Arabella Read online

  Mr Beaumaris, who had looked in midway through the evening – in fact, a bare ten minutes before the doors were relentlessly shut against late-comers – apparently for no other purpose than to entertain the wife of the Austrian Ambassador, saw Arabella, and was amused, guessing her emotions correctly. Suddenly he cast one of his quizzical looks at Princess Esterhazy, and said: ‘Shall I ask that chit to dance?’

  She raised her delicate black brows, a faint smile flickering on her lips. ‘Here, my friend, you are not supreme! I think you dare not.’

  ‘I know I dare not,’ said Mr Beaumaris, disarming her promptly. ‘That is why I ask you, Princess, to present me to the lady as a desirable partner.’

  She hesitated, glancing from him to Arabella, and then laughed, and shrugged. ‘Well! She does not put herself forward, after all, and I find her style excellent. Come, then!’

  Arabella, startled to find herself suddenly confronted by one of the most formidable patronesses, rose quickly.

  ‘You do not dance, Miss Tallant. May I present Mr Beaumaris to you as a very desirable partner?’ said the Princess, with a slightly malicious smile cast at Mr Beaumaris.

  Arabella could only curtsy, and blush, and be sorry to find that she was so ill-natured as to be conscious of feelings of ignoble triumph over the ladies who had been kind enough to look pityingly at her.

  Mr Beaumaris led her on to the floor, and encircled her waist with one arm, taking her right hand in a light clasp. Arabella was naturally a good dancer, but she felt extremely nervous, partly because she had never attempted the waltz, except in the Misses Caterham’s old schoolroom, and partly because it was so strange to be held in such close proximity to a man. For several turns she answered Mr Beaumaris very much at random, being preoccupied with her feet. She was so much shorter than he that her head only just reached his shoulder, and since she felt shy she did not look up, but steadfastly regarded the top of his waistcoat. Mr Beaumaris, who was not in the habit of devoting himself to such very young ladies, found this bashfulness amusing, and not unattractive. After he thought she had had time to recover from it a little, he said: ‘It is a nice waistcoat, isn’t it, Miss Tallant?’

  That did make her look up, and quickly too, her face breaking into laughter. She looked so lovely, and her big eyes met his with such a frank, ingenuous expression in them, that he was aware of a stir of something in his heart that was not mere amusement. But he had no intention of going to dangerous lengths with this or any other pretty chit, and he said, in a bantering tone: ‘It is customary, you know, to exchange polite conversation during the dance. I have now addressed no fewer than three unexceptionable remarks to you without winning one answer!’

  ‘You see, I am minding my steps,’ she confided seriously.

  Decidedly this absurd child was a refreshing change from the generality of damsels! Had he been a younger man, he reflected, he might easily have succumbed to her charm. It was fortunate that he was thirty, and no longer to be caught by a pretty face and naïve ways, for he knew well that these would pall on him, and that he wanted something more in the lady whom he would one day marry. He had never yet found just what he was looking for, did not even know what it might prove to be, and was perfectly resigned to his bachelordom.

  ‘It is not at all necessary,’ he said. ‘You dance delightfully. You do not mean to tell me that this is the first time you have waltzed?’

  Miss Tallant certainly did not mean to tell him anything of the sort, and was already regretting her impulsive confidence. ‘Good gracious, no!’ she said. ‘The first time at Almack’s, however.’

  ‘I am happy to think, then, that mine was the honour of first leading you on to the floor. You will certainly be besieged by every man present now it is seen that you have no objection to the waltz.’

  She said nothing, but fell to studying his waistcoat again. He glanced down at her, a hint of mockery in the smile that hovered about his mouth. ‘How does it feel, Miss Tallant, to be the rage of town? Do you enjoy it, or have your northern triumphs given you a distaste for this sort of thing?’

  She raised her eyes, and her chin too. ‘I am afraid, Mr Beaumaris, that you betrayed what I – what I begged you not to speak of!’

  There was a distinctly sardonic look in his eye, but he replied coolly: ‘I assure you, ma’am, I have mentioned your circumstances to one person only: Lord Fleetwood.’

  ‘Then it is he who –’ She broke off, flushing.

  ‘Very probably,’ he agreed. ‘You must not blame him, however. Such things are bound to leak out.’

  Her lips parted, and then closed again. He wondered what she had so nearly said: whether he was to have been treated to her society manners, or whether she had been about to tell him the truth. On the whole, he was glad that she had thought better of it. If she took him into her confidence, he supposed he would be obliged, in mercy, to bring this game to a close, which would be a pity, since it was providing him with a great deal of entertainment. To have elevated an unknown provincial to the heights of society was an achievement which only one who had no illusions about the world he led could properly appreciate. He was deriving much enjoyment too from observing the efforts of his devoted copyists to win the provincial’s hand. As for Arabella herself, Mr Beaumaris shrugged off a momentary compunction. She would no doubt retire in due course to her northern wilds, marry some red-faced squire, and talk for the rest of her life of her brilliant London season. He glanced down at her again, and thought that it would be a pity if she were to retire too soon. Probably, by the end of the London season he would be only too thankful to see her go, but for the present he was very well satisfied to gratify her by a little flirtation.

  The music ceased, and he led her off to the floor, to one of the adjoining rooms, where refreshments were served. These were of a very simple nature, the strongest drink offered being a mild claret-cup. Mr Beaumaris procured a glass of lemonade for Arabella, and said: ‘You must let me thank you for a delightful few minutes, Miss Tallant: I have seldom enjoyed a dance more.’ He received only a slight smile and an inclination of the head in answer to this which were both so eloquent of incredulity that he was delighted. No fool, then, the little Tallant! He would have pursued this new form of sport, in the hope of teasing her into retort, but at that moment two purposeful gentlemen bore down upon them. Arabella yielded to the solicitations of Mr Warkworth, and went off on his arm. Sir Geoffrey Morecambe sighed in a languishing way, but turned his rebuff to good account by seizing the opportunity to ask Mr Beaumaris what he called the arrangement of his neckcloth. He had to repeat the question, for Mr Beaumaris, watching Arabella walk away with Mr Warkworth, was not attending. He brought his gaze to bear on Sir Geoffrey’s face, however, at the second time of asking, and raised his brows enquiringly.

  ‘That style you have of tying your cravat!’ said Sir Geoffrey. ‘I don’t perfectly recognise it. Is it something new? Should you object to telling me what you call it?’

  ‘Not in the least,’ replied Mr Beaumaris blandly. ‘I call it Variation on an Original Theme.’

  Eight

  Mr Beaumaris’s sudden realisation that the little Tallant was no fool underwent no modification during the following days. It began to be borne in upon him that charm he never so wisely she was never within danger of losing her head over him. She treated him in the friendliest fashion, accepted his homage, and – he suspected – was bent upon making the fullest use of him. If he paid her compliments, she listened to them with the most innocent air in the world, but with a look in her candid gaze which gave him pause. The little Tallant valued his compliments not at all. Instead of being thrown into a flutter by the attentions of the biggest matrimonial prize in London, she plainly considered herself to be taking part in an agreeable game. If he flirted with her, she would generally respond in kind, but with so much the manner of one willing to indulge him that the hunter woke in him, and he was quite as mu
ch piqued as amused. He began to toy with the notion of making her fall in love with him in good earnest, just to teach her that the Nonpareil was not to be so treated with impunity. Once, when she was apparently not in the humour for gallantry, she actually had the effrontery to cut him short, saying: ‘Oh, never mind that! Who was that odd-looking man who waved to you just now? Why does he walk in that ridiculous way, and screw up his mouth so? Is he in pain?’

  He was taken aback, for really he had paid her a compliment calculated to cast her into exquisite confusion. His lips twitched, for he had as few illusions about himself as had, to all appearances the lady beside him. ‘That,’ he replied, ‘is Golden Ball, Miss Tallant, one of our dandies, as no doubt you have been told. He is not in pain. That walk denotes his consequence.’

  ‘Good gracious! He looks as though he went upon stilts! Why does he think himself of such consequence?’

  ‘He has never accustomed himself to the thought that he is worth not a penny less than forty thousand pounds a year,’ replied Mr Beaumaris gravely.

  ‘What an odious person he must be!’ she said scornfully. ‘To be consequential for such a reason as that is what I have no patience with!’

  ‘Naturally you have not,’ he agreed smoothly.

  Her colour rushed up. She said quickly: ‘Fortune cannot make the man: I am persuaded you agree with me, for they tell me you are even more wealthy, Mr Beaumaris, and I will say this! – you do not give yourself such airs as that!’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Mr Beaumaris meekly. ‘I scarcely dared to hope to earn so great an encomium from you, ma’am.’

  ‘Was it rude of me to say it? I beg your pardon!’

  ‘Not at all.’ He glanced down at her. ‘Tell me, Miss Tallant! – Just why do you grant me the pleasure of driving you out in my curricle?’

  She responded with perfect composure, but with that sparkle in her eye which he had encountered several times before: ‘You must know that it does me a great deal of good socially to be seen in your company, sir!’

  He was so much surprised that momentarily he let his hands drop. The grays broke into a canter, and Miss Tallant kindly advised him to mind his horses. The most notable whip in the country thanked her for her reminder, and steadied his pair. Miss Tallant consoled him for the chagrin he might have been supposed to feel by saying that she thought he drove very well. After a stunned moment, laughter welled up within him. His voice shook perceptibly as he answered: ‘You are too good, Miss Tallant!’

  ‘Oh, no!’ she said politely. ‘Shall you be at the masquerade at the Argyll Rooms tonight?’

  ‘I never attend such affairs, ma’am!’ he retorted, putting her in her place.

  ‘Oh, then I shall not see you there!’ remarked Miss Tallant, with unimpaired cheerfulness.

  She did not see him there, but, little though she might have known it, he was obliged to exercise considerable restraint not to cast to the four winds his famed fastidiousness, and to minister to her vanity by appearing at the ball. He did not do it, and hoped that she had missed him. She had, but this was something she would not acknowledge even to herself. Arabella, who had liked the Nonpareil on sight, was setting a strong guard over her sensibilities. He had seemed to her, when first her eyes had alighted on his handsome person, to be almost the embodiment of a dream. Then he had uttered such words to his friend as must shatter for ever her esteem, and had wickedly led her into vulgar prevarication. Now it pleased his fancy to single her out from all the beauties in town, for reasons better known to himself than to her, but which she darkly suspected to be mischievous. No fool, the little Tallant! Not for one moment would she permit herself to indulge the absurd fancy that his court was serious. He might intrude into her meditations, but whenever she was aware of his having done so she was resolute in banishing his image. Sometimes she was strongly of the opinion that he had not believed a word of her boasts on that never to be sufficiently regretted evening in Leicestershire; at others, it seemed as though she had deceived him as completely as she had deceived Lord Fleetwood. It was impossible to fathom the intricacies of his mind, but one thing was certain: the great Mr Beaumaris and the Vicar of Heythram’s daughter could have nothing to do with one another, so that the less the Vicar’s daughter thought about him the better it would be for her. One could not deny his address, or his handsome face, but one could – and one did – dwell on the many imperfections of his character. He was demonstrably indolent, a spoilt darling of society, with no thought for anything but his fleeting pleasure: a heartless, heedless leader of fashion, given over to selfishness, and every other vice which Papa’s daughter had been taught to think reprehensible.

  If she missed him at the masquerade, no one would have guessed it. She danced indefatigably the whole night through, refused an offer of marriage from a slightly intoxicated Mr Epworth, tumbled into bed at an advanced hour in the morning, and dropped instantly into untroubled sleep.

  She was awakened at a most unseasonable hour by the sudden clatter of fire-irons in the cold hearth. Since the menial who crept into her chamber each morning to sweep the grate, and kindle a new fire there, performed her task with trained stealth, this noise was unusual enough to rouse Arabella with a start. A gasp and a whimper, proceeding from the direction of the fireplace, made her sit up with a jerk, blinking at the unexpected vision of a small, dirty, and tearstained little boy, almost cowering on the hearth-rug, and regarding her out of scared, dilating eyes.

  ‘Good gracious!’ gasped Arabella, staring at him. ‘Who are you?’

  The child cringed at the sound of her voice, and returned no answer. The mists of sleep curled away from Arabella’s brain; her eyes took in the soot lying on the floor, the grimed appearance of her strange visitant, and enlightenment dawned on her. ‘You must be a climbing-boy!’ she exclaimed. ‘But what are you doing in my room?’ Then she perceived the terror in the pinched and grimed small face, and she said quickly: ‘Don’t be afraid! Did you lose your way in those horrid chimneys?’

  The urchin nodded, knuckling his eyes. He further volunteered the information that ole Grimsby would bash him for it. Arabella, who had had leisure to observe that one side of his face was swollen and discoloured, demanded: ‘Is that your master? Does he beat you?’

  The urchin nodded again, and shivered.

  ‘Well, he shan’t beat you for this!’ said Arabella, stretching out her hand for the dressing-gown that was chastely disposed across the chair beside her bed. ‘Wait! I am going to get up!’

  The urchin looked very much alarmed by this intelligence, and shrank back against the wall, watching her defensively. She slid out of bed, thrust her feet into her slippers, fastened her dressing-gown and advanced kindly upon her visitor. He flung up an instinctive arm, cringing before her. He was clad in disgraceful rags, and Arabella now saw that the ends of his frieze nether-garments were much charred, and that his skinny legs and his bare feet were badly burnt. She dropped to her knees, crying out pitifully: ‘Oh, poor little fellow! You have burnt yourself so dreadfully!’

  He slightly lowered his protective arm, looking suspiciously at her over it. ‘Ole Grimsby done it,’ he said.

  She caught her breath. ‘What!’

  ‘I’m afeard of going up the chimbley,’ explained the urchin. ‘Sometimes there’s rats – big, fierce ’uns!’

  She shuddered. ‘And he forces you to do so – like that?’

  ‘They most of ’em does,’ said the urchin, accepting life as he found it.

  She held out her hand. ‘Let me see! I will not hurt you.’

  He looked wary, but after a moment appeared to consider that she might be speaking the truth, for he allowed her to take one of his feet in her hand. He was surprised when he saw that tears stood in her eyes, for in his experience the gentler sex was more apt to beat one with a broom-handle than to weep over one.

  ‘Poor child, poor child!’ Arabella said,
a break in her voice. ‘You are so thin, too! I am sure you are half-starved! Are you hungry?’

  ‘I’m allus hungry,’ he replied simply.

  ‘And cold too!’ she said. ‘No wonder, in those rags! It is wicked, wicked!’ She jumped up, and, grasping the bell pull that hung beside the fireplace, tugged it violently.

  The urchin uttered another of his frightened whimpers, and said: ‘Ole Grimsby’ll beat the daylights out of me! Lemme go!’

  ‘He shan’t lay a finger on you!’ promised Arabella, her cheeks flushed, and her eyes sparkling through the tears they held.

  The urchin came to the conclusion that she was soft in her head. ‘Ho!’ he remarked bitterly, ‘you don’ know old Grimsby! Nor you don’ know his ole woman! Broke one of me ribs he did, onct!’

  ‘He shall never do so again, my dear,’ Arabella said, turning aside to pull open a drawer in one of the chests. She dragged out the soft shawl which had not so long since been swathed round the head of the sufferer from toothache, and put it round the boy, saying coaxingly: ‘There, let me wrap you up till we have had a fire lit! Is that more comfortable, my little man? Now sit down in this chair, and you shall have something to eat directly!’

  He allowed himself to be lifted into the armchair, but his expression was so eloquent of suspicion and terror that it wrung Arabella’s tender heart. She smoothed his cropped, sandy hair with one gentle hand, and said soothingly: ‘You must not be afraid of me: I promise you I will not hurt you, nor let your master either. What is your name, my dear?’

  ‘Jemmy,’ he replied, clutching the shawl about him, and fixing her with a frightened stare.

  ‘And how old are you?’

  This he was unable to answer, being uninstructed in the matter. She judged him to be perhaps seven or eight years old, but he was so undernourished that he might have been older. While she waited for the summons of the bell to bring her maid to the room, she put more questions to the child. He seemed to have no knowledge of the existence of any parents, volunteering that he was an orphing, on the Parish. When he saw that this seemed to distress her, he tried to comfort her by stating that one Mrs Balham said he was love-begotten. It appeared that this lady had brought him up until the moment when he had passed into the hands of his present owner. An enquiry into Mrs Balham’s disposition elicited the information that she was a rare one for jackey, and could half-murder anyone when under the influence of this stimulant. Arabella had no idea what jackey might be, but she gathered that Jemmy’s foster-mother was much addicted to strong drink. She questioned Jemmy more closely, and he, gaining confidence, imparted to her, in the most matter-of-fact way, some details of a climbing-boy’s life which drove the blood from her cheeks. He told her, with a certain distorted pride, of the violence of one of ole Grimsby’s associates, Mr Molys, a master-sweep, who, only a year before, had been sentenced to two years’ imprisonment for causing the death of his six-year-old slave.