Isobel caught her breath, a flare of temper in her eyes.
Gwendolen laughed with a release of tension and turned to Bertie again.
Lady Warburton joined them, and the conversation became enmeshed in gossip, cases of “he said” and “she said” and “do you really believe?”
Dinner was announced, and Omegus Jones offered his arm to Vespasia, which in view of Lady Salchester’s presence she found a singular honor, and they went into the long blue-and-gold dining room in solemn and correct procession, each to their appointed place at the glittering table.
The chandeliers above were reflected in the gleam of silver, shattered prisms of light on tiers of crystal goblets in a field of linen napkins folded like lilies. The fire burned warm in the grate. White chrysanthemums from the greenhouse filled the bowls, providing a redolence of earth and autumn leaves, the soft fragrance of woodland.
They began with the lightest consomme. There would be nine courses, but it was not expected that everyone would eat from all of them. Ladies in particular, mindful of the delicate figures and tiny waists demanded by fashion, would choose with care. Where physical survival was relatively easy, one created rules to make social survival more difficult. Not to be accepted was to become an outcast, a person who fitted nowhere.
Conversation turned to more serious topics. Sir John Warburton spoke of the current political situation, giving his views with gravity, his thin hands brown against the white linen of the cloth.
“Do you really think it will come to war?” Peter Hanning asked with a frown.
“With Russia?” Sir John raised his eyebrows. “It is not impossible.”
“Nonsense!” Lord Salchester said briskly, his wineglass in the air. “Nobody’s going to go to war against us! Especially over something as absurd as the Crimea! They’ll remember Waterloo, and leave us well alone.”
“Waterloo was over thirty-five years ago,” Omegus Jones pointed out. “The men who fought that have laid their swords by long ago.”
“The British army is still the same, sir!” Salchester retorted, his mustache bristling.
“Indeed, I fear it is,” Omegus agreed quietly, his lips tight, his eyes sad and far away.
“That was the finest, most invincible army in the world.” Salchester’s voice grew louder.
“We beat Napoleon,” Omegus corrected. “We have fought no one since then. Times change. Good and evil do not, nor pride and compassion, but warfare moves all the time—new weapons, new ideas, new strategies.”
“I do not like to disagree with you at your own table, sir,” Salchester responded. “Courtesy prevents me from telling you what I think of your view.”
Omegus’s face lit with a sudden smile, remarkably sweet and quite unaffected. “Let us hope that nothing happens to prove which one of us is correct.”
Footmen in livery and parlor maids with white lace-trimmed aprons removed the soup plates and served the fish. The butler poured wine. The lights blazed. The clink of silver on porcelain was the soft background as conversation began again.
Vespasia watched rather than listened. Faces, gestures told her more of emotion than the carefully considered words. She saw how often Gwendolen looked toward Bertie Rosythe, the flush in her face, how easily she laughed when he was amusing, and that it pleased him. He was almost as much aware of her, although he was more careful not to show it quite so openly.
Vespasia was not the only person to notice. She saw Blanche Twyford’s satisfaction and recalled hearing her make a remark, which now she understood more clearly. Blanche had spoken of spring weddings, and Gwendolen had blushed. Perhaps this was the weekend when a declaration was expected? It would seem so.
Fenton Twyford seemed less pleased. His dark face looked cautious. A couple of times his glance at Bertie suggested unease, as if an old shadow crossed his thoughts, but Vespasia had no idea what it might be. Was Bertie not quite as perfectly eligible as he seemed? Or was it Gwendolen who somehow fell short? As far as Vespasia knew, she was of good family, wealthy if undistinguished, and without a breath of scandal attached. Her late husband, Roger Kilmuir, was also without blemish and was connected to the aristocracy. If his far elder brother died childless, which seemed likely, then Roger would have inherited the title and all that went with it.
Only, Roger had died in an unfortunate accident, the sort of thing that happened now and again to even the best horsemen. Gwendolen had been quite shattered at the time. It was good to see that she was reaching after some kind of happiness again.
One by one gold-rimmed plates were removed, fresh courses brought, and more wine poured, until nothing was left but mounds of fresh grapes from the hothouse, and silver finger bowls to remove any faint traces of stickiness.
The ladies excused themselves to the withdrawing room and left the gentlemen to pass the port and, for those who so wished, to smoke.
Vespasia followed Isobel and Lady Salchester and was aware of the rustle of taffetas and silks as Gwendolen and Blanche Twyford came behind them. They took their seats in the velvet-curtained withdrawing room, carefully arranging mountainous skirts both to be flattering and not to impede other people’s approach, when the gentlemen should rejoin them.
This was the part of any evening that Vespasia liked the least. Conversation almost always became domestic, and since Rome she found it hard to concentrate on such things. She loved her children, deeply and instinctively, and her marriage was agreeable enough. Her husband was kind and intelligent—an honorable man. Many women would have been envious of so much. She wanted for nothing socially or materially. It was only in the longing of the heart, the hunger to care to the power and depth of her being, that she was not answered.
She looked at the other women in the room and wondered what lay behind the gracious masks of their faces. Lady Salchester had energy and intelligence, but she was plain, plainer than her own parlor maid, and probably the housemaid and the kitchen maid, as well. It was widely suspected that Lord Salchester’s attention wandered, in a practical as well as imaginary way.
“I know what you are thinking,” Isobel said beside her, leaning a little closer so she could speak in a whisper.
Vespasia was startled. “Do you?”
“Of course!” Isobel smiled. “I was thinking so, too. And it is quite unfair. If she were to do the same, with that nice-looking footman, society would be scandalized, and she would be ruined. She would never go anywhere again!”
“Dozens of married women become bored with their husbands, and after they have produced the appropriate number of children, they have affairs,” Vespasia pointed out sadly. “I don’t think I admire it, but I am quite aware that it occurs. I could name you half a dozen.”
“So could I,” Isobel agreed flippantly. “We’ll have to do it, and see if we know the same ones.”
Blanche Twyford was talking to Gwendolen, nodding every now and then, and Gwendolen was smiling. It was easy to guess the subject of their excitement.
Vespasia looked sideways at Isobel and saw the shadow in her eyes again. If Bertie proposed marriage to Gwendolen this weekend, which seemed to be generally expected, would Isobel really lose more than a possible admirer? Did she care for him, perhaps even have hopes herself? She had loved her husband; Vespasia knew that. But he had been gone for three years now, and Isobel was a young woman, no more than Vespasia’s own age. It was possible to fall in love again. In fact, at thirty it would be harsh and lonely not to.
Should she say something? Was this a time when real friendship dared embarrassment and rejection? Or was silence, the pretense of not knowing, preferable, thereby allowing the deeper wounds to remain private?
The decision was taken from her by the arrival of Lady Warburton, whereupon the conversation moved to fashion, Prince Albert’s latest ideas for improving the mind, and, of course, the queen’s enthusiasm for everything her husband said.
They were rejoined by the gentlemen, and the atmosphere changed again. Everyone became more self- conscious, backs a little straighter, laughter more delicate, movement more graceful. The servants had retreated to leave them alone. The final cleaning up would be done when the guests retired to bed.
They were all facing Gwendolen and Bertie when Isobel made the remark. Gwendolen was sitting with her skirts swept around her like a tide, her head up, her slender throat pale in the candlelight. She looked beautiful and triumphant. Bertie stood close to her, just a little possessively.
“Charming,” Lady Warburton said very quietly, as if the announcement had already been made.
