Babe Page 16

  “Was there any talk of my dunking at the Swansons’?” Barbara asked.

  “Several people asked for you. I said you stayed home to recuperate. I slipped Clivedon the word to bear me out, when he dropped in later.” She mentally noted that he had gone to the Staunton ball, and not back to the Argyle Rooms. Very likely Romeo had made his assignation with Adele, then, and she would be free of him for a while.

  They were still at the table when Clivedon arrived with the repaired phaeton and new team. “Get your bonnet and we’ll give them a try,” he told Barbara.

  When she went to prepare herself, Clivedon discussed with his sister the same matter she had just talked over with Barbara. “Not too great a brouhaha. It will pass over if no new calamities arise,” Lady Withers thought.

  “They won’t,” her brother answered confidently.

  “I was amazed she didn’t slip off behind our backs last night, when I heard young Romeo had been here,” Agnes replied innocently.

  She was not enlightened on this matter by her caller. “I dropped by myself later on,” he said. “We had a good talk, Agnes. Babe has had very poor advice from her former guardian. That Fannie, you know, running with a rackety crew and never trying to exercise the least restraint.”

  “It would not have been pleasant to be forever pinching at the girl. If they were to rub along at all, they must accept each other’s ways.”

  “It was for the older to show some guidance. Barbara was only seventeen when she went there first. She thanked me for lecturing her last night. I felt a perfect tyrant. Imagine, no one before ever bothered to be angry with her. I wonder she hasn’t run into real trouble before this. There must be more common sense there than we ever thought.”

  “She is no greenhead, certainly.”

  “She has more than her share of town bronze now, but is still quite childishly naive beneath it all.”

  “You gave her another talking-to about the water party, did you? I shouldn’t harp on it, Larry. It really wasn’t her fault. The thing to do is keep Romeo away from her. It was his picture that everyone spoke of—so shabby of him, and not what I would have expected from one of his sensitivity, for you remember he particularly said he had changed his mind about painting her undraped. I fear he is not completely reliable.”

  Clivedon stared at this mild reproof of the former favorite, and said he thought the fellow could be relied on totally to make a mash of anything he did, outside of painting. Their talk was interrupted by the arrival of the lady in question. She was led to the front door to view her team, another set of grays, not so different-looking from the last. “Oh, you found me new grays! Whose are they?”

  “Yours now—you said you preferred grays. They’re a tamer pair than Bradbury’s, you may be sure. They come from a country gentleman who trained them himself, but I drove them through town a couple of days to accustom them to city traffic. They’re sweet goers.”

  This mark of consideration, of time spent on her convenience, struck her most forcibly. “How very kind you are,” she said. “You spoil me, Clivedon.”

  “It is a guardian’s privilege.”

  “I think you mean unpleasant duty, but this goes beyond duty. How lowering for you to be seen driving this county-bred pair through town. Were they very farouche?”

  “A trifle nervous the first day, but they are fast learners.”

  She took the reins and directed the team to Bond Street, congratulating him on his choice. “These are obedient without being slavish, just as I like. Did I pay a great deal for them?”

  “Ah, good! You are showing an interest in your money. You’ll get the bill.”

  “Not till next quarter, I hope. Clivedon, I dislike to ask another favor of you when I am in such deep disgrace . . .”

  “You’re climbing out of the moat. What is it?”

  “There’s a bill in my reticule, just at my side there, if you wish to take it out. A jeweler you missed in your canvass to cut off my credit. But only a couple of pounds; he reset a ring for me. That is not the real favor, however. The thing is . . . oh, I see you have found Fannie’s letter. Read it, if you like. She is getting married in the country, and I ought to send her a present.”

  He drew out the letter and read it through, noticing the abrupt wording, no invitation for Barbara to attend the ceremony, but several joking references to enjoying herself and not sinking into obscurity with her new guardian. “Odd she should have been eager to send you to me, if she thought you were to be so poorly entertained,” he said curtly.

  “It was her idea, was it? I wondered where you got the notion of taking me on.”

  “She mentioned to Agnes that you did not wish to go with her to Austria. That led me to hope you were ready for the polite world. It was my own idea for me to replace Lord Withers as your guardian. What sort of present have you in mind?”

  “Diamonds certainly. Fannie loves diamonds, and hers are nearly all turned to paste with the high cost of living. A brooch, I thought. Not a terribly expensive one,” she went on, as she sensed his dislike of giving diamonds. “She had a good deal of bother with me all those years. I daresay I might have been an expense to her as well. We never discussed money much. Maybe I should give her more than a brooch?”

  “You were no financial burden to her. You had your own monies, which paid for at least half the running of that establishment, I expect. A brooch will do well enough.”

  They parked the phaeton and went to Hamlet’s to select the gift. “I’ll arrange to have it sent to her. One can hardly send diamonds through the mail,” he said, taking the parcel and putting it in his coat pocket. “Shall we walk a little and see who is on the strut?” he asked.

  “Lucky I can’t afford to buy any parcels to burden you with, or folks would be saying I had attached you as my new gallant, Clivedon,” she teased him, taking his arm to stroll down the street. This was a diversion not formerly engaged in by them, though they had often driven out together, and attended parties. She found it enjoyable to be seen in this new familiar light with her guardian.

  “Fine talk, after you have already burdened me with a package of diamonds,” he answered.

  “Very true, but no one will know, so you are safe. You have my permission to tell anyone we chance to meet that we are on our way to Waites to have a tooth drawn. That will provide you an unexceptionable excuse to be seen with me, for naturally I would not go except under duress.”

  “Naturally! A good thing you reminded me. I’ll have him give your teeth a going-over, since you mention it.”

  “Let us drop into the apothecary while we are about it, and order a mustard plaster, to complete our pleasant outing,” she suggested playfully.

  They continued for a block in this jocose vein, suggesting hair shirts and Bath chairs to each other till they saw a small crowd gathered around a shop window, looking at the cartoons of the day.

  “I wonder what Prinney has been up to today?” he said, and went to have a look. When he heard the word “Babe,” he knew be had misjudged the subject of the squib. Tall enough to see over others’ shoulders, he saw a depiction of Lady Barbara, arising like Venus from the waves, with her hair her only garment. He tensed and looked down at her, scowling.

  “What is it? What’s the matter?” she asked.

  “Stay here. I'll be right back.”

  She worked her way to the front of the little throng, just in time to see the cartoon being pulled from the window by Clivedon. She looked in dismay, catching a glimpse of the subject matter and an impression of an angry face behind the window. She saw him rip it into pieces and fling it to the floor, saw him utter a few angry words to the proprietor, while she withdrew to the back of the crowd, hoping she was unrecognized. She had graced dozens of shop windows in her flaming career. She had been shown climbing onto the Czar’s knee as he sat on his throne during the royal visit, she had been depicted as leading Wellington into battle after her Paris visit, she had been shown on horseback, and this very seaso
n there had been one of her sideswiping Lord Petersham in her phaeton, but she had never before been shown naked. She had rather enjoyed being Society’s daring darling, but this went beyond a joke. Clivedon was right; she had been closer to ruin than she knew, and wasn’t sure she hadn’t slipped off the razor’s edge with this exploit.

  He was out in a minute, taking her arm to walk briskly away. “You saw it?” he asked. She nodded her head mutely. “I’m talking you home at once,” he said in a hard voice.

  She was too distraught to make any reply, certain she was in for another lecture. When they went to climb onto the carriage, Clivedon took the driving seat. She was very relieved, for she was too overcome to drive now. She sat silent beside him, waiting for the attack to begin. “I’ll sue,” he said, after they had gone half a block.

  “What?”

  “I’ll sue him for defamation of character.”

  “That would create such a lot of talk,” she said hesitantly, envisioning courtrooms, crowds, more scandal, and more cartoons.”

  “Yes, you’re right, of course. That would do more harm than good, make it a cause célèbre. Better to hush it up, but I’ll threaten him in private, and it will prevent a repetition of this sort of thing. You won’t want to be seen on the streets today, with everyone talking about this. I’ll take you home and go back down to see if there are any more of them on display, and be rid of them if there are. Now don't give up,” he said bracingly, attempting a smile, for her benefit, she knew. “You have more pluck than that. It was a damned piece of insolence on the fellow’s part, but it is early, and not many can have seen it yet. A pity your every move is of so much interest to the vulgar. What can account for it, do you think?” he asked, positively smiling now, and with really something that sounded strangely like admiration, or pride, in his voice.

  She was stunned to see that his anger was not directed at herself for once. He seemed preoccupied as they went home. At the doorway he said, “You haven’t any other little rigs running that I ought to know about, have you? Quite sure you weren’t recognized by anyone last night?”

  “Only you and Romeo. You don’t think he might take into his head to tell anyone?”

  “God only knows what that bleater might do. I’ll go and put a flea in his noble ear this minute. All we need now is Gentz landing into town to claim you for his bride.”

  “No, I wrote him. That is—sent him a copy of the retraction, in case he should see . . .” She stumbled to a stop. Why was she lying? “Actually, he wrote me asking about it, and I sent him a note explaining.”

  “That was well done,” he congratulated her, when she was sure he’d browbeat her for writing to Gentz. “Don’t worry, my girl, we’ll pull through yet. Oh, what an infernal nuisance you are,” he said, but in a joking way. “I hope you’re worth all the bother.”

  She knew she wasn’t. She had never felt more worthless in her life. It was unpardonable to be putting her relatives to so muck bother and embarrassment. Lady Withers would hate the shabbiness of this latest bit.

  The cartoons (there were two others) were got rid of before many had seen them, and the matter appeared to be at rest. Lord Romeo was warned to keep silent about his last outing with Barbara and accepted it calmly. But then, he never got excited much about anything except beauty and ugliness.

  “I shan’t say a word. I do not want my wife to wear a bad reputation,” was his reply.

  “I don’t give a tinker’s curse about your wife, whoever she may turn out to be, but you will leave Lady Barbara alone,” Clivedon told him.

  “When I marry her, you will leave her alone.”

  “She’s not likely to marry a . . .” He could think of no comparison bad enough to convey his sentiments.

  “A cobbler should not judge above his last,” he was told. “I do not like you in the least.”

  “The feeling is mutual, I assure you.”

  “It was you who wrote my father, giving him a very wrong opinion of my renovations. I do not forgive you for that, nor for trying to keep me from Barbara. Please go away. You disturb me.”

  One always left Lord Romeo with a feeling of futility, unsure whether he had understood one’s point, but quite certain his own had been made.

  Chapter Eighteen

  If ever a sliding woman was restored to respectability, that woman surely was Lady Barbara Manfred. The infamous Babe was no more in evidence. She instituted a regime of propriety that old Queen Charlotte would have admired. She took to inserting lace fichus into the necks of her more dashing gowns, frowning at anyone who called her Babe, driving at a strict trot twice in the direction of Mecklenberg Square to read the Bible with her cousin, Lady Graham. When she was told she read too quickly, she slowed her reading down to a trot too, and received that strict dame’s strongest approval; she was declared to be tolerable. She was so determined to be decent that if she hadn’t been on the catch for a husband, she might very well have given up receiving morning callers and stayed home from the balls. But her main goal now was to find a husband before the Season was over, and time was running short.

  Ellingwood came soon to apologize for the fracas of the water party, and this uninteresting specimen was looked on with a new favor. Clivedon had often mentioned him as the sort of man she should be looking out for, and she learned to discover wisdom in his utterances. To be sure, he only said what everyone else said, but there was something in conventional wisdom, after all. Everyone couldn’t be wrong, and it was her old flouting of convention that had set her on the road to perdition. He invited her to drive out the next afternoon, and when she received a gracious nod from Lady Withers, she accepted with alacrity.

  Clivedon came to call just as she was on her way out the door. She smiled at him in a meaningful way, to show him how she was heeding his advice. He quirked a brow at her, but seemed pleased, she thought. He was less pleased when the performance was repeated the next day, and gave up any pretense of a smile when she quoted Ellingwood that evening before dinner. He dined with Lady Withers at her home on that occasion, in company with a large party.

  His approval was not so pronounced as Barbara thought it should be either when she went to sit with the Dowager Countess Anstrom and her sister, Lady Nathorn, both these ladies being sisters to Ellingwood’s mother. He raised a brow at her in a sarcastic way that did not indicate approval but mockery, while he himself went to talk to a Miss Chumpton, who was young, pretty, and not at all a backward sort of a girl. In fact, the two of them behaved in a way that caused the countess to look down her nose in disdain and proclaim Miss Chumpton “a froward creature.”

  As there was an assembly to be attended that same evening, the party at Cavendish Square broke up early. “Are you coming with me or Agnes?” Clivedon asked Barbara.

  “Lady Nathorn and Lady Anstrom have asked me to go with them,” she replied, looking for a bit of appreciation that she had gained favor with this pair of Tartars.

  “What!”

  “They are Charles’s aunts, you must know,” she explained in a low tone. Ellingwood had become Charles during the course of a few outings.

  “I see,” he answered, very briefly and with the utmost indifference. Then he turned to Miss Chumpton to compliment her on a gown that was every bit as daring, and as pretty, as a certain green Italian silk he had found unacceptable for his own ward to wear in public. Still Lady Barbara continued civil.

  “It is indeed lovely,” she said to the lady. “Along with Clivedon, I have been admiring it all evening.”

  “Thank you,” Miss Chumpton said with a little frown, wondering that her two admirers should be glaring at each other instead of looking at the gown for which they expressed admiration.

  Ellingwood had not been to dinner at Withers’, but he was at the assembly waiting for Lady Barbara to arrive. He rushed up to her, greeting her with both hands out. She had the strangest feeling he was going to seize her in his arms, which was not at all his usual way of proceeding. Certainly he was workin
g himself up to a proposal, and she did wish he could be a little more dashing in appearance. There were an even dozen that exceeded him in elegance, and a couple of dozen who outdid him in conversation. But he was eminently respectable and eligible, and seemed inclined to favor her, so she smiled and welcomed him warmly, while the Ladies Anstrom and Nathorn glared their approval. This was expressed in one jerky nod of the head, rather like a pair of owls.

  She saw from the corner of her eye that Clivedon was already present, and appeared to have unburdened himself of Miss Chumpton, though he had certainly brought her in his own carriage, quite unnecessarily, as her mother was at the dinner party at Cavendish Square. When she went to the floor with Ellingwood, however, Clivedon soon followed with another lady to join their set, and at the next dance led Miss Chumpton forward. As he seemed to be keeping a close eye on her, Barbara was fastidious that not so much as a wayward smile escaped her lips. She was nice to the point of insipidity.

  The evening was well advanced when at last Clivedon found her unpartnered for a dance. “Enjoying yourself?” he asked. She thought the stiffness in his voice was very likely the result of having stood up with Lady Angela, for despite the most marked lack of interest, she continued courting Clivedon, and had got herself on friendly enough terms that she had received an invitation to Lady Barbara’s ball.

  “Very much,” she told him brightly. “And you?”

  “Oh yes. I can relax tonight, with Romeo nowhere in sight and Ellingwood to keep you in line.”

  “You don’t have to worry about anyone keeping me in line. I have now got myself under control. I wonder where Romeo is these days? I haven’t seen him since the Cyprians’ Ball. Don’t bother to grin at me! I am careful not to mention that point in front of anyone but you. As you know all my past vices, I speak frankly.”

  Strangely enough, this remark brought forth the first smile that had been on Clivedon’s face for over an hour. “It must be pleasant for you to be able to relax for a minute and be yourself too,” he said.