The Other Miss Derwent

by Patricia M. Ashley

  Lady Dunford’s mouth took on the shape of a large 0, and she seemed to be temporarily bereft of speech.

  “I will leave Miss Derwent to explain to you what brought her to this pass,” he said, smiling maliciously, “But you may rest assured that no word of the ... of the circumstances will pass my lips! And now I will wish you good-night.”

  He bowed over the numbly unresponsive hand held out to him by Lady Dunford, but despite himself gave Anastasia’s hand a squeeze of encouragement.

  She looked at him rather piteously, but rightly judging that both ladies would get on better without the restraint of his presence, he made his farewells and left the room.

  Chapter Eleven

  Left alone with her niece Lady Dunford was bereft of words, a circumstance which was unusual almost to the point of being unique.

  She eyed the dejected, wan face before her, and her normal cheerful good sense reasserted itself.

  “Come, child! We must get you upstairs and out of those dreadful clothes before anyone sees you!”

  “I’m afraid I haven’t any others with me. I had a valise, but it was stolen from me by a footpad. Lord Silverfield rescued me.”

  “By a footpad!” Lady Dunford looked to be in imminent danger of losing her calm again, then she took a deep breath and brushed it aside.

  “Come, we will go to my bedroom. It would not do for anyone to see you like that. You can tell me all about everything later.”

  Anastasia rose and wrapped her greatcoat round her slim form. “I am afraid the butler saw me.”

  “Oh, that does not matter – Copes will not say anything. Let us just see if the hall is empty.”

  She opened the door and peered out cautiously. Copes was just crossing the hall. “Ah, Copes!” she beckoned. “This is my niece, Miss Derwent, who has come to pay a visit to me.”

  Copes’ face remained politely attentive, and he did not allow his eyes to rest for more than a moment on the strange figure standing beside his mistress.

  “You will please forget any. . .any unusual aspects of her arrival that you may have noticed.”

  “Certainly, my Lady.”

  She turned towards the imposing balustraded staircase. “Oh, and send my maid to my room, will you? Are the other servants. .. .?”

  “Still dining, my Lady.”

  “Good, good! Thank you, Copes.” She ushered her niece up the broad stairs.

  “I do not know what I would do without Copes..... the most discreet creature! You have no idea of the problems that beset one, as soon as one is a widow.... I am sure it was most inconsiderate of Lord Dunford to die and leave me alone like this!”

  Despite the waves of tiredness that threatened to engulf her, and a horribly aching head, Anastasia found this amusing. “I am sure he did not mean to die, dear Aunt!”

  “I am sure he need not have, if he had made the least push! But then – he never had the least spark of resolution!”

  They entered a commodious and opulently appointed bedroom. It looked more the lair of an Eastern potentate than the bedchamber of a respectable widow, Lady Dunford having indulged her tastes to the full for the more extreme of modern fashions.

  All the furniture, including the bed, stood on oddly carved feet, clawed and gilded, and the ceiling was of tented silk in an obtrusive shade of pink.

  There was a profusion of bright red lacquered cabinets, and the floor was carpeted in a riot of colours that made her head spin.

  “Good gracious!” she exclaimed, staring about her wide-eyed.

  Lady Dunford looked complacently about her: “You like it? It is all the highest kick of fashion, you know!”

  “It is all very. . . . very magnificent!” said Anastasia tactfully.

  There was a sound at the door and a maid hurried in, as thin and sour in appearance as her mistress was plump and pleasant.

  “Ah, Soper, there you are at last! This is my niece, Miss Derwent, who has arrived unexpectedly to visit me. She. . . well, she is dressed rather improperly, as you can see, and has lost her baggage, so we must find something of Miss Georgiana’s for her to wear for the moment.”

  The maid’s sour face registered amazed disapproval as she took in the full enormity of Anastasia’s dress. “Yes, my Lady! – the sooner the better, I would say!”

  This remark drew no rebuke from her mistress. “Oh come, Soper – I need your help! Let us see what we can do, and mind — not a word to the other servants!”

  The maid allowed a slight smile to alter her face. “I wouldn’t so demean myself,” she asserted. “And well you know it, my Lady!”

  Anastasia sat down rather gingerly, on a chair supported by what looked remarkably like crocodile legs, after first casting off her greatcoat. “Is my cousin at home?” she enquired.

  “Luckily, she has gone to a ball with a party of friends, so we may postpone explanations to her until tomorrow. Now....”

  She gave some instructions to her maid, who hurried out of the room.

  “Fortunately, you seem to be about the same size as Georgiana. I could wish you were both a little smaller. . . . Men like small, plump women best, I always think!”

  She smoothed her fine silk dress over her ample hips complacently, and added: “But there is no accounting for taste, after all! Poor Georgiana takes after her Papa.”

  Anastasia smiled sleepily.

  “Now, Anastasia, let me hear the worst – what have you been doing to make you run away like this?”

  Anastasia straightened, and tried to marshal her thoughts, then began to relate just why it was that she had felt that she could not stay and receive Sir Montagu’s proposal.

  They did not now appear to her to be very good reasons, and she began to think that, besides being very cowardly, she had only postponed the inevitable.

  “Though perhaps Sir Montagu will not want to marry me when he learns that I ran away rather than receive his proposal.” she added hopefully.

  “Sir Montagu Morley?” Lady Dunford shook her head doubtfully. “An elegant, polished man ..... except that if only half the rumours I have heard about him are true, I would not let any child of mine marry him!”

  “What sort of rumours?” enquired Anastasia with interest.

  “Never you mind! Just tell me the rest – and do not leave anything out, for I must know the worst if I am to advise you what to do.”

  So Anastasia poured out the whole story, including her meetings with Robin Carstares, which provoked an interest and dismay rather disproportionate to his importance in the tale; until Anastasia added that she ‘had known him for ever, and that he was so stupid as to fancy himself in love with her lately, which was the greatest bore imaginable’, upon which she lost interest in him and demanded the rest of the tale.

  For what reason she knew not, Anastasia suppressed the tale of her first meeting with Lord Silverfield, but told her all the rest, including such details as she knew of the will that had taken him there in the first place.

  “So it is true!” cried Lady Dunford. “There was a rumour of it.... How interesting!”

  There was indeed a rumour of it spreading round Town, since Lady Derwent had been so stupid as to confide the matter in a letter to a particular friend, in strictest secrecy.

  “Well!” She sat back and looked her niece over in baffled wonderment. “I do not know how you could bring yourself to it, but thank God you have arrived here safely and with no more than a bump on the head to teach you a lesson!”

  “It is thanks to Lord Silverfield,” said Anastasia soberly. “Things might not have turned out so fortunately if he had not been there to rescue me!”

  Lady Dunford pursed her lips in thoughts. “And Silverfield said that your brother and his family were to follow you straight away to London? Hmmmm... I have not previously had much to do with them – they do not, on the whole, move in the same circles as I do – and to tell the truth, I get on even less with Sir James than I did with your Papa, and he, as you know, could not abide me no
r I him!”

  “Well, I daresay it is due to our having lived always apart, and his being so much older than I, but I cannot love James as I should, Aunt Letty!” confessed Anastasia. “In fact, I have very little affection for him at all, and none at all for Maria!”

  “Yes, indeed! – an odiously overbearing woman! As to your niece, Louisa, the girl has been on the town these three or four years! Quite pretty in an insipid, blonde fashion, but with no real elegance of manner — and a peevish look about her too, sometimes!”

  “Lord Silverfield said that Sir Montagu is also returning to London tomorrow. Oh, and the Carstares are to come too, of all things! But I do not mind that!”

  “No, and if we can keep this matter of your running away quiet, as I hope we might, there is no necessity for you to marry Sir Montagu that I can see! And I can see no good in your being sent back into the country either, for ten to one you would simply get into more mischief from boredom! No, if your brother can be brought to agree to it, you shall stay here and do the season with Georgiana.”

  “Aunt Letty!”

  “Sir James should have had the good sense to bring you to Town last season, but I daresay he was hoping to get that Friday-faced girl of his safely married off before he did!” added Lady Dunford.

  “Oh, Aunt Letty!” she repeated. “May I really stay here with you? Oh best of Aunts!” And she flew across the room, tiredness forgotten, to embrace her.

  “But will my brother agree to such a scheme? And will not Sir Montagu press me for an answer?”

  “I think your brother will see the good sense of your making your debut here with me, especially,” she added drily, “If he will not be obliged to open his purse for the expense of it!”

  “Oh! – I had not thought – Aunt Letty, I would be such an expense to you!”

  “But, child! Expense?” She waved a plump, jewelled hand dismissively. “As to that, I am well enough provided for. Besides, I do not feel that I have interested myself in your welfare quite as much as I might. . . my only sister’s child! No, I will arrange all, and you will have your season.” And receive more than one offer of marriage, if she was not mistaken, thought Lady Dunford.

  Even in boy’s clothes she could see that her niece was not just in the common way – though it was unfortunate that she was not fashionably dark, of course.

  “And then, all men do not care for red hair,” she said aloud, continuing her train of thought. “But at least it is not that awful carroty shade – so vulgar! – but more a deep auburn. And no freckles like that unfortunate Miss Wilson!”

  Anastasia laughed. “I am so glad, dear Aunt! And perhaps James will agree to your scheme, for I think he is none too plump in the pocket at the moment.”

  “Gaming!” said Lady Dunford succinctly. “And Sir Montagu is another of that ilk, but too sharp to be ....” she halted abruptly, suddenly aware of the innocently inquiring gaze fixed on her. “Well, never mind that! Sir James must just inform him that you are too young at present to receive any offer. As to this young friend of yours, Carboys..”

  “Carstares,”

  “Carstares, I am sure he will make a pleasant partner for you at the balls and assemblies. It is always pleasant to number a well-looking young man amongst one’s acquaintances! He is well-looking?”

  Anastasia considered this. “Yes!” she said in some surprise at last. “In fact, he is very handsome. How strange!”

  “I would have thought it strange if he were not, for I believe I knew his Mama as a girl, and she was thought very pretty.”

  “I suppose she may have been once, but she is so plump now as to be almost spherical! She does not like me, or think me a suitable match for her son.”

  “Indeed! The Wintons might match with anyone, and as for the Derwents – a more recent family, it must be admitted, but they do well enough. I suppose. . . . . Have you any fortune, my dear? I do not remember.”

  “Five thousand pounds from Mama, that is all.”

  Lady Dunford shook her head sadly. “Never mind, we must contrive!”

  Soper returned. “I have lit a fire in the Blue bedchamber, my Lady, and laid out some articles of apparel there.”

  “Excellent, Soper. If there is no-one about let us go there.”

  In the Blue bedchamber Anastasia was divested of her boy’s clothes and clad as befit a young lady of fashion in an elegant dress of spotted muslin.

  Soper deftly pinned up the high waist a trifle. “A little thinner and shorter than Miss Georgiana,” she said through a mouthful of pins, “But not enough to matter.”

  Tiredness now swept back, threatening to engulf Anastasia totally, and she stood numbly and let them alter and pin about her with hazy uninterest.

  At last they were done, and Soper removed the dress, promising to return it ready to wear the next morning.

  “Thank you, Soper,” said Anastasia faintly, and she swayed slightly. “I ... I think I must sit down!”

  “My dear, how thoughtless of me!” exclaimed Lady Dunford remorsefully. “You must be tired to the bone, besides having a bruise to the head, and I keep you standing here! You shall get straight into bed.”

  With Soper’s assistance she was very soon warmly tucked up in bed wearing her cousin’s nightgown, and drinking a bowl of soup.

  “I had not realised till now just how hungry I was!” She drained the bowl to the last drop and set it down on the tray. “But when I think back, I have not eaten a thing all day!”

  Soper removed the tray and left the room.

  “You look much better now, my dear,” said Lady Dunford. “I thought you were going to swoon before. Now, I think I will leave you to sleep, for tomorrow promises to be a very busy day.”

  “Yes, very. . . very busy with. . . my brother, and...”Her voice became wholly suspended by a wide yawn.

  “Goodnight, child, and do not worry! You have been very foolish but all will turn out well, you will see,” said Lady Dunford with natural optimism and a warm smile.

  There was no reply other than the gentle sound of breathing.

  She blew out the candle and tiptoed out of the room.

  Chapter Twelve

  It was late the next morning when Anastasia awoke, and she lay there wondering where on earth she was.

  Then it all came back to her in a rush and she sat bolt upright and gazed about her at the handsomely appointed bedroom, a fire burning in the grate against the inclement April weather.

  It was all true then! She had not dreamt it and she, Anastasia Derwent, was at long last here in London where she had longed to be!

  There was a rattle of crockery outside, and a maid came in carrying a tray from which emanated a mouth-watering smell of hot chocolate.

  The maid had a pleasant, stupid face, and greeted her without curiosity, helping her to arrange her pillows behind her and then attending to the fire.

  “Is it very late?” enquired Anastasia.

  “Past eleven, Miss, but the mistress left instructions that I was not to disturb you till now.”

  “Oh,” said Anastasia. She started on the breakfast tray with a sharp appetite as the girl left the room.

  Just as she consumed the last morsel there was a soft tap at the door, and a dark girl dressed in a modish gown of striped sarcenet entered cautiously.

  “Oh, you are awake! Mama said I must not wake you up, but I could not wait to meet you! I am your cousin, you know – Georgiana.”

  “I thought you must be though you do not resemble your Mama at all!” she answered shyly.

  Georgiana was a tall girl, with an abundance of glossy black ringlets, dark eyes, and a classically handsome face. She had a misleading air of gravity, but this was frequently dispelled by her singularly sweet smile and lively manner.

  “No, I believe I take after my father. It is very hard for poor Mama, for I think she would have preferred a small plump, pretty daughter after her own style, and here she is having to do the best she can with me!”

  “
But you are very pretty,” said Anastasia admiringly, “And it is so nice to have a cousin of my own age. At home I have a niece who is older than I am!”

  “Yes, Louisa Derwent – I know her. And Mama has told me everything!”

  “Everything?” said Anastasia, startled. “Did she tell you why I ran away, and how I got here?”

  “Oh yes – she always tells me everything. But do not worry, I will not say anything to anybody. I do think you were brave to run away like that! But on the top of a common stage, and in male dress, too! I am sure I should not have had the courage.”

  “Lord, I had not thought. . . . I wonder what my hair looks like in the light of day?” exclaimed Anastasia. “I cut it, you know, to look more like a boy.” She pulled off her borrowed cap and got out of bed.

  “Oh, how very short it is!” cried Georgiana. “How could you bear to cut it? It is such a pretty colour, too.”

  She studied her reflection in the mirror. “I do not think I cut it too badly really, for I had not sufficient light to see, and only sewing scissors to do it with. But it is certainly very ragged. How does it look at the back?”

  “Rather strange!” said Georgiana frankly. “But the short hair itself rather suits you! Perhaps you will start a fashion. Does your hair curl naturally?”

  “It was always rather wavy, but once I cut it it seemed to curl up immediately. It is very strange – but perhaps the weight of the long hair was keeping it from curling.”

  By now they were chatting together like old friends, and Anastasia confided in her cousin some of the details that she had withheld from Lady Dunford.

  “I don’t know why you are so set against Sir Montagu!” exclaimed Georgiana in surprise. “I think he is the most delightful man! But I don’t know him very well, for Mama does not like me to dance with him — though you may meet him almost everywhere.”

  “I hope I do not!”

  “And then to be rescued by Lord Silverfield!” sighed Georgiana. “How terribly romantic!”

  “It was not romantic at all. I had just recovered from a stunning blow to the head and was most vilely sick. Then he tossed me into his curricle as if I were a ... a parcel! – and lectured me all the way here on my conduct. He is odious!”