The Stanbroke Girls Read online

  “It is impossible,” was all that young lady could bring out.

  “Evidently not,” said the Lady Elizabeth, then added a bit more kindly, “I had just that same thought, though, when I first came here last year.”

  Lord Halcot, who was the fifth and last member of their party, laughed a little at the ladies. “What a sight you are,” he teased Miss Lewis in particular. “Anyone would think you’d never seen a book before!”

  “A book yes,” answered Amy. “But there must be—there must be a hundred thousand here!”

  “Half a million,” Charlie informed her, very pleased to be able to present this figure. “At least, that is what Mr. Lackington claims. Claimed, I should say. I believe he died last year.” He went on, enjoying his rôle as teacher. “They say a coach-and-six were driven round this room—before the counters were installed, naturally.”

  The apartment in which they stood was indeed awesome, and though Charlie enjoyed teasing the girls, it was not difficult to see why they should be overwhelmed. Dozens of clerks flitted in and out from behind a huge circular counter; about the counter rose a series of spiralling galleries lined with books, surmounted high above their heads by a lofty dome. Employees and patrons scurried along the steps. Up a broad staircase to one side of the huge central chamber two lounging rooms were visible, their handsome arm-chairs and settees occupied by tonnish ladies and gentlemen leafing through elegant volumes. “The binding-rooms are over there,” said Charlie, pointing to a doorway. “And also the accounting-rooms, I think—”

  “Do you mean to say they publish books as well?”

  “Oh, by the hundreds!” he informed them cheerfully. Acting the part of a seasoned Corinthian put him in very good spirits. “Perhaps I can arrange for you to see the work-rooms, if you like.”

  “This is sufficient,” Isabella answered, smiling. “Mamma, may we wander about a little?” she asked, beginning to do so as she spoke. Permission granted, the girls dispersed, each admiringly seeking out those authors and subjects she most enjoyed. Isabella inspected the shelves of Sir Walter Scott, Elizabeth the volumes of Suckling and Pope.

  “Do you think it’s true about the coach-and-six?” Amy Lewis asked Halcot shyly, when he joined her before a row of Miss Burney’s novels.

  A shopman bustled up officiously behind them to obtain a copy of Evelina. “I don’t see why not,” said Charles. “If they didn’t drive it round in fact, they certainly could have. The place is more than large enough. Have you looked at the books in the lounging rooms? Some of them are quite rare and beautiful—Oh Jupiter,” he interrupted himself, as he turned to point her out the way. “Speaking of rare and beautiful…excuse me.” He hurried off very abruptly indeed and hastened up the broad staircase. Miss Lewis, watching him closely, saw him accost a tall, elegant female—with copper-coloured hair.

  “Miss Lemon,” she breathed to herself, tears starting at once to her eyes. “Oh, Charlie!”

  Lady Isabella, who had been looking for Amy, chanced to overhear her friend’s soft murmur. “‘Oh, Charlie,’ indeed,” she said scornfully, unable to stop herself. “Forgive me, dearest—but how can you possibly bear my brother? He is intolerable! First prosing on to show us what a man about town he is—oh, they say this, and Mr. Lackington claimed that! And then—to leave you standing here alone so—it is too bad of him,” she asserted loyally, slipping her arm round Amy’s. “The monster!” she went on, as she looked more carefully at Miss Lewis. “He has made you weep!”

  But, “I am not weeping,” contradicted Amy softly (and mendaciously). She went on in her steady, quiet voice. “My dear, I know your brother has his faults. I know he is a little of a bully, and I know he is a little…careless. He likes to seem more important than he is, perhaps—so do we all, in our hearts—and it is true I have seen him be selfish more than once. But, oh Isabella, these are human faults—and I cannot help it! I—” she stopped just short of a full confession and fastened her eyes on Charlie once more. “I cannot help it,” she amended. She struggled at once to get hold of herself, for Lord Halcot was fast bearing down upon them with Susannah Lemon in tow.

  “Lady Isabella, is it not?” breathed Miss Lemon as she approached. She extended her hand gracefully to Bella and gave a slight bow.

  Charlie beamed at them both. “Yes, yes, m’sister. You met her at her come-out, I dare say.”

  “Such a pleasant occasion,” said Susannah.

  There was a silence, during which Isabella looked purposefully at her brother.

  “Miss Lemon was looking for a copy of Child Howards Pilgrimage,” Charlie informed her after a moment

  “Childe Harold,” Isabella corrected tightly.

  “Yes, exactly. Lord Byron, isn’t it?”

  Swallowing a disagreeable smile at his error, Miss Lemon confirmed that it was. “I simply dote on Byron, do not you, Lady Isabella?”

  “Charlie, I think you ought to make Miss Lemon known to Miss Lewis,” was Isabella’s furious reply. For during all this interchange neither Halcot nor Susannah had given the slightest indication of being aware of Amy’s existence. Since she was standing within six inches of Bella, this was rather extraordinary—and extremely rude.

  “Dear me, have you not met?” blundered Charlie, surprised. “I thought you should have been presented to one another at the come-out. Well, anyhow, Miss Lemon, this is—”

  “We did meet, I think,” Amy suddenly brought out, dry-eyed and quite pale. “Miss Lemon,” she acknowledged, giving her hand briefly. It was a much more chilly greeting than any she was accustomed to give, and considering her lack of practice, she did it very well. The fact was, she had just realized that her birth gave her precedence over Susannah. She had been waiting for the other girl to recognise her, but after all it was her place to choose or not to choose to recognise Susannah. Moreover, it was for Miss Lemon to be presented to her and not the other way round. Since Charlie had also evidently forgotten this fact, and was about to present them as if Miss Lemon were the more consequential, Amy’s abrupt interjection saved him from a social solecism as well as restoring to herself a little dignity.

  Her behaviour was correct, but it was not agreeable to Miss Lemon. She was not in the habit of receiving cold acknowledgements from green country girls, and she found the experience displeasing. “I am sorry,” she replied very stiffly indeed. “I did not recall our having been acquainted.”

  “But now you do,” returned Amy with emphasis, astonished at her own words. Her voice was quite clear, and she had no trouble at all holding Miss Lemon’s eyes steadily. She was even, she realized with amazement, rather enjoying the confrontation. It gave her a curiously giddy sensation.

  This chit behaves as if she were royalty! thought Susannah to herself, but she was obliged to say aloud “Of course.”

  Amy smiled freezingly. “If you will excuse me,” she added in a murmur, and turned away. She walked off only a few steps, drew a book from a shelf at random, and pretended to glance through it with interest. I’ve done it! she exulted inwardly—at the same time demanding of herself frantically, What have I done? The book she was looking at, she slowly became aware, was a military history. It was also—as Isabella, presently joining her, pointed out—upside down.

  Isabella righted the book for her and whispered delightedly, “You were magnificent! Splendid! Amy, I am so proud of you.”

  But these words of praise rather upset Amy than reassured her. “I was terribly rude,” she replied, abashed. “I’ve never in my life insisted on taking precedence, till now.”

  “Well, you were never in your life so rudely ignored, I expect,” answered the other sensibly. “Oh, I should have liked to slap her, the—the snake!”

  “Oh no, Bella, I am persuaded…that is, I fear Miss Lemon simply did not see me. She could not have slighted me on pur—”

  “My dear girl, this is no time for charity! I never saw such discourtesy. Indeed, you were much too generous! You ought to have refused to know her at all
.”

  Horrified, Amy said, “I could not have done that! Only think of the awkwardness. No, no Isabella, I am afraid I did very wrong as it is. How cold I was! I shouldn’t have thought it possible. Do you know, I believe I ought to apologize to her.”

  Charlie and Miss Lemon having by now mounted into the spiralled galleries, Isabella allowed her voice to rise a little above a whisper. “My dear Amy, if you ever, ever think of such a thing again, I shall lose all my respect for you. Why should that…that spiteful wretch be permitted to make you uncomfortable? I shall simply murder Charlie when we get home. Childe Howard, indeed—what an idiot he is! I am sure Miss Lemon is laughing up her sleeve at him, too, for all her superior airs and graces. Who is she, anyhow?”

  “Isabella, if you say one word about this to Charlie I shall never forgive you,” Amy now said, ignoring the question. “Promise me you won’t; swear it.”

  Indignant though she was, Bella saw the reasonableness of such a demand. Accordingly she promised. “But if I ever have an opportunity to do Miss Susannah a disservice,” she threatened vaguely, “and I certainly hope I may—”

  “I certainly hope you may not,” interrupted Amy, who was perhaps just a little more charitable than even the reader would wish her to be. “If Charlie likes Miss Lemon, I am sure she must have many virtues. Everyone has some virtues, in any case,” she insisted in response to Bella’s skeptical glance.

  “Have they? Oh, no doubt you are right. Miss Lemon would make an ideal hassock, I should think,” Isabella answered, sounding for a moment more like her sister than herself. “I know I should be very pleased to use her for one.”

  Lady Trevor, with Elizabeth on her arm, now drew up to the girls and ended their conversation. “Where is Charlie?” she asked. “We must go home.”

  “He has climbed up into the boughs after a Lemon,” answered Isabella, with a gesture at the galleries above them.

  Elizabeth raised an eyebrow. “You are getting sharper, Bella,” she remarked.

  “Run up after him, and tell him we must leave, will you, my dear?” asked Lady Trevor of Amy.

  “I’ll go,” Isabella muttered, “though I should prefer to wait until they fell down. They are rotten enough fruit,” she added as she stalked off. Elizabeth gave her a puzzled glance, but Lady Trevor did not even bother to do so much as that. She had been a mother quite long enough to know when to ask no questions.

  Lady Emilia Barborough laid down her pen for a moment to rub a cramp out of her fingers. Really, Jemmy was too absurd! It was one thing to be so obstinate about accepting invitations as to force her to the device of a lottery—that was sufficiently silly—but to insist he would not attend his own sister’s dinner-party unless Lord Weld happened to draw her card from among the others…well, that was outside of enough. He had maintained it was only fair: nothing had been said, when they made their agreement, of exceptions for family. Emilia had argued that such an exception must be understood without any explicit discussion taking place, but she could not sway her brother. Very well, then! If he insisted on being preposterous, she could play that game as well. There was plenty of paper in the world, and plenty of ink. She had just written out her eleventh invitation to him; one more and she would be satisfied. She took up her pen again.

  When she’d finished she tossed her cards into a bowl with the others she’d collected during the week and went off in search of Lord Weld and her brother. She found the former in the breakfast-room, engaged in reading a journal of some sort. He was very startled indeed when she called his name, for he had been deeply engrossed in his reading, and then—surprise upon surprise—proceeded to blush till his pale skin almost matched the colour of his hair. “Oh, Lady Emilia—I…” He jumped up as if she’d caught him committing some heinous crime, laid his journal on the table, took it up again, set it down again (touching it as if it burned his fingers), and ended by placing it on his chair.

  “Lord Weld,” Emilia returned with amusement, “I seem to be disturbing you!”

  “Oh, no, oh, no, no,” said he, evidently in great discomfort. “Not at all. Can I be of service to—”

  “What on earth have you been reading, dear sir, that is so excessively absorbing?” she inquired, just as if she hadn’t realized this was the very question he hoped to avoid. Innocently she made her way round the table towards him, her blue muslin skirt whispering as she moved.

  He stood before the chair. “Nothing, no—that is to say,” he sputtered brokenly, “nothing of great interest.”

  She stood before him and extended her hand in the manner of a schoolmistress who waits to be given an illicit note. She was enjoying his embarrassment.

  “Oh dear, you don’t—Lady Emilia, how pretty you are looking today!” he exclaimed awkwardly.

  “None of that, my good man,” said she. “I’ve asked you a civil question, and I expect a civil—Oh my, the Ladies’ Monthly Museum!” she read out, for she had darted behind him and snatched the journal in question from his chair.

  “Dear madam, this is too bad of you,” said poor Weld.

  “My goodness me,” she crowed, ignoring his plaintive accusation, “if I had known ladies’ magazines interested you, I would have offered you my own!” She flitted away from him at just the instant he reached out to recover the disputed pages (a technique she’d perfected through long years of practice with Marchmont) and read aloud gleefully, “‘The Child of the Battle, by H. Finn.’ Is that what you were reading, sir?” She skipped to the end of the story and read, “‘A handkerchief was firmly tied across my eyes, and I prepared myself to resign my spirit beneath the surface of the ocean.’ My dear sir, you have been reading tragedies—and so early in the day! Oh no,” she went on, resolved to tease him without mercy, “I see it is to be continued! What a relief, Lord Weld, don’t you think? I know I shall sleep better!”

  “Lady Emilia, it is most unkind of you to chaff me so. Anyone could become involved in a story of that kind. They are very—er, compelling.”

  “Oh, yes, anyone could who was looking through the Ladies’ Monthly Museum. Were you looking for information on the Paris bonnets for summer, my lord? If so the Repository of the Arts is a much more complete source, I assure you. Allow me to lend you my copy.”

  “Lady Emilia,” he began, shaking his head vigorously and trying to sound stern.

  “Oh, no, I insist! You read my copy; I haven’t time anyhow. And then you can tell me all about what we must wear this July.”

  “My dear ma’am, you must surely be aware the Museum includes more than notes on fashion.”

  “Indeed! It includes novels, in serial form.”

  “I am sure you must realize,” he persisted, his blush receding at last, “there is quite a bit of political commentary to be found there. What I was looking at, before the—er, before The Child of the Battle caught my eye, was an account of the vote on the income-tax. You will find it on the previous page,” he pointed out stiffly, though with returning dignity.

  “You must permit me to share with you my subscription to the Journal des Dames et des Modes, Lord Weld,” smiled Lady Emilia regardless—but his lordship cut her short.

  “My dear ma’am, I am afraid you do your sex a great injustice. You seem to imagine that nothing printed for their benefit could possibly be of interest to a gentleman. I am sure you would not agree to the reverse of such a formula.”

  She considered. “You mean, that what is printed for the benefit of gentlemen can be of no interest to a lady?”

  “Precisely.”

  Nonplussed, she equivocated: “That is not quite the same, somehow.”

  “Just how, pray tell?”

  “Well, because—gentlemen…” She set the Monthly Museum down absent-mindedly and thought for a moment. “Well, everything is printed for the benefit of gentlemen. Gentlemen own the world, sir. And sometimes one is not even certain of the label ‘gentlemen.’ Perhaps ‘men’ would be better.”

  “I do not see what that has to say t
o the matter,” said Weld, now quite himself again. “And it is certainly not true that everything is printed for men. Mrs. Radcliffe appears to have a largely female audience, for example, and yet one can scarcely turn round without stumbling over one of her—ah, her productions.”

  “Aha! You see, you do not even like to use the word ‘book’ with regard to Mrs. Radcliffe. The literature that is created with women in mind is hardly literature at all, and you know it. It is trash.”

  “What about Miss Austen?” he demanded.

  “What about Alicia Mant?” she parried.

  “What about Madame d’Arblay?”

  “What about Caroline Scott? Or even better, what about our good friend H. Finn, author of the illuminating Child of the Battle? Tell me that isn’t nonsense!”

  “I liked it!” he asserted flatly, and so honestly that she forgot even to try to contradict him. She laughed instead, reaching for his arm.

  “Come, my dear sir. You are too much for me, I confess. I shan’t soon tease you again, depend upon it. Will you come and find my brother with me? It is time for another drawing in our famous lottery.”

  “Oh good, is it?” he asked, gladly escorting her. “Won’t Marchmont be pleased? We were just discussing these little drawings yesterday, and he was saying…ah, well, perhaps he will not be pleased exactly, but—Marchmont,” he broke off, calling into the library. “Marchmont, come out of there, will you, and join us. Your sister and I have planned an amusement for you.”

  The earl emerged warily. His shoulders were stiff from sitting hunched at his desk, and he kneaded them a little and rubbed at his neck.

  “Do come, old boy. This won’t hurt a bit!” Weld assured him as they followed Lady Emilia into the drawing-room. “Now you just sit here” (planting him in the wine-red arm-chair) “and close your eyes, and if you are a very very well-behaved young man, I think there will be a chocolate for you afterwards. Isn’t that true, ma’am?”