Earl's Invention

by Diana Campbell

  The earl’s jaw tightened, and, if possible, his eyes grew a trifle frostier.

  “But I can waste no further time.” Lady Hellier squared her shoulders with determination. “If the ball is to be a success, I must start work immediately.”

  She raced out of the library, and when the front door had slammed in her wake, David granted Bonnie a sardonic nod.

  “I am compelled to give you considerable credit,” he said. His voice was fearfully calm; he might have been commenting on the weather. “I did not dream you would be so devious as to prevail on Judith to give you a come-out.”

  “Prevail on her!” Bonnie gasped. “To the contrary, I— ”

  “A come-out which I shall have to pay for.” He went on as though he hadn’t heard her, and Bonnie dismally suspected he had not. “You do realize that, I trust? That the expense will inevitably devolve on me?"

  “Yes, I do.” Bonnie frantically bobbed her own head. “It is for that very reason that I attempted to dissuade her—”

  “But you’ve been determined from the outset to have a debut, and it is now in Judith’s interest to give you one. Especially since it will not cost her and Robert a single farthing.”

  “Please, David,” Bonnie pleaded. “Please listen to me. The assembly was entirely Lady Hellier’s idea, and I did not agree to it. I admit that I may have seemed to agree ..."

  But it was obvious he did not intend to listen—he was already turning away—and Bonnie snatched at a final straw.

  “Believe what you will,” she said stiffly. "Fortunately, there is yet another way to prevent the ball. I shall leave for Cheshire at once, and you can tell Lady Hellier I suddenly grew homesick and returned to Barbados after all."

  “That is absurd,” the earl snapped, whirling back round. “You are in no condition to undertake such a journey. You can hardly walk, much less climb in and out of a coach."

  “I can walk very well,” Bonnie lied. “In fact, my ankle is so much improved that I had decided to accompany you to Lady Cunningham’s assembly tomorrow evening. So there is no reason I cannot travel to Cheshire instead.”

  David hesitated, and Bonnie clenched her hands. She had spoken impulsively, spoken from sheer desperation, and it appeared she had gone too far . . .

  “No,” he said at last.

  Bonnie’s fingers weakened with relief, and she saw that her nails had left little crimson crescents in her palms.

  “No,” he repeated, “your departure would make me seem a cad indeed. I will not have it said that the Earl of Sedge- wick blithely permitted his injured niece to sail off to the Indies. You will stay in London, and you and Judith will have your ball. However, I further trust you will understand and forgive my lack of enthusiasm for the project.’

  His tone was still perfectly level, but his eyes had narrowed to the merest slivers of glittering blue ice. “I shall pay for the assembly, and I shall attend it, but pray do not expect me to assist in the planning. Should Francis bring a dozen messages a day, I shall not be available for consultation.”

  He jammed on his hat; apparently he had been going out. “If you will excuse me," he continued, as though in confirmation, “I was at the point of leaving for my club.” He bowed, turned away again, turned back. “In fact, as I think on it, I fancy it would be best if I spent my days at Brooks’s until arrangements for the ball are complete. I should hate to intrude on you and Francis.”

  He swept another bow and stalked into the vestibule, and Bonnie winced as the front door crashed to behind him.

  Papa had also been wont to preach that liars were invariably trapped in their falsehoods, and by half past nine the following evening, Bonnie was compelled to own him right on this head as well. No, not altogether right, she amended, for after nearly an hour of practice in her bedchamber, she could, in fact, walk quite smoothly. Well, perhaps it would be more accurate to say that she could appear to walk smoothly: if she placed all her weight on her right foot, then quickly slid her left in front of it, she fancied her gait would look normal to any but the most critical observer.

  But she had failed to consider the possibility that she would be required to stand—endlessly stand—in the corridor outside Lady Cunningham’s saloon, and her right ankle soon began to ache almost as much as her left. Had she designed the human body, she thought grouchily, she would have anticipated such circumstances and provided an emergency limb. As it was, she could only rock awkwardly from one leg to the other until, at last, the butler announced them and David escorted her into the drawing room.

  “Lord Sedgewick!” Lady Cunningham said brightly. “And Miss Carlisle.” Her face fell, and she sorrowfully shook her head. “How unfortunate that you should have been exposed

  to the very worst of our British ways so soon after your arrival. Perhaps you will be comforted to leam that you are not alone in your travail. No, I myself was nearly pushed off the footpath in Oxford Street last spring. Or was it the spring before? Well, it doesn’t signify. The point is that an excessively rude pedestrian somehow got between me and my footman ...”

  Her ladyship rattled on, and Bonnie understood why David had insisted they come to the assembly early. And why— despite this precaution—they had been left to languish in the hall for almost half an hour. If Lady Cunningham devoted such attention to each of her guests, there would soon be a line extending well into the street. Bonnie began shifting from foot to foot again, and just as she reached the point of collapse, her ladyship reached the end of her narrative.

  “Be that as it may." she concluded, “I am delighted that you are recovered sufficiently to attend my ball. However, if you will forgive an old woman's advice, I daresay your ankle is not as strong as you fancy. You should sit and rest awhile so that when the orchestra starts to play, you will be ready to dance.”

  Bonnie doubted she would be ready to dance if she rested her ankle a week, but she nodded and permitted David to guide her to a chair in the comer of the drawing room.

  “Would you care for a glass of champagne?” the earl said politely.

  “Yes, thank you. It would be very kind of you to bring me one.

  He bowed and strode out of the saloon, and Bonnie sighed. Though he had, in fact, been from home Monday afternoon and all day today, he had returned to Grosvenor Street for dinner last evening, and the meal had been grim in the extreme. Indeed, Bonnie soon came to wish that he had elected to dine out as well, for she did not believe he uttered twenty words in the whole hour they sat at table. At one point, she thought to inquire whether his gaming had been successful, but it then occurred to her that he was probably

  spending his time with Miss Godwin rather than at Brooks’s. So she had picked at her food in silence . . .

  Bonnie suddenly entertained a notion that she was being watched, and when she glanced around, she spied Lady Pamela Everett gazing in her direction. Following her conversation with Francis, she had sincerely tried to put the incident in Bond Street out of her mind, but she had been unable to do so. No, she was still persuaded—half-persuaded at least—that she had been pushed in front of the hackney coach, and she searched Lady Pamela’s face for some hint of confirmation. But her ladyship was situated just inside the drawing-room entry, too far for her expression to be readable, and Bonnie lowered her eyes and discreetly inspected her ankle.

  Upon removing the bandage that afternoon, she had been encouraged to note that her ankle had shrunk nearly to normal size and retained only a faint bluish tinge. And, she was pleased to see now, her hours of walking and standing had done no visible damage. It would have required a critical observer indeed to detect the slight remaining swelling, and that last trace of blue might almost appear to be a reflection cast by her periwinkle slipper. Yes, her ankle looked quite acceptable, and she would have been excessively happy if it didn’t hurt like the very deuce—

  “Bonnie!”

  She started and peered up just as Francis sank into the chair beside hers.

  “I crept past Lady Cu
nningham,” he whispered. “I should not ordinarily be so discourteous, but people are strung all the way to the street, and I had matters of grave importance to discuss with you.”

  What matters these might be, Bonnie was at a loss to conceive, for Francis had not left Grosvenor Street until half past five that afternoon. And that, if she recollected aright, had been his fourth call of the day. To say nothing of the three visits he had paid on Monday. The messages he had so dutifully borne ranged from the merely trivial (“Should we invite Clement Aldrich? Though he is Sir James Clayton’s

  cousin, his political views have rendered him decidedly unpopular . . .”) to the utterly ridiculous (“Should we place a potted palm on the left side of the orchestra or the right?”). But Francis was only doing his mother’s bidding, Bonnie reminded herself, and she essayed a tolerant smile.

  “To begin with,’’ Francis said earnestly, “Mama now believes we should put a fern in front of the orchestra instead of a palm. On the left side, of course; we agreed to that yesterday.”

  Bonnie would have sworn they had agreed to place the palm on the orchestra’s right, but she bobbed her head. “Yes,” she muttered. “A fern would be fine.”

  “And then there is the question of your attire,” Francis went on. “Mama feels—since the roses are to be yellow— that you might wish to wear a yellow dress.”

  It was fortunate, Bonnie thought dryly, that most of her ball gowns chanced to be yellow. “Yes," she said again. “I shall wear my—”

  “Francis,” the earl said coolly. He was carrying two glasses of champagne, and he thrust one into Bonnie’s hand and sipped at the other himself. “Your conversation with Lady Cunningham must have been one of historic brevity.”

  “To say the truth, I have not yet spoken with Lady Cunningham," Francis confessed. ‘“I own it was rude of me to avoid her. but I was eager to talk to Bonnie.”

  “That is quite understandable, but since you and Bonnie have finished your chat, I am sure she will permit you to pay your belated respects to our hostess.” David drained his glass and slammed it on the bow-fronted commode next to Bonnie’s chair. “In your absence, I shall stand up with your cousin.”

  Bonnie had been only distantly aware of the strains of music in the background, but she now realized that the orchestra was playing a waltz and that the dance floor—such as it was—was thronged with guests. David snatched her glass away, crashed it to the commode beside his, extended his hand; and Bonnie shook her head.

  “I fear I cannot dance," she murmured. “As Lady Cunningham suggested, my ankle is not so strong as I’d fancied.” “Then we must certainly leave,” the earl said kindly. “I shall summon Kimball at once.”

  “We needn’t go on my account,” Bonnie protested. “I shall be perfectly comfortable as long as I’m sitting.”

  “And I shall keep her company," Francis promised. “How very noble.” David shook his own head with admiration. “But such suffering is entirely unnecesssary, I assure you. No, I shall send for Kimball; allow me ten minutes. Then, Francis, you can desire one of Lady Cunningham’s servants to assist Bonnie down the stairs.”

  In the event, it was Francis who assisted her down the stairs, through the vestibule, and across the footpath; and she greeted the dozens of puzzled stares they received with a fixed bright smile. A smile which indicated that it was altogether natural to leave an assembly not long after ten o’clock. To her relief, David’s barouche was waiting, and Francis and Kimball between them boosted her into the forward- facing seat. Francis waved a rather dubious farewell, Kimball remounted the box; and a few seconds later—amid the curious frowns of the guests still milling in the street—the carriage clattered to a start.

  “We did not have to go so early,” Bonnie reiterated as they turned a comer and, blessedly, trotted beyond view of Lady Cunningham’s house. “As I stated, I should have been perfectly comfortable—”

  “And as / stated,” the earl interposed, “I could not subject you and Francis to a long, dull evening. No, it is clear you attempted to resume your activities too soon, and Lady Cunningham will understand your premature departure. I shall also send word to Lady Jersey that we cannot attend the assembly at Almack’s tomorrow night.”

  “Not go to Almack’s!” Bonnie’s eyes widened with disbelief. The servants in the Powell household had often debated how many of her children Mrs. Powell would trade for a voucher to Almack’s. The most conservative estimate was two; several on the staff had insisted she would readily give all six.

  “It is really very boring,” David said. “On the whole, I vastly prefer to play macao at Brooks’s, which is what I shall do tomorrow evening. But I can understand why you might wish to go to Almack’s once in your life, and I shall take you next week. When your ankle is completely healed.”

  Once in your life. There it was again: the chilling reminder that her days in London were fearfully numbered. "Yes,” she mumbled, “I daresay that would be best. I couldn’t possibly appreciate Almack’s if my ankle was still troubling me.”

  Once-in-your-life, once-in-your-life, once-in-your-life. The carriage wheels sang the refrain endlessly to the cobblestones as they rolled on through the darkness.

  10

  Bonnie had often pondered the awesome power of Fate: the enormous changes that a day, an hour, even a few minutes could create in one’s life. If, for example, Mr. Powell had chosen to visit his Stafford office on some other date or at some other time, he would have had no opportunity to engage her as his governess. And if she had chanced to be wearing her oldest gown rather than her newest when the Powell boys poured ink in her chair, she probably wouldn’t have fled the house in Portman Square. No, the ink would scarcely have showed on her ancient black bombazine dress, and Bonnie would not have cared a whit if it had. And then, of course, if she had raced into Oxford Street mere seconds sooner or later than she did, she would not have met the Earl of Sedgewick.

  Despite her frequent meditations on the subject, Bonnie had never decided whether the changes thus wrought were generally for good or ill. Nor did she reach any such conclusion the next morning when she realized that—a scant twelve hours after her humiliating retreat from Lady Cunningham’s ball—her ankle was perfectly healed.

  “You are not limping!” Nell said happily as Bonnie walked into the breakfast parlor. Two days earlier, the abigail had declared that in order to “get the morning stiffness out of

  your ankle,” Miss Bonnie must henceforth take her breakfast downstairs with Mr. David.

  “No, I am not,” Bonnie agreed.

  She glanced around the room, but she couldn’t determine whether the earl had eaten or not. The pristine tablecloth in front of his empty chair proved nothing; Kimball would have captured and destroyed every wayward crumb the instant his master departed. And inasmuch as the entire Wedgwood breakfast service was kept on top of the sideboard, it was impossible to judge if one plate was missing.

  “I seem to have recovered literally overnight,” Bonnie went on. Papa would no doubt have termed her dramatic improvement a "miracle,” but Bonnie had always been a trifle skeptical on this head. “Indeed, I was thinking to advise Uncle David that I can go to Almack’s after all.”

  “I fear it is too late.” Nell shook her head. "Mr. David has already left for Brooks’s, and he stated he would remain there through the evening."

  “I see,” Bonnie murmured. “Well, I can go to Almack’s next week, can I not?”

  Invalidism having long since lost its charms, Bonnie had mastered the art of expanding every remotely interesting activity to the maximum, and she dawdled over breakfast for nearly an hour before repairing to the library. Though she had by now discarded her abortive letters to Aunt Grace, she well remembered that she must soon send a communication to Cheshire; and she proceeded directly to the desk, withdrew a sheet of stationery from the drawer, and seized the pen. But her heart wasn’t in the project, and when Nell appeared to announce lunch, she was still laboring over the fi
rst paragraph.

  Lunch occupied another hour, and afterward—abandoning any notion of completing her letter today—Bonnie settled on the sofa with one of William Beckford’s gothic novels. But she was unable to concentrate on it either, and at length, she laid the book aside, gazed toward the window, and wondered if she should risk a walk. The weather was marginal, the sun only occasionally peeping out from behind a bank of scudding gray clouds. However, there had been no rain, and if she didn’t venture far from the house, she could quickly scurry back if it did start to rain . . .

  Unless Lady Pamela’s father and brother had stationed a man outside to watch for her. As they so obviously had last Friday. Well, she amended, as they might have done last Friday. She clenched her hands in frustration, desperately wishing she knew. Until she was persuaded that her mishap had truly been an accident, she was virtually a prisoner, not daring to step into the street alone—

  The doorbell pealed, and Bonnie spun her head eagerly toward the vestibule, so monstrous bored that she was prepared to welcome even one of Francis’ calls. Which was fortunate because it was, indeed, Francis who shortly loomed up in the library entry.