow street. As she watched, a ragged boy snatched an apple unnoticed from a greengrocer’s cart and dived through the traffic, narrowly avoiding the hooves of a high-stepping pair in a gentleman’s curricle. Good luck to him, she thought. She was used to seeing hardship in the bush, but the abject poverty of the London street dwellers distressed her.
Ironically, she realised she would have been better to have come to England with her parents two years before. At eighteen she would have doubtless adapted to the social whirl and made a good marriage. The interlude in Australia had gained her nothing but much heartache and a dislike for the frivolity of the rich.
She was tormented by guilt whenever she thought of the child she and Lloyd had recklessly brought into the world. Looking back, she was appalled at her behaviour in running away from the Barclays and at the risks she’d taken. She’d written to Cousin James before leaving Australia, attempting to apologise for the way she’d treated him and his family. The forgiving reply she’d received from him recently was probably more than she deserved.
Her ex-lover and the Jamiesons had apparently not been so generous. From them she hadn’t heard one word.
Chapter Nineteen
As the weeks passed Louise adapted to her new life, despite the strict etiquette that governed the life of a young lady. On the one hand she was supposed to attract the attention of eligible suitors and on the other it was necessary to behave with stifling decorum or risk being considered fast. It was as if she was walking a tightrope from which she must surely stumble.
She would never forget her first dinner party. The courses seemed countless and began with the customary soup and fish and included stuffed quail, venison, truffles, roast beef and duck, savouries and cheese and finished with ices, gateaux and fruit. The table decorations were elaborate and ostentatious and included at each setting a menu handwritten in French. Guests gorged themselves with little regard for the starving paupers in the East End.
Fortunately there were other, simpler pleasures to compensate, such as morning rides in Hyde Park, where the gentlemen and more adventurous ladies exercised their horses on Rotten Row. In the afternoon it was fashionable to drive a carriage instead. Louise enjoyed visits to the opera and the theatre, where it was possible to relax a little
without the need to make polite conversation. She gained some weight from all the rich food and although her mother’s remedies had done nothing for her complexion, the return of her old vitality brought a healthy glow to her cheeks.
Charles appeared to be enjoying the Season immensely. With his adventurous, sporting nature he’d made many friends among the young blades. At one of the balls they attended he introduced Louise to his favourite companion, an attractive young man whose brown eyes smiled into Louise’s as he clasped her hand.
‘I would like to introduce Mr Richard Langley. My sister Louise, Richard.’ Charles laughed then and cast formality aside. ‘Just be careful of him, Louise. He’s the son of a vicar, but he doesn’t let that bother him.’
Louise returned Langley’s smile, intrigued in spite of herself. ‘I’m pleased to make your acquaintance, Mr Langley. Is your father really a vicar?’
‘He certainly is, Miss Ashford. I grew up in a country vicarage in Sussex and I couldn’t wait to escape the confounded place.’
Louise laughed out loud for the first time in many months, genuinely amused by Langley’s irreverent honesty. ‘Surely you don’t mean that, Mr Langley!’
‘I’m afraid I do.’ Langley’s dark eyes held a glint of appreciation and she was human and fragile enough to be flattered by it. He made a striking figure in his cutaway coat with its long tails, elegant waistcoat and narrow trousers. He looked fit and athletic, with dark curls that sprang around his face despite the application of Macassar. Instinct told her to tread warily, but the promise of a little excitement was enough to entice her out of her indifference.
‘Would you do me the honour of writing my name on your card, Miss Ashford? Meanwhile, may I fetch you a glass of punch?’
‘If you’ll excuse me, there’s someone I must see,’ interjected Charles at this point, apparently sensing he was fast becoming superfluous. ‘Just remember that I warned you, Louise.’
That night, Louise genuinely enjoyed herself for the first time since her debut. She had to admit it was Langley, with whom she shared several dances and who escorted her to supper, who made the difference. Anyone less likely to have originated in a religious household Louise couldn’t imagine, for he was impudent and unconventional, with an amused contempt for stuffiness that struck an answering chord in Louise.
Her mother filled her in with all she could not have guessed in the carriage on the way home.
‘I noticed you enjoying yourself with Richard Langley tonight.’
Louise looked up, unable to read Irene Ashford’s expression in the darkness. ‘I danced with him, yes.’
‘Be careful, Louise. He’s twenty-six-years-old and he’s not the marrying kind. His mother had money of her own and he resigned a commission in the army when she died last year. He’s been living off the proceeds of her will ever since. But he has expensive tastes, so the money isn’t likely to last him long.’
‘I believe his father is a vicar,’ Louise responded coolly.
‘And his grandfather’s a Viscount, but don’t let that fool you into thinking Mr Langley respectable or a good catch. He’s reckless and irresponsible and as the youngest son of a youngest son his prospects are not bright. I can’t forbid you to see him, for he’s Charles’s friend, but I would prefer you kept him at a distance.’
‘I enjoyed his company, but I’m not about to be taken in by an accomplished flirt, Mama.’
Louise noticed her mother keeping Caroline out of Langley’s way, but after that first warning Mrs Ashford didn’t intervene in her friendship with him. She probably had no hopes now of Louise making any sort of splendid marriage and any marriage at all was better than none.
In some ways Richard was different from Charles, who had a shrewd head for business and never allowed himself any unnecessary extravagance in his pursuit of pleasure. Richard lacked Charles’s calculating nature and his uncertain temper. But in their determination of what their pleasures were, they were very much in agreement.
Louise cared for nothing but the fact that Richard made her laugh and laughter had been lacking in her life for many months now. With Charles to act as chaperon– though the idea of Charles being considered a fit person to chaperone anyone secretly amused her–the two enjoyed a great deal of each other’s company. Charles seemed pleased to see her behaving like her old self again and did nothing to discourage a friendship that under normal circumstances he would have been unlikely to foster.
Harry Ashford, watching them dance the polka together at yet another ball, swore under his breath and determined not to concern himself with his elder daughter.
At least Caroline had managed to fulfill his expectations. She’d attracted the interest of Sir Samuel Barton, a young, wealthy baronet and the announcement of their engagement would shortly be appearing in the Times. They would be marrying towards the end of the year when Caroline was eighteen. It seemed her future was assured.
Louise had no illusions about Langley. She knew he was anything but a saint and she didn’t trust either him or herself enough to allow him any liberties. She supposed that lack of trust was the major difference between her relationship with him and her previous relationship with Lloyd. She wondered if he asked her to marry him, if she would accept him. Life with him would be full of uncertainties, not the least of them knowing where their next meal was coming from. Perhaps he would be unfaithful to her and that would bring loneliness. But nothing could be lonelier than her present situation.
She wasn’t like the other debutantes; innocent, compliant young girls who expected to marry men of their families’ choosing while understanding nothing of what marriage entailed. She knew the importance of physical attraction and she found Langley extremely attractive. Surely it was preferable to have a little worry and heartache mingled with the pleasure than no pleasure at all.
Another thing Richard could give her was children. Another child might ease her restless yearning for the infant she’d left behind at the coachman’s cottage at Fenham Manor.
~*~
At the end of August when the Season was over, the Ashfords returned to Fenham Manor, accompanied by several house guests. Charles had asked Richard Langley to accompany them, so he could enjoy some of the good hunting and shooting to be had in the Devonshire countryside. Harry Ashford had invited an old college friend of his, Mr William Howard and his beautiful, younger wife Agatha. Caroline’s fiancé also was to be staying over for a time.
Sir Samuel Barton was a plump, shy, twenty-one-year-old who, except for his schooldays, had lived all his life at the family home in Yorkshire. He was more interested in farming than in the delights of London and Louise wondered what had prompted him to propose to a girl with such opposing interests. Yet he seemed devoted to Caroline, who basked happily in his admiration. Louise wondered if her fun-loving sister would persuade him to leave the rustic life of Yorkshire for the London Season each year, or if she would eventually go alone.
She mentioned her misgivings about the match to Langley but he only laughed. ‘Your sister will twist dear old Sam around her little finger, you’ll see. I wonder if he’s even kissed her yet? He’s such a dashed Puritan it’s boring.’
Louise’s colour rose. ‘Surely...they are betrothed, after all.’
‘Oh, a chaste peck on the cheek, no doubt. There is more to the art than that, as I would willingly demonstrate if you weren’t so evasive.’
His eyes were laughing down into hers, his mouth mere inches away. Louise wasn’t sure how he’d come to be so close. He was about to put his intention into practice when Charles walked into the room. Caught between disappointment and relief, she stepped back hastily. She imagined Richard’s notion of kissing would go further than was sensible or circumspect. Already she was too vulnerable.
Charles was standing with raised eyebrows, having missed no detail of this little scene. ‘Sorry to interrupt, old chap, but I must remind you that my sister isn’t one of the kitchen maids.’
Louise flushed and was abou
t to withdraw from the room when Langley put his hand on her arm to restrain her. ‘I can assure you that I hold your sister in every respect, Charles.’
‘I should have known better than to trust you,’ muttered Charles softly.
‘If I may have a word in this matter,’ put in Louise icily, ‘I have no intention of allowing myself to be seduced.’ She turned on her heel and left the room, closing the door purposely behind her. But then curiosity overcame dignity and she paused with her ear to the door, straining to hear Charles’s next words.
‘You had better make up your mind, Langley. Either marry her or leave her alone.’
‘Don’t rush me, old boy.’ Langley sounded bored. ‘I’m not ready to leap into matrimony just yet. But don’t fret yourself. I’d not seduce the sister of my friend.’
‘Not in that friend’s house, at any rate,’ agreed Charles on a note of amused cynicism. ‘Your father may be a clergyman, but I’ve never known that to inspire your conscience.’
Louise decided to retreat, before one of them opened the door to find her eavesdropping.
~*~
Caroline and Sir Samuel seemed to have one thing in common and that was a dislike of foxhunting. They preferred to keep sedate company with Mrs Ashford while the remaining members of the house party attended the local meets. Louise and the adventurous Agatha Howard shocked the older men by riding enthusiastically to hounds, keeping pace with the men despite their sidesaddles as they galloped over field and ditch. Most women, if they participated at all, preferred to follow at a more dignified pace.
Louise relished the excitement of following the baying hounds in the crisp morning air, but preferred to distance herself from the kill. She was too practical to become sentimental over a fox or deer and had seen cattle and sheep butchered for meat, but still she rode for the thrill of the chase rather than from any ghoulish delight in the outcome. She supposed foxhunting was as mindlessly frivolous as any of the pleasures of the wealthy, but it was enough for her that she found it enjoyable.
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