The Golden Season (29 page)

“For heaven’s sake, Lydia, oblige them so we might have some relative quiet,” Eleanor said.

Lydia did not know why she hesitated. She had been in this situation many times and had always been flattered by the crowd’s attention. But today she was impatient with their demands, hearing in their shouts and bellows not adoration, but insistence, the same sound the mob made at a horse race or an opera house or a theater. She had become a spectator’s sport.

“Lydia, please. They shan’t be quiet until someone in the carriage shows themselves and that shan’t be me.”

Dispiritedly, Lydia pulled back the curtain and drew the hood of her gold domino from her head. The crowd burst into cheers, hooting their approval, and Eleanor leaned forward and flicked back the curtain. “That’s quite enough,” she said.

The carriage passed through the gates and in a short while rolled to a halt, swaying as the tiger jumped from his perch. The boy opened the door and hauled out the stairs, situating himself at the bottom so Eleanor could use his head as a newel post.

“Be careful of your reputation tonight, Lydia,” Eleanor cautioned her before disembarking. “One never knows with whom one is conversing at these affairs. I have already heard tattle that several of the gentlemen’s mistresses will be presenting themselves under the anonymity of masks and veils. Brazen creatures, but I suppose that sort of thing is to be expected when you allow people to pretend to be something they are not.”

“That’s the fun of it,” Emily said, glumly patting her goose. Poor Emily. She tried, but she could not hide her fear that her compulsion would once again overwhelm her.

“And so it begins,” Eleanor murmured, alighting gracefully from the carriage. Emily followed, but Lydia stayed behind in the carriage, reluctant to start the evening, to risk seeing Ned, to know the disappointment of not seeing him.

She watched as Eleanor and Emily entered Spencer House through the wide set of double doors, vacillating. She was being ridiculous, she knew, hiding in the carriage like this. She had never before been a coward. She would not begin now.

She drew her enveloping domino close and stepped out of the carriage, following Robin Hood and Marian up the stairs and into the opulent entrance hall.

Eleanor and Emily were already being greeted by the earl and countess, both wearing identical expressions of fixed and polite interest. She took her place at the end of the line of guests, still wearing the black cloak that covered her costume, her hood still covering her hair. And then she was before them, thanking them and curtsying.

“How good of you to come . . . er, Riding Hood, I assume?” the earl asked without much interest and they were on to the next in the seemingly endless reception line.

She caught up with her companions in one of the anterooms reserved for the ladies’ use, where ranks of liveried servants collected armloads of cloaks and great-coats and mantles, exposing the costumes beneath: all manner of flora, fauna, and famous personages both real and imagined, some wearing masks, as did Lydia, others bare-faced or with feathers and paint applied. Lydia had decided that drama best served her purposes and so refused all offers to take off her domino.

After a quick readjustment of Emily’s goose, the trio followed the chattering crowds out of the antechamber. Few paid much heed to Lydia’s still-cloaked form, being more concerned with last-minute fine-tuning of their own costumes.

They traveled up the grand staircase, its banisters twined with thousands of white roses, petals strewn over the marble steps. At the top, they were once more obliged to stand in line, awaiting their turn to be announced into the ballroom.

Impatiently, Lydia rose on her tiptoes to see inside. Behind her mask, her eyes widened with appreciation. The room had been transformed into a fantastical garden bower. Silk bunting of varying rich green shades draped the walls while paler green gossamer billowed lightly over the open windows leading to the terrace beyond. Long ropes of woven roses, gardenias, and other hothouse flowers hung from the ceiling while the marble columns had been enveloped with mats of mosses, snow-drops, and violets sprouting from the downy growth.

Tables set at irregular distances from one another lined the interior wall, artfully draped with thick green velvet. Centered on the wall was a larger table groaning under a fountain of punch cunningly emptying into a silver-lined creek that coursed amongst the light dishes provided to sustain the guests until dinner. Hundreds of servants transported trays loaded with wineglasses, performing astonishing acts of dexterity to avoid spilling anything on the jostling masked and costumed mob.

People dressed as swans, peacocks, leopards, and deer formed part of an astonishing menagerie of animals while Othellos and Cleopatras, infamous Medicis and red-cloaked cardinals bent their noble heads in conversations with the fantastical and allegorical. The music from an orchestra comprised of rabbits, hedgehogs, and foxes could barely be heard beneath the din of human voices. But amongst them, Lydia could not find one gold head rising above the rest. Relief warred with disappointment and relief won.

On the threshold of the doorway, Eleanor hesitated, eying Lydia.

“Love you though I do,” she said, “I am not yet of an age to willingly let myself be cast in the shade. Go in, my dear. I shall arrive later.”

“But—”

“No ‘buts.’ Emily, what say you and I begin the evening with a game of whist?” Eleanor asked. She and Emily dearly loved their card games. “Lydia does not need us.”

“Indeed, I should be most pleased to accompany you,” Emily said. “But wouldn’t you find the conversation of a friend more convivial?”

“I am currently
with
my friends, Emily,” Eleanor replied.

Emily’s face pinked with pleasure at the compliment.

Eleanor turned to Lydia and her autocratic expression softened. “We will meet you later, Lydia. Go along, my dear. Bring them to their knees.” She paused. “But do
not
let them announce your name. Let them guess a while. Mystery is a powerful stimulant.”

Before Lydia could protest, the hall master’s aide was bending close to ask how she wished to be announced. She told him and by the time she had done so, Eleanor and Emily had left and she was alone.

She heard the hall master announce, “
Princess Aurelia, daughter of King Midas. In Transitus!”
She peeled back her hood and pulled the tie at her throat, her cloak dropping into the unseen hands of a footman as she stepped out of the doorway into the brilliantly lit ballroom.

Those around her grew hushed, their silence spreading like a reverse whisper through the crowd. And then abruptly someone applauded and then another as voices rose in approval and admiration. She curtsied, drawing the moment out.

It was too bad Miss Walter could not be here to witness the reception of her creation, Lydia thought. She well deserved the accolades. The modiste had fashioned her slip of thin gold tissue embroidered with gold lama in a subtle trellis design and the overgown of the sheerest net of fine gold thread. She had cut the bodice in a daringly low vee and edged the décolletage with amber and gold beads, as she had the puffed sleeves of gold gauze.

Lydia’s maid had plaited her hair into a loose coronet at the back of her head, threading the seal-brown locks with thick gold satin ribbons and bright gold wire. Her three-quarters mask was made of thin hammered gold, the shadow it cast on her face disguising the telling color of her eyes. But the most arresting aspect of her costume was not what she did wear, but what she didn’t.

She had eschewed jewelry of any sort, instead liberally dusting her shoulders, neck, arms, and bosom with gold dust so that reflected light glinted with her slightest movement. Rather than white gloves she’d had ones made of thin gold lama so that her hands and forearms looked like solid gold. This coupled with the shimmer of gold dust on her bare flesh gave the pronounced effect of being in the throes of an alchemist transition, already more than half the gold statue Midas’s daughter was to become.

She appreciated the irony, even if no one else could.

She glided into the room, murmurs following her.

“Who is she?”

“Lady Anne Major- Trent, I’ll lay my favorite horse on it.”

“I say Aurelia is Jenny Pickler.”

“Hair’s too light, gown’s too low for a girl who’s just made her bow.”

“Mrs. Dallyworth?”

“Lady Lydia.”

“She’d never hide her eyes. She’s too famous for ’em.”

“ ’ Spose you’re right.”

“
Who is she
?”

Why . . . she hadn’t been recognized.

The realization washed over her like cold, clear water, unexpected and bracing. No one knew her. No one had any expectations of her. The notion was intriguing. Even stimulating . . .

She had no obligations, no role to play other than one she scripted for herself. She could be mute or musical, a tartar or a tart, stiff- rumped or loose in the haft or anything in between. She could greet strangers as old friends and ignore those that only duty made it necessary to acknowledge and no one would take offense, because no one would know unless she chose to tell them.

A sense of liberation flooded her, alien and intoxicating. A titled lady by whom she had sat at a dinner last week approached, her smile growing uncertain and then fading as she abruptly shifted direction, deciding she did not know “Aurelia.” A genial- looking gentleman bowed as she moved past and she heard herself saying in a husky voice, “Mr. Borton! How fares your sister?”

“Very well, Miss, er, Lady, er . . .” He colored up.

“Aurelia will do, Mr. Borton.”

How titillating. Wickedly so, perhaps, but delightful nonetheless. No wonder so many mishaps and scandals occurred during masquerade balls. She had been to masquerades before, but she had never before masked her identity and so had never known the heady license provided by going incognito. It sent a shiver of thrill, even fear, through her. What might she discover in this guise, what she might say half-soused with social immunity?

What might she do?

She threaded her way through the throng. Outside it might be dark and damp, but in here all was brilliance and warmth. The chandeliers overhead blazed, the air was heated by hundreds of bodies. On the dance floor a quadrille was finishing, an opiate spectacle of feather, color, sparkle, and shine, headdresses and wings and crowns glinting and whirling as those around the dancers applauded and shouted encouragement, laughing raucously as Harlequin’s greasepaint dissolved in his sweat and Cleopatra’s asp headdress drooped in the swelter.

She spied Childe Smyth, an elegant Mephistopheles in scarlet and black, and was about to make her way to his side when a footman appeared and presented him with an envelope. He flicked it open and read, his insouciant expression tightening. Then he balled the note up in his fist and left the room, clearly in a hurry.

She wondered what news had caused him to leave so abruptly, but in a way she was glad he was gone. If she’d joined him, her identity would have been revealed and she had not yet started to have her fun.

Of course, she intended to reveal herself eventually. That was, after all, the
raison d’être
for this enormously expensive costume, to draw attention to herself, to be seen, to be admired, to be desired. But for a short while, she could afford the unknown luxury of anonymity.

She danced half a dozen times, including a waltz with a Spanish grandee and a cotillion with an Eastern fakir, both of whom she knew, neither of whom guessed her identity. By the time the fakir had returned her to the side of the room, the scent of perfume and glue and paint, the press of bodies and the roar of voices and music had become overwhelming. Overheated and breathless, she left the dance floor, ducking behind the gossamer drapes through the massive French doors that led to the courtyard behind.

Outside, torches encircled part of the courtyard where a few footmen stood sentry. Beyond, the gardens stretched into darkness. Lydia looked around, breathing deeply of the cool, moist air. Others had sought relief here, too, in pairs and groups, and while she longed to take off her mask and let the air cool her face, she was still loath to give up her anonymity. She avoided the other revelers, slipping amongst the shadows between the pools of light cast by the torches and disappearing into the gardens beyond. There, with a sigh, she pulled the mask up and lifted her face to the cold night air.

“Princess Aurelia,” a deep masculine voice murmured from behind her ear.

With a start, she dropped her mask back into place and spun around. A tall figure stood before her dressed entirely in black: his coat, skin-tight pantaloons, tall shining Hessians, even the lace on the cuffs of his shirt and the shirt itself. A black tricorn covered his head and he wore a black bauta mask in the Venetian style that left the lower half of his face exposed, revealing a square jaw and a firm chin marked with a cleft.

Ned
.

A shiver raced through Lydia, part trepidation, but more attraction to the seductive aura of danger surrounding him. Would he know her?

“I do not believe we have been introduced, sir,” she said in a husky whisper.

“No? Perhaps not,” he said, stepping back, sweeping his hat from his head, and making an elegant leg. His bright gold hair gleamed in the chance light. “I am Night.”

She tilted her head. “Night? That is all? Nothing more?”

“What more would you have?”

“
Lord
Night?
Prince
Night?
Sir
Night?” she suggested.

He shook his head. “It grieves me to disappoint you, Princess, but alas, I have no title. I am simply as you see me.”

Had
he recognized her? Did his words have another context? “Did I say I was disappointed? I am not.”