Chapter 33
Matlock House
Late Afternoon
Serena had climbed the magnificent steps to the imposing front door of Matlock House many times.
Never before, though, had she been so terribly anxious.
Even the steadiness of her elder brother's arm under her palm could not fully allay her fears.
Darcy patted her hand where it rested on his arm, and Serena took a deep breath, let it out slowly, and was pleased that her trembling subsided.
The day of her debut had arrived at last. Serena was not certain that she would have survived being the sole focus of attention at the ball this evening, and thus she was enormously grateful that her cousin Rebekah was being launched this evening as well.
Dinner was first, naturally, and Serena was not sure she would be able to eat so much as a bite of the sumptuous dinner even now being prepared in the Matlock kitchens.
The dinner party would be small, comparatively speaking, with a mere thirty guests bidden to attend, many of them known to Serena.
The ball, by comparison, would be one of the first squeezes of the Season, with hundreds of guests cramming into Lady Matlock's beautiful ballroom.
The very thought was nearly enough to terrify Serena quite out of her wits, so she did not dwell on it.
She would, at least, not be friendless in a sea of strangers.
Her brother would look after her, and her Fitzwilliam cousins could likewise be depended upon.
The Bennet ladies would also be attending, which was a cheering prospect.
Their own official coming-out ball would be the following week, but they were present tonight to support her, and Serena was very grateful.
She wished, for a single selfish moment, that Georgiana was standing beside her as Darcy raised the heavy brass knocker and rapped thrice on the door.
Her younger sister was safely back at Darcy House under the aegis of their governess and would not be forced into Society for at least two years.
Serena wasted a moment wishing she were back in the schoolroom with her sister.
Then the door opened, and she straightened her spine.
It was no use in repining her fate. All she could do was comport herself with dignity as befit her name and her family.
The open door revealed the Matlocks’ butler, who welcomed them within and, after they divested themselves of their outerwear, guided them down a corridor and into the drawing room, where Lord and Lady Matlock, Viscount Radway and his wife, and Colonel and Rebekah Fitzwilliam were waiting.
“My dear Serena,” Lady Matlock exclaimed, hurrying forward with a smile. “Good evening and welcome. You look lovely, dear one!”
Serena smiled gratefully in return. She did look quite well, she thought, so long as one did not focus on her excessive height.
The dressmaker in Lambton had suggested, with great tact, that Serena would look better in a simple dress, and for this most important of days, she was wearing a soft pink gown with a white gauze overdress and a simple pearl necklace around her neck.
“Thank you, Aunt,” she said aloud and then looked over to her cousin Rebekah. “You look marvelous, Cousin.”
Rebekah was pretty, with brown eyes and brown hair, and warm, creamy skin. She wore a primrose silk gown and a simple necklace at her throat and two gold bracelets on her wrists. She was also at least five inches shorter than Serena, having much more typical proportions.
“Thank you, Serena,” Rebekah said, walking over to smile up into her cousin’s face. “Are you excited about tonight?”
“Excited and nervous,” Serena confessed.
“I am nervous, too,” Rebekah said.
“I know you will both do very well,” Lord Matlock said, speaking for the first time. “How are you this evening, Nephew?”
Darcy, whose gaze had been fixed on his sister, turned and said, “I am doing very well, sir. Thank you for allowing Serena to be launched at your ball.”
“I will not pretend that I had anything to do with any of it,” Matlock said with a chuckle, “except to pay for everything. My dear wife and daughters were the ones who made all the arrangements.”
“Including Marianne,” Lady Matlock said, gesturing at her elder son’s wife, Lady Radway. “She was enormously helpful, as she still remembers all the details of her own coming out six years ago. You remember Marianne, Serena, Darcy?”
They did, of course, though they had met their cousin’s wife only a few times. Marianne was not a great beauty, but she had come with a substantial dowry and was a courteous and sensible lady, and she had already produced two sons for her husband, Viscount Radway, during their marriage.
“It is good to see you again, Lady Radway,” Darcy said with a bow.
“Oh, please call me Marianne,” the lady said. “I hope you do not mind if I ask about the Bennet ladies who will be attending the ball tonight? Richard tells me that they are a charming pair and that the elder is incredibly beautiful.”
Serena turned a startled look on her cousin Richard, who grinned and said, “I am right, am I not, Serena? Miss Elizabeth is handsome, but Miss Bennet is one of the most remarkable beauties I have ever beheld.”
Serena nodded slowly and said, “Jane is such a good friend that I do not really notice how handsome she is, but yes, she is very beautiful.”
“But it is her sister Elizabeth who is the great heiress, I understand?” Lord Radway asked, glancing at his brother Richard.
“More than eighty thousand pounds,” Richard agreed. “She will have eligible gentlemen clustering around her like bees to honey.”
Serena looked at her brother and noted the stiff look on his face.
“I know that Elizabeth does not want to marry a man who only wants her money,” she said aloud, and she was pleased when her brother’s expression relaxed a trifle.
“We shall see,” Lord Radway said drily. “Many a woman would trade a dowry for a substantial rise in societal position.”
“It will be interesting to see what happens,” Lady Matlock said diplomatically, just as the butler opened the drawing room door to introduce the first of the guests for dinner.
***
Matlock House
Later
An invitation to a Countess’s ball was valuable, and it appeared that everyone who had received one from Lady Matlock had accepted it.
The traffic on the street facing Matlock House was staggering, with coaches and carriages and chairs coming and going in a constant bustle.
The stream of traffic up the broad, shallow marble steps was no less impressive, gentlemen in their glorious evening coats and ladies arrayed as gloriously as peacocks, with glittering jewels in their hairs and fastened around wrists and necks.
The front doors stood wide open to admit the guests, who formed up in a loose queue to greet the receiving line.
Elizabeth stood a few feet within the door of the house, close beside her mother and Jane, and gazed about herself with awe.
She had expected to be one person among great crowds in London, but the reality was more than a trifle overwhelming.
Ahead of them, she saw a line of people who could only be the Earl of Matlock and his family; the Countess, a very elegant woman, standing beside him.
A younger man stood next to him, and a woman beyond, and then the only one of the family whom Elizabeth recognized.
She had already been grateful to have made the acquaintance of Colonel Fitzwilliam; now she was emphatically glad.
He would be able to introduce them to the rest of his family.
He was not, however, the member of the family who caught her interest at the moment.
A young lady stood upon his other side, looking glorious in white silk over a primrose underdress, pearls around her graceful neck and dewy yellow rosebuds pinning up her elaborate brown curls.
She was neither short nor tall and had a sweet, pretty face, rendered beautiful by her joy in the evening.
She could only be Rebekah Fitzwilliam, in whose honor, along with Serena Darcy, this ball was being held.
As Elizabeth watched, she curtseyed to a tall matron with iron-gray curls contained in a turban of plum silk and secured with a massive sapphire pin, and the two exchanged brief conversation.
Realizing that she was staring, Elizabeth turned her attention to her sister.
Jane looked as serene as she always did and perfectly angelic in a sky blue gown.
Delicate flowers, embroidered in white silk, were scattered across the skirt, the entire ensemble demurely hidden in a haze of white gauze overdress.
A single aquamarine pendant hung from a chain of tiny gold flowers and linked stems clasped about her neck.
Elizabeth’s gown was coordinated with her sister’s. The gauze overdress was the same, although Elizabeth had chosen a soft grass green for her underdress, the silk whispering against her legs with every step. Her only jewelry was in the form of a necklace of tiny pearls.
Both of them looked very well, Elizabeth thought, even though they were dressed nowhere near as gloriously as many of the other guests.
Mrs. Bennet had warned them that given that they were newcomers in Society, it would be in poor taste to flaunt their wealth, to be considered forward or vulgar.
Later in the Season, when they had begun to establish their family, they could perhaps indulge in brighter colors or more jewels, but for now, it was wise to be restrained.
The family just ahead of them in line finished greeting the Fitzwilliams and moved down the hall towards the ballroom, and Mrs. Bennet, flanked by her daughters, walked forward.
“Please allow me to make the appropriate introductions,” Colonel Fitzwilliam said, stepping up.
“Mother, Father, Brother, Sisters, may I please introduce Mrs. Bennet, Miss Bennet, and Miss Elizabeth Bennet. Ladies, my father, Lord Matlock, my mother, Lady Matlock, my older brother, Viscount Radway, his wife, Lady Radway, and my sister, Miss Fitzwilliam, who will be launched tonight.”
The Bennets curtseyed deeply, and Lady Matlock said graciously, “It is wonderful to meet you. I hope you will enjoy yourselves.”
“I am certain we will,” Mrs. Bennet said smoothly, and the colonel said, “Miss Bennet, might I have the honor of the second set of dances with you?”
Jane looked a trifle startled, but she quickly said, “I would be delighted. Thank you, Colonel.”
“And Miss Elizabeth, might I have the third set?”
“Yes, that would be lovely,” Elizabeth said with a pleased smile.
The threesome moved on in the direction of the noise and music, and they soon found themselves in a truly impressive ballroom.
Miss Bingley’s ball at Netherfield the previous autumn had, in comparison to the usual Meryton assemblies, been quite the grandest affair many of the attendees, Elizabeth included, had ever seen.
The entire execution had been impressive, from the music to the food to the decorations, and Miss Bingley had been justifiably proud of her ball.
Yet Lady Matlock’s ball for the debut of her daughter and niece entirely cast the Netherfield ball in the shade.
The ballroom at Matlock House was easily twice the size of the one at Netherfield Hall, and not one but three chandeliers illuminated the space, while the windows were thrown wide to let out the heat of attendees and dancers, sheer curtains fluttering in the soft breezes.
Great swathes of silk hung from the walls, and mirrors and candelabras stood in their paneled nooks.
Six musicians sat on their dais, surrounded by massive porcelain vases full of flowers and playing softly.
The dancing had not yet begun, and the guests milled about in the space, conversing with old friends and acquaintances, their garments a glorious mix of winking colors, while an entire flock of ostriches’ feathers bobbed above it all.
Elizabeth looked upon the scene with interest and admiration.
The influx of guests had begun to slow as the start of the ball drew nearer, and it would not be long now before the dancing began.
She was thankful that Mr. Darcy had already asked her for the first set, as it was unlikely that she would garner an invitation from anyone else given that she was a stranger to most of the gentlemen present.
“Mrs. Bennet, Misses Bennet,” a familiar male voice said from their left, and Elizabeth turned and beamed at Mr. and Miss Darcy, who were standing a few feet away next to a large vase of red roses.
“Serena, Mr. Darcy,” Elizabeth said warmly, “good evening! Serena, you look lovely.”
Serena smiled and said, “Thank you. You all look very well, too.”
“Thank you,” Elizabeth replied.
“Good evening!” a familiar voice exclaimed from behind them, and the small group turned in surprise.
“Mr. Bingley,” Jane said. “Good evening! I did not know that you were in London!”
“I arrived from Netherfield only two days ago,” the young man responded with an easy smile. “Darcy, I suspect I have you to thank for my invitation and am most grateful. I would not dream of missing this ball. I hope you are all well?”
“Indeed,” Serena murmured, and Darcy chimed in his agreement, and Elizabeth said, “Yes, and we are very excited about the ball tonight. Are your sisters here, sir?”
Bingley nodded. “Yes, and Hurst, too, but they stopped to talk with an old school friend. Miss Bennet, might I have the honor of a dance this evening?”
Jane nodded in response and said, “I have the first set available.”
Bingley’s eyes brightened with pleasure just as Richard Fitzwilliam hurried into the room, looked around, and then made his way over to the small group as the musicians began playing the notes which were a prelude to the first dance.
“Shall we, Miss Elizabeth?” Darcy asked. She smiled and placed her gloved hand lightly on his arm, and together they walked toward the dance floor, with Jane and Bingley behind them, and Serena and Colonel Fitzwilliam following after.