her eyes were sharp. ‘Forgive me, I don’t recognise you from London. You haven’t been up for the Season otherwise I would know. I know everyone.’ It was politely said, but the warning was unmistakable.
Elidh swallowed. This was their first test and their last if they failed it. But like any test, they’d prepared for it. They had a script, as her father liked to call it. He launched into that script now, bowing low and taking their hostess’s hand. He was being lavish, placing a kiss on her knuckles, his eyes holding hers, his accent thick. ‘Buongiorno, Signora Keynes. The apology is all mine. I see we have come unannounced despite my best efforts. My note must have missed you in London. I am Prince Lorenzo Balare di Fossano. Please, allow me to present my daughter, the Principessa Chiara Balare.’
He relinquished her hand and swept their hostess another extravagant bow. ‘We’d only just arrived in London when we saw the announcement and thought this would be a splendid opportunity to experience an English house party and to meet people.’ He paused long enough to look troubled. ‘I wrote, of course, enquiring about an invitation, but you’d already left. I hope we have not caused you any discomfort?’
It was cannily done; his wording already implied their appearance had been accepted. Elidh felt Catherine Keynes’s gaze sweep her, assessing her from the wide straw brim of her hat to the peeping toes of her shoes, dyed to match her gown. She’d dressed carefully for this first impression in an afternoon gown of robin’s-egg blue trimmed in expensive falls of cream lace at the short sleeves and a wide band of matching grosgrain ribbon at the waist. Rosie had outdone herself on this one. The transformation had astonished even Elidh. The fabric from her mother’s Lady Macbeth dinner gown combined with yards of lace from one of Titania’s filmy peignoirs. She was accessorised from head to toe, with tiny gold flower-shaped bobs at her ears, to the hand-painted fan at her wrist and the white sheer shawl looped through her arms. Nothing had been overlooked. She appeared both refined and fresh. Elidh wished she felt that way, too.
Assessment flickered in Catherine Keynes’s sharp eyes. Elidh could see her weighing the advantages to an additional guest who was both pretty and hopefully as polished as she looked. Elidh held the woman’s gaze with a confident smile, the sort of smile a princess would use, who did not doubt her acceptance anywhere. Catherine Keynes smiled back before she transferred her attentions to Elidh’s father. ‘It is no trouble at all, Your Highness.’
‘Call me Prince Lorenzo, per favore.’ Her father smiled graciously as if he was doing his hostess a favour by appearing at her party instead of discommoding her and creating the impossible task of finding two more rooms in a home that must already be filled to bursting if the number of girls on the back terrace was any indicator.
Catherine Keynes smiled, warmly this time, charmed by her father. ‘Allow me to introduce you to some of our guests. Rooms will be ready after tea. You will have a chance to meet my son at supper tonight. We dine at eight, with drinks in the drawing room at seven.’
They had passed the first test. A bubble of elation welled up inside Elidh. But that elation was short-lived. The prize for winning entrance to the party was to be bombarded with a barrage of names and faces to remember. Lord this, Lady that, Miss Sarah Landon with blonde ringlets in the frothy pink gown, Lady Imogen Bettancourt in the peach confection, Miss Lila Partridge in blue, the Bissell twins, Leah and Rachel, both in a lime-green muslin dotted with cool white flowers. The list went on, and those were only the lovely girls. There were the requisite mothers, but there were men, too. Brothers, uncles, fathers, cousins, who had come as well to perhaps lend additional credence to their female relations’ claims of eligibility. In short, a daunting field. The finest young girls in England were here, in a daunting home, undertaking a daunting task for which the outcome would be a single victor.
Well, it was a good thing she and her father had other goals to accomplish here. With so many pretty girls on hand, Elidh knew she didn’t have a chance, even if she’d wanted one. Now, her father would know it, too. He’d have to recognise their first priority needed to be securing a patron now that they’d seen the field first-hand.
* * *
When their rooms were prepared, Elidh was more than ready to seek the sanctuary of hers.
Rosie was waiting for her, unpacking trunks. ‘Did you see him, yet?’ She was vibrating with excited energy as she shook out a dinner gown.
‘No, we won’t see him until supper.’ Elidh untied her hat. ‘That’s better. All these clothes are so hot. Help me get out of this dress.’ She looked about the room as Rosie worked her laces loose. Even on short notice, the room carried the same opulence displayed throughout the house: pale blue walls, yards of flowing sheer white curtains at the long windows, wainscoting at the ceiling finished with intricately carved cornices, plush carpet beneath her feet, and a bed to die for—crisp linen, soft pillows, and a silk coverlet in easy-to-stain white, the ultimate in luxury.
‘There’s even a little chamber off your room for me to sleep in. My own room. That’s so much better than sharing a bed with my nieces in Upper Clapton,’ Rosie confided. ‘I’ve never seen a place so posh.’
‘I haven’t either.’ Doubt swamped Elidh. ‘Do you think we’re in over our heads, Rosie?’ They could still pull out, leave at any time. There were numerous excuses they could give. It wasn’t too late.
Rosie gathered up her gown and winked. ‘Being in over our heads is half the fun. We’ll manage, you’ll see.’
‘You’re as crazy as my father.’ Elidh stretched out on the bed.
‘Maybe so, but he hasn’t ever let us down,’ Rosie answered. Elidh thought that was debatable. She supposed it depended on how one looked at it. Rosie began going through the wardrobe, sorting through the newly unpacked gowns. ‘Do you remember when the troupe was in Prussia and the axel on the wagon broke?’ She did remember, it had been November and there’d been an early snow. ‘We had no money for rooms and repairs, so your father arranged for us to perform at the tavern in exchange for room and board. We never went hungry even when our pockets were to let.’ They’d slept in the hayloft, all of them crammed together. There’d been little comfort and less privacy, as Elidh recalled. She’d picked hay out of her clothes for days afterwards. ‘We always managed.’ Rosie sighed with nostalgia. ‘Now, what shall we wear tonight? I’ll need to get it pressed and these new skirts with their yards and yards of fabric are the very devil.’
Elidh laughed. ‘Spoken like a true lady’s maid. You pick. You’ll know what’s best.’ She would like to share Rosie’s nostalgic view of the past. Once, she had done so, but from the vantage point of the last few years, all she could see was how close to the edge they’d lived, how risky the adventure of their lives had always been. There’d never been a time of plenty, of ease, where there wasn’t a need to think about where the next meal came from. She envied the girl she’d once been, who hadn’t feared that uncertainty, who hadn’t been bothered by the unknown.
Elidh rolled to her side and stared out the window, listening to the ripple of the water ladder in the garden below. When had she changed? When had any risk become too much risk? When had she begun to crave certainty and stability? Goodness knew she wouldn’t find any of those things here. This whole scheme was the antithesis of all that.
‘What do you suppose Mr Keynes will be like?’ Rosie asked from the wardrobe. ‘Do you suppose he’s handsome?’
‘He’s certainly arrogant, to think he’ll find a bride in two weeks.’ Elidh sighed. ‘He’s audacious, too. How could he be otherwise, Rosie? I can’t imagine a serious man engineering such a spectacle, not that I need to worry. He won’t look twice at me, not with a house full of lovely girls.’ The sooner Rosie and her father accepted the fact that she couldn’t compete, the sooner they could set aside their fanciful notions.
But Rosie was undeterred. ‘There will be no talk of defeat, not so soon and with a closet of new dresses waiting to be worn. Don’t count yourself out yet. Now, come sit and let’s start to work on your hair for dinner. You have to give old Rosie a chance to work her magic and you might just be surprised.’