Winsor, Kathleen (137 page)

Planned
in the new style without those courtyards which had evolved from the enclosing
castle-walls, it was a perfectly symmetrical four-and-a-half-storied
cherry-brick building with windows made of several hundred small square glass
panes. It fronted on Pall Mall, which was lined with elm trees, and the gardens
in back were adjacent to St. James's Square—now become merely a sordid
receptacle for refuse, dead cats and dogs,

the
garbage and offal carted from the great houses and dumped there.

Neither
Captain Wynne nor his patron had overlooked any possibility for making the
house the newest and most sumptuous in London. Coloured paint on wood-work was
ho longer the mode, and so instead there were several rooms decorated with
large panels of allegorical figures, mostly from Greek or Roman mythology. The
floors in every important room were parquet, all laid in intricate designs. Glass
chandeliers, looking like great diamond ear-drops, were very uncommon, but
Ravenspur House had several; all others, including the sconces, were of silver.
She had one room panelled in fragrant pale-orange Javanese mahogany. The letter
C, entwined with crowns and cupids, were a recurring motif everywhere—to Amber
that C meant Carlton, as well as Charles.

Anything
she might have forgotten to put in her bedchamber at Whitehall she intended to
have in this one. The gigantic bed—the biggest in all England—was to be covered
with gold brocade and decorated with swags of gold cord and fringe. Each of its
four posters was surmounted by a bouquet of black-and-emerald ostrich-feathers
with a bordering of aigrettes. Every other piece of furniture was to be coated
with gold-leaf and all cushions on chairs and couches were of emerald velvet or
satin. The ceiling was a solid mass of mirrors; the walls had alternating
panels of mirrors and gold brocade; Persian carpets of velvet and
cloth-of-gold, pearl-embroidered, scattered the floor. Furnishings of other
rooms were to be of a similar raucous splendour.

One
hot day late in August Amber was there talking to Captain Wynne and looking at
the house—she wanted to move in soon and had been urging him to hurry the work
on it, while he protested that it could be done only at the cost of inferior
craftsmanship. The summer heat and haze still lay upon London, but fall was
fast coming on; already the willow trees hung in golden strips. And all about
them were the dry and dead leaves, sifting to the ground.

As
Amber talked her attention was distracted by Susanna who ran about, laughing
gleefully as she evaded the clumsy pursuing footsteps and grasping hands of her
nurse. She was five years old now, old enough to wear grown-up dresses, and
Amber clothed her beautifully, from her innumerable silk and taffeta gowns to
each pair of tiny shoes and miniature gloves. Two-year-old Charles Stanhope,
the future Duke of Ravenspur, gave every indication that one day he would be at
least as big as his father and, also like the King, he had a droll precocious
seriousness. His nurse was holding him in her arms and he looked at the house
with as much seeming interest and solemnity as if he realized the role he was
expected one day to play there.

Finally
Amber, in exasperation, stamped her foot and
shouted at Susanna: "Susanna!
Behave yourself, you pestilent little wench—or I'll take a course with
you!"

Susanna
stopped in her tracks, looked slowly around over her shoulder at Amber, and her
lower-lip thrust out stubbornly. Nevertheless she turned about and walked with
a kind of mock demureness back to her nurse, reaching up to slip her small hand
into the woman's palm. Amber pursed her lips and frowned, displeased with her
daughter's naughtiness. But just as she was about to turn away she heard a loud
burst of masculine laughter and swinging about she saw that it was Almsbury,
climbing out of his coach and starting toward her.

"Wait
till she grows up!" he bellowed. "Just wait! She'll lead you a mighty
merry chase about ten years from now, I'll warrant!"

"Oh,
Almsbury!" Amber's own lip stuck out now, in an expression very much like
Susanna's. "Who wants to think about ten years from now!" The older
she got the more she dreaded and feared the encroachment of the years. "I
hope it never comes!"

"But
it will," he assured her complacently. "Everything comes, if you wait
long enough, you know."

"Does
it!" snapped Amber crossly. "I've waited long enough and everything
hasn't come to me!" She turned her back to him and was about to take up
her conversation with Captain Wynne again when something she had seen in his
eyes caused her to turn and look at him. He was grinning at her, obviously very
much pleased with himself.

"Almsbury,"
she said slowly, and all of a sudden her throat felt dry and tight.
"Almsbury—what did you come out here for?"

He
strolled up to stand very close beside her, and his eyes looked down into hers.
"I came, sweetheart, to tell you that they're here. They got in last
night."

She
felt as though she had just been struck across the face, very hard, and for a
paralyzed moment she stood staring at him. She was aware that one of his hands
reached out and took hold of her upper arm, as if to steady her. Then she
looked beyond him, over his shoulder, out to where his crested coach stood
waiting.

"Where
is he?" Her lips formed the words, but she heard no sound.

"He's
home. At my house. His wife is here too, you know."

Swiftly
Amber's eyes came to his. The dazed almost dreamy look was gone from her face and
she looked alert and challenging.

"What
does she look like?"

Almsbury
answered gently, as if afraid of hurting her. "She's very beautiful."

"She
can't be!"

Amber
stood staring down at the wood shavings, the scraps
and piled
bricks that lay all about them. Her sweeping black brows had drawn together and
her face had an expression of almost tragic anxiety.

"She
can't be!" she repeated. Then suddenly she looked back
up at him
again, almost ashamed of herself. She had never been afraid of any woman on
earth. No matter what kind of beauty this Corinna was she had no reason to fear
her. "When—" She remembered that Captain Wynne was still there, just
beside them, and changed the words she had been about to say. "I'm having
a supper tonight. Why don't you come and bring Lord Carlton with you—and his
wife too, if she wants to come?"

"I
think they won't be going abroad for a few days—the voyage was longer than
usual and her Ladyship is tired."

"That's
too bad," said Amber tartly. "And is his Lordship too tired to stir
out of the house too?"

"I
don't think he'd care to go without her."

"Ye
gods!" cried Amber. "I'm sure I never thought Lord Carlton would be
the man to fawn over a wife!"

Almsbury
did not try to argue the point. "They're going to Arlington House Thursday
night—you'll be there, won't you?"

"Of
course. But Thursday—" Again she remembered the presence of Captain Wynne.
"Did he go down to the wharves today?"

"Yes.
But he's got a great deal of business there. I'd advise you to wait till
Thursday—"

Amber
gave him a glare that cut off his sentence in the middle. Then, mocking her, he
gulped a time or two as if in fright, bowed very formally, and turning walked
back to his coach. She watched him go, made a sudden little movement to run
after him and apologize—but did not. His coach had no sooner disappeared from
sight than Amber lost all interest in her house.

"I've
got to go now, Captain Wynne," she said hastily. "We'll talk about
this later. Good-day." And she half ran to get into her own coach,
followed by the nursemaids and the two children. "Drive down Water Lane to
the New Key! And hurry!"

But
he was not there. Her footman went up and down the wharf inquiring; they saw
his ships riding at anchor and were told that he had been there all morning but
had left at dinnertime and not returned. She waited for almost an hour, but the
children were becoming cross and tired and at last she had to go.

Back
at the Palace she immediately wrote him a letter, imploring him to come to her,
but she got no reply until the next morning and then it was merely a hasty
scratched note: "Business makes it impossible for me to wait on you. If
you're at Arlington House Thursday, may I claim the favour of a dance?
Carlton." Amber tore it into bits and flung herself onto the bed to cry.

But
in spite of herself she was forced to take certain practicalities into
consideration.

For
if it was true that Lady Carlton was a beauty then she must somehow contrive to
look more dazzling Thursday night than ever before in her life. They were used
to her at Court now and it had been a long while since her appearance at any
great or small function had aroused the excitement and envy she had been able
to stir up three and a half years ago. If Lady Carlton was even moderately
pretty she would be the object of every stare, the subject of every comment,
whether it were made in praise or derogation. Unless—unless I can wear
something or do something they won't be able to ignore, no matter how they try.

She
spent several hours in a frenzy of worry and indecision and then at last she
sent for Madame Rouvi
ère.
The only possible solution was a new gown, but a gown different from anything
she had ever seen, a gown no one had ever dared to wear.

"I've
got to have something they can't
help
staring at," Amber told her.
"If I have to go in stark naked with my hair on fire."

Madame
Rouvière laughed. "That would be well enough for an entrance—but after a
while they would grow tired and begin to look at the ladies with more on. It
must be something
indiscret
—and yet covering enough to make them try to
see more. Black would be the colour—black tiffany, perhaps—but there must be
something to glitter too—" She went on, talking aloud, sketching out the
dress with her hands while Amber listened in rapt attention and with glowing eyes.

Lady
Carlton! Poor creature—what chance would she have?

For
the next two days Amber did not leave her rooms. From early morning until late
at night they were filled with Madame Rouvière and her little sempstresses, all
of them chattering French and giggling while scissors snipped, deft fingers
stitched and Madame wrung her hands and shrieked hysterically if she discovered
a seam taken in a bit too far or a hem-line uneven by so much as a quarter of
an inch. Amber stood patiently hour after hour while the dress was fitted, and
they literally made it on her. No one was allowed to come in or to see it and
to her great delight all this secrecy set up a froth of rumours.

The
Duchess was going to come as Venus rising from the sea, dressed in a single
sea-shell. She was going to drive a gilt chariot and four full-grown horses up
the front stairs and into the drawing-room. Her gown was to be made of real
pearls which would fall off, a few at a time, until she had on nothing at all.
At least they did not doubt her audacity and their ingenuity gave considerable
credit to hers.

Thursday
they were still at work.

Amber's
hair was washed and dried and polished with silk before the hairdresser went to
work on it. Pumicestone removed every trace of fuzz from her arms and legs. She
slathered her face and neck a dozen times with French cold-creams and brushed
her teeth until her arm ached. She bathed in milk and poured jasmine perfume
into the palms of her hands to
rub on her legs and arms and body. She spent almost
an hour painting her face.

At
six o'clock the gown was done and Madame Rouvière proudly held it up at full
length for all of them to see. Susanna, who had spent the entire day in the
room, jumped and clapped her hands together and ran to kiss the hem. Madame let
out such a screech of horror at this sacrilege that Susanna almost fell over
backward in alarm.

Amber
threw off her dressing-gown and—wearing nothing but black silk stockings held
up by diamond-buckled garters and a pair of high-heeled black shoes—she lifted
her arms over her head so that they could slide it on. The bodice was a
wide-open lace-work of heavy cord sewn with black bugle beads, and it cut down
to a deep point. There was a long narrow sheath-like skirt, completely covered
with beads, that looked like something black and wet and shiny pouring over her
hips and legs and trailing away in back. Sheer black tiffany made great puffed
sleeves and an over-skirt which draped up at the sides and floated down over
the train like a black mist.