The Chevalier

by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

  She nodded and smiled, looking at him with shining eyes. The duke said heartily, 'Perhaps you will marry him, little one, when you grow up.’

  Now she was baited too far, and she swung round on her father, angry and hurt. 'I shall never marry!' she cried passionately. 'I shall be a great singer!’

  It was Twelfth Night, the night of prophecy, Karellie remembered, and he shivered with a brief and sudden foreboding.

  ‘Sing again for us, Principessa,' he said. 'Sing us something that Maurice has written.’

  Soothed, she took up her stance once more, tall for her age in her straight-skirted, white lace gown. If I had married when Berwick did, Karellie thought, I might have had a daughter like this by now. But already he felt less lonely.

  *

  New Year's day was so fine and soft, so perfect for scent, that everyone in the family turned out for it, even Sabine, who was heaved by main force on to the back of a stout, weight-carrying mare, and was immensely proud of it.

  ‘I hear Queen Anne follows the hunt in a two-wheel chariot, now she is too fat to ride,' she shouted, her voice ringing round the yard. 'Well, I am near ten years older than she, but I can still get myself across the back of a horse, eh, husband? We'll shew these striplings a thing or two!’

  India, resplendent in dark hunting green, with a hat two feet across and almost obscured by feathers, curled her lip at this speech from her vulgar aunt, but Francomb, not yet mounted, walked across to his wife, placed his hand over her foot, and smiled up at her.

  ‘Why aye, hinny, we'll shew 'em. They have no hunting here to compare with Blindburn. This is chasing butterflies on a bowling green, next to our hunting at home.' And Sabine looked down at him with grateful affection, and sat up straighter on her hairy-legged horse, feeling the pressure of his big hand on her ankle long after he had gone to mount up.

  India rode at the head of the procession beside Matt, and their two horses, almost identical except that Matt's had a white star, and India's one white coronet, matched their steps and arched their necks so that they danced along with their muzzles almost touching, their bridle ornaments ringing together and striking fire from the early sun. Matt's eyes were on his wife, admiring the grace of her carriage, the long arc of her neck, the bright colour of her cheeks, brushed now and then by a drooping feather from her preposterous hat. Last night - the memory of last night warmed him down to his toes - last night they had resumed married relations. He had been hesitant, though longing for her. He had said, 'My darling, are you not afraid you will get with child? It is so soon after little Robert. I can wait if I must -’

  But she had put her fingers over his lips and drawn her to him, whispering, 'Oh my dear husband, I am in God's hand. If He wills it, so be it. But I cannot endure any longer without you.’

  It had been a wonderful night, and this morning - just look at her! The love she had for him made her brilliant, he thought. Bright as a peacock, darting like a swallow, the centre of attention, her ready wit, her laughter, her beauty, drawing all eyes. And she was his! he crowed inwardly. Midnight and Star danced along, lifting their forelegs high, carrying their tails like banners.

  India turned to meet his gaze, and said, 'Husband, I have been thinking. Now that Clover is fifteen, it is good time that she should be married, don't you think?’

  Matt smiled inwardly, and said, 'What made you think of that so suddenly?'

  ‘It is not sudden. I have been watching her all this Christmas. I was wed at fifteen, my love, and have not regretted it for one moment. And I have thought of the perfect scheme - she should marry your cousin Arthur!' She waited, pleased, for his reaction. He turned it over in his mind, and she prompted his consideration. 'She has a fortune, but comes from an obscure family -'

  ‘The Ailesburys are a very respectable and old family in their own country,' Matt said. India went on as if he had not spoken.

  ‘And Arthur has a title and a coat of arms, but no estate, and as far as I can see, no income at all, other than what he earns. It is not fitting that Lord Ballincrea should have to earn his living. If he married Clover, he would not have to, and she would be Viscountess Ballincrea.' She stopped with the air of one who has just uncovered a treasure to public gaze. Matt grinned.

  ‘She'd like that,' he said. 'I suppose any woman would. Well, it is a good scheme, I give you, and it is kind of you to concern yourself with my family -'

  ‘My family too, now. Your concerns are mine, dearest husband.’

  but you know, I am not Clover's guardian. Clovis is. But I shall put it to him, never fear. I'll speak to him later today.’

  India leaned closer. ‘Do not say it was my idea, husband. Put it to him as your own thought. I would not have him think I am impertinent. I have the greatest horror of impertinence.'

  ‘My modest darling,' Matt smiled. 'Very well, I shall put it to him as my idea, first and last.’

  *

  The hunt was fast and furious, for the scent was good and the ground firm, and the family was soon well spread out, the first flight out of sight of the tailenders. Matt somehow got separated from India, and he did not know how that could have happened, for he had had his eye on her almost every moment. It must have been when we crossed the stream and had to jump that thicket of furze, he decided. She must have struck her own line through the trees and got parted from us. They lost the stag in the trees somewhere, and when they came out on the other side they halted to breathe the horses.

  Matt walked Star round in circles, for he was sweating and Matt did not want him to get cold, while keeping an eye out for the rest of the field. Sabina broke from the trees on the chestnut he had lent her for the day, and came cantering over to him. She was in stout black, with a small hat with a curly brim, her one flash of colour a crimson feather that turned over the brim and round her ear. She was growing up, he realized, and growing into an attractive young woman. He halted Star as she came up, and the two horses touched noses, and Star put his head down to graze.

  ‘Having a good run?' he asked her cheerfully. She nodded, making the feather bob. 'I'm glad to see you have kept up with us. We seem to have lost my wife - I hope she is all right. I am thinking of sending one of the servants to look for her before we set off. She may forget where we are going to draw.’

  Sabina looked at him rather oddly, he thought. Was it strange to be concerned for his wife's safety?

  ‘She's quite all right, I'm sure,' Sabina said. 'I saw her a while ago. She had Master Francomb with her -' ‘Oh, well, he'll take care of her,' Matt said. 'He's a fine huntsman.'

  ‘Yes,' Sabina said, still with that strange look. She leaned forward to him across her saddle. 'Matt -' she began hesitantly. He raised an eyebrow. 'Matt, I -'

  ‘Yes, Sabina, what is it?’

  She bit her lip, and then shook her head. 'No, nothing. Never mind it.' Matt looked at her with concern for a moment, and then reached over and patted her hand. Whatever was worrying her, he supposed she would tell it in her own time.

  ‘I think the horses have got their wind. Shall we go on and draw the high coppice? Ride beside me, little cousin, do. I do not feel right with an empty place there.' ‘Will you send a servant back?' Sabina asked in a small voice.

  ‘Oh no. If you say Francomb is with her, I shan't worry. He'll take care of her.’

  CHAPTER NINE

  In February 1703 Annunciata gave a dinner at Chelmsford House. It reminded her a little of the early days at St Germain, for all the guests were male, and all united by one common interest; though this time the interest was not soldiering but architecture, for the Countess of Chelmsford had at last made the firm decision to rebuilt her house at Shawes. She had invited her old friend Christopher Wren, now head of the Queen's Board of Works, to dinner to discuss the matter, and from those small beginnings the thing had developed. It happened that Wren's second-incommand at the Office of Works, Sir John Vanbrugh, was in London for the season, and Wren suggested that he come along too. Annunciata then thought of
inviting Henry Wise, the royal gardener, to be in on the discussions; Vanbrugh, on receiving his invitation, said he would bring along Nicholas Hawksmoor, who was also in London.

  At the same time Annunciata received a letter from Clovis saying that he wanted to come up and discuss the possibility of a marriage between Arthur and Clover, and that he would bring Arthur to London, as Annunciata had not yet met him since her return from exile. They made another two guests at what was becoming a definite Occasion; last to be invited was Henry Aldrich, Dean of Christ Church, whom Annunciata met in the Park. She knew him slightly, and on his enquiring kindly after Arthur, she remembered that it was by his patronage that Arthur had been made respectable, and that he was a distinguished amateur of architecture. She began telling him of her plans, and ended by inviting him to dinner.

  First, however, there was the meeting with Clovis and Arthur to be got over. They arrived in the early afternoon of the day before the dinner, and Annunciata thought at once that Clovis was looking drawn and fagged. He was unnaturally pale, even though it was still winter, and there was a line of fatigue etched about his lips. She made him sit down at once by the fire, and herself drew off his riding boots, in spite of his protests, and sent for hot wine for him.

  He smiled wearily at her and said, 'I shall be well enough, Countess. Let me but rest a while.'

  ‘They have worn you out over Christmas,' Annunciata said, leaving him and sitting in her own chair. 'You should have stayed here with me, and been quiet. You forget you are no longer a young man.' Clovis smiled more broadly.

  ‘How can I think myself not young, when I am younger than you, and you are the most perennially young of women?'

  ‘Oh, hush!' Annunciata said. 'Bring forward that young man lurking by the door and present him. I think he has had his fill of staring.’

  Clovis beckoned to Arthur, who had been standing quietly at the door, and indeed had been staring, for the Countess, his grandmother, was a legendary figure to him, and he could hardly believe that she had substance in reality. She stood up as he came across the room: he saw a tall woman, whose face was of such beauty it was impossible to associate it with great age, though he knew she must be old. Her hair, dressed without lace or flowers, was curled on the top of her head and fell in a tail of curls behind, and was as black as a young woman's; her eyes, large and very dark, were bright and gave her face a look of youthfulness and vitality; her features were fine, proud and stern, her lips full and soft-looking in a way that would have told him, had he been a student of physionomy, that her nature was passionate. There were diamonds at her throat - part of his mind calculated their value with respect - that glittered with many-coloured fire against the white skin of her neck and breast. Her dress was of deep crimson velvet, simply and richly cut, the skirt divided and drawn back to reveal the petticoat beneath of quilted crimson silk embroidered with gold threads. From the heavy lace of her sleeve ends her forearms emerged, white and smooth and innocent of jewellery. He was used to rich women displaying their wealth in a multiplicity of bracelets and rings, and the nakedness of her arms and hands was strangely affecting - both innocent and sensuous. She disturbed him, and he did not understand enough about people to know why she disturbed him. All the same it subdued his normal arrogance, and he approached her with a quiet humility. He had intended to salute her with a hearty kiss and call her grandmama: but that was before he saw her. Faced with her, he gave her involuntarily the respect he had not thought he would bestow on her.

  ‘My lady, may I present Arthur, Viscount Ballincrea; your grandson,' Clovis said genially. Arthur made his leg, with a deep flourish, and then, finding this was not enough, went down on to one knee and remained there until Annunciata bid him rise. She studied him as he came across the room, seeing a tall young man - not as tall as Karellie, but an inch or two higher than most men all the same - of considerable girth and weight, dressed in good, though not extreme, fashion, with a blond periwig that hung over his shoulders but not all the way down his back.

  The face - she did not recognize the face. She studied it for something of her own, or something of her son Hugo's, but he was entirely a stranger. She supposed he must look like someone on Caroline's side of the family. He was plump and fair with pale eyes and light eyelashes: she guessed that his own hair would be blond with a pinkish tinge, for he had freckles around his eyes and that indefinable look of gingerishness to his pale skin. He was entirely a stranger, and she felt a surge of great relief pass through her.

  Her first husband, Hugo, had inflicted a great hurt on her when she was very young, and she had never forgotten or forgiven it. She had come to hate him; she had hated the two children that she had borne him, Arabella and Hugo; she had thought that she must hate Hugo's son Arthur.

  But there was nothing of either Hugo or herself in Arthur, and it was as if a troublesome ghost had been laid. She was prepared to like, even to favour, this heavy young man in the sheer relief of being released from that burden of hate.

  ‘Sit down and be easy, sir, I am glad to see you,' she said. Arthur took a chair between her and Clovis, and Annunciata continued, 'Well, let us to business. Clovis proposes a marriage between you, Lord Ballincrea, and Mary Celia Ailesbury, who is his ward. What have you to say to that?’

  Arthur was startled by the abrupt turn to business, and could only stammer, 'I - I - have no great objection, my lady - but -' Annunciata dismissed him with a glance and turned to Clovis.

  ‘Have you spoken to either of them? Have you thought about settlements?’

  Clovis smiled. 'You go so fast, Countess! I am hardly coming to terms with the thought of my little one being old enough to marry, and you have them parcelled up and dispatched in two minutes.' Annunciata laughed at that, and Arthur saw how beautiful she must once have been.

  ‘Very well, I accept your reproof. But my dear Clovis, if it must be done, by all means let it be done quickly. I have not a man's love of lingering over business. If you will let the girl go, and they neither of them have any great objection, then I will give it my blessing. And since the girl has a great deal, and Arthur nothing but his name, I will make a settlement on him, so that he will not be ashamed. Arthur, I have a house and a small estate in Kendal, and it seems to me that it would be appropriate for you to have property in the same country as your wife. If you marry Clover, I shall give you that estate, and you may do as you please with it.'

  ‘Your ladyship is generous,' Arthur said. He thought briefly of India, but it was hard to keep her in mind in the presence of the Countess. He did not care about Clover one way or the other, but a man must marry, and all his life he had longed for an estate. If he pleased the Countess, perhaps she would make him her heir. He smiled carefully at her. 'I am your ladyship's servant. Whatever you decide, I will abide by.’

  The Countess gave him a thoughtful, penetrating look, and then turned to Clovis. 'Well, then, cousin, it is up to you. Shall we make a bargain? You must give her up some time, you know - best swallow the draft quickly and have it done.’

  She extended her long white hand, and it was made rosy on one side by the firelight. Clovis seemed to look at it for a long time, and then he straightened in his chair and extended his own, and they clasped. The two hands seemed to hover, disembodied, in the afternoon gloom of the room, white against the dark Turkey carpet and the red-gold flames of the fire.

  *

  The dinner-party was a most successful occasion, and Arthur was forced to see how elegantly things could be managed by someone whose taste equalled their wealth. It could have been very difficult, one woman entertaining seven men: he imagined India doing it, and knew that it would have been very different. Annunciata talked to the men as an equal, without shyness, without flirtation, without reserve. Her mind was as good as theirs, her education better than some, and yet there was no challenge in her manner. She was frank and easy, and with all that, perfectly feminine. She was dressed all in white, white satin with a white lace over-dress, the skirts held
back by large pink artificial roses, the bodice sewn with pearls and crystal spars, the same diamonds at her throat, her dark hair dressed high with pearls. She sat at the end of the table, like a snow-queen; Aldrich was on her left, Kit Wren on her right, and when she laughed or spoke to them, they bent forward like trees stirring in an unseen wind.

  The food was simple and elegant, the table service restrained and magnificent. The table was lit by three great silver candelabra, each holding eight candles, and they sat in a pool of light surrounded by darkness that grew as the afternoon closed into night. When they had done eating, they all retired to the drawing-room while the table was cleared, and then went back to spread out plans upon its surface and talk and point and discuss. Arthur felt as though he was in a dream, at the centre of which sat the black and white and glittering figure of the snow-queen. Against the dark mahogany of the table her naked white forearms gleamed as she pointed to some detail of her plan. The men grew heated and argued, not angrily, but passionately. She called Wren 'Kit', and Vanbrugh ‘Van'; they wrangled, Kit for his own brand of restrained elegance, Van for the sumptuous Palladian splendour, and the latter called on Hawksmoor and Arthur to support him.

  ‘Castle Howard - it will be most of all a feminine palace,' he cried, 'now won't it, Ballincrea? Support me, man! Does not your ladyship desire to be cradled in a voluptuous white temple, suitable to your beauty?'

  ‘Does my ladyship?' Annunciata said. 'I don't know that she does. Remember Van, I am Yorkshire born and bred. Grey stone and harsh lines are in my blood.’

  Wren picked her up eagerly. 'But of course, that is what I have been trying to tell these amateurs,' he cried. 'A building must look as though it has grown out of the place where it stands. Yorkshire -'

  ‘The Plain of York, remember,' Vanbrugh broke in. ‘Hardly harsh country, Kit. Green and fertile.'