April Lady

ly large hole in her next quarter’s allowance Nell realized, but decided, with the optimism of youth, that with a little economy she would contrive to scrape through the summer months.

She had been startled to receive Madame’s letter, and shrewd enough to perceive, underlying its smooth civility, a threat; but she was as yet too inexperienced to know that some unusual circumstance must lurk behind it, or that no modiste of high fashion would dream, for the paltry sum of three hundred and thirty guineas, of alienating a patroness of such rich promise as the young Countess of Cardross. But after a very few minutes in Madame Lavalle’s company she learned that the circumstances governing Madame’s action were very unusual indeed. Madame, after a long and lucrative career in Bruton Street, was about to retire from business. She was, in fact, returning to her native land, but this she naturally did not disclose to Lady Cardross, preferring to say with a vagueness at odd variance with her sharp-featured face, with its calculating sloe-eyes and inflexible mouth, that she would henceforward be out of the way of collecting debts. Lady Cardross was certainly an innocente, but even a bride from the schoolroom might wonder how it would be possible for Madame to return to France in time of war. It was possible, if one had money and time to spend on the journey, influential connections to assist one over the obstacles in the path, and, above all, relations well-placed in Paris. From England one might still travel to Denmark, and after that – eh bien, the matter arranged itself!

On the whole Madame had done very well out of her last London Season, but this was now in full swing, her most valued clients had purchased quite as many gowns as they were likely to need, and it was time to close her accounts. She had several bad debts: that went without saying; it was not worth the pain of attempting to recover those losses; but she knew well that although Lady Cardross might be at a temporary standstill her lord was as wealthy a man as might be found, and would certainly pay his wife’s debts. The sense of this she managed to convey to Nell in the most urbane manner conceivable, not an ungenteel word spoken, the sugared smile never deserting her lips.

‘Oh, if it is the case that you are retiring from business – !’ said Nell, shrugging her shoulders with splendid indifference. ‘I had not perfectly understood: naturally you will wish to be paid immediately! Rest assured that I will attend to the matter!’

She then sailed away, her head high, and her heart cowering in her little kid shoes. Madame, having curtseyed her off the premises with the greatest deference, rubbed her hands together, and said: ‘She will contrive, that one!’

That she must somehow contrive, and without Cardross’s knowledge, was by this time a fixed determination in Nell’s mind. Every day that had passed since the first appearance of Madame’s account had added to her dread that he would discover the debt; reason was lost sight of; the debt, and Cardross’s sentiments, if he should be called upon to pay it, assumed grotesque proportions, until it seemed to her as though it might wreck her life. No sobering counsel was at hand to cast a damper on lurid imagination, and give her thoughts a saner direction. Letty, exaggerating her own experiences, recommended her at all costs to settle the matter before Cardross got wind of it; and Dysart, knowing how much his own depredations on her purse were responsible for her present predicament, was apparently prepared to go to extraordinary lengths for the furtherance of this end. But Dysart had shaken her faith in him. Letty might applaud his scheme for her relief: she could not. It seemed to her a shocking thing to have attempted; and the thought of what next his wild humour might prompt him to do put her in a quake of apprehension. There must be no depending on Dysart; and there was no one else to whom she could turn.

Such a reflection as this was scarcely soothing to nerves already irritated. The conviction that she was friendless, and hunted into the bargain, began to take strong possession of Nell’s mind. She sank into a slough of self-pity, seeing her debt as a sum large enough to have ruined a Nabob, and her husband as a miser with a heart of flint.

It was in this mood that she presently stepped down from her barouche, and it was her coachman who rescued her from it, by desiring to know whether she would be requiring the carriage again that day. The very mention of it dispelled that unjust vision of Cardross. Just because she had once admired a friend’s barouche he had given her one for her very own, and with a pair of horses that took the shine out of every other pair to be seen in town. She had not liked the famous Cardross necklace, an awe-inspiring collection of emeralds and diamonds heavily set in gold, and instead of being offended he had told her to keep it for state occasions, and had given her the most charming pendant to wear in its stead. ‘For everyday use!’ he had said, with the smile that had won her heart in his eyes.

Self-pity turned in an instant to self-blame. From being a tyrannical miser Cardross became the most generous man alive, and quite the most ill-used; and she the embodiment of selfishness, extravagance, and ingratitude. And, if Dysart were to be believed, she had added blindness and stupidity to these vices. It now seemed to her wonderful that Cardross should have remained patient for so long. Perhaps he was regretting the impulse that had made him offer for her; perhaps, even, disgust at her coldness and depravity had already driven him back to Lady Orsett.

A year earlier Nell, instructed by Mama, had steeled herself to accept the fact of Lady Orsett as one of the inescapable crosses a wife must bear with complaisance; but between the girl who had supposed herself to be making a marriage of convenience and the bride who had been brought to realize that hers was a love-match there was a vast difference. Mama would scarcely have recognized her docile, beautifully mannered daughter in the bright-eyed young woman who uttered between clenched teeth: ‘She shan’t have him!’

This determination, excellent though it might be, only strengthened her resolve to settle Madame Lavalle’s account without applying to Cardross. In her view nothing could more surely jeopardize her whole future than to cast out lures to her husband while presenting him with yet another debt. He must certainly believe her to be hoaxing him, playing off a detestable cajolery that could only disgust a man of sensibility.

Her thoughts flickered to the second of Dysart’s suggestions, that she should sell some of her jewellery. Not, of course, Cardross’s gifts, but perhaps the row of pearls Mama had given her? But every feeling revolted. They were Mama’s own pearls, jealously preserved by her for her eldest daughter, and bestowed upon her with such affecting tenderness. Stress of circumstances had obliged poor Mama to sell nearly all her jewellery, but her pearls she had clung to through the direst of her straits, and for her daughter to sell them only to pay for an extravagant gown must sink her forever below reproach.

A very little reflection convinced Nell that there was only one way in which she could raise three hundred pounds. It must be borrowed. Dysart had rather unexpectedly condemned this expedient, but Nell knew that even Mama had had dealings with a moneylender, so that borrowing upon interest, though it might be an expensive practice, could not be a crime. Papa, of course, had carried it to unwise lengths: Nell perfectly understood how ruinous continued borrowings could be, but it was surely absurd to suppose that anything very dreadful would happen if one borrowed three hundred pounds only for a few weeks. It would be paid back at the end of June, and no one need ever know anything about it.

The more she considered it, the more Nell liked the scheme, and the more she was inclined to attribute Dysart’s severe attitude to some antiquated notion of propriety. Even the most careless of brothers could be amazingly stuffy on any question of conduct affecting the ladies of his family: that was one of the incomprehensible things about men. To hear Papa, in the bosom of his family, one would suppose that modesty and discretion were the two virtues he considered most indispensable in a female. But there had been nothing in Papa’s career to suggest this: indeed far otherwise! Dysart, warmly approving the generously displayed charms of a certain actress, almost in the same breath could speak censoriously of his sister’s gown, if it were cut rather lower than usual, or clung too closely to her form for his suddenly austere taste. Even Cardross suffered from this peculiarity. He had not criticized her raiment, but he made no secret of the fact that he expected from his wife and sister a degree of decorum which he did not practise himself. ‘I will have no scandal in my household,’ said Cardross inflexibly, just as though he had not been creating scandal in Lord Orsett’s household for years. Nell didn’t doubt that he would disapprove strongly of his wife’s patronizing a moneylender, but she didn’t allow it to worry her very much. Imprudent it might be, but what Mama had done could not be a crime.

Nell gave Dysart a day’s grace, and when he neither came to see her nor wrote to tell her what next he meant to do, set forth, not without some inward trepidation, on a visit to Mr King, in Clarges Street. It had been Mr King who had enjoyed Mama’s custom.

There were certain difficulties in the way of setting forth from Grosvenor Square alone and on foot, but she overcame these by ordering her carriage round to take her to the Green Park, where (she said) she was going to walk with some friends. At the last moment Letty nearly spoilt this careful plan by going with her, but she had the happy thought of saying that she had arranged to meet in the park two ladies whom Letty violently disliked, so Letty decided instead to go with her maid on a shopping expedition. Nell might tell herself that there was no harm in her projected errand, but she could not tell herself that it would be proper to take Letty into her confidence, for, oddly enough, although it might be allowable for herself to seek relief from her difficulties with Mr King, for Letty to do the same thing would be quite shocking. And she could not help feeling that that was just what Letty would do, once the idea had been put into her head, for she was never out of debt, and had lately been warned by Cardross that he was not going to encourage her extravagant habits by continuing to defray all the totally unnecessary expenses she incurred.

Nell dressed herself with great care for her expedition, choosing from the formidable collection of walking dresses

in her wardrobe one of cambric, made high to the neck, and with long sleeves, and only a border of cable trimming to relieve its austerity. For some reason which she could not have explained she felt that when one visited a moneylender one’s habit should be as modest as possible, so she added a sarsnet pelisse of dark blue to her ensemble. This lent her an undeniable note of sobriety, but when it came to the selection of a hat the only one she possessed that approached sobriety was made of olive brown silk. No exigency could induce her to wear this with a blue pelisse, so she was obliged to choose instead a frivolous bonnet that matched the pelisse but was trimmed with lace and flowers. A thick veil served the double purpose of providing a disguise and a touch of rather dowdy respectability. It also staggered her dresser, and certainly made her suspicious; but Nell said glibly that the dust from the streets had slightly roughened her cheeks, an explanation which seemed to satisfy Miss Sutton.

Set down at the Bath Gate, Nell entered the Green Park, and strolled for a little while beside the Basin, trying to recruit her ebbing courage. Two unwelcome thoughts had occurred to her: Mama, when she had turned in desperation to Mr King, had employed a go-between; and would not Mr King wish to know her identity? She had not previously considered this possibility, but as she rehearsed, during the drive from Grosvenor Square, what she must say at the coming interview she realized that not the most obliging moneylender was in the least likely to advance a large sum of money to an unknown and heavily veiled lady. Not only would he wish to know what were the circumstances of his client, but no doubt he would demand a note of hand from her. One might, of course, sign this with a fictitious name, but that would hardly satisfy Mr King. Nell was quite shrewd enough to know that an obscure Mrs Smith of no address would find it very much harder to borrow money upon interest than would the wife of an extremely wealthy peer.

A good deal daunted, it was with lagging steps that she left the Park, and crossed the ruts and cobbles of Piccadilly. Her errand no longer seemed so innocuous, for while it would be a simple matter, and surely quite unembarrassing, to arrange a loan under a cloak of anonymity, it was another matter altogether to be obliged to announce: ‘I am Lady Cardross.’

She turned into Clarges Street, and was soon abreast of the discreet-looking house in which Mr King carried on his business. She hesitated, saw that a man on the opposite side of the street was looking at her, and walked on, blushing under her veil. When she ventured to look round, he had disappeared from her view, so she turned, and began to walk back. By this time she was wishing herself a hundred miles away, dreading what lay before her, no longer sustained by the comforting reflection that it was not so very wrong after all. A small but insistent inner voice told her that on this occasion Mama would not wish her example to be copied; and again she walked past Mr King’s house.

From a window in a house on the other side of the street Mr Hethersett had for several minutes been observing these vacillations through his quizzing-glass. The particular crony whom he had come to visit, having addressed several remarks to him without receiving any other answer than an absentminded grunt, at last demanded if anything was amiss, and came to see what was claiming his attention. Mr Hethersett, letting his glass fall on the end of its ribbon, ejaculated: ‘Good God!’ and hastily picked up his hat and gloves. ‘Can’t stay!’ he said. ‘Remembered something important!’

His astonished friend protested, but Mr Hethersett, in general polite to a point, did not stay to listen. He was out of the house in a matter of seconds, and crossing the street with long strides.

Nell, drawing a resolute breath, had mounted the first of the steps leading to Mr King’s front door when she heard herself accosted in slightly breathless accents.

‘Cousin!’ said Mr Hethersett.

She jumped, and looked round. Mr Hethersett raised the hat from his head and executed the bow for which he was famous. ‘Very happy to have met you!’ he said. ‘Beg you will allow me to escort you home!’

‘Sir!’ uttered Nell, in what she hoped was the outraged voice of a stranger.

Apparently it was not. ‘Can’t hope to deceive me in that bonnet,’ explained Mr Hethersett apologetically. ‘Wore it the day I drove you to the Botanic Gardens.’ Acutely aware of the goggling gaze fixed on him from a window across the street, he added: ‘Take my arm! George Burnley has his eye on us, and it won’t do for him to recognize you. Not that I think he will, but no sense in running the risk.’

‘I am very much obliged to you, but pray don’t stay for me!’ Nell said, trying to speak in a careless way. ‘I – I have some business to transact!’

‘Yes, I know. That’s why I came across the road.’