Miss Cresswell's London Triumph (23 page)

When he had first learned of Lord Haslemere's wish to meet him, he had been overjoyed at the opportunity. As Lord Charlton had said, "Any man who has Haslemere's stamp of approval will go far, no matter what his political party."

Now Ned was longing to be back in London, all because he wanted to explain himself to someone he'd known since childhood, someone who, for all he knew, may not have cared whether or not he reassured her. I must be in my dotage, he thought. Why am I worrying about her feelings when in all probability she hasn't given a second thought to seeing Arabella and me, or if she has, she is, if anything, amused?

Here he was entirely wrong. Not only had Cassie given second thoughts to the intimate moment she had intruded on, she could not get the tableau of Arabella wrapped in Ned's arms out other mind. She was still too upset to realize that it was Ned who had been wrapped in Arabella's arms despite his heroic efforts to extricate himself gracefully. At this moment, Cassie s valiant efforts to erase the memory and direct her energies into more productive channels were taking the form of a ride in the park in Bertie's new phaeton.

Even the friends who had known Bertie since schooldays were constantly amazed that a man who spent so much time on his wardrobe and seeking out and repeating fashionable on-dits in London's most select drawing rooms, all the while completely ignoring such male haunts as Manton's and Gentleman Jackson's, could be such a notable whip. It seemed incongruous that the languid and willowy Bertie could possibly have the strength to keep a spirited pair in control. Yet somehow, without disarranging his exquisite attire or overcoming his loathing for any sort of exertion, he managed not only to handle the most restive of high-spirited teams, but drove with all the finesse of the most noted member of the Four Horse Club. He had recently purchased a beautiful pair and a new phaeton with yellow wheels, a combination destined to cause a stir in the park and arouse envy in the breast of every admirer of fine horseflesh.

Certainly his equipage had caused a favorable sensation at Mainwaring House. Teddy and Freddie had agreed that the turnout was slap up to the echo. Bertie and Cassie could have waited forever for them to finish examining and enumerating the fine points of the entire rig, if both Teddy and his uncle had not had too much respect for such a mettlesome pair to keep them standing.

Even Cassie forgot her unpleasant thoughts long enough to exclaim over them as they bowled along. Excellent horsewoman that she was, she kept silent while Bertie maneuvered through the streets, and refrained from commenting on the smooth gait and the well-sprung ride until they reached the park. "You do drive to an inch, Bertie," she commented admiringly as he skillfully negotiated his way between two wagons and through the gate.

"Thank you, Cassie." Bertie, knowing that Cassie's own driving skills were something beyond the ordinary, looked gratified. "But," he began as purposefully as Bertie Montgomery did anything, "we ain't here to pass judgment on my driving. We're here to help take yo
ur rightful place in the ton.

Cassie looked dubious. During her sleepless night she had thought about her expressed wish to become all the rage with some misgiving. She now gave voice to these reservations. "I'm not at all certain that I can simper, smile, and act bird-witted as though I am in the greatest need of
someone who can tell me how to go on and explain everything to me. Nor can I admire some overeager buck that I don't care a rap for."

"Whoa, Cassie. I ain't saying you have to do any of those things. You don't have to bamboozle anyone. Just enjoy yourself. If you're dancing with some blade who can only talk about the way he ties his cravats, it's Lombard Street to a China orange he has taste and can dance well, so you should take pleasure in the graceful way he executes his steps and appreciate the care he has taken with his toilette the way you would appreciate the skill of any other artist. If you're stuck with some beefy-faced squire who can speak of nothing but horses, why you can enjoy yourself discussing that without thinking that you would die of boredom if you were condemned to spend your entire life with him. People don't want flummery. They just want someone who is interested in their particular passions and can share these, as well as someone who knows how to converse with them on their favorite subjects."

Cassie was quiet. The more she thought about it, the more she realized that this was exactly what Bertie did. Every member of the ton liked him and sought out his company, not for his brilliant wit or overwhelming charm, but because of his amiable adaptability and the ease with which he could enter into any discussion. "That's all very well, but to be a diamond or a nonpareil one must be well looking and have an air of fashion," she objected.

"Well, one certainly can't be an antidote," he conceded. "But again, it's enjoying oneself that is important. Whatever rig one chooses, one should look upon selecting it as an artistic experience and take pleasure in using it as a way to express oneself."

Cassie looked puzzled.

"Take you, for instance. You wear your clothes as though choosing them were a duty. You always look elegant, but you don't appear as though you relished preparing your toilette. In point of fact, you take this all too seriously. You look at it the way you would some task of Greek translation, as though it has some underlying significance. You don't need to know the meaning of everything to take pleasure in it. You like beautiful things, don't you—paintings, sculpture, music?"

Cassie nodded.

"Then why not enjoy wearing beautiful things and using them to make yourself feel and look beautiful?"

Cassie sat silently as they rolled along, nodding mechanically to familiar faces here and there. She realized that Bertie was echoing a criticism, once voiced by Ned, that she considered everything too seriously. She sighed. It was all so very confusing and difficult to think about. Had she been wrong in the way she looked at things for so many years?

They had completed the circuit before Bertie interrupted these rather melancholy reflections. "Cassie, you mustn't look so blue-deviled. Well take you to Madame Regnery, choose some new togs for you, and you're bound to feel much more the thing. You must begin with a riding habit."

"A riding habit?" Cassie echoed blankly. "But I have a perfectly—"

"IVe seen it and it's all that's suitable, but that ain't enough," Bertie interjected firmly. "You have the best seat of anyone I know, man or woman. You should wear something that calls attention to you in a situation where you show to advantage and most females don't—Arabella Taylor for one. She'd be terrified of a cart horse while you can manage a prime bit of blood with ease. It's time the ton was aware of that."

Cassie, much struck by this idea, meekly allowed herself to be deposited at Madame Regnery's while Bertie found a boy to take care of the horses.

The next few hours flew by in a blur as Bertie, conversant with feminine fashion down to the last furbelow, ordered up gowns that would be an accurate reflection of the true spirit of Lady Cassandra Cresswell.

"And that hair," he concluded severely, subjecting her modest style to a critical examination, "positively must go."

"What's wrong with it?" Cassie demanded a trifle rebelliously. She had submitted with tolerable good grace to being pushed and pulled, fitted, evaluated, discussed, and gone over as though she were a prime piece of horseflesh, but she was now beginning to feel rather tired of being treated as though she didn't exist.

"It makes you look like an ape-leader," Bertie responded with unusually brutal frankness.

"It does no such thing! Besides, it's dignified. I detest the odiously fussy way everyone is wearing theirs now," Cassie objected mutinously.

Ignoring her completely, Bertie waved to Monsieur Ducros, Lady Frances's hairdresser, who had been hovering unobtrusively in the background. "You see what I mean?" he inquired despairingly.

Mais oui, Monsieur is entirely correct. Mademoiselle looks un peu severe, he agreed. Oui, c est trop severe. Mademoiselle must be moins serieuse, je pense. "

Cassie sighed and gave herself up to the ministrations of Monsieur. When he was finished, she was forced to admit that Bertie and Monsieur Ducros were entirely correct. Her previous coiffeur had been too severe. With her hair cut shorter, her curls were freed to fame her face, adding piquancy to her expression, emphasizing the large blue eyes, the generous mouth, and the delicately but firmly molded chin. It felt lighter, freer, and made her feel just that much lighter and gayer herself.

Bertie nodded sagely as she pirouetted in front of the mirror. "What did I tell you?" he asked, unable to keep a trace of smugness from showing. "Put on that new walking dress and youll feel a different person. No one should underestimate the importance of becoming clothes and coiffeur to one's sense of well-being. Anyone who tells you differently is a slowtop." He then directed Madame's assistance to help Cassie into the most dashing of the walking dresses and to wrap up the sober carriage dress she had been wearing. The cerulean blue spencer cut tight to the shape revealed Cassie's graceful figure and the matching gauze lining the very fashionable watered gros de Naples bonnet brought out the intense blue of her eyes.

As they strolled along to the carriage and Cassie caught sight of herself in shop windows she reveled in the moment of startled recognition when she realized that she belonged to that exquisitely fashionable reflection. This in turn made her conversation and expression more animated and sparkling. The air of gaiety and confidence, as much as her very real beauty, caused several passersby to stop and take a second look at the lovely young woman with Bertie Montgomery—a circumstance he was very careful to point out to her. This admiration increased Cassie's sense of well-being, so that she positively glowed with her enjoyment of the fineness of the day, her companion, and herself.

It was not only those on the street who were struck by Cassie's newfound eclat. Freddie and Nigel, strolling along after an agreeable sojourn at Tattersall's, halted in their discussion of the auction taking place there. "I say, that's a dashed pretty girl," Freddie remarked.

At which Nigel, who had observed more carefully than his companion, nearly doubled over with mirth. "Freddie, you cawker! That's your sister!" he bellowed.

"Why, so it is," Freddie agreed in mild surprise. "Hallo, Cass. What have you been doing to yourself? You look fine as fivepence."

"Why, thank you, Freddie." Cassie turned quite pink with pleasure. Freddie, the best of brothers a girl could wish for and unfailingly kind about including his twin in every kind of lark, was totally oblivious to the niceties of feminine fashion. To have her toilette penetrate his consciousness was a coup indeed! Even Nigel, who had been as unconscious as Freddie until his service with brother Guardsmen inclined to ogle any woman between the ages of sixteen and thirty had taught him the niceties of feminine fashion, was looking at her admiringly. Bertie is in the right of it, she thought to herself as she promenaded along surrounded by these escorts, wearing fashionable clothes does affect one's frame of mind.

It would have been too much to say that the transformation Bertie had effected in Cassie stunned the fashionable world, but the members of the ton were more aware of her presence. Captain Walworth, upon seeing her in the park mounted on Chiron and wearing a close-fitting lavender riding habit with its dashing hat, remarked to Major Dowling that Lady Cassandra Cresswell was a remarkably pretty girl. "Excellent seat, too," he observed, watching her with a critical but admiring eye.

Major Dowling repeated this to his bosom companion Henry Ffolke-Smythe, a noted clubman, who of course shared it with his fellows, and slowly Cassie found herself beginning to be scrutinized with a deal of interest and approval.

Taking Bertie's advice to heart, she relaxed and began to interest herself in the particular attributes and passions that each new admirer had to offer. Somewhat to her surprise, she truly began to enjoy herself in a way that she hadn't for a long time. She learned a great deal as well. As she sat next to him at Lady Waverly's musicale, instead of scorning the Honorable Winston Denham's obsession with his tailor, Cassie listened to his catalog of the agonies suffered over the perfect fitting of his coat and the creation of a new style of tying his cravat. She gained a new appreciation for the creativity that inspired this particular passion. Not that she could ever become the greatest of friends with someone who spent such an inordinate amount of time selecting just the right waistcoat and snuffbox to match his attire, but instead of discounting such attention to toilette entirely, she began to perceive it as a mode of self-expression and to have more sympathy toward him. This sympathy communicated itself to the Honorable Winston, who relaxed in its warmth and found himself opening up and speaking far more naturally and freely than he ordinarily did. In fact, he couldn't think when he last had a more delightful conversation. Later, recapping the evening to some of his closest friends, he pronounced Lady Cassandra Cresswell to be simply charming.

As Cassie pursued this new program she discovered that it put people more at their ease with her, and feeling comfortable, they were less likely to converse on the safe and boring subjects of the weather, the latest on-dit. or their health. Instead they began to share more topics that were their own particular concern, and this all made for much more enlightening and intriguing discussions. Cassie even began to look forward to some of the festivities of the Season and to take pleasure in social encounters. This new attitude expressed itself through the sparkle in her eyes and the vivacity of her expression. Those around her, attracted by this vitality, gravitated toward her naturally. The change was a gradual one, but it was distinct, nevertheless, and those near and dear to her remarked on it with pleasure.