She had just fastened Venetia’s dress when a knock fell on the door, and was followed by Aubrey’s voice, demanding admittance. Venetia called to him to come in, but Nurse felt her stiffen under her hands, as she laid a gauze scarf over her shoulders, and said sharply, when he did come in: ‘Now, don’t come worriting Miss Venetia, Master Aubrey, for she’s tired, and has enough to think of without you adding to it!’
‘I want to speak to you before you come downstairs,’ he said, paying no heed to Nurse.
Venetia’s heart sank, for she knew by the look in his face that he was going to be difficult. She said, however: ‘Yes, love, to be sure! Did you have good sport? Were you caught in the rain? I was! Thank you, Nurse! I shall do now: no one ever dresses my hair as well as you! Oh, Aubrey, my head is in such a whirl! I feel quite distracted, and can hardly believe it is true, and I am really going to London at last!’
She sat down at her dressing-table, so that she was not obliged to look at him, and began to select from her trinket-box the ornaments she wished to wear. As Nurse shut the door, he said: ‘You mean to go, then?’
‘Yes, how can you ask me? It is exactly what will suit me best, and you, too.’
‘It won’t suit me to stay with Aunt Hendred, if that’s what you’re thinking.’
‘No, not that, although – Have you seen my uncle?’
‘Oh, yes, I’ve seen him! I told him I shouldn’t go, unless you particularly wished for me.’
‘Aubrey, you weren’t uncivil?’ she exclaimed.
‘No, no!’ he answered impatiently. ‘I said what was proper, of course! I told him that Appersett having been away I was got behindhand, and must apply. He understood. At any rate, he didn’t care. My aunt would as lief I didn’t go, I know. That don’t signify! But he said you had told him of your scheme to set up house – wished me to promise I wouldn’t encourage you, since it wouldn’t do!’
‘My dear, I hope you did no such thing! It’s quite nonsensical! That’s why I am so glad that this chance has come in my way. I had made up my mind to it that there can be no staying at Undershaw while Mrs Scorrier remains fixed, and how can I find a house that will suit us unless I go to town? Do you dislike it? I won’t drag you away from Mr Appersett, if you do, but when you have gone up to Cambridge, there will be the vacations, and –’
‘That’s not it!’ he interrupted. ‘There must be tutors to spare in London, or I could study alone. What I don’t understand – Venetia does Jasper know of this?’
‘Yes, I rode over to tell him – thinking that very likely you wouldn’t care to go to Cavendish Square, and wishing to be sure that –’
‘What did he say to it?’ Aubrey demanded, frowning.
‘Need you ask? He said instantly that he would be glad to have you, and for as long as you choose to say. Oh, and I was to tell you to bring your horses, and the dogs, and that reminds me, love, if you do that you must take Fingle as well. And make him understand that Nidd is head groom at the Priory: you know what he is!’
‘Oh, for God’s sake –!’ he broke in irritably. ‘I’ll take care of all that! Is Jasper willing you should go? I thought – Venetia, are you going to marry him?’
‘Good gracious, no! Oh, you are thinking of a silly talk we had once! I wish you will forget it, for I fancy I shall never marry anyone. I thought at one time I might marry Edward; then I wondered if Damerel might not suit me better; and now – well, now I can’t think of anything but London, so it’s plain I am a hopeless case!’
‘I thought you were in love – both of you.’
‘Only flirting, stoopid!’
He stood looking at her for a minute. ‘Well, I still think it. I daresay I don’t notice a great deal, but I know when you’re shamming it!’
‘But, Aubrey, indeed –’
‘Oh, hold your tongue!’ he snapped, his temper flaring up. ‘If you don’t choose to tell me, it’s all one to me, but stop pitching that gammon! I don’t mean to meddle: I detest meddlers!’
‘Don’t be vexed with me! Pray don’t!’ she managed to say.
He had limped to the door, but he paused, and looked back. ‘I’m not vexed. Not with you – at least, I don’t think so: I suppose you must know what you’re about. Only I hoped you would have settled it between you. I like Jasper. Oh, well!’ He pulled open the door, and went away, banishing her, she thought, from his mind.
SIXTEEN
Three days later Venetia awoke, after a disturbed night, to the sound of a strident voice monotonously adjuring the residents in Cavendish Square to buy good silver-sand for their kitchens. Mrs Hendred, installing her niece in the best spare bedchamber, overlooking the Square, had told her that she would find it wonderfully quiet, quite unlike rooms that looked on to a street. It was certainly quieter than the room Venetia had occupied in Newark, on the previous night, but to one accustomed to the stillness of the country it more nearly resembled pandemonium than the quiet situation of the house-agents’ advertisements. It seemed as though no one ever went to bed in London; and whenever, during a lull in the apparently endless flow of traffic, she dropped off to sleep, she was very soon jerked awake by the voice of the watchman, proclaiming the hour, and the state of the weather. She could only suppose that the ears of Londoners had been bludgeoned into insensitivity and trust that her own would soon grow accustomed to the ceaseless racket; and, being a well-mannered girl, presently assured her aunt that she had passed an excellent night, and was feeling perfectly restored from the effects of her journey.
Her heavy eyes belied her. She had, in fact, enjoyed little sleep during any of the past three nights; and, since she waswholly unused to travel, a journey of nearly two hundred miles had left her battered, exhausted, and unable to believe, when she lay in bed, that she was not still being rocked and jolted down an endless post-road.
The expedition, once so longed-for, would live in her memory, she thought, only as a nightmare. At the start all had been bustle and distraction, with Powick to be interviewed, hurried arrangements to be made, keys, accounts, and memoranda to be handed over, warning reminders to be delivered; and a letter to be written to Lady Denny. Worst of all had been the leave-takings, for Nurse and Mrs Gurnard and Ribble had wept, and had had to be comforted; and when, with her uncle standing by with his watch in his hand, she came to the final moment of parting with Aubrey she was so much overpowered that she dared not trust her voice, and could only hug him convulsively, unable to see his face for the tears that filled her eyes.
There had been no time for private reflection until she had left York, where an hour had had to be spent with Mr Mytchett; but when she had signed the last of the documents spread before her, and answered the last of the careful questions put to her, there was too much. Mr Hendred, resigning himself to an inevitable recurrence of his nervous tic, wrapped a shawl about his head, and leaned back in his corner of the chaise, resolutely closing his eyes; and his niece was consequently at leisure to indulge reflection. Her thoughts were not happy; unfortunately they were absorbing, so that instead of gazing eagerly upon an unknown countryside, and watching for landmarks of note, she looked at little but the bobbing forms of the postilions, and took only a faint interest in the various historic towns through which she passed. The first stage of the journey had been necessarily short, leaving a hundred and twenty miles still to be covered. She had acquiesced in her uncle’s decision to halt butone night on the road; but when at last the chaise drew up in Cavendish Square she was so tired that she could reply to her aunt’s solicitudes only with mechanical civility, and force herself to swallow no more than a few mouthfuls of the elegant supper provided for her refreshment. Nothing could have exceeded Mrs Hendred’s kindness, or the expressions of warm affection with which she greeted the niece she had not seen for seven years. She fondled her, and pressed every attention upon her, herself escorted her to her bedchamber, stayed while her dresser waited upon Venetia, and did not leave the room until she had tucked Venetia into bed with her own hands, kissing her, and murmuring into her ear promises of much cosseting, and innumerable treats.
Mrs Hendred was a very pretty woman of great good-nature and much less than commonsense. Her chief objects in life were to remain in the forefront of fashion, and to achieve advantageous marriages for her five daughters within the shortest possible time of having expensively launched each of these damsels, one after the other, into society. She had achieved an excellent match for Louisa that very year; and hoped to do no less well for Theresa in the following spring, provided that the treatment she was at present undergoing at the hands of the dentist proved successful, and she was not obliged to have three front teeth extracted, and false ones screwed to their stumps; and provided also that before the date of her presentation a husband could be found for her beautiful cousin. Theresa was a pretty girl, and would have a handsome portion, but Mrs Hendred was under no illusion: Venetia might be handicapped by her five-and-twenty years, but she was not only so beautiful that people turned their heads in the street to stare at her, but she had more charm than all the Hendred girls put together. There were certain difficulties attached to the task of marrying her suitably, of which Mrs Hendred was only too well aware, butthat good lady’s optimism encouraged her to hope that with the assets of beauty, charm, and a considerable independence she might be able to contrive a very respectable alliance for her. But she did think it a sad pity that Venetia had not accepted Edward Yardley’s offer, for it would have been just the thing for her, since Mr Yardley was a warm man, and had enjoyed her father’s favour. Sir Francis, in writing, years ago, to decline his sister’s offer to present Venetia, had informed her that Venetia’s marriage was as good as settled. It was not long before she had told Venetia of this circumstance, and great was her shocked dismay when she learned that so far from entertaining any notion of marriage Venetia had come to town with the fixed resolve of establishing herself and Aubrey in a house in a quiet part of the town, or even, perhaps, in the suburbs. She could not have been more aghast had Venetia announced her intention of entering a nunnery, and most earnestly did she beg her to banish all such schemes from her head. ‘Your uncle would never hear of it!’ she said.
