Daphne (9 page)

Coloured flags hung limply between the trees and a hot-looking band were playing hot-sounding
military
marches.

Then the drums began to beat to arms from every
quarter summoning the reviewers and the reviewed to the field.

The avenues of the park were crowded with elegantly dressed women escorted by their beaux. The crowd was so great that when the Prince of Wales entered the park, it was thought advisable to lock the gates to avoid too much pressure.

Colours stood out very sharply in the close, darkening scene. There were uniforms of every hue. The Honourable and Ancient Artillery Company wore blue with scarlet and gold facings, pipe-clayed belts and black gaiters. The Bloomsbury and Inns of Court Volunteers were dressed in scarlet with yellow facings, white waistcoats and black gaiters. The Volunteer Rifles were clad in green.

Daphne was thrilled by her first sight of the Prince of Wales. To others he might appear gross, but to Daphne every inch of his corpulent form looked royal.

The Volunteers were a useful body. They served as police, and were duly drummed to church on National Fast and Thanksgiving days to represent the national party. The strength of the Volunteers had been at its peak over ten years ago when everyone had dreaded an invasion by Bonaparte.

Although now not so great in number, they were still very popular with the highest to the lowest since every man had a wish to be with the colours, an enthusiasm shared by the Prince Regent who had many times longed to go into action and who had so many times been refused permission. A large warm
drop of rain plopped down on Daphne’s nose and she looked anxiously up at the sky. The clouds were dark purple, so heavy they seemed to lie on top of the trees. Near at hand, the thunder growled.

There was a great blinding flash. Faces stood out white, colours sharp and brilliant, and the blackness swept over the Park as the rain came down with a great torrential burst.

There was no possibility of fleeing from the Park. The gates were locked and the Prince Regent was still reviewing the troops. Mr Garfield took Daphne’s parasol and held it over both their heads. Slowly the glory of the troops began to fade as their splendid uniforms lost all their gloss.

The smoke of a whole campaign could not have more discoloured them. Where the ground was hard, they slipped; where soft, they sank up to the knee. The water ran out of their cuffs as from a spout and filled up their half boots so that they squished and squashed with every step.

Water was beginning to run down the handle of the parasol and drip through the thin silk onto Daphne’s head. Her smart straw bonnet was
becoming
limp, her feet in their yellow silk sandals were beginning to sink into the quagmire that was forming at her feet.

Worse than that, many of their neighbours were beginning to crush in close to try to share some of the parasol and Daphne was rammed up hard against Mr Garfield. It was
indecent
, thought Daphne, that a muslin gown should offer so little protection.
She might as well have been naked. She was conscious of every hard muscle in Mr Garfield’s tall hard body. She tried to inch away from him, but found she could not. She squirmed uncomfortably against him and that seemed to make matters worse.

In despair, she twisted about and found herself bosom to chest with a fat, florid man with a wicked gleam in his eye, and so she wriggled back around again.

‘Better the evil you know …’ murmured Mr Garfield’s voice somewhere above her.

Drowned, sodden and battered, the flower of London society stood stoically while sheets of rain poured down, the thunder bellowed and the
lightning
flashed.

At long last, after two hours, the Prince Regent’s carriage moved off and the gates of the park were unlocked.

Mr Garfield held Daphne back as she tried to make a frenzied dash through the crowd.

‘We are so very wet,’ he said ruefully, throwing away the remains of her parasol, ‘that it will not hurt us to get a little wetter. We will be trampled underfoot by the mob if we try to leave now.’

He led her over to the shelter of a large oak. Daphne dragged her thin gauze stole about her shoulders.

Never before had she been so conscious of her body. Never before had she shown so much of it in public. Her wet dress was clinging to every inch of her form. The straw brim of her hat sagged over her
eyes. She impatiently undid the ribbons and let her hat fall to the ground.

Mr Garfield pulled off his coat and put it about her shoulders. He was smiling down at her in a way that was making her breathless and frightened.

‘Oh, do let us go,’ she said, feeling she could not bear it any longer.

She set off across the quagmire of the Park.

And then, through the pounding rain, she thought she saw the elegant figure of Mr Archer. He was walking towards the gate, carrying a large umbrella.

Sanctuary. Safe Mr Archer. Dull, unimaginative Mr Archer who never frightened her or did all these strange things to her body.

Daphne heard Mr Garfield call out behind her but paid no heed.

She plunged towards the retreating figure of the man with the umbrella. The next minute she had sunk up to her garters in the mud. She floundered to extricate herself. Mr Garfield came up behind her and put a strong arm about her waist to help her. But the emotions roused by the feel of that hard muscled arm under the softness of her bosom made Daphne struggle so wildly and so violently that they both fell over in the mud.

Mr Garfield lay full length on the ground beside Daphne, propped his head up on one hand and surveyed her wide, startled, terrified eyes with amusement.

‘Fair Daphne,’ he said. ‘Only you, out of all the ladies I know, could still appear exquisite when
covered with mud.’ Still laughing, he pulled her into his arms and kissed her, seemingly oblivious of the thundering rain and the muddy ground. For one brief moment all that held her to the world was his lips against hers. And then Daphne became alive to her situation. She had involuntarily wound her arms about his neck. They were both lying in the mud, and a passing lady stared down at them and let out a hysterical giggle.

‘Help me up, Mr Garfield,’ said Daphne icily. ‘I am like to catch my death of cold.’

He got to his feet and pulled her up and then lifted her up into his arms clear of the mud and started to walk off with her towards the gate.

‘Put me down,’ said Daphne weakly.

‘When we reach dry ground.’

‘You should not have kissed me.’

‘The temptation was too great. You should not have fallen in the mud. You looked so deliciously abandoned.’

‘Sir, you must remember I am almost affianced to Mr Archer.’

‘Indeed? Does he kiss you like this … and this … and this …?’

‘Oh, Mr Garfield. You should not. Put me down. Oh, Mr
Garfield
.’

At last he raised his lips from hers and smiled down at her worried, startled face.

‘I shall tell my father,’ whispered Daphne.

‘Who would be delighted.’

‘No, he would not,’ said Daphne regaining her
composure as they reached the gates of the Park and he set her down. ‘He would be most shocked that a gentleman should subject me to … to …’

‘To such an excess of civility.’

‘To such
humiliation
. Such familiarities, sir, should be between married people.’

Mr Garfield looked down at her in surprise. He took her arm and tucked it in his, and led the way along the glistening pavement. He had just realized that he had been guilty of quite dreadful behaviour. Unless he meant to marry her, then he had better apologize and try to convince her he was foxed. If she did tell her father, then the good vicar would soon be appearing with the marriage service in one hand and a gun in the other.

‘I am truly sorry,’ he said abruptly. ‘I did not mean to subject you to such behaviour. I had rather too much wine at luncheon and that combined with the sight of your beauty went to my head. Please forgive me and forget the whole distasteful episode. Come! Smile at me Daphne. I will dance at your wedding to Mr Archer.’

Daphne smiled weakly and mumbled that she forgave him. She felt very depressed and miserable and cold. She wanted to lie down at home in bed and pull the covers over her head and never, ever emerge until it was time to return to Hopeworth. Covered in rivulets of mud though they were, both had now become very chilly and formal.

So he took her home and left her on the step, bowing very stiffly to her before striding off into the rain.

Daphne went slowly into the house.

It was only when she got to her room that she realized she still had his jacket about her shoulders.

The Reverend Charles Armitage was a very
depressed
man. He had had high hopes of Mr Garfield. His wife had told him that a marriage with Daphne was definitely on the cards. And now the dratted man was nowhere to be found.

A week had passed since that day in the Park, the Armitage family had trotted Daphne to every event that off-Season London had to offer, but although Mr Archer seemed to be everywhere, Mr Garfield was not.

Daphne appeared perfectly comfortable with Mr Archer and had returned to her old glass-faced perfection. At long last the vicar remembered his prayer and decided to give Daphne his blessing.

The harvest had been excellent. He was comfortably off. If Mr Archer was what Daphne wanted, then Daphne should have him. Mr Armitage did not like Mr Archer, but, nonetheless, considered him harmless. Perhaps if Squire Radford had been present, he might have advised the vicar to wait until the following year. But the vicar, although mercenary, had always a very guilty conscience about this his main character defect, and letting Daphne marry whom she pleased seemed a splendid way of placating that very terrible God Who sat in the clouds somewhere above the vicar’s head.

There was only a very thin coating of civilization over the vicar’s primitive soul, and so deep down he
believed – when he believed in anything – in a God of wrath who needed burnt offerings and sacrifices: at times the vicar considered Him a very odd God indeed, since He did not seem in the least to appreciate the periodic offering up of various dead foxes.

Accordingly, as a week without Mr Garfield moved into yet another week without any sign of that gentleman, the vicar sent for Daphne and told that very surprised young lady that she might feel free to name the day any time she chose.

Then he sat and watched Daphne’s face, reflecting it had never looked so beautiful or so blank.

Daphne had received a shock. A Mr Archer who was forbidden fruit held all sorts of exciting charms. A Mr Archer who was accepted by the family was another matter. On the other hand, Mr Simon Garfield had kissed and run.

Mr Garfield was insultingly absent. Daphne had heard several
on dits
about Mr Garfield. It seemed he was a confirmed bachelor but that had not stopped ‘several silly misses from quite breaking their hearts over him’. Therefore an engagement to Mr Archer would show that chilly man that he had meant nothing to her. Which was
true
, thought Daphne savagely. On the other hand, if she married Mr Archer then she would never have a Season with all its balls and parties and pretty gowns. She would be an old married woman, sitting in the chimney corner, listening to her husband digress intelligently on the best way to remove wine stains from silk.

Aloud Daphne said, ‘Thank you, Papa. Mama and Annabelle will be quite cast down. They quite pined to see me wed Mr Garfield.’

‘Unlike them to take an interest,’ pointed out the vicar.

‘Well, if you cannot wed someone yourself, the next best thing is to get him in the family,’ said Daphne with rare malice. ‘Mama was so outrageous, I had fears of you calling on Mr Garfield and challenging him to a duel.’

‘What!’ The startled anger on the vicar’s face quickly fled before an enormous grin. ‘Wicked puss. Your mama has never looked at any man with interest in the whole of her born life – and that includes me.’

‘Oh, it had to be seen to be believed,’ said Daphne sweetly, ‘and Annabelle all but came out and begged him to take her to the Park too. Of course, Mama had just tried the same thing, but Annabelle is another matter. She is still young, although some people think twenty-one is fast approaching middle-age, and she has gone off in looks, so to see her making a cake of herself over another man was quite sad.’

Daphne lowered her eyelashes and pleated a fold of her skirt.

The vicar studied his beautiful daughter intently. ‘Never knew you to tell fibs before, Daphne. Annabelle’s in love with that husband of hers. She’s got a new baby …’

‘She dotes on
the baby
.’ Daphne’s better self rose above her unrecognized jealousy and she said
impulsively, ‘Oh, Papa, Annabelle is so very
unhappy
, and Brabington too. Something is badly wrong. Pray go and see her.’

‘I will, I will,’ said the vicar. ‘Hey, you ain’t thanked me.’

‘For what?’

‘For saying you can marry that caper-merchant, Archer.’

‘Why are you so anxious to marry me off if you do not like the gentleman? It’s not as if he is rich.’

‘Women!’ groaned the vicar. ‘Well, if you don’t want him, stop encouraging him.’

‘But I do want him!’

‘Don’t sound like it to me,’ said Mr Armitage, becoming suddenly suspicious. ‘Nothing to do with Garfield, I trust?’

‘Of course not!’

‘There’s a story going round the clubs about the day of the Review. Seems some member of the
ton
was lying in the mud kissing some young miss. You came home covered in mud. Wasn’t you by any chance?’

‘Papa!’

‘No, I thought not.’

The door opened and the butler came in with the post. The vicar idly ruffled through the letters and cards. ‘Here’s one from Minerva.’ He broke open the seal and scanned the contents. ‘Seems she is staying on in Brighton. Deirdre and Harry have taken off for France.
France!
Pah. What’s in France you can’t get in England?’

‘Good cooking and good clothes.’

‘Don’t be impertinent. Let’s see what else she says. Baby Julian is well. Peregrine and James are well. Mmm. Oh, she wonders if you would like to join her for a few days before returning to Hopeworth.’