Cotillion Read online

  Sustaining two set-downs from Miss Charing, who twice found excuses for refusing invitations to drive out with him in the curricle drawn by his famous chestnuts, Mr Westruther sent her, by the hand of his groom, a ravishing fan of ivory, pierced, gilded, and painted with delicate medallions by the hand of Angelica Kauffman. Accompanying this gift, was a letter so adroitly phrased that Kitty knew not how to refuse the fan. It was the betrothal-present, Mr Westruther wrote, of her oldest friend, who dared to subscribe himself by affection, if not by blood, her ever-loving cousin, Jack.

  ‘Well!’ exclaimed Meg, not quite pleased. ‘I am sure he has never given me anything one half as pretty! He must certainly have had a run of luck! The most expensive trifle, my dear Kitty!’

  Pressing her hands to her hot cheeks, Kitty said: ‘I must not accept such a valuable gift!’

  ‘Good gracious, why should you not? You can scarcely refuse it, my love! Quite unexceptionable, I assure you! “Your ever-loving cousin”—! Very prettily phrased, upon my word!’

  So when Mr Westruther renewed his invitation to his cousin-by-affection to drive with him to Richmond Park, to see the primroses there, bursting into pale flower under the shade of immemorial trees, it seemed to Miss Charing that she could only accept, with becoming pleasure. The luck favoured Mr Westruther; the appointed day was one of bright sunshine. It encouraged Miss Charing to wear a Villager-hat of satin straw, with flowers at one side, and an apple-green ribbon passed beneath her chin, and tied in a skittish bow under her ear; and to carry a frivolous parasol, bestowed upon her by Meg. Mr Westruther found himself thinking, as he handed her into his curricle, that her appearance was such as must satisfy the most exacting of men.

  It was his custom to drive abroad with a diminutive Tiger perched up behind him, but on this occasion he had dispensed with the services of this youth. He told Kitty, with the flicker of a smile, that such chaperonage could not be thought necessary for such near relations (by affection) as themselves. She agreed to it, but warily. Yet not the most querulous critic could have called in question Mr Westruther’s conduct from start to finish of this expedition. He was the big cousin who had enchanted her childish fancy; he might laugh at her, but he refrained from laughing at Freddy; if he never once referred to her engagement, at least he gave no sign of disbelieving it. Only at the end of an afternoon for which Kitty thanked him with real gratitude did he lower the mask for an instant. The laugh sprang to his eyes; he looked down into her face for a moment, lightly pinched her chin, and said, the words a caress: ‘Foolish, doubting, little Kitty! There, in with you, my child! I cannot leave my horses to go with you!’

  The colour rushed up under his careless fingers; she glanced fleetingly into his face, lowered her eyes again, and with a stammered: ‘Th-thank you! It was very agreeable!’ ran up the steps, and into the house. He drove away, very well satisfied; thinking, too, that the country cousin was unfurling new and charming petals.

  He let two days pass, and then called one morning in Berkeley Square to invite both ladies to go with him to Sadler’s Wells on the following evening, so that Kitty might see the great Grimaldi in a revival of his very successful pantomime, Mother Goose. Though Meg might cry out against so unsophisticated an entertainment, Mr Westruther knew Kitty well enough to be sure that she would revel in it. Had it been possible, he would unhesitatingly have taken her to Astley’s Amphitheatre, and would himself have derived a good deal of amusement, he thought, from watching her awe and delight at Grand Spectacles, and Equestrian Displays. But the Amphitheatre, like its rival, the Royal Circus, never opened until Easter Monday, by which time, Mr Westruther trusted, Kitty would have returned to Arnside.

  Meg’s butler, admitting him into the house, informed him that her ladyship had driven out, but that Miss Charing, though about to take the air with a friend, was in the Small Saloon. He then escorted Mr Westruther to this apartment, and, all unwitting, subjected him to a severe shock. ‘Mr Westruther!’ he announced, and went away, leaving Mr Westruther on the threshold, a little rigid, the lazy smile frozen on his lips.

  There were three people in the room. There was Kitty, in a mulberry bonnet and pelisse, engaged in working her fingers into a pair of new gloves; there was Freddy, standing with his back to the fire; and there was Miss Broughty, radiant in pale blue merino, with swansdown trimming, and a swansdown muff.

  It was only for an instant that Mr Westruther was shocked into immobility. Before Kitty, turning to greet him, had time to observe his stupefaction, he had recovered himself, and had moved forward, saying with perfect sangfroid: ‘I collect that I have not chosen my moment well: you are going out! Never mind! My errand is soon discharged.’

  ‘Yes, Miss Broughty is so kind as to give me her company,’ she replied, shaking hands with him. ‘We mean to walk in the Park, and see how the daffodils and the crocuses come on. Olivia, pray allow me to introduce Mr Westruther to you!’

  ‘Unnecessary,’ he said coolly, advancing towards Olivia, and holding out his hand. ‘I already have the honour of being acquainted with Miss Broughty. How do you do?’

  This announcement was productive of only the mildest surprise in Miss Charing; but when she glanced towards her friend she was astonished to see her face suffused with blushes. Miss Broughty looked up, and looked down, stammered something inaudible, and barely permitted Mr Westruther to touch her hand before tucking it away again in her muff. Such conduct, even in a girl unused to society, seemed strange. Kitty wondered if Jack could in some way have offended Olivia. She knew him to be occasionally arrogant; and had just decided that he must have wounded Olivia’s susceptibilities with some slighting look or remark, when she chanced to catch sight of Freddy. The elegant Mr Standen bore all the appearance of one who had been stuffed, his gaze being so glassy, and his face so totally devoid of expression, that one glance in his direction was enough to convince Kitty that she had stumbled upon a mystery he would have been very glad to have kept hidden from her. Only a short time earlier she would certainly have demanded an explanation, but her little stay in London had already taught her to command her tongue. Seeming not to notice Olivia’s confusion, she said: ‘And what is your errand, Jack?’

  It was soon disclosed; she could not answer for Meg’s willingness to go to Sadler’s Wells, but she said that for herself she would be all happiness to accept. She then shook hands with both gentlemen, unmistakeably dismissing them, and swept Olivia off for their proposed walk in the Park.

  Alone with Mr Standen, Mr Westruther said sweetly: ‘Would you care to explain to me, my very dear coz, how I come to find that charming ladybird on terms of intimacy with Kitty?’

  ‘Yes, I didn’t fancy you’d like it overmuch,’ replied Freddy. ‘Nothing to do with me. Don’t imagine I introduced her to Kit, do you?’

  ‘The notion, I own, had presented itself to me,’ said Mr Westruther.

  ‘Well, I didn’t,’ said Freddy. ‘Dashed bacon-brained notion to take into your cockloft! For one thing, not acquainted with the girl myself; for another, not the sort of girl I would introduce to Kit.’ He thought this over for a moment, and then said scrupulously; ‘What I mean is, won’t be, if she pays any heed to the lures you’ve been throwing out to her this age past! Looked to me as though she well might. Pretty little bit of muslin, but hen-witted.’

  ‘I thank you!’ Mr Westruther said sardonically. ‘If not to you, Freddy, to whom are my thanks due for this clever touch?’ He perceived that he had bewildered his cousin, and added impatiently: ‘Well? Who made Kitty known to the girl her perfidious cousin Jack has made the object of his attentions?’

  ‘Don’t think anyone did,’ replied Freddy. ‘Met her by chance. Know what I think? Good thing if you was to take a damper! Not engaged to Kit, coz!’

  Those very blue eyes glinted at him. ‘I might make the obvious retort, Freddy, but I won’t!’

  The two ladies in question, meanwhile, were treading