‘Disquieting,’ agreed his lordship. ‘One must bear in mind, however, the late-disturbed times in France. Possibly one of the new nobility?’
‘That’s what Jasper says, but it don’t make it any better. Seems to me that fellow Bonaparte ennobled a lot of devilish queer fish. Thing is, this Camille of Kit’s looked to me as though he meant to dangle after her. Told him we was engaged. Told him the terms of this Will Uncle Matthew means to make. Then he stopped haunting the place. Dangling after the Yalding fright instead.’
‘In fact, an adventurer! I imagine Annerwick will take good care that his daughter doesn’t marry to disoblige him. Isn’t there a sister living with Lady Maria, as dragon?’
‘Yes, but she’s a poor dab of a female. The on-dit is that Lady Maria means to have the Chevalier. Wouldn’t surprise me at all: handsome fellow, very popular with the ladies. No use saying it ain’t my affair. Seems to me it might be. What I mean is, if Annerwick took fright, very likely to set a lot of dashed awkward enquiries afoot. If the fellow’s an impostor, disagreeable situation for Kit. Besides, she don’t like not having relations. Told me so. Said it made her comfortable to have a respectable cousin. Ought to do something about it.’
Lord Legerwood, who had been listening to him with much more interest than he was wont to accord him, said: ‘I expect you ought, Freddy, but precisely what you should do I confess I don’t immediately perceive.’
Freddy looked surprised. ‘Don’t see any difficulty about that, sir. If he’s a loose-fish, nothing for it but to get rid of him.’
Lord Legerwood’s eyes widened a little. ‘I trust you are not proposing to fight a duel, Freddy?’
‘Lord, no! Cork-brained thing to do! Pack him off to France again; that’s the dandy!’
‘An excellent scheme—if you can bring it about.’
‘Daresay I shall think of a way,’ said Freddy. He observed a curious expression on his father’s countenance, and said with slight concern: ‘Anything amiss, sir?’
‘No—oh, no!’ replied Lord Legerwood, recovering himself, ‘I almost believe that you will think of a way, for I perceive that you have depths hitherto unsuspected by me, my dear boy. Tell me, if you please, if I am correct in assuming that my part in this is to discover for you, if I can, who and what is your Chevalier?’
‘That’s it,’ said Freddy, gratified by such ready understanding. ‘Very much obliged to you if you would, sir.’
‘I will do my poor best,’ bowed his lordship. ‘Meanwhile, permit me to congratulate you upon the change you have wrought in Kitty’s appearance! I collect that yours has been the guiding hand: alas, I knew when I saw her the other evening that my poor Meg could have had little to say in the choice of her apparel!’
Freddy looked pleased. ‘Elegant little thing, ain’t she?’ His brow clouded. ‘Shouldn’t have worn those topazes, though. Wouldn’t let me give her a set of garnets. Pity!’
Lord Legerwood, although noting this peculiar reluctance on Miss Charing’s part to receive gifts from her betrothed, refrained from comment. He merely said, polishing his eyeglass: ‘Oblige me, Freddy, by telling me if Jack Westruther is often to be found in Berkeley Square?’
Freddy’s brow darkened. ‘Too dashed often, for my taste. No need for you to trouble yourself, though. Keeping my eye on Meg!’
Lord Legerwood, sustaining yet another shock, said faintly: ‘You are?’
‘To be sure I am. What’s more, got my own notion of what’s in the wind.’ He nodded portentously, but added: ‘Don’t mean to say anything about that: not my affair! Trouble is—beginning to think he’s too damned loose in the haft!’
‘I have thought that any time these past seven years,’ said Lord Legerwood.
‘You have?’ said Freddy, regarding him with affectionate pride. ‘Always say you’re the downiest man I know, sir! Up to every rig and row in town!’
‘Freddy, you unman me!’ said his father, profoundly moved. ‘No one, I believe, has yet called me a slow-top, but I own I am happy to learn that you are—er—keeping an eye on your sister.’
‘Yes, but no need to fear there’ll be any brats coming though a side-door,’ said Freddy bluntly. ‘For one thing, can’t, with Meg increasing; for another—Jack’s got his eye on a devilish prime article. Don’t think he would, either: dash it, not such a rum touch as that!’
With this assurance Lord Legerwood had to be content, for his son’s confidences were at an end. Freddy saw no reason to inform his parent that he had been thunderstruck to discover that Miss Charing had, by means unknown to him, become acquainted with the damsel whom he had had no hesitation in designating a prime article. He had already viewed with disapprobation her friendship with an ill-favoured female of obviously plebeian origin; his feelings when he called in Berkeley Square and found his affianced bride entertaining Miss Broughty held him spellbound upon the threshold, his jaw dropping, and his eyes starting from his head. When Miss Broughty presently took her leave, he nerved himself to expostulate with Kitty, representing to her that to be striking up an acquaintanceship with the daughter of a lady whom he did not scruple to call an Abbess, if ever he saw one, could in no way add to her consequence. ‘It won’t do, Kit! Take it from me!’
To his intense discomfiture he came under the beam of Miss Charing’s wide-eyed, enquiring gaze. ‘What does an Abbess signify, Freddy?’ she asked.
He was thrown into disorder, and replied hastily: ‘Never mind that! Wouldn’t understand if I told you! Thing is, the woman’s putting that girl up to the highest bidder. Oughtn’t to say such things to you, but there it is!’
‘I know she is,’ responded Kitty calmly. ‘She is quite the most odious woman imaginable! I am so sorry for poor Olivia! Indeed, Freddy, you would pity her if you knew the whole!’
‘Yes, I daresay I should. No harm in being sorry for her, but it won’t do to be making a friend of her.’
‘But, Freddy, surely there can be no objection! Though we may dislike Mrs Broughty, Olivia’s birth is respectable, for she is related to Lady Batterstown, and she, I know, is a friend of your Mama’s!’
Freddy sighed. ‘Trouble is, Kit, you ain’t been on the town long enough to know the ins and the outs! Oliver Broughty was a dashed loose screw, by all I’ve ever heard, and it don’t make a ha’porth of odds if he was some kind of a third cousin to Lady Batterstown, of if he wasn’t. In fact, he was, but it’s what I was telling you t’other day: every family has its scaff and raff! We have! Thing is, don’t foist ’em on the ton!’
Kitty wrinkled her brow. ‘It is true that Lady Batterstown seems not to have been very kind to the Broughtys. One cannot but feel that had she but befriended Olivia the poor girl might have achieved a very creditable alliance, for you cannot deny, Freddy, that she is most beautiful!’
‘That ain’t enough,’ said the worldly-wise Mr Standen.
‘Well, but it seems as though sometimes it is!’ argued Kitty. ‘Olivia has been telling me about the beautiful Miss Gunnings, who were no better connected than she is, and yet, when their Mama brought them to London, they took the town by storm, and one of them married two Dukes!’
‘No, really, Kit!’ protested Mr Standen. ‘Doing it too brown! Couldn’t have!’
‘But indeed she did! First she was married to the Duke of Hamilton, and when he died she married the Duke of Argyll!’
‘Oh, when he died!’ said Freddy, glad to have this point elucidated. ‘No reason why she shouldn’t. Not but what this little ladybird won’t marry a Duke, let alone a couple of ’em. Well, I put it to you, Kit! I don’t know how it was when these Gunning-girls of yours were on the town, but the only Duke I can think of who hasn’t been married for years is Devonshire, and it’s not a bit of use laying lures for him, because it’s common knowledge he tried to fix his interest with the Princess Charlotte, and it ain’t likely he’d take Olivia Broughty instead!’
‘Of course I don’t mean that she should marry a Duke!’ replied Kitty. ‘Only it would be too dreadful if she was sold—for one can call it nothing else!—to such a creature as Sir Henry Gosford!’ She saw that these words had made a profound impression, and said triumphantly: ‘You are shocked, but I assure you—’
‘I should dashed well think I am shocked!’ interrupted Freddy. ‘You aren’t going to tell me that fellow visits Meg?’
‘No, of course not—’
‘Then where the deuce did you meet him?’
‘I didn’t meet him! Meg pointed him out to me once, when we were driving in the Park, but she only said that he was a horrid old rake, and she did not even give him a common bow in passing! It is Olivia who has told me all about him, and I do think you must have felt for her, Freddy, had you been here! She is being quite persecuted with his attentions, and because he is so rich, and Lady Batterstown has not put Olivia in the way of receiving more eligible offers, Mrs Broughty encourages his advances! Indeed, she positively forces him upon Olivia! How it will end I dare not think, for Olivia regards him with the greatest repugnance, and yet she is so much afraid of her Mama that she knows not what to do, and says that she fears sometimes that she may be compelled to do something desperate—though what this could be I don’t know. I cannot think that she would take the terrible step of putting a period to her existence!’
‘Well, there ain’t any need for you to think it,’ said Freddy, quite unmoved by this flight. ‘No wish to vex you, but Gosford ain’t the only buck throwing out lures to the girl!’
She said innocently; ‘No, no, she has received not one offer, Freddy!’
Mr Standen, feeling himself quite unequal to the task of explaining to her the precise nature of the offers likely to be received by Miss Broughty, gave it up. He might have pointed out that dazzling beauties, unaccepted by the ton, and permitted to appear in public accompanied only by a cousin of unmistakeable vulgarity who showed only too ready a disposition to efface herself if a modish buck ogled her charge, did not commonly achieve brilliant alliances, but, on the contrary, were more in the habit of being offered cartes blanches by such connoisseurs as Mr Westruther. Freddy was well aware of his cousin’s pursuit of the fair Olivia. He did not think that the attentions of such a notable Corinthian were distasteful to her; but he was very sure that however ardent Jack’s passion for her might be it would not carry him to the altar in her company. Whether he would succeed in mounting her as his latest mistress was a question which had not hitherto exercised Mr Standen’s mind, since it had in no way concerned him. He now hoped very much that Mr Westruther’s circumstances were not affluent enough to tempt Mrs Broughty, for he perceived, nebulously but with dismay, that such a liaison would be attended by quite hideous complications. Mr Standen, being blessed with sisters, entertained not the slightest doubt that Kitty, befriending Olivia, would be the recipient of all the secrets of her bosom. At the best, a certain crusading instinct in Miss Charing would undoubtedly lead her to kick up the devil of a dust, he thought. At the worst—but here Mr Standen’s powerful reasoning broke down, and he foundered in a sea of conjecture.
He had not forgotten that Kitty had confessed to him, on the road to London, that in coming to town she had a scheme in mind which she preferred not to disclose. There were moments when he thought he had a very fair idea of what this might be. He had been faintly surprised to learn from her that she hated Mr Westruther, for her youthful adoration of so magnificent a personage had been common knowledge in the family. As far as he could be said to have considered the matter at all, Freddy had supposed that the childish passion had worn itself out. But having been privileged to observe Kitty’s demeanour when Mr Westruther chanced to be present he no longer felt very sure of this. His Aunt Dolphinton, yielding to an uncertain temper, had informed him waspishly that Kitty had accepted his offer in a fit of pique; and while he paid very little heed to this at the time he soon began to think that it might be the truth. He could not otherwise account for Miss Charing’s affectionate demeanour towards him when, and only when, Mr Westruther was present. Jack had accompanied them to the ball at the Pantheon, but so far from evincing any desire to dance with him, Kitty had accorded him one only of the waltzes he demanded, and had excused herself from attempting to perform the steps of the quadrille under his guidance. ‘No, the next country-dance, if you please!’ she said.
‘But I do not please! How can you be so impolite?’
She laughed. ‘Oh, must I stand on ceremony with you? No, I have known you for too many years, and I don’t scruple to tell you that I daren’t trust myself to you in a quadrille, for you know, Jack, I made sad work of that waltz with you! To own the truth, I don’t care to dance waltzes or quadrilles with anyone but Freddy.’
So Mr Westruther, bowing in mock-humility, allowed himself to be fobbed off with a country-dance; and was presently afforded an excellent opportunity, had he cared to avail himself of it, of observing how merrily Miss Charing twirled about the hall with Mr Standen. But as he chose rather to flirt outrageously with Meg, Miss Charing could not be sure that he did observe it. When they stood up together in the country-dance, she no longer sparkled, and three times answered him at random. Called to order, she begged pardon, and said she had not been attending.
‘Thinking of Freddy, no doubt,’ said Mr Westruther sardonically.
‘No, I can’t plead that excuse. My mind was merely wandering.’
Since the ladies whom Mr Westruther chose to honour with his attentions did not commonly allow their minds to wander when he was talking to them, he was momentarily taken-aback. Recovering, he laughed. ‘A heavy set-down! Can it be that I have had the ill-fortune to offend you, Kitty?’
She was not obliged to reply to this, as they were separated just then by a movement of the dance. When they came together again, she asked him if he did not think Freddy a beautiful dancer.
‘Certainly: the best in town,’ he responded. ‘One might say that it is his only accomplishment—unless you hold his tailoring to be an accomplishment?’
‘That is not a proper mode in which to speak of Freddy to me!’ she countered forthrightly.
‘Don’t be absurd, Kitty!’
She disregarded this, but said seriously: ‘I think Freddy has what is better than accomplishments—a kind heart!’
‘Or do you mean a yielding disposition?’ said Mr Westruther, quizzing her. ‘Poor Freddy!’
She flushed. ‘He is your cousin, and you may sneer at him if you choose, but you shall not do so to me, Jack!’
‘You are mistaken: the emotion that fills my breast is not contempt, but compassion.’
For the second time in her life, Miss Charing was conscious of a strong desire to slap that handsome, mocking face. She controlled it, saying in a repressive tone: ‘I believe that he may yet surprise you.’
‘He has surprised me,’ replied Mr Westruther.
Miss Charing could only be glad when the dance ended.
Twelve
Kitty, however much Mr Westruther might disconcert her, was not ill-pleased by the results of her strategy. She had certainly arrested his attention. If he disbelieved the story of the engagement (and he gave every sign of disbelieving it), the tacit refusal of both parties to it to own the truth, coupled with Kitty’s apparent lack of interest in his activities, compelled him to alter his tactics. He did not doubt his ability to put an end to the comedy at any moment of his own choosing, for he was well aware that she had adored him for years; but he did not mean to let her, or his Great-uncle Matthew, dictate terms, or force his hand. Nothing in his life had annoyed him more than Mr Penicuik’s ultimatum. He certainly meant to marry one day; he as certainly meant country-bred, innocent Kitty to be his wife, believing that either to him or to her would Mr Penicuik’s fortune be bequeathed; but he was not a pawn on any chessboard of Mr Penicuik’s making; and, for he was a gamester
, he would have forgone every penny of that considerable fortune rather than have obeyed such a summons as he had received. Moreover, he was betting upon a certainty: Kitty was his for the lifting of a finger. He feared no competition from any one of his cousins, and if he had been surprised to learn of her engagement to Freddy it had been momentarily: an instant’s reflection showed him what must have been her reason. He was amused by it; he could even appreciate it; and although he meant to punish her a little, he bore her no ill-will for such a flash of spirit. But however negligible a rival Freddy might be, Mr Westruther was not so lost in self-esteem that he did not recognize the danger of Kitty’s succumbing to the flattery of other and more personable suitors. A pretty girl—and Mr Westruther had been surprised to discover how very pretty Kitty could be when she was tricked out in all the elegancies of fashion—presented to society by the Standens, carrying with her the aura of large expectations, would not lack admirers. However much Mr Penicuik might pride himself on abiding by his pledged word, Jack would not have wagered any considerable sum on the chance of his abiding by it, were Kitty to present herself at Arnside on the arm of a really brilliant suitor. Mr Westruther, introducing the Chevalier d’Evron to her in a spirit of pure mischief, had his own reasons for discounting danger from that quarter; her encouragement of Dolphinton’s absurd attentions he did not understand but was able to shrug away; there were other bachelors, by far more eligible, whom it would be unwise to despise. One, in particular, a youthful peer, had shown unmistakeable signs of developing a tendre for so lively and unaffected a damsel; and a noted connoisseur, not indeed in the first blush of his youth but none the less attractive for that, had not only solicited her to dance upon the occasion of her début at Almack’s, but had followed up this mark of his approval by sending her flowers upon the next day. It was time for Mr Westruther to move, even though he had no intention of dancing so easily to the tune of Miss Charing’s impertinent piping. It was one thing to be amused by the schemes of a child he had known from her cradle-days; quite another to yield to them. He could sympathize with her desire to visit London, but he would have been better pleased had she remained, rather like a Sleeping Beauty, at Arnside. Marriage in the immediate future he wished to avoid; but if Kitty doubted his intention to make her ultimately his wife it would be as well to fix his interest securely with her. None knew better than he how to charm and to tantalize until his victim had no eyes for another than himself. His conquests were many; and if no lady had actually died of unrequited love, one at least (but it was generally acknowledged that her sensibility was immoderate) had suffered a decline on his account. The appearance on her horizon of an even more captivating admirer had happily arrested the fell disease; but anxious parents took inordinate pains to shield their susceptible daughters from the fleeting attentions of a most destructive flirt.