Cotillion Read online

  ‘My dear Kitty, why did you not tell me so?’ said Mr Westruther, quite shocked. ‘Had I had the least suspicion of this very natural desire—! But it is not too late, I believe, to rectify my omissions! I have reason to think that one of your French relations is even now in London. Let me assure you that I shall lose no time in bringing him to visit you! You will like him excessively—a man of the first rank and character, I am persuaded! Dearest Meg, I must tear myself away from you—positively I must! Past ten o’clock, and I pledged to present myself at the Rockcliffes’ not an instant later than half-past nine! I must obviously make haste, or I shall be guilty of unpunctuality. I kiss your hands, my charmer, and Kitty’s cheek. Oh, you have no occasion to blush, absurd child! Recollect that I was your first love—in your nursery-days, of course, so Freddy must not take umbrage!’

  Her colour was indeed heightened, but she said, stammering a little: ‘Yes, indeed you w-were, but Freddy won’t take umbrage at that, for you are precisely a schoolgirl’s notion of what a romantic hero should be, Jack!’

  The laughter was back in his yes. ‘A doubler!’ he said.

  Her own gaze fell; she said hurriedly: ‘But tell me! Who is this relation of mine, pray?’

  ‘The Chevalier d’Evron. Rely upon me to make him known to you!’

  A friendly nod to Freddy, and he was gone. Kitty said doubtfully: ‘Who can it be? I never heard of such a person, you know!’

  ‘If you ask me,’ said Freddy, in a mood of dark scepticism, ‘it’s a hum! Playing off his tricks, that’s what I thought!’

  ‘Why, whatever can you mean?’ cried Meg. ‘He said the Chevalier was a man of the first rank and character!’

  ‘Heard him,’ replied Freddy. ‘Might not have thought it was a bubble, if he hadn’t said that. Dashed smoky, that’s what it is! I know Jack! If this Chevalier of his is one of Kit’s relations, willing to lay you a monkey he turns out to be a dirty dish!’ He saw that he had alarmed and slightly offended Miss Charing, and added kindly: ‘No need to take a pet! Very likely thing to happen! Everyone has ’em in the family. We have. Well, you ask Meg if it ain’t so!’

  ‘Yes, very true!’ corroborated his sister. ‘And they always arrive, without the least warning, to spend a long visit just when one is giving a ton party!’

  ‘Under a cloud, and telling you there’s an execution in the house,’ nodded Freddy.

  ‘Oh, you are thinking of Alfred Standen, and poor Papa having to pay all his debts! But what is much worse, Freddy, is people like Cousin Maria, really delighting in being shabby-genteel! But there is not the least reason to suppose that the Chevalier is not perfectly respectable!’

  ‘Lay you a monkey he ain’t,’ replied Freddy obstinately.

  Neither lady accepted the wager, which, in the event, was a fortunate circumstance for him. Nothing was seen in Berkeley Square of Mr Westruther during the succeeding two days, a defection on his part which would have troubled Miss Charing much more had she not been so sunk in dissipation as scarcely to notice it. Lady Buckhaven might say that London in March was as dull as could be, but in Miss Charing’s eyes all was wonderful, from Carlton House to an itinerant vendor of hot pies. She was determined to see all the sights, and to Mr Standen fell the task of escorting her on an extensive and exhausting tour of the town. His dismay at learning what was expected of him held him speechless for a full minute, a space of time occupied by Miss Charing in reciting a list of the historic edifices she wished to see, which made his eyes start from his head with horror. He managed to utter an inarticulate protest which made her pause and look enquiringly at him. ‘No, dash it, Kit!’ he said. ‘You can’t think I’m going to totter all over London looking at a lot of buildings I don’t want to see! Very happy to take you driving in the Park, but that’s coming it too strong, my dear girl!’

  Her face fell. ‘Meg thought you would take me,’ she faltered. ‘She says there can be no objection.’

  ‘Oh, she does, does she?’ said Freddy, justly incensed. ‘Well, if that’s what she thinks why don’t she take you herself? Tell me that!’

  ‘But, Freddy, indeed, I think she should not, in her situation! Might she not find it too fatiguing?’

  ‘I should rather think she would! Anyone would!’ said Freddy. ‘For the lord’s sake, Kit, don’t make such a goose of yourself! You’d be knocked into horse-nails!’

  ‘No, no, I am persuaded I should not!’

  ‘Well, I should!’ said Freddy bluntly. ‘Besides, I don’t know anything about these curst places you want to see! Couldn’t tell you anything about ’em!’

  ‘Oh, but that need not signify! Look, I purchased this book in Hatchard’s shop this morning, and it tells one everything! It is called The Picture of London, and it says here that it is a correct guide to all the Curiosities, Amusements, Exhibitions, Public Establishments, and Remarkable Objects in and near London, made for the use of Strangers, Foreigners, and all Persons who are not intimately acquainted with the Metropolis!’

  Freddy regarded the fat little volume with an eye of fascinated abhorrence. ‘Kit!’ he ejaculated. ‘No, really, Kit! Not yourself! Can’t be! Nice pair of flats we should look, going all over town with a dashed guide book!’

  She looked wistfully at him. ‘Would you dislike it so very much? I won’t tease you—only I have longed all my life to see St Paul’s, and Westminster Abbey, and the Waxworks, and the Guildhall, and London Bridge, and the Tower, and perhaps I may never have the opportunity again!’ Her voice broke on an unmistakable sob, but she swallowed resolutely, and laid the guide book aside, saying, with an uncertain smile: ‘I won’t think of it any more, I promise you! I wouldn’t have mentioned it if I had had the least notion it would be disagreeable to you, for indeed, Freddy, I am not unmindful of how deep I am in your debt!’

  ‘Now, my dear girl!’ expostulated Freddy. ‘Kit, for the lord’s sake—! Oh, very well!’

  A radiant face was turned towards him. ‘You will, Freddy!’ Miss Charing cried joyfully. ‘You will take me? Oh, Freddy, how very good you are! I can never be sufficiently obliged to you!’

  So Miss Charing, squired by Mr Standen, and armed with The Picture of London (Price Five Shillings, Bound in Red), set forth on a tour of the Metropolis in Lady Legerwood’s town carriage, borrowed for the occasion by Mr Standen, who doubted his ability to discover the locality of the various places of interest his betrothed was desirous of visiting, and so, with rare acumen, decided to entrust this task to his mother’s coachman rather than to attempt to find the way in his own natty tilbury.

  Their first port of call was naturally Westminster Abbey. Had Mr Standen had his way, it would also have been their last. Fresh as paint, and full of enthusiasm, Miss Charing was determined to miss nothing, even dragging Freddy to the twelve chapels, where an attendant verger took them in charge, and imparted a great deal of information to them in a way that caused Freddy to whisper in Miss Charing’s ear that he couldn’t stand much more of this sort of thing, because it made him feel he was back at Eton. He conducted himself very creditably at Shakespeare’s grave, saying that at all events he knew who he was, and adding a further touch of erudition by telling Kitty an interesting anecdote of having escorted his mother to the theatre once to see Kean in Hamlet, and of having dreamt, during this memorable performance, that he walked smash into a fellow he hadn’t set eyes on for years. ‘And, by Jove, that’s just what I did do, the very next day!’ he said. ‘Not that I wanted to, mind you, but there it was!’ He admitted that he was glad to have seen the Coronation Chair; but the dilapidated effigies in the Henry the Seventh Chapel, in particular the ghoulish countenance of Queen Elizabeth, proved to be his breaking-point. He said that he had never seen such a set of rum touches in his life, and represented to Miss Charing in the strongest terms that another five minutes spent in the chapel would make them both feel as blue as megrim. Miss Charing agreed that the effigies were horr