Джорджетт Хейер - Cotillion

“But I cannot think that Camille is at all respectable,” said Kitty, in a small voice. “I very much fear, Freddy, that he is a gamester!”

“He is?” said Freddy, rather pleased. “Just what I said! Te3i you so?”

“Yes. He said also that his father runs a hell!”

“No, does he? Shouldn’t wonder if it was in the Palais Royale,” said Freddy knowledgeably. “Find all the best ones there, so m’father tells me.”

Taken aback, Kitty said: “But, Freddy, is it not very shocking?”

“Well, it ain’t precisely what one wants in the family,” admitted Freddy. “Dashed awkward, if your uncle ran a hell in London, of course, but he ain’t at all likely to, and if only we can hit on a scheme to get rid of this Camille of yours— not that I’ve anything against the fellow, except that it’s as plain as a pikestaff he might easily become a deuced nuisance —we shall be all right and tight.”

“I have the greatest apprehension that there will be some dreadful scandal!” said Kitty. “I see that I must tell you the whole. Freddy, it appears that he has fallen desperately in love with Olivia!”

“No harm in that,” said Freddy. “In fact, good thing! Don’t mind telling you, Kit, that it’s his dangling after the Yalding widow that made me take fright. Bound to lead to trouble! Needn’t think old Annerwick won’t make a lot of dashed awkward enquiries, because that’s just what he will do. Anyone would!”

“Oh, Freddy, I fear you do not understand!” said Kitty unhappily, and began, in a halting voice, to tell him just what the Chevalier had said to her.

He listened to her attentively, but his comment, at the end of her recital, was not just what she had expected. “Do you mean to tell me the fellow said all this to you, Kit?” he demanded incredulously. “Well, if that don’t beat the Dutch! Why the deuce couldn’t he have kept his mouth shut? French! Never knew such a set of gabsters!”

“I must own, I did rather think that myself,” she confessed. “Indeed, I was aghast to learn that he had disclosed the truth to Olivia.”

“I should think you would be!” he agreed. “No doing anything with such a gudgeon! Think she’ll spread the tale?”

“Oh, no, I am persuaded she would not! But only think of the pain she must have suffered!”

“No use thinking of that. Got enough to think about on our own account. Nothing for it but to pack the fellow off to France again, Kit. Dashed if I’ll have him causing you embarrassment! Devilish unpleasant situation, if the truth leaked out, y’know.”

“Oh, yes, and how shocking it would be if poor Lady Maria were to be taken-in, when I know the whole, and should have warned her! Only, how can I, Freddy?”

Rather alarmed, he said: “Lord, no! Now, for God’s sake, Kit, don’t you do anything buffle-headed! Only make bad worse! Got to think of a way to be rid of him. Daresay I shall hit on something.”

“Would he go, do you suppose, if you threatened him with exposure?” she asked doubtfully.

“Not unless he’s a regular flat, which we know he ain’t,” he replied. “Must know I wouldn’t do any such thing! Nice scandal to start in the family!”

“Would—would Jack?” she asked. “That is what I can’t help being afraid of! I—I fancy Jack may have a good reason for wishing Camille otherwhere.”

“Fellow tell you that too?” demanded Freddy. “Well, upon my soul!”

*’Is it true, Freddy?”’ asked. Kitry shyly.

“No use asking me. For one thing, dashed improper! and tor another, wouldn’t tell you, if I knew, which { don’t. Got something better to do than to pry into what don’t concern me.”

“Well,” said Kitty, with fortitude, “I have learnt a great deal since I came to town, and I think very likely it is true.”

“It don’t signify whether it is or whether it ain’t. Point is, Jack won’t expose your cousin any more than I will. Coming it a trifle too strong! What I mean is, if he nimbied the fellow’s lay, what the devil did he mean by presenting him to you, let alone a lot of other people? Yes, by Jove! Brought him to m’sister’s house! Spiked his own guns, Kit! He’s a bruising rider, but he don’t over-face his horses. He’ll keep his mouth shut.”

“Freddy, if he knew—or even suspected—that my cousin was not what he pretends to be, why—why did he bring him to Berkeley Square?”

“Because it’s the sort of thing he would do!” said Freddy tartly. “Same reason he tried to hoax me into going down to Arnside. Got a dashed queer sense of humour.”

“Yes, I see,” said Kitty. “I expect he wanted to punish me a little. Why didn’t you tell me what you suspected, Freddy?”

“Because I ain’t a French gabster!” said Freddy.

Upon their arrival in Berkeley Square, they were admitted into the house by the porter. Freddy was just about to take formal leave of his betrothed when his sister, attired in a flounced and frilled dressing-gown of rose-pink silk, appeared at the head of the staircase, and began to deliver herself of a dignified request to Miss Charing to come to her bedroom before she retired to her own. As the speech had been carefully composed and conned, it was a pity that the greater part of it remained unuttered. Her ladyship, perceiving Kitty’s escort, broke off in sudden dismay, and clutched the banister-rail. “F’Freddy?” she said faintly.

“Oh, Meg, is that you?” cried Kitty, nobly coming to her rescue. “I wish you had not sat up for me! Was it very tedious, your party?”

A speaking look of gratitude was cast down at her. Meg recovered her colour a little, and replied: “Oh, yes, a dead bore! Do, pray, come to my room! Goodnight, Freddy! Don’t keep Kitty standing down there, prosing on for ever!” She waved an airy hand, and disappeared again from view.

Freddy, who had been surveying her with an expression on his face of strong disapproval, said despairingly: “Pink! Dashed if I know why it is, but a female’s only got to have a yaller head, and nothing will do for her but to wear pink! Can’t be surprised poor Buckhaven’s gone to China, can you? Now, mind, Kit! not a word to her about your cousin!”

“No, I promise I will be utterly silent on that head!” Kitty assured him, giving him her hand, and clasping his warmly. “Goodnight! And indeed I thank you, Freddy!”

He kissed her fingers gracefully, “No, no! Pleasure!” he stammered.

He then departed, and Kitty sped up the stairs to her hostess’s room. Their quarrel was forgotten: Meg said without preamble: “Kitty, how in the world came Freddy to bring you home? Good God, I was ready to sink!”

“He went to fetch me from the Scortons’ house, learned where I had gone, and came there in search of me. What a goose you are, Meg! I was in agonies lest you should betray yourself!”

“He didn’t suspect?” Meg said anxiously.

“No, of course he did not!”

“What an escape!” shuddered Meg. “I have been quite sick with apprehension, for he doesn’t like it when I go out with Jack, and if he knew of this I daresay he would tell Papa, and you may depend upon it I should be packed off to stay with Lady Buckhaven on the instant! I must say, it was excessively handsome of you not to have told him, Kitty!”

“As though I would do anything so shabby!” exclaimed Kitty. “But whatever possessed you to go to the Opera House? How could Jack have taken you there? I saw at once that it was not at all the sort of party one ought to go to, and surely he must have known that!”

“Oh, yes! He said that Freddy would have his blood, if he came to hear of it, but there was not the least harm, you know! I have always so wished to go to one of those masquerades, and of course Buckhaven will never take me, and nor will Freddy, so I teased Jack to! He took very good care of me, I assure you, and it is not as though I was unmasked. We came away at midnight, but I should like to have remained, for I thought it was very good sport, though, of course, shockingly vulgar! Did you enjoy it?”

Kitty shuddered. “It was quite the worst evening I have ever spent!” she said. “I was never more thankful in my life than when I saw Freddy!”

“Was he very much vexed?” enquired Meg. “He has such stuffy notions!”

“No, no, he was so kind that I almost burst into tears! And he might have reproached me! I do think,” said Kitty fervently, “that Freddy is the most truly chivalrous person imaginable!”

Freddy’s sister, regarding her with awe, opened her mouth, shut it again, swallowed, and managed to say, though in a faint voice: “Do you, indeed?”

“Yes, and a great deal more to the purpose than all the people one was taught to revere, like Sir Lancelot, and Sir Galahad, and Young Lochinvar, and—and that kind of man! I daresay Freddy might not be a great hand at slaying dragons, but you may depend upon it none of those knight-errants would, be able to rescue one from a social fix, and you must own, Meg, that one has not the smallest need of a man who can kill dragons! And as for riding off with one in the middle of a party, which I have always thought must have been extremely uncomfortable, and not at all the sort of thing one would wish to happen to one—What is the matter?”

Meg raised her head from the sofa-cushions: “He w-would say it was n-not at all the th-thing!”

“Very well, and why should he not?” said Kitty, refusing to share in her hostess’s unseemly mirth. “If you were to hear of such a thing’s happening, you would think it most improper, now, wouldn’t you?” A sudden thought occurred to her, and she choked, and said, in an uncertain tone: “As a matter of fact, he said that Lochinvar sounded to him like a d-dashed loose-screw!”

A wail from the depths of the cushions proved to be too much for Kitty’s command over herself. Both ladies then enjoyed a very hearty laugh; after which they embraced, and parted company for the night without exchanging any further confidences.