Four
Four days later, Principessa Chiara Balare di Fossano, accompanied by her maid and her father, Prince Lorenzo, stepped down from the hack that had driven them from the station in Newmarket, on to the hallowed grounds of Hartswood. Elidh had never been more nervous in her life. Perhaps it was fitting. This scheme was more outrageous than any other her father had cooked up. It was only right she should be more nervous. There was more to lose.
The concept of ‘more’ followed her everywhere like an unwanted stray. Her father was more audacious than he’d ever been, not only using their precious rent money for the carriage ride that took them from the station on All Saints to the estate, but he’d also purchased first-class accommodations for the journey from London and proudly introduced himself as Prince Lorenzo whenever asked. He reasoned no one would believe in a prince who travelled third class. If anyone made note of their arrival, he wanted to be prepared on all fronts. Elidh hoped they didn’t regret the expenditure later.
Looking up at the sandstone façade of Hartswood, it appeared the audacity and luxury didn’t end with her father. The estate was more opulent than anything Elidh had ever seen in England. That luxury was evident from the first turn into the long drive, featuring perfectly manicured lawns and leafy green trees overhead through which the sun filtered so artfully one had to wonder if the trees had been planted deliberately to get the effect. The circle at the end of the drive continued the theme, welcoming guests with an Italian fountain that burbled coolly in its centre while two sandstone staircases flanked the rising entrance to the double front doors of the estate, an elegant mix of English baroque and Italianate architecture.
The luxury didn’t end there. Grooms had leapt to take the horses’ heads as soon as the driver halted. A footman’s hand had waited to help her down, his head respectfully inclined. There was no moment for hesitation or uncertainty on her part. Nerves or not, she was immediately ‘on stage’, immediately immersed into her role as the Princess, and no one assumed otherwise. Perhaps her father was right. People saw what they expected to see. Certainly, none of the servants suspected otherwise.
A maid was present to guide them up the staircases to the wide, cool, white-marbled entrance hall, through the house and out to the afternoon comfort of the back terrace. The walk itself was subtly orchestrated to show a guest the level of opulence they’d stepped into. Perhaps it was meant to remind everyone that despite the lack of a title, the Keynes family was not without funds. It seemed she was not the only one with something to prove. Elidh filed the insight away for later.
She was grateful for her father’s presence at her elbow. Whatever the message this home meant to send, it was intimidating to a girl who lived in a tiny two-room boarding-house suite on Bermondsey Street. Her father was, at least, known and familiar to her in this strange wonderland. ‘Don’t look around too much,’ he whispered. ‘A princess would expect such a setting. Our hosts are trying to separate the wheat from the chaff, Daughter.’ He was playing his role of princely Italian royalty to the hilt, chin up, shoulders back, not a fearful iota in his gaze as they passed crystal-cut glass vases filled with armfuls of fresh flowers and open doors that allowed for surreptitious peeks into elegantly appointed rooms done in cool, pale colours.
Elidh could not argue with her father’s reasoning. Out on the back terrace, young girls gaped shamelessly at the graduated water ladder running down the centre of the gardens, the strategically placed statuary, the topiary trees cut in animal shapes, the plants arranged in colourful designs to draw the eye. She thought their gaping could be excused. The garden was spectacular.
‘Capability Brown’s best work, I like to argue.’ A stylishly dressed older woman with elaborately coiffed hair swanned up to them. ‘The house has been in the family for three generations. I’m Catherine Keynes, Mr Keynes’s mother and hostess for the party. Welcome to Hartswood.’
Elidh was immediately alert. Their hostess smiled politely, her tone gracious, but 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
