Talk of the Town Read online

  TALK OF THE TOWN

  Joan Smith

  Chapter 1

  Most families have a black sheep to boast or complain of—a relative who has gone astray from the path of respectability—but Daphne Ingleside felt unique in that their family’s erring member was a female, a black ewe. Aunt Effie, Mama’s only sister, had been a creature of much interest to Daphne for as long as she could remember. It seemed impossible to credit that plain, and really very ordinary Mama should have a sister who had set the whole of England and half of Europe ablaze with her affairs, but so it was.

  Not content with marrying a very eligible earl during her first Season, she had served him false in the second year of their marriage and been caught in flagrante delicto with an even more prestigious gentleman, the Marquis of Ansquith, who was also married. Lord Standington, Effie’s husband, who served as the villain in the Ingleside version of the story, had behaved in a most ungentlemanly manner and cast off his wife in a divorce trial that had rocked the country some thirty years ago, despite the fact that he kept a whole aviary of ladybirds himself.

  The Black Ewe had been severely punished for what was then her one straying from the path of wifely devotion: divorced, publicly disgraced, made a mockery of by all her former great friends. Not one of them spoke to her and, with her head bent low, she had set off for the Continent, to live out her life in sackcloth and ashes.

  But as luck would have it, Effie, who was allowed to retain the nominal dignity of Countess of Standington, no sooner set foot in France than she caught the eye and soon the heart of a certain Mr. Eglinton, a nabob who had made a colossal fortune with the East India Company. She felt it unbecoming to remarry, and in her deepest heart of hearts she still had a soft corner for her ex-husband. Indeed Effie’s whole heart was a cotton ball of softness, according to Mama. Always the kindest, most generous of sisters. As she wended her penitential way from France to Italy, she picked up such a throng of admirers that it soon became necessary for her to remarry for her own safety, and she did so in Florence.

  “The men wouldn’t let her alone,” Mama would sigh with satisfaction and perhaps a tinge of jealousy. Mama was not cursed with inspiring this sort of passion herself. Her husband, Sir James Ingleside, and no one else had found her irresistible. And to tell the truth, Papa was an old stick. One loved him, of course, but his whole discourse with his family was a series of complaints and commands. He was a very caring father, not only to his children but also to his wife. While poor Mama was told to eat up her peas and to stick a scarf into the neck of that low-cut gown, Effie enjoyed a foreign life of ease and recklessness. But in Greece, Mr. Eglinton had contracted a putrid fever while digging up a statue in a swamp, and with her head again bent low, Effie brought him home to England to be treated by the best doctors in the world, who soon had him in his grave.

  There was Effie once more, Mrs. Gerald Eglinton now, her title relinquished, cast upon a friendless sea of money. When he divorced his wife, Lord Standington retreated to his estate in Ireland a broken man, according to Mama, gnawed by his guilty conduct towards his near-innocent wife.

  With surprising alacrity, Effie’s great friends returned to her. Her elegant mansion on Half Moon Street was the scene of many parties, where all but the highest sticklers attended on her. She ran a salon, an idea picked up in France, of no very high intellectual calibre, but enlivened by many gracious foreigners, much good-natured joking, and the best wine the late Mr. Eglinton’s money could buy. Her open-handedness was a byword. A new acquaintance need no more than mention wanting to join the Army than he was handed a commission on a silver platter. When Lady Pamela Thurston pawned her diamonds to pay her gambling debts, it was Mrs. Eglinton who got them out of hawk and said, “Pay me when you can.” She put indigent friends’ sons through school, lavished gifts on everyone, and thought money was only to be spent.

  In the space of not too many years, she had done what she thought should be done with nine-tenths of Mr. Eglinton’s fortune and found herself living on a small fixed income. The champagne salons dwindled to sherry conversazioni and the roomful of eminent guests to three or four down-at-heels gentlemen willing to call a plateful of macaroons and a glass of sherry ‘‘dinner."

  Mama invited her to Wiltshire, but life held yet a few chapters for the beautiful Effie, still only in her late twenties and with enough looks to inspire one last passion. It was not the best of all possible partis who succumbed to her fading charms. Mr. Pealing was neither rich nor witty nor even very handsome, but he was available and Effie was lonesome, so she took him to be her third husband. He added nothing to the patina of the legend that had mushroomed around Effie.

  Sir James had always averred she would come to no good end and was happy that her wayward life should stand as a warning to his own wife and daughter. Effie’s letters now held no mention of salons or conversazoni. An occasional trip to Ranelagh or Vauxhall Gardens was remarked upon, but with increasing regularity the tone tended to be of the high prices charged for everything. The address changed from the mansion on Half Moon Street to Upper Grosvenor Square, with—horror of horrors!—an apartment number. The fabled Effie was living in rented rooms, complaining of the cost of green peas, not diamonds, and before too long complaining of the inefficacy of the medical profession. But with care Mr. Pealing held on for years, and it was not till Effie was in her fiftieth year that the long awaited card with its black edge informing of the death of Mr. Pealing arrived, throwing the Ingleside household into a pelter.

  “She is all alone,” Mama pointed out to Sir James with a tear in her eye.

  James’s heart was made of flint. No offer was extended to Effie to share the home of her sister. “If she asks, we’ll let her come for a visit,” was the best Mama could wring out of him, and Effie never asked. She had never asked them for anything.

  It was twelve months before any request came from her, and when it came, it was not to be allowed to come to them but to send her niece Daphne to her to bear her company for three months.

  “Oh, Mama, I should love it of all things!” Daphne said, her dark eyes shining. Really very like Effie herself at the same age, only the eyes were grey instead of blue, and it was a shame she should not have a crack at anything but the local beaux while her youth and beauty were upon her.

  “I have always wanted to meet her,” Daphne said.

  An accusing eye was levelled on Sir James by his spouse. “Your father does not wish her to come.”

  “We asked her when Eglinton died,” he pointed out. “She didn’t care to come to us then. Oh no, she must stay and party with her so-called friends while the money held out. It would not do at all for Daphne to go to her. An apartment in Upper Grosvenor Square! She will meet no one there.”

  “She is meeting no one worth a second glance here,” Lady Mary retorted with a steely look. “And if Daphne is not to be allowed to go to Effie, then I shall ask my sister to come to us.”

  Mama occasionally got her back up at Sir James’s high-handed ways; not often, but when she did, she was a perfect mule. Faced with this ultimatum, James allowed his daughter to jaunter off to London, relying on her native intelligence to keep her from mischief. Though she had the beauty of her aunt, she had, as well, a pretty fair streak of common sense from the Ingleside branch of the family. It was shown in her conversation before leaving. Unlike her goose of a mother, she did not speak of balls and routs, when she was not going to make her debut, but of wondering whether Auntie kept a carriage so that they might drive in the park. She didn’t even take her ball gowns with her. This caused James a wince of regret; Daphne dearly loved a ball, and how well she danced.

  “You can always have one made up should the need arise,” Mama said, and slipped a little roll
of bills, saved from the milk money, into her hand. She hadn’t a doubt in the world that her daughter would snare a husband on this trip, and how happy she was that he might be a real gentleman and not some local squire’s son.

  A shared smile with her father assured him that the daughter had a clearer idea of how her visit would go. “I shall take my paints,” she said. “I might do a sketch of Aunt Effie to bring back to you, and one of myself for her to keep, if she likes.”

  It took a week to get Daphne’s wardrobe ready for her holiday, for Mama would make a half-dozen trips to the village to buy her fans and ribbons and new patent slippers, all of which she warned her were not really fashionable enough for London. She also found a pair of elbow-length blue kid gloves that she could not resist, on half price, for they had such a cityfied look to them, and it was a great pity they didn’t match any of Daphne’s outfits. The ancient family travelling carriage was wheeled from the stable, brushed off, washed down, and a new coat of paint given to the wheels, which were covered with dust before they’d gone two miles. Mrs. Crozier, a neighbour going to London to visit her daughter, accompanied Daphne to lend respectability on her trip, and she was off.

  It was Miss Ingleside’s first trip to the Metropolis, and she enjoyed every minute of it. No worries of unaired beds, outrageously high prices at inns, of highwaymen or bad food came to annoy her. She wasted her time, in Mrs. Crozier’s opinion, looking out at grass, trees and fields, at passing vehicles, churches and farmhouses when she should have been figuring out whether the George at Farnborough hadn’t overcharged them a shilling for their breakfast.

  On the third day Daphne arrived in London no more weary than if she had just gone a mile down the road, and again gazed from the coach windows at the sights. She was delighted by the busiest streets, the finest homes, the most luxurious carriages and the best-dressed people she had ever seen. This opulence was due to the fact that the coachman was also a stranger to London and not much good at reading the map Sir James had given him. He delivered his charge first to the more elite Grosvenor Square. The real estate deteriorated sharply once he found his way to Upper Grosvenor Square, but it was by no means contemptible—still perfectly respectable. Miss Ingleside felt no qualms upon entering the brick building which held her precious aunt. It looked a very common sort of a house, to be sure, to domicile Lady Standington, as Mama still frequently referred to Mrs. Pealing; but she knew her aunt to be in straitened circumstances and was prepared for it.

  Within doors, Aunt Effie had been preparing for her niece for days, and all was in readiness.

  Chapter 2

  Daphne was met at the doorway by a butler whose livery had seen better days several years ago, but her eyes scarcely saw him; not two steps behind was the most interesting member of her family, the Black Ewe. She saw at a glance that the name was an inappropriate one, for Aunt Effie was blue, literally, from head to toe.

  Her hair, so often likened to a raven’s wing and Daphne’s own hair, had faded to grey and been touched up to blue. Her eyes were blue both within and without— the iris blue, and a blue shadow smeared on the lids with a liberal hand. The gown was blue, and even the feet were shod in dainty blue kid slippers. Daphne at once perceived a recipient for the useless blue gloves Mama had given her. The house was also predominantly blue, and Miss Ingleside was soon being shown into the Blue Saloon, where blue sofas sat against blue walls on a blue carpet, with blue window hangings decorating the grey windows. The whole was dilapidated though not actually squalid.

  Her surprise came out before she set a guard on her tongue. “What a blue room!” she said as soon as she had been made welcome.

  “‘Tis but a sad relic of its former self,” Effie said in a doleful tone, but she was not much given to sad repinings on the past and was soon smiling fondly on Daphne. “You are just as I knew you must be from Mary’s letters,” she said, admiring her niece’s healthy, vivacious face, intelligent grey eyes, and reading in them the image of her own.

  Her niece had to make a hard effort not to be disappointed. She knew her aunt was no longer young, but she was only fifty—five years older than Mama—and she looked sixty. There was no spark, no fire, no interestingness in her, as she was sure there must be in a lady who had led such an eventful, unconventional life. But for her blue hair and painted eyes, she might be any village matron. She was pudgy, more resigned than contented, and not even stylish. She wore an old shawl around her shoulders. Daphne felt cheated. She had come to encounter the dashing Black Ewe, and was met with a blue lap dog. She schooled herself to politeness and enquired how her aunt was enjoying London.

  “Of course it’s not what it once was, for me anyway,” was the sad answer.

  “Oh, dear, she’s going to be a whiner,” Daphne thought, and wished she were back at home. A glazed look fell on the blue eyes, and the lips lifted to reveal some barely discernible traces of a once-sweet smile. “But now that you are come, things will be better,” the aunt said, rallying, and from that point on things took a little turn for the better.

  “The fact of the matter is, my dear, I have been much alone since Mr. Pealing’s passing. Too much alone. Solitude is very bad for you, especially if you are a shatter-brained rattle like myself, with no deep pious thoughts to sustain you. I haven’t had a visitor in a month,” she admitted, “nor been to see anyone. All alone but for the servants, and they, you know, only want to scold and complain.”

  “Oh, Ma’am, you should have come to us!” Daphne said, her sympathy touched at this news.

  “And so I should have done if it weren’t for that Methodist your mama married. Now pray don’t tell me he is an Episcopalian, my dear, for I know very well what he calls himself, and what he really is, too. He wouldn’t want a shady character like me in his house, but then I had the idea of asking Mary to send you to me, and I thought James might allow it to keep me from his door, as I make no doubt he did. But whyever you are here, I’m glad you are, for I have been dying for someone to talk to.”

  She reached out and rang a bell. The butler appeared and she called for tea. “Now,” Effie ran on, unable to stem the flow now that she finally had a listener, “we shall settle in for a good cose, and you must tell me what Mary and James are up to these days, and your brothers, and, of course, all about your beaux. I wager you have many of them.”

  Daphne would no sooner answer one question of Mama’s activities than three more would be fired at her head. She was a little confused, but happy to see her aunt so alert and talkative. An hour later, with her head in a whirl, Daphne went to her room to relax after her trip, and later to change for dinner.

  Aunt Effie had exerted herself to make this first meal a particularly fine one. What silver, crystal, and china she still possessed were all cleaned and polished and laid on the table in a very closet of a dining parlour. The food was good and plentiful, and when Daphne got over the feeling she was eating in a clothespress, she enjoyed it.

  “Try this ragout,” Effie said, passing along a dish. There was no room for footmen at their elbows, and the niece doubted that such people were on the premises at all. “I got the recipe from Lady Devonshire’s Pierre years ago. Lord Holland most particularly liked it.”

  Later, when dessert wine was poured into her glass, Effie said, “This should be good. It’s old enough. It has sat in the cellars since the last century. Fox gave it to me for helping him win the election in ‘85, I think it was,” she added casually.

  “Fox, the great statesman?” Daphne asked, feeling that at last she was approaching the real Aunt Effie of legend.

  “To be sure, my dear. What a treasure he was! When Pitt had the parliament dissolved, you must know, we all—all the Prince of Wales’s set—got together and decided dear Charles must be our next prime minister. Prinney was a Whig then, fancy! The ladies took an active part in politics in those days. Georgiana, the Duchess of Devonshire, and I rounded up a bunch of ladies to go down into the most blackguard houses of Long Acres, begging v
otes and buying them with a kiss when we had to. We all wore a fox brush in our caps, and his buff-and-blue colours in a scarf, and combed his area. And when he won—what a revel! We stayed up all night partying at Devonshire House, and the next day Prinney had a do at Canton House that lasted from noon till six. I didn’t sleep for three days. That same night we went on to Mrs. Crewes for another party. I was married to Lord Standington in those days and moved in the best circles.”

  “And you actually knew the Prince of Wales personally?” Daphne enquired.

  “Knew him! My dear, he spent a week with Standington and myself at Arthur’s hunting box in Leicester, with Marie—Mrs. Fitzherbert, you know. Such a sweet thing she was, only quite stout and with rather a long nose, but very sweet. Georgiana told me such a story about Marie and the Prince. She was present at their betrothal, I suppose you would call it. The Prince was dying for Marie, and she would have nothing to do with him—he couldn’t legally marry her because of the Marriage Act, of course. Her a Papist amongst other things, and a widow! So the Prince had his quack in to leech him—he liked to look pale and romantic. There was a cup of blood drawn, and what must he do but pour it all over himself, cut a hole in his jacket, and send for Marie, pretending he’d tried to commit suicide for love of her. But she wouldn’t go to him without a lady escort, and that is how Georgiana came to be in on it. I wish she had called me. He proposed marriage, and Marie accepted—wrote to the Pope and all to see if it would do. Later they had a sort of marriage ceremony, though neither of them ever declared it publicly and later, when they made Prinney marry that horrid Caroline, he just dropped Marie. They may say what they will of a divorcee, at least I’m not a bigamist.”

  With interesting stories and characters of this sort to beguile the evening, it passed quickly. The ladies went from dining room to Blue Saloon with hardly a gap in the conversation. Tales incredible to believe were unfolded with such a wealth of detail as to name, place and circumstance that there was no disbelieving them. Then, too, despite her eventful life, Effie was not an imaginative person. She was, in fact, that sort of realist who would halt a conversation for five minutes to recall whether it was Mr. Pettigrew or his brother Robert who was second best man at a wedding, when the wedding itself was only a diversion in some other story.