Twelve #3
Lady Bridlington’s ball was the next social event of importance.
This promised to be an event of more than ordinary brilliance, and although the late Lord Bridlington, to gratify an ambitious bride, had added a ballroom and a conservatory to the back of the house, it seemed unlikely that all the guests who had accepted her ladyship’s invitation could be accommodated without a degree of overcrowding so uncomfortable as to mark the evening as an outstanding success.
An excellent band had been engaged for the dancing, Pandean pipes were to play during the supper, extra servants were hired, police-officers and link-boys warned to make Park Street their special objective, and refreshments to supplement the efforts of Lady Bridlington’s distracted cook ordered from Gunter’s.
For days before the event, housemaids were busy moving furniture, polishing the crystal chandeliers, washing the hundreds of spare glasses unearthed from a storeroom in the basement, counting and recounting plates and cutlery, and generally creating an atmosphere of bustle and unrest in the house.
Lord Bridlington, who combined an inclination for ceremonious hospitality with a naturally frugal mind, was torn between complacency at having drawn to his house all the most fashionable persons who adorned the ton , and a growing conviction that the cost of the party would be enormous.
The bill for wax candles alone threatened to rise to astronomical heights, and not his most optimistic calculations of the number of glasses of champagne likely to be drunk reduced the magnums that must be ordered to a total he could contemplate with anything but gloom.
But his self-esteem was too great to allow of his contemplating for more than a very few minutes the expedient of eking out the precious liquor by making it into an iced cup.
Cups there must certainly be, as well as lemonade, orgeat, and such milder beverages as would please the ladies, but unless the party were to fall under the stigma of having been but a shabby affair after all, the best champagne must flow throughout the evening in unlimited quantities.
His mind not being of an order to question his own consequence, his gratification on the whole outweighed his misgivings, and if a suspicion did enter his head that he had Arabella to thank for the flattering number of acceptances which poured into the house, he was easily able to banish it.
His mother, rather shrewder than he, gave honour where it was due, and, in a fit of reckless extravagance, was moved to order a new gown for Arabella from her own expensive dressmaker.
But she was not, after all, so sadly out of pocket over the transaction, since a very few words whispered into the ear of Mme Dumaine were enough to convince that astute woman of business that the réclame of designing a toilette for the great Miss Tallant would fully justify her in making a substantial reduction in the price of a gown of figured lace over a white satin robe, with short, full, plaited sleeves, fastened down the front with pearl buttons to match the edging of pearls to the overdress.
Arabella, ruefully surveying the depredations caused by a succession of parties to her glove-drawer, was obliged to purchase a new pair of long white gloves, as well as new satin sandals, and a length of silver net to drape round her shoulders in the style known as à l’Ariane.
There was not very much left, by this time, of the Squire’s handsome present to her; and when she considered how impossible her own folly had made it for her to requite her family’s generosity in the only way open to a personable young female, she was overcome by feelings of guilt and remorse, and could not refrain from shedding tears.
Nor could she refrain from indulging her fancy with the contemplation of the happiness which might even now have been hers, had she not allowed her temper to lead her so grossly to deceive Mr Beaumaris.
This was a thought more bitter than all the rest, and it was only by the resolute exercise of her common sense that she was able to regain some degree of calm.
It was not to be supposed that the haughty Mr Beaumaris, related as he was to so many noble houses, so distinguished in his bearing, so much courted, and so much pursued, would ever have looked twice at a girl from a country Vicarage, with neither fortune nor connection to recommend her to his notice.
It was therefore with mixed feelings that Arabella awaited the arrival of the first guests on the appointed night.
Lady Bridlington, thinking that she looked a little hagged (as well she might, after a week of such nerve-racking preparation) had tried to persuade her to allow Miss Crowle to rub a little – a very little!
– rouge into her cheeks, but after one look at the result of this delicate operation Arabella had washed it away, declaring that never would she employ such aids to beauty as must, could he but see them, destroy for ever Papa’s affection for his eldest daughter.
Lady Bridlington pointed out, very reasonably, that there could be no fear of Papa’s seeing them, but as Arabella remained adamant, and showed alarming signs of being about to burst into tears, she pressed her no more, consoling herself with the reflection that even without her usual blooming colour her goddaughter could not fail to appear lovely in the exquisite gown of Mme Dumaine’s making.
One cause at least for satisfaction was granted to Arabella: although some guests might arrive early, and leave betimes to attend another function; others walk in past two o’clock, having relegated Lady Bridlington’s ball to the third place on their list of the evening’s engagements, so that the ball was rendered chaotic by the constant comings and goings, and Park Street echoed hideously for hours to the shouts of My lord’s carriage!
or My lady’s chair! and heated police-officers quarrelled with vociferous link-boys, and chairmen exchanged insults with coachmen; Bertram arrived punctually at ten o’clock, and nobly remained throughout the proceedings.
He had recklessly ordered an evening dress from the obliging Mr Swindon, rightly deeming the simple garments he had brought with him from Heythram quite inadequate to the occasion.
Mr Swindon had done well by him, and when Arabella saw him mount the stairway between the banks of flowers which she had helped all day to revive by frequent sprinklings of water, her heart swelled with pride in his appearance.
His dark blue coat set admirably across his shoulders; his satin knee-breeches showed scarcely a crease; and nothing could have been more chaste than his stockings or his waistcoat.
With his dark, curly locks rigorously brushed into the fashionable Brutus, his handsome, aquiline countenance interestingly pale from the nervousness natural to a young gentleman attending his first ton party, he looked almost as distinguished as the Nonpareil himself.
Arabella, fleetingly clasping his hand, bestowed on him so speaking a look of admiration that he was betrayed into a grin so boyish and attractive as to cause another early arrival to demand of her companion, who was that handsome boy?
Emboldened by the intensive coaching of a noted French dancing-master, whom he had found the time to visit, he claimed his sister’s hand for the first waltz, and, being a graceful youth, taught by the athletic sports at Harrow to move with precision and a complete control over his limbs, acquitted himself so well that Arabella was moved to exclaim: ‘Oh, Bertram, how elegantly you dance! Do, pray, let us make up a set for the quadrille, and dance together in it!’