“You’ll have to excuse the condition of my fitting and showing rooms in the back, Mrs. Darcy, for I have not had a chance to straighten them in days,” Mrs. Hemmings said without the least trace of embarrassment. “Fortunately, I got to tidying the front room when Mary Coats came over last night to tell me that you were in town.”
Helen had the impulse to turn and flee. If the clutter that filled this small room was a result of tidying, she could not imagine what the rest of the house must look like. She did not flee, however, and allowed herself to be ushered to what Mrs. Hemmings referred to as her “back room.”
Helen stood a moment in amazement on the threshold of the not overlarge room. She beheld two well-worn dress forms, tilted on their stands; several unmatched chairs, one with a split cane seat, others laden with stacks of back issues of La Belle Assemblée and The Ladies’ Monthly Museum piled precariously high; a helter-skelter scattering of folders stuffed with what looked to be customers’ accounts; and a gate-leg table strewn with old dress patterns, several pairs of scissors and shears, and a profusion of pin cushions, spools and bobbins. There were boxes foaming with white waves of lace, and an old carved chest against one wall, its drawers spilling plumes and trimmings of every sort. Shelf upon shelf overflowed with bolts of colourful cloth. In a far corner of the room hung a heavy brocade curtain, faded and threadbare, behind which Helen guessed was the fitting room.
Yet despite this chaos, hanging on hooks along two walls, was a collection of the most elegant day dresses and most exquisite evening gowns Helen had seen outside of the best shops in New Bond Street.
Mrs. Hemmings understood Helen’s confusion. “Yes, Mrs. Darcy,” she said sympathetically, “those are my creations. I love to sew, you see, and like nothing better than making beautiful dresses. Oh, not for myself, for I am something of an eccentric, I fear, and since I am such a tiny person, I must dress in this striking fashion so as not to be lost in a crowd! Ladies come from miles around to have me sew for them, because I have such a fine eye for what becomes one—except in my own case—and because my creations are dagger-cheap, though in the very latest fashion! I suppose that I seem a very odd creature!”
Such a forthright speech did not call for a polite rejoinder, and Helen spared herself the necessity of searching for one. “Mrs. Hemmings,” she breathed in awed accents, “you are indeed an odd creature if you do not charge a fortune for such dresses. They are beautiful. But I confess I am at a loss to understand how so much beauty can come out of this… this jumble!”
“It is a jumble,” Mrs. Hemmings agreed, not in the least insulted. “I can’t account for it myself, either, but tidy rooms make me quite nervous!”
Helen glanced once more round the room before picking her way through the tangle, saying only, “It takes my breath away!”
“Then sit you down,” Mrs. Hemmings suggested, “and get your breath back again so we may see what we can do for you.”
Helen perched herself on what looked to be the safest of the chairs, and placed her reticule upon a tottering tower of folded remnants. Mrs. Hemmings then proceeded to barrage Helen with questions that required no answers about sizes, styles, colours and accessories.
The odd seamstress’s conversation was as pell-mell as the room, but the more Helen listened to her chatter, the more she discerned that the widow had a peculiar genius for creating fashion and an unerring eye for detail. The stream of commentary that accompanied Mrs. Hemmings’s seemingly aimless search through the dresses on the wall included judicious remarks on the colours and styles that would compliment her new client to the fullest. Helen decided that atop the gown of bold coquelicot stripes and the neck ruff sat a shrewd head.
She listened wide-eyed to most of this chatter but did manage during one of Mrs. Hemmings’s infrequent pauses to enquire, “How is it that you have so many dresses ready made?”
“Oh, that is very difficult to say! Many of these are waiting for my customers’ final fitting for adjustment of hems, but the others— Every now and then, I have an idea for a dress that I long to make though I have no particular customer in mind. I just decide to make it up and then see who comes along, and if no one does, well, it pleases me to see it hanging here. Now, where is that—ah, yes! Here is the one I was looking for!”
With that Mrs. Hemmings produced a most beautiful gown of a silk that shimmered between fiery gold and burnished red, whose skirt fell in simple folds from a high waist. Though the neckline was far from immodest, it was scooped lower than Helen was accustomed to wearing. It was a deceptively simple creation designed for evening wear but not a grand ball gown—the perfect dress for a quiet dinner with a gentleman. Mr. Darcy, for instance.
“Is this not a dress made for one of your customers?” Helen asked, unable to believe it was available for sale.
“I can’t recall now,” Mrs. Hemmings said, puzzling over the problem. “Perhaps I have made it for someone, although I do not remember at the moment who that might be! It would have to be for a lady with your colouring. Well, never mind, if it is for another lady, you may take this one, and I shall make her up a new one.”
Helen whispered, half in abstraction, “Dare I?”
“Mrs. Darcy!” Mrs. Hemmings cried. “How dare you not?”
“I can’t—” Helen began in weak protest, but was easily won over by Mrs. Hemmings’s convincing argument that Helen would be foolish not to try on a garment that so obviously suited her.
Thus persuaded, Helen went behind the curtain in the fitting corner to try the dress on. There, much to her surprise, she discovered a client’s bill caught under the lacing inside the bodice. Helen pulled it out and handed it to Mrs. Hemmings. The seamstress exclaimed over the rather large bill, which she claimed had been missing for months.
Blaming the unfortunate Sarah for its misplacement, she assured Helen that it was in no way associated with the golden gown. The dress suited Helen to perfection.
She then tried on a number of day dresses from which she selected two—a simple mulled muslin walking dress and a particularly becoming ensemble of worked jaconet in rich forest green with braided sleeves and collar, worn with a fluted pelisse of the same colour. Appropriate undergarments and gloves completed the toilette.
Both Helen and Mrs. Hemmings were extremely pleased with their work, which had continued into the early afternoon. They chatted companionably all the while, and Helen had the opportunity to invent a lively story about Mr. Darcy’s insistence that she travel light and his subsequent decision that her wardrobe was not adequate after all.
Finally Helen was ready to go. She had chosen to wear the forest-green ensemble right from the shop, rather than don her travel-stained old dress. “You tell me that you are dagger-cheap, Mrs. Hemmings,” she said, “but still I suppose that I do owe you something—besides the pleasure of my company! Now, what is the total?”
Mrs. Hemmings stayed Helen’s search through her reticule. “No, that won’t be necessary, Mrs. Darcy, and I’ll have the other things you tried on sent over to the George later in the afternoon when I’ve finished the hems.”
Helen looked up, surprised. “Surely there is some misunderstanding. I need—no, can afford only the three dresses. I like to discharge my debts as I go, you understand.”
“Oh, I do understand!” Mrs. Hemmings said with a laugh. “Let me explain. Earlier this morning, your husband’s man came round to assure me that you were to have free rein in my shop, and to purchase every outfit that suited you.”
This took Helen a moment to absorb. “Did he?” she said a little too sweetly. “How thoughtful of him!”
“Yes, wasn’t it?” Mrs. Hemmings replied. “No doubt Mr. Darcy knows that you’ve already spent this quarter’s allowance! I call that a fine husband, I do.”
Helen could hardly make a scene in front of Mrs. Hemmings and refuse to take the clothing she had already said she would purchase. After a severe struggle with herself, she was able to summon a smile for Mrs. Hemmings and t
o thank her for everything in a state of relative calm.
Once outside the door, however, she allowed her temper a looser tether. She marched back to the George, skirts swishing with indignation, and one look at the set of her face would have informed Mr. Darcy that she intended to have a private interview with him without a moment’s delay.
CHAPTER SIX
HELEN WAS IN LUCK. Mr. Darcy was just returning to the inn after a brief inspection of his horses with Keithley when she regained the back parlour. At the sight of her prey, she sent him a glance pregnant with intention. He bowed and entered the parlour docilely, after which she shut the door behind him with a slight snap.
If Mr. Darcy was aware that Helen was looking at all put out, he gave no sign of it. Instead, noticing her new green walking dress, he ran his eye over her elegant form and said, “Very becoming confection, my dear. One of the local seamstress’s inventions? Creditable. Very creditable, indeed!”
“Yes,” Helen replied through set teeth, her eyes narrowed.
The signs of a brewing tempest were not wholly unperceived by Mr. Darcy. “Is something amiss, my Nell?” he asked with a disturbing suggestion of humour.
“Don’t you ‘my Nell’ me, Mr. Darcy!” she warned.
“What is it, Miss Denville?” he asked politely, but in a lowered tone. It did not improve her mood to sense that he was still amused.
“It is just a small difficulty with money,” she said, trying hard to conceal her angry mortification.
“Ah! How clumsy of me,” Mr. Darcy said. “I was entirely forgetting your circumstances. I must beg your forgiveness for not having provided you with the pin-money you no doubt need to purchase—” he paused infinitesimally “—the trifles that females require.”
This further generosity on Mr. Darcy’s part not unnaturally paralyzed Helen’s tongue, but only for a moment. “I do not need pin-money! Nor do I need any money, from you or from anyone else, for trifles or otherwise!” she snapped. “It is rather that I have just discovered—to my deep chagrin—that you have been so thoughtful as to have gone about town discharging, in advance, any expenses I may incur for clothing. And that, without my permission!”
“Yes, I am glad you found it thoughtful. I saw no need to ask for your permission,” Mr. Darcy confessed, “since I did it in atonement for having forgotten about the wedding ring.”
Helen tried valiantly to keep her voice low, to prevent anyone from overhearing what might seem to be an extraordinary conversation. “These outward displays are most unnecessary and unwelcome!”
“Have I misunderstood?” Mr. Darcy asked in the manner of one who had no doubts about his understanding. “I thought your bank account was in such a state that you were not contemplating buying any clothing.”
She flushed deeply. “That is true!” she admitted in a harsh whisper.
“Then these are expenses that have been incurred as a result of your association with me,” he replied reasonably.
“But I cannot accept these things from you.”
“Why not?” he enquired.
“Because … because …” She faltered, and then mastered herself. “Because a woman does not accept a gift of clothing from a gentleman. That is why. And don’t pretend this is as commonplace as you have made the rest of this preposterous adventure!”
“Second thoughts, Nell?” Mr. Darcy said calmly, the humorous gleam unmistakably back in his eye. “I see that we are at something of an impasse. You say you cannot accept clothing from a gentleman—and I see your point!—but I, as a gentleman, am unable to allow you to shoulder the expense yourself. Furthermore, since the debt is already discharged, it seems pointless to pursue the matter, as I do not imagine that you are in a position to repay me. I think, therefore, that upon reflection, you shall have to own yourself beaten in this round.”
“I assume that you are using boxing cant,” she said coldly, very much on her dignity, for there was something extremely irritating about the truth of Mr. Darcy’s words, “but I shan’t mention it. I shall ask you to deduct the amount of the clothing from what you will pay me. I have nothing more to say to you, sir, except that you are outrageous, overbearing, domineering—”
The tide of this promising start to a very salutary flow of the conflicting emotions swirling in Helen’s breast was stemmed by a few discreet knocks at the door.
Mr. Darcy held up his hand to silence his indignant bride and crossed to the door. When he opened it to reveal a very nervous-looking Mr. Vest, Mr. Darcy evinced no surprise.
The local magistrate blustered into the room, heedless of the manifest signs of marital strain, thus compelling Helen to compose her features into a picture of wifely contentment.
“Your servant, sir, madam,” Mr. Vest saluted the distinguished couple. “Pray excuse this intrusion. You must know that I would never invade the privacy of the guests of the George were it not for some important business. You might think that as magistrate of Igglesthorpe, I have little to do. In fact, duties impose many demands upon my time, not to mention my decision-making capacities, which I do not scruple to tell you have won me some respect in our village. The position is no sinecure, indeed no! In a small village the magistrate performs tasks that in a larger community are distributed among many. I should not dream of wasting my time, or yours, if events did not oblige it. I have come, in short, on a rather unusual errand.”
“Never tell me that you are unable to meet me for cards after dinner!” Mr. Darcy cried in some, albeit spurious, alarm.
“Never that, sir!” he said. “Never think it! Hieronymus Vest is a man of his word, and if he has agreed to meet you, then meet you he shall. And with pleasure!”
“You have relieved my mind,” Mr. Darcy said, restored to his customary calm, “for I have an intuition that I may be quite in luck today.”
“I am glad to hear it, sir,” Mr. Vest replied automatically, and then reversed himself, “although I do not know why I should be glad to hear it, for it can only spell trouble for me. But that is of no consequence. I have come on awkward business. Devilishly awkward business!”
“I have every confidence in your ability to resolve it gracefully, sir,” Mr. Darcy said.
“You are too kind, Mr. Darcy,” the magistrate replied. “The matter rather concerns Mrs. Darcy. Something to do with a portmanteau and a lady—a foreign lady.”
Helen recognized her cue. “Mr. Vest,” she said with her most winning smile, “your delicacy of mind does you credit, but I fail to see how your business relates to me and, if it does in some obscure manner, how it could be awkward!”
Mr. Vest extracted a handkerchief from his waistcoat pocket and mopped his brow. “Such goodness, such charm!” he exclaimed with a bow of deep respect. “I experience a sincere reluctance to beg leave to inform you that there may have been an, ah, mix-up with your baggage somewhere along the way and that you have, ah, mistaken another lady’s case for your own.”
“I am unaware of any mix-up with my baggage,” Helen temporized. She sought Mr. Darcy’s eye for aid.
“Of course you would not, my dear,” Mr. Darcy quickly replied, “for you do not deal directly with it. Keithley does, and I have been out to see him just now. Since he did not inform me of any irregularities with Mrs. Darcy’s baggage, I must assume that the mistake lies elsewhere.”
“That is a profound relief,” Mr. Vest said. “And yet there is a lady out in the yard—I did not wish to impose upon you by showing her into your private parlour—who claims that Mrs. Darcy has a portmanteau of hers. How that may have occurred is quite beyond my comprehension, for the lady is travelling by job carriage and—”
“The foreign lady?” Mr. Darcy interposed.
“Yes, the foreign lady!” Mr. Vest confirmed. “She was not explicit about how the mix-up happened, but she was adamant on the point that Mrs. Darcy—whom she could not even mention by name! —was in possession of her portmanteau. She claimed it happened at the Brigstone Arms—in Thrapston, you know. But it
is not a posting house—though a very respectable inn, I give you my word, for I know the innkeeper like my own brother, as I do every innkeeper in the vicinity—and so I am in a puzzle as to how the regrettable confusion could have occurred there.”
“The Brigstone Arms, you say? We did make a short stop there,” Mr. Darcy said with a delicate hesitation, “for Mrs. Darcy. But as for a foreign lady—no, I do not think so.”
Helen remembered that Mr. Darcy had said they would have to improvise according to Vincenzo’s moves and guises. If she were to help him, now was the time. “A foreign lady, do you say? Do you not remember her, Richard? I think I even pointed her out to you. Yes, I am quite sure that I saw her, although I cannot, of course, be certain that she is foreign. Indeed, how could I when I did not hear her speak? But there was a certain something about her, aye ne sais quoi, if you see what I mean, Mr. Vest. Is that the one?”
Mr. Vest did not precisely see what Mrs. Darcy meant, but he had no intention of admitting it. He nodded vigorously in response to Mrs. Darcy’s description.
“And is she blond, Mr. Vest?” Helen pursued.
“Yes, she is!” he said, heartened to think that there would be a perfectly logical explanation for everything. “I should even call her a fine-looking woman, although not in the first blush of youth. Quite a taking little thing. Calls herself Graziella Something-or-other.”
“Ah, I see!” Mr. Darcy said. “Italian!”
“No, no, Mr. Darcy,” Mr. Vest corrected, “she is blond.”
At the reference to the impossibility of blond Italians, Helen felt Mr. Darcy’s eye upon her. She wisely refrained from meeting it. “Whatever Miss Graziella’s origins may be,” she said, “I think it best if I go out and speak with her. I see no reason for Mr. Darcy to be troubled by such a… trifling female matter.”
Oblivious to the shaft Helen aimed at Mr. Darcy, Mr. Vest seconded this suggestion with enthusiasm, saying he saw no reason for Mr. Darcy to be embroiled in an episode of someone else’s making.
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