‘Yes, but remember, ma’am, you have such a sensitive skin. No one will be surprised, least of all the master.’
Now Alice came forward with an armful of dresses. ‘I could put sleeves into all of these, I think.’ She grinned. ‘You will most likely find you’ve set a new style.’
‘Yes. And how hot and wretched I shall be in the mean time! But, Alice, what in the world am I to wear with these?’ She held out the box with its glittering contents.
‘I was thinking about that, ma’am, while you were talking. And, don’t you see, it comes out nice and easy. You must be in a proper taking about your burn, and the long sleeves, and looking so dowdy and all. So, you tell the master, you’re going to wear your best jewels, to carry it off.’
‘Of course! Bless you, Alice, what would I do without you? And you, Anne! Now, I must write a note to Josephine. Alice, will you see that it gets safely to Charleston? Please God, she’ll be there by the time it is.’
‘I wouldn’t count on it,’ said Anne.
***
Tarot had told Juliet that he would meet her at the theatre that night. It was bound to be a full house, since a touring company was putting on Lovers’ Vows, Mrs. Inchbald’s popular adaptation of Kotzebue’s play. ‘I know your theatre well,’ he had promised her. ‘I will see to it that we have a private moment.’
It was sheer bad luck that made Hyde inquire, when Juliet was already dressed, what the play was.
‘Lovers’ Vows,’ Juliet said without enthusiasm. ‘I doubt I shall be bored to distraction, but I promised Mrs. Broughton that I would join her party.’
‘Not the play that caused all the trouble in Mansfield Park? Do you know, I find myself strongly tempted to come and see whether it is really so shocking.’
‘Oh!’ Here was disaster. ‘But, consider, my dear,’ she recovered her tone quickly. ‘You have been out and about all day. You look worn out. I cannot think Judge James would approve of any more gadding.’
‘And you are all ready to go, and do not wish to wait while I change my dress? Does Mrs. Broughton call for you?’
‘Yes. Any minute now. Hyde, do be sensible. You know how tedious you find her, and how hot the theatre will be. And all her daughters are coming too.’ She hoped it would be the clincher.
It worked the other way. ‘In that case I feel in honour bound to act the good husband and come and keep up your spirits. But no need to keep Mrs. Broughton waiting. I will walk over when I am ready, and join you.’ He was half-way up the stair when he turned. ‘And, talking of the heat in the theatre, are you wise to be wearing long sleeves? Charming though you look in them.’
‘Oh, the most tedious thing. I contrived to burn myself yesterday, just in that short time I was without a parasol. My arms are not fit to be seen today.’
‘My condolences. And all the more reason why I should be your squire tonight, rather than some stranger who might hurt you by too strong a grasp. I will be with you directly.’
The sound of a carriage outside ended the conversation, to Juliet’s relief. Frightening to have had him come so near, by accident, to the real reason for her long sleeves.
Mrs. Broughton was as delighted as she was surprised to hear that Hyde was to join them. ‘Monsieur Tarot’s nose will be quite out of joint when he sees you actually squired by your husband. I am sure that is not at all what he had in mind when he begged to be allowed to join my party. See, girls, there is hope for you yet.’ Looking them over, as they alighted after the absurdly short drive to the theatre: ‘Geraldine, your necklace is twisted; Lucinda, your dress is creased; Deborah, stop slouching this instant.’ She turned to Juliet, who wondered for a wild moment what sergeant-major’s comment she would have for her. When it came, it was predictable enough. ‘Long sleeves, my love? You are like to be baked alive in the theatre.’
‘And serve me right for a careless fool.’ They were entering the brilliantly lighted foyer. ‘I forgot my parasol, coming in from Winchelsea yesterday, and am burned like a lobster today.’ She was looking about her eagerly as she spoke, hoping to snatch a word with Tarot before Hyde arrived.
William Jay and two gangling young cousins of the Broughtons had come forward eagerly to greet them and make themselves useful in taking pelisses and shawls and getting the ladies comfortably settled in the pair of boxes Mrs. Broughton had taken in the lower tier. ‘Monsieur Tarot is late as always,’ she said with some apparent satisfaction. ‘Even your charms, my dear, are not powerful enough to mend his manners. I doubt we shall see him before the interval.’
Hyde, on the other hand, slipped quietly into the seat behind Juliet just as the curtain rose for the first act. ‘I could not bear to miss the great discovery scene between Agatha and Frederic,’ he whispered. ‘Do you think this Agatha will contrive to be as “maternal” as Maria Bertram?’
‘Hush!’ said Juliet.
The play was just as nonsensical as she had predicted, but under other circumstances, she would have enormously enjoyed seeing it with Hyde, and tracing the course of those disastrous rehearsals in Sir Thomas’s converted study at Mansfield Park. As it was, it was only by an immense effort that she could keep her mind on the action at all. Of the many anxieties that plagued her, one stood out paramount. Would Hyde, as she had, see a likeness between Tarot and Fonseca?
She got her answer soon enough. When the ornate curtain swept down and the audience rustled to its feet to move out to the front rooms for refreshments, Hyde took her arm with the gentle touch due to her “sunburn”. ‘Let us act Darby and Joan,’ he said, ‘and shock the gossips.’ Mrs. Broughton was busy seeing to it that Mr. Jay and her two nephews did their duty by her daughters. ‘Do you know,’ he went on quietly. ‘If I believed in ghosts, I would think I had seen Fonseca’s as I came in.’
‘Fonseca’s ghost? Oh,’ she managed a smile. ‘You have seen an old acquaintance of mine, Monsieur Tarot. He is to join our party, Mrs. Broughton tells me. She seems to think I have made a conquest of him. Nonsense, of course; it is but that we are old acquaintances from before Waterloo. But, it is true, when I met him last night I, too, was struck for a moment by the likeness to Fonseca. It’s the foreign air, I think. There is no real similarity, but I confess I was taken aback for a moment. Poor Mr. Fonseca,’ she added.
‘Yes. Let us hope we do not find ourselves saying, “Poor Monsieur Tarot”.’
She looked up at him, puzzled and frightened. Was this a threat, a warning, or, impossibly, a joke? He smiled blandly back, ‘And here, if I mistake not, comes the gentleman himself, every exquisite inch of him. You must make me known to him, my dear. Every conquest of yours is of interest to me.’
‘Not such a great conquest as all that.’ She managed a laugh. ‘You must allow me my little vanities. As you see, he is slow enough to join us.’
‘Yes. One might almost think he was hoping to speak to you alone, waiting until I had done the gallant thing and gone off to fight my way through the crowd and fetch you an ice. You would like one, no doubt?’
‘Oh, yes, please! It’s stifling in here, and it makes my burn hurt. Anything cold would do: an ice, a drink …’
‘You shall have it. And I will resign myself to finding you in full flirtation with Monsieur — what did you say his name is? — Farot? — when I return.’
‘Tarot.’
‘You do not sound altogether certain yourself.’ How disturbingly quick he was to catch the nuances of her speech. ‘I must certainly meet the gentleman. Keep him for me, my dear, I beg you.’
He had been, as usual quite right. He had no sooner vanished into the crowd of gentlemen round the buffet than Tarot appeared at her elbow. ‘Enfin,’ he said. ‘The husband, I collect?’
‘Precisely. And eager to meet you. I have told him that you are at once an old acquaintance and my latest conquest, so you will pray act the part.’
‘It will be easy.’ A languishing glance that she found detestable. Hyde had been right in what he said. Tarot was superlatively fine
tonight. ‘You are admiring my tenue,’ he read her thoughts. ‘You can see how completely I trust you, ma mie. I spent my last few sous today so as not to disgrace you tonight. You’d hardly believe, would you, that one could obtain so much elegance so quickly, here in Savannah. But at a price, I must tell you, at a price.’
‘Yes.’ This was her cue, and there was not a moment to be lost. ‘But I must want you to expect nothing from me until after our party next week.’
‘Oh? And why not, pray? I thought we had understood each other well enough last night.’
‘Oh, yes.’ Anguished conviction in her tone. ‘I beg you to believe me that it is simply that I cannot find the funds.’
‘The devoted husband is so close-fisted?’
‘No! But —’ This was a safe enough chance to take. ‘You know me. My allowance is paid quarterly. On the first of the month.’
‘And here we are in mid-April and you have spent the lot?’ To her heart-throbbing relief he laughed. ‘Ma petite, sometimes, last night, I found myself thinking you hardly yourself. Now, I can see I was wrong. You are my Josephine right enough. So — the allowance is gone until July! You are hardly suggesting that I wait till then.’
‘Oh, no! You see my earrings?’
‘I have been admiring them.’
‘Oh, no, you haven’t. They are in the worst of taste, and you know it. A mistake I made, back in Paris. But gold and sapphires, just the same. They are part of a set ... my plan is to wear them at our party next week, and then you shall have them — A piece at a time,’ she added hurriedly. ‘It will be less likely to be noticed that way. I wear them very seldom.’
She did not like his smile. ‘Keeping me quiet by instalments, hein? We have come a long way, you and I, since Waterloo. And the fine husband? You think he will not notice?’
‘I hope not.’ Passionately she hoped that before Hyde should notice, Josephine would be back to deal with her own problem in her own way. ‘And here he comes,’ she added, with relief. ‘I had best make you known to him. As an old friend.’
‘Yes, indeed. An old, old friend.’ There was more in his tone than she wanted to understand.
And yet the introduction went off easily enough. Hyde was at his most agreeable, delighted to meet a friend of his wife’s and eager to hear about Tarot’s experiences in Russia. This innocuous subject lasted them to the end of the interval, when Hyde, somehow, was first in giving Juliet his arm. ‘We have decided to set a new style, my wife and I,’ his smile for Tarot was entirely friendly and Juliet breathed a sigh of relief. ‘The Constant Couple, or something of the kind. Come, my love, or we will disturb your dear friends the Broughtons.’
***
The week that followed was so busy, both with plans for their own party and with arrangements for the reception of the President that Juliet hardly had time to watch for the message from Josephine that never came. To her relief, Tarot had merely paid her a formal call, had found William Jay and a couple of other young men with her and had contented himself with a brief visit and an expressive glance, as he said goodbye, round her sumptuously furnished drawing-room. He was, he told her, greatly looking forward to the party to which she had been so kind as to invite him.
So was not she. But each day’s hope that Josephine would return and rescue her from her predicament was disappointed, and each day she found it impossible to decide whether she was glad or sorry. In the meantime, she got on with the preparations for the party as best she might, ably assisted by Anne, Alice and old Venus. ‘Of course Venus knows,’ Alice had told her. ‘They all do, by now. Here as well as at Winchelsea.’
‘And haven’t told?’
‘Other folks’ slaves? I should just about think not.’ Alice was affronted. ‘We free servants don’t reckon much on those others. And as to telling the family’s secrets; why, ma’am, we’d rather die.’
Another problem had been solved for Juliet, as once before, by Hyde, who summoned her into his study one morning and gave her what struck her as a simply immense sum of money. ‘For the party,’ he explained, as she wondered wildly whether here was a chance to pay off Tarot. ‘I wish you to pay cash for everything,’ he went on. ‘It is unusual, I know, but so is the state of business in town.’
‘Things are so bad?’ She had been half aware, despite her own private anxieties, of a state of carefully concealed tension among their business acquaintances.
‘Not good. Aside from the effect on public confidence, the President’s visit could hardly have happened at a worse time. I only pray that the expense of entertaining him will not be the last straw for poor Scarbrough, who is deep in enough already, what with his new house and the Savannah. Will you mind very much, my dear, if, when this party is over, we retrench a little in our style of living? I would wish to be able to help Scarbrough if it comes to a crisis.’
‘Of course I won’t mind!’ But, she thought gloomily, Josephine would. ‘May we not move back to Wichelsea,’ she went on eagerly, ‘as soon as the President’s visit is over?’
‘You’d like that?’
‘Of all things.’
‘Then we most certainly will. And now, if you will excuse me, I must leave you, my dear. There are a million things to think of in connection with the President’s visit. I can only thank my lucky stars I can leave our own party in your capable hands.’
‘Thank you.’ The compliment brought her so near to tears that it was lucky he had already turned to leave her. She ought to be grateful that his affairs kept him away from the house for most of what would almost certainly be their last few days together. She found it impossible to make herself so.
The day of the party came, and still no word from Josephine. Juliet had secretly taken to studying the shipping lists, but could find no mention of the Liberty’s arrival at Charleston. Josephine must still be wind-bound at Norfolk. She sighed, set her teeth and went to make sure that the floor of the two rooms that were to be used for dancing had been adequately chalked. With Hyde’s permission, she had made one change in the usual arrangements for a Savannah party. There was to be no separate downstairs buffet for the gentlemen. ‘I hate your American ways of separating the gentlemen from the ladies at parties,’ she told Hyde, who laughed and wished her luck in fighting it. ‘And how about the waltz?’ he had gone on to ask.
‘Oh dear!’ Suddenly she was coldly afraid, remembering that other party where Hyde had suddenly forbidden the waltz, she was sure, to prevent her from dancing it with Fonseca. Thank God, Tarot had had the sense to keep away from her, but he was bound to come to the party, was bound, like the rest of the gentlemen, to drink a great deal of everything from champagne to whisky punch ... After that, anything might happen ... ‘Let’s not have it,’ she went on hurriedly. ‘The gentlemen paw one’s gown so! And their hands not always of the cleanest!’
‘Very well. But don’t be surprised if you hear yourself accused of setting up for a prude!’
She tossed her head in a familiar gesture of Josephine’s. ‘Who cares for that?’
But, alone, she sat down to write one of Josephine’s own perfumed little notes, to be sent off, by hand to Monsieur Tarot. As an old friend, she said, she was hurt that he had let a whole week pass without calling.
It brought him within half an hour, and, mercifully, she was alone to receive him. ‘You sent for me, ma mie?’ He kissed her hand. ‘You have relented? Thought again?’
‘I think of nothing else.’ It was true enough. ‘And the more I think, the more I see that we must be practical, you and I.’ Alone with him, it was easier, and safer, to speak French. ‘There is something you need to know. There was a Monsieur Fonseca, here in Savannah.’ She paused, uncertain how to go on, and he interrupted her.
‘Who sleeps now, in the graveyard across there. Naturally, I have heard of him. Monsieur the husband’s first and only duel. And a dead shot, they tell me.’ His smile froze the marrow of her bones. ‘Do you remember holding the candles for me to snuff with my pistol, ma petite?
’
There was no need to feign a shudder. ‘That’s just why I sent for you,’ she took her cue. ‘To make sure you know that if Hyde dies his entire fortune goes to a disagreeable cousin in Charleston and I am left to eke out existence on a widow’s pittance.’
His smile was patronising now. ‘You really think I had not discovered that for myself? Do you imagine Monsieur Purchis would be alive now if I had not? You underestimate me, ma chère.’ He sighed, and picked up hat, gloves and cane. ‘Might it not have been better to pretend that some of your concern was for me? “The Constant Couple”, parbleu.’ He quoted Hyde’s words at the theatre with a controlled fury that frightened her more than anything else. ‘Do you think I have not been tempted, daily, to make a widow of you?’ He laughed. ‘A widow!’
Cold sweat prickled at his tone. ‘But a poor one.’
‘Precisely. So have no fears for the rich husband. I shall be the perfect guest tonight. You will see. And, tomorrow, I will call on you to receive your first “gift”. I shall have left my gloves behind. So careless! But you, in your goodness, will have them ready packed up for me, in a neat little parcel. With the sapphire necklace inside.’
‘I said the earrings.’
‘And I say the necklace.’ Their eyes met, cold and steady, but it was hers that fell first.
‘Very well. The necklace.’ And Hyde wanted to retrench.
Chapter Fourteen
Tarot stayed stone cold sober throughout the party, and Juliet found this, curiously, almost more frightening than anything else he had done. William Jay, on the other hand, seemed to have acquired the American habit of indiscriminately mixing claret, champagne and various forms of whisky punch. Dancing the third quadrille with her he confided, with flushed indiscretion and a loud voice, his anxieties about Mr. Scarbrough and his builders. ‘They’ve not been paid; they’re beginning to complain. But what can I do, Mrs. Purchis?’
‘Keep quiet about it, I should think.’ Her answer came out more tart than she intended, but she had noticed for herself that Scarbrough had new lines in his face.
All for Love Page 18