An Infamous Army (20 page)

This was soon done, and in a very short time Harriet was seated in the barouche, warmly tucked up in a rug, with her hands buried deep in her muff.

Barbara was standing in the doorway when Judith came out of the house, and said: "I wonder where Charles is now?"

"In Ghent, I suppose," Judith replied.

"I wish he had been with us," Barbara said, with a faint sigh.

"I wish it too."

"Oh! you are disliking me again? Well, I am sorry for it, but the truth is that respectable females and I don't deal together. I should be grateful to you for getting this party together. Shall I thank you? Confess that it has been an odious day!"

"Yes, odious," Judith said.

She directed a somewhat chilly look at Barbara as she spoke, and for an instant thought that she saw the glitter of tears on the ends of her lashes. But before she could be sure of it Barbara had turned from her, and was preparing to mount her horse. The next glimpse she had of her face made the very idea of tears seem absurd. She was laughing, exchanging jests with Peregrine, once more in reckless spirits.

Any plan that Peregrine might have formed of deserting the barouche was nipped in the bud by his sister, who said so pointedly that she was glad to have the escort of one gentleman at least that there was nothing for him to do but jog along beside the carriage with the best grace he could muster.

Lavisse and Barbara soon allowed their horses to drop into a walk; the barouche outstripped them, and was presently lost to sight over the brow of a slight hill. Lavisse studied Barbara's profile with a faint smile, and said softly: "Little fool! Little adorable fool!"

"Don't tease me! I could weep with vexation!"

"I know well that you could. But why?"

"Oh, because I'm bored - tired - anything that you please!"

"It does not please me that you should be bored or tired. I do not wonder at it, however. For me, these saintly Englishwomen are the devil."

"I don't dislike Lady Worth, if only she would not look so disapproving."

"Consider, my Bab, she will do so all your life."

"Oh, confound her, I'll take care she don't get the chance!"

"Ma pauvre, I see you surrounded by prim relatives, growing staid - or mad!"

"Wretch! Be quiet!"

"But no, I will not be quiet. Figure to yourself the difference were you to marry me!"

An irrepressible laugh broke from her. "I do. I should then be surrounded by your light-o'-loves. I have seen enough of that in my own family to be cured of wanting to marry a rake."

"You have in England a saying that a reformed rake -"

"My dear Etienne, if you were reformed you would be as dull as the next man. You are wasting your eloquence. I do not love you more than a very little. You are an admirable flirt, I grant, and I find you capital company."

"Do you find your colonel - capital company?"

She turned her head, regarding him with one of her clear looks. "Do you know, I have never thought of that: it has not occurred to me. It is the oddest thing, but if you were to ask me, what does he look like? how does he speak? I couldn't tell you. I think he is handsome; I suppose him to be good company, because it doesn't bore me to be with him. But I can't particularise him. I can't say, he is handsome, he is witty, or he is clever. I can only say, he is Charles."

The smile had quite faded from his face; his horse leapt suddenly under a spur driven cruelly home: "Ah, parbleu, you are serious then!" he exclaimed. "You are lovesick - besotted! I wish you a speedy recovery, ma belle!"

CHAPTER TEN

Judith saw nothing of Barbara on the following day, but heard of her having gone to a fete at Enghien, given by the Guards. She was present in the evening at a small party at Lady John Somerset's, surrounded by her usual court, and had nothing more than a nod and a wave of the hand to bestow upon Judith. The Comte de Lavisse had returned to his cantonments, but his place seemed to be admirably filled by Prince Pierre d'Aremberg, whose attentions, though possibly not serious, were extremely marked.

If Barbara missed Colonel Audley during the five days of his absence, she gave no sign of it. She seemed to plunge into a whirl of enjoyment; flitted from party to party; put in an appearance at the Opera; left before the end to attend a ball; danced into the small hours; rode out before breakfast with a party of younger officers; was off directly after to go to the races at Grammont; reappeared in Brussels in time to grace her sister-in-law's soiree; and enchanted the company by singing 0 Lady, twine no wreath for me, which had just been sent to her from London, along with a setting of Lord Byron's famous lyric, Farewell, Farewell!

"How can she do it?" marvelled the Lennox girls. "We should be dead with fatigue!"

On April 20th Brussels was fluttered by the arrival of a celebrated personage, none other than Madame Catalani, a cantatrice who had charmed all Europe with her trills and her quavers. Accompanied by her husband, M. de Valbreque, she descended upon Brussels for the purpose of consenting graciously (and for quite extortionate fees) to sing at a few select parties.

On the same evening Wellington drove into Brussels with his suite, and Colonel Audley, instead of ending a long day by drinking tea quietly at home and going to bed, arrayed himself in his dress uniform and went off to put in a tardy appearance at Sir Charles Stuart's evening party. He found his betrothed in an alcove, having each finger kissed by an adoring young Belgian, and waited perfectly patiently for this ceremony to come to an end. But Barbara saw him before her admirer had got beyond the fourth finger, and pulled her hands away, not in any confusion, but merely to hold them out to the Colonel. "Oh, Charles! You have come back!" she cried gladly.

The Belgian, very red in the face, and inwardly qwaking, stayed just enough for Colonel Audley to challenge him to a duel if he wished to, but when he found that the Colonel was really paying no attention to him, he discreetly withdrew, thanking his gods that the English were a phlegmatic race.

The Colonel took both Barbara's hands in his. Mischief gleamed in her eyes. She said: "Would you like to finish Rene's work, dear Charles?"

"No, not at all," he answered, drawing her closer.

She held up her face. "Very well! Oh, but I am glad to see you again!"

They sat down together on a small sofa. "You did not appear to be missing me very much!" said the Colonel.

"Don't be stupid! Tell me what you have been doing!"

"There's nothing to tell. What have you been doing? Or daren't you tell me?"

"That's impertinent. I have been forgetting Charles in a whirl of gaiety."

"Faithless one!"

"I have been to the Races, and was quite out of luck; I went to the Opera, but it was Gluck and detestable; I have danced endless waltzes and cotillions, but no one could dance as well as you; and I went to a macao party, and was dipped; to Enghien, and was kissed -"

"What?"

He had been listening with a smile in his eyes, but this vanished, and he interrupted with enough sharpness in his voice to arrest her attention and make her put up her chin a little.

"Well?"

"Did you mean that?"

"What, that I was kissed at Enghien? My dear Charles!"

"It's no answer to say 'My dear Charles', Bab."

"But can you doubt it? Don't you think I am very kissable?"

"I do, but I prefer that others should not."

"Oh no! how dull that would be!" she said, sparkling with laughter.

"Don't you agree that there is something a trifle vulgar in permitting Tom, Dick, and Harry to kiss you?"

"That's to say I'm vulgar, Charles. Am I, do you think?"

"The wonder is that you are not."

"The wonder?"

"Yes, since you do vulgar things."

She flushed, and looking directly into his eyes, said: "You are not wise to talk like that to me, my friend."

"My dear, did you suppose I should be so complaisant as to allow other men to kiss you? What an odd notion you must have of me!"

"I warned you I should flirt."

"And I warned you it would only be with me. To be plain with you, I expect you not to kiss any but myself."

"Tom, Dick, and Harry!" she flashed, betraying a wound.

"Yes or, for instance, the Comte de Lavisse."

There was an edge to the words; she glanced swiftly at him, understanding all at once that he was actuated as much by jealousy as by prudery. The anger left her face; she exclaimed: "Charles! Dear fool! You're quite rightt: it wasn't Etienne!"

He said ruefully: "Wasn't it? Yes, I did think so."

"And were longing to call him out!"

"Nothing so romantic. Merely to plant him a facer."

She was amused. "What the devil's that?"

"Boxing cant. Forget it! If you were to add that to your vocabulary it would be beyond everything!"

"Oh, but I know a deal of boxing cant! My brother George is much addicted to the Fancy , he himself displays to advantage, so I'm told! No shifting, not at all shy; in fact rattles in full of gaiety!"

"Bab, you incorrigible hussy!"

Their disagreement was forgotten; she began to talk to him of George, who was already on his passage to the Netherlands.

It was evident that George, a year older than his sister, was very near her heart. Colonel Audley was barely acquainted with him, but no one who had once met Lord George could fail to recognise him again. When he arrived in Brussels some days later it was from Liedekerke, in the vicinity of Ninove, where he was quartered. He rode into Brussels with the intention of surprising his family at dinner, but happening to encounter a friend on his way up the Montagne de la Cour, went off instead to join a riotous party at the Hotel d'Angleterre. When he presented himself in the Rue Ducale some hours later it was to learn from the butler that Lord and Lady Vidal were at the Opera, and his sister at a soiree.

"Well, I won't go to the Opera, that's certain," said his lordship. "What's this soiree you talk of?"

"I understand, my lord, a gathering of polite persons, with a little music, a -"

"Sounds devilish," remarked his lordship. "Who's holding it?"

"Lord and Lady Worth, my lord."

"Lady Worth, eh?" His lordship pricked up his ears.

"Oh! Ah! I'll go there. Won't throw me out, will they?"

The butler looked horrified. "Throw you out, my lord?"

"Haven't been invited: don't know the Worths,' explained George. "I'll risk it. Where do they live?"

Judith's salons were crowded when he arrived, and since the evening was too far advanced for her to expect any more guests, she had left her station by the door and was standing at the other end of the long room, Balking to two Belgian ladies. The footman's voice, announcing Lord George, was not audible above the clatter of conversation, and Judith remained unaware of his entrance until Madame van der Capellan directed her attention towards him, desiring to know who ce beau geant might be.

She turned her head, and saw his lordship standing on the threshold, looking round him with an air of perfect sangfroid. A handsome giant was a description which exactly hit him off. He stood over six foot, in all the magnificence of a Life Guardsman's dress uniform. He was a blaze of scarlet and gold; a very dark young man with curling black hair, and dashing whiskers, gleaming white teeth, and a pair of bold, fiery eyes.