The Last Earl

by Lara Blunte

  In the carriage Catherine could hardly keep up any conversation with her mother, as all she could think about was that she was going to see Adrian. She hoped that he would admire her today, when she looked better than she ever had.

  At the Countess' she did her best to look interested in her hosts and to move around chatting pleasantly to the people she knew, but her eyes scanned the room constantly for Adrian's arrival.

  When she saw him walk in, her heart started pounding, and she glowed with expectation. He wasn't the type of man to stop and greet everyone, and his progress towards her was rather quick. "You look lovely, Kate," he said. "I can only imagine that your dance card is full."

  It wasn't, because she had been keeping at least three dances for him. But he didn't ask. He stood with her for a while, laughed at some of her observations and made her laugh at his and then, when the music began, he simply walked away.

  Catherine could not stand in the middle of a ballroom as if in need of a partner, so she accepted the first gentleman who asked her, not fifteen seconds after Adrian left her side. She danced, and only remembered not to look ungracious after a while.

  The next waltz was about to begin and surely he would ask her now. He didn't. But as she whirled in yet another partner's arms, she looked around to see that Adrian was dancing with Lady Whitby.

  Why should the sight of a man dancing with another woman go through her like a sword? She didn't know, but it did. She had to make use of all her considerable strength to finish the waltz. Then she retreated towards the curtains at the edge of the ballroom and stood looking at Adrian, who kept chatting with Lady Whitby by the window across the room from her.

  Catherine cursed her own beauty that night, the beauty that she had carefully accentuated so as to draw him to her. Almost every other man in the room seemed to find her ravishing, for she was not left alone in her hiding place. They came, one after another, to ask her for a waltz, or a quadrille or a polka. Their hands repelled her, as did their breath on her face.

  How different it would have been if it were Adrian's hand on her waist, his face looking down and smiling, his eyes on her.

  He had the effrontery of dancing with Lady Whitby again. Catherine watched how elegant and handsome he looked, holding another woman, and felt as if she were being shot full of arrows. She begged her mother to go home early, pleading a headache.

  "My dear, you must be in severe pain, when dancing doesn't tempt you!" Lady Ware said affectionately in the carriage.

  At home Catherine told Henriette to undo the back of her dress and her corset and go, and this time she didn't apologize, because she needed to be alone immediately. As soon as the door shut, her breasts began heaving with sobs.

  She was in love for the first time in her life, and he loved another woman.

  When she looked up at the mirror and saw her face undone by tears, she ripped the diamonds out of her hair like a fury, throwing them on the ground. But later, as she lay in bed, she couldn't help touching her lips with her fingertips, feeling the spot where she would like him to kiss her one day.

  

  The next day Catherine walked listlessly in Lady Reville’s gallery, where the old lady kept the works of art that she had acquired during her life with the passion of a collector.

  Catherine had not wanted to go out that day, and she now entertained herself looking at the pictures hanging on the wall, which she had not previously stopped long enough to study. Apart from two or three religious works, the rest all seemed to portray scenes from mythology: Venus and Mars, Andromeda tied to a rock, Jupiter and Europa.

  She had seen paintings featuring nudity in Paris, as well as statues such as the one of Apollo chasing Daphne that Lady Reville had placed in the center of the room. Yet, when the footman came to tell her that Lord Halford was there, but that Lady Reville and Lady Ware were absent, her face became unduly hot and flushed.

  Controlling her sudden anxiety, she asked that Adrian be shown in. She had only eaten a piece of toast with a little tea all day, and she suddenly felt weak and cold, though it was a very warm day. She approached the mirror and saw that her hair was tidy, and that she looked composed in her dark pink dress, though she felt weak and ill.

  You stupid girl, she told herself.

  She waited for Adrian, but everywhere she turned there were the scenes of men ravishing women, kissing them, holding them. She began to feel faint as she heard his steps approaching. There were so many limbs intertwined in those paintings, so many faces in ecstasy or denial, so much exposed flesh. She shouldn’t meet him there! She decided to ask Adrian to go into the library with her, but the door opened and he was there. She could not see his face, as the light was behind him, she only saw the silhouette of his tall body and his hand on the door latch.

  She told herself to conquer the unknown emotion that seemed about to overpower her. Don’t be absurd, she thought. Step forward!

  Catherine moved, though her feet felt rooted to the carpet, and she did stretch out her hand, looking up at his face; but then darkness overcame her, and she realized too late that she was falling to the floor.

  II. Four. Shame

  When she recovered consciousness, only a few seconds later, Catherine was in Adrian's arms.

  He had lifted her from the floor and was carrying her to the sofa in the next room, where he set her down. She tried to sit but he pushed her back gently and took her wrist to feel her pulse. His touch only made it beat faster; she felt that a vein on her neck had coiled and would choke her.

  "Try to breathe."

  Her hand clutched at the neck of her gown and ripped it, revealing her neck. She lay with head back, trying to get air into her throat and to her lungs. He was still holding her wrist, frowning down at her in concern. Her lips opened as if she were going to say something, but she said nothing, only looked back at him.

  All at once his eyes changed. It seemed to her that they darkened till they were almost black.

  She understood that perhaps for the first time he desired her. She also understood that in a moment he would get up and break away from her, and that he would not allow himself such weakness again.

  Catherine kept Adrian where he was with her eyes and watched, at once hunter and prey, as he fought with himself. She had won, and that was all that mattered.

  Then there were steps outside, and he got up and moved quickly away from her before her mother and Lady Reville walked in. Lady Ware almost screamed when she saw her daughter prostrated on the sofa with the neck of her gown torn, and rushed to her side. Lady Reville followed, but could not avoid a horrified glance at Adrian, whose face was like stone.

  "What happened?" she asked him accusingly.

  "She fainted,” he said curtly.

  Catherine lay without speaking, while her mother entreated her to say what she was feeling. She asked Adrian in a bewildered voice what had happened, what she should do. He only shook his head slightly.

  Lady Ware concentrated solely on her daughter, but Lady Reville watched Adrian. She suspected what had almost taken place and wanted him to know as much. Yet he seemed haunted rather than frustrated.

  Lady Reville glanced at the girl on the sofa and saw her eyes seek Halford's with a plea in them. But what kind of plea?

  Adrian left, after making sure that Catherine was safe, and Lady Reville's physician was summoned. He saw nothing physically wrong with the girl and ascribed her collapse to nerves.

  "But she has always had iron nerves," Lady Ware said, wringing her handkerchief.

  "Have there been changes in her circumstances recently?" the doctor suggested, "Moving, traveling or an emotional shock?"

  "Oh, yes!" Lady Ware cried. "Yes, there have been such things! I have been through such nerves myself, but Kitty never... Not at the worst of times!"

  The doctor only advised them not to question the girl too much, to let her come back to them gradually, and to make sure that she ate well and took some exercise every day: a walk, or a ride in
the park.

  As he left, he told his long time patient privately, "I've seen this before, when girls are in love. She's a very beautiful young lady. Can she be suffering from rejection?"

  Lady Reville sighed. "As you say, no one will reject her for long. And that's the trouble."

  "Oh! A married man?"

  "I fear it is someone even more unsuitable than that," Lady Reville said grimly. "Unsuitable and irresistible."

  Lady Reville went back to see Catherine in her room. The old woman sat by the girl's bed and looked at her luminous and rosy face, sleepy from the sedative she had been given, and for the first time she felt not worry or impatience, but compassion. The contradiction between the pride and the extreme innocence in Catherine's nature might be her undoing.

  She knows nothing, thought Lady Reville, she is not armed to fight against this passion because she never expected that anything could make her lose control.

  "My dear," she said, taking one of Catherine's hands. "Is there anything you would like to tell me?"

  Lady Reville thought that if she could make Catherine confess her feelings for Halford, the girl would be safe; the older woman would find a way of convincing her of her folly and of keeping Adrian away. But Catherine, though she looked so vulnerable now, had the same forbidding quality which had always stopped Lady Reville from speaking openly to the Earl.

  "You have no father, no brothers, no men who tender you dearly. You must be strong, Catherine, and always defend yourself."

  "I don't know what you mean, Lady Reville," Catherine said quietly.

  Lady Reville sighed, "Your mama is a very dear woman, but she may not have prepared you for certain feelings. She may not have felt them to a great degree. But you are a high spirited creature, Catherine." The girl didn't react and Lady Reville continued, "High spirited people often have very strong emotions. You are also extremely intelligent. You have done very well in difficult circumstances. If you remember yourself, you will always do well."

  There was again a plea in Catherine's eyes, as if she were possessed by overwhelming contradictory forces and wanted someone to save her or damn her. She needs to be taken away, or Halford must go away, Lady Reville thought. The attraction between them is too strong.

  She patted Catherine's hand. “I am here for whatever you need. And I shan't be shocked at anything that you have to say. But listen to a woman who has seen a great deal of life: remember whose daughter you are, who you must be."

  Catherine seemed to be holding back tears. The old lady got up stiffly to give her privacy, and moved toward the door.

  The first time Adrian returned to the house, Catherine felt hot with shame, and had to gather all her strength to be able to meet him. She sat in his presence with her eyes lowered, as if not daring to look at his face, while Lady Ware begged him to convince her to get out of London and go back to Lytton Hall.

  "Look at her," Lady Ware said, almost weeping. "I have never seen her like this. She is not herself. All these things she has been through, coming back to England, the memories of her father, those papers, the responsibility she has felt... They're all telling on her now! She needs rest, exercise and fresh air."

  Catherine put a hand to her forehead, frowning. "Mama..."

  Lady Ware covered her mouth with one of her indispensable handkerchiefs. "I'm sorry, my sweet Kitty. I shall be quiet now."

  "She only needs a little time," Adrian said quietly. "She will be back to her old self."

  Catherine managed to raise her eyes to his then, saw that he was watching her with kindness, and blushed to the roots of her hair.

  He feels sorry for me, she thought. Sorry that I behaved so wildly. He wants me to forget what happened. And I can't forget.

  II. Five. Surrender

  Ten days later Princess Kwiatsova came to bring them invitations to her summer ball, which was to be a very extravagant affair.

  Catherine knew that Adrian meant to attend. She ordered a ravishing ice blue silk dress and a fantastically expensive diamond tiara. On the night of the ball, as Catherine came down the stairs, Lady Ware had to admit that in spite of her ill health she looked beautiful.

  "Of course," she ventured to say in the carriage, "Everyone will admire you so!"

  Her daughter was fastening a diamond bracelet over her long white gloves. "No one admires me, mama. Yet I am rich enough to do as I please. Let them talk about me as much as they want."

  "My dear," Lady Ware said sweetly, taking her by the hand, "You must not throw yourself headfirst against the world. There is more kindness in it than you know."

  Catherine stared out the window, not wanting her mother to see her eyes flood with tears at her concern. She forgot, at times, that Lady Ware’s tenderness was as crucial as her own strength to the task of living.

  At the ball, she did not care about what other women might be saying about her behind their fans. She ruled over the evening, and only a sharp observer would have noticed that she gripped her own fan too tightly, and that her eyes were too bright.

  When Adrian arrived and went to greet her, she was curt with him, going immediately back to her conversation with Hugh Kirkpatrick. Adrian moved away, but kept observing her with a frown. The knowledge that his eyes were on her made her act even more extravagantly: she danced several waltzes, and drank a great deal of champagne.

  He must not suppose that she was weak, or thinking of him.

  Yet exhaustion suddenly overtook her, and she moved away from the crowd to stand near a window, her head swimming. Adrian approached her and said forcefully, "You aren't well. I am taking you and Aunt Helen home."

  "There is nothing wrong with me that dancing won't cure,” she said with a brittle laugh. “Here is Mr. Dalton. I promised him this waltz."

  As she waltzed she felt dizzy, and did not demur when Jack led her to the summerhouse outside. Jack sat her down and fanned her, and meant to be extremely respectful until she raised her hand to her head. He stared at her arm and was not able to help himself, but grabbing it firmly, planted a desperate kiss on it. She was going to protest, but he suddenly stopped. Catherine lifted her eyes and found Adrian standing a foot away.

  Jack began stammering, "I-I-I was─"

  "I could see what you were doing," Adrian said icily.

  Jack stood up, shifted on his feet and began to sweat profusely, for he saw he might not escape a good thrashing. But Adrian made no move towards him, and instead looked at Catherine, who had turned her head away. Jack inched forward, walked around Adrian as if he were a chained beast, and disappeared into the house.

  Adrian asked, "What's the matter with you? Jack Dalton! I'd be less surprised to see you kissing a cockroach!"

  He raised her from the seat and her eyes stared into his, but she didn’t say anything. He shook his head at her after a moment.

  "You don't know what you are doing, Catherine. You don't understand what you are feeling."

  "I do know!" she cried.

  "No, you don't understand that there is a moment when neither you nor I can turn back anymore."

  "I don't want to turn back!"

  Her eyes shone with tears. She saw that for a second he still struggled with himself, but then he suddenly brought her body to his in an embrace and kissed her. She had never been kissed, and had only expected to feel the pressure of his lips, a pleasant, dreamlike sensation and nothing more.

  Instead, almost as soon as their lips touched he parted hers with his. As his tongue found hers, she felt as if her blood had been sent rushing through her all veins and arteries; it was almost like physical pain.

  He held her fast as he kissed her, his hand behind her head. Then, just as suddenly, he let her go and said, "Go inside now."

  She swayed a little where she stood, staring at him wide-eyed, realizing that she had begun to shake. If he had meant to teach her a lesson, he had. She hadn't known that she could feel like that. Her skin was humming from head to foot.

  Catherine didn't want to go in, she wan
ted more of him, more of that feeling. But he was standing in the dark, his eyes gleaming, as he threatened, "Go in or I will drag you in."

  She realized that he would, and she had just enough sense left to turn and walk towards the house. It was the hardest thing she had ever had to do, to leave him behind and enter the ballroom where people seemed to be giving her quizzical looks.

  A mirror told her that her hair was tidy and that there was no trace of his kiss, though she could still feel his lips and his tongue; there was no trace of the madness she felt from wanting him in her face.

  She put on a blind smile and went to find her mother.

  

  The next day a note came for Lady Ware while she was absent. Catherine saw it as she went down to breakfast and recognized Adrian's handwriting. She grabbed it from the tray and instinctively walked into the drawing room alone, shutting the door to read it.

  "Dear Aunt Helen, I regret to inform you that I must leave abruptly on important business..."

  She couldn't keep reading. Taking deep breaths, she waited until she had calmed herself a little, and then flung the door open and ran up the stairs, telling a footman to have her horse saddled. She ignored the upturned faces of the other servants.

  Henriette turned pale when she saw her."Qu-est-ce qu'il y a?"

  "My black riding habit! And my veil" Catherine cried.

  The maid knew better than to ask questions when her mistress was in this kind of mood, so she rushed to get her clothes. Catherine offered no explanation when she was getting dressed, though Henriette muttered, "You make me worry..."

  "There's nothing to worry about," Catherine said, picking up her riding stick. "Tell mama I needed exercise and have gone to the park. I might be absent a while."

  "Qu'est-ce que vous allez faire?" Henriette cried, coming to the corridor. "What are you going to do, Madame?"

  The maid grabbed her by the arm, digging her heels into the carpet. Catherine pulled herself free violently and pushed her to the floor, running down the stairs and out the door. Henriette watched her leave through the banisters, covering her cheeks with her hands.