Joan Wolf (16 page)

Chapter Twenty

And some, because the light doth them offend,

Do never peer but in the dark or night.

—Sir Thomas Wyatt

On the night of the play the great gallery at Minton was filled with eager spectators; the well-bred neighbors, friends, and relatives of the Foster family. One of the people packed into the rows of gilt chairs that lined the gallery floor was the Earl of Denham. He sat among the crush of upper-class strangers, his face inscrutable, his eyes on the closed curtain. His aunt, Lady Avanley, spoke to him once or twice and he replied pleasantly, but otherwise he made no attempt to socialize with anyone.

John had come to Minton for one reason only, and it was not to see the play. It was to see the girl who was taking the leading role. He did not have long to wait. The talk died away to an expectant silence, the curtains parted, and onstage was the main room of Hardcastle Hall, home of Mr. and Mrs. Hardcastle. Mr. Lewis and Mrs. Henry Foster, who were representing that couple, began the opening dialogue.

It was five minutes before Julianne made her entrance. She was dressed in an old-fashioned tight-waisted gown and her thick honey-blond hair fell in shining ringlets on her neck. John stared at the beautiful exposed line of her throat and heard hardly a word she was saying. He was startled when the audience laughed.

Julianne was startled as well. They had laughed at this point last night also, she remembered, and it was a laugh that disturbed her. It came at the end of the following interchange of dialogue between Kate Hardcastle and her father:

MR. HARDCASTLE. Then, to be plain with you, Kate, I expect the young gentleman I have chosen to be your husband from town this very day. I have his father’s letter, in which he informs me his son is set out, and that he intends to follow himself shortly thereafter.

KATE. Indeed! I wish I had known something of this before. Bless me, how shall I behave? It’s a thousand to one I shan’t like him; our meeting will be so formal, so like a thing of business, that I shall find no room for friendship or esteem.

MR. HARDCASTLE. Depend upon it, child, I never will control your choice, but Mr. Marlow, whom I have pitched upon, is the son of my old friend, Sir Charles Marlow, of whom you have heard me talk
so
often. The young gentleman has been bred a scholar, and is designed for an employment in the service of his country. I am told he is a man of excellent understanding.

KATE. Is he?

MR. HARDCASTLE. Very generous.

KATE. I believe I shall like him.

HARDCASTLE. Young and brave.

KATE. I am sure I shall like him.

HARDCASTLE. And very handsome.

KATE. My dear Papa, say no more. (
kissing
his hand).
He’s mine, I’ll have him!

Julianne thought about the laughter that had greeted that last line as she stood in the wings waiting for her next cue. Lord Rutherford was on the stage with his cousin Francis, who was playing Hastings. She watched her fiancé’s handsome face as she puzzled over her reaction and slowly the thought came to her that she had decided upon William in much the same fashion as Kate Hard-castle had said she would take the unknown Mr. Marlow. She, too, had had in her head a list of desirable husbandly virtues and when she had found a man who possessed them she had accepted him—without taking into consideration the man himself. It had seemed, at the time, to be a sensible thing to do. Now, with that laugh ringing in her ears, it seemed, well, stupid.

The play was a great success. George was glowing with pleasure as were, to a lesser degree, the other actors. Julianne received her compliments with gracious modesty and went upstairs to change her clothes. A cold supper was to be served in the dining room.

At supper she sat between George Foster and Lord Boldock, but, although she conversed with them sensibly enough, her nerves were focused on the black-haired man who sat across the table from her. She never looked at him directly, but she was aware nonetheless of his smallest movement.

When the ladies returned to the drawing room, Julianne found herself sitting next to Lady Avanley. “Your play this evening was delightful, Miss Wells,” said the countess. “I quite laughed myself silly.”

“I am happy you enjoyed it,” replied Julianne pleasantly. “Did Lord Denham like it also?”

“He certainly seemed to.”

“I am glad,” said Julianne quietly.

“And I am glad to see him enjoying something as civilized as a play,” said Lady Avanley. “He has been removed from civilization for too long.”

“I would hardly call Egypt uncivilized, Lady Avanley.” Julianne’s voice was very gentle. “There was a civilization on the Nile before England was ever heard of.”

“You sound like my grandnephew,” Lady Avanley said lightly. “He is forever castigating the insularity of the English.”

“Perhaps,” said Julianne, even more gently than before, “he has a point.”

“Perhaps.” Lady Avanley looked at Julianne with candid eyes. “I understand you knew my grand-nephew out in Egypt, Miss Wells.”

“A little. Lord Denham was a friend of my father’s.” Julianne looked into Lady Avanley’s shrewd gaze with eyes that were wide and clear and guileless. Unbidden, the memory of her father’s comments on the “renegade Englishman” that was John came to her, and her nostrils quivered.

“You appear to have enjoyed Egypt.” Lady Avanley’s eyes had not missed that quiver. “Your father was a missionary, I believe?”

“Yes,” said Julianne.

Lady Avanley gave her a charming smile. “And now you have come home and are going to marry that nice Lord Rutherford. I wish you every happiness, my dear.”

Julianne stared at her hands, lying lightly clasped in her lap. “Thank you, Lady Avanley.”

The countess sighed. “I hope John does the same, but I doubt he will.”

“He can’t marry Lord Rutherford,” said Julianne with amusement. “I believe there’s a law or something.”

Lady Avanley looked at her with arrested interest. “True,” she murmured. “England is so parochial.”

At that, Julianne laughed. “What I meant, my dear,” went on John’s aunt, “was that I should like to see him settle down, marry and have a family. He is the last Champernoun and Lansdowne needs a son.”

“Perhaps he will.” Julianne’s voice was very low.

“I don’t know.” Lady Avanley sighed. “He came home at least. That is something. I thought he would let Lansdowne go, and one could hardly blame him if he had. He has no cause to love it, I fear.”

“He did not get on with his uncle, did he?” Julianne’s eyes were on her hands so she did not see the assessing look Lady Avanley gave her.

“No, he did not. My nephew, the late Lord Denham, was a proud, cold, precise, and rigid man. He and John were complete opposites.
It
was most unfortunate that he should have been named John’s guardian. He felt it was his responsibility to ‘correct’ John’s personality.”

Julianne’s eyes flew to Lady Avanley’s face and the older woman smiled a little at what she saw there. “Oh, I don’t mean he beat him. George would never have done anything so crude. He used to lock John in his room. Often for a week at a time. Sometimes I used to think that it would have been infinitely kinder to have beaten him.”

Julianne knew all about punishments of isolation and silent disapproval. “Yes,” she said in a muffled voice.

Lady Avanley shook her head. “Sometimes I’ve wondered if that early deprivation of freedom accounts for John’s seemingly insatiable urge to roam the world. But I don’t know if it does.” She smiled ruefully. “Ever since childhood he has been a rebel. That’s one of the reasons he rubbed against his uncle so. And nothing George could do to him would change him. He simply came out of his room and resumed his old ways.”

“He is not a—safe—sort of a man,” said Julianne, staring once again at her hands.

“That he is not,” his aunt laughingly agreed. “He is like the bad ice in a pond where one sticks up a danger sign. He has had a sign stuck upon him ever since he was a boy.”

“Yes.” There was the sound of men’s voices in the saloon and Julianne looked up to see the subject of their conversation coming into the room with Lord Boldock. He cast a swift glance around, saw her, and immediately started across the room. Lady Avanley sat back, a smile on her lips, and watched the slight rosiness that crept up into Julianne’s translucent cheeks. Lord Rutherford made an appearance right behind John, and Lady Avanley did not think that the look Julianne gave her betrothed was at all loving. It looked, in fact, distinctly impatient.

On the drive home Lady Avanley made several comments about what a handsome, well-suited couple the future Lord and Lady Rutherford would be. Her nephew, she was pleased to see, did not like them at all. Perhaps, John’s aunt thought to herself as she got into bed, perhaps there was the chance of a son for Lansdowne after all. Then, as she snuggled down under the covers, she remembered that tomorrow’s festivities at Minton were in honor of the betrothed couple. Unhappily, it looked as if things had gone too far to be recalled.

Chapter Twenty-one

Others rejoice that see the fire so bright And wene to play in it as they do pretend And find the contrary of it that they intend.                                      

Alas, of that sort I may be by right...

—Sir Thomas Wyatt

Julianne’s thoughts were running along lines that were similar to Lady Avanley’s. She was beginning to realize that she had made a mistake, that she did not want to marry Lord Rutherford. But she did not see, either, how she was to get out of it.

Most of the gentlemen at Minton went out riding on Saturday morning and the ladies amused themselves by walking in the gardens or writing letters. Lady Minton was busy with her preparations for the evening’s dinner and ball, but she made time to check on all her guests to see if they were pleasantly occupied.

 Julianne was sitting with her grandmother in the library and she watched Lady Minton’s activities throughout the course of the morning. William’s mother was both efficient and dignified.  She exhibited great charm as she went from supervising the flower arrangements to looking in on her niece, who was playing the harp in the music room, to checking to see that the dowager duchess was properly supplied with paper and ink for her letter writing.

 Julianne tried to imagine herself in Lady Minton’s place, but somehow the picture would not come clear. Yet hadn’t that been her highest ambition in life—to be like Lady Minton? Why did the prospect now seem so limited, so dull?

She went out driving with Lord Rutherford in the afternoon and the subject of her book came up. She had received a letter in the morning from Mr. Murray asking her if she wished her name to appear as the author.

“Of course you will not allow your name to appear in print,” her fiancé said, clearly surprised that she should even consider such a possibility.

“But this is not a novel, William,” she pointed out. “It is a book of true experience. How can I hide my identity?”

“If you insist upon publishing such a document,” he replied stiffly, “you will subscribe yourself simply as ‘a lady.’ It is extremely improper for a woman’s name to appear in print in such a fashion.”

“But why? Everyone is sure to know who wrote it, anyway. What other ‘lady’ has traveled through Africa recently?”

“That is not the point. And if you had consulted me, I should have advised you against this whole venture. I don’t understand how you came to do it in the first place.”

She looked at his handsome boyish face. “Mr. Murray felt that the writing was extremely good,” she said quietly.

“That’s not the point,” he repeated impatiently. “The point is that ladies do not publish without a sort of ... notoriety being attached to their name. I don’t know what my mother and father will think. I haven’t told them about this yet.”

“I did not realize you felt like this,” she said slowly.

He looked at her with a glimmer of hope in his brown eyes. “I can have the publication stopped if you wish.”

She looked at him for a long silent minute and then shook her head. “I don’t think so,” she said gently.

His lips tightened. “I never knew you could be so stubborn.”

She could get round him if she wanted—she knew that. She had only to touch his arm, to smile meltingly, to let him kiss her, to nestle very sweet and close to him, and he would let her have her way without further argument. She did none of those things. She drew a little away from him on the seat of the phaeton and said gravely, “Ah, William, I don’t think you know me at all.”

The dinner that evening was an ordeal for Julianne. The state dining room was filled with people and more were due to come afterwards for the ball. The soft candlelight cast a lovely glow around the table; everything was beautiful, civilized, elegant, and polished. And all during the delicious impeccably-served dinner Julianne was conscious only of a wild desire to be back in Africa: to be away from the people and the talk and the excessive food; to be eating a dinner of roasted impala on the white banks of a sand river, with nothing to listen to but the silence and the occasional sound of an animal in the distance.

 When Lord Minton stood up to toast the young betrothed couple, and Lord Rutherford took her hand in his, she heard in the glowing words of her future father-in-law the sound of a gate crashing closed behind her. She gazed gravely around the table and saw on face after face an identical look of smiling goodwill; her slowly moving eyes encountered a wrenchingly familiar blue-green blaze, and stopped. John’s face was expressionless, but he had never been much good at disguising his eyes. She had seen in them anger and boredom, laughter and desire; at the moment they held an odd expression that it took her a moment to interpret. With a little shock she finally recognized it as pity.