Rondo Allegro (71 page)

“Clar-issa!”

The thrilling moan on the first syllable once again evoked
arenas and raging lions, but the pettish rise of
issa
made Clarissa think of a shed full of squabbling hens.

The older woman lay back on the cushions, assuming the look
of patient suffering that she had demonstrated before her mirror when her
vexatious brother insisted she must go on this horrid jaunt.

But Clarissa saw only that her aunt’s claim of faintness accorded
a trifle oddly with the rich crimson of her plump cheeks. “Your pardon, Aunt?”

“Oh, Clarissa,” Aunt Sophia moaned.

“I’m sorry, Aunt Sophia. I am looking forward to traveling,
and seeing a little of the world.”

“In
winter
, with
French revolutionaries hiding in every bush? I just pray we do not end up on
the guillotine!”

“I do not believe that the French would use the guillotine against
English ladies.” Clarissa leaned forward earnestly. “Since peace is all but
declared, this is the only opportunity to travel that has come my way, I am
grateful that Papa furnished this opportunity. If you are ill, dear aunt, you could
return home. I really believe that my father’s steward, my maids, and the men
who sail the yacht, will see me safely across the Channel into Holland, and Aunt
Beaumarchais’ hands.”

Aunt Sophia gave a loud, comprehensive sniff, which
effectively expressed her disdain for this host of nominal persons. “I would be
Failing in my Duty if I did not see you safely there.” The capital letters were
clearly enunciated. “No, I do
not
wish to go, but no sacrifice is too large for my family!
I
was taught that a true lady always performs her duty. Just as I
did when my sainted Papa made a match for me with my sainted Latchmore, though
I hardly knew him—had not met him above twice, and that in company.”

Clarissa looked down at her gloved hands. “Yes, aunt.”

Snapping her fan out, Aunt Sophia flapped irritably at her
purple cheeks. “Many a female at your age would feel grateful for any offer,
much less one to be so highly desired.”

Clarissa said, “I would feel grateful if I was wishful to
marry. But I am not.”

“So say you now. But trust me, when you are my age, or even
the age of poor Miss Frease, forced to accept Sir Pericles Denby, and who is to
say that he will be any better on his third marriage? She will be forced to turn
a deaf eye to his . . . his tendencies toward unmarital felicity. There is nothing
humorous in this.”

Clarissa tried to smother her guilty laughter. “I beg your
pardon, aunt. I agree about Sir Pericles, it was just Miss Frease’s unhearing
eyes that—”

Aunt Sophia said impatiently, “I have always sincerely
pitied Olivia Frease, though she is
not
biddable, and indeed has said she never
wished
to be married. But when the old baronet died, there she was, a burden that her
brother’s wife declared they would do well without. So there she was.”

There she was without the means to set up her own
establishment, Clarissa thought. But it would be indelicate to remind her aunt
that this was not her own case; though she did not know precisely the extent of
the fortune she was to inherit, she did know that to mention it would vex Aunt
Sophia, whose widowhood had found her left with nothing..

Aunt Sophia was already vexed. “You are nearly
five-and-twenty, and you do
not
have
the looks of your sweet sisters. It was no mistake that Hetty went off in her
first year last spring, and it shall be the same for Amelia this year. And when
you stand by her, even the immensity of your dowry, which I always told your
Papa the amount of which would only cause you to set yourself up unbecomingly,
and it is just as I foretold…” Aunt Sophia paused, trying in vain to recover
the thread of her discourse. “Well,” she finished with a twitch of her
shoulders. “I have
done
with you. I
believe I’d be better employed trying to compose myself a little before we are
sunk, or attacked by howling Thermidorians.”

“Then I shall remove myself, and permit you to rest in
comfort.”

Clarissa smiled gently on her fuming aunt, and slipped into
the smaller cabin outside the large one. Her maids, waiting there, were sorry
to observe the familiar faint line between their mistress’s brows, but when
Clarissa turned their way, it was with her ready smile.

“Mr. Bede says we’ll sail at once, Miss,” Rosina said.
“Becky has your wrap right here, should you be wishful to take a turn in the
air.” Rosina indicated the deck.

Clarissa smiled gratefully. “That is exactly what I was
about to do, and I didn’t think of a wrap. Thank you.”

In comparison to her four half-sisters’ beauty, no one but
her fondest relatives could find anything to compliment outside of her classic
nose and forehead, and her elegant posture. Her eyes were well spaced, but not
cornflower blue, and as for her hair, her grandmother had stated firmly that
tresses a quiet shade of chestnut were not as
showy
as her sisters’ guinea-colored curls, one of many hints that
her grace did not find Lord Chadwick’s second wife as highly-bred as his first.

Clarissa, very aware that her step-mother’s pedigree was
perfectly respectable, had grown up regarding these matters with a sense of
humor. How else could one regard such absurdities? It was either that or
descend into a fretful and futile temper against the vagaries of fate, as
demonstrated (for instance) by her aunt.

It was also true that Clarissa took little interest in her
own appearance—there were days when she did not glance in the mirror once from
the moment she woke up until she was ready for bed.

It galled Rosina, once her mother’s maid and now hers, that
to keep the peace Clarissa permitted her aunt to have the ordering of her
clothes. The dresses that Aunt Sophia chose were meant to make Clarissa look as
young as her sisters, but the whites and pinks that looked well on the younger girls turned Clarissa sallow,
and aged her unmercifully.

When Clarissa peered into the mirror and noticed how limp
were the short side-curls dangling next to her long face, she sighed and went
out.

Her heart full, Rosina muttered to Becky, the young lady’s
maid in training, “It breaks my heart, it does, to see her head dressed so
ill-suited.”

Becky agreed.
Dressing
mutton for lamb just makes the ewe look the older next or nigh a real lamb
,
Becky’s mother had stated bluntly, as she gave the butter churn a hard wring.

“At least this blue kerseymere looks well, and not a word
could the old tabby gainsay, when the lengths were sent by her grace the
Duchess-grandma herself,” Rosina said with satisfaction to Becky, who—the
perfect assistant—always agreed with her senior.

o0o

Clarissa stood on the deck, watching the last of Folkestone Harbour
vanish. She loved the swell and sinking of the billows, the salty bite of
brine, the ever-changing patterns of the sea in motion. So this was why men
left their warm homes for the sea! She turned around once, looking up in
admiration at the complication of ropes and spars and curving sails. How
glorious!

Mr. Bede, Lord Chadwick’s steward, saw her looking about,
and recognized in his lord’s quiet daughter one who had fallen instantly in
love with the sea. No stranger to this spectacle (Mr. Bede’s brother had run
away from a print shop at fourteen, and was even now a master aboard a tea
wagon on the far side of the world), he pointed out several sights to her and
chatted genially about travels he’d made before the French ruined such jaunts,
until the weather turned foul. As the swell began to increase, he recommended
she step back into the cabin.

Clarissa found her aunt in a stertorous sleep. Grateful for
the respite, she cast aside her bonnet and muff, and picked up the new edition
of Wordsworth’s
Lyrical Ballads
. She
read and dreamed over the poetry until the light began to fade.
How I wish it were possible for a lady to
own and sail a ship
, she thought wistfully.

The sun was setting, and wisps of fog drifted across the
dark grey water, bringing the enclosing gloom of gray sky meeting grey sea even
closer. The prospect of two months of travel cheered her immensely, in spite of
the fact that Aunt Beaumarchais’s letters had made plain her old-fashioned
respect for fathers ordaining suitable marriages for their daughters.

But as the fog thickened and the sun set somewhere behind
them, she tucked herself up more firmly, finally nodding off over the book.

She woke abruptly when she heard a loud cry from somewhere outside
the cabin.

“HO! LIGHTS AHEAD, LIGHTS—”

The shouter was interrupted as the yacht lurched, viciously.
There was a terrible sound of splintering wood and groaning metal. Aunt Sophia woke
screaming. Clarissa, trying to stand, was entangled in blankets and shawls and
lost her balance. As the ship rolled, she pitched forward toward the door, hit
her head on a low bulkhead, and slid into darkness.

______________
We hope you have enjoyed this sample chapter of
Danse de la Folie,
by Sherwood Smith.

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