Chapter Eighteen
The gown box had been delivered at four and stood upon the dressing-room table, still corded. Selina had not opened it and did not mean to while there was anyone present to watch her do so.
At a quarter past, the door opened without a knock.
“I am coming, and you cannot stop me. If you mean to send me to bed while the two of you fight my battle without me, I shall follow you. I shall take a hired chair to Lady Marwood’s if I must, and stand in the doorway and make such a scene that you will both wish you had simply allowed me to come.”
Georgiana ran out of breath and finished on what remained of it.
“There. That is my argument. I had a better one on the stairs.”
She stood in the middle of the dressing room with her chin at the familiar family angle and her fingers worrying the end of her sash.
Selina put down the hairpin she had been holding.
“I have no intention of sending you to bed. I do, however, intend to give you a part in this evening which is less satisfying than the one you have probably devised for yourself. Sit down and hear it before you agree.”
Georgiana remained standing.
“I can listen perfectly well from here,” she said. “Tell me.”
Selina turned from the glass. “Giles means to accuse me publicly. Rowland matters because he was the man who threatened you, and you still possess the letters he sent: the one insisting upon a clandestine meeting, and the later one threatening publication if you refused.”
Georgiana’s face tightened.
“I kept them.”
“I know. If they are needed tonight, you will produce them. You will not make a speech. You will show the letter and say only what cannot be disputed.”
“What am I to say?”
Selina considered.“‘He sent this letter to me.’”
Georgiana counted silently.
“Six words.”
“Six true words. Then let his own hand do the rest.”
“You think I want to stand up and denounce him.”
“I think you do.”
“Well, I do.” Georgiana looked down at the carpet. “I have rehearsed it, if you want the truth. Last night. There was a very fine part in the middle where I called him a coward to his face.”
“I am sure it was excellent.”
“It was.”
“And Rowland would answer it. He cannot answer his own letter quite so easily.”
“I know.” Georgiana’s hands went back to the sash. “That is the tiresome part. I know you are right and still prefer my speech.”
“You may deliver it to me tomorrow morning if you continue to feel deprived.”
“I shall hold you to that.”
Selina smiled faintly.
Georgiana did not.
“I am frightened,” she said.
The admission seemed to surprise her.
Selina’s expression softened. “I know.”
“You always seem to know what to do with it.”
“I have had considerably more practice.”
Georgiana finally sat, though upon the very edge of the chair.
Selina crouched before her.
“You are not required to be unafraid tonight. You are required only to know your part when the moment comes. Keep the letters with you. If they are needed, produce them. If they are not, they remain in your reticule and no one sees them. You owe that room no performance.”
Georgiana nodded.
“I would still rather make the speech.”
“I know.”
“But I would rather we won.”
“That is useful.”
Georgiana considered this with evident dissatisfaction.
“Is that what growing up is? Discovering that the sensible thing is usually less gratifying?”
Selina rose. “I sincerely hope not. It sounds very dull.”
That earned the beginning of a smile.
“Go and dress,” Selina said. “Simply. Nothing chosen to draw attention. Tonight the letters matter more than the gown carrying them.”
Georgiana went. At the door she stopped and put her hand flat against the frame.
“When you first came here,” Georgiana said, still facing the passage, “I thought you were a spy my brother had bought to manage me.”
“That was not an entirely unreasonable conclusion.”
“I disliked you.”
“That was obvious.”
“I disliked you particularly because you would not dislike me back.”
Selina said nothing.
Georgiana turned.
“And now I keep trying to remember exactly when that changed.”
Her voice had become less certain.
“You need not determine the date.”
“No. But I should like to say the thing while I can still say it here, instead of attempting it tonight with half London listening.”
Selina went very still.
“You are the nearest thing to a sister I have ever had,” Georgiana said. “And if Giles says anything about you tonight, I should like you to remember that before you remember him.”
For several seconds Selina could not answer.
Then she held out her arms.
“Come here.”
Georgiana did, and Selina embraced her briefly and hard.
“You are my sister too,” she said. “I had not expected one either.”
Georgiana’s arms tightened once around her.
When they parted, both looked elsewhere.
“Now go,” Selina said. “Before you ruin my eyes and oblige me to attend Lady Marwood’s looking genuinely distressed.”
Georgiana laughed and went.
The Season was well advanced, and Lady Marwood’s ball had attracted precisely the sort of attendance Giles required for a public accusation; and consequently, the audience Selina required for its answer.
Mrs Loxley had arrived earlier in the evening and had been given a private room in which to rest. She remained free to change her mind until the moment she was asked to enter the ballroom. Selina had made certain that this was understood by everyone concerned, most particularly Lady Marwood.
Petherick would attend with the proved copy of Lady Merrow’s codicil, the broker’s account of the garnet sale and Mr Dunmore’s records of Selina’s remittances.
The sequence of the answer was simple because Selina had insisted upon keeping it so.
If Giles alleged that the garnets belonged to the estate, the codicil would establish that they had belonged to Selina.
If he used the later payments to suggest that she had concealed estate funds, the accounts would establish their lawful sources. Mrs Loxley would speak of their destination only if she still wished to do so.
If Rowland attempted to present himself as an innocent party, Georgiana possessed his own threatening letters. Sowerby’s evidence supplied the connection between Rowland and Giles.
They would answer only what Giles actually alleged. Selina had refused to construct a dozen defences against accusations he might never make.
That morning another letter had arrived.