by Page, Sophie
‘Her grandmother was wheeling the smallest possible carry-on case.
‘I had a good book. The flight passed.’ She shrugged. ‘Now tell me about you two. Bella has a young man and a new job, I know. Lottie, what about you? Still enjoying London?’
Most of the traffic had gone by the time they got on to the M3. So they had a straight run, in a light grey drizzle, with Lottie talking about her job, very amusingly, and Georgia asking all the right questions, just as she always did, in her soft Southern drawl.
They delivered Lottie to the Hendreds, had a cup of tea and a mince pie there, and drove on to Janet and Kevin’s.
‘Now,’ said Georgia, as Bella pulled out of the Hendreds’ drive, ‘tell me about him. I can’t get any sense out of either of your parents. How long have you known him?’
‘Not long at all.’ Bella gave her a rapid outline of events to date.
‘Hmm. No, you’re right. That’s fast.’ It was interesting. When she was thinking aloud, Georgia’s Southern drawl became more pronounced. It was, decided Bella, very attractive – calm and somehow poised.
‘I wish I were poised,’ she said involuntarily.
Her grandmother looked at her quickly. ‘That’s an interesting word. Does he make you feel inadequate? Socially, maybe?’
‘He doesn’t but, well—’ She described the New Year’s briefing package.
Georgia’s sculpted lips tightened perceptibly. ‘How discourteous. Who did you say this person is?’
‘Lady Pansy. She’s Queen Jane’s right-hand woman, as far as I can see. Been with her for ever.’
Georgia drummed her fingers thoughtfully. ‘That suggests she has no life of her own,’ she drawled. ‘You need to watch these loyal retainers. They can become very gothic in their devotion.’
Bella laughed heartily. ‘Not Lady Pansy! If she weren’t so elegant you’d say she was a horse.’
‘Horses are very gothic,’ said Georgia obstinately. ‘You watch her. And watch your back around her.’
Of course she didn’t say any of that in front of Janet and Kevin. Georgia’s idea of good behaviour demanded a high degree of forbearance, as well as refraining from giving advice in public or arguing either. So when Janet started to complain about Finn baiting the newspapers with his antipathy to the monarch, Georgia just smiled faintly and drifted away to somewhere more congenial.
But she did take Bella on one side and say, ‘Are you really worried about spending the New Year with Richard’s family?’
‘No-o-o.’ But in the end it all poured out: the dancing-by-numbers Bella had never done before, The Striped Horror, the pumps.
Georgia laughed. ‘My dear child! You just need a posh frock.’
‘I’ve got one,’ said Bella gloomily. ‘And how.’
‘No. One you like and feel comfortable in. Look, you may not care for the idea, but I have a lot of my own frocks stored in London. We still just about made a debut in my day. Why don’t we see if there’s anything that you suitable among them? We’re quite similar. I think the size will be about right. They may be a little short, but if you have complicated dancing to face, that is hardly a fault.’
Bella agreed, but without much hope.
She spent an edgy Christmas, sustained mainly by Richard’s phone calls from various places in the world where British forces were serving. No wonder Ian had kept the diary from her, thought Bella, watching the TV News to see Richard jump lightly from a helicopter on to the deck of an aircraft carrier. He looked instantly at home, eager and friendly, and always a concerned, good listener. Oh, she did love him.
She looked up suddenly and found her grandmother’s eyes on her. Georgia said nothing, just inclined her elegant head, but Bella felt as if she had been given her grandmother’s blessing. She hugged herself.
‘You’ll love him,’ she said, suddenly certain that she was right.
‘I probably will, dear. As I said, you and I are very alike.’
Richard met Bella at the station on New Year’s Eve. Just him. No security officer, no Press Adviser. The stationmaster touched his cap in a friendly way and wished them both Happy New Year, and Richard drove the big 4WD off up into the hills, along an unmade track to the house.
‘Best view,’ he said, waving at folds of snow-covered hills to his left and a sparkling, darting brook in the white valley below them.
‘It’s gorgeous,’ Bella said, truthfully.
‘But freezing. Hope you brought plenty of warm clothes?’
‘Yes, I came prepared.’ Conscious of Georgia’s Alternative Posh Frock in her suitcase, Bella said carefully, ‘What will people wear to the ball tonight?’
Richard glanced down at her. ‘Yes, OK. Don’t rub it in. I’ll be prancing around in a kilt with a lace jabot and a velvet jacket. And so will all the other guys. I don’t get a vote.’
She was taken aback. ‘No? Really? You mean, I get to see your knees?’
His eyes glinted. ‘You’ve seen my knees, you baggage.’
‘Not in public. Not to really stand back and admire them.’ She let herself dwell on the picture with pleasure for a moment. Then said, ‘No, actually, what I meant was the ladies.’
He shrugged. ‘It’s easier for them. They wear their usual rig. With mountaineer’s underwear underneath to keep them warm, of course.’
‘Their usual rig?’
‘Yes. Why?’ he said puzzled
She thought of The Striped Horror. Puffed sleeves like a Michelin Man’s biceps were nobody’s idea of normal.
‘I think I may have got the wrong end of the stick,’ she said diplomatically. ‘Look, do me a favour. I’ve borrowed a dress … well, actually, like your boat, it’s more sort of inherited. Will you come and give me your opinion on it before we have to join the party?’
Richard agreed with enthusiasm.
And later he took one look at her in a Grace Kelly number, with a soft skirt of misty grey silk crepe, and, ‘Very elegant.’
So that was all right. At least it would be until Lady Pansy caught sight of it. Her niece, the Honourable Chloe, was among the guests as well. It would be interesting, thought Bella with a touch of cattiness, to see whether Chloe’s gown was out of the School of Striped Horror.
Richard took her down to the drawing room at Drummon House, at the cocktail hour. There was a handsome fire blazing in the great hearth, but a combination of stone walls and ill-fitting windows meant that the warmth did not permeate very far into the room.
The Queen, greeting Bella kindly, seemed not to notice that she had failed to curtsey.
Prince George, a taller, gawkier version of Richard, flapped a hand in greeting. ‘Hi. The sooner the physical jerks start, the sooner the sound of chattering teeth will die away.’
A steward offered her a tray. Richard inspected it and explained its contents. ‘You can have one of three sorts of malt whisky or a concoction of blended Scotch, amaretto and cointreau, which George invented last year. I don’t advise it.’
‘I call it Drummon Hell,’ Prince George told her proudly.
He had the reputation of being a bit of a hell-raiser and Bella had been wary of meeting him, but she found she liked him. It was impossible not to; he was a Labrador puppy in human form.
Bella took one of the glasses, with a word of thanks, and they moved further into the drawing room. As soon as they were out of earshot of the Queen she hissed, ‘I hate whisky.’
‘Don’t worry. I’ll drink it.’
‘And I forgot to curtsey to your mother.’
‘She’ll get over it.’
‘But Lady Pansy won’t. She looked really disappointed. You know, more in sorrow than in anger.’
‘Pansy’s an old fart,’ he said brutally. ‘Don’t worry about it. Lots of people don’t curtsey these days.’
‘I have tried, honest. But I just can’t get the hang of it.’
‘No sweat. When you have to, it will come naturally.’
Bella was alarmed. ‘When I have to? W
hat do you mean, have to? You just said lots of people don’t.’
Richard looked mischievous. ‘Wait and see.’
Bella looked round the room. There was a smattering of dinner jackets but the men were mostly in kilts, worn with crisp white shirts, a frilled or lacy stock, and a waisted black velvet jacket with gold buttons. They looked very fine. The women were more varied in their dress. If they had had the same instructions as Bella, none of them had resorted to stiff shiny satin and puffed sleeves. Some of the older ladies were wearing long white gloves, above the elbow. The cannier ones kept pashminas to hand. Bella saw that Lady Pansy herself was in a stiff violet crinoline that she had probably been wearing in the eighties.
No black permitted, Bella remembered from Lady Pansy’s notes, low necklines discouraged and sleeves were obligatory. Lottie had howled with laughter: ‘Where do they think they are? In a cathedral?’ she’d said. But now, looking at one of her fellow first-timers who had ignored the spirit of the notes and opted for festive décolletage, Bella felt sorry for the woman. Diamonds and gooseflesh was not a good look.
She did not have long to pity her, however. There were three mighty raps at the door, followed by an earsplitting noise like an elephant farting. Then the doors were flung open and in marched a piper, kilt swinging.
At once there was a scramble to fall in behind him.
George hissed in her ear, ‘We all march round the room after him, and divide so women go to the left and men to the right. Then we go down either side of the room and meet in front of the doors and join up with a partner and go into a Grand March.’
The name was vaguely familiar but that was all. ‘Sorry. My mind’s a blank.’
‘Don’t worry about it. It’s dead easy. Just do what everyone else does. All you need to do is make sure that nobody queue jumps when you go to meet your partner. It’s a favourite trick.’
‘I didn’t realise it was so competitive.’
‘Blood on the floor,’ said George cheerfully. ‘Keep your eye on Richard. You may need to make a grab.’ And he waved cheerily as he peeled off in the other direction.
‘I will.’
Bella nearly lost him, though, when Chloe, in a figure-hugging lacy dress that was only just this side of decent, darted in front of her at the last moment, just as Bella was about to step out in front of the big doors to meet him.
‘Excuse me,’ she said in a breathy, little girl voice that exactly matched her wide-eyed stare.
But Richard was too quick for her. With a nifty softshoe shuffle that Fred Astaire would not have been ashamed of, he slid momentarily out of his line and in again behind a grey-haired man, who at once stepped up to the place in front of the doors. The Hon Chloe had no choice. She gave the elderly party her hand and they marched off together down the middle of the drawing room, now cleared of furniture.
As they met and followed, Richard took Bella’s hand and laid it gently on his velvet-jacketed arm,
‘Fifteen love to us,’ he murmured.
A terrible desire to giggle took hold of her, as they marched solemnly down the freezing cold, overfurnished room, and round the edge again to join up in fours. The servants just about managed to clear a wide enough path through the furniture for the column of four to pass. But Bella had begun to see what was going to happen next. And there was no way they were going to be able to march down that room eight abreast.
‘Someone’s going to get impaled on a suit of armour,’ she said, half fascinated, half appalled.
Richard kept a straight face. ‘It has been known. It is rumoured that someone forgot to clear away the piano one year and my Uncle Leopold marched straight over it, dragging his partner after him.’
Bella folded her lips tightly together. Her shoulders were starting to shake. Oh, God, I’m not going to be able to get through this lunacy without disgracing myself, she thought.
And then they did all join up in an eight, and the lady at one end of the line and the man at the other did indeed have to vault over occasional tables and slalom round chairs. Above the clatter of falling objets d’art and cries of anguish from those who had stubbed their toes, the King’s voice could be heard saying testily, ‘Keep time. Keep time, damn you.’
Richard bent his head sideways. ‘Don’t worry. He’s almost certainly talking to the piper rather than my mother,’ he confided in a whisper.
Bella’s ribs ached. She moaned. Suppressing laughter was becoming agony for her.
‘You’re a swine,’ she said conversationally, keeping her bright smile in place.
‘Yeah. But I know how to do this stuff. So,’ he went into a mobster voice, ‘you need me, baby.’
That was when the double doors at the far end were flung wide and they progessed, eight by eight, into what Bella could only describe as a baronial hall: high ceiling, banners, serfs gathered round the walls watching, the lot. She gasped and would have stopped dead, but for the momentum of the group which kept surging forward. She stumbled but Richard and George between them half lifted her off her feet, keeping her upright and moving until she had regained her balance.
‘Keep up. Keep up,’ muttered Prince George in a very good imitation of the King.
Bella gave a strangled gulp and her ribs started to hurt again.
The piper got to the far end of the hall and turned to face them. The eights all peeled off and formed squares, and the serfs – who, now she came to look, were just as well dressed as the Royal party – bundled on to the floor too.
The piper started to tap his foot. You could feel the whole room counting. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. And they were off, circling round to the right, and then back, hell for leather, like a cavalry charge.
Richard said over his shoulder, ‘Next, stick out your right hand, left round my waist. You’re going round in a star with the other ladies.’
Bella was still trying to assimilate this when he put his arm round her waist, flung her into the circle and was galloping off, round again. And when they completed the circuit, he switched places with her and they went back and around the other way. Her head started to spin …
It seemed as if every time she learned how to do a move, and started to enjoy herself, the damn’ dance did something different. And did it fast. There was a good bit in the middle where you were allowed to stand still while other people did their thing. But sometimes you had to do your thing and that was torture. Richard was really good at sending Bella off into the fray, with a gentle push in the small of the back. But the other people in the set all seemed to know what they were doing, and helped too, reaching out a hand to steer her when it was feasible, giving her good clear hand signals when it wasn’t.
The music finally came to an end on a long chord and she and Richard were bowing to each other.
‘Curtsey,’ he mouthed.
‘What?’ But she looked sideways and saw what the women across the set were doing. Bella copied them and didn’t wobble too much at all.
‘I told you it would come naturally,’ said Richard smugly, taking her hand as she rose out of the curtsey. He tucked it under the crook of his arm. ‘I’m going to have to do lots of duty dances, but I’ve lined up friends and experts to take you through when I can’t dance with you. Have you got your dance card?’
‘A dance card? I’m supposed to have a dance card?’ Bella shook her head, caught between laughter and dismay. ‘What is this, Gone with the Wind? Georgia won’t believe it when I tell her.’
‘Pansy was supposed to have sent it to you. It has the list of dances in it and a small pencil.’
‘Well she sent me a paper mountain, but I don’t remember a dance card.’
‘Not a problem. There will be spares.’ He turned to his brother. ‘George, would you—?’
‘I’m on it.’ George disappeared into the throng like an eel and returned with the prize.
Richard squiggled his distinctive black R beside several dances and made sure that her other partners were both kind and e
xpert. ‘You can dance with George,’ he instructed, ‘but not in the Duke of Perth, when he goes crazy, or the Irish Rover because he always gets lost.’
George agreed cheerfully. He didn’t seem worried. ‘Everyone has one dance that brings them to their knees. Actually, that’s half the fun of reels – the catastrophes.’
Richard sighed. ‘See what I mean? Dance with him if you must, but watch yourself.’
But it wasn’t George who brought about the disaster. That was all Bella’s own fault.
Her partners, briefed by Richard, got her through the figures by a combination of timely crisp instruction and sheer muscle power. She danced a thing called Postie’s Jig with a gentle-faced, middle-aged man, who was clearly an expert.
‘It’s an interesting dance,’ he told her in a soft Highland accent. ‘Like a piece of paper that keeps being folded in on itself. Two couples dance at the same time, while the other four dancers stand still at the corners and help them round. Very pleasing when it’s well performed. It has balance.’
‘Um, good,’ said Bella doubtfully. She just wanted to scramble through it without falling flat on her face or poking someone’s eye out, but she didn’t tell her kindly partner that.
And they would have been fine, she was sure, if they had joined one of the friendly sets she had been dancing in up until then, where the other dancers were happy to give her an informal push in the right direction. But unfortunately she and her gentle partner were summoned to join the Queen’s set, in which Lady Pansy was also dancing. And Lady Pansy tried to help by shouting instructions at Bella across the set. Sometimes these conflicted with her partner’s. It was a nightmare, with Bella turning right when she should have gone left, blundering too far down the set, grabbing the hand of the wrong man when they came to turn in the middle … And then real disaster struck. They were dancing in the middle of the set, towards the Queen and her partner, in full regimentals. One couple had to make an arch; one had to go under it.
‘If you’re going up the set, you put your arms up,’ her kind partner whispered.
But Bella had no idea which direction was up. She thought she felt a tug and started to raise her arm, but Lady Pansy, standing at the top left-hand corner of the set, frowned and shook her head. So Bella snatched her hand back again – just as the Queen and her soldier lowered their heads to come through the arch they were expecting.