‘How sad for the old man. I wonder why he stays on in a house of bitter memories?’
‘It has many happy memories, too. His sons were born there, and Chloe. His wife, Lady Margaret, loved the Manor and would not live anywhere else. She died too young. Then, Lord Edward’s widowed sister, Jenny’s mother, lived with him for a time, although she did not long survive her daughter.’
‘You called it Ashbourne Manor.’ Karen tested the words aloud. They sounded familiar. However, the teasing memory would not be captured.
‘It is not the Earl’s principal seat. Rothmoor Castle is in the west, a bleak place.’
‘No wonder he prefers Devon. I think I should like to meet Lord Edward, some day.’
Charles looked uncomfortable.
She had no trouble reading his thoughts. ‘I see. We have met and he dislikes me.’
‘My apologies, Caroline. I do not always remember that this background information really is new to you. Amanda did assure me that your memory loss was genuine and total. I am sorry for it. ‘Tis a heavy burden to bear.’
‘Not as heavy as some. I am grateful to you for telling me all this, Charles.’
‘I felt you should know your adversary.’
‘A dead woman? Jenny, the paragon?’
‘An ordinary woman, much loved.’
Karen felt a bitter-sweet pang, somewhere in the region of her midriff, but shrugged it aside. ‘Thank you also for trusting me with your own private story. I appreciate what it must have cost you, and I think I know why you did it. You love Amanda, do you not?’
‘Is it so obvious?’ He seemed taken aback.
It amused her to reflect that all lovers seemed to believe in a mysterious cloak of invisibility that hid their private affairs from the world. She’d felt that way about Humphrey – whose mother had known immediately. Later, in a mood of bitterness, she’d mentally accused the woman of deliberately dying to escape the humiliation of such a daughter-in-law. Mama Doran should have waited around, she thought grimly. She’d have had her adored son back within a couple of months.
She brought her attention back to Charles. ‘I am afraid it is no secret. Do you fear that Amanda will reject you because of your illegitimacy?’
He changed color at her plain speech, but met it with honesty. ‘No, I believe I know her character sufficiently well. She will not despise the circumstances of my birth and upbringing. But how can I ask her to share my life when I have so little to offer her? Lady… Caro… She is all that any man could wish for in a woman, but I will not drag her down to my own level.’
He looked so miserable, and she could think of nothing to comfort him. It was true. Amanda might not count the cost of wedding an obscure and impoverished gentleman without a name, but he would count it for her. Now that she thought about it, it was strange that Amanda had not yet confided in her friend. They were so close, and yet Karen had no idea of the true situation with Charles.’
‘Have you spoken to Amanda about this yet?’
‘I have not, and I have no intention of doing so. I trust you not to betray my confidence, Caro.’
‘You may safely trust me. But I do think you should speak to her. If she loves you, as I believe she does, together you may be able to work something out.’
He shook his head and stood up. ‘It has relieved my mind talking to you. You are a kind woman. And Antony is a blind fool.’ He bowed and left her to absorb this tart compliment.
He’d given her a lot to think about. So had Sybilla. And, oddly enough, they had both said the same thing about Jenny, that she was an adversary. Karen recognized the truth in this. Not only was Antony still in love with his first wife, but Karen herself must be exhibiting signs of infatuation. Two people had commented upon it. How many others were slyly noting the fact? How amusing for them – a wife falling in love with her husband. How hilarious.
The worst complication, however, was Sybilla’s declared intention of annexing Antony for herself, just as if he was a piece of territory and she Napoleon with a grande armee at her back. Things could get quite embarrassing if she ever decided to make public claim to her cousin.
On thinking over last night’s confrontation, Karen had decided it held more pathos than drama. Poor Sybilla. She had to be quite unbalanced, carrying on with voodoo spells and a complete disregard for the rights of others. Karen, herself, might not be well versed in the traditions of karma and reincarnation, but she only had to compare Amanda’s attitudes and way of life with Sybilla’s to see that black magic and the practice of evil was an aberration in the scheme of things, and certainly it could never work towards the benefit of any soul. She was, however, uneasy about such powers. The mind was unpredictable. Sybilla’s dedication to her sinister arts might well produce the desired effects, perhaps by way of the psychology of an intended victim.
Karen couldn’t laugh away the idea that she was being insidiously worked upon. Anyone who could travel through time and space and end up as she had, had better keep an open mind.
Imagining the forces that had molded Sybilla, she concluded that the sudden abandonment of the Jamaican plantation might be a clue. Had her parents brought her to England for treatment? Perhaps her condition had deteriorated noticeably. Yet she had seemed quite normal when Karen first met her.
If she thought about Basil, which she didn’t if she could help it, or Lady Oriel herself, she might have seen the signs earlier. Sybilla simply hid her true nature, while the rest of her family blatantly displayed theirs. What a collection!
She puzzled over Sybilla’s history for some time, but finally abandoned speculation through lack of data. To discuss this with anyone, except maybe Amanda, would be to brand herself as jealous and neurotic. She’d take no risks while her own reputation for soundness of mind remained suspect. So Sybilla, ostensibly serene and balanced, would simply be kept under observation.
But, what an actress! Her façade had no crack. She’d even fooled everyone into believing she cared for Chloe, although her tone last night when speaking of ‘the brat’ in the miniature had destroyed that illusion for Karen. Thank heaven she’d won the child’s confidence herself and not left her to the dubious affections of her cousin.
Which brought her to the point she had been avoiding. Karen felt a shiver run over her. Last night Sybilla had displayed the perfect temperament for a killer. She would have little compunction in disposing of a rival, and she had the advantage of living on the spot. It took little cunning to push someone down the stairs; and what could be simpler than drugging a glass of milk and opening a window onto a storm? And – Sybilla had motive. She coveted Karen’s husband. Had she decided not to wait through a protracted and socially damaging divorce? If so, what was to stop her trying her hand at murder again, at any moment?
Deep in thought, Karen failed to hear the parlor door open. She jumped violently when Charles spoke.
‘I beg your pardon, Caro, but I did not have your answer to His Royal Highness’ invitation.’
‘Oh. Ah, yes. Yes indeed. Certainly we accept what amounts to a Royal Command. It should be a most interesting event.’
*
Interesting it was. It was also the longest, most drawn-out affair of the Season, and after nine hours Karen had had enough. She knew she would remember those hours, not only for their exhibition of the most wanton extravagance she was ever likely to witness, but as a panorama of all that Regency England represented when viewed from a position of privilege.
At nine o’clock exactly the horses swept through the portico with a flourish, and Antony and Karen stepped down from their carriage into the entrance lobby. Along with the expectant and unusually punctual crowd of guests, they moved through to the great hall, all green marble and yellow scagliola columns, with a splendid coffered ceiling overhead. There were glimpses of heavily gilded furniture, but most of it was hidden in the crush.
‘Two thousand guests have been bidden,’ said Antony in Karen’s ear. ‘Prinny will have surpassed himself
in the spending of public monies.’
‘I hear it whispered everywhere that he wildly overspends his budget,’ Karen agreed. She waved to an acquaintance and bowed acknowledgement of other greetings. It was impossible to have speech in this din unless the speaker placed his lips almost against his auditor’s ear.
Antony did so. ‘The cost of this function will be in the region of one hundred and twenty thousand pounds, I am reliably informed.’
Translating that into modern terms, she was aghast. The nation at war, exports frozen (discounting the extremely lucrative smuggling trade), people starving all over the country, and its own Regent spending as if he were a Croesus.
‘It’s wicked,’ she said, but her words were lost in the babble around them.
Joining a favored few, they were guided by footmen into an anteroom hung for the occasion in blue satin with gold embroidered fleur-de-lis. Their invitation had stated that the fete was given to honor the Comte de Provence, the self-styled Louis XVIII of France, and it was with a thrill of expectation that Karen advanced down the room towards a small group standing in the window embrasure.
It was dominated by two enormously fat men. Louis came as a disappointment. The Bourbon features did not lend themselves to majestic presence any more than they’d done for his murdered brother. But the Prince Regent, despite his corpulence, retained some of the famed beauty of countenance that had brought him the sobriquet of ‘Prince Charming’ in his youth. He was certainly not trying to hide his bulk in the scarlet uniform of a British field marshal. Ablaze with orders and festooned in gold braid – even the seams of his coat were embroidered – he emitted an aura of royalty. His jowls rested in the folds of his high cravat and he seemed likely to burst out of his corseted pantaloons, but Karen felt no disillusionment. He was a character, a figurehead, and with all the charm of a practiced beau he raised her from her curtsey, taking her hand and presenting her, himself, to the exiled king of France.
Again she dipped into the exceedingly difficult obeisance considered the due of kings, and which had cost her some effort to perfect. Louis murmured an indifferent greeting, but his host more than countered this. Waving Antony away, he took Karen on his arm and proceeded to introduce her to Louis’ family and entourage, all the while maintaining a running patter that was both amusing and embarrassing.
‘You have been too long absent from court, Lady Caroline. Such beauty should not be hid. Our debutantes will all be cast in the shade by such a sun goddess.’ He put up a hand to her flaming hair, contriving to brush her bare shoulder as he did. His heavy body pressed close.
‘This ungainly fellow is my brother Cumberland. Do not, I beg, be put off by his scowl. He has the fiend’s own temper and just now no means of dispersing it.’
Given no time to do more than curtsey in the direction of this forbidding Duke, Karen was hurried on to greet Lady Hertford, the Prince’s current friend, a dame of haughty appearance who gave her two fingers and then ignored her. Karen had no trouble believing the rumor that she had forcefully declined a cozier relationship, and merely wished to guide the Prince culturally and politically.
For the next ten minutes she was towed about the room clamped to the royal side, being slyly stroked, fulsomely praised and almost choked with the effort of holding back her laughter as he gave wicked sotto voce descriptions of the other guests.
Here was another complex character, not easily defined, and using his exalted position both as a weapon and an instrument of benevolence. One minute he could speak of a man with high praise for his acumen and ability, and then be dragging down another for the pettiest reasons. She saw him turn his back on George Brummel, once his closest confidant; and tell anyone who cared to listen that his morganatic wife, Maria Fitzherbert, would not be present that night as he had refused her a seat at his own table, while a place was reserved for Lady Hertford.
He also paused to listen to a hard-luck story, and thereupon commanded an equerry to hasten to the home of a young cornet of his regiment laid low with fever and in debt, taking money from the household purse. A strange mixture, this prince, and quite unforgettable.
Eventually Antony reclaimed her and they were able to leave the reception and take their place in the line descending the remarkable baroque staircase to the lower ground floor.
Karen halted to marvel at a room lined with ionic pillars, its ceiling molded and gilded and set with allegorical panels, its walls hung in silk and swagged in tasseled braid. The couches were of matching velvet, their legs clawed and marvelously carved; the doors were inlaid and, again, dazzlingly gilded. Chandeliers fell in ropes of crystal, ending in sunbursts that hurt the eye, and giant mirrors reflected a shopful of ornaments, busts and urns, clocks and figurines, all, inevitably, layered in gold.
‘I’ve never seen anything so overdone. It’s pure loco rococo.’ She laughed, unsure whether she was stunned with amazement or sickened by so much excess.
‘Reserve judgment until you have seen the conservatory,’ Antony advised, clearly enjoying her response to her surroundings.
‘It surely can’t be any more exotic. The Prince Regent seems to have taken for his motto, “Nothing succeeds like excess”.’
Antony smiled. His eyes rested on her face for one moment, then traveled over her gown. ‘I have not yet complimented you upon your appearance, Caro. You do me honor.’
She had admitted to herself as she dressed that she hoped to please him. The occasion was a very grand one and his wife’s appearance would, to a degree, affect his standing. It was the way of the world, and for once she didn’t rebel against standards that were not her own. Despite his seeming indifference, and her determination to hide her feelings, she valued his praise.
He took her hand to his lips. ‘Your gown is a triumph of simplicity against this background. You are to be congratulated.’ There was no doubting the admiration in his eyes, and something else that she did not care to analyze.
She flushed and looked away, meeting her reflection in a huge looking glass. It framed her slim white gown with its collar of lace cut low and edged in diamond drops. The lace at the hem sparkled with the same stones, as did the rose in her hair. Her shoulders rose white and sloping from the lace, bare of jewelry, as were her arms. Only the flaming curls gave her color, and the vivid blue of her eyes.
She could admire this snowy beauty without feeling it was any part of her. Even after months of living in Caroline Marchmont’s body she still felt like a stranger in costume. It made it hard to value any compliment; but it was doubly cruel to at last receive a genuine tribute from Antony and know it was not really meant for her.
She gave herself a mental shake. There she went, daydreaming again. It would be disastrous, as well as highly improbable, for Antony to fall in love with her. For one thing, Sybilla would go off like a nuclear bomb, and the fallout could cause a lot of damage.
Then there was her own response to be considered. As long as it had been just a dream she could afford to let it be; but the reality would end up pulling her apart. She never gave up hope of returning one day to her own time, and to Adele. It would be more than stupid to create a loving relationship that she would have to leave behind. Much better to walk a lonely way and save herself worse pain in the long term. Besides, Jenny still had his love.
On Antony’s arm, she stepped into the conservatory.
She had seen W.H. Pyne’s aquatints, but realized they were inadequate preparation for the reality. Someone had described the monolithic structure as a ‘neo-perpendicular extravaganza of cast iron and translucent colored glass’. She had to agree. The ceiling was a great web of fan-vaulting; the ornate arched colonnades were hung with gothic lanterns; the floor marbled in black and white squares, presently hidden by a two-hundred foot long table reaching from the west door through the length of the hall and the dining room beyond.
Antony’s shoulders shook.
‘What is it?’
‘Look at the table.’
Its cen
terpiece was unusual, to say the least. Before the Prince’s chair sat a pond with gold and silver fish, and from this basin a stream meandered the whole length of the board, bounded by mossy banks of flowers. Comments amongst the guests indicated wonder and high praise.
Karen met her husband’s dancing eyes and laughed. ‘Do you suppose we are to net our own dinner?’
‘Possibly. I have ceased to wonder at Prinny’s whims.’
The royal party entered to the strains of martial music and proceeded to the head of the table. Taking his place beneath a great gilded coronet, with a gracious smile the host indicated that they all should be seated, and the banquet began.
Sixty servitors ran with tureens, plates and bowls, all of silver, and as many changes as were wanted. Soups, roasts and cold meats came with vegetables and fruits in and out of season, the best of wines and iced champagne.
Hours passed, and still they sat, sated and, in Karen’s case, talked out. At the Regent’s table, where she and Antony were placed, the conversation had been brilliant at times. The Prince was an accomplished musician and knowledgeable. He discoursed on the later works of Beethoven and Handel, and discussed the merits of various opera singers at present in London. Mr. Sheridan’s plays came under discussion and, in deference to the guest of honor, those of Voltaire.
When art took its turn Karen joined in the commentary, much to the surprise of those men and women whose interest it was to patronize such work. Lady Hertford unbent to discuss the rival virtues of watercolor versus oils in landscape painting. She advocated Mr. Cotman’s watercolor of Greta Bridge as a prime example, and Karen countered with John Constable. They enjoyed their discussion very much. It was unfortunate that Lady Hertford should comment on her efforts to persuade the Prince to have his portrait done by Mr. Lawrence.
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