Mary Crawford’s Debut #5
He bent his head to hers, and Mary’s heart stopped—but not the world around them. She heard the unmistakable sound of a gasp.
They snapped apart, and he muttered, “Damnation.”
She blinked as a figure turned away from their secluded corner. “It’s only Jones,” she whispered, still dazed by the almost kiss.
He nodded once. “Pity.”
Mary paced restlessly in her bedchamber, a ticking clock the only sound to break the oppressive silence of the house.
The events of the day—of that almost kiss and his declaration of wishes versus duty—had left her in a state of turmoil.
She had been too stunned to think and repined that she had not enough perspicacity about her then to ask what he meant by it all.
“Pity,” he had said. Pity that only Jones had interrupted them? Or pity that her maid was no one to spread gossip about clandestine moments in the park, forcing them to wed?
To wed? Lawks, Mary, how quickly your imagination jumps from admiration to love, from love to matrimony.
She flopped onto her bed, unable to stop wondering why she felt so dejected; after all, she hardly knew the man, regardless of how well they got on, how handsome he was, charming, titled, rich… handsome.
You already listed handsome.
But it was true. Halstead was quite fine.
A knock at the door interrupted her thoughts, and she sat up, half-expecting, half-hoping for Lily or even Henry to offer some distraction, some escape from her spiralling psyche. But it was her aunt’s maid, Beauchamp.
“Pardon, mademoiselle. Madame Crawford requests your company.”
Mary sighed in relief. There was a comfort to be found in her aunt Crawford’s presence, a reassurance in her wisdom, even if her lingering illness had left her diminished in strength.
The house seemed empty as she made her way to her aunt’s apartments. The dim light of the late afternoon seemed to deepen the solitude but also made her aunt’s chambers more intimate.
Her aunt looked up as she entered, her face flushed with warmth from the fire that crackled in the hearth. Aunt Crawford, though frail, had the same keen regard and sharp wit that Mary had inherited.
“Ah, my sweet girl,” Aunt Crawford said, her voice weak but firm. “Sit with me, my dear. I heard from Beauchamp that your ball was a resounding success.”
Unsure of how to broach the topic of the viscount, Mary perched on the chair beside her aunt’s bed.
“Yes, yes. It was wonderful. You were missed… excessively. Aunt,” she began carefully, her voice faltering, “I—something has happened.”
A shadow passed over Aunt Crawford’s face as she shifted under the coverlet, and she stared blankly out of the window. Her voice, when it came, was pained.
“Beauchamp said that your uncle had done something most disgraceful.” She paused, her fingers trembling as she smoothed the folds of her blanket.
“He invited that woman into this house to attend your birthday celebration. I cannot fathom such disrespect. To permit her to step through our doors, to mingle among our guests, and at your debut of all places…” Aunt Crawford’s voice quavered with the effort to hold back tears.
“It is a humiliation. He has shamed me in front of everyone, and I cannot understand how he could be so callous to you.”
Mary clenched her fists in her lap with a fierce, sudden anger. The remembrance of the handsome woman, Mrs Smith-Wood, intruding in the ballroom where her aunt should have been made her blood boil.
“Aunt, I… You must know, surely, you must know, I did not know she was invited. I was not even certain who she was…” Mary’s voice spluttered, and her chest tightened with the injustice of it all.
Her aunt whispered, “Was she very beautiful?”
“La!” She clasped her aunt’s hands. “Varnish and gilding hide many stains.”
Her aunt kissed her fingers. “Oh, you are dear for attempting to soothe my wound.”
Mary sniffed, recalling the hale, sophisticated woman on the arm of one of her uncle’s friends. “I suppose I should be grateful I did not have to suffer an introduction.”
Aunt Crawford’s eyes glistened, and her voice was hoarse with hurt and resignation.
“Men like him do not understand what is sacred. They are too consumed with their desires and their selfishness to care about the damage they cause. To me, to you, to our reputation.” She let out a weedy, bitter laugh that resulted in a hacking fit.
Mary handed her a handkerchief and was horrified to note the bright red smear on the linen after the coughing subsided.
“What can we do?” Aunt Crawford said. “We cannot change them. I have endured your uncle’s mistresses for years, but I thought—I expected—that at least, in public, I might have some semblance of dignity. But no. Not even that.”
Mary reached for her aunt’s hand again, her voice tremulous with the shared encumbrance of their disillusionment. “I thought marriage… That love…”
They wept, and after a time, Aunt Crawford said, “Enough. That is enough of this sad indulgence. Tell me of your triumph.”
After such tears, Mary was in no humour to offer a proper accounting of the festivities, but she owed it to her aunt to lift her spirits. “I danced every set, the music was heavenly, the flowers lovely, and everybody was in looks. Lord Halstead arrived late—”
Her aunt raised an eyebrow, her hand worrying the delicate lace at her lap. “Ah, yes. Beauchamp said she heard there was some… moment of significance between you and the viscount at the ball, and I gather it has left you thinking of him.”
Aunt Crawford had always been perceptive, and Mary had not realised how much of her own emotions had been written on her face. She nodded, unwilling to lie, finally unravelling all: the waltz, the newssheets, and her confusion.
“And he came here this afternoon. And we took a turn in Berkeley Square. It was all... so sudden. He spoke to me of his family’s wishes, of Lady Penelope.”
And then, he almost kissed me.
She dared not reveal that to her aunt—why shock the dear woman further? “He is to marry her, as his family demands.”
Aunt Crawford squeezed Mary’s hand, her grip assured despite her frailty. “It is always like that with men, my dear. You must know that…? Men who pretend to love, who talk of affections, and yet, when it comes to duty, they are more loyal to their own demands.”
Mary knew her aunt spoke of her uncle Crawford more than Halstead’s duty to family, and she sat up straighter. “I know myself not to have silly notions about love, but I confess, after how he and I got on so well, I had hoped… I had… hoped.”
Her aunt’s smile was bittersweet. “Ah, but you are young, my dear, and the world has a way of teaching us lessons we are reluctant to learn. The truth is, we are all selfish creatures. Even those who seem earnest. To survive, we must love ourselves more than we love anyone else.”
“I suppose I have never believed in true love.” Mary’s shoulders sagged, feeling a stab of disappointment that she had been foolish enough, selfish enough, to imagine that perhaps she might be an exception.
“But perhaps… No, it’s all just folly. You are correct. We are all selfish, silly creatures.”
“But your uncle. He cannot love as I would wish. Men like him are too consumed by their own needs. Alas, my dear, selfishness must always be forgiven. Because there is no hope for a cure,” Aunt Crawford said glibly, albeit the truth of her words.
Mary forced a laugh, dry and rancorous, but continued her mockery. “Then I will endeavour to forgive him—” not knowing if she meant Halstead or her uncle “—if there is no cure.”
Her aunt sighed heavily. “Forgiveness is often all we can offer, for in the end, we must learn to live with our disappointments. It is not men we must trust but ourselves. Do not burden yourself with daydreams.”
The quiet in the room, like the weight of her aunt’s words, surrounded her. It was not the comfort she had sought, but perhaps it was the truth she needed to hear.
As she stood to leave, her aunt reached for her hand.
“You are a beautiful young woman. You will be courted, admired, and even loved. But you must remember, especially at age seventeen, that a man’s affection does not determine your worth. It never should.”
“I know, Aunt,” she replied in spite of her heartache. “I will try to remember.”
She left her aunt’s room, her beliefs swirling with the disquieting reality of the dear lady’s wisdom. Was the world nothing but broken promises and selfish desires? Perhaps, after this lesson, there was a part of her that could live without the affection of men after all.
To begin in perfect resolve to trust only oneself at the age of seventeen is a sobering thought.
Professing that she was not formed to be unhappy and convinced that the unjust interference of the viscount’s family, being injurious to at least three persons’ felicity, Mary would heed her aunt’s counsel and guard her heart.
For if there was little faith in men, there was little faith in love.
But on the following day, as she looked out of the window onto her aunt’s rose garden and contemplated the lady’s words of solemnity, the butler startled her peace: “His lordship, the Viscount Halstead.”
The way the viscount moved into the room!
He put her in mind of a lion she once had observed at The Menagerie at The Tower: caged, dangerous.
Each step deliberate, measured as he pursued his prey.
Halstead scanned the room with the same placid authority as if surveying some new domain and…
already his. Something about that confidence strangely appealed to her, especially when she felt swept up and considered his. A tickle teased up her spine.
“Miss Crawford,” he said, taking her hand and bowing over it. “I see you are well this fine day.”
“You have caught me admiring my aunt’s garden. I have a mind to collect some flowers for her room. Would you join me?” she asked, notwithstanding her edicts of being a woman of sense.
“I came for no other reason.”