Cotillion

‘No,’ said Freddy, ‘but there’s something he might have told me! Dash it, I ought to have thought of it before! When does term end?’ He saw that he had mystified his audience, and added impatiently: ‘Oxford!’

‘Good gracious, I don’t know!’ said Meg. ‘What does it signify?’

‘It may not signify anything to you, but it dashed well does to me!’ said Freddy, with feeling. ‘Because if m’father’s gone junketing off to Margate, and I’ve to take care of Charlie, it’s the outside of enough! The last time Charlie was in town he was pounded by the Watch, and I had to go and bail him out at three in the morning, because he’d spent his last groat! Yes, you may laugh, Meg, but you know very well that if Charlie comes down from Oxford, and finds m’father away, he’ll be bound to kick up some lark or other! I don’t say it ain’t a natural thing to do, but the thing is I shall get the blame for it. I must go and take a look at the calendar at once.’

‘Freddy, you will come to see me later, won’t you?’ Kitty begged. ‘You know we have something important to discuss!’

‘Yes, I’ll come tomorrow,’ he said. ‘Must make sure Charlie don’t catch me napping first!’

Kitty was a good deal amused, but as she and Meg began to walk back to Berkeley Square, Meg said: ‘Poor Freddy! He is for ever being obliged to get Charlie out of a scrape, you know!’

‘But I thought Charlie was the clever one!’ objected Kitty.

‘Oh, yes, indeed he is! He took a great many prizes at Eton, and never finds the least difficulty in learning anything! Only, of course, Freddy is the eldest, besides being on the town, and so it is not to be wondered at that Charlie depends upon him in all his absurd fixes. Charlie,’ said Meg, with simple pride, ‘is very wild, you see.’

Upon the following morning, while she waited for Meg in the barouche, outside a shop in Bond Street, Kitty heard her name spoken, and turned her head from the contemplation of a hat in a milliner’s window across the street to find that Mrs Broughty and Olivia had paused beside the carriage.

She saw at once that Olivia was looking pale and unhappy, and realized, as soon as Mrs Broughty began to speak, that that lady was very much incensed at the knowledge that she had been to the masquerade. The most profuse apologies to Miss Charing tripped off her tongue; she dared not hope that she would forgive Olivia for having drawn her into such a scrape; feared she must have been very much disgusted; scarcely knew how she herself could ever venture to look dear Lady Buckhaven in the face again.

Hoping very much that Meg would not suddenly appear to put her to this necessity, Kitty said everything that was proper, even going so far as to assert mendaciously that she had passed a very agreeable evening.

‘I would not have had such a thing happen for the world!’ Mrs Broughty declared, a flush of annoyance in her cheeks. ‘Opera House masquerades indeed! I cannot conceive how Olivia can have consented to such a vulgar scheme, for you are not to be thinking, Miss Charing, that I have not taught her better, as I don’t doubt you must be. Fine doings for a gentleman’s daughter, as I have been telling her ever since I heard about this start! If she does not destroy all her chances, it will be no fault of hers, I am sure! I was never more put-out in my life!’

‘Oh, pray, hush, ma’am!’ begged Kitty, perceiving that Olivia was on the brink of tears. ‘There was no harm done, I do assure you! Have you some errand in Bond Street? I am awaiting Lady Buckhaven, and should be so much obliged to you if you will permit Olivia to bear me company for a few minutes!’

‘I am sure the obligation is all on my side, dear Miss Charing, for I was prepared for you to cut the connection, and never have another word to say to Olivia! I am bound for Hookham’s Library, and I shall be very happy to leave Olivia with you, if you will be so condescending as to overlook her conduct.’

‘If Olivia will be so good as to stroll with me down the street, I will bring her to Hookham’s in a few minutes,’ promised Kitty, descending from the barouche. Addressing the footman who had jumped down to open the door for her, she said: ‘If her ladyship should return before I do myself, please inform her that I shall not be gone above fifteen minutes!’ She then bowed civilly to Mrs Broughty, and bore Olivia off in the opposite direction to Hookham’s, saying, as she slipped a hand in her arm: ‘We cannot talk freely in the carriage, so I thought you would not object to walking a little way with me. My dear, pray do not look so cast-down! Indeed, there is not the least need! I am sorry your Mama should be so much vexed, and fear you have been having a sad time of it, poor little thing!’

‘It has been so dreadful!’ Olivia said, in a trembling voice. ‘I thought we must have packed our trunks yesterday, for Mama quarrelled quite shockingly with Aunt Matty—I daresay you might have heard them half a mile away, particularly when my poor aunt fell into strong hysterics. However, it is now made-up between them, only Mama says that I have ruined all my chances, besides having behaved ill from the start, in not making a push to avail myself of all the opportunities that have been put in my way. But, oh, my dear Miss Charing, I did try to do just what she bid me, and I should have been very glad to have caught a rich husband then, for I had not met Camille! Only now it is all changed, and the only hope I have is that I shall go into a decline, and die!’

Slightly startled by this peculiar ambition, Kitty said: ‘Good God, don’t speak of such a thing! May I talk frankly to you? My cousin disclosed the whole to me, as I daresay he may have told you. You may guess how shocked I am, and how distressed to think that it should have been I who made him known to you! Believe me, had I had the smallest suspicion of the truth, I would never have done so! I have been an ill friend to you, Olivia. I am fully conscious of it!’

‘Oh, no, no, never!’ Olivia exclaimed. ‘We loved one another at first sight! Whatever becomes of me, I cannot regret that I have known him! But even hope is denied us: it is useless to suppose that Mama would give her consent, for although Camille’s Papa, you know, is in a very good way of business—he is the proprietor of several gaming establishments in Paris, and all of them of the first style of elegance!—Mama is so determined I should make a grand match that I know it would not do for her. Then, too, how would Camille’s Papa regard it? I have no fortune, and it is precisely that which Camille came to England to seek! Oh, Miss Charing, when I consider that I must be the unwitting cause of perhaps destroying all his chances, I declare I could almost cast myself into the river!’

Kitty had been prepared for reproaches, but scarcely for this. It was a moment before she could collect her wits enough to answer: ‘But you could not wish to marry one who is—alas!—an impostor? Worse! It pains me to say it, for I too had the greatest kindness for Camille! But I fear, Olivia, he is an adventurer! He has deceived us all! The shock to me has been severe; to you how much more so it must have been!’

‘Oh, yes, for I knew on the instant that Mama would dislike it extremely! But he has not deceived me, dear Miss Charing! Nothing could be more noble than his conduct!’

‘Olivia!’ said Kitty, trying to reassemble her thoughts. ‘You cannot mean that you would be willing to ally yourself with him!’

‘Oh, if it were possible!’ sighed Olivia. ‘I am sure I do not know why a man should not be a gamester, if his talents make it an eligible profession for him! Can it be that you suspect him of employing cheating tricks? I assure you, it is unjust! He says that Greeking methods never answer, and that he never uses them, save in the direst straits! His Papa’s houses are patronized by all the grandest people, and they never use loaded dice, or buy inferior wines! That, Camille says, is a very false economy. Everything should always be of the best, so that one’s clients may be pleased, and come again and again. Of course, it costs a great deal of money at the outset, but the returns are enormous!’

Kitty could think of nothing better to say than: ‘Are they, indeed?’

‘Yes, although there are, as one can readily perceive, great hazards. O

nly fancy! A run of luck may break the bank at any moment! How exciting it must be! I had previously no notion!’

‘No?’ said Kitty, quite stunned.

‘No, for I knew nothing of such matters.’ Olivia sighed, and relapsed into a mood of dejection. ‘But it is all to no avail! Mama would never give her consent.’

‘You must love my cousin very much!’ Kitty said. ‘Oh, dear, I wish—But that’s to no purpose! Do you think, if Camille were to engage upon some respectable occupation—? No, I suppose it would not answer.’

‘Oh, no, for how should he succeed? He was bred to his profession, you see, and you must perceive that with his air and address, and his great skill, it is the very thing for him! Moreover, it is very romantic to be for ever pitting one’s wits against everyone, and I could not endure it if I were to be the means of thrusting him into some occupation which he would think a dead bore! I must put him out of my thoughts, though of course I never shall, for how shocking it would be if I were to ruin his whole career! Besides,’ added Olivia, on a sob, ‘it is out of the question that I should be able to do so! Mama says I must make up my mind to it to accept Sir Henry, if he should be so obliging as to offer for me!’

They had turned, by this time, and were retracing their steps. ‘That,’ said Kitty decidedly, ‘you must never do! My poor Olivia, it is the most shocking coil, and I don’t know what to say, except that it would be quite wicked of you to marry that odious old man!’