The Scandal of the Season (7 page)

Having declined Lord Petre's invitation to dine, the girls were handed into a carriage back to St. James. By now they were tired, and tired even more of one another, and they welcomed the distractions of the streets in the early afternoon, which saved them from having to talk.

A street crier stopped beside the open window of the carriage. “Twelve pence a peck oysters,” he called, making Teresa jump.

“Buy my four ropes of hard onions!” shouted another, on Arabella's side of the coach.

“Just ignore them,” she instructed Teresa, struggling to draw up the tackle of the window sash, and falling back clumsily on her seat when she could not move it. “Will we never be out of this crush?” she asked, grappling in vain once again with her window. She sat back into her corner, brooding over the meeting with Lord Petre. What could be his business with a person such as Douglass? How curious that he had asked him to dinner—it appeared that they were friends, yet Lord Petre was the infinitely superior man. She pondered the question for a moment longer. The explanation was probably that Lord Petre was bored with his old acquaintance—and bored with himself, just as she had been before Teresa's arrival. With a smile she recalled the long jackboots he had been wearing (how well his legs had looked in them) and the way he swung his sword when he became excited. She had been struck forcibly by the sense of a man in want of adventure.

Teresa interrupted her thoughts. “Lord Petre's hair is very fine, don't you think?” she asked.

Arabella longed to agree with her cousin, to laugh about how handsome he was, to confess how much she wanted to see him again. But she was proud. “He must arrange it each morning at his toilet mirror, like a lady,” she said instead. “Rather vain, I think.”

“But he is exceedingly handsome, Arabella—even you must have noticed that.” Teresa, still smarting from Arabella's slighting her in front of Lord Petre, wanted at least to make her cousin admit that she admired him.

“Lord Petre makes sure that everyone notices that,” Arabella replied coolly. “Strange that he should be so precious about his appearance, when every girl in London must hope to marry him anyway.”

“
Every
girl?” Teresa echoed with a sharp look.

“Well, the ‘every girl' of daily speech—which is to say every girl except oneself,” Arabella answered, and they both fell silent.

When they arrived at the Blounts' house, Teresa hurried out of the coach. But she turned back, fearful that Arabella might exclude her from future expeditions. “Shall I see you at the midnight masque on Tuesday evening?” she asked.

Her cousin smiled. “You certainly will, for my disguise is thin. I shall be the only woman there not attired as a shepherdess.”

“Oh, I daresay there will be enough milkmaids and serving wenches to keep people guessing,” Teresa answered, encouraged to find that Arabella, too, seemed to want the friendship.

“How shall I know
you,
Teresa?” asked Arabella, placing one hand on the carriage door in preparation for closing it.

“I am going as Shakespeare's Viola, when she is disguised as Orsino's page,” Teresa replied. “My sister is to be Orsino himself. We have borrowed some of Alexander's things for it.” In spite of her best efforts to remain indifferent before her cousin, Teresa could not help but allow a little enthusiasm to break through on the subject of their dress. Arabella seemed unmoved by the news.

A
rabella was right, of course. Lord Petre had recognized Molly instantly. There had been a period of intimacy between them—two or three months at most, nearly a year ago—which he looked back upon fondly. In truth, Molly was a common enough wench, a shopgirl willing to lift her skirts for anybody who would pay her. But he had felt a powerful attraction nonetheless. She was handsome, with a strong square jaw and high cheeks that gave her a look of fierceness. And there had been something else—something about the way that she had looked at him when he had first asked her to step into his carriage. She would not be diminished by his rich clothes and grand manners. When he kissed her she had laughed at him, making him feel like a schoolboy making love to a duchess.

It was curious that he should have seen Molly again today of all days. He had not felt the surge of physical attraction for a long time. But he had felt it the moment Arabella Fermor appeared before him in the yard. When Douglass stepped over to hand Arabella the penny for her ginger, Lord Petre had wanted to shove him out of the way.

Relieved, he watched as the girls drove away. He had been so distracted by Douglass; he feared that Arabella would think him a fool. Frowning, he raised a hand to hail a waiting carriage.

“To Pontack's!” he directed, and stepped in. Douglass climbed in behind him, and shut the door with a click.

Douglass had said beforehand that they should take a cab ride after meeting; only in a carriage could they be sure that their conversation would not be overheard. Lord Petre turned to him, expecting to hear news of the plan. He tried to look somber, but in truth it was excitement as much as idealism that coursed through him at this moment. He suspected that the feeling had something to do with seeing Arabella again, but he pushed the thought from his mind.

He opened his mouth to speak, when Douglass spoke across him. “Splendid-looking girl, Arabella Fermor,” he said.

Petre was taken aback; this was not what he had expected. But of course he should have realized by now that Douglass took pleasure in being perverse. Petre recalled the night on which they had first met, only a few weeks ago, but already it seemed like many months. Petre had approached Douglass discreetly, expecting to be led away for a private meeting. Instead Douglass saluted him in the middle of the ballroom, bragging that he had just danced with a countess. It was at the French ambassador's masquerade—the night on which a guest was later murdered. Lord Petre felt a chill as he recalled it. So he and Douglass were not the only people there with a secret. How macabre to think that the murderers had been lurking somewhere in the darkness, waiting to see the priest leaving the ball.

Douglass had explained then that they would meet regularly over the next weeks and months as he received details of the plan. His taunting manner today must mean that intelligence had not yet come. Douglass teased him because he liked to do so, in order to test his mettle.

He did not mind—on the subject of women Lord Petre felt quite sure of himself. “Miss Fermor is the handsomest girl I have yet seen in London,” he answered. “We were companions in childhood—our families were often together—but I have not seen her since my father died.”

“Lucky for you to have renewed the acquaintance, then,” said Douglass, “for I fancy she's ready enough to be your playmate again. And who would not be willing to play any game Miss Fermor devised?” he added. “Only think of a visit to her chamber in the mornings: the nightgown scarcely upon her shoulder, a glimpse of her snowy breast…a hand upon her thigh…”

Lord Petre felt a rush of jealousy. “Enough, Douglass!” he intervened.

“You are coy, my lord!” Douglass exclaimed. “I should not have expected it. Nor, may I venture to add, would Arabella Fermor.”

“On the latter point, Douglass, I think you could not be more mistaken. A woman such as Miss Fermor does not fall prey to gentlemen like me. She has lived long enough in town to know that reputation is the most volatile of stocks; incalculably high at one moment, worth nothing at all at the next. Miss Fermor will not float hers in so tempestuous a market.”

“Spoken like a giddy young lover!” Douglass replied. “I see that you are not likely to be carried away by strength of feeling.”

“As the seventh Baron Petre, I am not rich enough to be carried away by my emotions,” said Lord Petre gravely. He wondered what Arabella's dowry might actually be. Four or five thousand, he guessed, knowing that she had several younger sisters, all of whom would require marriage settlements. As the eldest, Arabella's would be the largest, but if he was right about the Fermor family's fortunes, his mother would never approve such a union.

Douglass had turned to look out the window, but at Lord Petre's remark he turned back sharply. “Not rich enough? What the devil do you mean?”

Lord Petre caught the note of alarm in Douglass's voice. So this idle banter had not been idle after all. Douglass was trying to determine how wealthy he really was. It was a salutary reminder that Douglass was just as much in want of Lord Petre and his money as he was in want of a role in Douglass's plan.

“When I marry, it must be to a woman whose dowry is enough to give importance even to our estates,” he replied with aristocratic assurance. “It is my obligation to the title. I have lived three and twenty years in unstinting luxury—and they have made a slave of me.”

Douglass shook his head with a smile. “Your situation is desperate, my lord. I am heartily sorry for you.”

“I merely point out that I am at liberty only to fall in love with girls like Molly Walker, where there can be no expectation of marriage,” Lord Petre replied. As soon as he spoke he reproached himself. Why had he brought up Molly? It was unchivalrous. He still had a good deal to learn about dealing with a man like Douglass.

“Molly at Fowler's glove shop, you mean?” Douglass retorted. “There is not a gentleman in London who hasn't given his heart to Molly Walker. It is a wonder that there are hours enough in the day for her to accommodate so much heightened feeling. Though I suppose that since none of Molly's devoted sparks will ever try to make her their wife, she will always be at leisure to receive fresh declarations.”

In spite of his awakened caution, Lord Petre could not help but be amused by Douglass's frank way of talking. “Very true,” he answered with a smile. “Poor Molly is at the mercy of many a besotted young gentleman.”

Douglass guffawed. “Would that Arabella Fermor could hear you talk now. I would give a great deal to tell her about this conversation, and bring a glow to that calm smile of hers. Still, it is as they say, my lord: cold smile, warm—”

Lord Petre laughed, and clapped his companion upon the shoulder. “Your company does me good, Douglass,” he said as the horses rattled to a halt, and they were flung forward in the carriage, each putting up a boot to stop himself from falling.

Before they got out of the cab Douglass turned to him, his expression earnest at last. “No news yet, my lord,” he said. “But we watch and wait.”

“Watch and wait,” echoed Lord Petre, and Douglass opened the door to jump down.

The entrance to Pontack's restaurant in Abchurch Lane was crowded with gentlemen like Lord Petre and his companion: well dressed and disposed for enjoyment. Inside the tables were set out in rows down the length of a large paneled room, which reverberated with the sound of plates rattling, silver clinking, and voices raised in merriment.

Lord Petre walked ahead of Douglass toward two seats at the central table. Above the din of talk, chairs scraped as people stood to greet him. There was a general murmur of “Good day, my lord,” followed occasionally by his singling out of an acquaintance. He was pleased that Douglass should witness all of this, and he found himself wishing that Arabella Fermor might have seen it, too.

“I perceive that Richard Steele is sitting on the other side of the room,” he said. “What a clever fellow he is—his
Tatler
was the liveliest thing that I have ever read, and the
Spectator
is said to be even more diverting.”

Douglass, looking idly across the tables, said, “Your man Steele is with a gentleman whose acquaintance I made recently. A young poet, by the name of Alexander Pope.”

Lord Petre was surprised. He had not expected Douglass to be a reader of Steele's literary journals, and was certain that he would not have read Pope's poems. Might Douglass have some particular reason to notice him?

 

This was the first time that Alexander had been to Pontack's, and the first time that he had dined with the great periodical writer Richard Steele. He sat very upright, smiling the wide nodding smile of a person who is thinking of a thousand things beside those which his companion is saying to him. Half the restaurant had risen to greet them as they walked in, pressing forward to congratulate Steele on the first issues of his new paper, the
Spectator.
Alexander wondered briefly whether he should offer to pay for their dinner, decided against it, and was then unsure whether to involve himself in the ordering of their food, or to pretend, absently, that he had no interest in the matter. His eyes darted about the room, which he was certain must be filled with well-known figures. Could that be Robert Harley, Queen Anne's chief minister, sitting across from them? And his companion—he was sure that it was—that it must be—he could not stop himself from exclaiming: “It is Dr. Swift! Dr. Jonathan Swift! Sitting with the chief minister.”

Steele smiled and said, “Yes, yes; they dine together often. Incomprehensible. Swift is my intimate friend—he wrote for the
Tatler.
But Harley, intractable Tory, the worst chief minister we have had. Can't imagine why Swift sits down with him. But perhaps we can get them over here—”

Steele broke off to order their dinner. He chose a selection of dishes that showed his marked preference for meat, richly prepared.

“Your
Pastorals
made something of a success, Pope. I hope that more will soon flow from your pen to take the town by storm,” he said, flapping his napkin about as though in salute to Alexander's adept versification. “If you do, we shall write you up in the
Spectator.
A great many people in London are your supporters; I've heard you spoken of at a dozen supper parties…” but Steele was suddenly distracted, and he said, “Oh—I see that the Earl of Kingston is here, dining with that brute of a fellow Clotworthy Skeffington. Kingston probably hopes to exchange his daughter Lady Mary Pierrepont for Skeffington's fortune. How curious. Self-interest leads men into the oddest actions.” He laughed, forgetting that he had been in the midst of lavish praise for Alexander's writing.

But Alexander did not mind, for at this moment he felt that his stars were in alignment. Here he was in Pontack's restaurant, as the guest of Richard Steele, founding writer of the world's most fashionable periodical. Steele had mentioned Lady Mary Pierrepont, the lady whose portrait had been in Jervas's studio. Everybody seemed to know of her! His curiosity was piqued, but he was prevented from asking about her by the arrival of a larded chicken at the table, in company with another fowl draped amply in a cream sauce. Steele eyed them both excitedly, and then, seizing a leg of the bird nearest to him, embarked upon a new story, while Alexander continued to smile and nod, somewhat nervous of making his own attempt upon the poultry.

Steele was saying, “And you will particularly enjoy this part of the story, Pope, for she said to me—” when he broke off to remark, “Ah! My Lord Petre is here, too, I see.”

Alexander looked up and saw the man from Jervas's portrait walking toward him. Steele was on his feet, saying to Petre, “I am here with my young friend Mr. Pope, who is a poet. Perhaps you have met already, my lord.”

Alexander pulled himself up as straight as he could manage.

Lord Petre began to shake his head, and the words “I fear that—” were forming on his lips, when his expression changed abruptly.

“I
do
believe that I have made your acquaintance after all,” Lord Petre said quickly. His face had a stricken look, which made Alexander wince. He had remembered the day at Ladyholt. “But when I met you then, sir, I did not know you were a poet of country life,” Petre added, smiling graciously, but without at all compromising his air of confident superiority. Alexander saw that he was the master of a situation such as this.

Alexander turned to see Lord Petre's companion, whom until now he had noticed only obliquely. It was James Douglass.

“I, too, have made your acquaintance, Mr. Pope,” Douglass said, and Alexander stared. But Douglass did not seem to mark his surprise. Perhaps he was mistaken about Douglass's identity.

“Do you go to the masquerade tomorrow evening, Mr. Steele?” Petre asked affably. “I hope that you will write about it in the
Spectator,
and make us all famous.”

“I could write about it, my lord, but I would not make you famous,” Steele answered jovially. “Everybody there will be masked, so I cannot say which men and women are present, and which are not.”

“That hardly matters, sir!” Douglass interjected. “We all like to be remembered, even when we are disguised. Are not our true selves but rarely seen, even in ordinary life?”