A Lady of Consequence

by Mary Nichols

  ‘My mother invented Charron for a name because she thought it would be good for business. She was a modiste, you see.’ She smiled. ‘Like chefs and fencing masters who have never been anywhere near France give themselves French names.’

  ‘I still say there must be something in it. You have good breeding and that is something you cannot learn.’ He held up his hand when she opened her mouth to protest. ‘Oh, I know you are the finest actress that ever trod the boards, but even you could not assume what was never there. I think we should do some delving.’

  ‘Oh, not you too!’ she exclaimed, laughing at his flattery. ‘I did not think it would matter to you, unlike some I could name.’

  ‘Oh, it doesn’t, but like is attracted to like, don’t you think? I think that is why I feel we were meant for each other.’

  ‘Fustian!’

  ‘Oh, do not tell me you do not feel it too, this rapport we have.’

  ‘Rapport,’ she said. ‘I give you rapport, but that could happen to any two people at any time, that is not to say—’ She stopped, floundering. ‘You don’t have to be French.’

  ‘True,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘Maddy, don’t you know I adore you? I want to marry you.’

  ‘Oh, Pierre, I wish you hadn’t said that.’

  ‘Why? You are not going to turn me down, are you?’

  ‘I’m sorry. We have a great deal in common and I am very fond of you, but…’

  ‘You are still wearing the willow for the English Marquis,’ he said bitterly.

  ‘Who told you that?’

  ‘I do not need to be told. Whenever his name is mentioned, your eyes become blank as if you are far away in a dream of your own, and when he is present, as he was the other day at Lady Graham’s musical evening, you could not take your eyes off him. They glow when you see him, as if someone had turned up a lamp.’

  ‘That’s humbug.’ She wished he had not mentioned Lady Graham’s concert. She had not expected Duncan to be there and the sight of his tall figure in immaculate evening wear, standing at the back of the room, made her heart skip a beat. He had bowed to her as she passed on Pierre’s arm, murmuring, ‘Miss Charron, your obedient,’ but he had not smiled.

  She had spent the remainder of the evening not listening to the music but thinking of him, knowing from where he stood he could see her sitting in the middle of the audience. Once she had ventured to turn in her seat and found him looking at her, but his thoughts she could not fathom and quickly turned away again, knowing her face was on fire.

  ‘Oh, I know you tried to pretend indifference,’ Pierre went on. ‘And anyone less in tune with your sensibilities might have been taken in, but I was not. Maddy, he will not marry you, you know that very well and you are deceiving yourself if you think he will. Besides, I have it on good authority, he is as good as promised to Annabel Bulford.’ He seized her hand across the table and nearly knocked her wine glass over. ‘Forget him. Look at me. Am I not here? Am I not languishing for love of you?’

  ‘Are you? You have only known me a couple of weeks, not long enough to be sure of anything.’ She was aware, as she spoke, that she had fallen in love with Duncan Stanmore in less time than that. She could not stop herself comparing the two men. They were both handsome and both had impeccable manners, both were good company and both were generous, though Pierre was unable to spend as freely as Duncan, which would not have counted in the least if she had truly been in love with him. In the end it came down to how she felt in her heart and here there was no comparison. Duncan stirred her limbs, made her quiver with desire, sent her heart racing. But it was more than that; she admired his courtesy, his compassion, his tenderness for others, his intellect. Everything about him except his arrogance. And that, she decided, was bred in the bone.

  ‘It seems like forever.’

  ‘Pierre, I think it is not me you love, but the actress.’

  He sighed dramatically and blew his nose on a spotted silk handkerchief which, until that moment, had been dangling from his coat pocket. ‘You leave me desolate, a broken man.’

  ‘Who is the actor now?’ she demanded, laughing.

  He recovered astonishingly quickly and they finished their meal and were bowed out by the proprietor who was calculating how much extra business he could milk out of the fact that the great actress and her Corinthian friend had dignified his establishment. A cab was fetched for the short journey to her lodgings and he left her there with the admonishment, ‘I meant it, you know. Forget what you cannot have and settle for me.’

  Was he right? ‘I’ll think about it,’ she said.

  Duncan was trying his best to forget a pair of violet eyes which were as expressive as any words. Eyes that had been either blazing at him with fury or full of tears that sparkled on long dark lashes like diamonds, wringing his heart. An actress’s trick, of course, just as that sob story about the French comte had been a trick to gain his sympathy. She had used him and he did not like being used.

  He threw himself into the Social whirl, accepting almost every invitation that came his way in order to expunge her from his mind. He was the catch of the Season and to be seen in his company was the height of bliss for the year’s young hopefuls and so the gold-edged invitation cards poured in. He found himself attending routs and balls, concerts and lectures and going for picnics and carriage rides in the park.

  He tried to be even-handed, but that was becoming increasingly difficult because the word had gone round that he was dangling after Miss Annabel Bulford and she was at almost every function he attended and, according to Lavinia, being urged by her sister-in-law to make a push to bring him to a proposal. He supposed he could do worse. But that was damning with faint praise and was not a good basis for a happy marriage.

  Seeing Madeleine at Lady Graham’s with her new escort was a sharp reminder that his efforts to put her from his mind had failed. The story of her grandfather, the comte, had been accepted and was now being strengthened by the fact that her latest admirer was the son of a French émigré. The young man was too flamboyant for Duncan’s taste, both in dress and manners, but he would not admit he was prejudiced. He wondered if the man knew the truth about his lady love, a question echoed by Donald Greenaway.

  They were standing in Hyde Park in a huge crowd that had come to watch a balloon ascent. Duncan had offered to take Lavinia’s children and that had resulted in all the children in the family clamouring to accompany him. Besides Lavinia’s two, there was his fourteen-year-old cousin Jack, home from school for the summer holiday, his half-brother Freddie, now a sturdy nine-year-old and the apple of the Duchess’s eye, and Andrew and Beth, the children of James Corringham’s sister Augusta.

  Surrounded by the older children, with the two youngest perched one on each shoulder, he looked like a veritable Pied Piper, as Donald had told him when he had come upon him and laughingly taken Jamie from him to sit him astride his own shoulders. Relieved of the boy, Duncan had put Caroline’s tubby legs about his neck and taken her hands firmly in his own.

  ‘I’ve been thinking about Miss Charron,’ the Major said.

  ‘Oh.’ Duncan’s tone was guarded.

  ‘I’ve a mind to go and talk to her.’

  ‘Why? You are not planning to expose her, are you?’

  ‘No, but I was looking at that portrait the other day and I think you were right, it does bear some resemblance to Miss Charron. It’s a long shot, but I thought I’d show it to her. Have you any objections?’

  ‘Why should I?’

  ‘It might blow her story sky high and you said—’

  ‘Major, you have a job to do and how you do it is your affair. Besides, I do not think Miss Charron can have any connection with an English aristocrat or she would certainly have made use of it long before now. She would not have needed the French comte, would she?’

  ‘True. You’d think under the circumstances, she would keep away from all things French, wouldn’t you? Do you think Valois knows the truth?’

 
‘No idea. None of my business.’ His tone was curt and Donald fell silent.

  The preparations for the ascent going on in the open space that had been roped off from the public were proceeding apace and the balloon was almost fully inflated. Caroline, on his shoulder, was wriggling up and down in her excitement. ‘Sit still, Carrie,’ he said. ‘If you fall, you will be hurt and you won’t be able to see the balloon go up into the sky.’

  Intent on helping his small relatives to a good view as the intrepid flyers climbed into the basket and those holding the ropes prepared to release it, he did not see Madeleine. But she saw him. Standing beside Major Greenaway, surrounded by excited children, he seemed perfectly at ease. He was hatless and the child on his shoulders had ruffled his dark curls, his cravat had come awry and her dusty shoes had marked his green superfine frockcoat, but he seemed oblivious of it. Watching him and not the spectacle she and Marianne had come to see, her heart ached so much she wanted to burst into tears. He would make a wonderful family man. But not with her. If anything was needed to convince her, it was that happy group.

  ‘Who are they all?’ she asked Marianne, as the balloon began to ascend slowly, accompanied by cheers from the spectators.

  ‘Who?’ Marianne had not seen them.

  She used her frilled silk parasol as a pointer. ‘All those children with the Marquis.’

  ‘The tall young man is Jack, son of the Duke’s brother, though the Duke and Duchess have adopted him, the bantling beside him is Freddie, the Duke and Duchess’s son, and there is Andrew and Beth, who belong to the Earl of Corringham’s sister, Lady Augusta Harnham. And the two sitting on the men’s shoulders are Lady Lavinia Corringham’s children, Jamie and Caroline. James Corringham and Augusta are the Duchess’s stepchildren from her first marriage to the Earl of Corringham’s father, did you know that?’

  ‘No, I didn’t.’

  ‘They are all very close. I met the older ones when they took part in that play I told you about. It looks as though they adore the Marquis.’

  ‘Yes.’ She understood now why his family was so important to him and why he would never cut himself off from them, not even for love of a woman. She had never stood a chance.

  Some of the crowd began running after the balloon, intent on seeing it come down, but it soared up over the trees and was soon lost to sight. Others crowded into vehicles and tried to follow it, while the rest slowly dispersed. Duncan said goodbye to the Major whose business took him in a different direction, and turned to take the children home. It was then that he saw Madeleine standing not ten yards away. Dressed very simply in a pink muslin gown trimmed with silk rosebuds and wearing a fetching straw bonnet tied with a pink ribbon, she looked so modestly beautiful, it was difficult to believe she was capable of blatant deception. And yet she was.

  They stared at each other for several seconds, while the crowd milled about them. She could not move either towards him or away from him, or even curtsy. Neither could he bow to her because he still had Caroline perched on his shoulders, nor even doff his hat since he was not wearing one. ‘Miss Doubleday. Miss Charron. Goodday.’

  ‘Good afternoon, my lord.’ Marianne greeted him with a smile. ‘Have you ventured into running a kindergarten now?’

  He returned her smile, aware that Madeleine, standing beside her, had not moved. ‘Children are so rewarding, don’t you think? Give them your trust and they play you straight. These…’ he waved his hand about him, but he was looking at Madeleine as he spoke ‘…are my family, the rock on which my life is built.’

  ‘You are indeed fortunate to have such a family, my lord,’ Madeleine managed at last. ‘But they grow restive and we must not keep you from them.’

  He knew he deserved the put down, if put down it was. It was unkind of him to have made that comment about the children and his family. Madeleine had no family and perhaps that was why she needed to invent one. He could find sympathy for beggars and thieves and go out of his way to help them, yet he could not forgive her for her deception. But she had not asked for forgiveness; as far as he could tell she was utterly unrepentant.

  His smile was fixed and did not reach his dark eyes. ‘Then I bid you goodbye.’

  She watched him walk away, not quickly because the smaller children could not keep up, but shepherding them carefully.

  ‘Goodbye,’ she murmured, as she and Marianne turned to leave by the Stanhope Gate. She was seized with an urge to look back, but schooled herself to look straight ahead, twirling her parasol nonchalantly. But that goodbye was as final as anything could be.

  ‘Lancelot has decided this will be the last week of Love’s Labour’s Lost,’ Marianne said, as they walked. ‘Everyone in London who wanted to see it has surely been by now.’

  ‘I suppose so, we’ve had some very full houses. What is he going to do next?’

  ‘He hasn’t decided. He asked me what I thought.’

  ‘What did you say?’ If the play’s run was ending, now was the time to leave, now while she had the chance. She needed time, time to adjust, time to forget, time to build a new life. And not with Pierre Valois. If she stayed in London he would continue to importune her and she might weaken and that would be a disaster for both of them. Seeing Duncan with his family had finally decided her. She could not marry him, so she would remain single, but being single in London, reading about his wedding, perhaps even seeing him married, and watching his family grow around him would be unbearable.

  ‘I said we ought to have a change from Shakespeare.’ Marianne went on. ‘We’ve had three of his plays in succession and the public deserve a change. I suggested a farce. What do you think?’

  ‘It’s all one to me. I shall not be here.’

  ‘Not here? Where are you going?’

  ‘I don’t know yet, a provincial theatre somewhere.’

  ‘Have you told Lancelot?’

  ‘Not yet, but he won’t mind if he’s going to run a farce. It is not my style. I will tell him I need a rest.’

  ‘He won’t like it.’

  ‘My mind’s made up.’

  ‘What about Pierre? He has asked you to marry him, hasn’t he?’

  ‘Yes. I turned him down. It would not serve.’

  ‘Oh, Maddy,’ Marianne said despairingly. ‘You are not still pining for the Marquis of Risley, are you?’

  ‘No, that would be futile, wouldn’t it? But I do need a change of scene. I have become very stale.’

  ‘Nonsense! You are as good as you ever were.’ She paused. ‘But I do understand and I think you are probably right. If I can help, I will.’

  And so it was, that when Major Donald Greenaway went to the theatre, a few days later, he was told she had left and no one knew where she had gone.

  ‘Gone?’ Duncan repeated when the Major found him the following afternoon, sitting alone at his club, brooding about his life and a future which seemed so empty. ‘What do you mean, gone?’

  ‘Exactly that,’ Donald said. ‘The play she was in has finished and she has not been cast in the new one. She has left the theatre.’

  ‘With Valois?’

  ‘No. I spoke to him. He affects to be distraught by her disappearance. And he did know the truth about the comte, though no more details than we already have. I could have kicked myself for not going earlier.’

  ‘You did say it was a shot in the dark.’

  ‘True. Now I am back to combing through records. Did you ask at the prison if they’d had anyone there by the name of Cartwright?’

  ‘No luck, I’m afraid.’ To please his friend he had approached one of the country’s senior judges who had given him permission to peruse whatever records he chose. He had spent hours poring over lists, but to no avail. The search had served to take his mind off Madeleine for a few hours, but as soon as he was out in the street again, she was back in his head, tormenting him. And now she was gone. He felt as though he had received a blow to the body.

  ‘In a way that’s a relief,’ Donald said. ‘I would ha
ve hated to tell the old man his son-in-law was a criminal.’

  ‘Newgate is not the only prison in the country, you know, not even the only one in London.’

  Donald sighed. ‘I know. What about the orphanage?’

  ‘You must ask the Duchess. Now, if you will excuse me, I have to go home and change. It’s the Bulford ball tonight. Do you go?’

  Donald laughed. ‘No, I am not fit to be seen in such exalted company.’

  ‘I wish I were not. I have a feeling it is going to be a very uncomfortable evening.’

  It was only a short step to Stanmore House and within five minutes he was in his room, being readied by Davison. His bath was filled and his evening clothes laid out on the bed. On his dressing table, beside his hair brushes, lay his fob, his pocket watch, his quizzing glass, cravat pin and rings. Several starched white cravats hung over the mirror. Sometimes they did not tie to his valet’s satisfaction and became crumpled and he always insisted on having another ready to hand.

  An hour later, complete to a shade, he went downstairs to join the Duke and Duchess and together they went out to the carriage.

  He said little on the journey, his mind on the evening ahead of him. Somehow he had to make it quite clear to Annabel and her avaricious brother and his wife that he would not, could not, make an offer for her, and he had to do it without hurting her feelings. He rehearsed his words in his head over and over again, while he wondered how he had come to such a pass. He had never been more than polite to her, never even hinted that he had marriage in mind, so why did Society always jump to conclusions?

  He tried telling himself that he was being conceited in thinking that they expected an offer, but after that conversation with his father, he knew that was a vain hope. Bulford and his wife were determined to fire Annabel off and her feelings would not be considered. Well, he intended to consider them. Marriage to him would be a disaster for her, just as marriage to his father had been disastrous for his mother. And the other way about too. And it had nothing to do with a certain lying kitchen maid. Nothing whatever!