Bewitched (Bantam Series No. 16) (2 page)

An ordinary member of the Club would as soon have thought of taking a seat on the Woolsack in the House of Lords as of appropriating one of the chairs in the sacred window.

In the previous year, however, Beau Brummel had indulged in an unfortunate and ruinous quarrel with his Patron and friend, the Prince Regent.

Socially that did not ruin him, since the Regent had many enemies, and despite the fact that Beau Brummel was barred from Carlton House Society continued to make much of him.

Financially, however, he was in an appalling state of penury and early one day in 1816 he was forced to flee from London to land in Calais without any resources.

It was inevitable that as the Marquis and Charles Collington walked into the Morning-Room at White’s they should think of Beau Brummel.

A large number of the friends who had been closest to him were in the room and it was almost as if the ghost of him—elegant, audacious and witty—was amongst them.

The Marquis noticed Lord Alvanley, Prince Esterhazy and Lord Worcester, who were all listening to the somewhat pontifical voice of Sir Algernon Gibbon.

When Sir Algernon saw the Marquis his face lit up.

“Come and support me, Ruckley,” he said. “I am having an argument and I am certain you will be in full agreement with my cause.”

“Why should you be sure of that?” the Marquis asked, sauntering towards the group standing round the fire-place.

Sir Algernon Gibbon was, as everyone knew, attempting to take the place of Beau Brummel by setting himself up as an arbiter of fashion and deportment.

He was in fact, well qualified for the position, having excellent taste both in furniture and in clothes. He had also, since Beau Brummel’s downfall, become a close confidant and associate of the Regent.

He had, however, not the sharp perception nor the impertinent self-confidence which had made Beau Brummel so exceptional.

He was inclined to dogmatise and, although he was very knowledgeable on the subjects about which he spoke, his contemporaries were often more inclined to laugh at him rather than accept his dictates.

“What I am saying,” he said to the Marquis now, “is that it is impossible for someone who is ill-bred to disguise such a disadvantage of birth.”

“And I am saying,” Lord Alvanley interposed, “that if in particular a woman is well-educated and well-instructed it would be quite easy for her to pass herself off as a Lady of Quality.”

“She would not convince me,” Sir Algernon said obstinately.

“This all started,” Lord Worcester explained to the Marquis, “because Prince Esterhazy has queried the antecedents of a very pretty little French pigeon who swears she is an aristocratic refugee. She has a family tree—which she shows to her admiring gentlemen friends—which would make the Emperor Charlemagne’s look like a piece of scrap-paper!”

“The whole thing is a complete fake!” Prince Esterhazy exclaimed.

“Of course it is!” Sir Algernon agreed. “And anyone with sensibility or taste is able at a glance to tell the dross from the gold— the fake from the real.”

“What do you think, Ruckley?” Lord Alvanley enquired.

“I agree with you,” the Marquis replied. “I am sure, if the lady in question was astute enough, she could easily convince the average man that she was who she pretended to be. Surely it is only a question of acting?”

“Well, I can tell you one thing,” Sir Algernon said heatedly, “no woman or man would be able to deceive me. I can smell a
parvenu
a mile away!”

“Would you care to bet on it?” Lord Alvanley enquired.

“Of course,” Sir Algernon answered.

“Why not?” Lord Worcester said. “We can all set ourselves to deceive Gibbon and make him eat his words. He is getting too pompous by half!”

Everyone laughed and Sir Algernon took it good-humouredly.

“All right,” he said, “I will accept your bets. In fact I will go further. I will make it worth your while. I will bet you one thousand guineas to a hundred that you will not find a man or woman who can convince me that they are blue-blooded when they are in fact exactly the opposite.”

There was a roar of laughter from the gentlemen standing round him.

“Good for you, Gibbon!” Lord Worcester exclaimed. “I like a man who is prepared to back up his assertions in hard cash. What is more, I can do with some blunt at the moment!”

“Are foreigners barred?” Prince Esterhazy asked.

“No-one is barred,” Sir Algernon declared. “But if you fail to deceive me, Gentlemen, then each failure will cost you fifty guineas! I promise you I shall be well in pocket before the year is out.”

“I am not sure that he is not betting on a certainty,” Captain Collington said in a low voice to the Marquis.

They were both aware that Sir Algernon was very astute, and he had made a fetish of good taste whether it concerned dress, deportment or the furniture which graced his houses.

He was wealthy because his mother had been an heiress, and his family tree, which dated back to Tudor times, was an example of how the great families of England inter-married amongst themselves.

Genealogy was Sir Algernon’s main interest in life and the College of Heralds found him a continual thorn in their flesh as he frequently pointed out to them their mistakes.

Now Sir Algernon asked one of the stewards to bring him the Betting-Book.

Bound in leather and dating from 1743, the first record book having been destroyed in a fire several years earlier, it was an amazing record of the Members’ personal interests.

The bets were entered in a very irregular manner, the writing showing all too clearly that a great number of the wagers had been made after dinner and entered by a hand that found it difficult to write clearly.

“Now how many of you are challenging me?” Sir Algernon enquired.

He sat down on a chair as he spoke and, putting the Betting-Book on a table in front of him, inscribed their names one after the other.

There were finally five—Prince Esterhazy, Lord Alvanley, Lord Worcester, Captain Collington and the Marquis.

“You have a year in which to confront me,” Sir Algernon said. “If you have not been successful by that time in taking a thousand guineas from me, then I will give you all the best dinner that the Club can provide.”

“Do not worry,” the Prince said. “Long before that I shall be carrying your gold away in my pocket!”

“You are wrong,” Lord Alvanley said, “I shall be the first to win because I need the money and therefore cannot wait!”

“Perhaps your luck will change tonight,” the Prince answered, “in which case there will not be so much urgency where you are concerned.”

Lord Alvanley needed luck, as the Prince well knew. His extravagance had ruined him, and he owed a gaming debt of £50,000.

Yet his courage, like his wit, never failed him, and he enjoyed all the year round a fresh apricot tart on his side-table at dinner.

Lord Worcester, son and heir of the Duke of Beaufort had recently spent a fortune he did not possess on a team of greys which he drove with a panache that excited public admiration.

His liaison with the famous Courtesan, Harriette Wilson, when he was still a minor had forced the Duke to offer her the sum of five hundred pounds a year for life.

When the Duke tried to settle her claim with a huge sum Harriette wrote her Memoirs, a
chronique scandaleuse
which set fashionable London in a turmoil.

Prince Esterhazy, on the other hand, was the Austrian Ambassador and a very wealthy man. On State occasions he was known to wear jewels worth eighty thousand pounds.

The gentlemen were joking with each other while Sir Algernon, having carefully recorded the conditions and date of the wager, set the Betting-Book on one side.

Charles Collington picked it up.

“You know,” he said to the Marquis, “anyone reading this book in the future will think that most of the members of White’s were half-witted. Look at this, for instance.”

He pointed to a page on which was inscribed:

“
Ld Lincoln bets Ld Winchelsea One Hundred Guineas to Fifty guineas that the Duchess Dowager of Marlborough does not survive the Duchess Dowager of Cleveland
.”

“I remember reading that entry,” the Marquis said. “It is not as absurd as Lord Eglington’s, who wagered he would find ‘a man who shall kill twenty snipe in three-and-twenty shots’.”

“Where is that?” Charles Collington laughed.

“You will find it on one of the pages,” the Marquis replied. “I once read the book through from cover to cover, and came to the conclusion that the majority of the bets were made either by drunks or lunatics.”

“What about this one?” Charles Collington asked.

Turning the pages, he read aloud:

“
Mr.
Brummel bets Mr. Methuin two hundred guineas to twenty that Bonaparte will arrive in Paris on September 12th, 1812
.”

“At least Brummel collected on that occasion,” the Marquis remarked.

“Poor Brummel, I wish he was here now,” Charles Collington said. “If anyone could give an outsider a setdown it was he.”

“That is true,” the Marquis agreed. “Well, Charles, time is getting on. Shall we proceed to the Opera House?”

To his surprise his friend did not answer. Then after a moment Captain Collington said in a strange voice:

“Look at this, Fabius.”

He passed the book to the Marquis and, following the direction of his finger, the Marquis read:

“
Mr.
Jethro Ruck bets Sir James Copley that he will be in possession of a fortune and a title by the end of the year 1818
.”

The Marquis read it slowly then he turned to look at his friend. “That gives you exactly eight months,” Charles Collington said quietly.

“Do you really think—you cannot believe—” the Marquis began.

“Do not be a fool, Fabius. It is quite obvious. I told you Jethro has been praying for your death, and I am quite certain that tonight he was doing something a little more active than pray!”

“I have a feeling you are right,” the Marquis agreed.

“What are you going to do about it?” Charles Collington enquired.

The Marquis shrugged his shoulders.

“What can I do? I can hardly accuse Jethro of throwing masonry at me from the top of my house unless I have proof.”

“But good Lord, Fabius, you cannot just sit and do nothing! He will get to you sooner or later.”

“That is rather a challenge, is it not?”

“Now do not be turnip-headed about this,” Charles Collington admonished. “I have always detested your cousin, as you well know. I have always known that he is an unmitigated blackguard and it is no surprise to me that he plans to murder you. The only thing is—I could not bear him to be successful.”

“I do not particularly care for the idea myself!” the Marquis said dryly.

“Then do something about it,” Charles Collington said urgently.

“What do you suggest?”

“There must be something!”

“There is,” the Marquis said slowly, but he did not, in spite of his friend’s curiosity, volunteer what that might be.

The following afternoon Lady Walden, at her house near St. Albans in Hertfordshire, was surprised to receive a visitor.

“Fabius!” she exclaimed in surprise when the Marquis was announced. “I thought you never came to the country once you had left it for the London Season.”

“I wanted to see you,” the Marquis replied.

“I am flattered,” Lady Walden smiled, “but as it happens I am leaving here tomorrow, for I do not intend to miss the Duchess of Devonshire’s Ball which takes place on Thursday.”

“I was sure you would be there,” the Marquis said.

“And yet you have come all this way to see me today. I am flattered, Fabius.”

There was, however, surprise in her beautiful eyes as she looked at him.

Eurydice Walden had been the toast of St. James ever since she emerged from the school-room six years earlier.

She was lovely in the manner of the fashionable beauties of the time, with fair hair, blue eyes and an exquisitely curved body which left no-one in any doubt as to her femininity.

She had been feted for her beauty when she had burst almost like a comet on the astonished Social World, but she was at the moment even more desirable because as her beauty had increased with the years so had her assets.

She had married at seventeen the wild, attractive and immensely wealthy Sir Beaugrave Walden.

He had, however, been killed in the last month of the war, leaving an immense fortune to his widow who, a year later on the death of her father, inherited together with other assets ten thousand acres of land which marched with the Marquis’s own Estate.

Eurydice and the Marquis had known each other since they were children, and it had always been understood between their fathers that they should be married and their estates united.