A Search For A Secret: A Novel. Volume 1

Lady Desborough presently came down. She was extremely gracious and cordial, and, although it was not more than six months since she had seen me, she assured me that I had very much improved, especially in figure and carriage, – the points, she observed, in which young girls generally fail; and she said she should be quite proud of two such belles as Ada and myself to introduce into society.

We dined earlier than usual, and did not sit so long at the table. This was a great relief to me, as I hardly felt enough at home to have quite recovered from my old sense of oppression at the extreme stateliness of the meal. The reason for this change was, that we were going to the opera in the evening. We had dressed for it before dinner, so that there was no time lost, and we entered Lady Desborough's box a little before the overture began. Lady Desborough insisted on us girls taking the front seats. She sat between us, but rather farther back, while Percy stood sometimes behind Ada, sometimes behind me.

While the overture was going on, Ada told me to look down upon the sea of heads below. It was wonderful, but yet a little confusing, there were so many men looking up with opera-glasses, and a great many of them seemed gazing right into our box.

"How very rude they are, Ada!"

Ada laughed. She had often been there before, and was accustomed to it.

"My dear, it is the greatest possible compliment to us. All these lorgnettes turned to our box proclaim us indisputable belles. Men would not take the trouble to look at us if we were not pretty. There, child, don't colour up so; the only way is to look perfectly indifferent, as if you were quite unconscious of it."

It was easy advice to give, and I followed it to the best of my power; but I felt very hot and uncomfortable till the curtain drew up, and then I was too entirely absorbed in the music to have noticed it, even if the whole house had been looking at me.

It was to me an evening of enchantment. The opera was "Lucrezia Borgia," with Alboni as Orsini, and I had never before conceived it possible that the human voice was capable of producing such exquisite full liquid notes as those which poured from her, seemingly without the slightest effort. It was marvellous, and I was literally enchanted; and even between the acts I did not recover sufficiently from the effect it produced on me to listen to Ada, who wanted to talk, and tell me who every one was in the different boxes.

When we reached home, Lady Desborough said it was quite a treat going with any one who enjoyed herself as thoroughly as I did. The first time Ada went she did not seem to care in the least about the music, and only occupied herself in asking who all the people were.

The next day we went for a drive in the park, and I was quite astonished and delighted at the number and beauty of the carriages and horses; for in our walks at school, we had only kept in the secluded parts of the park and gardens, and had never been allowed to go near the fashionable quarters. It was quite a new pleasure to me. But whatever I felt, I knew it was right and proper to sit quite still, and to look passive and quiet as Ada did, especially as numbers of ladies in carriages bowed to Lady Desborough, and men on horseback lifted their hats, or sometimes rode up to the carriage and spoke. Ada knew most of them by name, but very few to speak to, as her mamma had not been in the habit of taking her out to drive with her, or of introducing her to any one, as she was not yet out. But now as we were to appear the next evening in public, Lady Desborough introduced several of the gentlemen to us, and some of them rode for a little way by the side of the carriage, talking to her ladyship, and sometimes exchanging a few words with Ada and myself. That evening we were a quiet little party, and after Ada and I had played some of our old school duets together, we went to bed quite early, in order to be fresh for the next day's fatigues.

What an exciting day that was! Early in the morning Gunter's men came and took possession of the dining-room, turning it completely upside down. A large cartload of benches and tressels came at the same time, and they took the dining-table away, and erected a large horse-shoe table in its place. In the mean time the upholsterer's men were hard at work in the drawing-room. First they removed all the furniture from it; then they took out the window-sashes, and erected a most lovely little tent over the whole balcony, lined with white and blue muslin, and furnished with couches, forming a most charming place to go out into between the dances. Having done this, they stretched a drugget over both drawing-rooms, and placed forms round the room. As soon as they were gone, Ada and I came into it, and performed a waltz on the drugget, which was pronounced stretched to perfection. About this time Percy arrived from Covent Garden, where he had been to see that the flowers which had been previously ordered were coming. Scarcely had he arrived when two carts drove up to the door full of them. We thereupon formed ourselves into a council of taste, and the flowers were distributed under our supervision in the hall, in the room behind the dining-room – which was to be for tea and ices – on the landings of the staircase, and in the grates of the drawing-rooms. The conservatory had been filled the day before, and a perfumed fountain from Rimmel's, placed there to play during the evening. When all was done, we pronounced the effect to be charming. Lady Desborough, at Ada's request, came down from her room, where she had been all the morning, to inspect the arrangements, which she pronounced exceedingly good. Indeed it looked extremely well, for the drawing-rooms, which were very large and handsome, had been repapered specially for the occasion, Lady Desborough being determined that nothing should be wanting, and their effect, with the pretty tent outside, and the large boudoir opening from the farther end, was really lovely. When she had inspected everything, she said that she particularly wished us to lie down for a time in the afternoon, and to get a short sleep if possible, if not to take a book, but at all events to keep quiet, in order that we might be fresh in the evening. This advice we of course had to follow, but it was very unpalatable to us both, as we were girls enough to enjoy all the bustle immensely; still there was no help for it; and so we went up to our rooms, where lunch, by Lady Desborough's orders, was brought up to us. After that we lay down, but I don't think either of us closed our eyes. I am sure I was far too excited at the thought of the evening before me. Presently Ada came into my room, and said that lying down was out of the question, so we wheeled two easy chairs before the fire, and sat there and chatted quietly.

By six o'clock the supper was all laid, under the superintendence of Gunter's managing man himself, and the effect, when we went in to see it on our way down to dinner in the back dining-room, was certainly superb. Even Lady Desborough condescended to express her conviction to Gunter's managing man, that nothing could be better.

After this, the house subsided into quiet, and soon after seven we went up to dress. We had thus nearly three hours before us, as it was quite certain no one would come before ten; and I confess I did not see how we could possibly occupy all that, and was half inclined to side with Percy in his remarks as to the absurdity of our being so long at our toilet. However, Ada paid no attention to what he said, and, of course, I went up-stairs with her. It was very pleasant up there, and we chatted a long time, sitting before Ada's fire, before we made any signs of beginning to dress.

Presently a knock at the door interrupted us, and we were told that the hairdresser was below.

"I will go down first, Agnes; you get on with your dressing. I shall not be twenty minutes at most."

While I was dressing a small parcel was brought up, which had been left at the door for me. It contained a note and a small jewel-box. The note was from Messrs. Hunt and Roskell, saying, "That they had received orders from Mr. Harmer, of Canterbury, to send me a cross, the choice of which he had left with them, and a small chain to suspend it round my neck. That they trusted the jewel would give me satisfaction; but that, if I wished, they would exchange it for any other in their shop, if I would favour them with a call." The contents of the case were a small cross, composed entirely of very large diamonds, of the value of which I had no idea, but which looked very lovely, and a small chain to hang it round my neck. I said nothing to Ada, although the door was open, as I wished to surprise her.

Ada's maid seemed a long time to me putting the finishing touches to my dress; for I was not accustomed to all these little minutiæ; but at last it was done, and I turned round to go into Ada's room – she having been dressed by Lady Desborough's own maid – when she came into the room to me, and as she did so we uttered an exclamation of mutual admiration. Ada certainly looked lovely; she was dressed in white silk, with white tulle over it, which was looped up with scarlet flowers, and she had a wreath of the same, with green leaves in her dark hair; round her neck was a beautiful necklace of pearls of great value, which was, I believe, a family heirloom.

My dress, like hers, was of white silk, with a skirt of lovely Brussels lace, a present from Mr. Harmer, over it. This was slightly looped up with blue forget-me-nots, and I had a wreath of the same flowers in my hair.

"Oh Agnes," Ada exclaimed, after our first burst of mutual congratulations was over, "Oh, Agnes, what a lovely diamond cross; where did you get it from? you never showed it me before."

I explained to her the manner in which I had just received it.

"Well, Agnes, that Mr. Harmer of yours is a trump, as Percy would say. What a beautiful thing. Have you any idea of the value of it?"

I knew nothing of the value of diamonds, and suggested twenty pounds.

"Twenty pounds, you silly child," Ada said; "you don't deserve to have presents made you. If I know anything of diamonds, it is worth two hundred."

"You don't mean that, Ada," I exclaimed, quite frightened at the idea of carrying such a valuable thing round my neck; "you are only laughing at me."

"I can assure you I am in earnest, Agnes; they are quite worth that; they are splendid diamonds, and the cross looks quite a blaze of light on your neck."

We were down stairs by a quarter to ten. Percy was already there, and paid us both many nonsensical compliments. Lady Desborough soon came down, and also expressed herself highly pleased with our appearance. She fully endorsed what Ada had said as to the value of the cross, and said that it was worth more than Ada had put it at, perhaps nearly twice as much.

"Now," she said, when Percy had gone out of the room to fetch something he had forgotten, "I wish to give you a last piece of advice. I give it to you, Miss Ashleigh, as much as I do to Ada, for as you come out under my charge, I consider myself as responsible for you equally. To you, Ada, I say be very careful you do not let your high spirits run away with you; above all, do not become noisy: I know well what your tendency is. This does not apply to you, Miss Ashleigh, for although you have good spirits, I know you are not likely to let them run away with you as Ada is. Do not either of you, I beg, dance more than once, or at most twice with any gentleman. This applies equally to you, Miss Ashleigh, as the heiress to a considerable fortune. It is incumbent on you both to be very careful with whom you dance, – I mean, dance frequently: there is nothing more damaging to a girl than that her name should be mentioned as seen flirting with any but a most eligible party; and as at present you do not know who is who, you cannot be too careful."

Here Percy's return interrupted any further advice which Lady Desborough might have been disposed to have tendered us; and in a few minutes the visitors began to arrive, and my first ball began.

I may here mention, with reference to Lady Desborough's remark about my being an heiress, that Clara Fairthorne had brought the news to school, when Mr. Harmer's intentions with respect to us were publicly announced, and from that time we were generally known there by the nickname of the "heiresses."

CHAPTER IX

THE OLD STORY

I never enjoyed myself in my life as much as I did at that ball. Lady Desborough introduced a good many of the first comers to me, and Percy brought up more. He had engaged me for the first waltz, and he presently asked me for the first polka after supper; and my card was soon quite full for the whole evening.

At some times I should have been sorry for this, as one does not like to be obliged to refuse any very eligible looking man who may be introduced to one. Besides, it prevents dancing a second dance with any particularly pleasant partner, – that is, of course, unless one has the coolness to turn out some one already on the list, which at that time I certainly had not.

But that night I preferred having fresh partners every dance. It was all so new to me, and I wanted to see everything; and in this way I was less engaged in interesting conversation, and was able to give more attention to what was going on.

It was a brilliant scene. The élite of London society were there, and very beautiful were many of the faces, and very exquisite the dresses. Not one of them all through was more lovely than Ada, and almost every one of my partners remarked to me how very lovely she was; indeed, she made quite a sensation.

The men I was not so much struck with. They were very distinguished-looking and very gentlemanly and polished in manner, – very, very different from what few young men there were at Canterbury. But they had a languid air about them which impressed me unpleasantly. They gave me the idea that they had gone out so much into society that they had quite ceased to care for dancing, and that even conversation was too much labour to be undertaken; and I knew it was bad taste, but I certainly preferred as partners the officers I had met at Canterbury to these languid young Guardsmen and scions of nobility.

For myself, I could not understand how any one could help dancing with spirit to that inspiring music; and the only drawback to my enjoyment was that the rooms were so very full that one was dreadfully squeezed and knocked about. However, on my venturing to remark to one of my partners that the room was extremely full, I found that I knew nothing about it, for he answered, —

"Dear me! Do you think so, now? Why, every one has been remarking to me how pleasant it is that the rooms are not crowded."

I found afterwards that my partner was right, and that I had shown my ignorance; for, at some of the balls I went to afterwards, the crush was so great that dancing was literally an impossibility.

I felt very thankful I had been to the opera, for most of my partners, on finding I was fresh from the country, asked that question, having, I suppose, no other topic in common with me. Had I danced oftener than once with some of them, no doubt my conversations would have been more lively. As it was, with a few exceptions, they were not interesting. But they all danced well, and that part I did enjoy most thoroughly. Most of all I liked my dances with Percy, for he told me who every one was, and did it really good naturedly, while some of my other partners, who had done the same, had been as sarcastic and ill-natured about every one, as if they thought that it must give me pleasure to hear other people run down; whereas, when they were making depreciating remarks upon other girls' dresses and manners, I could not but feel quite uncomfortable in wondering what they would say about me presently.

Percy managed to take me down to supper, carrying me off from my last partner in a very dexterous manner; and, what was very nice, he managed to get me a place next to Ada, who had been taken down by young Lord Holmeskirk, a very pleasant young fellow in the Guards. Ada introduced him to me at once, and he pleaded very hard for a dance after supper; I told him that my card was full, but he urged it so much that I said at last I would dance with him if he would manage it for me, but that I had not the least idea how it was to be done. I may here say that he did so; the second dance after supper, coming up to me as I was leaning on Percy's arm, after my polka with him, and saying, in the quietest way, "I believe I have the pleasure of this dance, Miss Ashleigh," he carried me off immediately the music struck up, before my real partner, whoever he was, could find me. Not being accustomed to this sort of thing, and not having the least idea who it was I was engaged to, I felt quite nervous and uncomfortable for the next dance or two, expecting that every gentleman who came near me was on the point of reproaching me for having broken my engagement to him. And, indeed, to the very end of my stay in London, I could never bring myself, in spite of what Ada told me about every one doing so, to turn off a partner in this way without feeling that I was doing something very wrong. I dare say my conscience would have been blunted in time, but as it was I never arrived at that point. Lord Holmeskirk turned out the most pleasant partner of all I had been introduced to, and I could chat with him with more freedom, – he was so perfectly natural and unaffected.

We were a very merry little group at supper; what I ate I have not the slightest idea. Percy kept my plate constantly filled, but, with the exception of strawberries and cream, I did not recognise a single thing he gave me. Then we pulled crackers, and found the mottoes within them of a singularly silly and unsatisfactory nature.

At last we got up from supper, and went up to the drawing-room, and then the gentlemen, at least those of them who were fortunate enough to find seats, sat down; and when they once did so, I began to think they would never come up again, they were such a terribly long time; and it seemed such a waste to be sitting still doing nothing, with that splendid music ready to go on again. While they were downstairs I was introduced to several ladies, to whose houses I was going in the next few nights with Lady Desborough and Ada.

At last the gentlemen came up again, and we began to dance as if to make up for lost time; for the dancing was certainly better than before supper, and my partners more agreeable and chatty; besides, some of the people had left, so that there was more room, and I enjoyed it accordingly. I think every one else did the same, for there seemed to me to be much more lively conversation and flirting going on than before supper.

I have said that I only danced once with each partner, but there was one exception: this was Lord Bangley, a captain in the Guards. He was introduced to me early in the evening, before my card was full, and he begged so earnestly for two dances that I had no excuse for refusing him; but of all the partners I had that evening, I disliked him certainly the most. He was a handsome man, that I could not deny; but that was all I could say for him. He was tall and very stiff – so stiff that his head seemed set too far back – with a supercilious sneering manner, a very harsh unpleasant voice, and an insufferable air of arrogance and conceit.

Ada told me next day that Lord Bangley had condescended to express to her his great approval of my appearance and manner. I curtsied low when Ada told me, but all that I could say was, "that the feeling was by no means reciprocal."

Presently the room began to thin in earnest, and there was a great noise outside, in the intervals of the music, of shouting for carriages and prancing of horses; and then, in a very short time, they were all gone, and there remained in the great drawing-room only Lady Desborough, Ada, Percy, and myself.

"What do you think of your first ball?" Lady Desborough asked.

"Oh, delightful!" we exclaimed simultaneously; "we could have gone on dancing all night."

"It has gone off very well indeed, and I am perfectly satisfied with everything. But now let us go off to bed; we shall have plenty of time to talk it all over in the morning."

It was, however, very long before Ada and I went to bed. We took off our ball-dresses, let down our hair, put our feet into slippers, and then sat by the fire in my room talking over the evening, and our partners, and our impressions of everything.

At last I said, "If we do not go to bed soon, Ada, we may as well give up all idea of going at all. It is nearly six o'clock."

Ada rose to go into her own room.

"We have a good five hours to sleep yet. We shall not breakfast till twelve. Good night, dear."

After this memorable entrée into society, we were out nearly every night, until, before the end of a month, I had had quite enough of parties and balls, and was really glad when we had a quiet evening to ourselves.

Sometimes, before going to the balls, we went to the opera, which, I think, after a time I liked more than the parties. Percy always accompanied us there, but he did not often go the balls, which I was sorry for; I liked him so much as a partner, and I could talk with him, so much more naturally and freely about every one there, than I could with my other partners.

For the first few nights I went out, Lord Bangley was very attentive to me; but I disliked him so much that at last I always was engaged when he asked me to dance; and, although he was very slow to see that any one really could dislike dancing with so very exalted a person as himself, he at last was forced to adopt that conclusion, and so gave up asking me, which was a great relief to me, for his disagreeable manner quite oppressed me.

Ada, one morning at breakfast – at which meal, by the bye, Lady Desborough never appeared – was laughing at me about him, when I said, sharply, that I could not bear him, and that I had shown him so most unmistakably.

"I am glad to hear you say so, Agnes," Percy said; for by this time Ada had pointed out to us the extreme absurdity of our being constantly together for two months, and calling each other Miss Ashleigh and Mr. Desborough all that time. So Percy, having obtained my willing consent, took to calling me Agnes, while I don't think I called him anything; but really Percy came almost naturally to my lips, for Ada had so often spoken of him to me by that name. "I am very glad to hear you say so, Agnes; Bangley is hated by his brother officers, and and is what I should call, although an earl's son, a downright snob; – a snob, because he is conceited about his advantages of person and position; – a snob, because he is a narrow-minded, empty-headed coxcomb."

"Well done, oh! most outspoken brother," Ada said. "Pray what offence has poor Lord Bangley given you for all this outburst?"

"No particular offence, Ada; but I can't bear the fellow."

"Curious, now," Ada said, rather mischievously; "I never heard you say anything against him before: your dislike must be of very recent origin."

"Recent or not recent," Percy said, dogmatically, "I can't bear him."

After I had been three weeks in London, Lady Desborough asked me to stay two months instead of one, as I had originally intended. She kindly said that it was so very advantageous and pleasant for Ada having me with her, and, indeed, pressed me so much that I saw she really wished it, and on my part I was only too glad to prolong my stay.

I was quite at home now in society, and knew nearly every one, and enjoyed the conversation now as much, or more, than the dancing. Ada told me one morning, when I had been there about five weeks, that I was getting a perfect flirt – quite as bad as she was – indeed worse, because quieter – and therefore much more dangerous.

"There is Lord Holmeskirk, Agnes: he is quite assiduous in his attentions to you. Now, Percy, you have certainly nothing to say against him, for he is an exceedingly nice, unaffected fellow."

"Holmeskirk," broke in Percy, "why, he is a mere boy!"

"He is an officer in the Guards, Percy. He is, I grant you, two years younger than your sapient self; still he is more than three years older than Agnes. Don't mind what he says, my dear: you have my free consent and approbation. I only wish it had been my magnificent self at whom he had deigned to throw his handkerchief."

"Nonsense, Ada. I do wish you would get out of the way of always talking such ridiculous nonsense;" and Percy got up quite crossly, and went straight out of the room.