Three weeks had passed since the funeral of Mr. Giles Frayne and the day of Ginny Bloggs’s arrival at Courtney had dawned.
Lord Gerald wished he could wash his hands of the whole thing. But he had promised to keep an eye on Ginny and she was in for quite a dreadful welcome. A large house party had been planned for her arrival, full of the most terrifying members of society, all of whom seemed determined to put the coal merchant’s daughter in her place.
All had been outraged at the idea of a member of the lower-middle classes inheriting Courtney. Lord Gerald had visited the Frayne mansion two days before to find it alive with comments such as:
“Bound to smell of the shop.”
“No breeding, mark my words.”
“Probably got a common accent.”
“How can we socialize with someone who could be one’s scullery maid?”
And so on.
Lord Gerald had been asked to invite guests of his own and had grimly chosen the type of men and women he admired most. He detested what he termed “old-fashioned girls”—the kind interested only in getting married and having babies. He liked his men friends to be cultured and witty and his women friends to have careers and do things. He liked women to wear long, lean lines instead of the depressingly fashionable laces and frills.
He liked them to have well-kept hair and well-kept short nails and to state their views with the forthrightness of men. He abhorred flirting. Romance was a tinsel invention of sentimental poets. Lord Gerald believed firmly in the marriage of true minds. He was by no means a virgin, having experienced several interesting affairs in his early twenties. But now from the height of his thirty-three years he could smile indulgently at the follies of youth. The urgings of the human body were a depressing hangover from prehistoric days and could be easily subdued by either hard work or a cold bath. He had been celibate for four years and had, he reflected, enjoyed every minute of it.
The trouble with Lord Gerald was that he had never had to seek female admiration. His combination of good looks, a title, and a great fortune were enough to secure him the attention of every woman when he walked into a room. He felt more comfortable with his court of hard-bitten, chain-smoking, intelligent women who, he felt sure, admired him for his mind alone. Surprisingly enough he had no liking for Tansy. She was too avaricious for his taste. Too blatantly grasping.
The more he thought of Ginny Bloggs, the more he found he was looking forward to meeting her. A girl from her class of society would have experienced something of the rougher side of life and would surely be no pampered doll. His women friends at least were not snobs. Weren’t they always talking about the equality of birth and opportunity?
He glanced at the clock. Miss Ginny Bloggs was due to arrive at any minute. The least he could do was to be there to meet her.
The house party moved about the lawns and rooms of Courtney, waiting for the imminent arrival of Miss Bloggs. There was something predatory about them, thought Lord Gerald. He turned with relief to his friend, Miss Alicia Benson, enjoying her appearance, her neat straw hat, hard, clever face, and the masculine lines of her Paquin suit, which, instead of being ridiculously hobbled, had a sensible skirt that allowed Miss Benson to move as freely as a man—which she did.
Tansy was, as usual, dressed in something angular and nasty, and Miss Barbara Briggs had erupted in an avalanche of old lace that fell in cascades from her massive bosom to her tiny swollen feet. Her wide voile hat was so embellished with fruit and flowers and feathers that it looked as if Miss Briggs might sink slowly into the lawn under its weight.
A long straight avenue of limes stretched in an unbroken line from the entrance of the house past the ornamental lake to the lodge and the gates beyond.
Lord Gerald found Jeffrey at his elbow. “Who has gone to the station to meet Miss Bloggs?” he asked.
Jeffrey turned an unlovely color of puce and mumbled something about “the gel makin’ her own way, what.”
“Do you mean,” said Lord Gerald, appalled, “that no one—not one of you—has gone to London to meet the girl off the train?”
“Well, why didn’t you, hen?” said Jeffrey with an irritating bray of laughter. “Got you there, laddie!”
Lord Gerald turned away in disgust.
Just then a stillness fell over the crowd. The croquet players stopped playing croquet, the gossipers stopped gossiping, and the walkers stopped walking. A carriage was coming up the drive at a great pace, pulled by four prime horses.
It swept up to the front of the house in tremendous style and a liveried footman jumped down from the box and opened the carriage door.
Miss Ginny Bloggs stepped down.
She turned vaguely and stared in silence for one whole minute at the open-mouthed crowd. An elderly gentleman got out and shook her hand.
“You’ve been so very kind to me,” said Miss Bloggs in a pleasant, well-modulated voice. “So very kind of you to escort me home. I really didn’t know what to do when I found there was no one to meet me. It must have been a mistake, of course.”
Ginny had addressed her last remark to Barbara Briggs, who rushed up stammering apologies. They had thought she would have her own carriage. They had not thought for a minute that she would be alone.
“Then it’s just as well I’m not,” replied Ginny with a dazzling smile. “This is Sir Philip Vere, who kindly rescued me. I met him by chance at the station.”
Sir Philip raked Miss Briggs up and down with a fiery glance. “Humph!” he said. “Must be on my way. See you look after this little lady, now, or you’ll hear from me. By gad, never heard the like!” And off he went.
The company surveyed Miss Ginny Bloggs in stunned silence. Lord Gerald smiled cordially to conceal his disappointment. Why, she was like a China doll.
And indeed, Ginny did look rather like a very expensive doll. She looked as if she had stepped out of a bandbox rather than someone who had just endured a long journey on a hot day. She was wearing a blue chiffon dress with a high boned collar, and her waist could not have been more than nineteen inches. The blue of the dress was not one of the smoky colors so fashionable at present. It was an uncomplicated blue: a clear summer’s sky-blue; a bright-blue straight from a child’s paint box. Her large and startling eyes were of the same color, set wide apart in an exquisite heartshaped face. Her hat was a ridiculous floppy thing in straw of the same blue, the crown being formed by a nosegay of artificial sweet peas. Tiny white openwork shoes with ridiculously pointed toes peeped out from beneath her hem and she carried a blue lace parasol with an ivory handle.
After a glance in Jeffrey’s direction, Lord Gerald stepped briskly forward with Alicia Benson. Alicia was feeling cheerful. To anyone else, of course, Miss Bloggs might appear glamorous, if you liked that chocolate-box type of look. But she knew that Gerald did not, and the girl typified everything he most despised in women… as long as she didn’t turn out to have a brain….
“Welcome to Courtney,” Lord Gerald was saying. “I am your next-door neighbor.”
“Oh, good,” said Ginny with a dazzling smile. “We shall be able to have long chats over the fence.”
“Long chats over the fence!” said Tansy with a bray of laughter. “My dear Miss Bloggs, we’re not in Bolton now.”
Ginny gave Tansy a bewildered look. “Of course we are not,” she said gently. “We are at Courtney, in the county of Kent.” And then she added in an undertone that was somehow perfectly audible to the listening guests, “Poor, poor lady. Imagine not knowing where you are? But then… it’s said there is one in every family.” And then, raising her voice, Ginny said, “I would like some tea. Do you think that is possible, Lord Gerald, or may I call you Jerry?”
“No, you may not,” said Lord Gerald firmly. “I dislike nursery names. Tea you shall have. Would you like to have it on the terrace?”
“Yes, please,” said Ginny. She sailed forward gracefully and sat down. “What a lot of people,” she remarked. “Do they all live here?”
“No, no,” said Barbara Briggs, laughing. She had dumped herself down on the chair on one side of Ginny while Lord Gerald and Alicia took the other two. “This is simply a house party in your honor, my dear.”
“Good,” said Ginny with devastating simplicity. “I do not like crowds of people to live with, although I do love parties.”
“I’m sure all this must be very bewildering for you, Miss Bloggs,” said Alicia earnestly. “But you shall find I shall be of inestimable help to you. I have done a great deal of charity work among the lower classes.”
“Indeed,” said Ginny, picking out the most fattening cake she could see. “Are part of my duties as mistress of Courtney to run charities?”
Alicia winced. “No, my dear. You misunderstood me. You will find this way of life a great deal different from the one you have been used to.”
“Oh,” said Ginny blankly. “In what way?”
“Well…” Alicia hesitated delicately. “There’s the running of the household, of course. You are surely not used to so many servants.”
Ginny looked at Alicia with a wide, blank, blue-eyed stare for a minute and then around, and waved the butler forward.
“Are you the butler?” asked Ginny.
“Yes, madam. Harvey is my name, madam.”
“And have you been here long?”
“Nigh on twenty years, madam,” said the butler proudly.
“And you run this household? I mean—all the servants come under you?”
“Yes, madam.”
Ginny’s clear blue gaze took in the elegant tea table and the well-appointed drawing room beyond.
“It seems to me you do an excellent job, Harvey,” she said. “Just keep on doing it and I shall be very happy.”
“Yes, madam,” said the much-gratified Harvey, beaming, bowing, and withdrawing.
“So that’s that,” said Ginny calmly. “What else is there?”
Alicia’s olive skin began to take on a shade of pink. “There’re… oh, so many things, my dear. You will be presented at Court. You must learn to curtsy—”
“Oh, I can do that… very well,” said Ginny.
Alicia did not know quite how it happened but she had been made to feel as if she had just committed the grossest of impertinences. She muttered some excuse, rose hurriedly from the table, and left.
Lord Gerald leaned forward. “Mr. Frayne very kindly left me the contents of his library in his will, Miss Bloggs. Perhaps you would care to look over the shelves when you have time. If there is anything you would particularly like, perhaps you would care to let me know… Miss Bloggs?”
He stared across the table as if he could not believe his eyes. Miss Ginny Bloggs had fallen neatly, suddenly, and quietly asleep.
Lord Gerald leaned back in his chair and battled with a series of unaccustomed emotions. Never had any girl or woman turned her eyes from him, let alone dropped off to sleep! Common, common girl! He wanted to shake her till her teeth rattled. How dare she sit there like the Sleeping Beauty, looking so fragile, so infinitely feminine, so sickening!
There was an embarrassed little silence. Then Barbara Briggs coughed very loudly in Ginny’s ear and Ginny woke up as simply and as suddenly as she had fallen asleep.
“I’m so sorry,” she said, yawning, “but I must lie down.”
“Of course,” said Barbara. “I’ll show you to your rooms.”
Ginny rose gracefully, and then turned and smiled up at Lord Gerald. “You were saying something or other about the library. I’m sorry I fell asleep. But we shall have a good long gossip about it this evening,” said Ginny comfortingly, “so don’t worry about a thing.”
And with that, she gave him a motherly pat on his well-tailored sleeve and drifted off upstairs.
“She’s impossible,” raged Lord Gerald de Fremney. “Utterly impossible!”
Ginny was still yawning as a maid undressed her and took the pins from her soft gold hair. Then the maid wrapped her in a kimono and brushed her hair with long, even strokes until it flowed in a shining golden cascade down Ginny’s back. When the maid had gone, Miss Ginny Bloggs climbed into the four-poster bed, vacated by the late and unlamented Mr. Frayne, and stared blankly at the ceiling. Slowly one small hand crept down and cautiously fingered the silk ribbons that were threaded through the sheets. Then the wide blue eyes stared around the room, from the gardenias at the window in their luster bowl to the marble washstand with its copper jugs of hot water covered by beribboned cozies bearing the Frayne crest. A portrait of Mr. Frayne stared down at her from above an Adam fireplace. Ginny stared back, and then with one blink of her blue eyes, fell fast asleep.
The four relatives met in the library and locked the door.
Cyril was the first to speak. “She c-can’t be as stupid as she looks,” he said.
“Chats over the fence, indeed,” sneered Tansy.
“You’d better be careful, Tansy,” warned Barbara sweetly. “Our dear Miss Bloggs implied you were not right in the head.”
“Useless little doll,” grumbled Jeffrey, fortifying himself from a decanter. “Needs putting in her place.”
“She’ll be put in her place this evening, all right,” said Tansy grimly. “Let’s make sure everyone dresses up to the nines and makes her feel small. And let’s all use the new small talk—you know, the Italian stuff. She’ll never know what we are saying. And as for you, Cyril, you’ve been playing simply frightful practical jokes at house parties for as long as I can remember. Why not play some on Miss Bloggs tonight?”
“I c-can’t h-have been p-playing practical jokes as l-long as you c-can remember,” said Cyril, “’cos you’re at least twice as old as I am.”
“I am not,” cried Tansy, outraged.
“Well, you look it,” said Cyril gleefully.
“Steady on! Steady the buffs!” cried Jeffrey. “We’ll never get to a plan of action if we quarrel among ourselves. Let’s just start by making things a bit uncomfortable for the gel, heh, what?”
“We mustn’t make it too obvious,” said Barbara nervously. “After all, we are being paid to bring her out, so to speak.”
“We’ll bring her out, all right,” said Tansy grimly. “We’ll bring Miss Ginny Bloggs out in a way that no debutante has been brought out before!”