Joan Smith - The Barefoot Baroness

"That nice young fellow who got me a glass of ratafia at Lady Morgan's ball? Why, what is amiss with him?"

Laura looked to Mr. Meadows for assistance. She could not like to blacken the young man's character. No real harm was known of him, save for his gambling. His behavior was rackety, but no polite doors had actually been closed to him as yet.

"Bit of a rackety fellow," Meadows said.

"Then perhaps you will go along to play propriety," Mrs. Traemore suggested.

"That is bound to turn her against me," Meadows said. It was a telling speech. Until this point, he had not expressed his intentions openly, although Laura was in little doubt that they were serious. "She is just beginning to taste society. She won't thank me for following after her, like the ghost at the feast."

"A ghost?" Mrs. Traemore said, staring at his bulk and wondering if she had heard aright. "I cannot imagine what you mean, Mr. Meadows. Livvie is very fond of you. Whenever she wants anything, she always says, 'I shall ask Mr. Meadows.’ “

"I daresay I must go," he agreed reluctantly. Then he brightened and said to Laura, "Perhaps you will come with me? My aunt will be happy to lend you her mount."

"I should like it, of all things!" Laura said. In fact, she had no desire to go, but wanted to lessen Mr. Meadows's burden.

He sent off at once for his and his aunt's mounts while Laura went upstairs to change. It was a good hour before Mr. Yarrow appeared at the door, leading a sly-looking bay mare with white stockings on her forelegs. Laura and Mr. Meadows rode behind, to ensure a good view of their charge. It was for Laura to express the family's gratitude to Mr. Meadows, for no one else had thought of doing it.

"I think you know why I am always eager to be of help to the baroness," he said.

"You plan to offer for her?"

"I would have done it before now, if she were not so far above my touch. Her fortune is considerably greater than my own, to say nothing of her having a title in her own right."

A formal alliance with Meadows seemed an excellent thing, and Laura encouraged him. "Your situation is not inferior to Mr. Yarrow's," she pointed out, wondering if it was Hyatt he meant.

"That boy will be in debt before the Season is out. The baroness could not choose more poorly if she tried. Though of course he is handsome. And young. Odd she did not fall for Hyatt, if it is a charmer she wants. At least she spared us that."

"Yes, it is odd. I fear he succumbed to her charms too easily."

"Or perhaps he is too old. Same age as myself," he added with a frown. "But of course he flies much higher.”

"Is his reputation very bad?" she asked.

"I don't mean to denigrate him. He is considered excellent ton, but he is a man of vast experience with the ladies, you know. One would have no hope of competing with him. Yarrow is an unlicked cub. I hope the baroness will soon tire of his eternal bragging and braying."

At the park, however, Olivia continued to be enamored of Mr. Yarrow. When he broke into a gallop, disturbing the polite pace of the other riders, Olivia was right behind him.

"I told her she must not gallop!" Laura said.

"Do I gallop after her and read her a lecture, or wait till she returns?" Meadows asked.

"They are coming back now. I'll read the lecture," Laura said, to keep Meadows free of the shadow of propriety.

She delivered her scathing attack to Mr. Yarrow. "If you cannot behave like a gentleman, Mr. Yarrow, you are not fit company for a lady," she said. "You know perfectly well that galloping is not permitted here."

"Jezebel is such a goer she got away on me," he said, without even blushing for his lie. "It won't happen again."

He resumed the proper pace. When he was beyond earshot of the others, he said to Olivia, "What is the point of a track if you can't ride? That is just like these people. You cannot stand up with the lady you want to for more than one set. You cannot stay for more than a short visit when you call on her, and you can never be alone with her for a minute, without some dashed Nosey Parker sticking his nose into your business."

"You never have called on me," Olivia said.

"Not much point, is there? There would be a raft of chaperones. Now if we were to go to the Pantheon masquerade, we would have some privacy. What about tonight?"

"We are having the Morgans to dinner and going to the play with them after."

Yarrow gave a commiserating nod. "I have managed to get hold of a lady's domino and mask anyhow. You just give me the nod when you feel you can get away."

"I don't think I should.”

"All the girls do it. Why, Angie Carstairs goes twice a week, at least."

"How does she get away?"

"Claims a sick headache. Tells her chaperone she is going home for a bit of a lie-down, then nips off with us."

"If I said that, my cousin and Mr. Meadows would accompany me home."

"Of course they would. So does Angie's chaperone. What she does, she goes to bed in her gown and nips down the servants' stairs and out the back door. We have the rig waiting at the corner. Nothing to it, if you have a bit of pluck." He looked a challenge at her.

The baroness prided herself on her pluck. "Perhaps next week."

"We ain't going tonight, in any case. Cowan has managed to get us into Mrs. Hyde's gaming hell. No limit on the betting," he boasted. "A fellow may plunge as deep as he likes. I shan't invite you along, for even Angie won't go there. Not the place for ladies."

This concern for her reputation assured Olivia that Mr. Yarrow was a model of propriety. They continued their ride, with Olivia's mount "getting away from her" next time to share the blame. Mr. Yarrow was not tardy to give chase. Laura and Meadows were waiting for them when they returned, and they immediately took Olivia home.

"Very kind of you to escort the baroness, Mr. Yarrow, but I am buying her own mount for her this afternoon and shall accompany her when she wishes to ride," Mr. Meadows said.

Olivia was consoled with the notion of having her own mount at last. Mr. Yarrow, she thought, would not have hesitated so long to procure it. She dutifully reminded herself that Mr. Meadows had been very kind to her, but really he was a bit of a slow top.

The next week proceeded without undue incident. A staid mount who never "got away from her" was procured for Olivia and given a few outings in Rotten Row. Olivia's presentation was the main concern, and there was little danger of encountering Mr. Yarrow at that staid do. The baroness also made her bows at Almack's and was convinced at last by the strict formality of this select club, by the eagle-eyed patronesses, the orgeat and the Scottish reels, that established society do's were a dead bore. Next week, she would try the Pantheon with Mr. Yarrow and his friends.

The painting sessions removed to Lord Hyatt's atelier, which was a large, glass-walled room attached to the back of his mansion in Park Lane. The chaperones were much more comfortable in upholstered chairs than on a park bench. One end of the studio was set up as a drawing room for the audience. There was a carpet on the floor, lamps, tables and all the appurtenances of a polite drawing room.

But the most interesting feature was the view through the windowed wall of a garden in the heart of busy London. Tulips and daffodils nodded in the morning sun. As space was limited, the trees were all evergreens, which did not cast too much shade on the flowers.

The Season continued. Matches were arranged, hearts were broken, reputations and fortunes were lost and made in about equal proportion. Lady Devereau soon had two new ornaments for her arm: a jaded minor peer and a diamond bracelet.

The baroness's painting was nearing completion. No crowds came to bother the party at Hyatt's studio, but an occasional friend dropped in. Lord Talman, the Duke of Castlefield's heir, came twice. Laura suspected the baroness was the drawing card, and when he returned on the third day, which was the last sitting, she was convinced of it.

When Laura initially heard that her cousin was to make her bows, it was some such grand match as Lord Talman that she envisaged for the baroness. A marquis of impressive pedigree, rich in his own right, and heir to a dukedom, he was one of the Season's prime catches. To put the cap on it, his character was unblemished.

Physically he was not the sort to set a girl's blood racing, but then no one was perfect. He was of a bookish turn of mind, tall, thin, pale, a trifle high in the instep. All the other debs appreciated his eligibility, but Laura feared Olivia was unimpressed.

On the marquis's second visit Olivia snipped, "I don't see why Lord Talman is permitted to come and stare for an hour at a time, when Lord Hyatt turned Mr. Yarrow away."

Laura replied, "Lord Talman behaves himself. He does not bring a crowd and turn the sitting into a public circus."

"He makes my flesh crawl, the way he stares."

There was no denying Olivia had changed. Whether it was the unaccustomed attention of society or Mr. Yarrow that turned her head was difficult to say, but certainly she had lost that first eagerness to please. To add to the difficulty of managing her, she no longer looked to Laura as her mentor.

When Lord Talman once again appeared for the last sitting, Olivia gave him a very cold glance, then looked away without even nodding. Talman took up a seat beside Laura.

"The baroness seems out of sorts today," he said in a low voice.

"The strain of the sittings is beginning to tell on her," Laura invented.

"Yet Hyatt works faster than most painters. He is a fine artist. Have you seen his engravings?"