Part 6 (1/2)
The other possessed the blondest hair Henrietta had ever seen, like pure white silken threads. She made little kisses with her voluptuous lips. ”Eleanora, ma chere amie est ici ma chere amie est ici and with and with pet.i.t pet.i.t Tommie.” She spoke her broken French and English with a thick Germanic accent. Tommie.” She spoke her broken French and English with a thick Germanic accent.
The darker lady waved her long, gloved hand, clanging the jeweled bracelets on her wrists. ”h.e.l.lo, darlings! We have been such good girls, scouring London looking for brides.” She had a low, breathy voice.
”We make a list for you.” The blonde shoved her hand in her down bodice, patting about her expansive bosom. ”Oh no, where did I put it?” She checked the other breast. ”Voila!” She pulled out a wrinkled piece of paper and leaned over the carriage's edge, presenting it to Lady Kesseley.
Kesseley laughed. It struck Henrietta how at ease he seemed with these fas.h.i.+onable ladies whose bombastic beauty made her feel like a homely country lump. He caught her studying him.
”Your Highness and Lady Winslow, may I present my mother's companion, Henrietta Watson.”
”A princess!” Henrietta gasped.
”Oui, the queen is ma chere cousine.”
Kesseley knew stunning princesses! Why hadn't he told her? She thought she knew everything about him, yet here, he was a stranger to her. With Kesseley talking to royalty and her love chasing dainty daisy bonnets about the park, her world was rolling out of its tidy little orbit.
”Curtsey,” Kesseley whispered under his breath.
Oh Lud, in her heartbreak and confusion she had forgotten to curtsey! She made a quick bob, her body burning with embarra.s.sment. Kesseley chuckled at her gauche.
The copper-eyed lady flicked her wrist as if she were already bored with Henrietta. ”Tommie, I'm dreadfully sorry but it's a motley crew of young ladies this year, quite frightful. Freckles and crooked teeth. All dreadfully rich and connected, of course. The only one with any beauty is Lady Sara, and she is chasing this splendidly handsome poet.”
They knew Edward!
”Monsieur Watson is tres handsome.” The princess's impressive bosom rose in admiration. The princess's impressive bosom rose in admiration.
”When I saw him, I thought he was poetry himself and ran out for his book,” Lady Winslow said. She coiled a s.h.i.+ny lock around her finger, then let it go. ”Horrid stuff, gave me a pounding headache. The physician advised I throw it out because of my particular sensitivities to bad art, else just looking at it might send me into boughs again.”
Lady Kesseley glanced at Henrietta, a tiny smirk hiking the side of her lips.
”Ellie,” the princess said in a sing-song voice. ”Un homme bel t'attend. He's come to London just to see you.” He's come to London just to see you.”
Lady Kesseley took a sharp intake of breath. Lady Winslow rammed her elbow into her blonde friend's ribs.
”Ouch!”
”A handsome man waits for Mama?” Kesseley lifted a questioning brow at his mother. ”Why have I not heard about this suitor? Is he a secret?” he said in mock severity, as he smiled. Lady Kesseley didn't see any humor. ”There isn't a man waiting for me. The princess is mistaken.”
Her Highness blinked, confusion creasing her forehead. ”Pardon. I thought-”
Lady Winslow cleared her throat and touched her blonde friend's arm. ”Oh well, we shall ask around the park for brides,” she said brightly. ”Perhaps there is an heiress hiding about.” She kissed her hand and blew it to Lady Kesseley as the carriage jolted forward. ”Au revoir, my dear, dear darling.” my dear, dear darling.”
Kesseley turned to his mother. ”Is a man bothering you?” His voice was thick with that savage male protectiveness.
”No.”
”Tell me his name.”
”For G.o.d sakes. I'm not like Henrietta. I can take care of myself.” Lady Kesseley darted across the equestrian traffic, causing several hors.e.m.e.n to quickly rein their horses. Then she disappeared into a small path cutting into the heart of the park.
Henrietta's gaze shot to Kesseley's face. An unvoiced curse formed on his lips, and he headed off after his mother, apologizing to the inconvenienced riders. Henrietta hurried to catch up.
They found her standing alone beside the Serpentine, looking at her reflection on the water's surface. The branches of a willow drooped down around her like a leafy picture frame. She made such a lovely, elegant vision that a painter-set up with his easels and paints on the bank a few feet away-stopped in mid-brush stroke to stare.
Kesseley drew his mother to him. ”Who is this man? Do I need to kill him?” he asked gently.
”He is no one.” She laughed, a brittle sound, and pulled herself free. ”Let's keep walking.”
Henrietta paused to let them go ahead. She needed s.p.a.ce to think about Edward. She looked deep into the water, past her reflection, to the pale fish darting below. A raindrop splashed the water, then another, breaking everything up.
That was Lady Sara in that daisy bonnet. It had to be. At this very moment, she would be near him, trying to find shelter from the coming rain, feeling the giddy excitement of having him close, their hands touching. Did he kiss Lady Sara too? Did he look at her like she was the most precious thing in the world and whisper sonnets in her ear? Henrietta wondered if Lady Sara even knew about her-the one left behind.
How invisible she felt. As if in a dream where her house was on fire, but she was unable to move or scream, helpless as the flames grew. Except in this scenario she never woke, forced to watch some little bonnet spotted with daisies steal her life.
”No, no, don't leave me, Edward. Don't leave me like this.”
”Pardon?” the painter said a few feet away. It took a moment to realize she had spoken aloud. Oh Lud! She was as mad as Papa. Quickly she tried to cover her mistake.
”I said, umm, no, don't paint paint me. Don't me. Don't paint paint me like this. That's what I said.” me like this. That's what I said.”
His bright eyes regarded her warily as one would a lunatic. ”I'm not.”
”Good.”
She lifted her skirt and hurried past his easel, then stopped. For all his soulful artistic demeanor, he was the worst painter she had ever encountered. Blotches and swirls of paint, it could have been any body of water painted by a three-year-old.
A mysterious smile played on his face and he scratched his graying bearded chin. ”It's about color. I am trying to capture the exact color of the water as I see it now. This moment.”
”Oh.”
”After all, all we have are moments. One after the other, ticking by, then all is gone but the memory of how blue the river was one afternoon in the park.”
Henrietta paused. ”That makes me sad. Time flying away and only blue left.”
”Perhaps not what you have left. Perhaps all you ever had.”
Her heart swelled with pain. This was all she would ever have? This heartache? The man gazed at her with ancient eyes, compa.s.sionate and deep. ”I have to go,” she said, but remained still.
He looked at her companions, now waiting in the distance. ”They will miss you.”
Henrietta nodded, not speaking, then turned and ran off to catch up with Kesseley and his mother. She took his arm, and they hurried toward the road as drops of rain started pelting down. She glanced over her shoulder as the path turned along a row of oaks. The odd painter stood, unaffected by the rain, watching them.
Chapter Seven.
At the edge of the park, Kesseley waved down a hackney. The rain came down like a heavy gray wall of water. Everyone crammed inside the carriage that smelled like old stockings. Kesseley wiped the steam off the window. Outside, the people trapped by the rain huddled under coat collars or journals, navigating the muddy streams of filth and trash flowing down the street gutters.
How could people live year round in this wet, squalid city, breathing its rank air? He hated London.