Chapter 5
H etty sat at her vanity as the morning sun streamed through the windows of her bedchamber. Behind her, her lady’s maid, Molly, wrestled a brush through the tangled curls that had heroically survived three reels, a waltz, a cotillion, a quadrille, and a near collision with the punch table.
“Four dances with the same gentleman, miss,” Molly said once more, as though repeating it might make it less astonishing. “Mercy, I dare say half the room was craning their necks to see what you’d do next!”
Hetty only smiled and took another sip of her tea, already imagining the headlines: Lady H.T.
Commits Social Suicide in Scandalous Silk!
Or perhaps: The Earl of Langley Ensnared by Notorious Tolliver Minx!
Either would suffice, so long as her name was spelt correctly and accompanied by a flattering sketch of her gown.
The gown in question lay draped over a nearby chaise longue like the spoils of a glorious battle.
Hetty cast it a fond glance, recalling the exact moment Lady Wexley had dropped her fan in sheer horror as she and Theo swept into a fourth dance.
It was, she reflected, the most exciting evening she’d had in years.
Molly, struggling with a particularly obstinate curl, offered a wry smile. “I do understand, Miss, that Lord Langley has been your companion since childhood, but one must admit he has matured into quite the handsome gentleman. The very toast of Mayfair, according to the scandal sheets.”
Hetty scoffed softly. “If a crooked nose and devil-may-care hair are the height of fashion, then it is no surprise he has set the standard for all Mayfair. He has become quite the rake, you must know.”
Molly gave a small nod, but Hetty caught her smile in the mirror. “If you say so, Miss. Though between you and me, I have always thought a touch of rakishness suits him rather well.”
Hetty mused on this for a moment, wincing as Molly wrestled another curl into submission.
She had never given much heed to Theo’s amorous exploits, yet it struck her as a most grievous injustice that he might indulge in such freedoms without consequence, whilst she could scarcely be alone in a room with a gentleman without a chaperone.
Truth be told, she found herself rather curious what Theo’s escapades truly entailed – beyond the kissing, naturally, which she had read no shortage in the scandalous novels she kept well-hidden beneath her chiffons.
She imagined there must be more, of course, but she would not allow herself to entertain thoughts of Theo in such a manner, lest she be seized by a fit of nausea.
Tugging a final pin into place, Molly’s expression turned serious. “Now, if I may be so bold, Miss, I do not expect her ladyship shall recover swiftly. Her nerves were quite delicate already, after Miss Charlotte’s incident with the archery target.”
Hetty’s lips twitched. “That was hardly Lottie’s fault. The marquess should not have wandered into the path of a drawn bow.”
“All the same, miss,” Molly said, stepping back to admire her handiwork in the glass, “I daresay her ladyship was not expecting two daughters to imperil the family name in as many days. She declared herself quite certain her spleen was failing as she was helped to bed last night.”
As though summoned by the very mention, the door burst open.
Hetty neither rose from her toilette nor flinched nor spared her mother so much as a glance.
She had awaited this moment since the instant she had taken to the dance floor for the fourth time.
She remained composed, teacup in hand, a picture of serenity in the face of certain maternal doom.
“Good morning, Mama,” she said evenly as Lady Tolliver stormed in with a rolled up newspaper in one hand. “Do come in.”
“Have you read this, Henrietta Anne Tolliver?” her mother cried, breathing as though she had galloped up the stairs in a fit of hysteria – which, in fairness, she had.
“I can scarcely imagine the horrors it contains!” Without awaiting response, she snapped open the paper and launched into a breathless recitation:
“The most daring young lady of the Season has set tongues wagging and hearts aflutter after last night’s Devonshire Ball.
Lady H.T. – whose name need hardly be spelt out for our discerning readers – was resplendent in sapphire satin, her gown cut in the à la Grecque style, with an empire waist and a décolletage of such boldness that one could only presume divine confidence or criminal intent.
Yet rather than censure, the effect produced was one of stunned admiration, as though a goddess herself had descended to grace the drawing room with fashionable impunity.
The modistes are already beside themselves with inquiries. Heaven help us all.”
Lady Tolliver lowered the paper with an expression of such utter bewilderment, one might have believed she had just been informed of her own engagement. Hetty set down her teacup with exquisite care as her mother continued to read:
“Yet fashion is not the only sphere in which Lady H.T. has left her mark, for she was seen dancing no fewer than four times with a certain earl – whose absence from such assemblies has long been an object of speculation. Theirevident intimacy anddelight in one another’s company did not pass unnoticed.
Such frequency has not been seen since Lord Denholm proposed amid a quadrille.
Are wedding bells on the horizon? We await confirmation.
But for now, society may rejoice: a new diamond has been named – and her name is Tolliver. ’”
There followed a silence so profound that even Molly dared not move. Hetty reached for her vinaigrette bottle and uncorked it delicately beneath her own nose.
Lady Tolliver, by contrast, launched into a frenzy of fanning.
“A diamond? A diamond! Do you have the faintest notion what this means, Henrietta? The Diamond of the Season! The toast of every drawing room from Grosvenor Square to Berkeley Street! Oh, the Duchess of Devonshire herself shall surely call upon us!” She grasped the back of a nearby chair as though the force of her maternal triumph had physically overcome her.
“You have ignited the ton , child. I daresay even Lady Wexley has swallowed her lorgnette from sheer envy.”
Hetty inhaled a slow breath. Indeed, the rise and fall of her shoulders might have belonged to a girl receiving her penmanship award from a well-meaning aunt. To be praised rather than ruined was a most vexatious outcome.
Nevertheless, folding her hands neatly in her lap, Hetty replied with devastating composure, “Quite so, Mama. It was, naturally, all part of the design. I cannot imagine why you ever doubted me.”
—
?—
The Tolliver drawing room, ordinarily a space for tea, embroidery and the occasional poultry-related incident, had, by mid-morning, assumed all the energy and organisation of a military encampment.
The footman had already answered the door no fewer than six times, a second salver of calling cards had been presented for inspection and the burgeoning heap of floral tributes now resembled a modest conservatory.
Hetty was seated on the central settee with her spine straight, hands folded demurely in her lap and lips fixed into a smile so composed it might have been sewn on.
Her gown – seafoam muslin with embroidered violets – had been selected by Lady Tolliver herself, and most alarmingly, featured a neckline that teetered perilously close to French.
Hetty’s smile had not faltered in half an hour, which was a remarkable feat, considering her left eye had begun to twitch.
Beside her, the viscountess had ensconced herself in the finest armchair as though presiding over a drawing room levee, robed in a plum satin morning gown so heavily adorned with lace it looked as though a haberdasher’s entire stock had perished in its making.
She had already declared herself “positively beside herself with delight” on two occasions and looked very likely to do so a third.
Her ladyship had issued strict commands to her daughters that morning – excluding, of course, Hetty, whose elevation to Diamond of the Season had rendered her temporarily immune to criticism.
The others had not been so fortunate. “I expect serenity,” Lady Tolliver had proclaimed. “And ankles firmly together, Eleanor!”
Nell, cross-legged and visibly itching to climb something, had been wrestled into a lemon-yellow day gown and now sat on the very edge of the settee, hands folded so tightly in her lap it looked like she might implode.
In the corner, Mari sat curled in a chair like a small woodland creature.
She was buried in a copy of The Mysteries of Udolpho, and while she had not spoken since breakfast, every inch of her posture expressed the sort of despair usually reserved for Gothic heroines locked in towers.
From time to time, she peered above the book’s edge with the wary vigilance of a mouse inspecting a trap.
Lottie was rigidly upright in a pale green frock with a violently stiff sash.
Her hair had been curled within an inch of its life and she kept tugging on her gloves as though debating whether strangling one of Hetty’s suitor might be worth the scandal.
Having exhausted all other amusements between callers, she had taken to enlivening the room by reading aloud select passages from The Morning Tattler, with particular emphasis on those she deemed most absurd:
“The ever-delightful Miss Tolliver was observed last evening in animated conversation with no fewer than three eligible gentlemen, none of whom departed without adjusting their cravats. One wonders what precisely was said to provoke such evident agitation.”
“I told one of them his boots squeaked,” Hetty murmured behind the fragile veneer of her smile, “and the other that his teeth appeared dangerously sharp.”