She would think of something. She always did. Suddenly Georgiana felt almost cheerful. A good challenge was always the best remedy for the dismals, she reflected.
Chapter 8
The honorable Vera Burton was walking in the park with her sister. It was a chill day. They were both wrapped in warm pelisses, their hands thrust into fur-lined muffs. One would hardly know that it was only September, Georgiana complained, except that the park was so empty. She sighed with regret. At this time of the afternoon during the Season Rotten Row would be so crowded with carriages, horses, and pedestrians that one would be scarcely able to move. And there would be so many acquaintances and admirers that one would not really wish to move. But at this time of the year there was positively no one in London.
Georgiana was finding her sister a great comfort. The return to town two weeks before had proved every bit as dreadful as she had expected. There was very little entertainment; none of her special cronies was in town, even Dennis Vaughan, who had told her he would be back by the end of August; Ralph spent a great deal of time away from home, having taken his seat in the House of Lords; Gloria lived in her mother's shadow; Lord Stanley, who was her age and who might have brightened her home life, merely tried to flirt with her; and the dowager countess was the crowning horror.
Georgiana could quite see why everyone within her sphere of influence lived in awe of the dowager. She did not order people around. There was no obvious domineering against which one could set one's will. All was complaints, whines, hints, and sly suggestions. She would give up her room at Middleton House to Georgiana, she had said on their return, of course she would. It was only right that the Countess of Chartleigh should occupy the best set of rooms in the house. She, after all, was relegated now to the position of dowager countess. She merely hoped that Georgiana would be as happy in the rooms as she had been. The dear departed Chartleigh would be sorely grieved if he could see her now having to carry all her belongings to another suite. He had taken her to those rooms on their marriage and told her that that was where she would reside forever after when they were in town. She had pulled out a lace handkerchief at that point in her recital.
"Heavens!" Georgiana had declared. "I have no wish to turn you out of your room, Mother. You can put me anywhere. I shan't mind."
"We will share the rose apartments, Georgiana," Ralph had said with a smile. "They are smaller than Mama's, but I have always thought them far more lovely."
That had happened only an hour after their return from the country. It was seemingly a very minor incident. But it set a pattern, Georgiana had discovered. Her mother-in-law got her way in everything. She totally ruled the house and everyone in it. Everyone gave in to her because that course led to the easiest existence. Had Georgiana realized these facts on that first evening, she was convinced, she would merely have offered to help the dowager carry her belongings to her new room-as if the woman would have been called upon to carry one pin for herself anyway. Not that Georgiana had any interest in occupying the largest apartments in the house. But she should have shown right from the start that she intended to be the mistress of her new home.
It was quite ludicrous really to think that she was mistress of Middleton House. She felt more like a nuisance of a little girl intruding on a well-established routine. It was his mother who suggested that Ralph eat larger breakfasts to ward off chills and that he spend less time in the library reading in order to preserve his eyesight, and, and, and...she was constantly nagging at him about something. Georgiana fumed. He never argued with his mother or told her to hold her tongue. He always favored her with that annoying, affectionate smile. She noticed that he still ate only one slice of toast for breakfast and spent as much time reading as before. But even so! Could he not openly assert himself? Georgiana did not think she would be able to keep her mouth shut much longer.
The dowager had received the news of Gloria's approaching nuptials with ominous sweetness. She had kissed her daughter and commended Ralph for his kindness in granting his permission for the banns to be read—Georgiana's part in granting that permission had not been mentioned. But somehow in the two weeks that had passed since their return, she had made them all feel that the marriage would be a disaster to the two principals and especially to her in the rawness of her grief and her present low state of health. Georgiana was terribly afraid that, after all, the wedding would be postponed yet again.
She had turned to Vera for companionship. The two sisters had always been surprisingly close. There was a five-year difference in their ages, and a larger difference in their temperaments. Vera was the very antithesis of Georgiana. She was serious and thoughtful. She took little pleasure in the social round and had only a few close friends, all of them female. She was not a beauty, at least not to anyone who knew her less intimately than Georgiana. The latter was always loud to proclaim, in fact, that she had a sweetness and a depth of character that gave her beauty to those who knew her well. That beauty showed particularly in her eyes, which were large and almost always calm. But it showed too in her face on the rare occasions when it was animated.
Vera was offering comfort during this walk in the park.
"I can understand just how difficult it must be to find suddenly that your home is with near-strangers," she said. "And it is doubly difficult when Lady Chartleigh has been mistress of the house for so long and must now step down in your favor. But I am sure, Georgie, that if you have patience you will find that it will become easier as time passes. Both you and your mother-in-law will adjust to the new situation. And she cannot but love you once she gets to know you."
Georgiana looked doubtful. "Patience is something I have very little of," she said.
They both paused to nod in the direction of a passing carriage, from which one of their acquaintances waved to them.
"I am sure his lordship will help you," Vera said. "He seems a very kindly man, Georgiana. You have been very fortunate in your choice, I believe."
"Oh. yes," Georgiana agreed, "very fortunate. I rarely even see him."
Vera looked sharply at her sister, alerted by her tone. "Is something wrong between you?" she asked.
Georgiana did not immediately reply. "Oh, everything!" she blurted at last. "And it is all my fault, Vera, as usual. I think I must have said something when we were at Chartleigh that hurt Ralph in some way. And since then it has been as if there were a huge barrier between us. We cannot communicate at all."
"Oh," Vera said. "I did not know. I am so sorry, Georgie. Can you not go to him and say you are sorry?"
"No," Georgiana said, coloring slightly. "It is not as simple as that. Ralph is very quiet and sensitive, you see. I believe I did more than hurt him. I think I destroyed his confidence in himself. And just saying something to him will not restore that. I have been trying to think of some way of making him believe in himself again."
Vera stared at her for a few silent moments. "I cannot think that you could have said or done anything so dreadful, Georgie," she said. "You were ever mischievous and impulsive, but you have always had a good heart. His lordship is fond of you, I am sure. I don't believe the situation can be as bad as you think."
Georgiana had been watching her shoes with a frown. Else she would certainly have noticed the rider approaching them, especially as he was a particularly handsome young man mounted on a quite magnificent stallion. But she did not see him until he was drawing rein before them and sweeping his beaver hat from his head.
"Well, if it is not my newest cousin, the Countess of Chartleigh," he said as she looked up startled.
Georgiana recognized him immediately and dimpled. "Lord Beauchamp," she said. "How glad I am to see a familiar face."
"What?" he said. "Never tell me you are admitting to boredom, ma'am, and you a four weeks' bride?"
"Well, I am nonetheless, sir," she said candidly. "There is positively nothing to do in London at this season of the year."
"My cousin Ralph must be a poor-spirited creature if he is not finding amusement for his bride," Roger Beauchamp said. "I must take the matter in hand myself. You will be hearing from me, ma'am."
"Oh," Georgiana said, delighted, "you mean there are entertainments to which we may procure invitations? Then I do wish you will exert yourself on my behalf, sir."
He grinned. "At your service, my dear Lady Chartleigh," he said. "May I have the honor of being presented to your charming companion?"
