‘It’s not that, ma’am,’ said Squire Radford, straightening his old-fashioned bag wig with a nervous hand. ‘Diana must marry this Dantrey. There is nothing else to be done.’
‘But why?’
‘Because Diana had obviously been recognized. Mr Armitage received an anonymous letter.’ After the letter had been shown to Lady Godolphin, the squire continued, ‘What if the writer of this letter should speak up when the Season is at its height? Then everyone would say she had to marry Dantrey.’
‘Well, they might say that anyway.’
‘But it wouldn’t matter,’ said Squire Radford. ‘No one really cares what is said about married women. But scandal can destroy the hopes of any young miss.’
‘Follicles!’ screamed Lady Godolphin in exasperation. ‘I used to think Mary Wollstonecraft and her right for women a load of … of … fustian. But now! Hark’ee, Charles Armitage. Is it not unfair this world of ours? A man may do as he pleases. He may drink and gamble and keep a stable of mistresses and he is accounted no end of an out-and-outer. But a gentlewoman must needs primp and simper and die of boredom in order to be comma fault.’
‘Comme il Taut,’ said the squire. ‘Your nerves are overwrought, dear lady. Your charming sex was made to help and support man and to bear his children. That is God’s will and it should not be questioned.’
‘It’s no use us sitting here argyfying,’ said the vicar sourly. ‘Fetch Diana down.’
‘There’s no sense in wrecking the poor girl’s life by telling her she’s got to be married,’ said Lady Godolphin. ‘She has behaved shockingly and badly but it’s not her fault she was brought up wrong, what with your wife, Charles, living in a comma of cheap quack medicines. And you yourself! ’Tis a wonder your lady did not give birth to a pair of hounds.’
‘Diana’s got to be told,’ said the vicar sternly. ‘She’s got to learn the folly of her ways.’
‘Diana’s already learned them,’ snapped Lady Godolphin. ‘In this short time, she’s turned out the sweetest little lady you ever did see. What’s more, I have hopes of Mr Emberton asking for her hand in marriage.’
‘The new tenant at the Wentwater place?’ said the squire. ‘I do not think he has even met her.’
‘That’s where you’re wrong,’ said Lady Godolphin triumphantly. ‘He followed her to town and he was here, in this very house, for dinner last night, making sheep’s eyes at her. She is not indifferent to him, neither.’
‘I am sure Mr Emberton is an inestimable young man,’ said the squire. ‘But what do we really know of him? Parents? Background?’
‘Blood line?’ put in the vicar.
‘I’ve gone into all that,’ said Lady Godolphin, not even realizing in her eagerness to help Diana wed the splendid Mr Emberton that she was lying. ‘He’s a gentleman born and bred.’
‘Then let us hope Diana has not become too fond of him,’ sighed the squire. ‘For she must marry Lord Dantrey.’
There was a gasp from the doorway and Diana stood there, her eyes wide and dark.
‘Papa! You know? Oh, Lady Godolphin, I had not thought you would betray me.’
‘I didn’t,’ said Lady Godolphin gruffly. ‘Someone has sent your papa an anonymous letter. You were seen with Dantrey in a coffee house and so it seems as if you’ll have to marry him.’
‘I cannot,’ said Diana desperately. ‘He hates me.’
‘Stow it,’ said her father rudely. ‘You’ll do as you’re told, miss. Where is Dantrey to be found?’
‘At Limmer’s,’ said Lady Godolphin.
The squire stood up. ‘Let us go, Charles, and get this exceedingly unpleasant business over with as soon as possible.’
‘Don’t. Please don’t,’ begged Diana.
She clutched at the squire’s sleeve. He gently disengaged himself and said firmly, ‘I cannot help but feel you have come off extremely lightly in this disgraceful matter, Miss Diana. It is no use begging and pleading. I suggest you pray for forgiveness, if you have not already done so, and think of the trouble and anxiety you have caused … you are causing … your parents.’
‘You are too sakkimonious for my taste,’ said Lady Godolphin, putting a pudgy arm around Diana’s shoulders. ‘Be off with you then. You will not find Dantrey an easy mark. He may think you arranged the whole thing in order to trap him.’
‘He will,’ wailed Diana, beginning to cry. ‘It’s happened to him before and he said he wouldn’t marry the girl, no matter what anyone said. He despises me already. What will he think now? Oh dear, I left my trunk at Limmer’s and I did not pay my bill!’
‘Don’t matter,’ said Lady Godolphin, pulling out a rouge-stained handkerchief and dabbing at Diana’s tears. ‘We’ll have breakfast. Everything looks better after breakfast.’
The vicar turned in the doorway and glared at his drooping daughter. ‘You and I will have a talk when I return,’ he growled. ‘It ain’t no use putting the blame on me and trying to make me feel guilty. I DON’T FEEL GUILTY!’ And cramming his shovel hat on his head, he left the room with the squire at his heels.
Grey-brown, choking fog engulfed them. The fog was so thick, so dense, that the parish lamps were still lit, feeble flickering lights behind dirty glass globes. In front of shops, the fog turned golden yellow in the light from the windows without allowing any visibility. One found oneself walking through thick golden fog in front of the shops and plunging into dirty grey fog again on the other side of the window.
The vicar and the squire had decided to walk, since Conduit Street was only a short distance away from Hanover Square. The pillars of St George’s Church suddenly loomed up out of the thinning fog on the south side of the square, like the ruined columns of some antique Greek building, since the bulk of the church was veiled in fog.
They pressed themselves against the side of a building as two Irish chairmen came charging along the narrow pavement with their cry of ‘Make way!’ At the corner of Conduit Street, the vicar threw a crossing sweeper a coin.
The little squire found himself dreading the forthcoming interview, since his sympathies lay with Lord Dantrey. To him it seemed perfectly natural that a gentleman should take advantage of the situation. The squire privately thought that Diana Armitage had behaved like a trollop. The world was full of girls who were delighted with their role in life, which was to flatter and please gentlemen. Why should Miss Diana consider herself different?
At Limmer’s, the vicar paid Diana’s bill and said he would collect ‘Mr Armitage’s’ trunk after he had seen Lord Dantrey. The squire found himself hoping that Lord Dantrey would be out.
But Lord Dantrey was abovestairs in his room, they were told, and after a short while a servant came back to say his lordship would be pleased to see them.
Lord Dantrey looked anything but pleased. His eyes held a cynical gleam as he sat down opposite the vicar and the squire.
‘You are no doubt come,’ said Lord Dantrey languidly, ‘to coerce me into marriage with your daughter. I have behaved stupidly, that I admit. Had I my wits about me, then I should have been alive to the situation.’
‘The fact is,’ said the vicar, keeping his volatile temper on a tight rein, ‘that I have had this here anonymous letter. Were it simply a matter of you keeping quiet and Diana keeping quiet, then it would not matter. I have no desire to see a daughter of mine ruined …’
‘Then you should take better care of her.’
‘… ruined by a man who already carries the reputation of a rake.’
‘Now, dear vicar,’ said Lord Dantrey gently, ‘you would not have me call you out.’
‘I’m only stating the facts,’ said the vicar. ‘Seems you knew she was a girl from the start. Why did you encourage her in this ploy?’
‘I was bored, she interested me … only briefly, alas. My taste does not run to hoydens.’
‘Then you must marry her. An you do not,’ said the vicar, leaning forward and clenching his plump fists on his knees, ‘your reputation will be
mud.’
‘You forget. I am accustomed to that. I have no intention of marrying your daughter. I do not like her.’
‘Sir!’ cried the squire, outraged, all his sympathies now with the absent Diana.
‘Furthermore,’ went on Lord Dantrey as if the squire had not spoken, ‘no one else seemed to take her for a woman except myself. As a matter of fact, she was even pressganged on Tower Hill.’
‘Oh, merciful God!’ cried the little vicar, wondering if there were any more horrors that Lady Godolphin had neglected to tell him. ‘I have done nothing to deserve this. Oh, sharper than a serpent’s tooth, it is to have a thankless child. St Luke, chapter …’
‘Shakespeare. King Lear.’
‘What!’
‘Not the Bible. Shakespeare,’ said Lord Dantrey. ‘And if you wonder what you have done to deserve this, I think you have more good fortune than you deserve. You allow your daughter to dress as a man when she ought to be learning the arts of ladylike accomplishment. You then try to force her on me in marriage when there is no reason to do so that I can see, unless you wish to get your hands on my fortune.’
The vicar choked and spluttered with rage.
‘Sir,’ said the squire, looking at Lord Dantrey with dislike. ‘You forget about the anonymous letter. You forget that, knowing Diana Armitage to be a lady, you nonetheless allowed yourself to be seen about with her, and you even thrust your attentions upon her.’
‘Miss Diana was extremely fortunate,’ said Lord Dantrey sharply. ‘I treated her to an excess of civility, nothing more. Very well, gentlemen, I admit I behaved badly. But marry Miss Diana Armitage, I most certainly will not. What exactly did the letter say?’
The vicar produced the much-fingered anonymous letter and handed it over.
Lord Dantrey took out his quizzing glass, polished it, and studied the letter. ‘Hubbold’s coffee house,’ he mused. ‘Now let me think …’
The vicar opened his mouth to say something, but the squire restrained him with a warning look.
‘The only thing I did notice,’ said Lord Dantrey slowly, ‘was the presence of two very young men, more schoolboys than men. The light was bad in the coffee house, but it did strike me that they bore a strong resemblance to Miss Diana Armitage.’
‘Peregrine and James!’ said the squire.
‘Can’t be,’ said the vicar. ‘They’re at Eton. And why would they send their father an anonymous letter?’
‘Because they did not want Papa to know they were not at school when they should have been,’ said Lord Dantrey, swinging his quizzing glass to and fro on its long silk cord.
‘We’d best go to Eton and find out,’ said the squire eagerly. ‘You do not want this man as a son-in-law, Charles, if it can possibly be helped.’
‘No, I grant you that,’ said the vicar. ‘Took a dislike to him as soon as I set eyes on him.’
‘If you will forgive me taking exception to your discussing me as if I were not here,’ said Lord Dantrey silkily, ‘I should like, for my part, to emphasize that nothing on this earth could persuade me, after meeting you, my very dear reverend, to ally my name with that of your family.’
‘We’ll see about that,’ said the vicar. ‘After we get back from Eton.’
* * *
Diana and Lady Godolphin waited nervously for the return of the vicar and the squire. But the hours grew longer and the day darker and still they did not return. They discussed the problem earnestly. Lady Godolphin grew more prepared to look on the bright side, saying that Lord Dantrey was quite a good catch, while Diana became more and more vehement in her protestations that Lord Dantrey was unfeeling and evil.
Colonel Brian had promised to call to escort Lady Godolphin and Diana to the play. Lady Godolphin had not asked Mr Emberton to join the party, feeling that a little absence might make the heart grow fonder, but when he called late that afternoon to thank her for dinner and to pay his respects to Diana, she abruptly invited him to accompany them that evening. If Diana were to marry a man she did not like, then let her at least have one evening in the company of a man she did.
When the two ladies went upstairs to prepare for the evening, Lady Godolphin consoled Diana by pointing out that if the vicar had had any success with Lord Dantrey, he would have returned immediately. It would be just like him, said Lady Godolphin acidly, to return to the country and sulk if he did not get his own way.
Mr Emberton kept looking thoughtfully at Diana’s set face, revealed in the light of the carriage lamps as the chariot bearing them to the playhouse lurched and inched its way through the suffocating fog.
Diana was wearing an evening gown richly ornamented à la militaire, gold braid and netted buttons forming a sort of epaulette on each shoulder. Her hair was carefully arranged in dishevelled curls and crowned with laurel leaves.
Lady Godolphin was wearing a pink merino gown with white silk stripes, and on her head she sported a pink gauze turban. Her face was so thickly enamelled that when she smiled, little cracks appeared in the paint at the corners of her mouth and eyes.
The play was called The Beau in Love, a light piece of nonsense, greatly appreciated by the audience. It was different from Diana’s last visit to the theatre. This time she was seated in a box, above the hurly-burly of the pit, and since the production was popular, she could actually hear most of what was said on the stage.
For a little while she was able to lose herself in the play. But as it neared its end she looked across the theatre and saw Lord Dantrey. He was sitting in a box opposite with his friend, Mr Fane. As she looked, he raised his quizzing glass and she quickly dropped her eyes, her heart beating hard.
Lord Dantrey lowered his glass. He had not at first been sure that the modish beauty in the opposite box was Diana Armitage. Somehow he kept expecting to see the ‘boy’ Diana, but the elegant creature sitting beside Lady Godolphin could never in a hundred years be mistaken for a man. Perhaps he was wrong. If it were Diana, then this was a Diana a hundred times more beautiful than the one he had seen in the park. Bands of fog lay across the theatre, distorting vision. Of course it must be she. It could not be anyone else with that Emberton fellow, not to mention the extraordinary Lady Godolphin. He had a sudden desire to talk to her again, to warn her about Mr Emberton. But that might be taken as a sign that he wished to marry the girl. He was now sure the vicar and Diana knew exactly what they were about. Diana had not lost her way hunting. She had deliberately called at his door.
But if she wanted to compromise herself to get your hand in marriage, said a niggling voice in his brain, would it not have been better to stay the night and then have her father call in the morning? He shook his head to clear it. As he watched, Jack Emberton bent his head and said something to Diana and she looked up at him and smiled. All at once Lord Dantrey found himself becoming very angry indeed. She had no right to smile like that. In fact, he would tell her so himself.
‘What ails you?’ asked his friend, Mr Tony Fane, at his elbow. ‘You look as black as thunder.’
‘Nothing,’ said Lord Dantrey, rallying. ‘The play is not to my taste.’
‘Indeed?’ said Mr Fane. ‘I did not notice you paying much attention to the play. Your eyes have been fixed on Miss Diana Armitage for this age.’
‘Nonsense! Can’t see anything in this curst fog, Tony. The whole of London is turning black with the exception of yourself. You are changing to a ripe mahogany colour.’
Mr Fane had browned his face and the backs of his hands with walnut as was the fashion, but he had applied it with too liberal a hand, and had already been mistaken for the Jamaican actor, Romeo Coates, by a crowd of sightseers outside the playhouse.
Mr Fane was large, fat and jovial. He was younger than Lord Dantrey. The pair had met two years before when Lord Dantrey’s travels had taken him to Greece. Mr Fane had been making the Grand Tour and was delighted to meet another Englishman. Since then, they had written to each other and Lord Dantrey’s return to England had found Mr Fane eage
r to renew the friendship. Lord Dantrey sometimes envied his friend his enjoyment of life and easy, undemanding good nature. Lord Dantrey was still concerned about putting the Osbadiston estates in good order, since he had a long lease on the lands and property. His father, the Earl of Juxborough, would brook no interference in his own estates and was content to supply his eldest son with as much money as he wanted, provided he played farmer elsewhere. Mr Fane, on the other, hand, was a true gentleman of his times and found a life of pleasure and idleness suited him very well. He sometimes was amazed that Lord Dantrey should wish to boggle his mind with crop rotation and fertilizers, but he was too idle to interfere in anyone else’s mode of life.
Lord Dantrey was debating whether or not to wait for the farce which followed the play when he noticed Lady Godolphin’s party getting to its feet.
‘Let us go,’ he said abruptly. Mr Fane looked meaningfully in the direction of Lady Godolphin’s box but did not say anything.
Lord Dantrey fairly hustled him along, through the crush of fashionably dressed people, brushing off the clawing hands of the prostitutes who were offering their wares for two shillings and a glass of rum.
Prices had gone up, even in whoring, reflected Mr Fane with mild astonishment. Not so long ago it had been only one shilling and a glass of rum that was demanded.
He and Lord Dantrey came face to face with Lady Godolphin’s party at the foot of the stairs. Diana looked full at Lord Dantrey, coloured and lowered her eyes, her thick lashes fanning out over her cheeks. Her military-style gown had been cleverly cut to show the rich fullness of her bosom to advantage. Her face looked thinner and yet softer. He had somehow thought of her as having a strong masculine chin, but there was nothing at all masculine about the beautiful girl who stood before him, desperately trying to avoid his gaze.
Just then a party of roistering bucks and bloods thrust their way in front of Lord Dantrey, blocking Diana from view.
An elderly gentleman on the other side of Mr Fane objected loudly to their behaviour and started hitting out with his stick. Someone else punched the leading buck and soon the theatre was in an uproar of shrieking, fainting women and cursing men. By the time order was restored and Lord Dantrey was able to look around, Diana, Lady Godolphin, Mr Emberton and Colonel Brian were already on the road to Hanover Square.
Diana the Huntress Page 9