A Night of Gaiety (12 page)

It was ten o’clock before Davita had finished her packing and asked Billy to carry her trunks downstairs and fetch a hackney-carriage.

She knew that Violet would not wake for at least another two hours, and by that time she would have disappeared.

This was the only thing she could do, for she was certain that however much she protested, however much she swore she would not take the Marquis’s money, Violet and Lord Mundesley would compel her to do so.

The mere idea of accepting even a farthing from him was so humiliating that she could almost hear her mother telling her that she must go away and hide rather than be involved in what the Marquis had said so truly was blackmail.

Davita was aware that blackmail was a crime punishable by law, but although the Marquis had been contemptuous of the manner in which he had been tricked, she was quite certain that he would not wish to face a scandal.

“What must he think of me?” she asked. “Does he think I was a party to what was happening?”

Then she thought despairingly that that was what he must think. Why it should matter to her if the Marquis disapproved of her personally she did not know—but it did!

Because Lord Mundesley was his implacable enemy, Davita was sure that he would not hesitate to allow the photographs that had been taken of them in bed to be printed in the more scurrilous newspapers.

She remembered how her father when he returned from London had brought home a number of newspapers which he told her not to read.

Curious, because they were lying about in his study she had glanced at them, seeing that they were mostly concerned with scandalous stories about the aristocracy and were, she was sure, an effort by the Radicals to discredit the Government and the Conservative Party.

When she thought about it, she realised that if she accepted Lord Mundesley’s proposition of installing her in a house in Chelsea, his plot to get at the Marquis would have been dropped.

“But how could he think I could do anything not only so wicked but so ... disloyal to ..
.
Violet?” Davita asked herself.

The more she thought about it, the more despicable Lord Mundesley’s behaviour appeared.

It was he who had arranged with the Prince that she and the Marquis should be drugged at the party and carried up to the bedroom in his house.

At the same time, because she attracted him, he had been prepared, if she agreed, to call it off at the last moment, drop Violet, and make her his mistress.

It was obvious, Davita thought, that he had not offered Violet a house in Chelsea.

Then she told herself that she was disparaging her friend even by thinking she would sink so low with any man, let alone Lord Mundesley.

Yet Violet accepted expensive gowns from him and, on her own admission, sables.

“I do not ... understand,” Davita complained, and did not want to.

As the night wore on she felt less woolly-headed, more alert, and it was only an hour after she got to bed that dawn broke.

She got up, packed her trunks, and strapped them up as they had been when she arrived from Scotland.

Then she dressed herself in the same garments which had belonged to her mother and in which she had travelled down from the North, and put on the plain but pretty bonnet with the ribbons that tied under her chin.

When she looked at herself in the mirror she saw that there were lines under her eyes and she was very pale.

Otherwise, the horrors of the night appeared to have left little mark on her, although she thought that if her hair had turned white she would not have been surprised.

Then she remembered how before they had drunk the toast to the Prince and he had cut his birthday-cake, the evening had seemed so glorious and exciting.

“My night of gaiety,” she told herself, “and I shall never have one again.”

She knew that the whole idea of the Gaiety Theatre with its lovely girls was typified by Lottie Collins’s dance when she sang: “
Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay!”

First there was her demure appearance in her red gown and Gainsborough hat, and the shy, sweet little verse, before unexpectedly and with a wild abandonment came the chorus.

That was the reality of the Gaiety Theatre and the so-called Gaiety Girls, Davita thought, and the impression they evoked of being refined and ladylike was merely superficial.

“I will never see them or the Theatre again,” she told herself, as her hackney-carriage drove away from Mrs. Jenkins’s lodging-house.

She had paid for her bed and board, and only when she told her what she owed did Mrs. Jenkins say:

“
Violet never tells me yer was leavin’ today.”

“
It was all arranged last night,” Davita answered.

“
Well, I hopes yer’re going some’ere nice, dear,” Mrs. Jenkins replied. “With yer face, yer’ll have to look after yerself, an’ don’t forget I told yer so.”

“
I will remember,” Davita replied, “and thank you very much for being so kind to me.”

S
he told the cabman in Mrs. Jenkins’s hearing to drive to Waterloo Station, but as soon as they reached the end of the road she put her head out the window, saying she had changed her mind.

“I
want to go to the best Domestic Bureau in the West End,” she said.

F
or one moment she was afraid he would say he did not know where there was one, but after a moment he replied:

“
Yer means th’ un in Mount Street?”

“
That is right.”

T
he horse did not hurry itself, and as they journeyed there Davita planned what she would say.

N
evertheless, when they drew up outside the building that had a shop on the Ground Floor with a door at the side of it marked:
“Mrs. Belmont’s Domestic Bureau,”
her heart was beating in a frightened manner.

Sh
e asked the cabman to wait and he grunted a reply. Then she went up some narrow, rather dirty stairs and opened a door on the small landing at the top of them.

I
nside there was a narrow room which was exactly what her mother had told her to expect.

O
n each side of it were long wooden benches on which several servants were seated.

A
t the far end there was a high desk where there was a strange-looking woman wearing what appeared to be a black wig.

S
he had a large nose and her thin face was wrinkled with lines, but her eyes were sharp and shrewd and she looked at Davita a little uncertainly as she walked up to her.

A
s she reached the desk there was a pause before the woman asked:

“What can I do for you—Ma’am?”

There was a distinct pause before the word “Ma’am,” and Davita knew she was making up her mind whether she was an employer or an employee and had come to the conclusion that she was the former.

“I am looking for a position as a ... Companion,” Davita replied.

She tried to make her voice sound firm and confident, but there was a decided tremor on the last word. Mrs. Belmont’s attitude
c
hanged immediately.

“A Companion?” she repeated. “Have you any experience?”

“I am afraid not.”

“I imagined that was the case,” Mrs. Belmont observed in a hard voice. “And I’d have thought you were far too young for that sort of position.”

Davita had decided in the carriage what she should say, but it was difficult to speak because she felt Mrs. Belmont was already dismissing her. However, she managed at length to articulate:

“My mother ... Lady Kilcraig, when she was ... alive, always told me that if ever I ... needed a position ... I should apply ... to you.”

There was a distinct pause.

“Did you say your mother was a Lady of Title?” Mrs. Belmont enquired.

“Yes. My father was Sir Iain Kilcraig of Kilcraig Castle, Kirkcudbrightshire, Scotland.”

It was obvious that Mrs. Belmont’s attitude had changed once again.

Now she looked at Davita as if she hoped to find something in her appearance to recommend her. Then she looked down at the huge ledger which stood open on her desk.

W
ithout speaking she turned over several pages. Then a mousy, middle-aged woman who had been sitting behind her and whom Davita had not noticed before came to Mrs. Belmont’s side to whisper in her ear.

D
avita heard her say:

“
She wants someone immediately and there’s no-one else we can send.”

M
rs. Belmont turned over another page of the ledger.

“
She’s too young,” she replied out of the side of her mouth.

“
But she might fill the gap,” the mousy woman replied.

M
rs. Belmont looked at Davita again and made up her mind.

“
I’ve just one place where you might be suitable,” she said. “You’d better give me your particulars.”

D
avita gave her name, but when Mrs. Belmont asked her age she hesitated. Then, fearing that eighteen would sound much too young, she said:

“
I am twenty ... nearly twenty-one.”

“
You certainly don’t look it!” Mrs. Belmont remarked.

“I
know,” Davita agreed, “but I shall become older in time.”

M
rs. Belmont did not smile, she merely noted Davita’s age in her ledger.

“
Address?” she queried.

“
I have only just arrived from Scotland, and I have at the moment no address in London.”

“
Then you can leave for the country immediately?”

“That is what I should like to do.”

“
You have your luggage with you?”

“
Yes.”

Mrs. Belmont had a long conversation with the mousy woman. Then she said:

“
Have you enough money to pay your own fare to Oxford?”

“
Yes, I have,” Davita replied.

“
Very well, then,” Mrs. Belmont said. “I will send a telegram to say that you are arriving at Oxford on the next train from Paddington. They’ll be able to find out
which it is and you’ll be met at the Station. Your fare will be refunded to you.”

“
Thank you.”

M
rs. Belmont was writing in an untidy, uneducated hand on a card.

I
t took her some time, and when she had finished she passed it to Davita.

“
This is who you’re going to as Companion,” she said, “and I hope, Miss Kilcraig, you’ll do everything in your power to give satisfaction. If you return with a bad reference, it would be very difficult for me to place you in another position. Do you understand?”

“
Yes, I understand,” Davita answered, “and thank you very much for helping me.”

“
I don’t mind telling you,” Mrs. Belmont went on, “that I’m taking a risk in sending anyone so young to the Dowager Countess. She’s very particular. In fact, I’ve supplied her with no less than four Companions this last year, and none of them have settled down or been satisfactory.”

“Was it because they wished to leave, or because they were dismissed?” Davita asked.

“
I don’t think there’s any need for me to answer that question,” Mrs. Belmont said in a lofty tone. “You just do your best, Miss Kilcraig, and remember that as you’re so young and inexperienced, you’ve a lot to learn.”

S
he held out the card and Davita took it from her. She looked at it, saw that written on it was
“The Dowager Countess of Sherburn, Sherburn House, Wilbrougham Oxfordshire.
”

“Thank you,” she said after she had read it. “Thank you very much.”

“Now remember what I’ve said,” Mrs. Belmont warned. “The young never listen to advice, but I expect your mother’d want you to listen to me.”

“I will certainly try to please the Countess,” Davita promised.

But as she drove towards Paddington Station she was thinking of the four Companions who had failed in the last year to satisfy the Dowager.

Yet nothing mattered for the moment except that she was escaping from Violet, from Lord Mundesley, and from the intolerable position in which they had placed her.

They were not likely to guess where she had gone, and even if Violet was curious enough to make enquiries at various Domestic Bureaus, she would doubtless “let sleeping dogs lie,” and be content that she had Lord Mundesley to herself.

“Besides, she will be angry with me for not accepting the Marquis’s money,” Davita told herself, “and she would never understand why I was not grateful to her for worrying about me.”