Mistress of My Fate (43 page)
He turned to me with an incredulous look and then burst into a laugh.
“Why, of course,” he exclaimed. “Any other arrangement would be preposterous.” He then stepped out of my coach, a picture of swagger and confidence, before leaning in to address me through the window. “All the
ton
thinks St. John ridiculous. He keeps you as a miserly shopkeeper might keep his spouse.”
I smirked at this admission, for I was amused to learn what society made of my gaoler, but also because I could scarcely believe what had occurred. The simplicity of the transaction, the ease with which I had arranged an escape to my freedom, seemed remarkable.
Before you judge me too harshly, reader, I ought to explain. There are many among my sex who wish a gentleman to run through every penny at his disposal in purchasing trifles and gifts for them. But this was not my intention in allying myself to Philip Quindell. What I desired from him was not his limitless credit, ten hundred new gowns or a neck hung with jewels, but rather that he should simply unlock my cage.
In truth, by the time I had made my proposition, I had contemplated the matter quite closely. If I were to execute a plan similar to that of Lucy’s former mistress, I recognized that I required a private abode of my own. It was necessary that I had a place, unobserved by my new keeper, where I might prepare for my journey to Paris. It would be to this address that St. John might send my clothing and effects, and from which I might pawn every expensive bottle and petticoat, each unnecessary hat and brooch, till I had accumulated the price of my passage to France. In fact, I figured, the matter might be concluded so quickly that I would hardly be resident at my new lodgings for more than a handful of days before I made my escape.
Apart from the dangers of complete ruin, which were considerable, that which also gave me disquiet was the character of Philip Quindell. Indeed, the man was no better than a capricious puppy and had little by way of intelligence. I recognized immediately that he would require guidance in this scheme. This, I dreaded, for to suggest a plan is one thing, but to see to its successful execution demands courage and skill, and I believed myself sorely lacking in both of these qualities. Nevertheless, I prepared myself.
On the morning following our meeting, I set about composing a series of signs and signals to be used at the card table. I scribbled each down, attempting to make them as simple as possible, for my liberty was to be won or lost upon the ease with which Quindell could commit them to his memory. Each suit was given a gesture: hearts—I placed my hand to my neck or bosom; spades—to either ear; clubs—to my chin; and diamonds—to my lips. The royal cards were each to be signalled with a look: king—up; queen—down; knave—to either side; while the numbers were to be displayed upon my fan. Quindell was to countthe spokes I revealed; one was an ace and so on.
Devising this act of brazen dishonesty distressed me so much that by the time I had committed the strategy to paper and then copied it out for my conspirator, I felt so faint and unwell I was forced to lie upon my
sofa in order to recover. Once I had regained my nerve, I wrote under a separate cover that I wished him to commit the contents to heart and to destroy the incriminating note once he had done so. I then sent Lucy off with the two sealed packets. “Blessed Fortuna,” I prayed as I watched her steal down the road, “do not abandon me just yet.”
Faithful reader, I had no knowledge of when my day of judgement was to arrive. When I dispatched my message to Quindell, this had been left entirely to the Fates. I thought it likely that St. John and I should, within a few weeks, or even a month, happen upon Quindell at an intimate gathering, when a game of cards would then be amicably proposed. In my heart, I knew that chance would fix the date of our meeting. Indeed, this is precisely what came to pass, though not at all in the fashion I might have wished.
In the very week that I set the wheels of my devious design into motion, St. John and I were to attend a ball and supper at Carlton House, which was then the home of our late King George IV, when he was still Prince of Wales. My friends, do remember that this was an age quite different from the present one. Women of my sort were very much in favour with the Prince and his circle; indeed, never will you have seen a greater gathering of libertines and reprobates than was to be found in his gilded rooms. Lord Barrymore and his brothers, Mrs. Mahon’s lascivious Duke of Queensberry, and the stinking Duke of Norfolk, who would sooner bathe in rum punch than water, were all numbered among his closest associates. To be sure, no person who wished to preserve their reputation in respectable circles was to be seen at occasions such as this one. Should you wonder at the tone of the evening, I need only explain that the guest of honour was not to be a foreign head of state or one of the Prince’s royal sisters. No, it was to be the Prince’s jockey, Samuel Chifney, who attended the ball upon Escape, one of His Majesty’s champions. The horse bucked and bridled, soiled a carpet, kicked over a chair and nearly tore Mrs. Farren’s train before being led back to the stables. But here I get ahead of myself.
Suffice to say, although I had been introduced to the Prince before, it had only been in passing, at the opera. Never had I imagined that I should be honoured with an invitation to Carlton House, and from the day of its arrival, lived in great anticipation of the event. I passed a good deal of time deciding on the gown I should wear and how my hair ought to be arranged; whether it should be set into flowing curls or wrapped into a turban, whether I should sport two feathers or simply a large one at the back of my head. Not once did I bother myself by thinking on other matters; such as who else might be present that evening. Why, had I not received a message from Philip Quindell on the day before, I dread to think what might have been the outcome.
“My dear Goddess,” he wrote:
I have reason to believe I shall have the honour of claiming you for my own tomorrow night. Sweet Juno, I count the hours, the very minutes until you are in my arms and freed from that tyrant, who has no right to your charms. Make haste to the card tables! Do not delay! I cover you with a thousand kisses,
Q
Gracious heaven! His words struck me with the force of lightning. It would be tomorrow; the event I both prayed for and dreaded. My head began to spin and I swayed upon my feet. Could it be? thought I, allowing my heart to swell with hope. Was it possible that I should be with my beloved in Paris in a week’s time? But I calmed myself; I steadied my nerve. There was much still that lay between St. John’s house on Park Street and Allenham’s arms in France.
I went to a small porcelain box of toothpowder that I kept upon my dresser, and carefully removed the hidden note containing the code. After I had taken a moment to rehearse the signals in my mind, I threw it upon the fire. I then went in search of an appropriate fan.
The selection of this object required a good deal of careful consideration,
for she would be the tablet upon which my bid for liberty would be written. I riffled through my modest collection. It was essential that she not be too showy. Her design must not be too complex or appealing or I would be likely to draw too much attention. Her spokes must be clearly visible, not painted to fade into the pattern of the silk, or made of perforated ivory, which would be too difficult to make out. I chose from among my menagerie a simple, elegant piece; her handle was of dark japanned wood, set with a few paste jewels. I held her to the light. The outline of her black spokes showed through her pale pink silk, like a lady’s figure through a chemise. I chose her for my accomplice.
And so, dear friends, my treachery was prepared. I went to my bed that night, but had scarcely any rest. St. John lay beside me in a deep swoon, entirely innocent of my designs. Oh, how my head flitted this way and that. I rolled in my bed covers. I recited the code to myself again and again, but still my pulse raced. What if Quindell failed me? Where should I be then? I turned and studied St. John, breathing like a child on his pillow. His long, sharp features did not appear so menacing when held in sleep. Would you cast me out? thought I. Would you have me sent to prison with Quindell for defrauding you at cards? He had it in his heart to be foul, cruel and spiteful. “Oh, would that I should never again have to share your bed,” I sighed at him and then gently shut my eyes. I willed Fortuna to my side. I willed Allenham to me, just as he claimed I had done when I first flew to him at Herberton.
I willed him near to me. I willed myself down a road that ran through many miles of grass. I drew him nearer. I saw him come to me from the distant horizon, a tall figure approaching, hidden beneath a hat. And as the distance between us grew shorter, so did the person before me. With each step, I spied more. I noted that the hat was in fact a cape, and the man was in fact a woman, and before I could pronounce her name she was standing before me, her mouth drawn back in a dog’s snarl.
“I shall sour every joy! I shall blacken every triumph!” she barked. “You will never escape your prison—I shall see to that!”
My eyes sprang wide. Gasping for my breath, I drew myself upright. “Cathy.” I covered my face and moved my head, wishing to free it from her image, hoping to empty my ears of her dreadful curses. “Prison… prison…” I whispered in horror. Was this some prophecy? Now I did truly begin to shiver, for there, wrapped in the gloom of the bed hangings, I ventured to consider this possibility. Carefully, I picked over her words, recalling those hateful sentiments that she shot at me through my nightmares. “You will never keep him,” she had mouthed to me as I lay upon my childbed, Georgie not quite born. I had dismissed that vision as nonsense. At the time, I believed she spoke of Allenham, but now, with hindsight, I saw to whom she referred: my son, who would be taken from my arms.
At that distressing thought I began to weep and, not wishing to wake St. John, I removed myself from the bed. My heart went into a frenzy. My mind bolted from all restraints. I was a child of reason, but to my troubled soul, this presentiment seemed to contain some irrefutable truth.
“Prison.” My hands and feet grew suddenly numb. I could not bear to contemplate it further. I wished to move, to run from these thoughts. I threw open the doors to my dressing room and then to the corridor beyond it.
I cannot say why I longed to look upon my mother’s face, or why it should then offer me some comfort, when in times before it never had. She had been no better than a stranger to me, a sumptuously painted portrait of a favourite mistress, a heavy collar of pearls, a set of sheets upon a bed, a dried block of carmine. And yet I longed for her. I wished that she might calm me.
So I crept into the night-filled parlour, just as I had done weeks before. There, I settled myself upon the sofa, directly beneath her gaze, and allowed the light touch of her smile to fall upon me.
Had I not dreamed of Lady Catherine, had I not entertained her words as a prophecy of my ruin, the night ahead of me would have filled me with sufficient dread, but now I was nearly beside myself with anxiety.
I was not at home to any callers that morning, and locked myself away, having first sent Lucy out for some syrup of motherwort, which I then sipped throughout the day. I ingested a good deal of this cordial, perhaps more than I ought, but the result was a good one for, by the time I was dressed that afternoon, I found myself in possession of a clear head. I would require it, and a vast amount of fortitude, for the evening was to prove a lengthy one.
Would that we could have repaired directly to Carlton House, but that was not to be the order of events. The ball would not begin until after the theatres closed, and we, like the Prince and his beloved Mrs. Fitzherbert, were to attend a performance of
The Haunted Tower
that night. I feared that my nerve would not withstand the hours of anticipation, and that I would betray myself to St. John. Indeed, I scarcely spoke to or looked upon him that entire afternoon, but he had grown so accustomed to my reproachful silences that he thought nothing of this.
As I had feared, once we arrived at the theatre the effects of my medicine had begun to wear thin. Slowly, my sense of agitation returned. I shifted in my seat, adjusted the ribbons on my sleeve, and fingered the jewels at my throat, until St. John paid me an exasperated look. At that, I corrected my conduct and surveyed the faces among the audience. It
was then that I noticed the outline of Philip Quindell in a box opposite, peering at me through the darkness. His eyes glowed like those of a wolf in the woods. I squeezed my fan in the palm of my hands. My mouth ran dry.
Barely a bite of dinner had passed my lips that afternoon. My stomach was too full of worry to desire food. The light-headedness I experienced while St. John’s coach conveyed us along Pall Mall to the illuminated windows of Carlton House had as much to do with my lack of nourishment as my nerves. Everyone in my company, including St. John and Sir John Lade, was so soused in drink that they failed to spot my unease. Only Lady Lade poked me with her fan.
“What ails you, chicken?” said she, leaning into my ear. I shook my head and then cast my eyes at St. John who was laughing riotously at Sir John’s impersonation of Lord Derby.
“Him.” She sniffed and nodded, before laying a sympathetic hand upon my shoulder.
The windows of Carlton House blazed like stars through the profiles of the stark winter trees. Indeed, there were few houses in London grand enough to burn so many lights at once. To be sure, it was a remarkable place, and more like an opulent fairy palace than a habitable abode. Its interior was lined with marble, every column touched with gilding, every curl and swirl of plasterwork washed with colour. The elaborate gold stair seemed to twist upward into the heavens. Everywhere, lanterns, candelabra, torchères and chandeliers flamed and danced like sprites, while clocks ticked and looking glasses glittered from each corner. I had been quaking like a jelly until distracted by these splendours. For a brief few moments, I found myself at ease, marvelling at the walls of paintings by Rubens and Van Dyck, and the bronzes, marble busts and precious Chinese jars that towered above my head.
