Patricia Veryan - [Sanguinet Saga 07] - Married Past Redemption

The front steps of the house on Portland Place were
of marble and, whatever the vagaries of London's weather,
were kept immaculate. The front door, very tall and topped by a
pediment, was flanked by stained-glass windows and boasted a brass
doorknob so highly polished it seemed to puff itself out with its own
consequence and sneer at any hand presuming to encircle it. The windows
sparkled, the lace curtains were like snow, the iron railings
protecting the steps leading down to the areaway were black and glossy,
and the entire exterior exuded quiet and well-mannered affluence. So,
to a point, did the interior. The ground floor rooms were gracious and
the main drawing room, located on the first floor, was large and most
elegant. Nor could any fault be found with the music room and three
guest bedrooms, all most nicely appointed. Only the parlour, wherein
family gatherings took place, showed signs of becoming shabby, although
it was still a quite comfortable room.

Deterioration was more noticeable on the second floor. The
bedchambers and connecting private parlour of Mr. Humphrey Van Lindsay
and his wife Philippa overlooked the street and were a very good size,
but more than a suspicion of wear was manifested in fading bedcurtains
and carpets inclining to the threadbare. Here also were the three
bedrooms of the children. As thirteen years divided the sons of the
house, Timothy had shared the bedchamber only on the occasions when he
came down from University. These past five years he had been building
himself a fine record with his Regiment and was now in France with the
Army of Occupation. Norman, aged sixteen, was thus left in sole
possession of the room, a circumstance he extolled publicly and
privately despised. From early childhood the eldest Van Lindsay
daughter had required a private bedchamber (this demand resulting in a
marked lack of opposition from her two sisters), but three years ago,
in June of 1813, Beatrice had married Sir William Dwyer, whereby
Lisette and Judith now also had rooms to themselves. In marked contrast
to the elegance of the lower regions, however, these bedchambers were
far from luxurious, the furniture being sadly past the stage at which
reupholstering or repairs would have redeemed it, the carpets downright
tattered, and the apartments spared from being dismal only by the
inventive young minds of their occupants.

The top floor contained the schoolroom and the servants'
quarters and was, to judge from the occasional pithy remarks of the
housekeeper and cook,
decidedly
dismal.

On a rainy afternoon in early April, the large house was
unusually quiet. Mr. Van Lindsay was in his study writing a speech to
be delivered in the House of Commons, of which august body he was a
Member of long standing; Mrs. Van Lindsay was laid down upon her bed,
resting; Judith was at her dancing lesson, and a sulky Norman was
exasperating his tutor by attempting to explain both his execrable
failures in Latin and his conviction that not even when he reached the
ripe old age of eighteen would he be able to pass Smalls. In the rear
corner bedroom, Lisette Van Lindsay sat alone, head bowed as she
ostensibly mended a lace tablecloth. Thick hair of a very dark brown,
styled in one of the new shorter cuts, accentuated the beautiful shape
of her head, which remained down-bent until a gust of wind drove
raindrops in a busy pattering at the windowpanes. Lisette looked up
then, revealing a heart-shaped face blessed with a clear, creamy
complexion, a straight nose with just the suggestion of an upward tilt,
and a full-lipped mouth, just now tragically drooping above a firm
little chin. The grey skies outside were no greyer than the hue of Miss
Van Lindsay's world; the raindrops no damper than the tears that fell
with distressing frequency from great eyes, near-black, to wet her
rather uneven stitches. At the advanced age of one and twenty her
future stretched out bleak and hopeless; a spinster's existence. For
she would, she thought grievously, never wed. Not now that she had been
spurned, tossed aside like—

"Lisette! Lisette! Are you in there?"

An impatient scratching at the door accompanied that urgent
enquiry, and the tablecloth was brought into play to dab hurriedly at
the tearful eyes that then blinked down at the stitch to be set. "Come
in," Lisette invited rather belatedly as the door burst open.

Judith Van Lindsay, a plump and tomboyish fourteen, exploded
into the room, her long pigtails flying. "Only guess who I just saw!"
she cried. "Only guess! You'll
never
guess!"

Bending to examine her stitchery—and conceal her somewhat
reddened eyes—Lisette guessed dutifully, "The Duke of Wellington?"

Judith's round face sank. With a regretful sigh she admitted
that her hero had not been the one observed, but then, her own dark
eyes bright with importance, she divulged, "That dreadful Rachel Strand
woman! She was with her brother—or at least Elinor
said
it was her brother. And I thought she was not so spectacular as
everyone says. She's not near as pretty as you, and why that stupid
Tristram Leith should have chose
her
is more than
I—or Elinor either—could fathom! Oh, now I have made you prick your
finger!"

"No, no," Lisette reassured. And thus provided with an excuse
to look strained, as she knew she must, corrected, "The lady is now
Mrs. Leith, Judith. Not Rachel Strand."

"And not a lady," Judith said pertly. Her sister's frown
caused her to hurry on. "But do you not think her daring to venture
into Town with her
shocking
reputation? I could
scarce credit it. And you would never
think
her a
notorious woman, for she is angelically fair—" She broke off to add
loyally, "but nowhere
near
as pretty as you!" In
need of sustenance after all this excitement, Judith then bounced onto
the bed and produced from her reticule a sticky glob from which she
began with great concentration to remove some much wrinkled and not too
clean paper.

Such a procedure would normally have ensured her immediate
banishment, but watching her ebullient sister unseeingly, Lisette
murmured, "So she really
is
a beauty."

"In a blond way, I suppose." Judith licked her treasure
happily and went on, whenever her tongue was not otherwise employed,
"She must have all the looks… in the family, for I heard Mama telling
Papa that her sister… Charity, is a plain little dab of a thing."

Attempting to be objective, Lisette set another stitch and
remarked that she'd heard Charity Strand did not enjoy good health.
"Have you seen her, also?"

"No. But I saw the brother, and
he
certainly could not be said to be even slightly handsome. Oh, he's a
good pair of shoulders, were they not so bony, and straight legs, but—"

"Judith!"

The bold young miss giggled. "Well, he has. But he is so
thin,
Lisette! And his face is
brown,
which makes his
eyes look positive weird!" She licked again, then paused, her mood
changing as she observed, "Poor soul. I know how he must feel. Look at
me. Fat and plain. And this hair!" She gave one thick rope a
deprecatory tug, then pulled a face as her fingers adhered to the long
strands.

Lisette groaned in exasperation and went to the washstand.
Wetting a cloth, she returned and handed it to her sister. "If you
would not eat so many sweets, Judith, you'd likely put off some of
those extra inches. But it is just puppy fat, after all. I suppose by
the time you reach fifteen you will be slim, if only you are a little
more careful. Now give me that horrid stuff."

Relinquishing her prize with a martyred sigh, Judith dabbed at
her fingers and mourned, "Even if I do manage to become thinner in the
next year, I shall never have your looks, dearest. You could have wed
any bachelor in London, and you know it, had you not set your cap for—"

"What fustian!" Lisette intervened hastily. "I shall never
marry, because I do not wish to be wed." With a prideful tilt of the
chin, she added a reinforcing, "I am much too modern to submit to a
man's will! And—and as for Leith"—oh, how hard it was to say his
name!—"only think what a narrow escape I had, for he must have very
little sense of family obligation or pride to wed into so unacceptable
a house. Indeed, my heart quite goes out to his poor father for—"

"Not—
marry?"
gasped Judith, who had been
momentarily struck dumb. "But, Lisette, you
must
marry! Papa told Timothy we are pinning all our hopes on your making a
brilliant match. And with
your
looks… Only recall
that fellow who kept writing those odes to your eyes." She gave a
squeak of laughter. "Remember the one that went: 'Great eyes that glow
like dusky pansies…'?"

"Yes." Lisette sat on the bed and giggled. "And as though that
were not bad enough, he finished it with, 'Despair to every hope of
man's is!' Dreadful!" Briefly, they both succumbed to mirth. Still
smiling, Lisette asked, "How do you know that Papa told Timothy I was
the hope of the family? Did Tim tell you?''

"No. It was in a letter Papa was writing. I saw it when I was
sent to his study to be punished for putting water in the bottle with
Norman's silly model ship."

"Judith!" gasped Lisette, much shocked. "You never did?"

Judith's chin set mulishly. "Well, he will never finish it,
and it was all droopy on one side at all events!" She brightened to a
redeeming notion. "Now he can say it sank!"

"I didn't mean that. You
read
Papa's
letter? That is dishonourable!"

To receive such a scold from the sister she both adored and
admired, and to realize the justification for that rebuke, was
crushing. Her face reddening, Judith said defiantly, "Well—well, look
at what
you're
doing! Darning that old thing!
Mama would be properly in the boughs did she see you."

"I know, but someone must do the mending, and Mrs. Helm is
always saying she has not the time because she is so short of maids.
Poor Sandy has her hands full, trying to take care of Mama and me. So
who else is to do it?"

"There would not be so much to be done if Mama did not persist
in using lace tablecloths. Someday she will have to admit we are poor,
instead of forever pretending we are better than everyone else."

The criticism was well based, but stifling a sigh, Lisette
said, "You must not forget, dear, that we are of a very old house. Mama
is proud of being a Bayes-Copeland. And Papa—''

"Papa is proud of Mama, and tells his cronies that 'Poor
Norman' could not go to Eton because he is too frail. Frail! The great
monster is sturdy as any bull, and had we the ready, would have been—"
She broke off with a guilty start as the door opened to admit her
mother's regal figure.

Mrs. Van Lindsay swept into the room with a shushing of silks
and a breath of expensive perfume. In her youth, Philippa Van Lindsay
had been a great beauty. At seven and forty, she was still a handsome
woman. She had long ago determined she would never allow herself to
become a fat and indolent matron, with the result that she was, if
anything, rather too angular, but she had a clear skin, the luxuriant
dark hair that marked all her children, and the same big, dark eyes
that enhanced Lisette's lovely face. "So you are back, Judith," she
observed redundantly. "Did you get your feet wet?"

Judith, who had sprung up respectfully, now replied in the
rather scared voice she invariably adopted towards her parent that she
was perfectly dry, thank you.

"Well, I must say your lessons seem to become shorter and
shorter. I would by far prefer that you go to Madame Coutrain. Your
cousin Matthilde moves with such grace, and I am assured it is only
thanks to the Coutrain woman, for her mama was of most indifferent
upbringing. However, your grandmama
would
have
Alexis is more the thing, so… Well, that is neither here nor there."
She folded her hands, her eyes slightly frowning as she reflected that
since her mother was paying for the lessons, there was little she could
do about it. That vexed gaze came to rest on the lace tablecloth that
Judith's plump form did not quite conceal. Her frown deepening, she
demanded, "Lisette, whatever are you about?" and, seizing the
tablecloth without waiting for a response, eyed the hanging thread and
needle with disapprobation. "How many
times
have
I told you, child? You are
not
a seamstress!"

Lisette, having also come to her feet, said anxiously, "No,
but someone must mend them, Mama, and we do not have a seamstress or
anyone who—"

She quailed into silence, for her mother's fine eyes held a
formidable flash as they rested upon her. "We may not, just at the
present," admitted Mrs. Van Lindsay in a voice of ice, "be enabled to
procure such servants as we would wish. We are, nonetheless, of such
consequence as would forbid us to engage in menial tasks. If you have
no sense of your own pride, Lisette, you might do me the courtesy to
consider mine!"

"Y-yours, Mama?"

"Mine! How bitterly humiliated I would be did the servants
spread the news that one for whom we had once entertained such
brilliant hopes was reduced to spoiling her pretty fingers by hours of
drudgery."

Lisette lowered her lashes to conceal the tears that, these
days, sprang to her eyes so readily. Judith saw the painful flush that
stained her idol's cheeks and, with unprecedented courage, proclaimed,
"Lisette
still
has brilliant hopes, Mama! She may
be one and twenty, but she is quite the prettiest girl in all London,
and has lots of beaux! You should only see how the gentlemen stare when
we walk out. She'll likely find a far better catch than that old
Tristram Leith! And who wants him, anyway, with his face all scarred as
it is since Waterloo."