The Drop of the Dice

THE WEDDING

IT WAS A HOT June day. The following morning I was to be married. I was trying to look into the future and kept telling myself: It will be all right. It’s the best thing that could happen. Everyone is pleased. Everyone is sure I am going to be happy. They must be right.

It was more than three years since Dickon had been sent to Virginia but sometimes it seemed as though he were still with me. I had been dreaming of him in those weeks before my marriage. I could see him clearly, remember every detail of his face as he had stood there when he said goodbye; I fancied his eyes were full of reproach.

We were only children, I told myself, and we met in such strange circumstances. It was only natural that we should feel as we did. We did not really know each other—not as I knew Lance.

Over the last three years Lance had been a constant visitor to Eversleigh and when I became aware that he came to see me I will not pretend that I was not flattered. I looked forward to his visits. I began to realize that they were the highlights of the weeks. He brought little gifts from London or any part of the country he happened to have visited. We laughed a great deal together; we rode; we walked; and the family looked on with growing approval. And at last it came—the proposal of marriage.

I refused him. How could I marry anyone while I was waiting for Dickon? He will come home for me, I used to tell myself, and when he does I must be ready for him.

The family was disappointed. They had made up their minds that Lance would be the ideal match for me. He was older than I, but as Damaris said, I needed an older man. He was comfortably off financially, of an extremely pleasant humour; he was excellent company and approved of by Uncle Carl and therefore a very welcome visitor to Eversleigh.

Damaris tried to persuade me to reconsider his proposal. Arabella said it would be a good thing if we married; Uncle Carl said it would be an ideal match; and even Great-Grandfather Carleton said he could see nothing wrong with the young man.

Lance seemed to take my refusal more calmly than anyone. He continued to call and made it clear that he enjoyed my company still. That suited me, for I knew now how much I should hate it if he removed his friendship and his visits ceased.

He understood about Dickon, he said. That almost uncanny understanding of other people’s minds was one of the most attractive aspects of his character. He was patient, gentle and tender and gave me the impression that while he would not worry me with his importunings he was sure it would all come right in the end.

There came a day when I paid a visit to London with Damaris and Jeremy. It had been planned suddenly as Jeremy had to go to town and Damaris had thought it would be a good idea if we accompanied him. We arrived in the late afternoon and went immediately to the family’s town house where we were to stay for the few days we should be there.

The next morning I was up early and suddenly decided that it would be amusing to pay an early call on Lance. I was sure he would be delighted to see me and learn that we were to stay for a little while…

I took a sedan to the house in Albemarle Street. It was only about ten o’clock. I had always enjoyed the streets of London and was thrilled to be carried through them in my chair. Everything was so colourful. I delighted in the sedans, like the one in which I was travelling, carrying, even at this early hour, elegantly clad ladies and gentlemen. One could see the latest fashions which these bewigged and painted ladies and gentlemen liked to display. I was quizzed by one or two gentlemen passing in their chairs and I shrank back farther into my seat, feeling very much the country girl. In contrast to these brilliant people were the beggars and street tradesmen. These fascinated me and I was conscious of the tremendous noise everywhere. The newsmen were blowing their tin trumpets to announce they had the Gazette or whatever journal they were selling; the bellows-menders and the knife-grinders squatted on the cobbles working at their tasks and calling out all the time, while the Colly Molly Puff man who sold his pies stood side by side with a milkmaid.

I was smiling, thinking of Lance’s pleasure when he saw me, and when I reached his door I told the chairman to wait, just in case Lance should not be at home and I needed him to take me back at once.

I knocked at the door and Lance’s very excellent footman opened it.

‘Hello, Thomas,’ I said. ‘This is a surprise visit.’

He stared at me as though he could not believe his eyes. It was the first time I had seen him nonplussed. He knew me well, of course, for I with my family had often visited the house in Albemarle Street.

‘Is Sir Lance at home?’ I asked.

He floundered a little, which was odd, because he was usually so precise. ‘Oh, yes, Mistress Clarissa, but…’

I had stepped inside. ‘Oh, I am glad he’s at home. I should have been so disappointed if he had not been. I’ll go and find him. I want this to be a surprise.’

Thomas put out a hand as though to restrain me, but I had gone past him, laughing to myself at the prospect of seeing Lance’s face when he saw me.

I opened the door of the dining-room, expecting to see him at breakfast, but he was not there.

‘Mistress… you can’t!’ Thomas was close behind me.

I took no heed. I bounded up the stairs, taking them two at a time. He must be still abed. I would tease him about his laziness. It was wrong of me to go to his bedroom. Damaris would not have approved but there was a special relationship between us. I was being unconventional but Lance himself had often said that conventions were for the unimaginative, and individualists disregarded them when it was expedient to do so.

I was doing that now.

I came to his bedroom door. Thomas was puffing after me. I knocked at the door.

‘Come in,’ said a woman’s voice.

I opened the door. She was seated at the dressing-table in her nightgown, combing her long dark hair.

‘Put the tray down there,’ she said, without turning her head.

I was astounded. What was this woman doing in Lance’s bedroom?

Then Lance himself appeared. I stared at him in amazement. He was wearing light-coloured breeches and was shirtless so that he was naked from the waist.

‘I’m ready for breakfast, darling, are you?’ he said. Then he stopped short, for he had seen me.

My face was scarlet. I turned and ran out of the room, almost falling over Thomas who was beside himself with dismay. I started down the stairs. I heard Lance call after me: ‘Clarissa. Clarissa, come back.’

I took no notice. I ran out of the house to the chair, which was mercifully waiting for me.

I did not see the colourful streets now; I did not hear the raucous cries of the street-sellers. I could only see Lance with a woman in his bedroom. Lance… who had asked me to marry him.

I never want to see him again, I told myself fiercely. I was very upset and most unhappy.

Lance, of course, did not let the matter rest there. He came to see me later in the day. I pleaded a headache and refused to leave my room. But he kept calling until I did see him.

‘I want to explain,’ he said.

‘It was self-explanatory,’ I retorted.

‘I dare say it was,’ he agreed ruefully.

‘That woman… who is she?’

‘A very dear friend of mine.’

‘Oh… you are shameful.’

‘You, my dear Clarissa, are very young. Yes, your inference is correct. Elvira Vernon is my mistress and has been for some time.’

‘Your mistress! But you have asked me to marry you.’

‘And you refused me. Do you deny me consolation?’

‘I don’t understand you.’

‘There is a great deal you have to learn of the world, Clarissa.’

‘I have already learned so much about you! What if people knew…’

‘My dear, a great many of them know. There is nothing terrible or unusual about this situation. It is a very amicable arrangement. Elvira and I suit her each other very well.’

‘Then why don’t you marry her?’

‘It isn’t that sort of relationship.’

‘It seemed that that was what it was… exactly. Oh, how wise I was to refuse you. Suppose…’

‘Suppose you had agreed to marry me? Then I should have brought to a close my relationship with Elvira and begun my life as a respectable married man.’

‘You are so… glib.’

‘Listen, Clarissa, I am fond of Elvira in a certain way but I don’t want to marry her any more than she wants to marry me. We just like each other. We console each other. I love you. I want to marry you. You must believe that.’

‘I do not and I have no wish to see you any more. I think it is… horrible, and I suppose you have had lots of mistresses.’

‘A few,’ he admitted.

‘Then go back to them and leave me alone. What a lucky escape I have had.’

‘So you did consider me, then?’

‘I have told you I love someone else and I am waiting for him. But it is no concern of yours because I shall never see you again.’

He regarded me with a smile, half tender, half mocking. One of the things which exasperated me was his inability to be serious about any subject; and in a way it fascinated me. It gave him an added stature, as though he was completely competent to deal with any situation.

After he had gone I realized how angry I was, how hurt, how humiliated. Why should I be? I asked myself. What he does is no concern of mine. Let him have a houseful of mistresses if he wants them.

He continued to visit the family. When he saw me he behaved as though nothing had happened. I kept wondering about him and visualizing Elvira Vernon in his bedroom. I was not entirely sure what love-making entailed and I began to develop a great curiosity about this. Occasionally I saw Elvira Vernon. She was poised and sophisticated. Quite old, I thought a little maliciously.

I became jealous if Lance did not pay enough attention to me. I could not understand myself. I was thinking more often of him than I did of Dickon. He seemed half amused by what had happened and not in the least ashamed.

Once he said to me: ‘I’m not a saint. I’m not even a monk. Elvira and I are good for each other… at the moment.’

‘I suppose,’ I retorted, ‘one could say that mistresses are as much a part of your life as gambling.’

‘I suppose one could,’ he replied. ‘What a dissolute character that makes of me. But lovable withal, eh, Clarissa?’

Then he put his arms round me and held me tightly and suddenly he kissed me.

I drew away breathless, assuming an anger which I did not feel. The fact was that I was tingling with excitement.

After that I began to realize that life was rather dull when he was not around. I thought a great deal about us. Lance, with his mistresses and his gambling, would be far from the perfect husband. And what sort of wife would I be to him—in love with someone else who was lost to me?

I talked a great deal about Dickon to Lance, stressing his innocence, his gallantry, his purity.

‘And sent overseas for years and years,’ said Lance. ‘Few ever return; are you going to spend your life in single blessedness waiting for something which may never happen? People change with the years. Your Dickon, even if he came back, would not be this pure and gallant boy who went away. And what are those years going to do to you, my sweet Clarissa? Take what is offered you now. Think what we can do for each other. You can lure me from my vices; I can make you forget an impossible dream.’

I thought a great deal about what he had said. Our relationship “was changing. He would embrace me when we met, kiss me in a strangely stirring manner. Sometimes I thought he was laughing at me because I was so innocent of life that I thought it was so dreadful for a man to have a mistress.

‘If,’ I said, ‘I should agree to marry you you would have to say goodbye to your mistress of the moment.’

‘Done,’ he said.

‘You would have to be a faithful husband.’

‘I promise.’

Then he picked me up and held me tightly and when Damaris came into the room he said: ‘It’s happened at last. Clarissa has promised to marry me.’

I told myself I must stop thinking of Dickon. That encounter with him was one little incident in my life. Lance was here, my future husband, kind, worldly, tender, taking life as it came along, enjoying it, never allowing it to oppress him. That was how I wanted to live. He was a gambler. He gambled with life. He took chances and if he lost he shrugged his shoulders and was sure he would win next time.

He had been an only child, I learned. His father had died when he was a boy and his mother had lived only a few years longer. He had inherited estates on the borders of Kent and Sussex and if he was not exactly wealthy he would have been if he had not lived so extravagantly and not lost so much at the gaming tables. My family, of course, was naturally interested in his financial position. I know now that my Grandmother Priscilla had an obsession about my being married for my money, for I was a considerable heiress.

My mother had been left a fortune and as I was her nearest of kin, that came to me. It had been looked after by Leigh, who had a head for such matters, and had accumulated during my mother’s absence in France and until my coming of age. The money was to be mine on my eighteenth birthday or when I married.

There was also my inheritance from my father which Lord Hessenfield, who had charge of these affairs, had decided should be divided equally between myself and Aimée. He had made the provision that the money should not pass to either of us until my eighteenth birthday, which was strange because Aimée was a few years older than I. I wondered why he had arranged this, for he had accepted Aimée, yet she must wait for her share. If either of us died, her share was to go to the other living sister.

However, I did not think very much about the money. My family was sure it had not influenced Lance’s desire to marry me. He was sufficiently comfortably off without it.

Now here I was, not only on the threshold of marriage, but about to become a rich woman in my own right. Sometimes I felt very happy. Then I would think of Dickon.

The day had begun. I lay in bed listening to the sounds of the house beginning to stir. In the cupboard was my wedding dress. Lance was staying at Eversleigh Court and Uncle Carl was there too. Jeremy was going to give me away and Priscilla had wanted the traditional wedding as she remembered it in the past.

While I was brooding on all this my door was pushed open and a small figure came into the room. This was Sabrina—nearly four years old now, a high-spirited and enchanting little girl. She climbed on to my bed and snuggled down beside me.

‘It’s the wedding,’ she whispered.

I held her tightly. I had always been very fond of Sabrina. She was exceptionally pretty; they said she had a look of my mother, Carlotta, who had been one of the beauties of the family. Moreover, she was well aware of her charm and made good use of it to get her own way. She was always darting about the house; one minute she would be in the kitchen standing on a chair watching them make pies and cakes, sticking a greedy finger into sweet mixtures when no one was looking, the next, dashing out to the stables and coaxing one of the grooms to take her round the paddock on her newly acquired pony; playing with the gardeners’ wheelbarrows, hiding in the minstrels’ gallery, jumping out on Gwen the parlourmaid, who believed in ghosts, finding an irresistible desire to do everything she was told not to do—that was Sabrina.

But she had the greatest charm and she had quickly discovered that one of her enchanting smiles, coupled with an air of penitence, could extract her from most trouble.

Now she was chattering about weddings. It was mine, wasn’t it? When was she going to have a wedding? She was going to wear a pink silk dress. Nanny Curlew was still sewing it. She was going to have flowers in her hair… and she was going to stand beside me. So it was really her wedding too.

She put her arms round my neck and her face was close to mine.

‘You’re going away from here,’ she said.

‘I shall be back often.’

‘It’s not your home any more. You’re going to Uncle Lance’s home.’

“We’ll, he’ll be my husband.’

Her face puckered a little. ‘Stay here,’ she whispered. She tightened her arms about my neck and added pleadingly: ‘Stay here with Sabrina.’

‘Wives always live with their husbands, you know.’

‘Let Lance come here.’

‘We’ll be here often. You’ll see.’

She shook her head. It wasn’t the same. ‘I don’t want you to get married.’

‘Everyone else does.’

‘Sabrina doesn’t.’ She looked at me calculatingly, as though that was the best of all reasons for calling off the affair.

‘When you are older you can come and stay with us,’ I said.

‘Tomorrow?’ she asked brightly.

‘That’s a little soon.’

‘I’ll be older.’

‘Only one day. It’ll have to be more than that.’

‘Two days? Three days?’

‘Months perhaps. Go and open the cupboard door and you’ll see my dress.’

She leaped out of bed. ‘Ooo!’ she said, stroking the folds of satin.

‘Don’t put your fingers on it,’ I warned.

She turned to look at me. ‘Why?’ she asked. Sabrina always wanted an explanation of everything.

‘They might be dirty.’

She looked at them and then at me; she smiled slowly and deliberately touched the dress. That was typical of Sabrina. ‘Don’t touch’ meant ‘I must touch at all costs.’

‘Not dirty,’ she said reassuringly. Then she pounced on my shoes, which were of white satin with silver buckles and silver heels. She picked one up and smiled at me, stroking the satin and looking at me with a mischievous twinkle in her eyes, assuming, I supposed, that if the dress must not be touched neither must the slippers.

There was a knock on the door. It was Nanny Curlew.

‘I knew I’d find you here, Miss,’ she said. ‘Begging your pardon, Miss Clarissa. The child is into everything.’

‘It’s a very special morning, Nanny,’ I said. ‘She has caught the general excitement.’

‘It’s my wedding really,’ announced Sabrina.

‘Come along,’ said Nanny Curlew firmly. ‘Miss Clarissa has other things to think about than you, my lady.’

Sabrina looked puzzled. ‘What things?’ she asked, as though it were inconceivable that there could be any subject more absorbing than that of herself.

But Nanny Curlew had her firmly by the hand and with an apologetic smile at me dragged the child away. Sabrina gave me one of her enchanting smiles as she disappeared.

My next visitor was Jeanne. She came in bristling with importance.

‘Ah, is it awake then? To do… there is so much. I have sent for a tray for you. That is best.’

‘I couldn’t eat anything, Jeanne.’

‘That is not the way to talk, Milady. You must eat. Do you want to faint at the feet of this new ’usband?’ Jeanne had never completely conquered her h’s and could only manage them in calm moments. ‘Oh, this is the great day,’ she went on. ‘I am so ’appy. Sir Lance… he is a good man. He is the charming man.’ She closed her eyes and blew an imaginary kiss to Lance. ‘I say to myself, I say, “This is the one for my little bébé. This is the ’usband for Clarissa. So beautiful… the brocade waistcoat… ‘e dresses like a Frenchman.”’

‘There could be no greater praise than that coming from you, Jeanne. But I wonder whether Lance would appreciate it.’

‘Now come… the bath… then the food… and then the ’air. I shall make you so beautiful thees day.’

‘As beautiful as Lance?’ I asked.

‘I say this, no one shall be as beautiful as my lady. This is ’er day. She will be the most beautiful of all brides…’

‘Made so by the deft hands of Jeanne.’

‘So… so…’ she murmured.

Jeanne and I had grown very close to each other over the years. She always regretted that she had not been with me on my visit to the North. She was very fond of Sabrina. ‘There is big charm in that one,’ was her comment. ‘But naughtiness too. She will have to be watched. You were not like that as a little one. No.’

‘I lacked the charm.’

‘That is a nonsense.’ Jeanne had an amusing way of adapting words to suit herself and I sometimes found myself using them. ‘You have the charm,’ she went on. ‘But you were a good little girl… more caring for others, per’aps. You more like the ladies Priscilla and Arabella. Not like your mother and father… they cared first for themselves. So with the little Sabrina.’

‘She is only a child.’

‘I know much of children. What is in them at three is in them at thirty.’

‘My dear, wise Jeanne…’

‘So wise that I will get you up this minute. We have good time but let us not waste it.’

I put myself in her hands. I was content to sit at the mirror while she waited on me, brushing my hair and coiling it round my head so that it would show to the best advantage.

I watched her in the mirror, intent and proud of me. Dear Jeanne!

‘I have so much to thank you for,’ I said with emotion. ‘What can I do to show you that I appreciate all you have done for me?’

She touched my shoulder lightly. ‘It is not to be measured out,’ she said. ‘You have change my life. You let me come here… be your lady’s maid. That is what I ask. I do… You do… But we do not count what we do.’

‘Yes, Jeanne, of course.’

‘I am to be with you. It is what I want. We shall leave this house… you go to your husband and I go with you. I am glad of that. I would not wish to stay here… without you. And you let me come with you and Sir Lance, ‘e say Yes. “I hear you are coming with us, Jeanne,” he say. “That is good… very good.” That is what he say. And he smile his beautiful smile. He is a beautiful gentilhomme.’

‘I am glad you approve of him, Jeanne.’

‘He is what I would choose for you. Stop thinking of this… Dickon. He is a boy. He is far away. He would not have been the one for you.’

‘How can you know?’

‘Something tell me. He is away fourteen years… that one… that boy. Fourteen years! Mon Dieu! He will have a wife out there in that foreign place. Black, most likely. No, Sir Lance… he is the one for you.’

‘He certainly has a champion in you.’

She nodded, smiling.

‘How will you like leaving Enderby?’ I asked.

She was silent for a few moments, holding the brush over my head and staring down at it. Then she said rather vehemently: ‘I am ’appy. I go with you and that is good. Enderby is not a good house.’

‘Not a good house! What do you mean?’

‘Shadows… whispers… noises in the night. There’s spirits about it… long-dead ones that can’t rest.’

‘Really, Jeanne, surely you don’t believe that. Where is your practical French realism?’

‘It is a ’ouse where ’appiness do not stay… long. A little time maybe, but it flits away. I am glad we leave. I could not have borne not to go with you. So… now I am ’appy. It is what I always want… to be lady’s maid. I remember your mother… so… so beautiful and Claudine was her lady’s maid. She was very important, Claudine. Not like the rest of us. I always wanted to be lady’s maid… to comb the ’air, to touch up the cheeks, to make little black beauty spots… that was my dream. Germaine was jealous of Claudine. Germaine always wanted to be lady’s maid. And now I am one and I go with you and your beautiful ’usband. We shall go to London… Ah, that is a great place to be.’

‘And in the country sometimes.’

‘That will be good too.’

‘And we shall come back here to Enderby for visits.’

‘For visit. That is not the same as living here.’

‘You talk as though we’re escaping from some evil spell.’

‘Per’aps,’ said Jeanne, shrugging her shoulders.

She looked down at my hands. ‘You are not going to wear that ring at your wedding?’

I twisted the ring, which now fitted my middle finger, round and round. My hands had grown since Lord Hessenfield had given it to me.

‘It’s my bezoar ring,’ I said. ‘A very special ring.’

‘It will not match your dress.’

‘Never mind. I shall wear it all the same. Don’t look at it like that, Jeanne. It’s a very precious ring. Queen Elizabeth gave it to one of my ancestors and it has special properties. It’s an antidote against poison.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean that if someone gave me a drink with arsenic in it—perhaps some other poison—this ring would absorb the poison. It acts as a sort of sponge.’

Jeanne made a noise of disgust. ‘A likely story,’ she said; but she took my hands and studied the ring. ‘Queen Elizabeth, did you say? Was it one of hers then?’

‘Yes, and that makes it very valuable. It has her initial engraved inside.’

‘Well, in that case you can wear it.’

‘Thank you, Jeanne.’

I was almost ready now. Very soon I would go to the church and be married to Lance. I was both excited and apprehensive. I wished that I could forget going into Lance’s bedroom and seeing Elvira sitting at the mirror; they had seemed so unconcerned, so natural. There was so much I had to learn. I could not resist slipping away from Jeanne and taking a look at the bridal chamber which that night I should occupy with Lance. It would be that room which had once been in red velvet and which Damaris had changed when she came to Enderby. Now it was white and gold damask and had been decorated for the wedding with blue and green ribbons. Two serving girls were tying sprigs of rosemary to the posts.

They were giggling together and were suddenly silent as they saw me.

‘It looks very pretty,’ I said, trying to speak without emotion. Somehow I had never really liked this room. Perhaps it was because as a child, when Damaris and I had been very close to each other, I had sensed her dislike of it. She hardly ever came to it, but it was, of course, the most elaborate and biggest of the bedchambers and it was natural that it should be turned into the bridal suite for this occasion.

‘It’s a great day, Miss Clarissa,’ said one of the maids.

I agreed that it was.

When I went back to my room Jeanne was searching everywhere for one of my shoes.

‘I’ve looked ’igh and low,’ she declared, ‘I am certain they were both here. Where can it have got to. You can’t be married in one shoe!’

I joined in the search without success and Damaris came in while we were still hunting.

‘You look beautiful, darling,’ she said. ‘Oh, Clarissa, I am so happy for you.’

Dear Damaris. I knew she was thinking of the day she had found me in the cellar. She embraced me and then Jeanne.

‘Oh, Madame,’ said Jeanne, ‘no tears today, please. It spoil the eyes.’

We laughed. Jeanne had prevented an emotional scene.

‘And,’ she went on, ‘where is this shoe? We do not know where it ’ave gone.’

‘Well, it must be found,’ I said. ‘Sabrina came into my bedroom this morning. She looked at the gown. The shoes were there then.’

‘Ah,’ cried Jeanne. ‘I have the idea. One moment, please.’

She went away and soon came back holding Sabrina by one hand—and the shoe was in the other.

‘This wicked one had ‘id it,’ announced Jeanne.

‘Oh, Sabrina!’ said Damaris.

‘It was so she wouldn’t be able to get married,’ explained Sabrina.

‘You have cause great trouble and you should be spank,’ said Jeanne.

Sabrina’s face crinkled in dismay. ‘I only did it so that Clarissa wouldn’t go away and leave me,’ she explained.

Damaris knelt down and put her arms round the child. ‘Darling,’ she said, ‘Clarissa is going to be very happy. You want that, don’t you?’

Sabrina nodded. ‘But me, too,’ she said.

Damaris was touched but I was not sure whether the spirit of mischief in Sabrina had not been responsible for her act as much as her desire to prevent my marrying. However, the shoe was found and my toilet was complete now and I was ready for my marriage.

Lance was waiting in the church with the family from Eversleigh Court. Great-Grandfather Carleton looked on with a certain pride, although he tried to hide it. Leigh was there with Benjie and Anita. I guessed they would all be thinking of Harriet and Gregory, as we must at a time like this. Arabella and Priscilla were alternating between their delight and that emotion which women feel at weddings.

So we were married and as I came out of the church with Lance I tried to suppress my uneasy feelings and assure myself that I had done right in accepting him. It would have been foolish to go on dreaming of a boy who had been transported to the colony of Virginia and whom I could not see until we were so much older. So much happened over the years and it was hardly likely that, even if we did meet again in the far distant future, we should still be the same people who had met so romantically and parted so tragically.

At Enderby the celebrations were taking place. Everyone who had gone to church had carried a sprig of rosemary in accordance with the old custom, and when we were all seated at the table a great punchbowl was passed round so that everyone could drink the health of the bride and groom. As the bowl came to them each of the guests dipped into it the rosemary they had carried to church, and so they wished us married joy.

Lance held my hand firmly and I was reassured. I had done what was right. In my heart I whispered wistfully; ‘Goodbye, Dickon. Goodbye for ever.’

Healths continued to be drunk, people made speeches, and there was a great deal of chatter and laughter. Then we went to the hall which was decorated as a ballroom and in the minstrels’ gallery the musicians played for our dancing.

There were no ghosts there that night.

At midnight Lance and I retired to the bedroom with its brocade-covered bed and sprigs of rosemary, and the moments I had been dreading were at hand. I was terribly apprehensive; I was both ignorant and innocent. I had vague ideas of the relationship between men and women. I had come across servants in embarrassing situations. I had heard giggles, seen certain fumblings in dark corners; I had once come across a couple in the woods, merged into one another under a tree, moving and moaning; I knew one of the kitchen maids had been, as the cook said, ‘anyone’s for the taking’ and finally she had had a baby. I will not pretend that I had not thought about an idyllic relationship with Dickon, and when we had lain side by side in Makeshift Gallery we had both deplored the fact that we were not alone. I think we both knew that if we had been, our emotions would have swept us into a physical union which would have been irresistible to us both. I thought now that if we had been we should have been bound irrevocably together and I should not be in this bridal suite with Lance at this time.

But it had not been so and there was I seated at the mirror brushing my hair, going on and on because I was afraid to stop. Lance had removed his coat. He was standing there bare to the waist and I could not help seeing in my mind’s eye that other scene; Lance as he looked now, but another woman at the mirror. She had been relaxed and smiling, luxuriously dreamy like a satisfied cat. How different I was—ignorant and inadequate.

Lance came and stood over me, smiling at me in the mirror. He slipped the robe over my shoulders until it fell to my waist. Then he kissed me… my lips, my neck and my breasts.

I turned to him suddenly and clung to him.

‘Don’t be afraid, Clarissa,’ he said. ‘It’s not like you to be afraid. Besides, there’s nothing to fear.’

He pulled me to my feet and my robe fell to the floor. I felt unprotected without my clothes. But Lance was laughing softly as he picked me up and carried me to the bed.

So my wedding night had begun. It bewildered me. I felt I had stepped into a new world where Lance was my guide and teacher. He was gentle and sympathetic. He understood my ignorance, and something told me that he knew I was thinking of that occasion when I had seen Elvira in his bedroom. He was determined to make me share his pleasure in our relationship, but at the same time he respected my virginity and understood that I must come to understanding gradually.

Finally he slept. But I did not. I lay awake thinking of all the young brides who had come to this room… all dead and gone now… but it seemed as though their spirits lingered on. I seemed to hear voices in the rustle of the curtains and the faint moaning of the wind in the trees. Then I thought: Oh Dickon, it should have been you. It would have sealed our love for ever.

The curtains had been drawn back and there was a full moon. It shone into the room through the mullioned windows, making shifting patterns on the wall from the swaying branches of the trees outside. Lance lay on his back. I could see his face clearly in moonlight—the well-chiselled features and fine bones, the Roman nose, the high forehead and the hair which grew back thick and wavy. And as I watched him the moonlight touched his face and in the shifting pattern his face seemed to change. I could believe he was an old man now… the shadows did that to him. I thought, he may look like that in thirty years’ time. It made him seem vulnerable and suddenly I felt how very dear he was to me.

The moonlight shifted; he was young and handsome again.

I must love him, I told myself. I must cease to think of Dickon. Even if he comes back we shall be two different people. Lance is my husband. I must remember that… always.

So I continued to lie sleepless in the big four-poster bed, my husband beside me.

So I became Lady Clavering, and the days that followed were full of new experiences. Lance was always the tender lover, at ease in every situation, and his exquisite manners were in evidence in the bedchamber as everywhere else. He was sweeping my fears aside; he tutored me in the arts of love as he had in those of living when we were on the road from York together. I could see that life with him would always be lived graciously. Our intimacy had brought us very close. I do love him, I assured myself. I was certainly proud of him; he was charming, easy-going and distinguished in company.

Jeanne’s delight increased with every day. Unmarried herself, yet she was knowledgeable in the ways of men and women. He was the beautiful man; as far as she was concerned we were worthy of each other.

Everyone around us was content.

My Grandmother Priscilla was, I think, particularly so. She said I must read the family journals and contribute to them myself.

‘You will see how it was with your mother,’ she said. ‘She was a stormy girl from the beginning. She was far too beautiful. Your character is quite different from hers. You had a harsh beginning, my child; I think it developed you in a certain way. But you have been happy since Damaris brought you home.’

‘Damaris did so much for me. I shall never forget it.’

‘You did a great deal for her, my dear,’ said my grandmother.

On the day Lance and I were to leave for London I received a letter from Aimée. Over the last three years I had had about two or three letters. They had come at Christmas time.

I did know that there had been a close watch on Hessenfield Castle after the flight of the Pretender when the Jacobites were being rounded up and brought to trial. Lord Hessenfield had been questioned and suspected; his fate had been undecided for some time and then, no doubt because of his disability, he had been left in peace.

My dear sister [wrote Aimée],

Everything has changed at the Castle. Our dear uncle has passed away. You can guess what an upheaval there has been and now we have a new Lord. Alas, I am unwelcome here. He is the son of one of our uncles, a younger brother of dear Lord Hessenfield, whose brothers were all executed… so the title and estates have gone to this nephew.

The fact is I cannot stay here, I feel my life is in ruins. I cannot go back to France. My mother would not want me. She is settled in with her new family. She has stepchildren. No, I could not face that. I thank God—and our father—that I am not in need of money. But I feel bereft… alone… without family or friends. I often think of my little sister… the only relation I have here. Dear Clarissa, may I come and stay with you… just for a little while until I know what I can do…?

Jeanne came in while I was reading the letter.

‘What is it, chérie?’ she asked. ‘You look a little distrait.’

‘I’ve had a letter from my sister.’

Jeanne frowned. ‘So?’ she murmured.

‘She wants to come and stay with me for a while.’

‘But you are just married. You want to be alone with your ’usband.’

‘She is my half-sister, Jeanne.’

‘Why now she want to come?’

‘A great deal has happened up there. My uncle has died and a nephew has the title and the castle now. There are changes evidently and they have made it clear that Aimée is not wanted there. There will be plenty of room in the London house and in the country. Of course she must come. I dare say she will marry if she comes to London. She wouldn’t have many opportunities for meeting people up there. They were all intent on one thing—putting James on the throne.’

Jeanne clicked her tongue. ‘Wasting time in silly plots when they might be marrying and having dear little babies!’

I laughed. ‘I shall tell Lance and see what he feels about it,’ I said.

I knew in advance what he would say. ‘Of course your sister must come.’

So I wrote and told her that she would be welcome to arrive at any time.

Lance and I travelled to London about a week after our wedding day. I was enchanted by London. In the first place I loved Lance’s town house, with its big windows which let in the maximum of light, and its large uncluttered rooms. After Enderby it seemed airy and welcoming—a happy house.

My delight in everything was a source of pleasure to Lance. He devoted himself to me entirely. He wanted to show me London, that city of contrasts, such a place as I had never dreamed existed, having only before savoured brief visits. I was amazed at the wealth and splendour which I saw side by side with poverty and squalor, I wanted to give to every beggar I saw, and whenever a flower-girl crossed my path I would buy her entire basketful. Flower-sellers always brought back such poignant memories.

We went often to the theatres. There was one in Drury Lane and that one called the New Theatre in Portugal Street; there was a theatre and opera house in the Haymarket. Lance was fond of the opera and was determined that I should also appreciate its delights. I found those days immensely exciting, full of new experiences as they were.

We would take our seats among those reserved for the quality, and I would often find the audience more entertaining than the play. After the first act one of the theatre employees would come round to take the money for the seats, which was a signal for many to sneak out—not, as they would imply, because they were disgusted with the play, but because they did not want to pay for their seats. Lance said that many people made a habit of coming to first acts and then going to the coffee houses, where they would discuss the play with a show of knowledge and call themselves patrons of the theatre.

Up in the top gallery were the footmen who came with their masters and mistresses to the theatre, where they had free seats, and oddly enough they were often the most vociferous among the audience, expressing their pleasure or more often their disgust.

‘Although they have not paid for their seats,’ Lance pointed out, ‘they believe they have a right to disdain the play, which shows that the more people are given the more they take as their natural right. I wonder they don’t demand the price of the seat which they haven’t paid for.’

Lance was interested in people, but his attitude towards them was light-hearted and even cynical. He looked for something beyond the facade and I was sure he was often right in his judgement. When I pitied some poor beggar in the streets he would suggest that the woebegone look was part of an act.

‘I once knew a man,’ he told me, ‘who was a great figure in the night life of London. He’d wager a thousand pounds and think nothing of it. He lived in style in St James’s, I saw him one day disguised so that I scarcely recognized him. He was waylaying fine ladies as they came out of their houses and telling such a pitiful tale that there was scarcely one of them who didn’t dip into her purse and give the plausible rogue some money. I had a game with him. I pretended not to recognize him and gave him five pounds on condition that when he was able to he should repay me threefold. “May Gawd bless you, sir,” he said. He had a good line of talk, and although by night he spoke in a highly cultured fashion, the jargon of the streets came readily to his tongue. “That I will right gladly, noble sir,” he said, “I never forget them that hoffers a poor beggar what’s in need”.’ Lance laughed at the memory. ‘It was a fortnight later when I saw him in the Thatched House coffee house in St James’s. I said, “Hello, you old rogue, you owe me fifteen pounds.” He was startled, but when I told him I had recognized him in the ragged beggarman he was overcome with mirth. He paid out the fifteen pounds and made me swear to tell no one of his little subterfuge.’

‘I am sure his was an isolated case,’ I said.

‘That may be. But how can you say how many men-about-town are hiding behind their rags and tatters? How many ladies of quality are telling their doleful tale to passers-by? I always remember him when I see them. It teaches you something.’

‘It teaches me that he couldn’t have been very successful at the gaming tables if he had to resort to such methods. Oh, yes, it teaches me that gambling is a foolish way to lose one’s money.’

‘Touché,’ he said. ‘I wouldn’t have told you this tale if I had known it would bring us round to this. As a matter of fact he was fairly lucky at the tables. I think he did the begging out of a spirit of mischief.’

After that, I must admit, I looked closely at the beggars, and was less generous.

I had a dressmaker who came to the house and made a whole new wardrobe for me. The clothes I had worn at Enderby were scarcely suitable for London life. All the latest fashions, I discovered, came from France—a fact which delighted Jeanne. If it had been worn at Versailles that was its accolade. My dressmaker would bring large dolls sent from her associate in Paris, and these dolls would be dressed in the latest fashion, all made in exact detail. There would be tight-fitting bodices with sleeves to the elbow which ended in the most elaborate frills. Big collars and fichus were very much in vogue. Panniers were worn and the widened skirt accentuated the narrowness of the waist. There was a new kind of gown called a sacque, and although the bodice was tightly fitting, there was a fullness at the back which I thought most becoming. The dresses were made of silks and satins, brocades and velvet. ‘The material is of the utmost importance,’ declared Alison the dressmaker, with such seriousness that she might have been discussing the Treaty of Utrecht.

It was all very exciting and amusing. Then there were the cosmetics. I must be patched and powdered like every other lady of fashion. Jeanne quickly adapted herself to the art, as she had done with that of hairdressing.

‘I am not having one of these fancy hairdressers doing your hair, Milady,’ she announced firmly.

I was all too ready to leave myself in the capable hands of Jeanne and Alison.

I said to Lance: ‘I shall soon be as elegant as you are.’

It must have been about a month after I had received that first letter from Aimée that I had another.

My Dear Sister [she wrote],

A wonderful thing has happened to me. I am to be married. Just as I was thinking myself all alone and forlorn—it was a few days after I wrote to you before—I met Ralph. He lives close by Hessenfield Castle in a fine old house. Is it not strange that we did not meet before? He was not one for the social life… until we met. We like each other… we meet again… and again, and then to my surprise he said “Marry me!” Well, I am amazed, but after a while I say yes. He is a little older than I am… well, thirty years to be truthful. But I do not notice… I am so happy. Dear little sister, you must come and see us. You will one day, eh? I have a fine house and am mistress of it. It makes me feel happy to be wanted, for I was not at Hessenfield and even dear Uncle Paul was never completely warm towards me. He was a most conventional man and I think he did not like the irregularity of our births. But our father, being as he was, how could it have been otherwise…?

I thank you for your warm invitation. It has made me so happy. One day we shall meet again…’

I wrote back to say how delighted I was that she had found happiness with Ralph! I could see her as the mistress of some stately home with an elderly husband who adored her.

The summer days flew past, and I was too young and inexperienced not to believe that they would go on like that for ever.

I could not have had a better companion than Lance. He was completely at home in London—far more so, I was to realize, than he could ever be in the country. He loved the coffee-house talk, and we would go out, dressed more simply than usual so that we could mingle more easily. The Calf’s Head, the Apollo, the October, the Mughouse… I was taken to them all. We would sit listening to the talk, which was clever and even witty, and Lance often joined in.

‘The coffee house is one of the best things that has happened to London,’ he declared.

After the theatre we would have supper in one of the restaurants which were springing up all over the town. We went to Pontac’s or Locket’s, which were two of the most exclusive; but sometimes we went to the less elegant ones—just for the adventure of it, Lance said. There was, for instance, the Salutation in Newgate Street and the Mitre in Fleet Street.

The days and nights were filled with new experiences and I felt that marriage was a wonderful experience. I could now respond to Lance’s passion, which delighted him. I was no longer the shrinking and reluctant maiden and although I could not be said to be worldly, I was growing into a full-blooded woman.

Though the streets could be dangerous at night, and pickpockets—and worse—lurked in the shadows, I always felt safe with Lance. His carriage with its stalwart driver and footman would always be waiting for us.

‘They have, thank God, got rid of the Mohocks,’ Lance commented. ‘A scandalous club, that was… dedicated to making mischief. No one was safe from them. They’d run a sword through a sedan and they once rolled women down Snow Hill in hogsheads. It is a few years since they were disbanded but memories of them linger on, and although the streets are still a danger, they are better for the removal of those men.’

We were entertained a great deal. Lance had many friends in fashionable London. I visited gracious houses with him and we gave dinner parties. There was no anxiety for me, for arrangements were taken care of by an adequate staff; my own concern was that I should be a credit to Lance.

I was welcomed into society. I was known as a member of the Eversleigh family and Lance was a favourite everywhere. We did not go to Court, though Lance supposed we should have to at some time.

‘It’s incredibly dull how,’ he said. ‘Those Germanic customs are not appreciated here. The King is dull and heavy and there is no Queen… only those grasping mistresses; who, I believe, are making fortunes for themselves out of selling favours. George is criticized for putting his poor wife, Sophia Dorothea, away—they say she is more or less a prisoner—and all because he suspected her of being unfaithful with Count Königsmarck, and if she were, she was only following in the footsteps of her husband.’

The London life absorbed me and I was a little disappointed when Lance said it would be necessary for us to go to his estates in the country for a little while.

Clavering Hall had been the house of the family for two hundred years, and I was back again in the kind of house I knew so well from Eversleigh and Enderby. After the airy comfort of the modern house in Albemarle Street I found the Hall a little oppressive. Like all such houses it seemed to carry with it an aura of the past, as though those who had lived there before lingered on in spirit, endowing the place with their joys and sorrows—mostly sorrows.

But no house in which Lance lived could be gloomy. There were elegant touches in curtains, carpets and such articles; but the court cupboards, the four-poster beds, and large refectory tables were relics of a bygone age.

The hall, of course, was the centre of the house, with the east and west wings on either side, and there were two fine staircases with handrails framed into the newels; the woodwork was exquisite, the doors intricately carved and the fireplaces, which were very fine indeed, were carved with scenes from the Bible. There were rich tapestries on the walls in beautifully blended colours. It was a gracious, lovely house and Lance was proud of it.

He had a large estate which demanded a great deal of attention, but he had several people who did the necessary work under a most efficient manager. That suited Lance, who, I discovered, did not care to do one thing for too long at a time. He could be enthusiastic about the estate for a few days and then when some weeks had passed it began to pall.

The house was frequently full of guests from the neighbourhood; they came to dine and, I discovered, to play games of chance.

I was dismayed one night after dinner when I, with the ladies, had left the table and we had chatted together, to rejoin the men and find them preparing to sit down and play with the cards.

I saw the excitement in Lance’s eyes and I realized then that when the gambling fever was upon him he was like a different man. Before, I had always been aware of his tender attention at gatherings like this. He always looked after me, which was what I had wanted when I was first introduced to his friends. He would give me a detailed—and always amusing—description of the people we were meeting, telling me their likes and dislikes, warning me of their foibles, making it easy for me to be a success in society. I had always been aware of that special care and had been grateful for it. Now, I realized that he had forgotten me. I saw that gleam in his eyes which I was to see many times in the years ahead.

The play began. Those who did not join in were left to amuse themselves. Quite a number of the women did join in and I noticed that they appeared to play with the same feverish intensity as the men.

When all those who did not wish to play had left I retired to my bedroom. Lance went on playing with those who had gone to the tables. I lay in bed waiting for him to come up. It was past three o’clock when he did.

He came to the bed and looked down at me.

‘Still awake?’ he asked. ‘You should be fast asleep by now.’

‘So should you,’ I said.

He bent over and kissed me. ‘A good night’s play,’ he said. ‘I won two hundred pounds.’

‘You might have lost it,’ I said, aghast.

‘What a dismal outlook! I won two hundred and you talk of losses. Never mind. I’ll buy you a new dress when we get back to London.’

‘I have enough new dresses.’

‘Oh come, a woman can always do with another. You sound a little piqued, sweetheart. Is it because I left you alone so long?’

I said: ‘I wish you didn’t love gambling so much.’

‘Sweet of you,’ he said lightly, ‘to care so much for what I do.’

‘One day,’ I began.

‘Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof,’ he quoted. ‘That’s a good motto. It’s one of mine. You should make it one of yours, Clarissa. There. I’m back now. I’ll be with you in a moment.’

I lay uneasy until he came. He slipped into bed beside me and took me into his arms.

‘Let me kiss away the frowns,’ he said. ‘Remember, I’m the one you love… full of imperfections… but you love me all the same.’

He made such ardent love to me that I forgot I had been left alone. In my heart I knew it was something I must accept, but just then I preferred to forget.