Loving Julia

by Karen Robards

  Oliver’s whisper was audible only to Julia over the commotion of the farce that was taking place on the stage below. She stared down at the gaudily dressed players with unseeing eyes, so annoyed with Oliver’s insistence on propriety and so anxious that Sebastian might turn up again before she had talked him around to her way of thinking that she could hardly sit still.

  In the five days since Sebastian’s departure, she had brought up the subject as many times as she had seen Oliver. Each time he treated her hints as to how romantic she would find a runaway wedding like they were a not particularly tasteful joke. Now he was actually sounding irritated with her. Julia chewed on a fingernail and stared out over the darkened theatre while her mind worked furiously. If she truly wished to become Lady Carlyle, she was going to have to think of some way to move this thickheaded lump of a man around to her way of thinking. And fast!

  With them in the box were Caroline and her escort, Lord Rowland, a tall thin man of perhaps forty-five with a charming smile. The other members of the party, which had been gotten up at nearly the last minute, were Lord and Lady Courtland. Lord Courtland was small and slight, and he spoke with a hint of a lisp that made him seem slightly afraid of his more forceful wife. Lady Courtland was one of Caroline’s bosom bows. She was a plump woman who had the poor judgment to try to squeeze her too large frame into the most daring of the latest fashions, and the result was not beautiful. But she was most amiable, at least when she was not issuing silky orders to her husband while her eyes flayed him like twin whips.

  The play seemed to last forever, so anxious was she to get Oliver out to a place where she could talk to him. Finally she could wait no longer. The heroine of the dramatic piece following the farce had just announced her intention of killing herself if her lover didn’t return to her when Julia leaned over to Oliver and whispered that she had a headache.

  Immediately he was all solicitude, offering to take her home at once, and she smiled her thanks at him. With a quick word to Caroline, who nodded and appeared not to have the least objection to Julia going off alone at night in a closed carriage with a man who was not a close relative—something that was considered to be questionable behavior by the ton’s high sticklers. But Julia was not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, and she quickly gathered up her evening cloak and reticule and allowed Oliver to lead her from the box. But by the time they reached the lighted lobby and had ordered the carriage to be brought around, Oliver himself was beginning to have second thoughts.

  “Perhaps we should have asked Mrs. Peyton to accompany us,” Oliver said thoughtfully as he draped her cream silk cloak around her bare shoulders. “I know that you would not wish to give the least appearance of impropriety, my dear Julia, and it is not quite the done thing for us to leave the theatre alone together. Though such a thing might not occur to you—you are such an unworldly innocent! I feel that it is my responsibility to consider such repercussions for us both.”

  “Dear Oliver,” Julia said, smiling up at him, though it was something of an effort to assume an expression of proper affection. In reality she wanted to shake him. He was always so, so proper! “It could not be right to disturb Caroline and her friends. They are enjoying the play, and I would feel quite low if they had to leave without seeing the end on my account. Grosvenor Square is only fifteen minutes from the theatre, after all.”

  “Still,” Oliver said darkly, “there may be those who will take note of the impropriety. We are not officially engaged yet, you know, and I do not want anyone saying that we are to marry because … because it is necessary. Yes, the more I consider the matter the more I feel that we must ask Mrs. Peyton to accompany us.”

  Julia counted to ten before she replied. As she counted, she made a little business of fastening the silver frogs that closed her cloak up the front. Worn over a full skirted, tightly bodiced dress of the same cream silk embellished with silver lace, it was an elegant and highly becoming ensemble. She looked all the crack, as the wags would say, and she was surprised that she did not enjoy the knowledge more. Earlier this evening, when she had first put on the dress and stood looking at herself in the glass, the beautiful picture she made had elicited hardly more than a shrug from her. What good was looking beautiful if there was no one to see? Despite her best efforts to make him do so, Oliver simply didn’t count. Neither did Caroline and her friends, nor the rest of the theatre. The audience she wanted to dazzle was Sebastian and Sebastian only. Without him to witness and be moved by her beauty, it was meaningless. The realization annoyed her past bearing, but she could not blind herself to the truth.

  “I shall send a note in to Mrs. Peyton.” Oliver was still mumbling, and Julia could no longer contain her irritation.

  “Don’t be a goose, Oliver,” she said crisply, turning to face him. Seeing his eyes widen in affront, she hastily smiled and put her hand on his arm. She did not want to alienate him, after all.

  “I’m sorry, Oliver, I spoke without thinking. But you see, you really musn’t send for Caroline. I don’t have a headache at all, I only used it as an excuse. The truth is, I wish to talk to you alone.

  I have something to say that is very important for you to know, and I must tell you at once. I had hoped to keep the truth from you, but I find I cannot so deceive you. So if you will humor me?”

  Oliver stared down at her. Before he could say anything, the link boy called that the carriage was waiting. Julia, breathing a sigh of relief, immediately moved toward where the footmen were waiting to assist her inside. Oliver had no choice but to follow.

  “What is it that is so important for you to tell me?” he demanded testily once they were inside and the door was closed.

  Seen in the light from the streetlamps which poured through the window, he looked old suddenly. The lines on his face were shadowed into deep creases, and webbed circles surrounded his eyes. His jowls were heavier and his nose was longer and thicker. Instead of the vigorous man in the prime of life that Julia had thought him, he seemed old enough to be her father.

  “Oliver, it saddens me to have to tell you this, but I feel I must,” Julia began, looking down at her hands in an attitude of virtuous sorrow as the carriage jerked into motion. “There is an impediment to our marriage of which you are unaware. I fear that unless we wed secretly within the next few days, we will be torn from each other forever.”

  That was very well done, Julia congratulated herself. She silently thanked Mrs. Radcliffe’s novels, which were full of lovers being torn asunder by cruel guardians, and from which she had culled her idea. Given the way Oliver felt about Sebastian, he would have no reason to doubt her story, which was, she defended herself to herself, almost true in a way.

  “What kind of impediment?” Oliver was staring at her. Through the shifting patterns of light cast as the carriage passed through the streets, Julia could see that his expression was very stern.

  “I—I hate to have to say this. Indeed, I hoped I would not! But I have turned the matter over and over in my head, and I can hit on no other solution. Oh, Oliver, you must tell me what we should do! Sebastian—Lord Moorland!—will never allow me to wed you. You see, he wants me for himself.”

  “Moorland wishes to marry you?”

  Julia managed a blush and an anguished look up at Oliver before casting her eyes back down to her clasped hands.

  “I am afraid it is worse, much worse than that,” she said mournfully, in a voice so tiny as to suggest she could hardly speak at all. “I am almost ashamed to tell you, but Lord Moorland made it quite, quite clear that he … he was not offering marriage.”

  “That bas—, your pardon, Julia. That blackguard had the insufferable cheek to offer you a slip on the shoulder?” Oliver looked outraged. Julia, casting a swift look up at him, had to suppress a smile of pure satisfaction. Her confession was certainly having all the effect she had hoped for.

  “I—I am so ashamed,” she whispered.

  “Oh, my dear,” he said in quite a different voice, reaching o
ut to take her hand. Julia allowed her hand to be swallowed up by his larger, warmer one, and even turned hers over so that her fingers were clinging to his as though for support. “There is no shame attached to you. It is Moorland who should be ashamed. For years the ton has whispered of his depravity, even before the tale went round that he had murdered his wife. But that he should have offered such an insult to you! He shall meet me for this.”

  This last was said with fierce determination. Julia, who had not anticipated such a violent eventuality, gasped. Oliver could never be allowed to call Sebastian out! She did not know, but she suspected that Sebastian might accept even a groundless challenge. He had no liking for Oliver either. And Sebastian might kill Oliver—or, nightmare of nightmares, Oliver might actually succeed in killing Sebastian!

  “No, no, you must not do that!” Julia hurried into speech with a conviction borne of true horror. “Only—only think of

  what a—a slur that would be on my reputation! For there could be no other reason for you to quarrel with my guardian, and all the world must know it! Besides, you could be killed!”

  She threw that in because it sounded like something a loving fiancÉe would say, and looked up at him with trepidation. He appeared much struck by what she had said, and she hurried on.

  “What we should do—I’ve thought about this, you see, through many a sleepless night—is be married out of hand. It would not have to be a havey cavey affair at all. Is there not such a thing as a special license? We could be married right here in London, in a perfectly proper fashion, before Lord Moorland even returns to town. Then—then he could have no further hold over me, and could not undo what had been done.”

  Oliver was silent for a long moment, running his fingers absently over the soft skin on the back of her hand. Julia, impatient with his touch, nevertheless allowed it. Anything to persuade him to her way of thinking!

  “You may be in the right of it. I will have to think about it,” he said slowly just as the carriage pulled to a halt in front of the house in Grosvenor Square. “If you will permit me, I will call upon you tomorrow to let you know what I decide.”

  Such lack of a definitive answer did not sit well with Julia, but there was nothing she could do but smile tremulously at him as he pressed his lips to her hand just as the footman swung open the door.

  XXVIII

  Two evenings later Julia was preparing for Lady Jersey’s ball. One of the highlights of the Season, it was a grand affair which nearly everyone who was anyone would attend. All across fashionable London, ladies were dressing in their finest ballgowns and bringing out their most valuable jewelry. A tangible sense of excitement lay over the haute monde.

  Julia was in her bedchamber, oblivious to its comforts as she sat before the mirror watching Emily do her hair. Caroline, who had treated her as a bosom bow since Julia had confided that she was engaged to Oliver, had offered the services of her dresser, Miss Hanks, on the grounds that Emily had not the expertise to turn one out “complete to a shade” as was necessary for Lady Jersey’s ball. But Julia had declined the offer with thanks, and now as she sat looking at herself in the glass she saw no reason to regret her decision. Emily had done a beautiful job of twirling her hair into an intricate knot on top of her head, and then coaxing curling tendrils down from the upsweep to frame her face.

  “A little rice powder, Miss Julia?” With Julia’s hair complete Emily turned her attention to the collection of cosmetics on the dressing table. Julia usually wore only the barest minimum of cosmetics, but rice powder was unexceptionable—everyone with the smallest pretensions to beauty wore it. She nodded, and Emily passed the paper over her face, leaving it milky white without the least hint of shine. Fortunately her lashes were naturally inky black like her hair, so she had no need to resort to stroking them with the burnt ends of matches as some of the fairer ladies did.

  “Some color, Miss Julia?” Emily was already reaching for the rouge pot before Julia nodded. With a whisk of a rabbit’s foot across her cheekbones and lips, she bloomed with subtle color. No one but Emily and herself would know that it was not a real blush.

  Then Emily removed the towel that she had placed around Julia’s neck to prevent any cosmetics from getting on her throat or bosom and Julia stood up to be eased into her dress. In honor of the occasion, she was laced so tightly that she could scarcely breathe. Above the lacing her breasts threatened to pop from her chemise. Below it four lacy petticoats billowed, ending in layers of flounces just above her slender silk encased ankles and narrow black dancing slippers. Emily lifted the dress from the bed, and threw it over Julia’s head with a deftness that disturbed not a hair. Then Julia stood before the cheval glass in the corner of the room, staring at her reflection as Emily did the dozens of tiny pearl buttons up the back.

  The dress was made up of dull gold tissue over an underdress of gold satin. It was designed with tiny off the shoulder sleeves that made the most of her neck and shoulders and arms. The neckline was low and heart shaped, dipping to form a vee in the valley between her breasts, where it was held in place with a tiny gold satin rose. The bodice clung closely to her shape, outlining her proud high breasts and slender rib cage before flaring out into the enormous circle of her skirt. A wide gold satin sash wrapped her tiny waist, ending in an enormous bow with trailing satin streamers at the rear. The overskirt of tissue was caught up in scallops all around the hem and secured with tiny gold satin roses like the one at her bosom, revealing the gold satin underdress. A necklace of topazes loaned by Caroline was around her neck, a gold satin rose was pinned to a matching satin ribbon around one wrist, and another tiny gold satin rose was perched in her hair. The color made her eyes gleam even brighter than the topazes, and emphasized the creamy whiteness of her skin and the ebony blackness of her hair. It was a dream dress, and in it she looked like a dream.

  Emily finished with the buttons, and stepped back. Taking a long look at Julia in the mirror, she shook her head and sighed.

  “You surely do look a picture, Miss Julia. You’ll be the most beautiful lady at the ball.”

  “Thank you, Emily.” Julia smiled at the girl with real affection. Emily had seen her through some of the most difficult days of her life, and she thought of the girl as a friend as well as a servant. Never by word or look did Emily treat her as anything other than a lady, though she knew as well as anyone the arduous process that had gone into producing the fashionable damsel who stood before her tonight.

  “You’re welcome, Miss Julia.” Emily smiled back at her, the round face lightening into impish prettiness. She turned away to pick up a fan with an intricately painted scene in gold and creme, and Julia’s shawl, which was of gold lace and which was designed to droop negligently from the elbows. Just then a knock sounded at the door.

  “Lord Carlyle is below, Miss Julia,” a voice called. Then footsteps hurried away, presumably to so inform Caroline and the countess. It was close on ten o’clock, and the ball had started at half past nine. Of course, no one who was anyone would dream of arriving on time, but it was not good manners to be too late. Forty-five minutes to an hour was about right. And Oliver, of course, was punctilious about matters of that sort.

  It was foolish to let something so praiseworthy irritate her, Julia told herself as she scooped up her reticule and told Emily with a smile not to wait up for her. Oliver was to be her husband—in three days’ time, to be exact—and reliability was an excellent quality in a husband. If he dictated to her (such as by telling her, when he took her driving the afternoon after their aborted theatre visit, that they would be married in his London townhouse in four days’ time, when she would have preferred a far shorter wait for fear Sebastian would return and dash their plans), then she had best get used to it. Husbands had the absolute ordering of their wives’ lives, and the price she would have to pay for being Lady Carlyle, with all that that entailed, was being Oliver’s chattel. He was from all indications a kind and generous man, and she did not fear that he would abus
e her. So surely putting up with his occasionally pedantic ways should not be too great a hardship. If she could just quit comparing his deliberate weighing of everything with Sebastian’s careless confidence. She would not compare him to Sebastian, she would not.

  Oliver was looking very distinguished, she saw, in black evening clothes with a tall black top hat which he carried in one hand and an ebony cane. The silver streaks in his dark hair gave him a look of importance. Clearly he was a gentleman of influence, and she should be proud to be his fiancÉe.

  “You are looking very nice, Oliver,” she called gaily down to him. He looked swiftly up at her as she came down the stairs, her golden skirts swirling around her feet. His eyes widened with appreciation, then he smiled his slow kind smile.

  “And you are looking dazzling,” he responded, his eyes moving over her. He looked as if he would say more, but then his

  eyes traveled beyond her and his smile changed to the merely polite.

  “You look very lovely too, Countess,” he said. “And you too, as always, Mrs. Peyton.”

  Julia reached the bottom of the stairs and looked up to see the countess, out of black for the occasion, clad in an elegantly severe gown of silver brocade. Beside her stood Caroline, dressed in a floaty organza in her favorite shade of pale blue. The countess smiled coolly at Oliver, of whom she approved, while her eyes passed over Julia with scarcely veiled malice in their depths. Julia had never forgotten the countess’ threat to make her regret speaking out in Sebastian’s defense, and that look made her shiver. The moment quickly passed as Smathers handed the ladies their cloaks, and Caroline and Julia exclaimed over each other’s gowns. Then they were off to the ball.

  After fighting their way through the street that was thronged with carriages all on their way to Lady Jersey’s, Julia’s party was a good hour and a half late. But other late arrivals still streamed in the door, where they were relieved of their cloaks by liveried servants and pressed on up the wide staircase that led to the reception rooms on the first story. At the head of the stairs stood the receiving line, consisting of Lady Jersey and her seldom seen husband, her married daughter and the daughter’s husband, and Lady Soames, who Julia knew was a good friend of Lady Jersey’s, and her husband. She passed down the line as in a dream, murmuring polite phrases as the august ladies beamed at her.