My Dear Jenny (11 page)

Jenny cast an eye at the growing crowds, then at Lady Teeve,
who remained planted directly in her path.

Finally, with a deadly calm, she spoke between her teeth. “Madam,
since you force me to it, I must reveal myself to you: I am a woman of no
fortune, no beauty, and no youth, with only the blessing of a respectable
family behind me. I
have
no reputation with the
ton
. Indeed, I am
like all of those ciphers who linger on the fringes—the companions and
the governesses. I am sure that were I to vanish at this moment from the face
of the earth, only my cousins in the nursery of my aunt’s home would seriously
miss me. For the friendship I bear Mr. Domenic Teverley, and the affection I
owe to Miss Pellering and her family, I had rather not cause a scene here. But
my friends are waiting me, and I
will
pass.”

Lady Teeve bridled. “You will? I’ll see you in Newgate if
you lay a hand on me, you cheap, lying little—” She raised her stick with
a gesture almost unbelievable in one of her delicate appearance, and seemed to
have every intention of using it, only a hand came from the crowd which grasped
the stick, then the lady’s arm.

“Quite enough, Aunt. I am sure that my uncle would not be
pleased were you to cause a scene here, to say nothing of Domenic and myself.
To which add that there are several of the Royals here tonight, and I doubt
that they would approve of your making a scene with a young lady who has made
plain her determination to quit this quarrel.” He took Jenny’s hand. “May I
take you to your friends, Miss Prydd?”

“Thank you, sir,” Jenny whispered.

Lady Teeve backed away from them as if both man and woman
had the plague, her mouth drawn into a tight, disagreeable knot.

“Come along, then. I’ll rejoin you and Domenic in a moment,
Aunt.” Tucking her hand into his arm, Teverley led Jenny down through the
crowds and to Mrs. Temple’s side. “Good night, Miss Prydd,” he said formally.

“Good night, sir. And thank you,” she whispered.

“You have my word that you will hear no more of this from my
Aunt Teeve. I shall see to that myself. Ladies.” He made a general bow to the
party and took his leave.

Mrs. Temple, unaware of any of this, made speed to the
carriage nonetheless, already thinking of a cup of chocolate and her bed. Emily
and Mirabelle continued to talk, but not with the same giddy abandon as before.
Emily, in fact, seemed somewhat subdued and answered Mirabelle’s comments—mostly
about Domenic Teverley—in monosyllables.

At home at last, Emily and Jenny trudged upstairs side by
side. As was her custom, Jenny walked her friend to the door of her bedroom,
and was about to turn down the hall towards her own, when Emily’s mournful
voice stopped her.

“Jenny, Mirabelle said—Oh, I think she said it more to
be hateful than anything! But she said that she didn’t think Peter Teverley had
any more interest in me than he has in
flying
. Of course, she’s only
jealous because she liked Dom and he paid her hardly any notice,” she admitted
with glum satisfaction. “But I
must
, that is,
he
must ... oh,
Jenny, he has to notice me!”

“I should say that he has given you considerable evidence of
his notice, starting from the moment when he decided we really couldn’t let you
ruin yourself on Ratherscombe,” Jenny said dryly.

“That isn’t what I meant,” Emily insisted. “I expected ... I
want him to—”

“Emily, I am tired.” Jenny, speaking again through clenched
teeth, realized how true this was with every word. “I am probably more tired
even than I think. I suggest that you go to sleep, and perhaps things will seem
brighter to you in the light of day. And you might give a thought, in passing,
to those of us who are not in a position to
want
or to
expect
.
Good night.” And without another word Miss Prydd turned and went toward her own
room.

“Jenny? Oh, Jenny darling, was I unkind? I truly didn’t mean
to be. I’m just a stupid, silly chit, and I say things ... Please forgive me,
love. I’m the most selfish wretch on earth, and—”

“You are forgiven, love,” Jenny said, goaded into good humor
by her own fatigue and Emily’s earnest distress. “But
I
need my rest,
and I think you need yours as well. Shall we talk more in the morning?”

Emily agreed rapidly, a little mawkishly, and at last left
Jenny alone.

Without the luxury of a lady’s maid, Jenny forced herself to
undress, hang away her clothes, and make her ablutions, when all she really
wanted to do was to collapse upon the bed and cry for an hour At last, climbing
into the bed, she tried, despite her busy brain, to sleep. But it was not until
light had begun to show in her window that Jenny, having resigned herself to a
night awake, drifted into an uneasy, heavy slumber, which nothing could
disturb, not even the startling conclusion that she was as much, and as
foolishly, infatuated with Peter Teverley as ever Emily was, and that, just the
same as her friend, there was absolutely nothing she could do about it.

For several days after the incident at the opera, an
unnatural calm reigned in the Graybarr house. Emily did not annoy her family by
fretting aloud over the identity of her mysterious caller, or over Mirabelle
Temple’s disobliging assertions regarding Peter Teverley and herself. Jenny,
for her part, endeavored to be as pleasant as she could, in some way to atone
for what she felt, in the light of day, was her inexcusable conduct toward
Emily. The demeanor, she felt also, might banish from her mind all thoughts of
Peter Teverley. And when Mr. Teverley not only called the next day to see how
the young ladies got on, but was particular in his concern for Miss Prydd, both
ladies’ forbearance and control was equally remarkable. Jenny had not yet
explained to Emily about the scene between herself and Lady Teeve, and as the
days went by she began to think there was no need to do so. Lady Teeve had been
disabused of her notion that Jenny was Miss Pellering, and Peter Teverley had
vowed that they would have no further trouble from that quarter. So why not
simply forget the whole episode?

Unaware of the revolutions that were taking place in the
lives of her child and her guest, Lady Graybarr had only cautioned Emily not to
show too much partiality for a man who had not indicated that his intentions
and interests ran with her own. “After all, dearest, the man looks well enough,
and has made himself a tidy fortune in India, I am told, but I have set my
sights higher than that for you,” Lady Graybarr concluded, certain that an
appeal to her daughter’s self-interest would weigh as much with Emily as it did
with herself. Emily, in fact, saw this lecture as only one more romantic
barrier in True Love’s path, and cherished it in a fashion that Lady Graybarr
would never have credited.

After several days spent in the house due to inclement
weather, Jenny was pleased at commissions from Lady Graybarr and Emily
involving the milliners and the subscription library, and set out in the
afternoon sunshine with a maid to accomplish her tasks. Lady Graybarr, after
making a few attempts to enlist her daughter in a campaign of calls, gave up in
exasperation, wondering what on earth the child was waiting for, and went
herself, leaving Emily alone in the house (with the exception of the house
staff and the second cook’s cousin, who was visiting from Bournemouth). Emily,
in fact, had been anxiously awaiting the return of her mysterious caller, whom,
despite all Jenny’s reasonable suggestions to the contrary, she persisted in
believing must have been Teverley. Lord Graybarr, coming in to closet himself
with his factor and a pile of unpleasant-looking account books, looked in on
his daughter and found her reading a book of travels; had he looked in five
minutes earlier, he might have found her doing needlepoint; ten minutes later,
and she was simply staring into space, bored with both book and needle, So,
when Feabers knocked on the door and asked if Emily was at home to a gentleman,
she was nearly asleep.

“A gentleman?” Emily asked groggily.

“Yes, miss. I think so,” he added after a moment’s consideration.

“It isn’t Mr. Teverley, is it?”

“If I may say so, miss, I know Mr. Teverley upon sight. Both
Mr. Teverleys,” Feabers said aggrievedly. “This gentleman ain’t neither of
them.”

Torn between sleepiness and curiosity, “Ask him for his
card,” Emily suggested.

Feabers left the room with a martial air. Emily wondered if
the stranger would have the temerity to deny the butler’s awesome authority.
Evidently he did not, for a moment later Feabers reappeared with the card on a
tray.

Emily glanced at it curiously. “I don’t know any Arthur
Reagham, do I?” she asked.

“The gentleman asked most specifically for you, miss.”

“Did he?” Emily smiled. “Well, send him in before I die of
curiosity!” Disregarding the butler’s sour expression, Emily tucked a strand of
hair back in its place and unwound her leg from its inappropriate position
beneath her in the chair.

The man Feabers presented to her looked unremarkable enough.
He was dressed in plain, well-cut clothes, his dark hair combed in an
unfashionable style away from his face and severely kept there, she assumed
from his scent, by patchouli pomade. Emily shivered with delectable uneasiness:
Whoever this man was, he had an air of familiarity that was slightly sinister.

“Miss Emily Pellering?” the man wheezed. He had a strange
high-pitched voice that issued from his nose.

“Mr. Reagham?”

“The same, ma’am.” He bowed. Then, for a full minute, each
waited for the other to say something. At last Mr. Reagham, seemingly
overwhelmed by the awkwardness of his situation, began to speak.

“I have been commissioned by one who wishes to meet with you
somewhere away from this house and the prying ears of—ah—your
servants.”

Emily brightened immediately at the scent of intrigue. “Who?”

“Need I say? One who holds you in the greatest esteem and
dearest affection.” Reagham stated. “Of course, I cannot speak his name
here
….”

“Of course not,” Emily agreed eagerly, wondering why not,
and all the while convincing herself that it must be Teverley.
She
was
right, and Jenny and Mamma, and that hateful Mirabelle Temple, were all a
humbug.

“May I continue?” Reagham asked silkily.

“Please do,” Emily nodded graciously.

“This person—ah—gentleman—would like to
have the chance to speak privately with you, and has sent me for the purpose of
arranging a—ah—rendezvous. For no reason that is not strictly
honorable, of course,” Reagham assured her. “He is loath to cause you any
embarrassment, and has cause to believe that his suit for you is not—entirely—ahum—well,
appreciated, perhaps? In certain quarters?”

Absolutely Teverley, Emily concluded.

Reagham paused to gauge the effect of his words on Miss
Pellering. He could not have wished for a better audience: Emily sat on the
edge of her chair, hands clasped before her, her mouth charmingly agape, her
eyes glowing.

“This gentleman has asked that I speak to you, to learn if—ah—you
would be agreeable to a meeting.” As Emily showed no signs of disgust, Reagham
continued. “Would you be able to meet with him, perhaps next Sunday, by the
Serpentine?”

“Sunday? But—” Emily broke in, practicality vying with
romance, for she was engaged to go riding that afternoon.

“Well, perhaps at an early hour, when you may slip from the
house unseen and return the same way before your family has stirred from its—ah—first
sleep?” Reagham paused, and the slightest edge of malice came into his voice. “At
eight o’clock, perhaps?”

Emily swallowed at the thought of this early a rising, for,
left to her own devices, she rarely rose before noon. “I shall do it, of
course!” she declared to Reagham, thinking to herself that if Teverley
preferred early rising she would learn to do so herself. “By the Serpentine at
eight o’clock on Sunday morning next.”

“You have it right, dear lady,” Reagham approved.

Feeling that, much as she was coming to dislike this
messenger, the occasion demanded extraordinary civility, Emily rose and gave
him her hand.

“Pray give my regards to—ah—your friend,” she
begged, unconsciously aping Reagham’s manner.

“
Our
friend.”

With a nod over her hand that stood in stead of another bow,
Reagham ambled toward the doorway. Emily, in unfocused stupor, sank back into
the chair and watched him go. Only when the door had closed behind him did
furor replace stupor: She gave a great whoop and tossed several sofa cushions
high in the air over her head.

“Not particular! Not particular! I’ll show Mamma, and Jenny,
and Dom, and that hateful,
hateful
Mirabelle Temple, what particular is!
Sunday morning in the park!” Sinking again into her chair, this time half
buried under sofa cushions, Emily began to giggle to herself. When Feabers
knocked and entered, wondering what the noise was about, it was all Emily could
do to produce an appearance of sanity as she straightened herself, knocked
aside most of the cushions, and pretended to be immersed in a book that she
held, upside down, before her. While Feabers could find nothing untoward in her
behavior, he nodded his head in a way that indicated he did not for a moment
believe the picture she presented. He returned to the hallway and his brasses.

o0o

Once in the street, Mr. Arthur Reagham walked briskly to the
corner, turned it, walked several streets so quickly one might almost have
supposed him in flight, and turned into a small mews, where another gentleman
awaited him.

“Well?” the second man prodded. “What did the chit say? Was
she alone? Was the dragon there, or her
dear
mamma?”

“No one there but a dried-up manservant who didn’t like my
looks,” Reagham answered sourly.