Animating Maria (10 page)

‘We will do our best,’ Effy heard Amy say.

When the duke had left, Effy flew at Amy crying, ‘How could you promise such a thing. Maria should have been consulted first.’

‘Shhh!’ snapped Amy. ‘Let me think!’

Effy plucked at one of her gauze shawls impatiently while Amy frowned horribly and drank port as if it were water.

‘Maria ain’t too bad,’ said Amy slowly, finally breaking a long silence. ‘Head full of dreams. Understandable. But she’s a lady. For all their faults, the Kendalls have turned her out a lady. It ain’t Maria that needs schooling, it’s the Kendalls.’

‘Whatever can you mean?’

‘I mean, let’s see if we can make a go of this. Berham’s a cold codface, I’ll grant you that, but he ain’t nasty or vicious. Make a tolerable husband and Maria can pretty much lead her own life once she’s produced a few heirs for him. And after all he’s put her through – no, don’t ask me. I was told in confidence – I think if she does turn him down, he should be made to hurt a little.

‘My plan is this. We get the Kendalls here and tell them flat out they are in danger of spoiling their daughter’s chances through their own vulgarity. If they scream with outrage and call off the wedding and drag Maria back to Bath, we’ll still get all that money from the duke. If they’ll listen to us, we’ll get to work on them and turn them out a couple of model society parents.’

Effy shook her head. ‘It would not work. It is different with the young. So hard to change the old.’

‘Nonsense. I’m going to send off an express today. And I’ll make sure they leave that Spiggs woman behind. Great mud-coloured simpering creature with a face like a whipped whore’s bum.’

‘Listening to the charm of your speech, sister dear,’ said Effy sarcastically. ‘I am sure you are just the lady to refine the Kendalls.’

They decided not to break the news to Maria of her parents’ possible visit to London until they had heard from them.

Lord Alistair Beaumont called that afternoon to ask permission to take Maria for a drive. The sisters gave their consent. Maria had told Amy that Beau had apologized for the scene at the inn, and he was such a handsome man with his long strong legs, curly black hair, and blue eyes that Amy secretly thought Maria would be much better off with him than with the duke.

Maria’s heart beat a little faster as she glanced sideways at Beau as he drove expertly through the traffic on the road to Hyde Park. He looked so much like that captain of her dreams.

He asked her if she was going to hear Catalini sing and Maria said ruefully that all her engagements were handled by the Tribbles and so she did not know. ‘I should think you will be there,’ he said with a smile. ‘Rum old birds, the Tribble sisters, from what I’ve heard. Always guaranteed to turn up at any leading society event. They’re a fixture and feature of any Season.’

‘I am extremely fond of them,’ said Maria quietly. ‘Particularly Miss Amy.’

‘Ah, your gallant captain.’

Maria blushed. ‘So you know?’

‘Of course I know. I was Berham’s second. What a coil. I don’t think anything like that ever happened to Berham in all his well-ordered stuffy life. Sorry. Shouldn’t have said that. Fact is, Amy Tribble should have been a man. She’d have been a regular rip.’

‘She is really very womanly.’ Maria thought compassionately of the glow in Amy’s eyes when she looked at Mr Haddon. ‘I disagree with you. I think she would have made some man of character an excellent wife.’

‘Too old for that now,’ said Beau brutally. ‘She must be over fifty and most of her contemporaries are dead.’

‘She does not seem old to me.’ Maria’s eyes misted over as she thought of Amy’s awkward kindness.

‘I declare I’ve upset you. What can I do to make amends?’ Beau reined in his horses and turned to look at her.

The day was fine and warm. Young leaves were budding on the sooty trees in the Park. Maria was wearing a gown of some soft green stuff that showed the excellence of her figure. She was frowning in thought. Then she looked up at him, her green eyes dancing, and he caught his breath. ‘I know,’ she said. ‘Although I do not know whether we are to attend the opera or not, I do know we are going to Mrs Marriot’s ball on Saturday. Why do you not ask Miss Amy to waltz with you!’

‘And that would please you?’

‘So very much.’

‘Done! For you I shall waltz with Miss Amy
and
take her into supper. Here comes your beloved.’

Maria looked ahead and a shadow crossed her face. Driving towards them at a smart pace was the Duke of Berham. He had very good eyesight. He saw Beau saying something and pointing in his direction with his whip. He saw Maria look straight at him and saw the worry mixed with trepidation and disappointment on her face. He should have felt glad, for surely such a look meant she was happier with Beau than she possibly could be in his company and that she would be glad to escape from the engagement. But he felt cross and angry.

He reined in his horses and pulled alongside Beau’s carriage.

He bowed to Maria and said, ‘I am sorry I have been neglecting you, but I have had many matters to attend to.’

‘Such as driving yourself in the Park,’ said Beau maliciously.

The duke gave him an unfathomable look from his black eyes. ‘I shall call on you tomorrow, Miss Kendall.’

‘At what time, your grace?’ asked Maria nervously.

‘At three o’clock.’

Maria’s face fell. She had planned to visit the Exeter Exchange in the Strand with Frederica. She had been looking forward to it immensely. ‘I regret I have an engagement at that time,’ she said.

The duke thought that the Tribbles had done their work very well and very quickly. ‘In that case, I shall see you on Saturday, when I call to escort you to the ball.’

‘Very good, your grace,’ said Maria meekly.

He bowed and drove off.

‘How formal you both are!’ exclaimed Beau.

‘Are we?’

‘Very much so. Do not look so miserable, I pray. Gunter’s has just received a new shipment of ice from Greenland. How would you like a strawberry ice?’

‘Lord Beaumont, what a splendid idea!’

They drove out of the Park and bowled past the Duke of Berham, who had stopped his carriage to talk to some friends. They were chatting and laughing and did not notice him. But the duke noticed them and felt he had offered too much money to the Tribbles. The task had obviously been an easy one.

The duke said goodbye to his friends and drove to Holles Street. Effy received him with many nervous flutterings. She found the duke quite intimidating and wished Amy had not gone to lie down.

‘I congratulate you both,’ said the duke. ‘I met Miss Kendall in the Park and I could judge from her manner that you had already been successful in persuading her that we should not suit.’

‘Oh, no,’ said Effy, waving her hands helplessly. ‘We have not started yet. Not a word, I assure you. But she is very young for you and she is most certainly not in love with you, so . . .’

‘Did she tell you she was not in love with me?’

‘No-o. But you did explain most clearly it was to be a marriage of convenience. I mean, you yourself are clearly not in love with Miss Kendall.’

‘Not at all.’

‘Then that’s all right. Such a relief when no hearts are engaged, don’t you think? Tea, your grace?’

‘No, I thank you. My mother has returned, I believe, and I must see her.’

The dowager duchess looked up crossly as her son came striding into her boudoir and curtly dismissed her maid.

‘And now you are going to give me a jaw-me-dead about that engagement,’ said his mother with a sigh.

‘And why not?’ demanded the duke wrathfully. ‘I did agree to let the engagement stand, but that was before I met the girl’s parents. Out of the question. What can you have been thinking of to even consider joining our great name with such incredibly vulgar people as the Kendalls?’

‘I did not think you were marrying
them.
You need not see them once you are married. The fact is Miss Kendall would suit you very well. Fascinating little creature. She has very pretty ankles.’

‘I wish to make one thing perfectly plain to you, Mama. Never again must you interfere in my life, do you hear?’

‘Yes, dear. I can hear you, and so can the whole of Cavendish Square. What are you going to do?’

‘I have offered the Tribbles money to persuade Miss Kendall not to marry me.’

‘You silly boy. She is so very beautiful and so very rich, she can take her pick. She does not need you. The Tribbles would probably have done it for nothing.’

‘Am I such an antidote?’

‘No, but you are so used to being run after and toadied to that you have quite forgot how to please. You will soon become an opinionated crusty old bore. Now, send my maid back and take yourself off.’

Maria spent a delightful afternoon with her new friend Frederica. They looked at the wild animals in the small zoo, bought trinkets from the booths at Exeter Change, and then strolled down the Strand and across the road and down towards the river.

‘We should go back,’ said Frederica suddenly.

Maria, who had been discussing books and fashions, looked around her. Tall, ugly, ramshackle tenements reared up on either side. On the entrance steps of one of them, a woman in rags, nursing a baby, held out a claw-like hand for money.

‘Let me just give some alms to this poor woman,’ said Maria.

‘No, no, come away. It is dangerous here,’ squeaked Frederica, tugging at her sleeve.

Maria gently disengaged herself and took some silver from her reticule and handed it to the woman.

‘She will only spend it on gin,’ pointed out Frederica.

‘That I won’t,’ said the woman, for she had heard Frederica, who had spoken quite loudly and clearly, thinking, like most of her class, that beggars were stone-deaf. ‘I’ll pay my rent and get food for the baby.’

‘Who owns such property?’ asked Maria wonderingly. ‘It is quite disgusting.’

‘Duke of Berham,’ said the woman, hugging the baby close.

‘Come away,’ said Frederica, putting an arm around Maria’s waist.

‘Very well,’ said Maria numbly. They hurried back towards the Strand.

‘Do not look so troubled.’ Frederica peered anxiously at her friend’s stricken face. ‘Most of these London rookeries are owned by the aristocracy. It’s not Berham’s fault. He probably does not know such a place exists.’

‘Do you think that woman’s baby is his?’ asked Maria.

‘How can you say such things? What put such an idea into your head?’

‘I am reading this monstrous fine book called
Jasper’s Cruelty or The Wicked Duke.
The duke is quite like Berham, I mean the duke in the novel. And he owns property like this and ruins all the female tenants and then turns them out in the street. Why, Emily – the girl in the book – is most affecting. She stands outside White’s Club with her baby in her arms on a snowy night and cries to him as he comes out, ‘‘Look upon your son, you dastard!’’’

‘Maria! I don’t think you love Berham one little bit.’

‘No,’ said Maria. ‘I am grateful for that, for I can never marry him now!’

Is not marriage an open question, when it is alleged, from the beginning of the world, that such as are in the institution wish to get out, and such as are out wish to get in?

Emerson

Maria sought out Amy, who was lying in her room, nursing her sore, stiff shoulder.

Breathlessly, Maria told her about the buildings off the Strand and then launched into a comparison between the Duke of Berham and the duke in the novel she had been reading.

Amy groaned. ‘You are worse than I thought,’ she said. ‘I have never heard such a piece of silliness in all my born days. Grow up!’

Maria coloured angrily. ‘You must admit, Miss Amy, it is disgraceful that he should be the owner of such property.’

‘Take it from me, he probably doesn’t even know he’s got it,’ said Amy. ‘His agents and men of business handle things like that. Maybe it was not even his agents who bought the wretched place, but his grandfather’s. That is not what troubles me. You seem like an intelligent girl to me and yet you can easily dream up a picture of Berham having
droit de seigneur
with a lot of poor women when he could have practically anyone in society he wanted. Young girls’ dreams are one thing, Maria; dangerous fantasies are another. If you are looking for a way to break the engagement, then wait and do it gracefully. Don’t you want just a little bit of revenge on Berham? He don’t really care a fig for you at the moment, and believe me, if you told him right now it was all off, he would probably sigh with relief.’

‘Oh, he would, would he?’ exclaimed Maria, suddenly furious. ‘Then why was he so eager to let the engagement stand?’

‘That was before he met your parents. Yes,’ went on Amy, surveying Maria’s stricken face, ‘your parents. Now, Effy and I have invited Mr and Mrs Kendall to London.’

‘No!’ said Maria. ‘Oh, no.’

‘Listen. We are going to put it to them that
they
are the ones who need schooling. Think, Maria. If not Berham, then perhaps someone like Beaumont, hey? We’ll put a little town bronze on your ma and pa and then you can fly as high as you like.’