The Second Mrs Darcy (27 page)

“I have no desire to be fleeced by Portal,” he said easily. “It is always the same with him, he cannot help but win.”

“What are you looking at?”

“This sketchbook. My apologies, Mrs. Darcy, for I realise it is yours, and I should not go peeking and prying without your consent.”

“Oh, look as much as you like,” said Octavia cheerfully, and then let out a groan as Mr. Portal won more of her fish. “There are no secrets in it.”

“Charming drawings, however,” said Lord Rutherford politely. “That is how I knew it must be yours, all these scenes of Indian life are quite fascinating.” He took the book over to the table where she was sitting with the others and found the page that had caught his attention. “You have drawn a portrait here, who is this man?”

Octavia glanced at him, and the smile faded from her face. “Oh,” she said wryly. “That is my nemesis, that is a likeness of Lieutenant Gresham.”

“Is it indeed? You interest me strangely.”

“Do you know him?”

“I do not.”

The next day Lady Sophronia was dismayed to learn, when she came down to breakfast, that Lord Rutherford was not in the house, that he had left at first light to drive to London.

“Are you sure?” she said to the footman who imparted this news.

“He ordered his curricle, my lady, and I heard him say to his groom as how he was going to town. He set off at a cracking pace,” he added, with a gleam of enthusiasm, swiftly suppressed as he saw the look in her ladyship's eye.

“Did he leave word as to when he will be back?” she said.

“I don't believe so, my lady, but I will make enquiries if you wish.”

“It is too bad,” Lady Sophronia said to Lady Susan. “Here we are, only three days until the performance, and our Orsino has done a flit.”

“I expect he will be back this evening, it will be some matter of business, I dare say. Let Octavia stand in for him, she knows his part inside out, we can manage perfectly well without him.”

The rehearsal did not go well, however. Charlotte was in a hopeless mood, forgetting her lines, missing her entrances, and seemingly lost in another world. When Lady Sophronia told her, quite sharply for her, to attend, she went pink and hung her pretty head and apologised, but it brought no improvement in her performance. Her mother was indulgent. “She is in love,” she confided to Mrs. Rowan, who wasn't in the play, but who liked to come to the rehearsals.

“That is very nice, who is the fortunate man?” said Mrs. Rowan.

“She has eyes for no one but his lordship, we are in daily expectation of a declaration. Indeed, it seems that he may have gone to town to fetch a ring.”

Satisfaction oozed out of Lady Goulding, but Mrs. Rowan felt uneasy. The word was that Rutherford and Charlotte were to make a match of it; but she had noticed the change that came over Charlotte when Mr. Dance entered a room. Charlotte's face never lit up at the sight of Lord Rutherford; indeed she seemed to take care not to look at him. Which might be bashfulness, but there was no bashfulness in the quick, secretive smiles she exchanged with Mr. Dance when she thought she was unobserved.

“I told her what I suspect,” went on Lady Goulding. “I have told her that she must contrive to be alone with Lord Rutherford when he returns, so that he may ask her. Of course, he should approach Sir Joseph first, but these days the young people are impatient of convention.”

The next morning brought a message from Haye Park, with extraordinary news. Charlotte had eloped, stolen out of the house in the dead of night, and been driven away.

The messenger was followed in short order by Sir Joseph himself, anxiety etched on to his usually rubicund and amiable face. Lady Sophronia greeted him with words of comfort and consolation, which, however, he was too distressed to pay much attention to. She led him firmly to the dining room, ordered coffee, and almost pushed him down on to a chair, and listened to what he had to say about his daughter's disappearance. “I shall summon my brother directly,” she said.

“Lord Rutherford is here?”

“He is. He returned late last night, he was in town for the day. I hear his voice.”

Sir Joseph gave a deep sigh. “It is as I feared. Lady Goulding had some slight hopes that perhaps Charlotte and his lordship— I told her it could be no such thing.”

“Good morning, Sir Joseph,” said Rutherford. “You honour us with an early visit. Is Miss Goulding not with you?”

Sophronia shot him a warning glance. “Here is Sir Joseph come in a great state of worry to see if we have any idea where Charlotte may be. It appears that she has eloped, but the note she left with Sir
Joseph and Lady Goulding isn't clear, and they are not at all sure with whom she has run away.”

“I brought her note,” said Sir Joseph, producing a sorry-looking piece of notepaper. “It was written in haste, I suppose, and”—his voice caught—“I think she was weeping when she wrote it, look how the ink has run.”

“May I read it?” said Lord Rutherford, and took the letter. He ran his eye down the almost illegible words. “Not very coherent,” he said.

“How could she be, she must have known what distress she was causing Lady Goulding and myself, how could she do such a thing?”

“More to the point,” said Rutherford, “who has whisked her off in this unseemly way? But, my dear sir, rather than coming here, would you not be better employed going after your daughter? She cannot have got so far. I assume she will be heading for the border, since she is not of age.”

“I have sent men out along the Great North Road to make enquiries. I am not sure when—that is, Charlotte retired early, saying she had the headache, and indeed, she did not look at all well. Lady Goulding put her head round the door of her bedchamber before we went to bed, that was at about midnight, and she was there then, fast asleep. I have no idea how she woke up, or by what means she contrived to leave the house. Her maid, a stupid creature, just weeps into her apron and declares that she knows nothing, which is probably the truth. I came to Netherfield because this is where Charlotte has spent all her time these last few days. Is it someone here, or has she received some clandestine correspondence at Netherfield? She could not do so at Haye Park, she could not have received any letter without our knowing about it.”

Octavia had come into the dining room halfway through this conversation, and Lady Sophronia drew her aside to fill her in on the events of the night at Haye Park.

Octavia thought for a moment, and then said in a low voice to Lady Sophronia, “Has anyone seen Mr. Dance this morning?”

“I have not, but it is early. Do you think—?”

Octavia nodded. Lady Sophronia at once rang the bell, and told
the footman who answered it to go up to find Mr. Dance and ask him to come to the dining room. “He might be in the library, working, or in his room.”

“Neither of those, my lady,” said the footman. “Mr. Dance seems not to have slept in his room last night; the maid who took up his chocolate this morning found the room empty. She says that Mr. Dance is usually an early riser, but she is sure he didn't sleep there last night. The curtains on the bed were drawn back, and the bed has not been disturbed. And his bags have gone. I should say,” he finished in a burst of importance, “that he's done a flit!”

“Go to the stables, Thomas,” Lord Rutherford said. “Ask if any of the horses are missing.”

Silence reigned in the dining room while Thomas was gone. Lord Rutherford stood by the window, looking out at the thin drizzle that had set in that morning. Lady Sophronia and Octavia brought coffee for Sir Joseph, and pressed food on him. “I am sure you left Haye Park without eating,” Lady Sophronia said.

Thomas came back into the room, big with news. “Just as I got to the stables, my lord, there was the groom from the inn at Meryton coming into the yard, leading the brown hack. He says a gentleman from the house here left the horse there in the early hours of the morning, with the request that it be returned to Netherfield House.”

“The gentleman in question would be Mr. Dance, I suppose?”

“It seems so,” said Thomas. “The groom said the gentleman had arranged to have a chaise waiting in the yard, and he was off the horse and into the chaise directly he reached the inn.”

“Well, there is your answer,” said Lord Rutherford, giving Sir Joseph a sympathetic look. “Miss Goulding has run off with Mr. Quintus Dance.”

Sir Joseph was nearly apoplectic. “Mr. Quintus Dance, who is this Mr. Dance?”

“You will have seen him at the assembly,” said Octavia. “He danced with Charlotte. He is an architect, the architect who is building Lord Rutherford's new house.”

“Architect! An architect! Charlotte has eloped with Mr. Dance
the architect! This is far, far worse— Whatever am I to tell Lady Goulding?”

“Well, if they are apprehended and brought back, then no great harm is done,” said Lord Rutherford. “You may be sure that the story will go no further than the walls of this room; we are not a set of gossips, and I believe we know how to hold our tongues.”

“The shame,” cried Sir Joseph. “The impropriety of it!”

“If you cannot catch the runaway couple, then all I can say to comfort you is that Mr. Dance is a talented young man, of a respectable family, a clergyman's son, and that he has a great future ahead of him. Wealthy he is not, but he may acquire riches through his abilities, which are considerable.”

“After such a scandal as this, who will employ him?” said Sir Joseph. “What an unequal match; how came Charlotte, who was clearly destined for a great marriage, to have sunk so low—” He put his head in his hands, and the others looked at each other. Lord Rutherford shrugged his shoulders.

“It seems that Miss Goulding found my company hard to bear,” he said quietly to his sister.

“Oh, stuff, don't try to pretend you cared tuppence for Charlotte.”

“She has only done what Eliza did all those years ago, fled so as not to marry me.”

“She has done nothing of the kind. You were in love with Eliza, you are not in the least in love with Charlotte. Mr. Dance has done you a great favour, brother, and you know it.”

Octavia was trying to convince Sir Joseph that Mr. Quintus Dance was no fortune hunter, that he and Charlotte were in love, and that he would make her a good husband, if they reached Scotland and found a clergyman who would marry them.

Sir Joseph let out a moan at the mention of a clergyman and marriage, and Lady Sophronia said, somewhat sharply, Octavia thought, that marriage would be the best that could be hoped for, and that the alternative would be far worse.

“No, no, do not upset yourself, sir,” Octavia cried, giving Lady
Sophronia an exasperated look. “Mr. Dance is an honourable man.”

“If he's so honourable,” said Lord Rutherford, who seemed to be in a most cheerful frame of mind, ill suited to Sir Joseph's evident woe, “why did he not approach Sir Joseph and ask for Miss Goulding's hand?”

“Ask me for her hand! When it was the dearest hope of myself and Lady Goulding— I think, Lord Rutherford, we were not indulging in any false fancies when I say— Well, the long and the short of it is, we thought you and Charlotte might make a match of it, that is all.”

“Yes, and so did many other people,” said Lady Sophronia. “You need not reproach yourself with that, Sir Joseph, and let me assure you that Charlotte is likely to be a good deal happier with Quintus Dance than ever she would be with my brother.”

“But the difference, a mere Mrs. Dance, when she might have been a countess,” said Sir Joseph despairingly. “Even if his lordship hadn't proposed, with her beauty and fortune and breeding, she could have married a duke, even!”

“She would have made a beautiful countess,” said Lady Sophronia, “but only consider, would she have been happy? Did she love my brother? I never saw any sign of it, only duty and a willingness to please you. Charlotte does not care for the kind of life Rutherford leads in London; you know that she is shy, and she finds large groups of people intimidating.”

“And I shall have to support them for ever. After this, who will employ Mr. Dance?”

“Well, I shall,” said Lord Rutherford. “His plans for Chauntry are excellent, he is a most gifted architect, I would not dream of replacing him.”

“There, sir,” said Octavia. “With Lord Rutherford's patronage, he will be much in demand, and making a good income.”

“With that and Charlotte's fortune, they may live more than comfortably,” said Lady Sophronia. “Mr. Dance can build a fine house in a good part of town for himself, and Charlotte will be far more content running such a household than she would be at Rutherford
Castle, or in Rutherford's London house, full of arguing politicians and clever, talkative people, and intriguing Whigs!”

“Thank you, Sophronia, for your interesting insights into my life,” said Lord Rutherford.

Octavia was not at all sure, as Sir Joseph took his rather mournful leave, shaking his head and declaring he did not know how he was to break this news to Lady Goulding, that the bracing company of the Rutherfords had been much use to him.

“Could you not have been a little kinder, more sympathetic?” she said to Lady Sophronia.

“Sophronia is more concerned about the play, and how she will manage without a Viola and a Sebastian, than about Sir Joseph's feelings,” said Lord Rutherford.

“Well, they are a silly pair, going off in that dramatic way. I suppose her mama had persuaded him that you were about to propose—were you, Sholto?”

“A pointless question,” said Lord Rutherford, “since it's clear that Charlotte preferred Dance to me. A blow to my self-esteem, but I dare say I shall recover.”

“At least you are too honest to pretend it is a blow to your heart. As to the play, I shall ask one of the young Lucas boys to play Sebastian, they all do theatricals at school, and of course Octavia will have to take the part of Viola.”

Octavia didn't think she had heard aright. “I? I have never acted in my life!”

“Then it's time you began,” said Lord Rutherford. “Sophronia, summon the rest of the cast, I don't care if they're asleep or awake or what they are doing. Mrs. Darcy must have the whole play by heart, but she will need to rehearse the role, there's not a moment to lose.”

There was no asking or inviting her, Octavia told herself, it was simply assumed by both the Rutherfords that she would step into the breach. She did not want in the least to play Viola, the very thought of being up on the stage, in front of an audience, filled her with dismay. She would forget her lines, miss her entrances, make her exits on the wrong side of the stage, stand in the wrong place.

Lord Rutherford was looking amused. “I know what you are feeling, and you are quite wrong to be alarmed.”

“Alarmed? Panic-stricken would be nearer the mark.”

“There is no need to be. You will manage splendidly, you will carry off the part with aplomb, and everyone will be grateful to you. Come, Mrs. Darcy, it would be such a shame to call off the performance at this stage, when we have worked so hard.”

“Surely there is someone else—”

“To take over the prompting? Certainly. I am sure Mrs. Rowan will oblige, I have noticed a stage-struck gleam in her eyes.”

“Someone else to take the part. Perhaps Mrs. Rowan—”

“No, we need a more youthful Viola. You will be splendid,” said Lady Sophronia, coming briskly back into the room after sending directions to her Thespians to assemble in the ballroom. “Now, before we begin, let us go and find you a costume. You can wear breeches, you will not object to breeches.”

“Good,” said Lord Rutherford. “Charlotte in that robe looked more like a lawyer than Viola. And find Mrs. Darcy a more dashing hat than Charlotte had.”

“What if Sir Joseph's men catch up with Charlotte, and she is brought back to Hertfordshire? It may happen, and then she can play Viola,” said Octavia, clutching at a straw.

“In that case, Dance is more of a fool than I take him for,” Lord Rutherford said. “If he hasn't stinted himself, and I believe it is the first rule of an elopement to do things in style, then he will have a coach and four, and they will not be able to catch up with him. And should Charlotte be brought back an unmarried woman, then I am sure the Gouldings will be far too full of reproaches and lectures for her to be spared for a drama which will seem much less exciting than the one she is enacting for herself.”

The breeches which had originally been put out for Charlotte, only to be rejected by Lady Goulding, were brought out once more, and Octavia was thrust behind a screen by Lady Sophronia to try them on.

Octavia had a tussle, trying to hold up the skirts of her morning
dress so that she could pull on the breeches, but she managed it with help from Alice, who had peered round the screen to see how she was getting on and stepped in to assist her. It felt extremely odd to be wearing breeches; Lady Sophronia laughed at her when she said so.

“I know exactly how you feel. I have taken breeches parts, but after a little while you will find you grow perfectly used to them, and will be strutting around in a most masculine style. Those are a good fit. Alice will see to a shirt and jerkin for you, and there are the shoes to be considered. Never mind those for now, the important task of the morning is to have you on stage, going through the play.”