Forgetting for the moment that she was not in charity with Mr. Darcy, Helen said to him in an aside, “This is beginning to have all the appearances of a farce, sir!”
“I would have said a travesty,” he returned dryly.
A laugh betrayed her. “That card takes the trick!” she said, and left the room to play her part.
Mr. Vest escorted her into the yard. There Helen beheld Graziella, a striking vision of fair femininity from the golden ringlets that cunningly framed her face—and minimized the squarish jaw that Helen quickly recognized—to her lace stockings and yellow kid Roman boots on feet a trifle to large for true grace. The unwary eye would not have dwelt on either of these minor flaws but would have instead been drawn in appreciation to the lithe, willowy figure clad in what must have been her favourite blue. Graziella had fallen into a charming attitude that contrasted sharply with that of the slightly nervous Vincenzo of the stagecoach. Graziella’s mannerisms promised to be languorous and simpering, while Vincenzo’s had been brisk, just as Graziella’s eye was languishing where Vincenzo’s had been alert.
Helen drank in the complexities of the encounter in a flash. “Oh, I am sorry, Mr. Vest,” she said with credible dismay. “This is definitely not the person I saw at the Brigstone Arms. She was not as… handsome as the young lady here. I fear that there has been some mistake.”
Mr. Vest exhaled slowly and looked hopefully to Graziella to drop the matter.
“But, no, signore, this is the one,” Graziella breathed in the dusky accents of the Mediterranean. “I remember her quite distinctly. But I think now that it is impossible for her to remember me, because she did not see me.”
“I most certainly did not see you,” Helen said with a cool smile, hoping to freeze Graziella’s chances with Mr. Vest.
“It is as I say, signorina,” Graziella said and then, with a conspicuous glance at Helen’s gold-banded ring finger, corrected herself, “signora. You did not see me. The yard at the inn was most busy, do you remember? Yes, I see that you do! I discovered I had a portmanteau that was not mine, and then noticed mine in your possession. I made my way across the crowds of people to you, but when I got to where you should have been, you were already vanished. I could not find you again anywhere.”
“How odd that you were unable to find me before I left again, for I was circulating widely at that inn. Do you not find it odd, Mr. Vest?” Helen said with chilling civility.
Mr. Vest did find that odd. So did Graziella. “Yes, is it not?” she said with a melting siren’s smile for the worldly magistrate.
One look at Mr. Vest’s face, stamped with deep appreciation of this foreign beauty’s charms, suggested to Helen that she alter her tactics. Friendly warmth might be more effective than unfriendly chilliness.
Helen spied her own portmanteau peeping out from behind the blue folds of Graziella’s skirt. She said kindly, “Dear ma’am, I perceive that you have been the victim of a dreadful mistake! It must be all the more difficult for you to have mislaid your portmanteau, being so far from your home. That is, I assume that your home is not England?”
“I am italiana,” Graziella said with simple dignity.
“Italian!” Mr. Vest ejaculated. “Well, upon my soul! Wouldn’t have thought it! Not for a minute!”
“Italy!” Helen cried, falling into raptures. “What a fortunate lady you are to live in the country of sunshine and great art! Is that not so, Mr. Vest? We positively must help this lady recover her portmanteau so that she may continue her journey without further delay. Where did you say you last saw it, dear ma’am?”
“I have told you,” Graziella replied in her rich, husky voice, “that I last saw it at the inn, and it was in your possession.”
“So you have said!” Helen returned, all sympathy. “But I think we have decided that I do not know anything about your portmanteau—as sorry as I am about it!”
“But I can prove that I have yours,” Graziella told her, “and that might suggest that you have mine.”
Mr. Vest was beginning to feel acutely uncomfortable. He ran his finger round the inside of his rather high, starched shirt points. He looked to Helen for an answer.
“You may try to prove anything you wish, ma’am,” Helen invited.
Graziella stepped aside to reveal a plain, brown portmanteau. “I believe that you have such a valise,” she said.
“So I do,” Helen replied calmly. “There are many such cases in this world.”
“But the clothes inside belong to you and not to me. We have but to open it to discover the truth of my statement. What do you think, signore?”
Thus beseeched, Mr. Vest was not proof against the artistic fluttering of Graziella’s eyelashes. The signore thought, with all due respect, that the idea was not without merit.
“That won’t prove anything, Mr. Vest,” Helen said, “for you can see that the lady and I are almost of a height. Our clothing could be almost interchangeable.”
“Yours is perhaps the fuller figure, signora,” Graziella was kind enough to point out.
Mr. Vest considered this point at length and preserved what he considered to be a tactful silence.
Helen had no adequate reply. All she could think of to say was “I still do not see what it will prove.” However, since Mr. Vest seemed inclined to bend to Graziella’s will and to examine the contents of the portmanteau, Helen could not continue to demur without raising suspicion.
Help came from an unexpected quarter. Much in the manner of a mother duck with her ducklings, Mrs. Hemmings just then waddled across the street. In her wake came a delivery boy bearing several boxes of dresses intended for Mrs. Darcy. Mrs. Hemmings stopped and sent the boy inside to Mrs. Coats, who would put the boxes in the proper chamber.
Although every feature on Mr. Vest’s face was composed to indicate that he thought Mrs. Hemmings a silly creature, that lady took no note of it. She greeted Mr. Vest affably, then Mrs. Darcy. She twittered, “But tell me, Hieronymus, what is the matter here? For I do believe that something is amiss!”
“There is nothing the matter here, and it does not concern you, Hattie,” Mr. Vest said irascibly.
“I am sure it does not concern me, Hieronymous. How could it, indeed, when I have just arrived in the yard? Now, what is this all about?”
Helen thought it an excellent idea to inform the seamstress of the proceedings. “This poor, charming lady from Italy has mislaid her portmanteau. Thinking that I was in possession of it, she followed me here to effect an exchange. But first we must go through the contents of this portmanteau to discover whether the clothes therein fit me, and if they do, then the portmanteau must be mine, and I must have hers! Mr. Vest thinks that such a course of action must settle the matter. I do not precisely agree, but I yield to his superior judgement.”
“Capital idea, Hieronymus!” Mrs. Hemmings said with another twitter. “I quite see how it will decide the whole affair. For it is rather odd that this charming lady from Italy should have Mrs. Darcy’s portmanteau and she hers, without Mrs. Darcy knowing about it, isn’t it, Hieronymus? You are entirely right to go through this portmanteau, but I would not do it here in the yard. I think it would be most improper and might shock Mrs. Chartley were she to pass by at this moment. I do not know that she will pass by, of course, but one never knows! Nevertheless, I can think of no better way of proving the truth of the matter to everyone’s satisfaction than seeing if the clothes fit Mrs. Darcy, even if Mrs. Darcy has never seen them before. Yes, I am sure that you are doing the right thing, Hieronymus.”
“Thank you very much, Hattie,” Mr. Vest said in a tone heavy with irony and long-suffering patience.
Mrs. Hemmings nodded and smiled and addressed the two ladies. “We are very proud of Mr. Vest here in Igglesthorpe. Such a thorough magistrate! Such judgement! Why, even as a young boy, Hieronymus knew just how to deal with matters. Why, once when all the youngsters went fishing, Clarence Dubois exchanged all Hieronymus’s bait worms for slugs. And what d
id our future law enforcement officer do? The only proper thing! He went straight to Mrs. Dubois and related to her the details of the incident. Justice was carried out, I can assure you! So never fear, Mr. Vest knows just what to do. But I must be running along inside. Don’t let me get in your way! Carry on, Hieronymus!”
“Damned chatterbox!” Mr. Vest muttered angrily. “I detest chatterboxes!”
Mrs. Hemmings’s speech could not have been more beneficial to Helen, nor more disastrous to Graziella’s campaign. Not only had Mrs. Hemmings put her finger on the glaring oddities of Graziella’s request, she had reduced Mr. Vest to schoolboy status and related an incident he would have preferred forgotten. Added to that, such was Mr. Vest’s belief in Mrs. Hemmings’s profound silliness that any course of action she endorsed could not but seem to him equally silly. Mr. Vest now had no intention of lowering his dignity or Mrs. Darcy’s to meet the desires of this strange Italian woman.
Graziella immediately perceived Mr. Vest’s change of heart. She positioned herself for one last attack by leaning slightly against Mr. Vest’s arm. She gestured at the valise at her feet. “Let us forget about the clothing in this portmanteau. I wish instead that you grant me one brief look into the portmanteau that this lady has,” Graziella said in her sultriest voice, “just to ease the last, remaining doubts in my mind.”
Mr. Vest’s defences were crumbling. He was plainly undecided.
Helen said, “Well, I do not see any harm in it, but I must first consult with my husband to ask his permission. He is… particular, you know. But I shall do my best to persuade him that the Italian lady should inspect my personal belongings.”
Mention of Mr. Darcy decided the matter for Mr. Vest. He had had enough of mix-ups and enough of foreigners. Hadn’t he always thought that Italians were a queer kettle of fish? In his most authoritative voice, he said that he had no intention of disturbing Mr. Darcy with such a request.
Graziella knew when she was beaten and withdrew her forces for the retreat. “Perhaps I have been mistaken after all,” she said silkily.
“It seems that you have, ma’am,” Mr. Vest said, “for common sense tells me that what you claim is hardly likely.”
Helen would have described Mr. Vest’s decision in different terms: Graziella’s subtle charms had been routed by the scatter-shot effect of Mrs. Hemmings’s intervention, added to the heavy artillery of Mr. Darcy’s possible disapproval.
Graziella curtsied gracefully, bid Mr. Vest and Helen a respectful addio, picked up Helen’s portmanteau, and regained her job carriage without a backward glance.
As the vehicle pulled away at a smart pace, Mr. Vest uttered in accents of relief, “Awkward business! Devilishly awkward! Glad to have it behind me!”
Helen turned to the flustered magistrate. “You did right, Mr. Vest,” she congratulated him. “Handled her to a turn. It would not have been at all the thing to be impolite to the lady. Especially a foreigner, to whom one must show courtesy. Polite but firm you were with her, Mr. Vest!”
“Well, I don’t know, Mrs. Darcy,” he said, still trying to comprehend what had happened. “But I must take myself off with no further loss of time. I’m a very busy man, you know, not that I do not try to execute to the best of my powers any of the unexpected tasks that come my way. Take Miss Graziella, for instance! Well, she just wouldn’t be gone until she had seen you, but things came off for the best. Yes, I rather think they did. Well, now I must be gone. Until tonight! Good day to you, ma’am!”
Helen went back to the parlour where Mr. Darcy was patiently waiting. He had apparently not been idle, for upon her entrance, he ceased reading the document he held in his hands and folded the sheets with unhurried deliberation.
“Gone?” he asked.
“Graziella is a most graceful and charming lady!” Helen said. “Yet her charm did not have the weight of Mrs. Hemmings’s guns or the threat of a cannon attack from you!”
Upon his demanding what she meant, Helen provided Mr. Darcy with a fluent, unvarnished account of the events in the yard. She included with some gusto the story of Clarence Dubois and Hieronymus Vest. Mr. Darcy proved an appreciative audience.
“Do you think we shall see the most piquant Graziella again?” Helen asked.
“I predict that we shall be treated to a visit from Graziella’s brother before too many days pass,” Mr. Darcy said. Then, with his most pleasant smile, he added, “Now, where were we?”
“I am sure that I do not know what you mean, sir,” Helen replied, adopting her chilly tone once again.
“We were at the part, I believe, where I was outrageous, overbearing and domineering,” he reminded her kindly. “I do not think that you had entirely finished when Mr. Vest came calling.”
“I am quite finished,” she informed him. “It is obvious to me that your character is past praying for and that you are determined to arrange things to your liking. I am powerless to stop you from doing as you please. I can only hope that in the period that I have just spent with Mr. Vest and Graziella, you have had the leisure to reflect upon what I said to you earlier about…that is, about the clothing and the money.”
“Yes,” Mr. Darcy said, “and it has occurred to me that it might be mutually satisfactory if I were to give you an advance on the wage you are to receive from me. Not the whole amount just now, mind you, for I think you should not like the responsibility of carrying it around in your reticule or stuffing it in your trunk, but just enough for the next week or so.”
Helen felt some distaste at actually accepting money from him. “No, pray do not give me anything just yet! There is not the least necessity!”
“I am afraid there is a great necessity, for we have struck a bargain. I intend to uphold my end of it, certainly, as you do yours. Indeed, you have already earned half of your wage just now.”
“I have done nothing!” she disclaimed.
“On the contrary, you have pierced one of Vincenzo’s disguises, and it appears that you have done it to perfection. I look forward to his next attempt to retrieve the portmanteau, but in the meantime I hope you will not insult me by refusing to accept a part of your payment.”
There was nothing she could say. “Oh, you are unscrupulous!” she said, colouring.
“Ah! I was forgetting unscrupulous! And here I was thinking you had finished with my character! But you, ma’am, are over-scrupulous with regard to accepting money you have earned.”
Helen fell back on the age-old cry of those losing an argument. “This is different!”
“I allow that it is not customary for a young woman to travel with a man and to accept clothing from him. I have granted you that concession from the start, and I had thought we had put your delicate principles to the side for the duration of our partnership. The fact that the circumstances are unusual does not give you leave to impugn my character, even if we are in some forgotten corner of the world.”
Helen gasped. “Impugn your character?”
“I doubt you have an ambition to be thought of as an extravagant female who has the habit of hanging on her husband and wheedling every penny she can out of him.”
“Of course not!” she said. “Because I am no such thing. I mean, I would not be, if I were a wife, but—”
“And I have no wish to figure as a husband who would begrudge his wife the clothing that he can obviously afford.”
His manner and his smile, both of which were charming, affected Helen powerfully, but she was not about to let him twist her around his little finger. “That is a fine speech, sir,” she said with dignity, “but I have yet to understand what prompted you to have acted in such a high-handed fashion as to have gone without my knowledge to Mrs. Hemmings and to have put me in this odious position.”
“Merely a selfish desire to avoid an unpleasant scene about money,” he said coolly.
Helen’s eyes flashed. “You leave me with nothing to say, Mr. Darcy!”
He bowed. “That is my object, Miss Denville.”
; She regarded him a moment in speechless dudgeon and then started to leave the room with a movement remarkably like a flounce. Mr. Darcy caught her arm.
“Come!” he said on a gentler note. “It will not do to have a division within the ranks. A military man would call it a tactical weakness.” He held out his hand. “Shall we cry friends?”
After a moment Helen accepted his hand and shook it. “A gentleman’s agreement?” she asked, casting him a wary look.
“You might put it that way,” he said and held her hand a moment before releasing it.
“All right then,” she said with a rueful smile. “I concede that I should take a part of the payment now. But please, no more talk of money for the present.”
“ ‘Word of a magistrate,’” he quoted as he handed her several bills that he abstracted from his notecase.
Accepting them, she smiled more openly this time and looked at him with her clear gaze. “Now that we are on such excellent terms again, I shall beg to take my leave of you and go to sort out my purchases above stairs. Shall I meet you down in the front room again just before dinner? I shall assume that we are observing country hours here.”
“Yes,” Mr. Darcy said, “I have already instructed Mrs. Coats to begin serving us at six o’clock.”
Helen nodded and moved to go. The sound of Mr. Darcy’s voice stayed her momentarily.
“And, Nell,” he said smoothly, “be sure to wear the gold evening dress. The seamstress assured me that it suits you to perfection, and I have an investor’s desire to review my shares in Mrs. Hemmings’s industry.”
Helen threw him a smouldering glance over her shoulder. “Deliberate provocation, Richard!” she replied.
CHAPTER SEVEN
As A RESULT of her latest conversation with Mr. Darcy, Helen reached her bedchamber with a much heightened colour and a bright, unmistakably militant sparkle in her eye.
“Odious, provoking man!” she said aloud, unthinking, while opening the door to her chamber.
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