All for Love (19 page)

‘Well, that’s something to be thankful for. Say goodbye to your cousin, Juliet.’

‘And the expenses of the journey?’ asked Joinville.

‘I’ve funds in my study to cover that.’

‘Please.’ Juliet had risen from her chair to come forward and stand between Hyde and Josephine. ‘Hyde?’

‘Yes?’

‘May we not give them the sapphires? It was almost a promise. And I’ll never wear them.’

‘They’re yours,’ said Hyde. ‘Do what you like with them.’

‘Here, then!’ She hurried over to the alcove and fetched the leather box. ‘Think of me sometimes, Jo, when you wear them?’

‘Ju! I’m sorry!’ Suddenly, they were both crying, their arms round each other in an embrace that wiped out the past.

‘Write to me sometimes!’

‘Of course I will.’

Hyde and Joinville exchanged a long glance, that said, more clearly than words, ‘Women!’

‘Time to be gone!’ Hyde opened the boudoir door so suddenly that Alice and Anne fell into the room. Behind them, the staircase was lined with gawping black faces. For an instant, he was rigid with rage, then, almost mildly. ‘What in the devil’s name are you all doing here?’

‘Satan saw him climb in,’ explained Anne. ‘We were waiting to make sure …’

‘He didn’t eat me alive? Then I can only thank you all kindly and point out that I am quite capable of taking care of myself. Now, scoot, the lot of you, and if one word of this night’s work gets out, I’ll flay every man jack of you, free or not.’

A roar of delighted laughter from the stairway saluted his words and convinced Juliet that they had managed to hear enough to know just how the land lay. Well, so much the simpler.

Suddenly, amazingly, she was alone with Anne and Alice. She drew a deep breath. ‘We’re likely to be late for Mr. Scarbrough’s dinner,’ she said. ‘I’ll wear the green, Alice, and the Winchelsea emeralds.’

***

With Anne and Alice both helping, she managed the change in ten minutes. ‘Anne!’ She was fastening the second emerald earring. ‘See if Mr. Purchis is ready and can spare me a moment before we go.’

‘Yes, ma’am.’ Curiously, indefinably, something had changed in their relationship.

Hyde tapped on her door a few moments later, immaculate in evening dress. ‘My dear!’ He kissed her hand. And then, with a laugh, ‘Did it never occur to you that you spent a most suspiciously short time on your toilette?’

‘Oh!’ She made a face at him. ‘Must you go on convincing me that I’m a hopeless conspirator! But, Hyde, I wanted to see you ... before we ... before they go. You will make sure, won’t you, that they have enough funds? Anne and Alice are sorting out a collection of gowns that won’t be missed, but, really, everything should be Josephine’s ... Not just the sapphires ... After all, it’s not her fault —’

‘No.’ His smile was heart-warming. ‘So much as our good fortune. If she married me without love, why, so, I now realise, did I her. It is not everyone who is so miraculously released. And after all, I owe it to her that I have found you. A debt beyond all possibility of payment. So — that’s right, her shawl, Alice, we must be going — whatever the price of the
Liberty
, I have promised her an income for life — and shall see to it that it is safely tied up for her and her children.’ He took her arm. ‘We shall be poor, my love, comparatively speaking.’

‘Poor! With you! But —’ they were in the hall now ‘Hyde, may I not see her again? To say goodbye?’

‘No.’ He led her firmly downstairs. ‘It’s all been said. Besides, if you remember, we are scandalously late for dinner.’ Moses flung open front door and Hyde ushered her down the steps to the waiting carriage. Helping her up, ‘One thing,’ he said.

‘Yes?’ Settling green silk skirts, she turned to look at him inquiringly.

‘Drive on, Charon! As fast as you dare.’ He turned back to smile at her. ‘I must remind you, love, that so far as the world is concerned we are, at best, a modem couple, content each to go our own way.’

‘Yes?’ Puzzled.

‘Well.’ His smile was an embrace. ‘If you look at me like that, I shall probably kiss you in public; the world will think us run mad, and may guess at our secret. Which, frankly, I would much rather keep hid.’

‘Am I so obvious?’

‘My darling, it shines out of you. I really think we had best invent a quarrel and play one more scene for our friends’ benefit. Luckily, they will be too much occupied with the President to notice us much. And you, remember, are to act as hostess. Poor Scarbrough will be nearly out of his wits at our lateness. What quarrel, do you think, could have made us commit such a solecism?’

‘I’ve lost my sapphires,’ she suggested. ‘And had to change at the last moment. Scarbrough will think you have impounded them for some reason connected with that mysterious sale. The rest of the world will think whatever it pleases. And you —’ she tapped his hand with her fan — ‘you were such a tasteless boor as to suggest that I wear the Winchelsea emeralds with a blue dress. No wonder if we have quarrelled!’

‘No indeed.’ Charon was drawing his horses to a sweating halt at the porticoed front entrance to the Scarbrough house. ‘That’s right, Charon, no time to go in at the side. At least we’re so late as to have missed the crowd.’

‘Who are doubtless missing us,’ said Juliet.

‘My love.’ Hyde held her, hard, as he lifted her down. ‘There’s been so little time. But you do know, don’t you, how happy I am?’

She smiled up at him. ‘I know how happy
I
am.’ And then, on the high pitched note of a shrew. ‘Well, of course we are late. What else did you expect?’ She picked up her skirts with an angry swish and began to mount the steps to the hospitably open front door.

‘There you are, ma’am, and sir —’ Scarbrough’s butler had obviously been hovering there on the lookout for them. ‘The master says to leave your things right here with me, if you please, and go on up. The President, he’s here.’ And indeed they could hear the strains of
Monroe’s
March
echoing down from above.

‘Oh, very well,’ said Juliet petulantly. ‘I suppose if I must meet the President without even a chance to see that my curls are in place, I must. Here —’ she handed the man her shawl, shook out her skirts, and turned to the curving stairway that led up to the principal rooms on the first floor.

It was like arriving at a theatre after the curtain had gone up. Above them, the buzz of conversation and the music; here, silence and emptiness, so that she actually had time, as she mounted the stair, to look up at the high ceiling, three floors above, where Mr. Jay had painted a huge, domed skylight with the stars of the midnight sky. ‘It’s a splendid house,’ she turned for a moment to Hyde, forgetting their ‘quarrel’.

‘Yes, poor Scarbrough.’ And then, to remind her, sharply, ‘You will make your own apologies to the President.’

‘Well, of course I shall! I’d rather be late than arrive looking a fright.’ The words, angrily spoken, carried her into the ballroom. It was packed with people, but a lane opened at once to let them through to the far side, where the President was standing in a bower of evergreens, surrounded by his
entourage
and the town worthies. As usual, none of their wives were in the group. It made Juliet’s part much easier. ‘Mr. President,’ she swept him a deep curtsy, ‘before you even accept my apologies for our lateness, you must settle an argument between my husband and me.’ A furious glance for Hyde, just behind her. ‘He said you were of Irish descent, and I must wear green in your honour. I maintained you were Scots, and true blue was your colour. Now, tell me’ — another burning glance for Hyde — ‘which of us was right?’

‘Madam.’ The President smiled down at her. ‘You were right of course, but I cannot regret a mistake that has brought you to us looking so delightful.’ He took her hand. ‘They are waiting for us, I believe, to begin the dancing.’

Extraordinary to be here, sweeping her curtsy to the President and then to the man on the other side of her, waiting for the music to begin, looking down, for just a moment, to Hyde, half-way along the set, talking animatedly to Mrs. Broughton. What in the world could he be saying to her? What in the world did it matter? Later, when they got home, she would ask him. She let the slow, sure realisation of happiness flood through her. Tonight she should have been rowing down to Winchelsea and exile, the last, quick farewells said, the play ended, and forever. ‘Die on the field of battle,’ the rowers would have sung, ‘Glory to my soul.’

And here she was. And furthermore, she realised, the President of the United States had just said something to her and she had no idea in the world what it was. She made her smile an apology. ‘Forgive me. I came in such haste, I’ve hardly caught my breath.’ Luckily, it was time for them to cross hands and part, and when they met again she had herself well in hand, ready for the necessary social exchange of nothings.

The next dance, inevitably, was Scarbrough’s and here she was profuse in her apologies for their lateness, and animated in her description of Hyde’s absurd suggestion that she wear sapphires with a green dress. Scarbrough gave her, she thought, a strange look, but then he was so obviously keyed up this evening that his looks were beyond interpretation.

The entertainment was incredibly lavish. When the signal was given to move through to the long dining-room behind the ballroom they found champagne running like water, and a luxurious display of cold meats, made dishes and shivering desserts laid out among a thicket of greenery. Trying to remember when she had eaten last, Juliet realised that it had been at breakfast. Or had Anne made her take something while she was changing? At all events, she was starving, and delighted to accept a lavishly loaded plate from the devoted hands of Mr. Jay. Congratulating him on the house, she was aware that already a large proportion of the men had slipped away. No doubt, somewhere downstairs, more solid food, and drink, was being served to them.

‘I don’t believe a word of it,’ Jay was saying.

‘I beg your pardon?’ She sipped champagne cautiously and looked at him over the glass.

‘He’d never sell my house.’ And then, aware of her amazed expression. ‘You mean you’ve not heard? He’s not even told you?’

‘Mr. Scarbrough?’ What an extraordinary moment to have chosen.

‘No!’ Explosively. ‘If it was only that, I’d understand. No, madam, not Mr. Scarbrough, Mr. Purchis. I am informed on the very best authority that your husband is putting your town house up for sale. My masterpiece. Designed from my heart!’ A languishing glance told her why. ‘This is nothing — a showpiece. But your house, Oglethorpe Square! I’ll never do anything to touch it. How could I?’ Another languishing glance.

This was getting to be too much. ‘Tell me, Mr. Jay,’ she made her voice ice-cool, ‘Who was your “best authority”?’

‘Why, Mrs. Broughton. Your husband danced the first dance with her, you know.’

‘Yes, so he did. And there, by happy chance, she is. Forgive me, Mr. Jay, if I consult the “authority”?’ For once she was grateful for the awkward custom of buffet suppers as she bore down upon Mrs. Broughton, who had settled herself comfortably at a small table, two of her three daughters in attendance. ‘May I join you?’ Juliet took assent for granted and settled herself, straight-backed, on a stool in the corner beside Mrs. Broughton. ‘Mr. Jay has just been telling me the most amazing tale,’ she went on affably.

‘Oh!’ Mrs. Broughton actually looked frightened. ‘My dears,’ to her daughters. ‘I am sure Mrs. Purchis and I would trust you to choose our dessert for us.’

‘Yes, indeeed.’ Juliet had absent-mindedly cleared the loaded plate. ‘And if there is any truth in this story Mr. Jay has been telling me, I believe I shall need another glass of champagne. Thank you, Lucinda, my dear.’ What a mercy to have remembered the name of the youngest plain Miss Broughton.

‘My dearest creature,’ Mrs. Broughton leaned forward eagerly as her daughters began to push their way through the crowd towards the loaded buffet tables. ‘You cannot mean that Mr. Purchis has not told you?’

‘Told me what?’

‘That he is putting the house in Oglethorpe Square up for sale. La, my dear, what creatures these men are for sure, but if you ask me, that is beyond enough. I’d make him smart for it, if I were you. And with a tale, too, of “extravagance”, if you please. Why!’ Even in these circumstances, her sympathetic glance was almost beyond bearing. ‘If I’ve seen you wear that dress once, I’ve seen it six times. And very becoming it is too,’ she added hurriedly. ‘But, I ask you! Extravagance! We were saying, only the other day, my dear girls and I, what a model you had become. And after all —’ a very knowing look — ‘the sapphires were quite your own, were they not? But, my dear —’ she leaned closer, so that Juliet could smell the peppermint on her breath, ‘is it really true that he is closing out your account at the Planters’ Bank? I tell you, I never heard anything so Gothic in my life. And taking you to rusticate at Winchelsea as soon as the President is gone. Though, mind you,’ fairly, ‘if the house is to be sold, I’d think you’d prefer not to be there to see it go.’

‘You’re right there!’ It was true enough. She surged to her feet. ‘And here, in happy hour,
is
my husband. Mr. Purchis,’ she made her voice shrill, ‘Mrs. Broughton has been telling me the most amazing tale.’

‘Amazing, perhaps.’ Hyde smiled down at her. ‘But true.’