Part 20 (1/2)
”And if the real parents are unknown?” Camille asked.
”We follow the same careful investigative procedure,” Miss Ford said. ”Having our children adopted feels a little like giving up our own children, you know. We will do it gladly if it is for the child's benefit, but it is never easy to say goodbye. Understandably, most adoptive parents do not want to come back here for visits.”
”Do you remember Sammy and his golden curls?” the nurse asked, and she and Miss Ford were off into reminiscences of babies they had lost to adoption.
Camille returned to her room and wrote to Harry to congratulate him upon his promotion. It was the first time she had written directly to him. It was painful. Harry had been the Earl of Riverdale. She had been forever annoyed with him because he was having the time of his life, surrounded by companions who numbered more sycophants than real friends, merely wearing a black armband in deference to their father's pa.s.sing while Mama, Abby, and she were swathed in funereal black. But he had been a good-hearted boy, cheerful, intelligent, affectionate. She had loved him dearly without fully realizing it. And she loved him now and felt the pain of what had happened to him. His letters were always high spirited, but what was the reality? Would he even be alive to read her letter? Her fear for him was always there, deeply suppressed but very real.
The price of love, she thought, was pain. Was it worth it? Was it better not to love at all?
In the middle of the afternoon she walked up to the Royal Crescent, as she had done yesterday before the picnic, to raid her wardrobe for something more suitable to wear to the evening's ball than any of the few garments that hung in her room at the orphanage. It felt a little like digging into a past life she had left behind longer ago than a few months, but there was something undeniably enticing about it. What woman did not like to dress up and look her best at least once in a while?
She chose a gown of silver lace over blue satin, its waistline high beneath her bosom, its neckline low, the sleeves short and puffed. The hem was deeply scalloped and embroidered with silver thread. She donned long silver gloves and silver slippers and would carry a delicate fan that opened to reveal a brightly colored painting of fat winged cherubs hovering above a romantically handsome, languis.h.i.+ng young man who looked as though he had been badly wounded by one of Cupid's darts. It amused Camille-though she had never thought of it before-to imagine that the holder of the fan perhaps held the fate of a young man's love literally in the palm of her hand. Her only jewelry was the pearl necklace her father had given her on her come-out-actually it was his secretary who had delivered it to her-and the matching earrings that had been her mother's gift. Her grandmother's dresser styled her hair high on her head with intricate twists and curls and some waved tendrils to lie along her neck and over her ears.
For a moment, looking at herself in her mirror, she felt a wave of nostalgia for that familiar world she had left behind so abruptly. But it surprised her to realize that she would not go back now even if she could. She did not believe she particularly liked the person she had been then, and she certainly did not like the person to whom she had been betrothed. She turned away and went to Abigail's room, where she found her sister looking like a relic of springtime in a pretty pale yellow gown Camille had not seen before. She was in a fever of excitement and anxiety.
”Will it be like a real ball, do you think?” she asked. ”Oh, you do look lovely, Cam. I always wish I had grown as tall as you.” Abby had attended a few local a.s.semblies in the country, but no formal b.a.l.l.s. She had never had a coming-out Season.
”It will not be like a London squeeze, I suppose,” Camille said, ”but I understand the whole of Bath polite society has been invited, and I would imagine it is being touted as the grandest event of the summer. The Westcotts have more than their fair share of t.i.tles among them, after all. It will be well attended.”
”Do you think-” Abigail stopped and fussed over donning her shawl and picking up her fan. ”Do you think we may have a few partners, Cam? Apart from Uncle Thomas and Alexander, that is?”
”I think,” Camille said, ”our aunts will take their duties as hostesses seriously, Abby. A hostess does not like to see wallflowers decorating her ballroom. It reflects badly upon her.”
”They will find us partners, then?” Abigail wrinkled her nose.
”It is the way things are arranged,” Camille told her. ”And sometimes gentlemen will ask to be presented. It is not done, you know, for them to rush up and ask for a dance when there has been no introduction.”
She hoped she was speaking the truth. She hoped her sister would have dancing partners and that they would not be just older married men who had been coerced into it or had taken pity on her. She did not care for herself. She would be quite content merely to watch the festivities and spend a little more time with her family before they returned home. And, as Abby had just said, Uncle Thomas and Alexander and even Avery would no doubt dance with her. And . . .
Joel?
She had tried very hard all day not to think about yesterday. What exactly had he been saying? He probably did not even know himself, though-he had compared his mind to a hornets' nest. But-I would like to have children of my own. I would like to give them what I never knew, a father and a mother. And he had spoken of adopting children. He had mentioned Sarah. And then, after seeming to be building to something, he had thanked her for coming and for listening and led the way down the hill.
Oh, she was going to go home to Hinsford with Mama and Abby. She was simply going to give up the struggle and be abject. No, she was not. She was going to remain at the school. She was going to stay firm and . . . Perhaps she would set up her own establishment somewhere and live independently. She could do it with the money she was taking from Anna. She could live very well on it, in fact. She was sure even a quarter of her father's fortune was a very handsome sum. Yes, perhaps she would do just that or. . . .
Oh, Joel.
Abigail was ready to go downstairs, and soon they were in the carriage with their mother and grandmother on the way to the Upper a.s.sembly Rooms even though the distance was a very short one. Mama held Abby's hand tightly, Camille noticed. She herself opened and closed her fan on her lap and wondered if there would be any waltzes.
Joel had become something of a local celebrity. He was already known by some people, of course, as a portrait painter, and those people were able to point him out to everyone else as the penniless orphan who had turned out to be the long-lost great-nephew-some even said grandson-of the very wealthy Mr. c.o.x-Phillips, who had lived in one of the mansions up in the hills. The elderly gentleman had discovered the truth in the very nick of time, or so the story ran, and left every last penny of his millions to the young man, whom he had been able to clasp to his bosom for the first and last time almost with his dying breath.
Joel's celebrity had been enhanced rather than diminished when the story began to circulate and then ignite fas.h.i.+onable drawing rooms that he had punched Viscount Uxbury in the face during a tea at the Upper Rooms, knocking all his teeth down his throat in the process, for insulting a lady.
It was with a great deal of trepidation, then, that Joel approached those same Upper Rooms on Sat.u.r.day evening, uncomfortable in new evening clothes and shoes and wondering if it was imperative for a man to dance at such an event when he had only ever danced at the orphanage. And wondering too if there would be enough dark corners in which to hide. And wondering if it was too late to turn around and go back home. But he was mortally tired of his own cowardice. One thing was certain. He could not return to his old, comfortable life. Very well, then. He would move on with the new.
Besides, Camille might well take herself off to Hinsford Manor tomorrow with her mother and sister, and he was not going to allow it to happen without a fight-or without at least talking to her first.
He walked purposefully up to the door of the rooms, gave his name to the bruiser of a uniformed man who half filled the doorway-at least one person in Bath, it seemed, did not know him by sight-and stepped inside.
Every citizen of Bath except the bruiser at the door must have been invited, he thought over the next few minutes. The tearoom was crammed, the ballroom was full, and if he was not drawing attention wherever he went, then his imagination was far more vivid than he had realized. An orchestra on a raised platform was tuning its instruments, though the dancing had not begun. The place hummed with conversation and laughter, and if someone would just open a trapdoor in the floor Joel would gladly disappear through it without even checking for steps first.
And then Lady Molenor claimed him, all sparkling jewels and nodding hair plumes and gracious manners, and she was closely followed by the Dowager d.u.c.h.ess of Netherby, formidable in a royal blue gown and matching turban with a jewel the size of a robin's egg pinned to the front of it. They bore him off between them to greet the Dowager Countess of Riverdale, who was seated in the ballroom on a chair that resembled a throne, happily receiving the homage and birthday greetings of all and sundry while Lady Matilda Westcott, her daughter, plied a fan in the vicinity of her face, all solicitous concern for her mother's comfort. Anna, looking very lovely indeed in deep rose pink, came to hug him, and Lady Jessica Archer and Miss Abigail Westcott fluttered their fans at him and smiled brightly before walking off arm-in-arm to display their prettiness before the gathered mult.i.tudes. And . . . Camille was there, standing for the moment a little off to one side of her grandmother, alone.
”I do not believe,” he said, stepping closer to her, ”I have ever seen a more beautiful woman.”
She stared at him for a moment and he realized how very extravagant and silly his words must have sounded. But then she smiled slowly, an expression that began with dancing eyes. ”Or I a more handsome man,” she said. ”Joel, you have been shopping. Was it very painful?”
”Excruciatingly so,” he said, grinning at her. ”But I walked all the way up here and my shoes have still not blistered all my toes. Or my heels. Nor has my cravat rubbed my neck raw.”
”You do look very splendid,” she said.
”Camille,” he said, sobering, ”are you really going to go home with your mother and sister?”
She did not answer immediately. ”No,” she said then. ”It would be an admission of defeat, and I refuse to be defeated.”
”Good girl,” he said, as though he were speaking to one of the pupils at the school.
”But, Joel,” she said, unfurling her fan and immediately adding a flourish of gorgeous color to the delicate blues and silver of her garments. ”I have accepted Anna's offer of one-quarter of my father's fortune. I am not sure yet what I will do with it, if anything.”
”Ah,” he said, and he did not know if he was glad or sorry. ”What made you change your mind?”
”I am trying to make my heart follow the lead my head has set,” she said. ”I am trying to love her, Joel. I am trying to think of her as my sister, not just as my half sister. Sharing her fortune is crucial to her happiness.”
He had no chance to answer. There was an increase of movement all about them, and he realized that the orchestra had fallen silent and couples were gathering on the dance floor.
”My set, I believe, Camille,” the Earl of Riverdale said, nodding genially at Joel and extending a hand toward his cousin.
”Yes, Alexander. Thank you,” she said.
And Joel was left alone again until Lady Overfield stepped up beside him. ”I remember Anna telling me about the dances that were held at the orphanage when her old teacher was still there,” she said. ”She knew the steps of everything except the waltz. I suppose you do too, Mr. Cunningham. At the risk of sounding unpardonably forward, would you care to try this one with me? The floor is very crowded. I daresay we will be lost among the ma.s.ses and absolutely no one will even see us.”
And if Camille was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, Joel thought-and he might, of course, be partial-then surely Lady Overfield was the kindest.
”I shall do my very best not to shame you, ma'am,” he said, smiling ruefully at her as he offered his arm.
”I was delighted to learn yesterday,” Alexander said after leading Camille onto the floor, ”that Cousin Viola is returning to Hinsford to live and that Abigail is going with her. Will you go too, Camille?”
”No,” she said, ”except for the occasional visit. But I do not disapprove. I am glad for them too.”
”Your future lies here?” he asked her, looking beyond her shoulder to where Joel was leading Elizabeth out.
”For now, yes,” she said. ”I actually enjoy teaching, though it is the most chaotic, alarming activity I have ever been involved in and I sometimes wonder what on earth I am doing.”
He looked back at her and smiled. ”Apparently Miss Ford has offered you the job for at least the next twenty years,” he said. ”I believe that is a high recommendation.”
”And what about you, Alexander?” she asked him. ”However will you restore the fortunes of Brambledean Court? Or, like Papa, will you not even try?”