Best Behaviour

18

Best Behaviour

    If the lady wearing spangled lilac at the play had had certain hopes of Noël Amory, they were doomed to disappointment. He did not call on her the following morning, as he had promised. Instead he called on Mrs Urqhart.

    “Don’t be a fool, Noel,” said the old lady to his indignant outburst. “In the first place Nan ain’t a fortune-hunter on the catch for a third husband, she’s a respectable widder, in the second place, she’s richer than I am, and in the third place, it was me as asked Cousin Clorinda to keep an eye on her. And Nan wouldn’t never do nothing to hurt Cherry, nor to lead her into no bad company, neither. And last but not least, sounds as if you did not half enjoy having her ‘precipitate herself’, as you put it, into yer arms! Now!” She panted.

    Silence. Mrs Urqhart just waited.

    “Very well,” he said heavily. “But how in God’s name does she come to know the fat female in pink satin who was hanging on Curwellion’s arm?”

    “Pink satin, were it?” she said with relish, shaking slightly. “That were my fault: she met the creature at the house of an old friend of mine. Petty-bourgeois, perfectly respectable, only they got a cousin what ain’t.”

    “So it’s true,” he said slowly: “it was a chapter of accidents, as she said.”

    “Aye.”

    There was a long and thoughtful silence in the warm sitting-room.

     “So, what about Cherry?” asked Mrs Urqhart at last.

    Noël got up and walked over to the window. “I have had a letter from her,” he said, staring into the street.

    “Aye, she showed it me.”

    His nostrils flared. “And you let her send it,” he said grimly.

    “She is a big girl, Noël. And I ain’t her Ma.”

    “She is— ” He broke off. “An unfledged chick,” he said in a muffled voice.

    “So does you mean to marry her?” she asked baldly.

    “I—Yes,” he said stiffly. “I—I think I’ve gone about it all wrong. I suppose, at the back of my mind, there was always the thought that if we discovered we did not suit we could break it off with no fuss. But I—I do not know how, let alone why! But over the past few months I seem to have erected a picture of her in my mind as my wife, that—that will not go away.”

    “That’s promisin’.”

    “Is it?” he said dully.

    “Uh—well, depends what sort of picture, I suppose,” said Mrs Urqhart lamely. She looked at him cautiously and cleared her throat. “I don’t mean to pry, Noël, but do you want her? Acos that be important, don’t let’s pretend it ain’t.”

    After a moment he admitted in a low voice: “Yes. Is that what you wish to hear?”

    “More or less, aye. At the same time, you has a picture of her as your wife, right? With you down in Devon, and so forth?”

    He gave a tiny shrug. “Going with me to the play and protecting me from creatures like Mrs Pink Satin: mm.”

    “And from Lady Spangled Lilac?”

    “By God, your spies are everywhere! Er—well, yes, very much so.”

    “Noël, lovey, you is the only person what can protect you from the likes of her.”

    “Yes. But I— Sometimes I feel the effort would be easier—in fact that it would not even be an effort—if—if I had Cherry by my side.”

    She went up to him and patted his arm briskly. “I think you is well on the way, me lovey.”

    “That’s good.” he said wryly.

    “You has to give her time. Try not to have a fight if she still insists on breaking it off. Remember she ain’t doing it because you is you, she is doing it because of what her notion of honour is.”

    “Yes,” he said tightly.

    “And—and try treating her like a woman and not like some possession you is sure of.”

    “I did not think I was—” He broke off. “Very well,” he said stiffly. “I shall try.”

    In the wake of their encounter at the playhouse both Nan and Noël, though the latter did not phrase it to himself quite so, were determined to be on their best behaviour.

    London, however had different ideas. For one thing, the encounter at the play had not been without witnesses. Even though Nan had believed herself to know nobody in the house save Mrs Storey, there had been other eyes there who had recognised her.

    “So that was Hugo Benedict’s widow?” said the Fürstin von Maltzahn-Dressen.

    May Beresford nodded her curly head. “Yes, indeed, Aunt Fanny! Did you not think her pretty?”

    Fanny von Maltzahn-Dressen, who had in her day been a great beauty, inclined her still lovely head, whereon the fair curls had silvered quite deliciously, and said slowly, in her distinctive, husky voice that had an enchanting little break in it: “Indeed. Ve-ry much in the Southern European style. Fritzl would have said, the look of a ripe peach.”

    May nodded respectfully, even though, as was well known in the family, and indeed in European diplomatic circles, “Fritzl” had not been the late Fürst von Maltzahn-Dressen, but Fanny Beresford von Maltzahn-Dressen’s lover. It had been an excellent match; indeed, for a mere Miss Beresford, a great catch; and if the marriage had not been precisely a conventional one, Fanny had been happy enough. But she had also been happy enough to return to the land of her birth on the Prince’s death. The Continent had never been the same, she was wont to declare mournfully, since that monster, Bonaparte. There were, too, the additional points that the von Maltzahn-Dressen principal seat was a huge, cold, draughty castle, that the town houses, if marbled and magnificent, were also cold and draughty, and that the hunting lodge which had been her favourite residence in her husband’s country was now all too frequently occupied by her second son and his string quartet. Fanny was fond enough of music but she was not fond of Gerhard’s habit of donning the silks, satins and powdered wigs of the last century, with the quartet likewise. Most especially since they were silk and satin skirts, not coats, though the musicians were all men.

    The robust Rowena Beresford had very little in common with her late husband’s sister, but they got on well enough. And Fanny’s offer to launch May into Society had been too good to refuse: she could meet only the best people, being launched from the Fürstin’s house. So at the beginning of April Mrs Beresford and May had moved into the gracious mansion near the Park which sheltered the Fürstin  von Maltzahn-Dressen, her red-haired daughter, Adélaïde, and Adélaïde’s fluffy Pomeranian, Pfötchen.

    “Did you notice the gentleman with her, May, my love?” murmured Fanny.

    May blushed. “Yes: her brother, Mr Baldaya.”

    “Er—oh, yes, the pretty dark boy. But did you not remark the brown-haired gentleman in the box? During the second interval.”

    “Um, I think there was, yes.”

    “Mm. Noël Amory,” said Fanny von Maltzahn-Dressen slowly. “A pretty enough fellow. I am very sure she thought so.”

    “Aunt Fanny, Sir Noël Amory is engaged to Cherry Chalfont!” she gasped.

    “Oh? I think I do not know— No, stay, they are connexions of the Coulton-Whassetts. And what is Miss Chalfont like, my dear?”

    “Um, well, quite pretty, I think, Aunt Fanny. Slim: black curls, and a pale skin. Big deep blue eyes. She—she has a waif-like look, so I have always thought,” she added shyly. It was a sentiment that her Mamma would have rubbished majestically.

    But Aunt Fanny nodded and smiled, and said: “My Mamma was used to say the same of Mirabelle Coulton-Whassett. Oddly enough, the men would run wild over her.”—May blushed deeply at this sophisticated utterance in her presence but the Fürstin did not remark her.—“Well, there is no fathoming the creatures, after all. But certainly the ripe-peach type is what Noël Amory has always been known to favour, heretofore.“

    “Um—oh: Luh-Lady Benedict?” faltered May.

    “Precisely. This Season promises to be quite in-tri-guing. –Run along, May, my dear,” she said kindly, patting her hand.

    “Thank you, Aunt Fanny!” gasped May, bobbing and disappearing.

    Fanny von Maltzahn-Dressen stared into space for a while. Then she rang the bell. When a footman came in she sent him for Smithers, the butler. Smithers had been the von Maltzahn-Dressens’ butler on the occasion of His Highness’s appointment to a diplomatic post at the Court of St James’s some years since, and had stayed with them. He knew everything. And if he did not he made it his business to find out.

    “I believe that Lady Amory the younger is not in town,” she said without preamble.

    Smithers bowed. “No, indeed, Your Highness.”

    There was a pause. Smithers merely looked respectful.

    “I knew Viola Whittaker when we were girls... Mon dieu, what a time ago it seems, to be sure,” said the Fürstin dreamily.  “It is Devon, I know that.”

    “I will ascertain the address, Your Highness.”

    “Thank you. And send me in pen and paper directly, if you please.”

    He bowed, and withdrew.

    “Yes,” said Fanny von Maltzahn-Dressen to herself on a grim note that was most unlike her usual languid tones. “If that boy of hers is in a way to make a silly scandal, Viola had best be warned.” She paused. “Though if he be the sort of fool she was in her heyday, there is probably little anyone can do!”

    May’s Mamma would not wish to hear the shocking news that Sir Noël Amory was flirting with Lady Benedict while he was engaged to Cherry Chalfont: she would condemn her for spreading gossip. So May went upstairs to impart it to Adélaïde, faute de mieux. As she had expected, her cousin was lying on the floor in the old schoolroom—an attitude strictly forbidden both young ladies—playing with the fluffy Pfötchen. May joined her immediately.

    The red-headed Adélaïde who had very little right to the name von Maltzahn-Dressen was unlike her tall, slender, languidly pretty mother in almost every respect. She was short and plumpish, and she took no interest in dress. And she was, May had discovered with something like thrilled horror, almost entirely illiterate. True, she could chatter in four languages: but she could barely write her name in any. And she could not do the simplest sum. She could play the pianoforte quite prettily, but only by ear. And she was amazingly ignorant about such things as European geography, though she knew several cities quite intimately. She had, in fact, resisted any and all efforts at formal education. Nor could she set a stitch. She had explained to May that it did not matter: she would be married off to some boring princeling who was not of her own choice, however ignorant or ill-favoured she was. She was not, in fact, ill-favoured but quite pretty, with round hazel eyes and thick, natural curls.

    “Boring,” she said definitely at the end of May's narrative.

    May flushed. “You would not say so, if you knew poor Cherry! She is a lovely person!”

    “Vell, I am sorry, if she is a friend of yours,” she said politely. “Does she have a horse?”

    “No! For goodness’ sake, Adélaïde! Can you think of nothing but horses? How did you come by this—this single-minded passion?”

    “It is not my only passion: I also care for Pfötchen.”

    May sighed.

    “It is the Claveringhams’ dance next week. I am sure it vill be boring.”

    May groaned loudly. She looked round wildly for a weapon. There was very little to hand, so she seized a cushion that had somehow got onto the floor, and commenced to beat her cousin unmercifully with it. Adélaïde duly yelped and grabbed at it, and the two young ladies rolled on the floor, shrieking and giggling. Forgetting for the nonce the boring drudgery of the London débutante’s life.

    “Ah,” said the Fürstin von Maltzahn-Dressen with interest, as there was a stir by the door, and General Baldaya and his nephew were seen to join the Portuguese Ambassador and his wife as they received their guests. “That is she—is it not, May, my dear?”

    May nodded nervously, avoiding her mother’s eye. Lady Benedict was in a black silk gown, with a little train. True, it was more than sufficiently low cut, and its puff sleeves were delightful, but even if she was a grown-up lady and a widow, she was not very old, after all: how dreadful to have to wear black to a party!

    Mrs Beresford looked. Her colour heightened alarmingly. “That cannot be—”

    “Yes, it is, Mamma,” said May in a stifled voice.

    “Elle a le type portugais, bien entendu... Mais charmante,” decided Fanny.

    Jack Beresford had come up to town in time to be dragooned into escorting his relatives to a boring Embassy reception. Now he was extremely glad he had done so. “Those rumours about her must have been completely ill-founded, Mamma. As you see, she is received at the Embassy.”

    “Received at the Embassy with marked en-thu-si-asm,” smiled Fanny von Maltzahn-Dressen with her throaty little laugh as the Ambassador’s lady eagerly presented two young men to Lady Benedict. “—Do but look, Adélaïde: now she presents Panardouche and Papelardouche to the poor young woman!”

    “Ja. Rotten seats,” said Adélaïde without interest.

    Mrs Beresford looked weakly at the Portuguese Ambassador’s plain and yellowish sons bowing profoundly to Lady Benedict. “Er—what did you call those young men, Fanny?”

    “Oh: they are the nicknames they were known by when we were in Vienna.”

    “Mamma and her friends were playing a silly rhyming game one day,” explained Adélaïde. “Everyone and everything had to have a name that ended in ouche or douche.”

    “So what do Pap-something-douche and Pan-something-douche mean?” asked May eagerly.

    “Panard is a word one would use of a horse. Splay-legged,” said Adélaïde, wrinkling up her little snub nose. “The elder and thinner, you see?”

    “Ye-es... Oh!” gulped May as the crowd shifted a little and she had a view of how the eider of the two yellowish ones was standing.

    “And the other word is papelard, but I do not know the English.”

    “Sanctimonious,” murmured Fanny, turning the lorgnette on young Mr Baldaya. “A very pret-ty boy.”

    Jack glanced at his mother with a mocking expression on his lean, dark face. “I think I shall go and welcome her Ladyship to town,” he said on a sly note. “If I can get near her, that is. Excuse me, Aunt Fanny—Mamma.” He bowed and was off.

    Fanny watched with interest as her sister-in-law reddened angrily. “What is it? –You did not have hopes of the Carvalho dos Santos boys, I trust?”

    “What? No!”

    “Even Oncle Pom-Pom would not consider either of them as eligibles!” said Adélaïde on a scornful note.

    Her mother sighed. “That will do, I think, Adélaïde.”

    “Who is Oncle Pom-Pom?” hissed May, as the older ladies’ attention returned to Lady Benedict.

    “My Papa’s younger brother. He is a terrible old match-maker.”

    “Oh,” said May, nodding wisely.

    Adélaïde got rather close. “He is said to have been the lover of the late Queen of France!” she hissed.

    May’s jaw sagged. “He can’t have been! I mean, if he is your Papa’s younger... I mean, she went to the guillotine thirty years ago, did she not?”

    Adélaïde looked vague. “Marie Antoinette of Austria.”

    “Yes, precisely! How old is he?”

    Adélaïde looked vague. “Old. Vell, younger than Papa.”

    “Mm...” May was so busy doing arithmetic that she did not notice Jack going up to Lady Benedict and bowing deeply to her. But Mrs Beresford most certainly did.

    Mr Amory had brazenly invited himself to his nephew’s house for dinner that evening. Ignoring Noël’s representations to the effect that he was not welcome, and informing him that that was what uncles were for. Over the repast he said casually: “Bumped into young Cecil Jerningham at White’s t’other day.”

    Noël sighed. “What the Devil was Cecil doing at White’s?”

    “Mm? Oh! There with his uncle. –Is he?” he asked himself. Noël sighed again. “Commander Sir Arthur Jerningham.”

    “All is explained,” he murmured.

    “Eh? Oh, aye: they would certainly not let Cecil in by himself!” he said with a laugh.

    “Bobby, is there a point to this story?” asked Noël heavily.

    “Um—mm.” He coughed.

    Noël was by now on the alert: when Bobby got even more round-aboutish than usual, it was generally a sign he had news which he was not entirely sure would be welcomed by his audience. “Just say it,” he advised acidly.

    “Well, Cecil is at the Horse Guards, out of course. Had it from General Sir Francis Kernohan himself that General Baldaya’s come to London to put things right for Lady Benedict! –She’s his niece or some such.”

    “Oh. Well, I am glad to hear it, both for her sake and for little Lizzie’s,” he said stiffly.

    “Er—yes. Well, of course!” Bobby smiled uneasily. “So—uh—you goin’ to the Portuguese Ambassador’s reception tonight?”

    “Apparently: yes,” replied his nephew smoothly.

    One of the pairs of watching eyes at the Friday's performance of The Taming of the Shrew had belonged to Sophia, Lady Creigh. She was an old friend of the lady in the spangled lilac, and had been fascinated to see Sir Noël Amory firstly in Fenella Hartington-Pyke’s company, and then leaving her company for that of the stunning dark young woman in a box further round the circle.

    Had she been in town entirely on her own account Sophia would not have expected an invitation to an Embassy reception: Sir William Creigh was an obscure country gentleman. But this year her brother had invited her to act as his hostess for the Season, at the same time launching her eldest daughter from his house. Sophia had been thrilled to accept: with her kind uncle as her sponsor, Anne would have the entrée everywhere! Sophia’s duties would also include chaperoning her youngest sister and her cousin’s daughter—the latter proposed and seconded by the cousin’s wife—but she was of an amiable temperament and did not mind how many extra débutantes were, as her sister had drily put it, foisted upon her.

    So tonight she was in charge of three young ladies: Anne, a plump little pink-cheeked, brown-haired damsel, doing her Mamma credit in embroidered white muslin with white satin ribbons and the strand of pearls her kind uncle had bestowed upon her; Cousin Lilias, a dashing yellow-haired girl with china-blue eyes, sparkling in blue; and the dark-haired Iris, at twenty-four the oldest of the trio, glowing in an apricot gauze which set off her lovely creamy-skinned, peachy-cheeked looks to perfection. Sophia Creigh was very pleased with the three of them. In especial as they were all on their very best behaviour tonight. Being almost as impressed with the company as was their chaperone.

    Lady Creigh’s lorgnette was a very recent acquisition: she fumbled with it a little, then managed to raise it in the appropriate style. Ooh, it was that lady!

    “Whom are you looking at, Mamma?” asked Anne.

    Lilias tip-toed. “Oh, it is the dark lady we saw at the play, is it not, Aunt Sophia? She must be in half-mourning, as you thought: look, tonight she is wearing black.”

    “Yes; lovelier than ever: Fenella Hartington-Pyke will be green as grass!” said Lady Creigh unguardedly.

    “Why, Mamma?” asked Anne innocently.

    “We thought she was your friend, Sophia,” murmured Iris, less innocently.

    “Iris, really!” Lady Creigh re-focussed the lorgnette. Her old friend certainly looked not best pleased at the sight of the new arrival. Though the greenness as such was possibly merely the reflection of the unfortunate shade of satin she had chosen to wear tonight.

    “Who is the dark lady, Aunt Sophia?” asked Lilias.

    “I have no notion, my dear.”

    “Perhaps my uncle knows her!” said Anne on a hopeful note.

    Sophia signalled to her brother, who was talking with some gentlemen a few yards away. He came over to them, smiling. “Well? Is this enough notables for you, Anne?”

    Anne pinkened, dimpled, and nodded.

    “Who is that, my dear?” asked Sophia, inclining her head in the direction of where the lovely dark lady had just been joined by Jack Beresford.

    “Mr Beresford, unless my eyes have something very wrong with them,” noted Iris drily.

    “Good gracious, yes, so it is! I wonder if his mother—”

    “Yes,” said Iris, drier than ever.

    “Oh, yes! –I meant the dark lady he is speaking with, Robert.”

    “Lady Benedict,” said her brother shortly.

    “Ooh, do you know her, Uncle Robert?” breathed Anne. “Is she not exquisite?”

    His nostrils flared. “Indeed. –You will all know her very soon. I had not expected— I had no notion she was in town.”

    The oddness of his tone, not to say his disjointed utterance, put Lady Creigh on the alert. “What on earth is it, Robert? Who is she?”

    He took a deep breath. “I need to speak to you all. Come into that little side room, please.”

    Obediently his wondering relatives went into the little side room with Lord Keywes.

    Nan was having a lovely time. She had arrived at the reception escorted by General Sir Francis; the Portuguese Ambassador and Senhora Carvalho dos Santos had both spoken very kindly indeed to her; and Uncle Érico and Cousin Mauro had immediately placed themselves at her side. And Dom was behaving himself very properly, even though before the event, though allowing that General Baldaya was “not a bad old steeck, eef he be fat as a flawn and the worst tactician since Vercingetorix were a boy” and that the mild-mannered Cousin Mauro seemed “acceptable enough”, he had predicted that the place would be “full of yaller-faced Portugees all tryin’ to thrust their snaggle-toothed daughters upon one.” And had complained bitterly that he could not invite Mr Ferdy Sotheby to accompany them.

    Mrs Urqhart had seconded him in these opinions, though rather weakly: she had been overcome to have been included in the invitation. And was doing the Embassy justice in bright purple satin heavily embroidered with seed pearls, crystal beads and gold and green thread in an Oriental pattern of long-tailed pheasants and curly-leaved peonies, with a matching turban. The Embassy was bright with orders, jewels and satin gowns: but if Mrs Urqhart’s gown was the brightest there, so also were her diamonds.

    Nan had hesitated over her jewels, but in the end had chosen only pearl drops. They were black pearls: Mrs Urqhart had goggled at their size and silvery sheen and said numbly: “Lordy, I think I’d kill for them earrings, deary. Never seen nothing to touch ’em!'

    General Baldaya, who was a stout elderly widower, had shown a somewhat regrettable tendency from their very first meeting to flirt with Mrs Urqhart; Mrs Urqhart, vastly entertained, had encouraged him, explaining later to Nan and Dom that “he thinks he is irresistible to us Englishwomen with them furrin black eyes of his, you see, fat though ’e be. On the whole it be more fun to let ’im believe it than to disillusion the poor fool.” Dom, from thinking she was not quite a fit person for his sister to know, had rapidly fallen under Mrs Urqhart's spell and had now become one of her most loyal supporters: the main purpose of his being present tonight, as he had carefully explained to his sister, was to watch the progress of the elderly flirtation!

    Mrs Urqhart had provisioned herself with a giant fan of white ostrich plumes and was now using it to great effect: either rolled up, to bash the General's arm or dig him in his well-covered ribs, or unfurled, to flutter coyly before her face.

    “’Ere! That’ll do!” she choked as the fat old gentleman whispered some outrageous compliment in her ear. She bashed him on the arm again, though somewhat half-heartedly and noted, her eyes fixed on the door: “Oops.”

    Nan followed her gaze. She went very pink. “Surely he ees not received here?” she gulped.

    The thin-faced Lord Curwellion came in slowly, quizzing glass lifted.

    “Shall we speak to her now?” said Lady Creigh, as Lady Benedict was perceived to be merely chatting with her chaperone and with General Sir Francis Kernohan.

    “Er, yes—No, wait,” said Lord Keywes, as old Hugh Throgmorton came up to Lady Benedict on the arm of the Prussian Ambassador and proceeded to effect introductions. The Ambassador seemed impressed. So did his aide, who was with them. So did she, to judge by the way she was smiling up at the fellow.

    As they hesitated, Captain Lord Vyvyan Gratton-Gordon, who by rights surely should have been at his cousins’ party this evening, unless Robert had it wrong and that was another night, came up laughing with the younger Rowbotham brother and a slim, brown-haired young man— Oh. Henri-Louis de Bourbon. A very, very minor sprig off that vast shady tree, but... Terrific bowings and scrapings ensued. The young man who was known by his intimates and those who wished to seem more intimate than they were as “le petit Monsieur” appeared charmed. Lady Benedict also appeared charmed...

    “I suppose you will say that for diplomatic reasons it would be unwise to introduce ourselves to her notice at this precise moment,” drawled Iris.

    Robert frowned. “Iris; we cannot possibly present ourselves as a family of relations she has never met when she is with a crowd like that: it would be unkind and—and embarrassing.”

    “On the other hand, if we don’t present ourselves and she realises who we are,” noted Lilias with a malicious sparkle in the big china-blue eyes, “it could be even more unkind. Though not necessarily embarrassing, of course.”

    Irritably Robert reflected that it was high time Cousin Lilias was married off: she was getting to be a cattish old maid.

    “Perhaps you might go up to her quietly by yourself, Robert, at—at some other juncture,” offered Sophia, starting off brave but ending up on a quaver.

    Suddenly Iris tucked her arm in hers. “Yes. Because allow me to say, brother dear, if you’ve put your foot in it with this new cousin already, I for one don’t wish to see Sophia bear the brunt of it.”

    Robert reddened. “No such thing!”

    “It will have been Aunt Kate,” noted the sapient Lilias.

    His relatives stared expectantly at Robert.

    “Uh—” He bit his lip.

    “Some diplomatist you must have made!” said Iris with a crow of laughter. “The answer is writ all over you!”

    “Oh, Lor’!” said Bobby with a laugh in his voice as they came in, rather late, received Senhora Carvalho dos Santos’s assurances that they were not late, and saw Lady Benedict enthroned on a sofa, surrounded by admirers.

    “Old Sir Francis Kernohan is before you, it seems,” said his nephew drily.

    “And young Jack Beresford: dark young fellow. Currently fightin’ it out with— Good gad, that ain’t Wilf Rowbotham?” he croaked. “It is! Currently fightin’ it out with Wilf Rowbotham and General Sir Francis as to whose glass of fizz she is goin’ to accept.”

    “She will take none of them,” drawled Noël.

    “A monkey on the General,” he said instantly.

    “Where are your eyes, Bobby? –Superior tactics!” said Noël with a laugh as the Duke of Wellington came up, presented her Ladyship with a glass, and walked away with her on his arm.

    “Taken the military men by storm, ain’t she?” said Bobby, his shoulders shaking. “And I say, that back in the naval dress uniform is Arthur Jerningham, or I am a Dutchman!”

    “And not merely the naval and military men: the Exquisite next to it is old Hugh Throgmorton!” choked Noël.

    “By God, it is,” said Bobby limply as the huddle of Nan’s disconsolate swains broke up into the usual rabble that succeeded His Grace’s battles and began to limp off the field licking its wounds. “By God, that is Ceddie Rowbotham!” he croaked.

    “Eh? No, no: it’s dear old Wilf.”

    “No! There! Next to Kernohan!”

    “Good gad,” said Noel limply as the stoutish figure next to General Sir Francis turned its head, to reveal itself as, indeed, Sir Cedric Rowbotham, former Ambassador from the Court of St James to the Prussian Court.

    “Military, naval, and diplomatic!” choked Bobby. “A rout!”

    “It was worth coming, just to see it,” sighed Noël happily.

    “Aye!”

    Sniggering, they went off arm-in-arm towards the refreshments. Nevertheless, Noël noted drily, his uncle's eyes kept roaming the room in search of her.

    To Nan’s great relief, Lord Curwellion had not come near her the entire evening. It must be because she was well protected, she concluded, taking a very firm vow never to appear in Society without some large male at her side. Not Dom. Because of his Lordship’s presence she instinctively clung rather more to General Sir Francis Kernohan than she normally would have done. She did not perceive the gallant elderly gentleman's pride and pleasure in this, but Mrs Urqhart did, and sighed over it a little.

    As the evening wore on various persons began to slip away, often mentioning to Nan on a hopeful note, if they were male persons, that they were going on to so-and-so, and would they see her—? No? What a pity. Au revoir, then.

    “Should you care to go on somewhere?” asked General Sir Francis, smiling.

    “I own I should like eet of all theengs—but weell eet not mean keeping dear Mrs Urqhart up too late?”

    He looked wryly at the group of gentlemen surrounding Mrs Urqhart’s and General Baldaya’s sofa, whence proceeded roars of laughter, but said nicely: “I shall ask her. Pray excuse me a moment, my dear.” He bowed and before Nan could gasp “Don’t!” had left her.

    One of the louder gentlemen in Mrs Urqhart's group laboured under the soubriquet of “Fuzzy”—Admiral Dauntry to the hoi-polloi. He was a close friend of the Duke of Wellington’s but also a very old friend of General Sir Francis’s. Nan watched fearfully: would her escort be absorbed into the group? Gentlemen, even the best-behaved, were so apt to let that happen...

    “Now,” said Iris grimly. “She is alone.”

    “Er—oh, very well.” Sophia, Lilias and Anne were chatting with friends at a little remove: before Lord Keywes could signal to them his irritating sister had grabbed his arm and was unceremoniously pulling him towards Lady Benedict's sofa.

    They were pre-empted by a slim older gentleman who went up and bowed very low.

    “I neither know nor care who that is, if it be the Prince of Orange or the Prince of Darkness himself, I care not: come on!” said Iris crossly.

    Lord Keywes’s lips tightened. “Iris, if she knows that fellow—”

    Iris ignored him and forged ahead.

    Lord Curwellion straightened. He had unusual amber eyes, Nan saw with a little start: they sparkled maliciously. “Rather different company from t’other night, ain’t it?” he drawled.

    “For both of us,” returned Nan grimly.

    He gave a little laugh.

    “Go away,” she said grimly.

    “Or pretty Francis Kernohan will come and spit me with his pretty dress-sword?” he drawled, raising his eyebrows very high.

    Nan’s mind immediately conceived a dreadful scenario of what might, indeed, be Sir Francis’s reaction to finding her thus accosted: swords at dawn, blood on the grass... In the split second it took to imagine this scene, she also realised that Curwellion had intended her to envisage precisely that. Her lips tightened. “I would not permit anytheeng so rideeculous. Go away, I do not know you.”

    “But it would be very easy to get to know me, precious one!” he said with a laugh.

    Nan had by now had more than time to perceive that he was, if he must be nearly as old as Sir Francis and not so classically beautiful, quite devilishly attractive. Well, she had always wondered if a rake would be, and she supposed now she had her answer. His face and figure were not marred by the usual marks of high living: on the contrary, had you met him under other circumstances—or had he not opened his impertinent mouth—you would perhaps have taken him for an ascetic. Fine-boned, chiselled features and a narrow, high-bridged nose. And a long, narrow mouth that could curl unpleasantly but at the same time looked as if it knew— Well, yes. That was to be expected. She swallowed, and turned her head away.

    “Cousin, is this horrid old fellow annoying you?” said a cheerful soprano voice.

    Nan jumped, and gasped.

    “Because Robert is just here, and he will send him to the rightabout!” ended the dark-haired young lady.

    “I—I do not know heem: he—he ees accosting me on the strength of—of having also accosted me at the play last week!” gasped Nan, putting her hand to her heart.

    “Affecting,” noted his Lordship, the sneer becoming more pronounced. “I retire discomforted. –Quite the Amazon: may I wish you luck?” he added mockingly; and was gone.

    Nan’s cheeks flamed: whoever the kind lady was, she could only hope to goodness she had had no notion of what the horrid man had meant to imply. “Thank you so much!” she gasped. “I—I was weeth Sir Francis Kernohan: he—he ees just over there—”

    “Yes, and I was with my brother, but they are never around when you need them!” said Iris with a laugh as he came up looking uncertain.

    Lord Keywes had, in fact, been two steps behind her when he had been detained by the Prussian Ambassador’s lady. As soon as he had realized that some sort of contretemps was taking place, he had excused himself hurriedly. Too late, it now appeared. “What is wrong?”

    “Nothing, now!” replied Iris, seating herself beside Nan. “Lady Benedict was accosted by an old fellow with more Classical scholarship than he had manners.”

    Nan gulped: it was clear the lady had taken the reference.

    Iris looked at her with a little smile. “I think you have met my brother?”

    The tall gentleman in conventional evening clothes had light brown curls, cut very short and brushed back neatly. The face was long and high-cheekboned, the nose rather aquiline—

    “Oh,” said Nan weakly. “I'm sorry, I deed not recognize you, Lord Keywes. Eet—eet ees the clothes and—and... your hair,” she ended limply, blushing.

    “I see!” said Iris, smiling very much. “He told us he went straight from the boat to see you, Cousin: do I gather he was in that absurd fur greatcoat with”—her shrewd blue eyes twinkled—“his curls in need of cutting, and a day’s growth of beard on his cheeks?”

    “Well, yes!” said Nan, unable to refrain from a little laugh in spite of her embarrassed dismay. “That ees exactly eet! My leetle neighbour thought he looked like a Viking.”

    Iris nodded. “He has a golden beard. And when he puts the nasty pomade on the curls, they look ten shades darker. Mamma is said to have wept for a week when they first cut them!”

    “That will do, Iris,” said her brother on a grim note.

    “No, no, do not reprove her, Lord Keywes!” said Nan, laughing suddenly. “Mothers do, you know! I wept when we cut Johnny’s, though up until the vairy moment of the first crunch of the scissors I would have sworn I could not be so eediotishly over-sensible!”

    “That’s your little boy, is it?” said Iris, all smiles.

    Her brother perceived with an amazed jolt of relief that she was not doing it all to annoy him: she actually liked this newly acquired cousin! Iris liked very few people: he was aware she was fond of him, though she fought him at every turn; but though she saw a lot of Lilias, Lord Keywes would not have said she was truly fond of her. And in his opinion the pair of ’em were very bad for each other: brought out the cattishness in each other. Well, if only Lady Benedict would turn out to be a respectable woman, then she might be a friend for Iris, at last.

    Nan nodded. “Yes. He ees four.”

    “Four?” said Iris limply.

    “I was married to my first husband vairy young.”

    Robert repressed a wince. “Before we enmesh ourselves in family history, Cousin, may I present my sister? –Iris Jeffreys. Iris, as you know, this is our second cousin, Lady Benedict.”

    “I am vairy glad to meet you, Miss Jeffreys,” said Nan politely.

    Iris grinned at her. “Do, please, call me Iris. ‘Miss Jeffreys’ makes me look over my shoulder for Aunt Kate!”

    “Perhaps now is not the time nor the place,” put in Robert on a grim note, “but I should like to apologize for Aunt Kate, Lady Benedict.”

    “That ees all right,” said Nan weakly. “She—she had had a shock. And I lost my temper, also. I—I theenk she may have come to Bath weeth the best of intentions, but—but—”

    “Lost her rag,” said Iris, nodding.

    “No, well, as you so kindly say, it was a shock,” Robert allowed. “You did strike her as so very like Cousin Nancy. And I must admit I had the same impression on first meeting. The likeness was—was remarkable.”

    “Eendeed?” said Nan, holding up her chin. She gave him a sparkling look. “And on second meeting, Lord Keywes?”

    Iris looked from her new cousin to her brother with bright-eyed interest.

    He flushed. “Not so much,” he said stiffly.

    With difficulty refraining from rolling her eyes madly, Iris said briskly: “Don't be such a stick, Robert: you are not at the damned Swedish Court now! –You look wonderful, Cousin, and I have been jealously watching your scores of admirers prostrate themselves at your feet all evening!”

    Nan was very red. “Thank you,” she said limply.

    “Tell us about your little boy,” prompted Iris.

    “Oh, wuh-well, Johnny ees nearly five, and—and hees Papa was my first husband. I— Well, he talks vairy well, now,” said Nan limply.

    “Hair—eyes?” said Iris, rolling her own eyes slightly.

    Nan laughed a little. “Oh! Well, you are not a married lady, Cousin Iris: I would not weesh to bore you! We theenk een the family that Johnny ees vairy beautiful and that hees treecks are vairy cunning. But he ees just an ordinary leetle boy, een truth. Brown hair and grey-blue eyes like hees father's.”

    “He was not amongst the crowd in the hall that day?” said Robert suddenly.

    “Was he? ...No, that’s right: he was upstairs with Rosebud, and I had told Sita to look to them, and was vairy cross to find her een the hall interfering with the—um—packing,” finished Nan, eyeing him warily.

    “Rosebud?” asked Iris.

    “My leetle girl. She ees just one and a half years old. Um, actually we are to have a party for Johnny’s fifth birthday: should you weesh to come, Cousin Iris?” said Nan, rather shyly. Cousin Iris was not very old, but she had the self-assured manner of a much older lady. And—and it was obvious that Lord Keywes was still angry with her, Nan, and did not approve of her. And he must have seen Lord Curwellion speaking to her, and even if his sister told him that he had been pestering her, he would surely conclude that the sort of woman who was pestered by that type of man at formal gatherings was not the sort of woman that was fit for his sister to know!

    “We should love to; should we not, Robert?” said Iris immediately.

    Nan had not meant Lord Keywes, too: she looked at him limply. “Eet—eet ees just a children’s party,” she faltered.

    “I should like to very much,” he said formally.

    Horrors! thought Nan, swallowing. “Splendeed,” she croaked.

    General Sir Francis then coming up arm-in-arm with Admiral Dauntry, the Jeffreyses made their farewells, as it was clear that the Admiral wished for Lady Benedict and the General to join his group.

    “Why in God’s name did you behave like such a stick?” demanded Iris the minute they were out of earshot.

    “I do not think I behaved like a stick,” he said stiffly.

    “Robert, you are doing it now!”

    Lord Keywes’s fists clenched: he said nothing.

    Iris sighed. “What happened that day you called on her in Bath?”

    “I have told you. I interrupted her packing.”

    Iris made a scornful noise.

    “You may go back to Sophia,” he said tightly. “This conversation is not worth pursuing.”

    “I know old Dauntry,” said Bobby uncertainly, looking at Lady Benedict’s group.

    Noël shuddered.

    “Well, dash it! We’ve been hangin' about here like a pair of idiots all the evening! I am going to speak to her! Are you coming or not?” replied his uncle fiercely.

    Noël had just perceived that Fenella Hartington-Pyke was of the Admiral's party. He blenched. “Er—not.”

    Bobby looked. He gave a crack of scornful laughter. “Serves you right! Hartington-Pyke? That fellow Pyke has as much right to the hyphen—no, less—as I have to call meself Plantagenet-Amory!”

    “Pl— Bobby, even if the sprig of broom still be in our arms, that was a very long time back,” said Noël feebly.

    “So was the Hartington connexion.” Bobby strode off.

    Nan was very flown on compliments, on the relief of having the first encounter with Lord Keywes since their Bath meeting over with, on the relief of having got rid of Lord Keywes without another scene, and on the relief of having seen Lord Curwellion leave the reception. Not to say on the further glass of champagne which she had accepted from Admiral Dauntry in the wake of this last. She greeted Bobby with delight, smiling into his eyes.

    “May I say you are in great looks tonight, Lady Benedict?” he returned, bowing low over her hand.

    “No, you may not: this fellow is a shockin’ flirt, Lady Benedict, and must be sent to the rightabout without delay!” said the Admiral with his rumbling laugh.

    “Well, do you come about, grapple weeth heem, board heem and tow heem off as your prize as you deed weeth the Santa Maria de los Angeles, Admiral!”

    Admiral Dauntry was terrifically gratified: terrifically; preened himself like nobody's business, beamed all over his square, ruddy face—the which shade in Bobby’s opinion was due entirely to the consumption of too much indifferent port and worse claret, and nothing whatsoever to do with his naval career—and declared he would do just that, and he had never met such a knowledgeable young lady—blah, blah. Did she learn up the details of their naval and military careers the day afore she was due to meet ’em? wondered Bobby glumly.

    Then, what do you know, damned young Henri-Louis de Bourbon—talking of names certain persons had very little right to—comes up: bow, bow, smarm, smarm. “Why, Monsieur!” she cries—Monsieur, pooh! thought Bobby crossly, if he had been “Monsieur” or anything like it the Frogs would have cut off his head long since, and good riddance, too—“I thought you had gone off to dance weeth the pretty girls?” Bow, bow, smarm, smarm, no pretty girls—meaningful look—pining away. At which she laughs very much and says: “Oh, but thees weell never do! But I do not dance, you know: see, I have a leetle train?” –Why the Hell was it, thought Mr Amory morosely, that the words “little train” in that accent of hers were just killing? Just—killing. The damned Admiral thought so, too: he had gone a sort of mottled purple shade and was makin’ puffing noises. As for Henri-Louis—well, he was young, the little squirt. Some excuse for him.

    “Possibly we could sit out and watch the young people, Lady Benedict,” said the Admiral.

    “Mais oui! And I could explain all the personalities!” cried le petit Monsieur.

    Bobby stepped forward. “Lord, sir, we would not wish to deprive you of the amusements fit for your age, y’know. Enjoy yourself while you may. We fellows who have only experience to recommend us will look after Lady Benedict.”

    “Exactly!” gasped Nan, helpless tears of laughter oozing out of the corners of her eyes. “Of course you must dance, Monsieur! –Oh! Excuse me, Mr Amory! Oh, dear! Thank you! But I theenk you have muh-more than just experience to recommend you, no?”

    Bobby could cheerfully have wrung her very pretty neck. And Henri-Louis’s, and— Well, all of ’em, really. He bowed very low. “You flatter me, Lady Benedict. But certainly, was planning to go on to the Gratton-Gordon dance, if you should wish to see a little gaiety?”

    “Well, yes, eet sounds delightful. But I have not received an invitation,” she said, looking up at Sir Francis with those great dark eyes of hers.

    Resignedly Bobby observed the subsequent hand-patting and reassuring. It did not in the least matter that she had not received an invitation: Sir Francis had; the Admiral had; le petit Monsieur could assure Madame he could get her in. Bobby had no doubt he could, yes. And her blush of confusion as the damned little fellow said it was doubtless quite genuine. All the same! The lot of ’em? He did not even bother to fight it out as to who was to have the honour of taking her arm.

    In the end she went out between Henri-Louis de Bourbon and General Sir Francis Kernohan. The fellow that was of the highest rank, you see, and the fellow what had brought her. Oodles of tact with it. Bobby followed, swallowing a sigh. And not bothering even to turn his head to see if damned Noël might wish to come with them, or not.

    “But my dear ma’am, you must dance!” protested His Grace of Wellington. To his rear—well to his rear—Bobby sighed. This ought do the trick, but what good was that? Apart from the odd princeling or two, there was admirals and generals and umpteen colonels and God-knew-whats, before a mere Mister.

    “Well, I— Oh, but I have a leetle train!”

    That did it, registered Mr Amory glumly. His Grace fell over himself: of course she could loop it up for him, could she not?

    “A pony she loops it up for him,” said a sour voice in his ear.

    Jumping, Bobby replied: “Not I! It is a sure thing! –How did you get here, Beresford?”

    “In my aunt’s carriage.”

    “Hah, hah.”

    “Is it another G.-G. daughter, this year?” asked Mr Beresford without much interest.

    “Mm? Oh, aye: Katherine. Over there. White gauze, pink ribbons.”

    “Uh-huh.” Jack looked thoughtfully at where Lord Curwellion, who was almost always to be seen at Mrs Gratton-Gordon’s functions, et pour cause, was propping up a pillar, looking bored. “Is this the one that—?”

    “Think so. So I’d avoid her like the plague,” added Bobby sourly.

    “Oh, Lor’, yes,” said Jack on a vague note, his eyes on Lady Benedict waltzing with His Grace of Wellington.

    Bobby followed his gaze. “I warn you, there is a very long queue of senior officers.”

    Jack laughed. “Aye! I wish the damned Bath cats could be here to see it!”

    Bobby's face softened. “Me, too. Well, hand of piquet, Jack?”

    “Why not?” he agreed.

    Waltzing with His Grace of Wellington was tremendously exciting. Nan was not foolish enough to believe that it had all that much to do with his being the Hero of Waterloo, either. He radiated a sort of energy that was positively irresistible. She did not say very much as they circled the floor, His Grace holding her rather too tightly.

    By the end of it she was more or less reduced to a quivering jelly and she had a fair idea he knew it. But he bowed very properly, murmuring: “Delightful.”

    “Yes!” she said breathlessly. “Thank you so much, Duke!”

    “My pleasure, Lady Benedict. Now, dare I abandon you to old Fuzzy? I warn you, watch your toes!”

    The Admiral stepped forward, laughing; His Grace bowed over Nan's hand again, and was gone. Feebly she allowed Admiral Dauntry to lead her off into a country dance. Fortunately he was the sort of man who shouted cheerful nothings at you when you met in the figures and did not seem to care if you merely shouted “Yes!” or “No!” in return. Then it was more of the same, what with Uncle Érico, who did not comport himself during their dance in a noticeably avuncular fashion, a very close friend of the Admiral’s, Henri-Louis, who turned out to be terribly sweet and just a little shy once he had Nan to himself in their waltz, the romantic-looking Commander Sir Arthur Jerningham, who told her a lot about his last ship when they met in the figures, Mr Wilfred Rowbotham, professing himself delighted to see that Lady Benedict had decided to come on after all, and finally...

    “Oh,” said Nan in a tiny voice. “How are you, Sir Noël?”

    “Very well, I thank you, Lady Benedict. And you?” he returned, bowing.

    “I am vairy well, too.”

    “Splendid. So you are dancing, tonight?” he said lightly.

    “Yes; I am out of my mourning: thees ees—ees just my good dress!” gulped Nan, very off-balance. He was handsomer even than she had remembered. Oh, why was she always attracted in in the wrong sort of way to the wrong sort of man?

    “The next is a waltz, I think. Will you?” he said.

    Nan glanced round for help, but Mrs Urqhart was engrossed in bashing Uncle Érico with her fan, now somewhat the worse for wear. “Thank you,” she said feebly.

    Noël was more than a little startled at the way she melted into his arms. After a few moments he managed to say lightly: “I think you must have been schooled in the waltz by His Grace of Wellington himself, Lady Benedict.”

    “Horrors, am I dancing indelicately?” she gulped, pulling away from him.

    He smiled, pulling her back. “No, indeed! Let us not pretend you are a débutante.”

    “No,” said Nan in a squashed voice.

    After a period during which she could not have said whether she was in agony or in ecstasy he said: “I believe I owe you an apology.”

    “What? Oh!” She went very pink. “I deed tell you eet was a chapter of accidents.”

    “Indeed you did, and I apologize for not believing you. My Aunt Betsy has, er, sorted me out,” he said with a little grimace.

    “Horrors!” said Nan with a smothered giggle.

    “Am I forgiven, then?”

    “Well, yes. Eet—eet was the natural assumption.”

    “I am glad you see it like that. Curwellion was not bothering you again tonight, was he?”

    “He deed try, but—but my cousin came to my rescue.”

    “Your... Oh, good gad: that was Keywes, was it not?”

    “Yes. But eet was not he who rescued me at all, but hees sister. I theenk he ees a feeble man!” said Nan with scorn.

    Sir Noël was a little taken aback. “Er—he is very well thought of,” he murmured.

    She shrugged. “He needed but to take two steps forward, to get reed of the horrid man. You, on the contrary, deed vairy well, for even though you thought I was not worth rescuing, you deed eet!”

    He smiled. “I might have had an ulterior motive, however.”

    “That ees vairy true.”

    He waited but she did not add to the statement. “Am I condemned or reprieved, then?” he said lightly.

    “I most certainly reprieve you, Sir Noël: you cannot know how frightening eet was when he came eento the box!”

    Noël’s pulses raced. “Good,” he said hoarsely.

    “That was delightful,” he murmured, as the dance ended, “but, forgive me, I think that for the sake of both our reputations we had best not—er—repeat the experience?” He raised his eyebrows, smiling just a little.

    Nan was very pink, but could not forbear to smile back. “No, I agree.”

    He bowed, led her up to his Aunt Betsy, murmured a conventional expression of gratitude for the dance, bowed again, and left them.

    Mrs Urqhart straightened her turban, briskly dispatched General Baldaya for a glass of fizz, and patted the sofa beside her. “That were a mistake, hey?”

    “Not entirely. I know he ees not right for me, nor I for heem. He sees that too, I can assure you.”

    “Does he, indeed?” said Betsy Urqhart in some surprise. “I’m glad to hear it. And I has to admit it, no more is old Érico right for me, and I don’t mind telling you, I been leadin’ him or for fun, mostly. Only—well, not entirely,” she said with a sigh. “S’pose the both on us had best stop afore we regrets it, hey?”

    Nan nodded, smiling a little, but biting her lip a little, also. “Eendeed!”