Marjorie Farrel (22 page)

“I may rest later. But right now, I think I need some strong tea.” She took nothing from the sideboard but a muffin, and barely nibbled at that.

“Well, I am off,” Stephen said as he folded the Gazette. “I am likely to be late again tonight since we are still working on that difficult brief. Are you sure you are all right?”

“Yes, Stephen, please don’t be concerned.” Judith smiled, not wanting him to pry into her unhappiness further. “We will see you later.”

Judith spent a restless morning, unable to settle down to anything, housework or painting. Finally she grabbed her woolen cloak and, telling Hannah that she would return for tea, decided to see if a visit to Hatchards would lift her spirits.

At Hatchards she immediately sought out the latest Minerva romance. I am not up to anything heavier, she thought, and noticed a new novel by Mrs. Hazeltine. Delighted, she started to page through it, and was quite caught up in the first few pages when she heard Simon’s voice. She stood as still as a deer caught in torchlight, afraid she would be seen, forgetting Simon could not see her. Then as she realized she would remain unobserved, she turned, ready to pull the hood of her cloak up to avoid the gaze of John, the footman who often accompanied the duke. It was not John with Simon, but a stranger, an older man quite smothered in a long muffler. Judith realized this must be the reader who had taken her place.

Simon was asking at the desk for Miss Austen’s latest, and the clerk pointed Wiggins toward Judith. “I shall be right back, your grace,” he said awkwardly as he let go of Simon’s arm. He was not used to guiding the duke and was so careful that Simon was ready to scream.

Wiggins approached the table where Judith was standing, and hesitantly asked her if this was indeed where
Emma
was located. She nodded, and Wiggins picked up a copy.

“Do you read many novels, miss?” asked Wiggins, surprised at his own boldness in addressing a strange young woman, but from her worn cloak, he guessed she was not a young lady of quality, and he was very nervous at what seemed to be his next reading assignment.

“Yes ... yes, I do,” said Judith distractedly, gazing at the duke.

“I am a reader for his grace, and I have never read a novel,” said Wiggins. “I am very nervous about reading anything but straight prose.”

“Never read a novel?” asked Judith, looking at him for the first time. “How sad.”

“Sad? I have never thought about it that way, but I have never had the time. I have been a clerk my whole life, you see, and am used only to things of a practical nature.”

“I see.” Judith smiled. “You will have a treat in store for you, then.”

“Do you have any advice, ma’am, as to how I should read a novel aloud? I wish to go on pleasing my employer, but I am afraid I will not be able to read dramatically enough.”

“I suggest you read it as though the characters were real and the author was next to you, gossiping about them. You need not be a Kean to read in an entertaining manner. I never tried to sound too dramatic when I read to him, and his grace seemed perfectly satisfied.”

Mr. Wiggins looked up from
Emma
in surprise. Judith was so distracted by Simon’s presence that she did not even realize what she had said. But Wiggins, who had heard a few scattered comments from the servants about his predecessor, knew this must indeed be that “nice little Miss Ware” who always had a smile for even the lowest housemaid and whom the duke had dismissed for no known reason.

“You had better get back,” said Judith. “The duke is beginning to look restless.”

Simon was indeed wondering what was keeping his reader. He could hear customers talking around him, and he felt his usual anxiety about being left alone in a strange place. It was galling to stand and wait, knowing he could not move without making a fool of himself, and so, when Wiggins returned, his tone was rather sharp. “Did you find the book?”

“Yes, your grace, yes, and I am sorry I took so long.”

“Well, let us pay for it and get home,” Simon said, determined never again to go into a public strange place without a friend to accompany him.

Judith watched them leave and then went up to make her purchase. She was shaken by seeing Simon.

Mr. Wiggins was distracted on the way home. He wondered why the duke had dismissed so nice a young lady and why she had looked so sad. As he told his wife later, she was a small, wren-like girl who reminded him of his sister Joan: frail on the outside, but inside, tough as an oak.

“And how did your first reading of the novel go?” asked his wife.

“Quite well, I think, once I warmed up and got into the swing of it. I think I will take a bit from my next wages to join a circulating library and treat you to a reading of Miss Austen too!”

Mrs. Wiggins was delighted, and was privately convinced that the demise of his former employer had been a blessing in disguise. For years her Joseph had come home, head aching and body stiff from bending over his work, with barely enough energy to eat his supper and chat in front of the fire before they took themselves off to bed. But now her husband had energy to spare when he came home. He had new sights and sounds to chat about, and new ideas. His eyes were clear again, instead of red and strained, and his walk to the duke’s house was beginning to make him feel younger.

The salary was generous; it almost matched what he had been making as a clerk, which meant they did not have to draw upon their meager savings. The servants were welcoming and often asked him to share a light luncheon with them before he went home. It is an ill wind, thought Mrs. Wiggins. I am not happy that that poor young man has lost his sight, nor that this young woman lost her position, but my Joseph deserved something good for all his years of drudgery, and I am glad he has finally gotten it!

Simon had thrown himself so thoroughly into his political preparations during the day, and into a more active social life at night, that while he had occasionally found himself thinking of one of their discussions, at first he had managed not to think of Judith. At the moment, he found Wiggins a satisfactory if colorless reader, and Lady Diana very pleasant to be with.

While he and Diana were enjoying more than a little frisson of excitement from their flirtation, Robin became more and more aloof. Instead of using the opportunities Simon was trying to give him to reestablish a relationship with Diana, Robin excused himself and sought out Lady Lenox. He cared too much for his friend to interfere in what he thought was becoming a romantic attachment. Diana was perhaps what Simon wanted, after all: a sophisticated woman of his own rank to support his career. Judith hadn’t stood a chance, thought Robin. Perhaps there had been some feeling between the duke and Miss Ware, but now it seemed as though he had forgotten her existence.

Simon and Diana continued to enjoy each other’s company. Because it was clearly understood by both of them that the flirtation was only that, they were free to enjoy it. There was an undercurrent of physical attraction that both were aware of and both comfortable with, since there were clear boundaries on the relationship. For Simon, it was wonderful to know that he could kindle attraction in a woman, despite his handicap. Judith had been correct, although he was still not aware of it. His helplessness had led to a certain resignation and he had lost his sense of himself as a man. He had never been one who needed to dominate a woman, but he did need to be able to take the initiative and respond to a woman’s physical vulnerability with a feeling of strength. Simon could sense Diana’s tension when Robin was with them, and her pain as he continued to address her with a cool and precise courtesy, and he felt protective of her, as well as stimulated by her.

Simon was, in fact, a little annoyed with his friend. He assumed Robin could tell this was nothing but a growing friendship with the frosting of a light flirtation. He kept trying to generate conversation between the two, but neither would proceed beyond monosyllables. He was not able to just walk off and leave them alone together, so their meetings were always in his presence. On the second occasion he had suggested Robin take his dance with Diana, he was dismayed by the cold refusal on account of a prior engagement.

As Simon gained confidence, however, his thoughts returned more often to his former reader. He would be in the middle of a particularly vapid conversation and plan to recount it to her so they could both laugh at it, or he would hear a voice that had the same timbre as hers, and, for a moment, was convinced she was nearby.

The more he enjoyed Diana’s company, the clearer it became to him how well-suited she and Robin were. She was intelligent, but not with Judith’s passionate brightness. Her interests, though wider than many ladies, were narrower than Judith’s. She had never wanted for anything and had never wanted a life different from what she was born to. In her first Season, she had been considered a bit wild and continued to have that reputation, but Simon knew her rebelliousness was only skin-deep. Once she was settled down she would be a wonderfully content wife and mother.

The duke found himself annoyed with Miss Ware all over again. It was so clear they were well-suited, sharing a critical stance toward their society and a sense of humor. Now that he had acted as rescuer to both Lady Alice and Diana, Simon felt less of a burden, more conscious of his attractiveness, and he was beginning to be more sure he would be quite happy with Judith as his companion at any of these social occasions.

Robin was not the only one affected by Simon’s supposed conquest of Lady Diana. Or by Lady Diana, Barbara would have said. “She has interfered with and spoiled all of our lives,” said Barbara one morning as she and Judith set out on a shopping trip.

“How is the viscount these days?” Judith asked sympathetically.

“No longer visibly brokenhearted. He has thrown himself into late-night gambling and drinking, and then visits me the morning after, looking pale and blue-deviled and clearly expecting me to be the good little Barbara who always cheered him when he fell off his pony or got into trouble with his father. Well, I won’t do it this time. With him, of course, I have been quite cool and sensible, and said that clearly Simon and Diana are well-suited and seem to be happy together, which, of course, infuriates him. He wants me to tell him that she’ll get bored with Simon and turn back to him.”

“Do you really think the duke is in love with her and she with him?” Judith asked quietly.

“It certainly appears so. They are together at every occasion.”

Judith felt a most painful mixture of love and jealousy. I can’t really feel happy for him, she thought. I should, if I really loved him ... But I don’t. I want to be held in his arms, and I want to be the one who convinces him he is attractive still.

In the quiet of the duke’s library, reading and talking, Judith had given free rein to one part of her feeling for him. She had let herself care for him with her mind and heart, but had been, she saw now, terrified of her growing attraction to him. She had refused to entertain her fantasies, her desire to trace his lips with her fingers and pull his face down to hers, or her need to be held by him, to bury her nose in his shoulder and take in the smell of cloth, cologne, and Simon. She had been frank and open with him in many ways, but she had carefully controlled her physical response, putting up a barrier that might well have made it hard for him to have thought of her as anything but a companion and friend.

I was so careful, she thought despairingly, and I don’t know how to flirt or let a little of the physical enter in to a relationship. No wonder he offered me companionship without passion. How could he have been attracted to me if I never let my attraction to him anywhere near the surface? And he probably wouldn’t be attracted to me. Lady Diana is far more sophisticated and beautiful. Of course, he can’t see how beautiful she is, but I’m sure he can remember it, she thought, a bit wildly. Compounded with her sickening feeling of jealousy was her increasing sense of foolishness, of having ruined her own chances, whatever they might have been.

“And now Robin is miserable and won’t admit it because Simon is his best friend and I must listen to Dev complain and never let him know my own feelings, and you, my dear friend, are sitting there looking as though your heart were broken.” Barbara’s voice broke through Judith’s distraction. “You must let me buy you something for Christmas, Judith, and you must come to the Rosses’ ball with us,” said Barbara impulsively. “You have met them at our house and they especially invited you. You need to get out and meet people. You cannot go into a decline over this.”

“I assure you,” replied Judith, “that I do not intend to go into a decline. It is painful to hear about Simon, but if he is happy, then how can I begrudge it to him? And, yes, I will let you buy me a dress, and I will go to the Rosses’ ball. I need something to look forward to for the holidays.” Judith was tired of resignation, and all her good resolutions against socializing flew out the window.

“At last! I agree, we may as well throw ourselves into the frivolous pursuit of the perfect dress, if the perfect man will take no notice of us!”

The two women made a determined descent upon Madame Celeste’s and the Pantheon Bazaar. Barbara selected a pale-blue embroidered silk. She and the dressmaker, one of the few genuine Parisian modistes in a trade where every other seamstress adapted a French name and accent, took more time with Judith. She brought out lighter colors first, but they did nothing for Judith’s coloring.

“Un moment, I have just the dress,” she said suddenly, and sent her assistant to the back. The young woman returned, carrying the richest dress Judith had ever seen. It was forest-green velvet, cut simply and with the wider skirts that were becoming popular. As it was slipped over her head, she stood there trembling, thinking how wonderful it would be to own such a dress. “It is a bit large in the waist and the bodice, for it was made for someone else, who in the end decided against it. But of course I will alter it to fit mademoiselle. And, of course, it will not be too dear, since it was originally made for someone else,” said Celeste shrewdly, guessing from Judith’s appearance that price might be a consideration.