The American Heiress (34 page)

Mrs Wyndham’s small blue eyes criss-crossed the room looking for young men with titles and no tin who might be interested in Adelaide Schiller, from Ohio, who had three million dollars and an accent that could only improve. Mrs Wyndham had hoped to bring Miss Schiller with her tonight, but Cora had been firm. ‘No Miss Schiller. I don’t care how long she studied at the conservatory, I’m not being unkind but I don’t want to give anyone the chance to make scathing remarks about American heiresses. And I don’t want anyone who might flirt with Reggie Greatorex. Sybil would never forgive me.’ Mrs Wyndham had wheedled but Cora would not budge. ‘Ivo’s already been through my list twice, I daren’t add anyone else. But bring Miss Schiller for tea one day and I will look her over.’ It didn’t take long, thought Mrs Wyndham, for a girl from New York to turn into a grande dame. She had no doubt that Miss Schiller herself would be equally fastidious when she had landed her title.

Cora and Ivo were standing close to each other, closer than you might expect a married couple to stand. They looked in accord; Ivo was just behind his wife and every so often he would whisper into her ear and make her laugh.

Sir Odo and Lady Beauchamp were next in the procession to be announced. Charlotte was wearing gold satin which made her look literally radiant, everyone around her seemed lacklustre by comparison. Only her husband with his blond curls, red shiny cheeks and elaborately embroidered brocade waistcoat could stand the juxtaposition. Most of the people on the staircase had an air of eagerness, there was a sense of anticipation – a new hostess, a new way of doing things – but the Beauchamps did not hurry up the staircase, they sauntered, creating a pocket of space around them as they stopped to exchange greetings with people in the hall below. They contrived to create a hiatus on the crowded steps, so that it was the Duke and Duchess who stood waiting, while the Beauchamps greeted those around them. And when, eventually, the Beauchamps glided towards their hosts, they had an air of slight fatigue as if the party had already begun to pall.

Cora, who had no choice but to observe these manoeuvres, did not let her smile of welcome falter even as Ivo was muttering in her ear, ‘What is that buffoon Odo wearing? The man’s absurd.’

‘How lovely to see you.’ She leant forward to kiss Charlotte on the cheek. ‘You must both stand by me tonight. You are, after all, my oldest English friends.’

‘Indeed, Duchess,’ sniggered Odo. ‘Charlotte and I like to claim we invented you!’

‘No one could invent Cora, Odo,’ said the Duke. ‘Not even a man possessed of your imagination. My wife is part of a new and wonderful species that has evolved independently in the Americas. Nothing scares her, except perhaps her mother.’

‘Ivo, stop talking nonsense,’ said Cora, pleased nevertheless that Ivo had resisted Odo’s attempt to patronise her. ‘Perhaps you could tell the orchestra to play something else. I must have heard that waltz ten times already. I can see Mr Stebbings wincing at the predictability of it all. Please, Ivo.’

‘Is it really that bad? I thought it was rather charming myself, but if you insist. We can’t have a party with wincing poets.’ Ivo walked off in the direction of the musicians.

Charlotte leant forward so that her husband could not hear. ‘Is Louvain here?’

‘Not yet,’ Cora whispered back. ‘I still haven’t seen the picture.’

Charlotte touched her on the arm with her fan. ‘Don’t worry, I’m sure he’ll have done you justice.’

The Beauchamps moved into the drawing room and Cora let her smile slip just a little and felt the ache in her cheeks. She could see the line of guests stretching down the stairs almost into the street itself. She wondered when Louvain would arrive. Every time she thought about the picture, she felt her pulse quicken. It had only been one kiss after all, but she could still feel it sometimes – the scrape of his moustache against her lips.

Duchess Fanny was in front of her, her blond head a little on one side as if she was trying to remember who her hostess was.

‘My dear Cora, what a charming occasion. I had no idea there were so many people in London in November. You look a little peaky though, dear, I do hope you are not overdoing it. Really, you don’t have to stand here any longer, I think half an hour is quite long enough to be in the receiving line.’ She gave Cora a gracious smile.

‘But I don’t know everybody. I would feel discourteous if I wasn’t here to greet my guests,’ said Cora.

‘I suppose you are still young enough to think that you should set a good example. By all means, do the right thing, dear, but don’t expect anyone to thank you for it.’ Duchess Fanny moved off into the drawing room, the light catching the diamond drops hanging from her ears so that Cora fancied for one moment that her mother-in-law’s head had caught fire.

‘Don’t take any notice of her, Cora.’ Sybil was beside her. ‘She is furious that you are having a party without asking for her advice. I think everything looks lovely. There can hardly be an orchid left in London. Very forward of you to invite Mrs Stanley, I know there are all sorts of stories about her but I have been dying to meet her since I saw her in
Lady Windermere’s Fan
.’ Cora could see that Sybil’s eyes were searching the room.

‘Would you like me to introduce you? I am sure she would like to meet an admirer.’

‘No need, I can see she is talking to Reggie.’ Sybil sped off, her bright red hair clearly visible in the crowd. Judging by the reddening of an inch of skin between Reggie’s collar and his hair, he too was an admirer of Mrs Stanley.

‘Your Grace.’ The butler was standing beside her. ‘Mr Louvain is in the library and everything has been arranged as you asked.’

‘Tell him I will be down directly the guests have stopped arriving.’

She wanted to go down at once, but she knew that Duchess Fanny would think she was following her advice, and that she was determined
not
to do.

Downstairs in the library, Bertha was looking at the portrait of her mistress. She had been right, she thought, to suspect Louvain’s intentions. Louvain had painted her lying back on the green chaise longue, one arm draped invitingly along its buttoned back, the other demurely in her lap. The abundant chestnut hair fell down over her shoulders as if she had just released it, the jacket of her dress was open with a suggestion of white lace beneath. It was a provocative pose with a hint that Cora had been surprised in the act of undressing, but the most striking feature of the painting was the expression on her face as she looked directly out of the canvas. The only word Bertha could think of to describe it was a word she had heard used time and again in her Carolina childhood: wanton. Louvain had made Cora look wanton. Her eyelids appeared weighed down by the long eyelashes, her mouth was slightly open and on each cheek was a splash of colour. Bertha, who had seen her mistress look like this often in Venice and occasionally since, was amazed at how accurate the painting was. You could almost feel the heat coming from the canvas, from the golden browns and umber tones that Louvain had used for the hair. Cora’s grey-green eyes looked unfocused, the pupils dilated. Bertha could almost taste Cora’s soft red lips again; Cora had changed so much since she had asked her maid for kissing lessons, but this painting managed to get across something of the innocence of those days as well as the woman she was now. But there was nothing yielding about the picture, it was the image of a woman who wanted satisfaction.

Louvain was watching her with a smile, showing his teeth.

‘So, what do you think?’

‘It’s very like her, sir. I reckon Miss Cora will be pleased.’ She could say that in truth; her mistress would like it, she was sure, but she wondered whether the Duke would feel the same way.

‘And you? Do you like the picture?’ he pressed her.

‘That ain’t the point, is it, sir?’ Bertha looked at him directly.

‘Why not?’

‘Because you didn’t paint it for me. You did it for her and I reckon she will like what you’ve done.’

Louvain was staring at her with narrowed eyes.

‘You know, I would like to paint you, Bertha. You have such beautiful skin, it would be a challenge.’

‘I don’t think that would be right, sir, and besides, my young man wouldn’t like it.’ She knew the kind of picture Louvain had in mind, and she had no intention of taking her clothes off.

‘Are you sure, Bertha? There are plenty of women upstairs who are longing to pose for me. Wouldn’t you like to hang alongside a duchess?’ He moved towards her to stroke her cheek, but Bertha saw him coming and took a step aside to look at the picture more closely.

‘I don’t think the ladies who want you to paint them would be too happy if you start painting their maids,’ she said.

‘Perhaps not, but no one tells me what to paint,’ Louvain said without hesitation.

She looked at him as blankly as she could, thinking that no one could tell her to be painted either. He caught the sense of her silence and smiled.

‘Do you realise, you are the first woman ever to turn me down.’

‘We all of us need practice in being disappointed, sir.’ Bertha made a perfunctory little curtsy. She had to find Miss Cora at once. ‘If you’ll excuse me, sir.’

‘Run away then. You’ll regret this one day.’ Louvain dismissed her with a wave.

Bertha went out into the black and white checkered hall. There was still a stream of guests coming in from the cold, surrendering their coats and furs to the maids at the door and making their way up the wide curving stairway to where Cora stood. Bertha wondered how she could reach her mistress discreetly. It would have been simpler if she had been in uniform, but as a lady’s maid she did not wear a cap and apron. But to her surprise, no one so much as glanced at her as she went up the stairs. Back home it would have been unthinkable for a coloured maid to make her way through a crowd of white folks without leaving a trail of disapproving stares in her wake. Most people in this country didn’t realise that she was coloured. The English cared more about class, and here the society people simply did not see those who were not in their world. Bertha wondered what she disliked most: to be noticed for her colour or to be ignored for her class. But right now it suited her to be invisible. She waited until Cora had greeted an older lady wearing some threadbare ostrich plumes in her hair and her two gawky daughters whose kid gloves, Bertha couldn’t help noticing, were soiled. That family was sorely in need of a new lady’s maid, she thought – or perhaps they did not care. English ladies, she had observed, were a lot less particular than the Americans. Miss Cora would rather stay at home than wear dirty gloves. But at last the grubby family moved on and Bertha sidled up to her mistress.

‘Miss Cora,’ she said quietly, but Cora was in what Bertha thought of as her ‘Duchess’ mode.

‘Bertha, you must remember to call me Your Grace in public, you know how the Duke feels about it.’

‘Your Grace, I think you should come and look at your portrait,’ Bertha said.

Cora said impatiently, ‘I will be down as soon as all the guests are here. I am going to present it to Ivo.’

‘But don’t you think you ought to see it first?’ Bertha persisted.

‘Why, what’s wrong with it?’ She seized Bertha’s arm. ‘Does it make me look ugly? Or fat?’

‘No, Miss Cora, I mean, Your Grace, you look fine in the picture. I just think you should see the picture, is all.’ Bertha was beginning to regret her mission. Perhaps she had imagined things.

‘Well, in that case, I have nothing to worry about.’ Cora turned away. ‘Dear Father Oliver, I am so pleased you could come to my little soirée.’

Bertha left her there. She felt full of foreboding about the portrait, but there was no more she could do. She went downstairs to the servants’ hall. Jim was in the pantry eating a piece of cold pie. He looked up guiltily as she walked in.

‘Oh crikey, I thought you was Mr Clewes.’ He smiled at her. ‘But I’m so glad you’re not.’ He brushed the crumbs away from his mouth and gave her a kiss. She pushed him away.

‘Jim, don’t. It’s not worth it.’

He kissed her again, his lips still greasy from the pie. ‘I’ll be the judge of that.’

She wriggled away and stood in front of him, her arms folded.

‘I’m worried, Jim.’

‘Don’t worry about Clewes and the others. They’re all busy upstairs. I’m meant to be helping but luckily the spare livery didn’t fit.’

‘No, it’s not that. It’s about Miss Cora’s picture. It ain’t respectful, and she don’t know it.’ Bertha shook her head.

‘Why, is she naked?’ Jim rolled his eyes.

‘No, of course not! Thing is, she looks like she could be, if you know what I mean,’ Bertha said.

‘Nothing wrong with that. There are lots of pictures of naked women at Lulworth.’

‘But not of ladies, Jim. Those goddesses and such ain’t ladies.’ Bertha looked at him.

‘Ladies look the same underneath, don’t they, or is there some secret you aren’t telling me?’

Jim was whispering in her ear now. Bertha felt his breath tickling her neck. She wanted to fold herself into him, to press her heart against his heart and feel the warmth between them, but she could not contain her worry. There were times when she didn’t much care for Miss Cora but she was her mistress and she could not be indifferent. She knew Jim did not understand the connection she felt. He felt loyalty to the Duke but he did not feel responsible for him; the Duke was his employer not his charge. But for Bertha it was different.