April Lady

‘I think you must be trying to joke me,’ she said, her face still averted. ‘It is not kind – when I have the headache!’

‘You must forgive me.’ After a slight pause, he added: ‘I came to tell you – and I trust it may relieve your headache – that I learned today that Allandale has gone into the country for a couple of nights, on a visit to an uncle, or some such thing. You may relax your vigilance – and I would he might remain out of town until he sets sail!’

‘I can’t blame you for that. I know you have had a great deal to vex you.’

‘Do you?’ he said. ‘Well! it is something that you should own it, I suppose!’

Eleven

The night, though she spent the better part of it in desperate thought, brought Nell no counsel, and certainly no comfort. While Dysart remained out of her reach there seemed to be nothing she could do. There was no way, even, of finding him, for though they might know, at his lodgings, where he had gone, she could not follow him. Yet of all things that was the most important, to find Dysart before he had sold the necklace. She wondered, since that could not be done, whether he would be able to recover it for her. Lavalle’s bill suddenly became a matter of little significance: so much so that she was vaguely surprised she should have thought it so impossible to tell Cardross about it. It seemed a trivial thing, set beside the loss of the necklace, and far too trivial a thing to have led to the disaster which now confronted her. The maxims of her childhood reproached her; almost she could see Miss Wilby’s grave countenance when she lectured her charges on the awful consequences of trying to conceal a fault. Miss Wilby had had plenty of examples to cite, but not even the awe-inspiring tale of the abandoned character whose dreadful end upon the scaffold could be traced back, through a series of crimes, to the fatal day when he had stolen the jam from his mother’s cupboard, and denied it, was more terrible than the consequences of Nell’s attempt to deceive Cardross. She had been afraid that confession would make it impossible for him to believe that she had married him for love, and not for his fortune; and now it seemed dreadfully probable that he would not care any longer whether she loved him or not. She had made him suspicious of her; there was a hard look in his eyes; and not once, since his return from Merion, had he attempted to do more than kiss her hand. If his love were not already dead, the discovery of her black wickedness would surely give it its coup de grâce.

She fell asleep with the dawn, but suffered uneasy dreams, and woke to full sunlight with heavy eyes, and a heavier heart.

She received no morning visit from Cardross, and he had left the house before she emerged from her room, looking, according to his sister, a perfect quiz, in a blue and yellow striped waistcoat, and a spotted cravat. From this unflattering description Nell realized that it must be one of the days when the Four-Horse Club met in George Street, and drove out to dine at Salt Hill. ‘Very likely!’ said Letty. ‘Though why they have to make such figures of themselves I cannot conceive!’

She then informed Nell that her cousin Selina had sent a note round to beg her to go with her in her mama’s carriage to choose a wedding-gift for Fanny. She added, with the light of battle in her eyes, that she supposed there could be no objection to that scheme.

Nell was glad to be able to acquiesce. She had no great liking for Miss Selina Thorne, but if Mr Allandale had gone into the country it was hard to see what harm could come of allowing Letty out of her sight for an hour or two. She did indeed suggest, when she saw that Mrs Thorne had not sent a maid with her daughter, that Martha should accompany the young ladies, but Letty scoffed at her for a prude; and Selina exclaimed rather pertly that of all odious things a servant listening to one’s private conversations was the worst. Nell had a momentary vision of the cousins with their heads together, giggling over secrets, and thought, not for the first time, that Selina would have been the better for a course of Miss Wilby’s discipline. She said no more, however; and

after arguing for a few minutes about the nature of the gifts to be chosen, the girls went away, their first objective, Nell guessed, being the Pantheon Bazaar, in which fascinating mart, though they might not discover a suitable wedding-gift, they would certainly fritter away a good deal of money on ingenious trifles for themselves. Nell was too glad to see Letty in better spirits, and too anxious to be left to the indulgence of some quiet reflection, to raise any objection to this programme.

Her quiet reflection did nothing to raise the tone of her own spirits; but when Letty returned, much later in the day, she was seen to be in a sunnier humour than she had been for some time. As Nell had expected, she was laden with parcels, most of which were found to contain such doubtful purchases as a pair of perkale gloves, which it had seemed a pity not to buy, since they were so cheap, but which, on second thoughts, Letty thought she would give to Martha; a stocking-purse; several faggots of artificial flowers, one of which she generously presented to Nell; a gauze apron; two muslin handkerchiefs; a box of honeysuckle soap; and a Turkish lappet, which had hit her fancy at the time, but which, now that she saw it again, was quite hideous. For Fanny she had purchased a gold armlet and ear-rings, a handsome gift which made Nell exclaim: ‘Good gracious! I had not thought you could afford anything so dear!’

‘No, but I asked Giles, and he said I might purchase what I liked,’ replied Letty unconcernedly.

This seemed to indicate that a truce had been declared. The impression was strengthened by Letty’s next words, which were uttered after a thoughtful pause. ‘He says it is true that he told you that you might invite Jeremy to dine here.’

‘Of course it is true!’

‘Well, I thought very likely it was a hum, but if it was not I expect it was your notion, and you coaxed him into it. I am very much obliged to you! When will you write to Jeremy?’

‘Whenever you wish,’ Nell replied. ‘Now, if you desire me to.’

‘Oh, no, there is no occasion for you to do so now! He is gone to visit his uncle, you know, and he did not expect to be in London again until tomorrow evening. I was thinking, love, that if we were to go to Almack’s on Friday I daresay we should meet him there, and then, don’t you think? we could discover when it would be convenient for him to come to us.’

It was evident, from this speech, that an assignation at Almack’s had already been made. Nell did not feel equal to giving a promise that she would attend the Assembly, but she said that she would do so if she felt well enough, and with this Letty, after a little more coaxing, was obliged to be content. In the state of wretchedness she was in Nell could not think of taking part in such a frivolous entertainment without a shudder, but she did manage to extract a grain of comfort from the reflection that the first fury of Letty’s passionate despair had worn itself out, and she was not contemplating any immediate act of imprudence.

The more compliant mood lasted. Letty was able to see Cardross again without ripping up; and although her spirits were languid, and her manner lacked its usual liveliness, there could be no doubt that she was making a serious endeavour to mend her temper.

The hope that Dysart would come to her kept Nell at home on the following day. Cardross was to have escorted both his ladies to a Review in Hyde Park, but in the end only Letty went with him. She had said at first that she was in no humour for it, but upon Nell’s appealing to her to bear Cardross company so that she herself might nurse a headache at home she at once agreed to go. She was too much absorbed in her own troubles to perceive that her sister-in-law was looking far from well until her attention was directed to this circumstance, but when Sutton told her that she was quite in a worry over her mistress, she was instantly ready not only to do what was asked of her, but a great deal that was not asked, such as placing cushions behind Nell’s head, a stool under her feet, and a shawl across her knees, bathing her brow with vinegar, offering her all manner of remedies from hartshorn to camphor, and enquiring every few minutes if she felt a degree better. Nell endured these ministrations patiently, but Cardross, coming to see how she did, exclaimed: ‘Good God, Letty, don’t fidget her so! Enough to drive her into a fever!’

Letty was inclined to take affront at this, but he pushed her out of the room without compunction, telling her to go and put her hat on, since his curricle would be at the door in five minutes. ‘And if you want me to let you handle the ribbons, take that pout from your face!’ he recommended. He turned, and went back to Nell’s chair, and held her wrist in his hand for a moment. Under his fingers her pulse was flurried enough to make him say: ‘If you are not better by the time we return I’ll send for Baillie.’

‘Oh, no, pray do not! Indeed I am not ill! Only I still have the headache, and it seems foolish to go out in this hot sun,’ she replied quickly. ‘I shall be perfectly well presently.’

‘I hope you may be,’ he said, laying her hand down again. He glanced at Sutton. ‘Take care of her ladyship!’

An extremely dignified curtsey was all the answer vouchsafed to his behest. From the dresser’s downcast eyes and lifted brows he might have inferred that she was deeply offended, but he did not look at her again. His gaze had returned to his wife’s face; his expression seemed to her to soften; and after hesitating for a moment he bent over her, and lightly kissed her cheek. ‘Poor Nell!’ he said.

He was gone before she could say a word, leaving her with an almost overpowering inclination to cry her heart out. She managed to overcome it, and to assure Sutton, with very tolerable composure, that she was already better, and needed nothing to restore her to her usual health but to be left to rest quietly for an hour or so. She believed that she might fall asleep if no one came to disturb her.

It would have been well for her had she done so, but sleep had never been farther from her. She tried to interest herself in a new novel, and discovered that she had read three pages without taking in the sense of one word; every vehicle heard approaching in the square below brought her to her feet and hurrying to the window; and when she took up her embroidery, determined to employ herself rather than to pace about the room, a prey to most harrowing reflections, she found that her hands were so unsteady as to make it impossible for her to set a stitch.

Dysart did not come, and so severe was her disappointment that it took all the resolution of which she was capable to enable her to meet Cardross upon his return with a calm countenance. Her training stood her in good stead: no one could have supposed from her demeanour that her brain was in a turmoil; and when it was suggested to her that she might prefer not to go to the Italian Opera that evening she laughed away this solicitude, telling her husband and sister-in-law that they must not try to wrap her in cotton.

Dysart walked in on her, unannounced, just before noon on the following morning. She was sitting with Letty in the drawing-room, endeavouring to soothe feelings very much ruffled by a visit from Miss Berry. The good lady had called a little earlier to enquire after her state of health, but upon Letty’s coming into the room had speedily infuriated that injured damsel by entering with great earnestness into a discussion of her affairs. What she said held excellent common sense, and did honour to her heart as much as to her judgement, but her manner was unfortunate. A trick she had of repeating over and over again some catch-phrase could only irritate; she had a way of talking in a hurried, over-emphatic style; and the caresses and exaggerated terms of affection she employed in trying to win more confidence than was voluntarily reposed in her served only to set up Letty’s back. She had not long left the house when Dysart entered it; and when he walked into the drawing-room the angry flush had not faded from Letty’s cheeks.

‘Dysart!’ Nell cried, springing up from her chair.