‘That’s true enough,’ Leontina said, with a return to her normal dry, sardonic manner. ‘Then I am sorry, my dear. I will not importune you further.’ If she had particularly noted Allegra’s bold and futile declaration of love, she chose not to remark upon it.
‘I’m sorry too,’ she said. ‘Thank you, Mama.’ And then, fearing a loss of control on her part and a collapse in her fragile composure that must be painful to both of them, she left the room.
44
Lord Milton arrived that very afternoon, and Mrs Constantine had left instructions with the servants that Allegra should be informed of his arrival, and would meet with him alone once more. No small girls lay in wait for him this time; the mood in the house was subdued, even if most of its inhabitants had not the least idea why.
He was shown in, and they regarded each other in silence. His classically handsome face was a little pale, she thought. But probably so was she, and if he thought that it was because of him, through sleepless nights spent wrestling with the temptations and disadvantages of his proposal, she would not be the one to disillusion him. It could scarcely matter less to her, in brutal honesty, though she did not mean to be brutal to him; he had not deserved that of her.
‘You are indeed resolved?’ he asked at last, since one of them was obliged to speak first.
‘I am,’ she said simply. ‘I suppose you have come to assure yourself that I will be silent over what you have told me, and you may rest assured that I will. You need fear no exposure throughany careless words of mine. I am only sorry… that I could not help you. Your situation is not an enviable one, and I do regret my small part in it.’
He made a gesture of denial. ‘I asked too much,’ he said sombrely. ‘I know that. Difficult enough to expect any woman to take me on when aware of the truth, but I made it all too unflatteringly plain that I didn’t really want to marry you, didn’t I? I am well requited for my clumsiness and lack of chivalry, and can only thank you for your very honourable response despite all that, which I shall not easily forget.’
She had no words to answer this, and he went on more gently when she remained silent, ‘Forgive me, but it seems to me that you are deeply unhappy, Miss Constantine, and I am not such a coxcomb that I can long deceive myself that I am the cause. We shall not marry, and I must ask myself seriously whether it would be fair for me to marry anyone, circumstanced as I am, but I hope I may offer you my friendship, if nothing else. Can I help you in your trouble?’
‘No,’ she said, managing a wan sort of a smile. ‘Nobody can. But I thank you.’ And then she went on to say, less firmly, ‘I know you have a good opinion of me now, which I am not confident I have earned, and perhaps I am about to destroy it utterly, but if that is so, I must bear it. I have no right to lecture you, sir, but… but it has seemed odd to me, that I have seen evidence more than once of prejudice in you – prejudice of rank, and birth, and race.’
‘What do you mean, ma’am?’ he asked. His voice was cold now, and his face a mask.
She pushed on, since in the end she didn’t really care what he thought of her. There was injustice in the world – she saw it every day, and was for the most part entirely powerless to address it. But this, at least, she could say. She was thinking, perhaps, of Mr Severin’s friend Melissa, met so briefly, who had with greatcourage and cost to herself spoken her heart’s truth to her disagreeable parents. This was nothing, compared to that, and far less personal – for her, at least.
‘It seems to me that you – and your horrid mother, but she is hardly at issue now – despise those who are not of equal rank with you, or at any rate of noble birth. You criticise, therefore, others for matters which are entirely out of their control, and take pride in something that you did not gain through any virtue of your own or effort on your part. Your rank, your title, your wealth, all of these things are matters of pure chance and nothing more. You might have been poor or illegitimate; fortune has happened to decree otherwise. You cannot really claim any merit because of this simple fact.’ He was silent, ominously so, and she continued resolutely, ‘Your nature, similarly, as you revealed it to me, has been formed in a certain way that is… more than inconvenient to you, as society is currently arranged. If you reproach yourself for that, when it lies just as far outside your control, that seems to me equally illogical. And plain wrong.’
She broke off, frustrated at her apparent inability to express herself with sufficient clarity, or at the rigidness of mind that made it impossible for him to grasp her meaning, however imperfectly it was expressed, and give any serious consideration to it. ‘Forgive me, sir,’ she said. ‘I have no right to say these things to you. I must sound like a terrible prig as I lecture you, and it is none of my affair, after all. Not now, at any rate.’
‘Well,’ came the unexpected riposte, ‘I offered you my friendship, did I not, Allegra? And friends, I would have thought, have the right, perhaps even the duty, to say such uncomfortable things to each other, even if they sound like excessively earnest undergraduates – who’ve drunk a little too much wine – when they are doing so. I confess I had not suspected you of holding revolutionary sympathies. Probably it is just as well that you willnot, after all, be obliged to spend extended periods of time in the company of my mother.’ He saw that she was about to launch into impetuous speech again and forestalled her, smiling slightly. ‘Don’t apologise. Sheishorrid. I’ve always thought so. As did my father, I believe. Her tragedy, if you are inclined to care at all when there is no reason why you should, is that she suspects as much, and it is far too late to mend matters.’
This was encouraging, in the main, and so she went on, ‘At the further risk of sounding like someone who has just swallowed a book of moral precepts, I must say this too, sir: once you related to me a piece of gossip, about Mr Severin and a young lady. And I am now in a position to tell you that what you said, and the greater detail which you probably knew but considered unfit for my innocent ears, is entirely untrue. His behaviour in that situation which you and all outsiders understand only partly was not dishonourable, but quite the reverse. Believe me or not, as you choose.’
He looked alarmed now, and said urgently, ‘I hope you have not been imprudent, Miss Constantine, and formed an entirely inappropriate attachment. As your firm friend, I must urge you with all possible force…’
She shook her head. ‘There you go again, when I was beginning to think better of you. I appreciate your concern, sir, but I must tell you that it is misplaced. It was merely that I wanted to tell you, and I don’t really know why, that Mr Severin is not what you think him, or what those who whisper so assiduously about others in the ton think him, because of their wicked prejudice and yours. I’m not reproving you for repeating gossip – I asked you to tell me, did I not? So if there is guilt to be apportioned, I am as blameworthy as you are. I believed it, too, when I heard it, though I know better now.’
‘My God, you’re in love with him,’ Lord Milton said, shockand pity warring disagreeably in his voice and on his regular features.
For the second time in just a few hours, Allegra was definitelynotcrying. ‘What if I am?’ she told her exasperating ex-suitor tiredly. ‘Do you not love someone the world tells you that you should not, that you must not? Explain to me, if you please, what is the difference? Or is it just that you are an English peer, and he, Max, is not and I am not, just a woman of no consequence, but you’re embarrassed to say so out loud, because there’s no earthly justification for any of it?’
‘I’m sorry, Allegra. You’re right,’ he said, grinning a little wryly and looking suddenly younger, and far less pompous. ‘I of all people should know that you cannot choose where you love.’
‘Well, that’s not the point at all,’ she said crossly. ‘Everybody knowsthat. Our kitchen cat knows that, and has had the curious-looking kittens to prove it. The point is – I know I’m being undergraduate again, but I really don’t care – that you shouldn’t cling to views of people, whole groups of people, that have no basis in reality. Not unless you want to be treated in exactly the same way in return. I expect your noble ancestors went charging around on carthorses waving their big swords and beheading anyone who didn’t grovel to them fast enough, in intervals between kidnapping wenches who took their fancy, regardless of their wishes. Those times are past, thank goodness.’
He threw up a hand, in the gesture fencers used to acknowledge a hit. ‘If we are to speak of ancestors, I’ll wager yours did too, in Italy.’
That gave her pause for a second, but after all it was true, in a fashion. Those people in their suits of armour were her ancestors, along with the peasants they oppressed and exploited; she and Max had similar complicated heritages, in that sense. ‘I’m sure they did. I know it, in fact. Dreadful things, they did, and not solong ago. It’s notrevolutionaryto want life to be fairer for everybody. I don’t have any power to make things change – you do, though,mylord.’
‘Not much.’
‘More than most people.’
He laughed ruefully. ‘Being married to you would never have been dull, would it, Allegra, whatever else it was? I’m going to go now, before we fall to arguing politics and find ourselves completely out of charity with each other. I will reflect on all that you have said – I promise I will; I do not say so idly.’ He took her hand, and bent over it with his usual incomparable grace. ‘Friends, if nothing else?’
‘Friends,’ she agreed. She was in need of them, she supposed, even if they couldn’t help her.
45
Meanwhile, in Mayfair, the patience of Mr Severin’s long-suffering butler, George Wicken, was being severely tested by the arrival of yet another unconventional and insistent visitor – this time, shamelessly, in broad daylight. Mr Wicken could not help connecting this fresh arrival in his mind, obscurely, with the young person, or young lady if one was being charitable, who had appeared here, heavily cloaked and visibly agitated, a few nights ago, and been admitted. In this supposition he was entirely correct, though he was never to know it.
