Frederica Read online

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said Jessamy, bracing himself.

  ‘You’ve claimed my protection as your guardian, and you must now submit to your guardian’s judgment. Which is that you will henceforth moderate your studies – believe me, they are excessive! – and devote some part of every day to your physical needs. What you want, Jessamy, is not a Pedestrian Curricle, but a horse!’

  Light sprang to Jessamy’s sombre eyes; he exclaimed involuntarily: ‘Oh, if only – !’ He stopped short, and shook his head. ‘I can’t. Not in London! The expense –’

  ‘There will be no expense. You are going to exercise one of my hacks – thereby doing me a favour!’

  ‘R-ride your horses? You – you’d let me – t-trust me?’ stammered Jessamy. ‘Oh, no! I don’t deserve to be rewarded, sir!’

  ‘You are not being rewarded: you are being commanded!’ said Alverstoke. ‘A novel experience for you, young man!’ The glowing eyes lifted to his, the trembling of Jessamy’s lip, touched him. He smiled, and dropped a hand on the boy’s shoulder, gripping it. ‘Pluck up, you gudgeon!’ he said. ‘You haven’t broken even one of the Ten Commandments, you know, so stop trying to turn a molehill into a mountain! If Knapp has finished furbishing up your coat, I’ll drive you home now.’

  Fifteen

  Upon the following morning, the Marquis received a letter from Frederica, thanking him for his kind offices, and expressing her regret that he should have been put to so much trouble on Jessamy’s behalf. He read it appreciatively, knowing very well that its civility hid – or was meant to hide – intense mortification. She acknowledged it, when, two days later, he met her at an assembly. She said, in answer to his quizzing accusation: ‘Oh, no, no, no, not cross, but so deeply mortified! After all my protestations – ! I do most sincerely beg your pardon!’

  ‘Nonsense! What had you to do with it?’

  ‘Oh, everything!’ she sighed. ‘I brought him to London against his wish, and I’ve neglected him for Charis. I ought not to leave him so much to his own devices.’ She thought this over, and added candidly: ‘Not that he would like it if I were to thrust my company on him too frequently. In fact, it would irk him past bearing. He is a – a very solitary person, you know. And that’s my fault too: I expect I should have at least made a push to cure him of that.’

  ‘You would have been wasting your time. I wish you will explain to me why you are making such a heavy matter of a trivial and perfectly understandable episode? He, of course, was bound to do so, at this stage of his career, but why should you?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t!’ she said quickly. ‘If he hadn’t turned to you instead of to me I should have been excessively diverted! But it does vex me that he should have dragged you into the affair. Yes, and although he gets upon his high ropes if I question him, and says it is no concern of mine, but quite his own business, I am persuaded you must have paid for all the damage he did, and that I cannot bear!’

  ‘Nor could he, so I have merely lent him the necessary sum – in return for his promise that he will abate his studies a trifle. Yes, I know you are burning to reimburse me immediately, but that let me tell you, would be a high piece of meddling – and, if I were to allow you to do it, which I shan’t – destructive of the good I rather think I may have achieved.’

  She looked at him, her eyes warm with gratitude. ‘Indeed you have! I was afraid that he would have fallen into dejection, for in general he always does so when he has kicked up a lark, but this time he is more aux anges than in despair. I wish you might have seen him when he rode up to our door on your horse, and called me out to admire its points! So proud and happy! I won’t meddle, but at least let me thank you!’

  ‘No, the subject has begun to bore me. Tell me, instead, who’s the dashing blade with Charis?’

  Her eyes travelled to her sister, who was waltzing with a lively young gentleman, obviously of the first stare of à la modality, and even more obviously bent on fixing his interest with her. ‘Mr Peter Navenby. We met him at Lady Jersey’s party. She told me he no sooner set eyes on Charis than he begged her to present him. There’s nothing unusual in that, of course, but he has become extremely particular in his attentions, and – which I think most significant! – he prevailed upon his mother to pay us a morning visit! I liked her so much! What’s of more consequence is that she liked Charis. I collect, from something she said to me, that her dread is to see him snapped up by some horridly mercenary girl on the catch for a rich husband – which she instantly perceived Charis is not!’ She looked anxiously at his lordship. ‘It would be an eligible match, wouldn’t it?’

  The Marquis, who was surveying Mr Navenby through his quizzing-glass, said: ‘Young Navenby, is he? Oh, a most eligible match! He has all the advantages of birth, and a respectable fortune – prospective, of course, but we must hope his father won’t be long-lived.’

  ‘I don’t hope anything of the sort!’ said Frederica, flushing angrily. ‘An – an abominable thing to say – even for you, my lord!’

  ‘But I thought you were determined to marry Charis to a fortune!’

  ‘I am not, and nor did I ever say so. I wish to see her comfortably established – which is a very different matter to scheming for titles and fortunes! What I do not wish for her is a handsome muttonhead like your cousin, whose fortune is as small as his brain! I shall be very much obliged to you if you will nip that affair in the bud!’

  He looked rather amused, but merely said: ‘You must have been listening to my cousin Lucretia. Let me reassure you! Endymion was not born without a shirt. He inherited quite an easy competence.’

  Conscious of having let her annoyance betray her into a very improper speech, she said stiffly: ‘I shouldn’t have spoken as I did about your cousin. I beg your pardon!’

  ‘Oh, I’ve no objection!’ he replied indifferently. ‘I have really very little interest in Endymion, and not the smallest intention of interfering in his concerns. So you won’t have to be obliged to me. That should at least afford you some consolation.’ He glanced mockingly at her as he spoke, but she had turned her face away, biting her lip. ‘Well? Doesn’t it?’

  ‘No. You made me fly into a miff, and snap your nose off, but I didn’t mean to offend you. I hope I am not so ungrateful!’

  ‘You haven’t offended me, and I don’t want your gratitude,’ he said. Startled by the harsh note in his voice, she looked up at him, doubt and a little dismay in her face. His was inscrutable, but after a moment he smiled, and said, in his usual languid way: ‘Gratitude is another of the things which I find a dead bore.’

  ‘Then you must take care not to give me cause to feel it,’ she replied.

  He had transferred his attention again to Charis, and said abruptly: ‘A budding Tulip, young Navenby. Am I to understand that you have abandoned hope of her milky suitor?’

  ‘Yes, entirely! You were perfectly right: he’s nothing but an air-dreamer! Do but look at him now! – he is seated beside Mrs Porthcawl, watching Charis with the most ridiculous smile on his face! He doesn’t care a rush that she should be dancing with Navenby!’

  ‘True!’ he agreed. The quizzing-glass came into play again, sweeping the room until it found its object. ‘So unlike my muttonheaded cousin!’

  ‘Well, he is muttonheaded!’ she said defiantly.

  ‘I never denied it. I even refrained from retaliating in kind.’

  An irrepressible dimple peeped in her cheek, but she replied with dignity: ‘You mean, I collect, that my sister isn’t – isn’t blue, or – or very clever –’

  ‘You may so phrase it, if you choose. Your sister, Frederica, is a beautiful pea-goose – and well you know it!’

  Since an innate honesty forbade her to refute this charge, all she could think of to say was: ‘The more reason for her to marry a man of sense, and judgment!’

  ‘You may be right. Does that description fit young Navenby? I shouldn’t have thought it, but again you may be right. I know nothing about him, after all, and it never does to j