“Thank you, Mrs. Waplington. I am extremely grateful.”
Cranford’s fears confirmed, he made no comment, but Trelenny noted, when she glanced at him, that his face was set with disapproval; and she remembered the delightful times she had spent with his mother and sister around the pianoforte. Well, there, she thought, with less satisfaction than she would formerly have gained, he has yet another reason to leave off his useless pursuit of me. I have absolutely none of the qualities he wishes in a wife and, she reiterated firmly to herself, he has none I wish in a husband. The matter should not have occurred to her at all, perhaps, at such a time, but she was oblivious to the anomaly.
Cranford excused himself before they were shown their rooms, and Mrs. Waplington watched him depart with a sigh. “Such an elegant young man. Would that I had had a son! But with such a shatterbrain for a mother he would not possess near the air or address of Mr. Ashwicke, I fear. I think there is nothing so delightful as an attentive, gentle manner, do you, Maria?”
She opened the door of a bedchamber done in green— the sofa, the chairs, the draperies, the carpet, the wallpaper, the bedcover all in various shades—and announced, “Maria, this is the room you shall have. I call it the Garden Bed-chamber and have only recently redone it. Do you think perhaps you will need another chair and table? I have a kidney-shaped gueridon in the attic, but I had hoped to have it regilded before using it.”
“Please don’t think of it! How very charming! Not a thing is needed, I promise you.” Mrs. Storwood took in the vases full of fall flowers and the paintings of gardens and still lifes of blooms of all varieties. “I have never seen anything half so…fascinating. Is it your own idea?”
“Yes,” Mrs. Waplington admitted proudly. “I do not at all favor the Egyptian craze—so very heavy, you know. And in town I am apt to miss my extensive gardens, so I specially designed this room to my own taste. You will be the first to occupy it, my dear. I’ve put Trelenny next to you,” she said as she opened the interconnecting door. “Now here, I fear, Andrew has insisted on a more masculine setting, for he says he won’t have the whole house full of female fripperies when his friends come to stay. A trifle sparsely furnished, I fear, and rather austere, but there, men have such simple tastes.”
Since the furniture in the room consisted of a circular rosewood table, a pair of bronze lampstands, an enormous armchair, a smaller chair, a settee, a folding card table, and a secretaire in addition to a dressing table with washstand, the say nothing of a wardrobe and a four-poster bed, Trelenny could only regard her hostess with astonishment. It was perhaps the only room in the house where the wall color could be seen, since there were only two pictures on each wall, and they were Rowlandson prints that bordered on the risqué
When Mrs. Waplington noticed the direction of Trelenny’s eyes, she exclaimed, “I had forgotten those! Andrew will have his little joke. Never mind, I shall replace them for your stay, my dear. Let’s see. Eight. Yes, I am certain I have at least half a dozen paintings of dogs. Do you like dogs? There may be eight. Or there are a dozen views of Somerset stored in the attics, by the most remarkable painter. Have I told you of him, Maria? It is all the fashion to have an artistic protégé, you will find, and I congratulate myself on finding this particular fellow, for he is undoubedly talented. Yes, you will doubtless prefer the landscapes. Not that I don’t appreciate the robust humor of Mr. Rowlandson’s prints, you understand, but they are hardly proper material for a girl of Trelenny’s age to meditate on. And landscapes are so uplifting, don’t you think?”
“Indeed I shall be enchanted to have them,” Trelenny assured her politely, “and I find the room delightful.”
“Splendid. I will leave you and your mother to unpack and rest, my dear, but I hope you will join me in the drawing room when you wish.” She squeezed Trelenny’s hand affectionately. “Where is my mind wandering? I have forgotten to tell you that I have invited a few very close friends to dine with us this evening. Mr. Ashwicke is included, of course, but I fear you will find most of them rather elderly. Still, I cannot think but that you will feel the more comfortable for knowing a few people when you go to the Pump Room in the morning.”
Mrs. Storwood expressed her appreciation and Trelenny’s eyes danced with sheer good spirits. Her very first social occasion away from home! It mattered little what it was. She was in Bath, and her introduction to the world was about to begin.
~ ~ ~
It came as no surprise to Maria Storwood that the “small dinner party” turned out to consist of twenty guests, who were seated at one enormous table in the vast dining hall from which several superfluous items of furniture had been removed for their accommodation. Even in their youth Elsa Waplington had shown a tendency to entertain in accordance with her flamboyant personality—everything on a grand scale, with the best food, the best dinner service, the best people. And yet there was a lack of pretension for all this extravagant manner which endeared Mrs. Waplington to her friends, among whom Mrs. Storwood had been numbered for better than twenty years, maintained without their seeing each other even once, through the medium of letters. Over the years Mrs. Waplington had imparted news of all their acquaintances in a voluminous running journal, while Maria Storwood had written of her husband and child, feeling sadly deficient as a correspondent and frequently wondering whether she had anything to say that would be of interest to Elsa. Had she but known that Elsa lived parenthood vicariously through her, she would not have worried, and would rather have been pleased that she could give so much pleasure with so little effort.
As she dressed for dinner, Mrs. Storwood gazed anxiously in the glass, aware of a nervousness that she had not experienced since she was Trelenny’s age. Mysteriously secretive on who was to be at the gathering, Elsa had hinted that her friend would meet several old acquaintances, but she had such a wicked twinkle in her eyes that Maria’s heart nearly failed her as she settled a blue silk shawl about her shoulders. She turned to the maid to ask, “Is Trelenny ready?”
“Yes, ma’am. Shall I have her come to you?”
“If you would.” She felt an unusual burst of pride when her daughter glided into the room in a white crape frock over a primrose sarcenet slip, the bodice ornamented with deep vandykes of primrose velvet. Her headdress was of three folds of primrose crêpe lisse, with rows of pearls beneath, placed between large bows of her silken blonde hair, which was arranged in festoons of plaits on the left, and a single bow on the right fastened by a pearled comb. “You…look beautiful, my love. Never say Alice did your hair!”
“Mrs. Waplington sent her dresser round to do something special. Do you like it?”
“It’s delightful.”
“Yes,” Trelenny said thoughtfully, “I think it makes me look a bit older, don’t you? I’ll have Alice peek at the guests so she can experiment with some new styles for me. Isn’t it exciting, Mama, to be here at last?”
“It is, love. I hope you are not in agonies over your introduction to a lot of strangers. How well I remember my own first formal party. My hands were like ice and I hadn’t the least color in my cheeks.” She took her daughter’s hands and found them a great deal warmer than her own. “Your cheeks are not so rosy as usual, Trelenny.”
Her daughter grinned. “Mrs. Waplington’s dresser thought a touch of powder would disguise the freckles.”
“Oh.”
“Shall I wash it off?” Trelenny asked anxiously. “The freckles don’t seem half so prominent as usual, anyway, for the days we spent in the carriage.”
“No, love, you look wonderful just as you are. Pray pay no heed to me. I own I am a great deal more nervous than you appear to be.” With a puzzled shake of her head, she linked her arm with her daughter’s. What Trelenny lacked in an air of modesty and a retiring deportment she would fully make up for in her natural enthusiasm, Mrs. Storwood decided with confidence. Refusing to allow herself any misgivings on this head, she proceeded with her daughter to the drawing room,
where she presented Trelenny to Mr. Waplington, who had regrettably been kept from home the whole of the day.
Andrew Waplington was half a head shorter than his wife, and a wiry, energetic man of forty. “Maria, forgive my not being here to welcome you. A matter of business, and most pressing. Miss Storwood, an honor to meet you. The image of your mother, as Elsa told me. Is your room comfortable?”
Since Mrs. Waplington had forgotten to have the prints removed and replaced, Trelenny’s eyes sparkled with mischief as she assured him, “It is more than comfortable, sir, and we are very sensible of your kindness in taking us into your home.”
Mrs. Storwood watched fascinated as he conversed with Trelenny in a sort of rapid firing of questions, followed by the most profound attention to her answers. No shyness inhibited her daughter from answering with frankness his inquiries as to her home, her father, her education, and her hopes for her visit to Bath. As the first guest was announced he turned to Mrs. Storwood and pronounced judgment. “You’ve raised a very lively girl, Maria, and I congratulate you. No retiring flower here, by God, and I’m pleased to see it, if you want the truth of the matter. Bless me if you don’t find a parcel of milk-and-water misses at this watering hole, and nothing could be more boring than a chit who’s afraid to open her mouth for fear of putting herself forward unbecomingly. What’s that, my dear?” he asked as his wife recalled his attention.
“Our guests,” Mrs. Waplington scolded with a touch of her painted gauze fan to his arm.
Although her courage was reinforced by Mr. Waplington’s favorable opinion of Trelenny, Maria Storwood nevertheless felt grateful that Cranford was among the first to arrive. There were other familiar faces, of course, but it was in most cases more of a strain than a pleasure to renew old acquaintances. Too often she was conscious of the enormous gap in time that separated her from this fashionable gathering. Did they pity her for her years of retirement away from the social scene? Would they accept Trelenny, with her open countenance and exuberance—and her freckles? She glanced over to see her daughter, under Cranford’s watchful eye, greet each newcomer with lowered eyes and an expression of her extreme pleasure at the honor done her. And she heard Cranford murmur, “Well done, Trelenny. I hope the strain will not prove too much for you.”
“If it does, I shall faint dead away on some sofa and declare I am so overcome with such distinguished notice that I am unable to bear my joy,” her daughter retorted in an undervoice, all the while smiling shyly at him.
“You won’t like it if they burn feathers under your nose.”
But Mrs. Storwood entirely lost the rest of their good-natured bickering. A voice at her elbow, a voice that had once been very familiar, startled her so badly that her fan dropped unnoticed from her nerveless hands. The gentleman who retrieved it smiled bemusedly at her. “I should have known. First, I saw this young lady,” indicating Trelenny “yesterday and then I received an indubitably provocative invitation from Elsa. Her note said that although my acceptance would give her great pleasure, she thought my pleasure would be greater.” He lifted her icy hand to his lips. “Maria Champion... Storwood, after all these years. My good fortune overwhelms me.”
“Mr. Wheldrake,” she replied breathlessly, accepting her fan without noticing, and promptly dropping it again. “Elsa did not mention you were in town. Thank you. May I present you to my daughter, Trelenny Storwood?”
He turned to the girl with an apologetic smile. “You will forgive me staring at you yesterday, I hope. I thought for a moment I had suffered some sort of attack or had been illogically transported back in time. Is this your first stay in Bath?”
“Yes, sir, we only arrived yesterday, shortly before we saw you in the street. May I present Mr. Ashwicke, our neighbor and escort?” Trelenny observed the older man’s easy grace in acknowledging the introduction, and his equal ease in returning to conversation with her mother, whom he soon maneuvered out of the growing crowd of guests to a retired seat in the corner.
“I don’t see Mr. Storwood here. Did he not accompany you?”
“No, he doesn’t travel owing to a weak heart,” Mrs. Storwood replied. “Elsa wrote some years ago that your wife had died. I am so sorry for you.”
“Thank you.”
His head bowed slightly at her remark and she noticed the silvering at his temples. How very many years had passed, and yet the graying was the only significant sign of his aging. “You have children of your own, I believe.”
The solemnity vanished from his face to be replaced by an engaging animation. “Two boys, slightly younger than your daughter, I should say. They’re at Harrow just now, and kicking up every sort of lark. I expect them to be sent down at any time,” he said ruefully.
“Sometimes I think we should have sent Trelenny to school. Not that she isn’t well read, for her father took a hand in her education and she is very quick. She lacks the ... restraint one sees in young ladies educated away from home, though.” She lifted her eyes from her hands. “She is the dearest girl, you understand, and I would far rather she not suffer from the shyness which so distresses me, but—”
“I thought her very properly reserved.”
“She’s just behaving that way to taunt Cranford,” Mrs. Storwood confessed. “They are forever at loggerheads, and largely over this very matter. Listen to me going on about my concerns as though they could be of the least interest to anyone else. Do forgive me.”
“Not at all. I’m honored with your confidence after all these years.” He shook his head wonderingly as he smiled gently at her. “You are still as lovely as ever, Maria.”
Two flushed spots appeared in her cheeks. Just as though I were a girl of Trelenny’s age, she thought in confusion. “You flatter me, Mr. Wheldrake.” In attempting to fan her warm face, she once again dropped the fan, and stared at it helplessly.
Mr. Wheldrake retrieved it for the third time and tucked it in his pocket. “I’ve always thought ivory too slippery a material to use for fans. Will you be going to London with your daughter?”
“No, we can only be away for a few weeks. This is all the come-out Trelenny will have, so I am intent on seeing she enjoys herself to the fullest. She’s never been to a ball or an assembly, not even to a dinner party so large as this. I really shouldn’t leave her.”
“Of course not.” He rose and walked with her toward Trelenny and Cranford. “I hope you will allow me to assist Mr. Ashwicke in escorting you about town. He probably has friends of his own with whom he will wish to spend time, and I promise you I am entirely at your disposal.”
Mrs. Storwood found it difficult to meet his hopeful gaze. “I have worried about that. It seems wrong to tie up all his time and yet…”
“You had no one else to serve you, but now you have. I could ask for no greater pleasure than to be called upon.”
“Thank you, Mr. Wheldrake. I have no right to ask such a favor of you.”
“You have every right, and you used to call me Frederick.”
“That was a very long time ago,” she said faintly.
“In years, perhaps, but not in memory.”
His gray eyes sought to hold hers, but she quickly looked toward her daughter with a fond smile. “Have you met everyone, dear?”
“Yes, but I am quite at a loss to remember half their names, Mama,” Trelenny whispered.
“Repeat them as you are introduced, and as often as you can in conversation without sounding forced, love. We’re going in to dinner now. I’m sure Cranford will take you.”
“I . . . think he’d rather not. He’s met an old friend,” Trelenny said forlornly.
* * *
Chapter 11
Cranford had, in fact, met several old friends. As he stood beside Trelenny and was introduced to their fellow guests his eyes wandered to the door where Lord and Lady Babthorpe were entering; he a man of sixty-odd and she a lady of perhaps five-and-twenty. It was just the sort of match Trelenny had deplored the previous day and as they
approached she pinched Cranford’s finger and murmured, “A gay-beard with a youthful maiden.” She was considerably surprised, therefore, when Cranford greeted them as previous acquaintances.
“Lady Babthorpe, Lord Babthorpe, a pleasure to see you again. May I introduce Miss Storwood? She and her mother are neighbors in Westmorland.”
Owing to his reduced financial circumstances, Cranford had not been about town much in the previous two years, but his acquaintance with the couple went back some time before that, and though his knowledge of Lord Babthorpe was slight, his acquaintance with his lady greatly exceeded it. Lady Babthorpe had an air of provocativeness which was proclaimed in her slightly pouting lips, her loosely flowing black hair, and her sleepy eyes as well as her alluring figure. “Ah, Mr. Ashwicke. I can see Bath holds more interest than I had thought this year.”
Her husband, who came to Bath for the waters, drew himself up like a bantam cock (which he greatly resembled, to Trelenny’s mind) and glared at the younger man. “Bath is of all places the most tiresome. No variety compared to London, and a batch of loose hangers-on into the bargain. We come only for its health-restoring properties and have little time for social intercourse.”
“One doesn’t, of course, refuse an invitation from Mrs. Waplington or any other of equal importance,” Lady Babthorpe said with a speaking look at Cranford that very nearly caused Trelenny to blush.
“It would be a great deal too bad to see such a charming lady retired from society,” Cranford replied with practiced gallantry.
“She is much in my society,” Lord Babthorpe retorted, “and that is just as it should be. You are not likely to see much of her.”
“Quel dommage,” Cranford murmured, before turning the conversation. “Miss Storwood has not been to Bath previously, and has yet to sample the waters.”
“They have a frightful taste,” Lady Babthorpe informed Trelenny negligently, “but I dare say you will journey regularly to the Pump Room with all the other misses on their daily round.”
Holiday in Bath Page 10