Babe Page 4

  “I see.” His answer was light, like her own, almost offhand, but she sensed she had wasted an opportunity to know him better. It was not often she was invited to partake of rational conversation. She was angry with herself suddenly, to have been so flippant. She didn’t like those things she mentioned, not to any great extent. She liked the country better than the city, liked riding better than dancing, she preferred good conversation to gossip, too. Most of all, she would like to feel she belonged somewhere, that there was a spot in the world where she was more than a bothersome guest. She wanted someone to love, and to love her, but she could hardly say so to a near-stranger, and a hateful, heartless stranger at that.

  “You enjoy travel, I think,” he mentioned, but in a half-hearted, make-talk sort of way.

  “I do not much like it,” some perversity caused her to say.

  “You do a fair bit of it.”

  “When the people you are staying with travel, you have to either go with them or cause a great bother, trying to find someone else to billet yourself on. There is no saying either that you won’t end up at Mecklenberg Square,” she added tartly.

  “Where would you prefer to end up?”

  “At home. At Drumbeig. But it is too far away, and there is no one to take me.”

  “Did Fannie never take you home?”

  “No, not once,” she answered, feeling very sorry for herself, and letting some trace of it creep into her voice.

  “What is it like, Drumbeig?” he asked, with enough interest that she answered in considerable detail.

  “It’s beautiful – away north in the Cotswold Hills, in Oxfordshire. Excellent riding of course, rough and rugged terrain.” She spoke on at length, mentioning her friends there, and as he posed a few thoughtful questions, she was soon relating to him episodes from her very childhood.

  “I have a hunting box not too far away from your place,” he mentioned. “It is beautiful countryside. Was there no one you might have stayed at home with after your father’s death?”

  “It was nearly time for me to be presented – everyone said I should be, and as father was – was seeing rather a lot of Fannie at the time, he left me in her charge.”

  “How old were you when you went to Fannie?”

  “Seventeen. I was presented at seventeen. Fannie thought it old enough. I was at Devonshire House a year before that, when my father was still alive, but ill. He had to be near the best physicians. Dr. Ward had him in his private sanatorium, and he wanted me to be close enough to visit him often. I stayed half a year there after his death, and half a year with Fannie before I made my come-out. She said it would help me forget him, going to parties and balls.”

  “Did it?”

  “I didn’t try to forget him. My happiest memories are of my father. I was very young when my mother died. I have nearly forgotten her, though Papa used to say I was very like her. No, I do not want to forget the best friend I ever had. I am sorry his memory is growing dim in my mind. I have no picture of him in London. Sometimes I can hardly remember how he looked.”

  “I must apologize for leading you into this conversation. It can hardly he amusing for you, and you have told me that is what you like, amusing talk and people.”

  “If you feel a fit of apology descending on your shoulders, apologize for where you have sent me to live. I didn’t mean to bore you with my autobiography.”

  “It was not at all boring.”

  There was less talk on the return trip. Each was sunk in his own ruminations, Barbara of her past, Clivedon trying to remember her then. Seventeen was a young age for a country girl to have been thrown to the London wolves. An impressionable age too, just at the edge of womanhood. He had only the haziest memory of her at that time. Young enough himself that he was interested not in girls but very dashing older ladies. He recalled a few amusing incidents, but perfectly harmless. Galloping instead of trotting in the parks, being a little rowdy and countrified at polite do’s. He felt a strong and utterly futile wish that he had known her better then. Or even two years ago, before she had fallen in with the Continental set. It was only recently she had become the infamous Babe Manfred. If there was any good fiber left in her, she’d straighten out. He didn’t think the twig was so inalterably bent that it was impossible.

  In the afternoon she went dutifully to examine once again the Elgin Marbles, and agreed verbally with the mandarins that it had been a wise purchase, while mentally balking at the high price paid for these smashed relics of antiquity. Yet there was a strangely compelling beauty in the carvings. A peaceful order that was sadly lacking in her own disordered life. It was restful to see those shepherds and athletes caught in their prime, beautiful and immutable forever in marble. Never to grow old and have circles under their eyes. Never to be running into scrapes. How peaceful it would be to be a statue, she thought.

  Chapter Five

  Barbara was not at all fagged when the hour for the Farrows’ ball rolled around. She thumbed through those gowns that still remained to her, selecting a deep blue that matched her eyes and set off her pale coloring. Harper did her hair up high on her head, held in place with a pair of sapphire-tipped pins she had had made to her own design at Rundell and Bridges. She was happy Lady Withers had not considered this gown too risqué. It was one of her favorites. Lady Graham, when she beheld her first sight of it was not of the same mind.

  “You’re surely not taking Barbara into company half naked!” she exclaimed, horrified with bare shoulders and no sleeves.

  “It is the style this year, Cousin,” he explained with a bemused smile, finding no fault in it.

  “You men are all alike, always in favor of any style that shows you parts of a lady’s body you shouldn’t see.”

  “Barbara has a shawl. Better put it over your shoulders,” he advised her, with a shared look that did not augur his expecting her to keep it there long.

  “A French style, I daresay,” the old dame scolded, while Mabel risked a little smile of approval. Recalling her guest’s mixed parentage, Lady Graham went on to mitigate her insult. “Not that I mean to say the Frenchies are all bad. They are very wise about money. Tight as drums, or so I have heard. Not so bad as the Austrians, with that wicked waltz they have invented. Ladies and gentlemen holding onto each other in public. You won’t let Lady Barbara waltz, Clivedon?”

  “Certainly not!” he answered at once, feigning great shock. When he saw the young lady’s lips open to object, he rapidly spoke on. “Nor shall I waltz myself.”

  Lady Graham shook her head in approval. “And I want her home early, mind.”

  “Don’t wait up for her, ma’am. I wouldn’t dream of keeping you up past midnight, and these do’s often go on till one, you know.”

  He had no notion of leaving a minute before two, and neither had his companion. “Just leave the door on the latch. Harper will be up,” Barbara mentioned.

  “The butler will be up. I couldn’t sleep with the door on the latch without Smudge up to guard us. One o’clock, eh? That is very late. Too late for me,” Lady Graham decreed.

  They escaped into the night. “This is hardly worth the trip, if we are not to waltz and be home at one o’clock,” Barbara offered.

  “I didn’t want to shock the old girl. Better cover up those naked shoulders,” he joked, as they settled into the carriage.

  “Deceitful creature! To hear her praise you . . .”

  “And you!” he informed her, lifting a finger. “She was kind enough to tell me you were not nearly as wild as she had been led to expect.”

  “I wonder who gave her that reading of my character. It wouldn’t do to suggest it was yourself.”

  “‘A trifle headstrong’ is the phrase I used, but then, she knows you are not completely English.” They chatted with no altercation till they reached the city.

  “Where does Lady Angela live?” Barbara asked. “We are to pick her up, you said.”

  “No, no, she does not come with us. She goes with her mother. We
’ll see her there.”

  Barbara thought that if she were Clivedon’s girl friend, she would have something to say about this arrangement. Lady Angela, she assumed, was built of sterner, or more polite, stuff than herself.

  No time was wasted to find Angela once they had been announced. He walked directly to her side. “You are acquainted with my cousin, Lady Barbara, I think?” he asked her.

  The two ladies had met casually several times over the years, for they had both been on the town for some time. Though they were each daughters of an earl, each youngish and attractive, they had never been more than nodding acquaintances. Angela was not precisely a prude. She was fashionable, and a good horsewoman, but she held herself rather high. She had never been to a masquerade, and had no desire to attend one. Almack’s was her preferred spot for socializing, and while it was very prestigious socially, it had a reputation for dullness.

  “We have met,” Angela allowed, and offered her hand with a smile that was polite without showing the least warmth.

  A quick appraisal of toilettes took place between the two, with Barbara wishing she had worn white—so well it looked against Angela’s dark coloring. But it made herself look like a ghost. Angela thought it was time she abandoned white and broke into some livelier hues. She was sick to death of white.

  Clivedon’s duty was to stand up with one of them and find an escort for the other. His preference, which he had soon translated into a duty, was to partner the lady he had escorted to the ball, but Lady Angela had put a hand on his arm in a very possessive manner, and disengaging himself proved difficult. The whole happened so quickly it was no more than a fleeting thought.

  A young gentleman hurried forward to make his bows to them while they were still saying good evening to each other. He was Lord Ellingwood, a cousin of Angela’s and considered one of her court, though he did not, in fact, care any more for her than she cared for him. They were of the same age, and thus the lady found him a child and he thought of her as an older woman. It was in Barbara’s direction that he was smiling shyly. Being somewhat a backward fellow, he was strongly attracted to comets, the more dashing the better. He was not ill-favored. He was tall and well enough built, with a passingly handsome face that one was inclined to forget as soon as he left the vicinity. Of much more importance than all this, he was a baron and he was in possession of a good fortune that was likely to become better when his two aunts departed the world. He asked for permission to accompany Lady Barbara for the opening minuet. With no visible disappointment, she accepted.

  She found him remarkably dull, but her disappointment faded when she saw Colonel Gentz across the room. She had not the least suspicion he would be here, and for a few weeks he had been her closest companion. She wanted to regale him with the tales of her recent trials. She had thought he would be at Burrells’ with Fannie and Bagstorff, and even if he remained behind, she would not have expected to meet him at such a proper do as this. But she was happy to see him walking towards her at a brisk pace as soon as the dance was over.

  “Babe!” he said, taking her hand and squeezing it. “Where the devil have you been hiding yourself all week-end? I went around to Withers’, but learned you were not there as Fannie thought. Lady Withers mentioned someone called Graham, but couldn’t give me the address.”

  Babe rapidly concluded that the address had been withheld on purpose, and considered giving it to him. No, Lady Graham would dislike this foreigner, and one’s hostess must be taken into consideration. “I am living in the wilds. You would need an Indian guide to find me,” she laughed, trying to dismiss it. He pestered her a few more times, but found out no more than that she was somewhere north of the city. Ellingwood, forgotten, bowed himself away.

  When the next set began, she stood up with Gentz, with some little premonition that Clivedon would not like it. She realized her feeling had been correct when she saw him glaring at her from the side of the room and taking a close look at the colonel. The use of an army rank was a holdover from the Napoleonic wars. Gentz was now a civilian, outfitted in a black coat like everyone else on this night. He was an older gentleman, in his mid-thirties like Clivedon, but seemed older. It was perhaps his Continental manners that lent him a slightly raffish air. They were elegant, almost excessively so when he dealt with ladies, and his dealings were mostly with ladies. His smile was just a shade too wide, his ease too pronounced, as though to proclaim he was not inferior to anyone. But he was tall and handsome, an amusing flirt. She enjoyed her dance with him but did not regret its termination either.

  “When shall I see you again, Babe?” he asked. “I am desolate away from you. You know I only turned down the Burrells’ invitation to be with you. When may I see you?”

  “Do you go to Seftons’ rout tomorrow night?” she asked.

  “I’ll try if I can wangle an entrée from someone. Maybe the fellow who got me a ticket for tonight’s do can arrange it. You can’t imagine how busy I have been, trying to find you, and worse, get to you.”

  That this should have been a trial told her clearly enough he was not entirely welcome in polite Society, and she regretted her former closeness with him. He grabbed her hand and kissed it violently, then darted away before any definite meeting was arranged.

  Looking around to see what might have sent him off in such haste, she saw Clivedon advancing towards her, walking quickly. “Who let that mugger in? It’s to get you away from the likes of him I sent you to Cousin Graham.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with Theodor,” she defended.

  “That commoner in gentleman’s clothing!”

  “He is an officer, and, one assumes, a gentleman.”

  “He’s a fortune hunter.”

  “He’s not likely to weasel any money out of me at a ball,” she laughed. “Unless he has mastered the art of extracting blood from a stone, he isn’t likely to get any from me anywhere else either.”

  “I hope you didn’t ask him to call on you.”

  “I value my head more highly! La Graham does not care for foreigners—and a waltzing Austrian at that! Tch-tch, she’d send us both to church to be sprinkled with ashes. I suppose you are wondering who you can find to partner me for the next dance. Don’t take your duty so hard, Clivedon. I see Welby there alone in the corner, playing with his watch. I’ll go to him.”

  “It is no doubt that quarter-strain of French that urges you to be chasing after men, when you should better wait for them to come to you.”

  “Sans doute it is my blood’s age, not nationality, that makes me so eager. I am no longer a deb who must sit batting her fan in a corner till she is asked to dance. We ape-leaders set out with our ropes and trap what we want. Ten to one someone will stop me before I get to Welby,” she added, with a toss of her head to smile at a passing friend. Sir Lyle Covington immediately drew up beside her.

  “Busy next dance, Babe?” he asked.

  “Lady Barbara is engaged to me for the next dance,” Clivedon answered, with a repressive emphasis on her title and name.

  “Save me the next one, Babe,” Covington said, unrepressed, and walked on.

  “Pity we hadn’t placed a wager on my finding a partner. I could use the blunt.”

  “Money is the more common and ladylike term for the commodity.”

  “I wouldn’t like to be common,” she answered, assuming a prissy face and placing her fingertips daintily on his arm.

  “Or ladylike,” he added.

  “Now be fair! Has any lady this evening taken your arm so elegantly as I do, as though I can hardly bear to touch you? You have had a full half hour of ladylike attention from your other companion. Variety is the spice of life, Clivedon. Let me spice up your evening with some of my indecorous chit-chat. Balfour has just slipped out the door with Mrs. Harkness, and I am dying to see whether they left or sneaked upstairs. He does, you know. Fannie tells me he was caught practically in the act at Brockley Hall last month.”

  “Barbara! I wish you would think before you sp
eak!” he said loudly, with a fearful glance around to see if she had been overheard.

  “I did think. I was going to say caught with his pants down, but was afraid you might not like it, it is so graphically accurate. A little ambiguity in such cases is more delicate. Old York is well into his cups tonight,” she added, with a careless glance across the room.

  “The music is better than usual,” he said, trying to divert her mind.

  “Is it? I hadn’t noticed.”

  “You said you liked lively music.”

  “I usually do, but I was standing up with young Ellingwood, you know, and he has three or four left feet, poor boy. I had to concentrate on outmaneuvering them all.”

  “He is five-and-twenty years old. Hardly a boy. Now, he is the sort I wouldn’t mind to see calling on you. A nice, decent fellow. Well to grass, too.”

  She peered up at him from the corner of her eyes, to see if he was smiling. He wasn’t, though he watched her with interest to read her reaction to his suggestion. What he noticed instead was how dark a blue her eyes were, and how long the sweep of her lashes. Soon he noticed a slow smile peep out on her lips, tilting them up at the corners, and without realizing it, a smile alit on his own lips.

  “I knew you were teasing me,” she said, in her low drawling accents.

  “I was not! Twenty-five is plenty old enough for you, old lady, so long as the man is good and sensible.”

  “If he is too good and sensible, the age is irrelevant. He will not do.”

  His plans for her reformation were to lead the way to propriety by avoiding her old haunts and old friends and seeing her marry a gentleman who would continue the job. This would require a man of strong character and resolution. He came to see that the man must have as well a heart of stone, or she’d only deprave him. The expression on her face was a combination of mischief and laughter that struck him as very wicked and very French.

  “Clivedon, let’s sneak out into the garden and blow a cloud,” she said, in a low, conspiratorial whisper.

  “I beg your pardon?” he asked, stunned.