Midnight's Song (18 page)

Right,
I recalled as I groggily arose from bed that
morning.
It’s the first day of
summer.
I sat up, sensing a headache come
on. I was already well acquainted with Lord Gregory alright –
conceivably more than I should have been. When I say my preparation
for this moment had been meticulous, I mean that the facts about
these men were literally
ground
into me.

If I thought
balancing books on my head was hard – I should have tried balancing
the books
while
memorizing the names, birthdays, likes, dislikes and other
key facts about the wealthy dukes and dignitaries coming to visit.
It was no breeze, I can tell you that much.

And, to be honest; it didn’t make me
enjoy the idea of courting them any more than I already
had.

“You should wear this…oh wait…”Emily
told me after pulling me out of bed and leading me to the closet.
After rooting through several outfits for comparison, she pulled
out a deep blue dress and a straw sun hat; contemplatively holding
it up next to my face to see if it matched my complexion. “…Yes,
this will work. With a pair of pearl earrings, you’ll look
perfect!”

“Don’t you feel…that I shouldn’t be so
formal?” I interrupted her, partially stalling and also attempting
to do whatever I could to make myself look as undesirable as
possible. Emily stared at me, baffled.

“Well, this isn’t too formal. But, if
you like I will give you something plainer for your outing.” She
rustled through the closet again, pulling out a pink dress. I shook
my head no; still not content with its extravagance. It took 3 more
tries until I settled on a very toned down, white cotton dress with
tiny vertical stripes. Even then, Emily was still baffled. “I don’t
know Elissa…it’s awfully plain. It seems more like leisure wear
than something for a formal outing.”

“No! No! It’s
perfect,” I insisted. If this was leisure wear, so be it. I would
have been happy to have seemed in any way frumpy or unattractive.
“It’s
just
what I
need!”

Nearly reluctant allow me to wear it;
Emily helped me slip into the dress and topped my head with the
large-brimmed straw hat. When I came down for breakfast that
morning, my family held their breath. What had I planned to do,
coming dressed like this?

“You’re dressed
quite lavishly today,” Stella cynically rolled her eyes at me from
across the breakfast table. Her face read a sour, poorly concealed
flame from within. After all –
she
wasn’t the one going on an outing with Lord
Gregory Gellman. She wasn’t being vouched for by Winston Everen
either. Internally, she turning was a covetous green – plotting her
revenge, whatever it could be. Though, I would have honestly traded
places with her any day
.

“Thank you, Stella. You
look rather marvelous today yourself.” It was all I told her in
reply before the maids came and quickly took up our
plates.

They hurried us from our seats as the
doorman announced that Lord Gregory Gellman was making a quite
eager and untimely arrival. Like clockwork, we assembled in our
places at the front of the manor and watched Lord Gregory pull up
in his carriage and jovially touch the brim of his top hat before
he made his way out. The moment that he saw me, I could have sworn
that the boy nearly lost himself and jogged over. Covered in sweat,
he grabbed my hand and attempted to flatter it with a
kiss.

It was nowhere near as suave as one
that would have come from Rhys.

“Lady Celeste,” Gregory began, his
voice shaking. “I have been so hoping to see you! I have….a
wonderful…day planned for us.” He stopped speaking, probably for
the best anyway. If he would have proceeded, the poor boy would
have thrown up on me. He hooked his arm around mine and politely
followed the rest of my family back to the manor. Yes, I absolutely
dreaded this.

Though, I actually
had a plan. Unattractive as it might have been –
I
did not care
what Gregory had planned for me. I was going to
surprise him with a treacherous day of exercise in the outdoors.
Unless he was completely infatuated with me; my ploy would surely
send him running in the opposite direction.

“You have plans for today?” I suddenly
piped up as we entered through the towering wooden door, “So do
I!”

“Oh…really?” Gregory stammered in
surprise. He had no idea what was in store.

I challenged him with a
day filled with riding, climbing, and running around in the intense
heat of the day. I was determined to appear to him as if I was a
complete, rigid feminist with girlish looks but a boyish inside. If
he was anything like I had studied – he should have been completely
put-off by this attitude. Gregory was completely unathletic also,
so that turned to be a total plus.

“You sure you can take it?” I called
to him loudly as we trotted across an open field in the hottest
part of the June afternoon. My horse was running fairly fast and
paraded several hundred feet ahead of Gregory while he struggled to
keep up.

“Yes – I believe that I can!” He
shouted back, clearly out of breath. I pulled back the reigns of my
horse and came to a slow halt. It took nearly two minutes for him
to catch up with me, but when he did he gazed at me, practically
gasping for air; and released a slight grin. “For a girl in a
dress, you are quite the rider.”

As I always did when I was upset, I
bit my lower lip. There was a desperate hope I had that somehow,
this would turn him off. Yet now…it seemed to be doing the
opposite. I quickly jolted the reigns of my horse and galloped away
from him in a swift, mannish challenge to see if he would grow
tired of keeping up with me once more. This had to work, unless he
was completely besotted by me.

Unfortunately, Gregory fell into the
category of complete infatuation.

By the end of the day, I was sure he
must have hated me. I’d used him to plow numerous fields, sent him
up trees, and even caused him swallow some turf when he fell off of
his horse onto the ground. Had we not had a spare set of trousers
for him in our female-dominated household; Gregory would have shown
up at dinner covered in grass stains and sweat.

Still, this could not deter
him.

“My sweet petal…of a
spring flower!” Gregory serenaded me later in the evening, smelling
of grass and sweat after he pulled me outside alone on the balcony.
My relatives all positioned themselves silently but eagerly against
the windows inside. “My angel…of glorious roses! Shall I see you
yet again?”

I rolled my eyes.
No, Gregory.
I don’t want to see you again
and spend another hour and a half at dinner talking about all of
your accolades.
I didn’t know what to tell
him, realizing that no matter what I said or did there would be no
way to let him down easily. I could in no way deter him now – but
luckily, I didn’t have to. Cousin Stella, with completely different
motives; did so for me.

“So, Lord Gregory….” Stella abrasively
interrupted us, parading onto the patio after no more than a few
seconds of alone time. I quickly studied her demeanor. She had
changed into a much more provocative set of clothes…unashamedly
clinging to every single one of her curves. She leaned over the
railings of the patio as if she were teasing him. He looked up,
suddenly infatuated. “I hear your family owns several villas in the
South? Do tell me of them.”

“Oh, yes…we do. Of course I will tell
you!” Gregory nervously exclaimed at this attractive newcomer whom
he’d failed to notice early in her plain, childish
attire.

“Let us stroll through the garden; and
we can share these fantastic tales!” Stella glared at me, hooking
her arm into his. She felt as if she had won something against me,
I was sure. But in all honesty, I was thankful for this loss. I
could only fall back and relief when the day was over and Gregory
was gone.

The rest of the family
however, was appalled by this behavior.

“How dare you interfere with her
affairs!” Grandmamma scolded Stella at her bedside the next day.
“This is Elissa’s courtship – not yours! Because of your audacious
behavior, Lord Gregory Gellman has slipped through our
fingers!”

I’m sure that Stella wasn’t at all
surprised by it; she knew she had it coming. But, she took the
words in stride. It had obviously all been worth it. Beeti stood in
the corner of the room, glaring and silent but filled with a secret
pride in her daughter’s actions.

“With all due respect Grandmamma, he
hasn’t slipped through our fingers. He simply has taken interest in
me over her. And rightfully so!” Stella haughtily snapped
back.

Though confined to her bed, Grandmamma
mustered enough strength to sit up; nearly swatting the girl. It
was obvious that Beeti wasn’t going to reprimand her daughter. She
glared at her granddaughter so harshly that Stella stopped her
sneering.

“No, it was not
‘rightfully so!’ You are too young to wed. Elissa is not even
accepting a marriage proposal from these men until she feels she is
old enough to make up her mind! In any case, you are to stay away
from Elissa’s suitors. When will you ever learn? These suitors are
not coming to choose between the two of you! This is about
her.
Not you!
”

The last two words seared through
Stella’s pride. She fell silent, brewing with more anger inside
than she ever had before. She didn’t interfere with my suitors
anymore beyond doing anything but displaying her usual, grating
nature for all to see. And meanwhile, over the next two months I
went through four more suitors – maddeningly going through the same
series of introductions and superficial day trips over and over
again. Although Gregory only visited for a day, all of the others
seemed to stay at least one day longer than the last until their
stays became painfully drawn-out in an attempt to be certain that
they would win me.

All of them were
incredibly obnoxious for men of such great wealth and power. They
were a group whose affairs I quickly became tiresome over. Each one
seemed to either be in love with themselves or feel the need to go
on and on about some strange accomplishment. After Gregory, there
came Hubert Hackley; as 22 year old heir to a fortune made by his
father in the horse breeding
industry.

“We have the finest horses in all of
New Kennington,” Hubert proudly illuminated over dinner on his
second night; his mouth full of food as he spoke.

“Is that so?” Wren uncomfortably
asked, closing her eyes in an attempt to ignore his poor table
manners.

“Yes indeed! Celeste – you grew up in
the rough of it, so I’m told. Perhaps you know the secret to having
a well bred horse?” He spun around to face me, practically spitting
his food in my face as he spoke. It must have been rhetorical,
because just as I opened my mouth to reply –he went on and informed
me anyway.

“It’s all in the
blood of the stallion!” He quickly interrupted. “Why, with a good
stallion and a few lucky mares you can have a full, thoroughbred
herd within a year’s time! This season we’ve successfully produced
over 200.”
Lucky.
I cringed at his terminology. He continued, absolutely
smitten with the topic. “Oh, the artificial method is the only way
to do it right, I tell you! The natural process is so much slower
compared to the way we –”

Grandmamma quickly
put up her hand and halted him. “Hubert, I grew up as an avid
equestrian. We are all well aware of the anatomy and if you please;
I would prefer that you
not
make us aware of your methods at the dinner
table.”

After that, Hubert abruptly went
home.

Then there was
Albert, the 19 year old son of a wealthy plantation owner in the
Southeast. He stayed with us for three days, and all he could speak
of was a strange fixation that he had with pineapples. After
Albert, there came Reginald Lawson. Yes,
that
Reginald. Just when I thought I
could take talk of horses no longer; I was forced to spend a full
four days with one in mid-July.

It was a very stale
courtship. Oddly enough, Reginald never actually expressed much
interest in me at all. All he ever wished to do was talk about how
his great grandfather founded the famous
Lawson Trout.
It was all his family
ate, and apparently he had 80 ponds stocked full of them. If that
was all his family ate, I guessed the creature must have been
contaminated with something that caused imminent stupidity. Nothing
came of us; but my week with Reginald didn’t go unnoticed by
Stella. I was now stepping into her territory by infiltrating her
circle of friends – and she continually seethed with
envy.

This is about her.
Not you!
The words tore across her psyche.
They did more than tear, they
burned
. Now she couldn’t put the
thought from her mind – the thought of her own
revenge.
And, Beeti wasn’t going to
hinder this. In fact, although her hand was nowhere in this plot,
she was going to encourage it. For, deep down beneath it all – they
both had ulterior motives.