Chapter 14 Sleepless in Storborough House

Damerel eyed his eldest daughter with concern. He did not like the pallor of her cheeks or the dark smudges under eyes. The endless round of parties, outings, routs and balls was, evidently, beginning to take its toll even on her youthful stamina. "You look exhausted, sweet pea. You'd do better to go back to bed than ride out with me. You're short of sleep and rest."

Helena had, in fact, lain awake much of the night but she was not about to confide as much to her father. "I am fine, Papa. A brisk canter in the morning air will do me good."

It was early enough that the streets were quiet as they rode sedately toward the park. "I imagine," Damerel volunteered, "that Louisa and Aunt Maria are congratulating themselves this morning on the success of last night's ball — as well they should! In all respects — the food, decorations and music — it was all top flight. Georgina handled herself beautifully, too. I noticed she suffered a bit from nerves at first, but as the evening wore on, she seemed to relax and enjoy herself. I was a great deal of time in the card room, admittedly, but I heard she never once lacked for a partner. They say she danced with young Claiborne twice. Is that true?"

Helena felt a flare of pain as her father, all unwitting, touched the tender bruise on her heart. "Yes," she replied shortly, and then forced herself to add, "Lord Percy also took her in to supper."

"Well, well!" Damerel said, appreciatively. "I confess I didn't foresee Georgina's making such a conquest, but if she has, my hat's off to her! It's a better match, I daresay, than Louisa envisaged for her. I believe she had her hopes set on young Flavell's making an offer, or, if not him, a Harcourt relation named Alan Something-or-other. Claiborne, with his noble connections, is a far more prestigious prospect."

Each of these observations smote Helena anew. Her father's surprise at Lord Percy's attendance on Georgie was some small consolation in that it echoed and thus validated her own, but that was her only comfort. In the hours she'd lain awake tossing and turning, she'd tried to make sense of Lord Percy's defection, and, what was worse, his appearing to have transferred his regard to her cousin, but, struggle as she might to piece the puzzle together, she could not work it out. She felt some compunction at being stunned by Lord Percy's change of heart — it was hardly a compliment to Georgie — but her cousin, she knew, would be the first to be amazed that Helena had been passed over in her favor. Helena was not much given to self-doubt — life had given her little cause to develop insecurities — and so it was something of a novel and painful exercise for her to pass her conduct in minute review, trying to discern some word or deed which had so displeased or offended Lord Percy as to cost her his esteem. She was unsparing in her examination, but, apart from that one instance of rudeness for which she'd apologized, she found nothing in her comportment either to blush for or reprove. It was a maddening conundrum, and when day dawned at last, she was no less confused and dispirited than when she'd sought her bed.

It was, in the end, Penny who proposed, if not an answer to the riddle, at least a tenable hypothesis. Unlike their father, Penny did not mistake her sister's listlessness for mere fatigue and, having pressed her to confide what troubled her, had the full story of the previous evening's events. She was all sympathy, sharing in Helena's disappointment as if it were her own and was no less perplexed, initially, by Lord Percy's volte-face. On one point, however, she was adamant: Helena was not to blame herself. It was simply inconceivable that she could have done or said anything obnoxious enough to drive Lord Percy away. The explanation must needs lie elsewhere.

Penny set her mind to the problem, and after some moments' reflection, mused aloud, "Lord Percy cannot have lost interest in you, Lena. I will not credit it. But, if that is the case, why should he draw back? It cannot be that his family objects. A baron's daughter is quite the equal of a duke's younger son." She came suddenly to attention, the flash of inspiration brightening her face. "On the other hand, a duke's younger son is no rival for a marquess and future duke. Oh, Lena! Can it not be Lord Percy has withdrawn because he believes he cannot compete with Lord Hartshorne? His lordship has been so particular in his attentions, it's obvious he means to offer for you. Lord Percy must have concluded that pressing his own, far less impressive suit would be futile."

Helena felt a rush of relief and new optimism. Penny's speculation fit the facts so neatly, she wondered she hadn't thought of it, herself. "He is discouraged, then? No more than that?"

Penny hesitated. "It's a theory, yes. But, Lena, if I'm right and he's given up all hope, it's no small thing."

"No," Helena conceded quickly. "Especially if, in his hopelessness, he's decided to turn elsewhere."

"To Georgie, do you mean?" Penny shook her head. "You know I love Georgie like a sister, but you won't convince me she's capable of attaching Lord Percy."

"You would not say so if you had seen them together last night! Even Papa remarked on it."

"Still, it's a lot to conclude on the basis of one evening, and it was not, you'll recall, just any old affair but Georgie's official come-out. What could be more natural in a courteous guest than to lavish especial attention on the evening's honoree?"

Helena was much struck by this argument. "You think, then, that Lord Percy was only being exceptionally considerate?"

Penny shrugged. "You are better placed to judge than I. Would you say he is generally a kind and thoughtful person?"

Helena pictured Lord Percy's impeccable manners, his gentlemanly awareness of and solicitude for others. "Yes," she said decidedly. "I would."

"There you are, then! When next they meet, Lord Percy will have reverted to being merely affable and civil. You'll see!"

Helena threw her arms about Penny and hugged her tight. "Best and cleverest of sisters! You are always such a comfort! What would I do without you?"

Penny gave her sister's shoulder a reassuring pat. "As to that, heaven willing, you need never know, Lena. I shall always be here if you need me."

Helena was so much heartened by this conversation, she felt equal to pursuing the activities which, only hours before, had seemed beyond her strength. These included, among other calls, a stop in Cavendish Square to inquire how the ladies Hendred and Harcourt fared in the aftermath of their lavish entertainment and to indulge in the pleasant exercise of passing the evening's highlights in detailed review. Helena found Georgie aglow with contentment and what looked, to her eye, to be a newfound self-assurance. The number of posies and nosegays brightening the drawing room were a testament to the success of her debut, and she was, quite justifiably, proud of herself. An unusually large bouquet of lily of the valley caught Helena's eye, and, upon being informed that the sender was Lord Percy, she felt a sharp stab of pain, but then she rationalized the tribute as a simple extension of the previous evening's kindness and so blunted the sting.

Over the next few days, however, Helena found it increasingly hard and then impossible to maintain her belief in Penny's theory. The reassuring proof her sister had foreseen with such confidence failed to materialize and, indeed, contradictory evidence mounted with every garden party, soirée or ball Helena attended. Lord Percy was not ostentatious in his attentions toward Georgie, but for anyone keeping tabs as closely as Helena it was clear he was seeking her out with greater frequency and spending more time in her company. He never again partnered her for more than one dance per evening but he became something of a regular caller in Cavendish Square and Helena had spied him one particularly fine afternoon driving Georgie in the park.

Helena's pride would not permit her to quiz Georgie on the subject of Lord Percy, but finally, the day after seeing her cousin perched beside him in his phaeton, she could not resist observing, "You looked to be enjoying yourself when I saw you yesterday in the park."

Georgie smiled radiantly. "Oh, yes! Wasn't the weather lovely? I was never so glad as when Lord Percy stopped by and invited me to drive out with him."

"You are seeing rather a lot of Lord Percy these days," Helena said carefully.

A wash of sudden color stained Georgie's cheeks. "Yes! He has been exceedingly kind. I… I'm sure I don't know why. I can't conceive of his being genuinely interested in courting me."

Georgie's self-deprecation had the rather perverse effect of rousing Helena to indignation on her cousin's behalf. "You must not run yourself down so, Georgie! You have a great deal to offer any man. Lord Percy would be only too fortunate to win your affections."

Georgie's blush deepened but her eyes shone with gratitude. "It is like you to be so generous, Lena, but I can't help but be conscious that I am not his equal, not socially or, indeed, in many other respects. I am so woefully uninformed and badly educated, I can hardly hold up my end of the conversation when we speak."

"Some men actively prefer a lack of knowledge in their wives."

"The majority of them, at a guess," Georgie said with an impish smile, "but I don't think Lord Percy is of their number. He'd do better with a clever, cultivated girl who could talk intelligently about books and art and would understand his references to Greek philosophers and Shakespeare! You would be ideal for him, Lena, except for your being all but betrothed to Lord Hartshorne."

Helena stiffened, her hands clasping each other more tightly in her lap. "That is far from certain. His lordship has yet to make an offer."

"Oh, but he must! After the expectations he has raised, it would be a scandal if he failed to propose. Mamma says he has crossed over the line where he might have withdrawn without causing you serious injury and is consequently honor-bound, if for no other reason, to ask for your hand."

Helena might have divulged that, on their own circuit of the park, Lord Hartshorne had intimated his intention to propose in unmistakable fashion. This had come in the form of an announcement that she could in short order expect to receive an invitation for herself and Lady Damerel to take tea with his mother, her Grace of Litchfield, at the ducal mansion in St. James Square. Helena took this to mean she had satisfied the marquess as to her worthiness to be his consort and that it remained only for the current duchess to inspect her son's selection and either withhold or set her seal of approval on the match. Given the marquess' thoroughness in vetting his bride, her Grace's consent was bound to be a mere formality.

Helena emerged from her reverie to hear Georgie saying, "Rumor has it that even Miss Stanhope has conceded you've carried the day, and apparently…" She broke off abruptly, and then resumed with some diffidence, "Perhaps, as it is only gossip, I shouldn't repeat what I heard, but… well, they do say, Lena, that Miss Stanhope is in a rage at having let Lord Hartshorne slip through her fingers, and she has a rather nasty reputation for not accepting defeat with good grace. She's been known to be spiteful and try to injure people who've thwarted her ambitions. You should be on your guard against her, Lena. She might well try to hurt you."

Helena smiled thinly. "She has made no secret of disliking me and has slighted and snubbed me since the moment we met, but if her aim has been to wound me with such cuts, she has fallen well short of the mark. I have no care for her opinion, good or ill. She may well lash out at me, but what real harm can she do? I have given her no weapons to use against me. Her animosity is irritating, to be sure, but I do not fear her."

Georgie regarded her with frank awe and admiration. "In your shoes, I should not be half so calm! The idea of having made an enemy of such a one as Miss Stanhope would have me constantly on edge and bracing for attack! Who knows what mischief she might do!"

This question worried Helena not at all, and indeed she gave no more thought to Miss Stanhope than to regret she had been so poor-spirited as to surrender her pursuit of Lord Hartshorne. Helena had a great many other matters to occupy her mind, principle among these how, now that it appeared all but inevitable, she was to receive the marquess' proposal. Her first instinct was a disinclination so strong, she felt she could only refuse him, but that response, being purely emotional, she mistrusted as childish and irrational. She could not, after all, be sure how much of her recoil stemmed from a general and natural fear of a major, life-altering step rather than the more particular unease Hartshorne inspired. In any event, the time to have heeded such misgivings was long past; no less than the marquess, she, through allowing and appearing to welcome his attentions, had given rise to the expectation that, should he choose to extend an offer, she would accept as a matter of course. She tried to project herself into that future, fateful interview with Lord Hartshorne, calmly informing him that, upon mature reflection, she had decided they would not suit, but no, it was impossible! She could not envision herself screwing up the necessary courage.

For how would justify her rejection? On the basis that she did not love him? He would find such an objection nonsensical. People of their station did not marry for love. It was wealth and status — their acquisition or consolidation — that was the determining factor in which parties should wed. Wealth had its privileges, but also its obligations; it required safeguarding, nurturing and careful management. It was, moreover, essential to the continued existence of the noble class that its members collaborate in keeping their riches, and thus their power, in the same small number of hands. Forming alliances for mutual financial benefit was nothing less than critical for survival. In this context, insisting on a love match was impermissibly foolish and juvenile.

Helena saw these conventional marriages everywhere about her. The Yardleys, for example, or her father's cousin Alfred and his wife: there was no great love between the spouses but there was respect and consideration enough that they presented a unified and contented front to the world. Even Great-Aunt Maria, though in love with another, had been brought to accept the sensible match arranged for her with the well-to-do, if far less dashing, Phillip Hendred. Maria's brother Francis was, by contrast, the illustration of what came of disdaining all practical concerns in love's name: his marriage to the beautiful but penniless and shallow Aurelie Chiltoe had been an unmitigated disaster. The same was true, to a lesser degree, of her Uncle Conway's marriage: what had begun as a heady, whirlwind romance had soured over time into a rocky relationship with regret and disillusionment on both sides.

The marriage that had been most directly before her eyes had, of course, been her parents' and theirs was the happy combination of a socially acceptable pairing and a love match. Even before she'd had words to describe it, Helena had sensed the strong connection her parents shared. Theirs was a powerful bond, compounded, she grew to understand, of an authentic respect and deep regard one for the other. Her father being so much older, it might have been assumed he would dominate over his wife, but instead he had ever treated her mother as his full and equal partner. They knew each other so well and understood each other so thoroughly they could conduct entire conversations with their eyes alone. This, then, their profound, unequivocal attachment, had informed Helena's idea of what marriage should be, and she, naively, had taken it for granted that she would find her own loving companion in time. She had always known that her parents' closeness was unusual, but it only now occurred to her that it might not simply be exceptional but rare. Was it possible she would not be so lucky, so blessed?

These thoughts gave rise to feelings of such anxiety and helplessness that Helena blocked them as much as possible. She pinned her hopes, rather desperately, on a kind Fate's intervening to spare her Lord Hartshorne's proposal and proceeded to throw herself into any distraction that offered. Fortunately there was no shortage of these: there were Cassie and Iris' birthday gifts to shop for, final fittings at the modiste's for her coming-out ball gown, and preparations for the reception of their soon-to-arrive house guests to assist with.

And then, there was the proposed excursion to Epsom Downs for the Derby. Helena had attended the opening day of Royal Ascot the previous summer, but, as the Derby was considered an event more for the masses, she had never been to that race. Her father was a regular, though, and this year, as the Priory stables had a filly entered and her horse-mad sister was begging to accompany him, he had elected to turn the day into an outing for the whole family. They were to travel down in two carriages with a couple of servants in attendance and hampers packed with food and drink for picnicking in the open air. It promised to be just the sort of relaxed, carefree day Helena needed.

And so it might have proved if not for an unexpected and most unwelcome encounter.