My Dear Jenny (16 page)

“I grant you every right to feel injured,” Teverley agreed,
more quietly. “But why in God’s name are you exposing yourself—hell,
throwing yourself directly in the path of further insult? My aunt knows more ways
to make people wretched—all with seeming civility, which makes it the
very devil!”

“Mr. Teverley, your aunt has very civilly asked Emily and me
to be her guests at Teeve for the space of a week. Now that she knows that I am
not trying to entangle Domenic, I imagine that she will pay me no further
attention. Indeed, I am hardly worth her notice. Aside from which,” she
continued, as Teverley seemed likely to contradict her statement, “she
instructed Dom to assure me that she wished to make up for the slights that she
had dealt me. And if her basis for disliking me was her fear that Dom would
grow to have an attachment for
me
—the
greatest nonsense in the world—then it may well be that she will attach
her dislike to Emmy, as that is where his real attachment lies. And that child
is in no way up to your aunt’s weight.”

“So you intend to play sacrificial lamb and draw Lady Teeve’s
fire from Emily to yourself?” Teverley scoffed.

“Certainly not. But she may need someone there all the same.”

“Prydd, I did not take you for a fool,” Teverley murmured.

“Perhaps I am not one.” She looked at him coldly. “Perhaps
your predictions of gloom are simply idle frettings. Emily has accepted the
invitation, and come next Tuesday we leave for Teeve. And I hope to have a
pleasant, uneventful time there.”

“Well, my dear, should you find that you need some
assistance, I shall be there as well. And if you decide not to make the
journey, no one will think the less of you for it.”

“What, and give your aunt the point?” Jenny said, so low
that he almost did not hear it. “Well, sir, thank you for your offer. I am
quite overwhelmed.” And she curtsied and left him without another word. As she
was about to reenter the main hall, however, she felt a strong hand on her arm.

“Prydd—Jenny, have I offended you in some way? I truly
did not mean to, you know. But I felt you should be warned of what you were
walking into—”

“Believe me, Mr. Teverley,” Jenny replied, very serious now.
“I know exactly what I am walking into, and I try not to dwell upon it. But go
I must, therefore, it really is no use to warn me away.”

“All right, then, Miss Prydd, go ahead. I only hope that you
do not hurt yourself in the doing, or that innocent child.” He looked down at
her for a moment, but did not smile, and although he walked with her back to
Lady Graybarr’s chair, he did not linger, but made as quick an exit as Jenny
herself had tried to do a moment before.

“Well, my dear, have you been having a comfortable chat with
Mr. Teverley?”

“No, ma’am,” Jenny replied absently, with perfect truth, and
was so preoccupied with staring after the man that she missed entirely Lady
Graybarr’s mild look of astonishment.

Tuesday morning Emily Pellering and Miss Prydd, together
with one of the maids and an enormous pile of bandboxes and trunks, were loaded
into one of the Teeve traveling chaises (“Imagine having more than one!” Emily
had whispered) and the party set off toward the North Road, Cumberland, and
Teeve. Jenny had slept badly the night before—indeed, every night since
her last interview with Teverley. Emily had teased to know what was bothering
her dearest Jenny, but Miss Prydd remained stubbornly silent, and at last Emily
gave up. Now the two of them sat watching the city disappear, and the fields
begin to take the view; Emily bubbled with an excitement that, despite her
fatigue and her misgivings, Jenny could not but find somewhat infectious. Even
the little maid, a dab of a child in a fresh dress and shiny new pelisse,
glowed with importance at her adventure with the two Young Misses. Jenny began
to think that perhaps, despite her pessimism and Peter Teverley’s, Emily and
Domenic were right, and the excursion to Teeve would be merely a week’s
pleasure and excitement in the country. Aside from which, there would be no end
to the stories such a week would furnish for the nursery at Winchell. She had
written her aunt to tell of this latest invitation, and had received back a
letter full of praise for Lady Teeve and her family, and counseling that her
Dearest Jenny must not fail to be one of the party.

“I begin to think that we shall come aright after all,” she
murmured to herself.

Some hours later, stiff and chilled to the bone with
traveling, she could not summon up quite the same enthusiasm. She had twice
requested that the driver stop at a posting house to permit them to refresh
themselves, but the man had insisted that his orders were to make no stops.
Jenny tried not to regard this as a sinister omen, and when, finally, the
carriage began the long mile to the main house at Teeve, she was so relieved
and happy to have at last arrived that she abandoned all misgivings at once and
was as ready to be delighted as Emily herself.

They were shown to their rooms by a very superior servant
and told that, when they had refreshed themselves, Lady Teeve would greet them
in the green room below—they had only to ask a maid for the direction. A
fire had been laid in her room and water was poured and steaming in the basin.
Jenny removed her bonnet and set about repairing the ravages of travel to hair,
face, and hands; after a moment she decided to change her dress as well, for
the gown she had worn was hopelessly travel-stained and wrinkled. She chose one
of the new gowns that were Lady Graybarr’s gift—a gray muslin over blue,
trimmed sparingly with blue ribbon and touches of lace. Meeting Emily in the
hall, the two gathered their courage and descended into the green room.

Lady Teeve was certainly awaiting them—with six or
seven other people. The fragile, sweet-appearing old lady, charmingly dressed
as usual, rose to greet her guests and was smoothly, sweetly, and a little
unconvincingly welcoming to Emily. Her welcome to Jenny was just as smooth and
genteel—with a hint of condescension that indicated that she, her
household, and her family were doing a great favor to this poor, plain nobody,
and that proper appreciation of this fact was expected. Then she forgot Jenny
entirely and made a great point of introducing Emily to her other guests.

The portly, red-faced man in the sky-blue, old-fashioned
coat, creaking a little (could he be wearing stays, as the prince was said to
do?) was Lord Teeve. His welcome of both girls—for he made a point of
including Jenny as sincerely as his wife had excluded her—was courtly. He
ignored the look of irritation with which he was favored by his wife. A little
behind him sat a pretty girl, poorly dressed and with a nervous, discontented
look, who was introduced as Miss Mary Quare, companion to Lady Teeve. She
obviously understood the lay of the land, for her greeting to Emily was all
that was charming, while she ignored Jenny with a positive gleam of pleasure.
Lady Teeve went on to say that she knew—and here she tittered slightly—that
there was no need to introduce her son Domenic to Miss Pellering. Dom smiled
and made his bow to both ladies, but said nothing, obviously overpowered by his
mother’s presence. The last three of the party were introduced wholesale as the
Brickerhams: Sir John and his sisters, Joanna and Sarah. Sir John appeared the
picture of a young squire—plump, somnolent, indolent—until he
opened his mouth. His speech was a total contradiction, brisk and cordial. Like
Lord Teeve, he included both women in his smile and acknowledgment. His sisters
were dark, pretty girls in identical dresses, which made it, at first, quite
difficult to tell them apart. The elder, Miss Joanna Brickerham, followed her
hostess’s lead and welcomed Emily but somehow forgot to include Jenny; Miss
Sarah Brickerham smiled tremulously at both newcomers and said nothing.

After assuring her guests that dinner would be served
shortly, Lady Teeve drew Emily aside to speak with her, “for I have had no
chance to become acquainted with this dear child,” she announced to the room at
large. Dom gave his mother a resentful look for preempting his privilege, but a
wise look from his father, and a request from his mother that he show dear Miss
Brickerham (meaning Miss Joanna) the new books that had only arrived that day
from London, kept him silent. For herself, Jenny was content to sit quietly and
observe the others in the room. Lord Teeve had begun an animated conversation
with Sir John about a tenant farmer he was having trouble with, and Miss Quare
tried to interest Miss Sarah Brickerham in comparing embroidery patterns.

When the door opened and Jenny looked up, expecting a
servant announcing dinner, it was Peter Teverley. As their eyes met and he
smiled a smile that resolved the quarrel that had darkened their last meeting,
Jenny felt the familiar, startling jolt in her stomach.

“Peter, my dear, do come and talk with us,” Lady Teeve
commanded from the other end of the room, in a voice that brooked no refusal.
He did, on his way past her chair, stop to offer a few words to Jenny.

“Courage, my Prydd,” he murmured. “Aunt won’t let us talk
together—she thinks we are in league.” He smiled for the general company
and went to join his aunt and Emily.

Jenny pondered this cryptic, ridiculously cheering message
for a few minutes, until a footman appeared to announce that it was, indeed,
time for dinner to be served. Lady Teeve rose, offered her arm to Peter
Teverley, and then requested that Domenic take Emily in. “Teeve, please take
Dear Joanna in to dinner, and Sir John, if you will favor your sister?” She
swept from the room leaving Jenny and Miss Quare to make their own way into the
dining hall. Miss Quare favored Jenny with a particularly disdainful and
unpleasant look but said nothing, bundling her embroidery away and following after
the party.

The dining room was smaller than Jenny had expected for the
size of Teeve, but Sir John Brickerham, seated next to Jenny, explained that
there was still another dining room, considerably larger than this one, used
only for dinners of state. Jenny professed herself suitably impressed, but Sir
John only laughed and told her that she needn’t be. “They rarely use it, you
know, since Teeve don’t care for large gatherings the way Lady Teeve does.”
Grateful for even this small show of friendliness, Jenny smiled at him and then
felt Peter Teverley’s eye fall on her from above her at table.

He needn’t look so dour, she thought. And forgot about it in
her amazement at the size and extravagance of the dinner, which would have
impressed her even in London. “Lady T dined at Carlton House some months back,
and spends her time trying to compete where any sensible mortal would gladly
fall behind,” Sir John whispered, as a baron of beef, pheasant pies, a soufflé
of mushrooms and cheese, a sautéed sole, and peas in sauce béchamel, and
several dishes of vegetables were removed with a leg of venison, currant tarts,
ragout of veal
parisienne
, and potatoes and onions in a casserole. Lady
Teeve, at the head of the table, glowered at Sir John, but whether it was for
his friendliness to Miss Prydd or his derision of her table, Jenny could not
tell. The frown lasted only a moment, for when Sir John resumed a conversation
with Emily, on his left, Lady Teeve appeared satisfied again, and except for an
occasional, timid smile from Sarah Brickerham, and the black looks with which she
was favored by Miss Quare, Jenny finished her meal in undistinguished silence.

Emily, for her part, seated between Domenic and Sir John,
was seeing Dom in a new, slightly unfavorable light. While he had been her
hero, she had overlooked his lack of years and his devotion to herself
(Teverley’s indifference, while more frustrating, was generally more
intriguing) and his occasional lapse into schoolboy cant. But under his mother’s
eye Domenic was a different person altogether: someone’s Son. Emily watched as
Lady Teeve reminded Domenic several times not to spill his wine, or to cut his
fowl into such large pieces; she encouraged him to eat a soufflé of spinach by
promising him that he might have apple tart afterward, and each time she spoke
to him her voice acquired a peculiar, cloying sweetness. No matter to Emily
that Domenic, with masterful forbearance, put up with his mother’s misbehavior
and politely ignored her whenever possible; she saw him reduced to the category
of Boy, one who was instructed as to which vegetables to eat, and who might at
any moment be banished to the schoolroom to learn his manners. Disgusted by
this new aspect of her hero, Emily turned to begin a conversation with Sir
John, who was pleasant enough, and even had a certain wry turn of conversation
that baffled Emily completely, and thus reminded her of Teverley. But every few
minutes her eyes would wander to Teverley as he sat conversing with Joanna
Brickerham.

Sir John, who had taken little notice of Miss Pellering on
her arrival except to note that she was a pretty child and in favor with Lady
Teeve, began to be agreeably surprised by her. Emily, no matter that her eyes
turned every now and again in Teverley’s uninterested direction, kept up a flow
of delightful small talk, interspersed with questions that Sir John had no
chance to answer, and flutterings of her long lashes. He made no comments on
Lady Teeve’s dinner to her, and proposed himself, after a particularly charming
remark, entirely her slave. Emily, who in truth thought him a rather old
gentleman, and fat—although he was three years Teverley’s junior—moved
the conversation on with little thought. She listened to Teverley talk to Miss
Brickerham with half attention, and to Lady Teeve’s honeyed badgering of her
son. The girl’s color was high, her eyes sparkled, and Jenny was afraid, from
these signs, that Emily was growing more and more distraught.

At last, after what seemed like an interminable time, Lady
Teeve rose to lead the ladies into the drawing room to wait for the gentlemen.
Once away from Domenic and Peter Teverley, Emily calmed herself perceptibly,
although Jenny watched her still with some uneasiness. Lady Teeve again drew
the girl aside to ask her questions, in her mellifluous, soft, inexorable
voice; Jenny, seeing there was nothing she could do to help her friend,
conversed with Miss Sarah Brickerham on country life.