Joan Wolf (10 page)

I stood up as well. “Thank you, Grandmama. I should be glad to freshen up.”

She looked me over critically. “Whatever have you done to your hair, child? It looks dreadful.”

“I know. I was sick and they cut it.”

“Sick?” she repeated. “Recently? Is that why you are so thin?”

I sighed. This refrain was becoming rather tedious. “Yes, Grandmama,” I said.

“We’ll have to feed you up,” my grandmother said. “I’ll have some nice soup taken up to you right away.”

I trailed out of the room after her, reflecting in some astonishment that the whole world seemed to be united in a mission to fatten up Valentine.

* * * *

My grandfather was also silver-haired and dignified. He welcomed me temperately but kindly and told me I was too thin.

My grandmother had a dressmaker in and I was fitted for a new wardrobe. My grandmother’s hairdresser also looked at my hair and, after shaking her head in horror, produced a style that I rather liked. I thought it made me look sophisticated.

Four days after my arrival I was walking back from a visit to the stable when I heard a voice call from the orchard next to the path.

“Val! Over here, Val!”

I looked and saw a familiar face peering out at me.

“Georgie!” I looked hurriedly around, but no one was near, so I slipped into the trees to join him. “What are you doing here?” I asked in wonder.

“His lordship sent me to find out if you were really here.”

“Oh. How-how is he?”

“God.” Georgie shivered. “There’s been no talking to him, Val. Everyone at Carlton is walking on eggshells.”

“Oh, dear. Well, you can tell him I’m just fine, Georgie. My grandparents have been very nice to me. I told them I had been staying with my old nurse, so they know nothing about Carlton or about my disguise.”

“Is your grandfather really an earl?” Georgie asked.

“I’m afraid so.”

“But
why ...”
He broke off and then looked at his boots. “Never mind,” he mumbled.

“I know,” I said. “I should have come here right after my father died. It doesn’t make sense to anyone but me why I didn’t.”

“Well, if I had a grandfather who lived in a house like this, I sure wouldn’t run off to be a groom.”

“I know,” I repeated. “I’m peculiar, I suppose.”

“You’re not peculiar,” said Georgie. “You’re just Val, and not like anyone else.”

“True,” I said glumly. “That’s always been my problem.”

Georgie grinned. “Well, then, I’ll tell his lordship he’s not to worry about you.”

“That’s right. I’m perfectly fine. I’m even getting a new wardrobe.”

“You need one,” said Georgie.

I made a face at him. “How is everyone else?” I asked, and he gave me all the news of the stable.

“Well, I’d better be going,” he said at last, and I had to struggle to keep tears from my eyes. It had been so good to see him.

“Yes, I suppose so.” I bit my lip. “I miss you all.”

“We miss you too, Val.” He sounded suddenly gruff. “It just hasn’t been the same at Carlton since you left.”

I managed a smile and held out my hand. It was clasped briefly in his hard and calloused one, and then he turned and walked very swiftly through the trees and out of my sight. He had a horse tied near the main road, he had told me. He was heading straight back to Carlton. I wished with all my heart that I was going with him.

PART II

Spring, 1810

Your master quits you; and for your service done him,

So much against the mettle of your sex,

So far beneath your soft and tender breeding

And since you called me master, for so long,

Here is my hand; you shall from tis time be

Your master's mistress.

                                                         
Twelfth Night

Chapter 14

I had told my grandmother that I would do my best to be a satisfactory granddaughter, and for the following year I conscientiously tried to fulfill my promise. Without wishing to sound smug, I think I was fairly successful.

My grandparents were lonely. It didn’t take me long to perceive that they regretted the break with my mother. It was pride that had kept them estranged. If my mother had made the first move toward them, they would have relented. But Mama had had her pride too, I suppose. Really, it was all so stupid. I hoped I should never make myself so unhappy for so little reason.

I recognized my grandparents’ loneliness so quickly because it was a state I was familiar with myself. I tried not to think of him. I was not successful. In the midst of all the elegance and beauty of Ardsley, I was possessed by a cold and flinty loneliness that nothing could alleviate. Music was the only thing that helped. My grandparents had a wonderful piano and for hours every day I escaped into the only world I could find comfort in.

In the spring my grandparents took me to London for the Season. I was not reluctant to go. It was the only chance I could see of getting news of Diccon. (In my mind, now, that was how I thought of him. The distance between us made the familiarity seem comforting rather than dangerous.)

The Season was the time of year when all the important members of society descended upon London en masse. Town houses, which bore the names of the families who lived in them, were opened and staffed. Splendid carriages and sporty equipages filled the streets. Gentlemen sat in the windows of their clubs and watched the world go by. The business of government went on in the Houses of Parliament, and every night there were receptions and balls that didn’t end until four in the morning.

My grandparents opened up Ardsley House in Grosvenor Square for the first time in years and my grandmother procured for me a voucher for Almack’s. Almack’s I was solemnly informed, was London’s most exclusive social club and parade ground for all the young girls who came to London to find a husband.

“Is that why we’re going to London, Grand-mama?” I asked. “So I can find a husband?”

“You will have to marry, Valentine. All girls marry.”

This was indisputably true, if somewhat depressing.

“You are certain to find some nice young man,” my grandmother went serenely on. “A nice,
suitable
young man,” she amended. It was one of the very few references she had ever made to my father. She too was keeping to her part of the bargain.

I was to meet society at a ball given by my grandmother’s old friend the Countess of Witton.

“Letty has kept up her ties with the world far more than I,” my grandmother informed me. “She always gives one of the opening balls of the Season and she has very kindly agreed to launch you. It will be a wonderful opportunity, Valentine.”

I had a beautiful new gown for the Great Occasion: white gauze over a hyacinth blue underskirt. It had a scooped neck and small sleeves, and fell gracefully from a high-cut waistline. I was still very slim—I had decided gloomily that I was never going to be voluptuous—but I no longer looked skinny. My hair had grown as well, and Grandmama’s own dresser had arranged it very nicely off my neck with a spray of blue flowers pinned in the knot she had fastened. I wore pearls and small pearl earrings, and thought I looked rather nice.

Grandmama looked pleased with me and Grandpapa patted my cheek and said I would be the prettiest girl in London. The poor old dears were so happy to have a party to look forward to.

Lady Witton, Grandmama’s bosom bow, was absolutely glittering with diamonds when we arrived in Berkeley Square. There was a small dinner party first. I was seated between two elderly gentlemen, one of whom I discovered was at the Horse Guards. We discussed the Peninsula campaign quite happily during most of the courses.

As soon as the rest of the guests began to arrive, Lady Witton stationed herself at the top of her long, curving staircase to receive them. I stood next to her, and beyond me were Grandmama and Grandpapa.

There must have been three hundred people in attendance. I stood there, smiling and shaking hands, and listened in wonder to the stentorian tones of the majordomo as he boomed out the names of the approaching guests. There was a veritable orgy of titles: His Grace of This, the Right Honorable That, Lord and Lady This and That, His Excellency the Ambassador of Who Knows Where. They went by me in a haze of black and white and flashing jewels and gowns, and no one registered on my consciousness until the majordomo proclaimed, “The Right Honorable Martin Wakefield,” and I felt my grandmother stiffen beside me. I looked at her quickly. Wakefield was my grandparents’ family name.

“I don’t believe you’ve ever met your cousin,” Lady Witton was saying to the young man before her. Then she turned to me. “Valentine, allow me to present a cousin of yours, Martin Wakefield.”

I held out my hand. “How do you do. I didn’t know I had a cousin.”

Martin Wakefield smiled. He was noticeably handsome, with a fresh-colored face and smooth blond hair. He took my hand in his and held it.

“I didn’t know I had a cousin like you,” he returned. There was unabashed admiration in his gray eyes and I smiled back.

“How have you been, Martin?” said my grandmother, and he dropped my hand and turned to speak to her. She looked a little frostier than usual, I thought, but she was very civil to him.

Finally there was a break in the stream of guests and Lady Witton turned to my grandmother. “You can take this child into the ballroom now, Mary.”

My grandmother nodded. “Come along, Valentine. You are to open the dancing.”

“I am?”

“Yes. Would you like to lead off with the Duke of Wellfleet?”

“Oh, no. I want to dance with Grandpapa first. Please.”

The poor love looked absolutely delighted and with gallant courtesy offered me his arm. We went onto the floor and the orchestra started up. The ball was officially open.

It was quite a nice dance, and rather to my own surprise, I found myself enjoying it. I danced twice with my newfound cousin and I enjoyed talking to him as well.

“Why is it I’ve never heard of you?” I asked him as we went into supper together.

“Your grandfather does not approve of me.” He gave me a strange slanting look and added, “I don’t suppose you know, then, that I’m his heir?”

“Are you?” I looked at him thoughtfully. “Is that why Grandpapa doesn’t approve of you?”

He grinned. He had a very engaging smile. “No. It’s my politics that infuriate him so.”

“And what are your politics?”

“Your grandfather would call me a radical.”

This was intriguing. “What do you propose that is so radical?”

“Change,” he said wryly.

“Oh, dear. I suppose you are a Whig?”

“Well, at any rate, I sit in the Commons and always vote against the Tories.”

“I see your problem,” I sympathized.

“Uncle George cannot bear the thought that someday I will be Lord Ardsley. The Wakefields have always been a strictly reactionary, intensely class-conscious family. He regards me as a black sheep.”

“The poor dear,” I murmured. “He has a fatal talent for making himself unhappy.”

He looked at me curiously. “What do you mean?”

“He fell out with my mother because he thought she had married beneath her,” I explained. “And he has apparently alienated you as well. And the person who has suffered the most from these estrangements is himself. And Grandmama too, of course. It is really too bad.”

We sat down at a little table. “Well, now they have you,” he said.

“Yes.” I tried the lobster patties. They were delicious. “The poor old dears are pathetically glad to have a young person about the place.”

“Well, they were the ones who banished your mother,” he said a little grimly. “God, these old families and their obsession with class.”

“Not all old families are like that,” I said, and thought of one particular family and one particular person.

“Oh, oh. Here they come.” My cousin rose to his feet as my grandparents approached. They both looked extremely dignified and not at all pathetic.

“I am glad to see you and Valentine are getting acquainted, Martin,” my grandmother said graciously.

Martin looked so surprised that I had to stifle a giggle. “May I get you a plate of food, Aunt Mary?” he asked.

“Thank you, dear boy.”

The dear boy exchanged a mystified look with me and took himself off. When he returned, he sat down again and the four of us made a very pleasant family party.

“This is certainly a change of tune,” Martin muttered to me as he escorted me back into the ballroom.

“Haven’t you tumbled to it yet?” I asked.

He stared at me blankly. “Tumbled to what?”

“The heir and the granddaughter,” I said
sotto voce.
“The old dears are matchmaking.”

His brows flew up. “So that’s it, by Jove.”

“Of course it is.” I smiled at him cheerfully. “Don’t worry, Martin. I’m not out to catch you.”

He assumed an exaggerated expression of hurt. “Now you’ve injured my feelings,” he complained. “I’m not so bad a fellow.”

I laughed. “We’ll see,” I said teasingly. “We’ll see.”

Chapter 15

The day after Lady Witton’s ball four bouquets of flowers were delivered to Ardsley House for me; Grandmama was delighted. The four gentlemen who sent the flowers all came to call, and I sat sedately in the drawing room and made conversation. Late in the afternoon Martin took me for a drive in the park and that evening there was another ball. Life in London appeared to be a continual round of social activity.

I was dancing with Martin at Almack’s one evening two weeks after my presentation when there was a little flutter of excitement around the dance floor. I followed most people’s eyes and looked toward the door. Standing there was the most beautiful girl I had ever seen. Her hair was like spun gold and the blue of her eyes was visible all the way across the room. I looked up at Martin.