Chapter 19

Gowns chosen, Georgiana and her companions rejoined the rest of the party, and for the remainder of the day she was treated to the spectacle of the Duke staying close by Alice's side. He was not so uncivil as ever to meet Georgie's eyes again while he was doing so; his behaviour was impeccable, and he never overstepped the bounds of propriety, but the mere fact of his attention lighting on her seemed to make Alice extremely uneasy. Her mother, by contrast, was delighted, while Mary Debenham and her parents were trying and to a large extent failing to conceal their great chagrin at this new turn of events. Mary's sharp tongue, which had on previous days been largely employed in acid comments directed at Georgie, was now engaged in criticising every detail of Alice's dress and deportment. She spent much of the day giggling behind her hand with her crony Miss French, in a blatant way that made Georgie, rising above her own turmoil, itch to give her a set-down. Alice could hardly be oblivious to such behaviour either, and, after a particularly poisonous after-dinner sally set her friend blushing, Georgie drew her aside for a turn about the room.

The weather was a little better than it had been of late, the warmth of a fire was no longer necessary, and this evening the ladies were gathered to wait for the gentlemen in the long picture gallery that led off the great hall. It had French windows at one end that opened onto a sheltered little garden set into an angle of a turret, and Georgie, not stopping to examine any of the portraits of Mauleverer ancestors that held the other ladies' attention, took Miss Templeton's arm and ushered her outside. They found themselves alone, in a small, secluded space of low box hedges, stone statues and climbing greenery; an antique fountain in the shape of a wolf's head tinkled in one corner. She closed the door behind them and said, ‘Now we can speak in private!'

She saw that tears stood in Alice's eyes. ‘Oh, Georgie!' she almost wailed. ‘I am in the most terrible coil! Miss Debenham's odious behaviour is the least of my concerns, horrid though it is. No! Mama is convinced that the Duke means to offer for me – perhaps at the ball! And she is delighted. She is writing to Papa this evening to tell him the wonderful news!'

‘I do not think you can yet be sure that the Duke has any fixed intention of making you an offer,' said Georgiana. ‘It has only been today that he has paid you any particular attention, and he seems to me to be… capricious. Perhaps his fancy will alight somewhere else tomorrow, and somewhere else again the day after.'

‘I hope you're right! But that will be almost as bad, because then Mama will blame me, and say that I should have done something to secure his regard when I had the chance!'

‘Like what?'

‘I don't know! She has counselled me strictly never to be alone with him, and of course I would not in any case – it's not as though I want to, for heaven's sake! – but she has already reproved me for not appearing to be delighted whenever he deigns to notice me. She says I look like a frightened rabbit when he addresses me. And I expect I do! I am not stupid, Georgie, as a general rule, but when he speaks to me I can think of nothing rational to say. He is so very intimidating, is he not? Even when he doesn't have those terrifying beasts with him!'

It could not be denied that there was a certain awkwardness to this conversation, which Georgiana had not considered when she led Alice aside in a well-meant attempt to save her from Mary's spite. She found herself reluctant to discuss the Duke with her friend; it would be improper, wrong, and above all unwise to do so. But she was obliged to give her some answer. ‘I confess I do not find him so, nor his dogs, for that matter,' she said with an effort at lightness.

‘You do not freeze when he addresses you? No, you do not, for you are not scared of anyone, are you? Not even of men, or large dogs with huge, sharp teeth! I have noticed that, and I cannot tell you how I envy you for it. I expect it comes of having such a great quantity of brothers,' Alice said thoughtfully. She seemed to be fast regaining her composure now that Mary Debenham and the Duke were absent.

‘I expect it does,' said Georgie with a weak smile. Alice looked at her fixedly, and as Georgie observed her with unease, an idea plainly occurred to her.

‘I don't suppose that you would consider marrying him?' cried Alice in sudden inspiration. ‘You're not scared of him at all, and I am sure you would make a perfectly splendid duchess! You are quite accustomed to all this…' She waved her hand expansively at the stone walls and many casement windows of the Castle, the sea and sky and dukes and dogs of Yorkshire. ‘You have lived your whole life in the very first circles, you are on excellent terms with all those terrifying Howard and Cavendish ladies, when I cannot always distinguish them one from another. I can imagine it so clearly!' she said fervently. ‘You will be very grand, and witty, and host splendid dinners which the Regent will attend. Quite apart from the Duke, though he is bad enough, the thought of all that horrifies me. If the Prince Regent or his brother of York, say, were to speak to me, I would… I would die of mortification!'

‘But…'

Alice had the bit between her teeth now, and was not to be cut off or diverted. ‘And what's more,' she said, eyes sparkling, ‘Mama and Papa could not possibly blame me if it turned out that Northriding preferred you. Because you are an earl's daughter, and it is entirely natural that he should choose to marry one of his own rank, or nearly so. That is why horrid Mary Debenham was so catty to you before: because she thought that the Duke was bound to choose you over the rest of us. Indeed,' she said na?vely, ‘I wonder that he has not. But I suppose you are not here for that purpose, after all, but as a friend of the family. I expect that accounts for it.'

‘Alice,' said Georgiana, conscious of a bubble of wild laughter rising within her, clamouring for release, ‘are you truly asking me to marry the Duke to save you from that fate?'

‘Yes! I only wonder I had not thought of it before. Oh. Oh dear. I suppose it really is a great deal to ask of a friend, is it not?' Her face fell in a comical fashion, and Georgie was obliged to bite her lip quite hard to prevent mirth from overwhelming her. ‘I'm sorry. I cannot expect you to do such a thing. I had not thought… But now I realise I was being foolish.'

‘Not foolish, Alice, but… it is, as you say, a great deal to ask of me. I would help you if I could, if I could only think of a way, but…'

Miss Templeton pressed her hand fervently. ‘I know you would! You are the best of friends. But I understand that if you agreed to take him instead you would then have in the end to actually marry him, to be alone with him, and… and allow him all the liberties that a gentleman must…'

‘Yes,' said Georgie in hollow tones. ‘Those.'

‘I am sure you would mind all that every bit as much as I would. How could you not? I cannot ask you to sacrifice yourself to save me. To submit to… that. No,' she said with a dolefully little sniff. ‘I see now that it was selfish of me, and I must endure it. Do not regard anything I have said, I beg you. And perhaps it will not be so very bad, after all. When I tried to tell Mama of my fears, she said that I was a silly girl and that I would learn to accustom myself to that aspect of life, as every married woman must. She said she counts linens – in her head, naturally, not out loud, which I expect a gentleman might not like, after all. And while I know she was trying to be helpful, probably, I must admit that is a thing I am sure I would have preferred never to know. But there is always death in childbed, I suppose. Even Mama,' she said with a spark of spirit, ‘could not blame me for that, and if she did, I would not be here to see it! That is a consolation.'

‘Is it?' said Georgiana wildly. She simply could not bring herself to discuss such intimate matters with Alice, nor to suggest to her that it was at least possible she might find pleasure in the Duke's embraces. It was not her place to offer consolation, and the reply that occurred to her – that the Duke was reputed to be a man of great experience, who might well know how best to set his nervous bride at her ease – was not something she felt any desire at all to put into words. Indeed, she wished she had not so much as thought of it. All this strayed, she felt, far too close to most dangerous territory. She also detected in herself a new and alarming tendency to feel slightly sorry for Northriding, faced with the prospect of a wife who shrank in horror even from the contemplation of being alone with him, quite apart from… No. That train of thought must cease.

‘Will you forgive me, Georgiana?' said Alice now, her small chin wobbling a little. ‘You are a true friend, I know, but I cannot ask so much even of you. I hope you will stand by my side, and be my bridesmaid, though, if I am permitted to choose one and do not have some grand lady whom I do not know forced on me. That way at least I will have one kind face beside me in my time of trial. And when I am dead, which I suppose will not be very long, if I'm lucky, perhaps you will have a care for my poor motherless child, left alone with his cold, unloving father – and his savage companions – in this bleak wilderness!' She gestured dramatically at Yorkshire once again, and Georgie was obliged to stifle the urge to applaud and cry, Brava! Her friend's soft brown eyes were overflowing with tears now at the deeply affecting picture she had painted of her brief but tragic future.

‘Have you been reading Mrs Radcliffe again, Alice? I believe you must have been, and it has lodged Gothic ideas in your brain. Do try not to dwell on them. I cannot think the Duke so very bad, or your prospects so very dark, you know.' Georgie scarcely knew what to say, and did not think that Alice would appreciate being laughed at. Who did?

‘No!' said Alice nobly, her head held high. ‘You are very kind, but do not attempt to comfort me. There is no comfort to be had. My fate is sealed, I know. I will go back inside and reconcile myself with it. There is no use repining for a life fated to be cut cruelly short!' And on this excellent curtain line – not easy to say, either – she left, her bearing and gait very much those of a queen tragically and unjustly condemned to the scaffold, but resolved to meet her untimely death with courage.

Georgie remained outside, having no taste for the role of chief lady-in-waiting to Lady Jane Grey, and succumbed to the slightly hysterical laughter that she had been holding at bay for the last few moments, but when her mirth subsided she began to feel ashamed. She might think Alice's fears ridiculously melodramatic and overwrought, but it was still true that her friend dreaded the future that had been laid out for her without any regard for her own wishes, and shrank from this marriage with repugnance, hard though it was for Georgie to understand this.

Alice's case was very different from her own, and it would be unjust to fail to recognise it. She was fortunate indeed to be surrounded by close relatives, male and female, who would never think to force her into a match she did not want, however advantageous it might appear in the eyes of the world. Last year when she had made her come-out and gentlemen had flocked to offer for her hand, her brother had consulted her as to her preferences in the matter, and listened to what she had said, even though her choice was one he could not approve. When she had entangled herself with Captain Hart… but this was old ground, and there was no profit in going over it again and flagellating herself anew. She was aware – and her recent resolution to be entirely and painfully honest with herself obliged her to confront the thought – that Alice had just offered her an excellent excuse to change her mind and accept the Duke after all, should she want it. Should she want it…

But if she seized the chance, by the same token she must not deceive herself into thinking that she was being noble. She had read the same novels Alice had, but if she chose to become Duchess of Northriding she would be doing it because she wanted to, and not in order to save her friend from the Gothic fate she had so feelingly described. And all the powerful reasons not to marry him that had seemed so clear to her last night still held. She might not be frightened of the Duke as Alice was, the idea of physical intimacy with him was a temptation rather than a terror to her, but the vision of the woman she might become if she accepted him must prevent her at last from making such a choice.

She sighed, and arranged her face, and went inside.