Chapter 15

C HAPTER 15

"That scarred hussy, " Evangeline growled, stalking back and forth across the parlor like a panther wearing muslin. "I hate her, I hate her, I hate her. "

Cordelia huddled in a chair, wishing that she could crawl into her shawl like a limpet. She had never seen her mother so furious before. Angry, yes. Frustrated, certainly. But usually she was bemoaning the stupidity of other people, and how obnoxious it was to always be working around them. Cordelia had never seen her in such a thwarted rage. Her only hope was to stay absolutely still and pray that her mother forgot she even had a daughter.

Evangeline's flawless skin was mottled with red, like a hothouse orchid. "I hate her!"

Cordelia was quite certain that her mother had never admitted to hating anyone before. To hate someone would be to give them too much respect. Yet somehow Penelope Green had merited this simply by existing.

It had been two days. Two days of watching her mother fray at the edges, of the Squire sandwiched between Penelope Green and her mother at dinner, in a cloud of conversation that glittered like knives. Two very long days.

Evangeline would throw out a statement like a blade and Penelope would deflect it, often with some self-deprecating comment. And then, instead of returning the attack, she would usually find a way to make the Squire laugh, which only made her mother colder and angrier and more determined to strike again.

Cordelia was astonished to find that she was actually embarrassed by her mother's showing in those conversations. I wish Mother wasn't doing it. I wish she didn't look so petty when she does it. Except I don't know if anyone else thinks that she looks petty. Maybe this is how people talk all the time. I don't know.

She should have been glad that none of the delicate barbs that Evangeline threw ever seemed to lodge in Mrs. Green's flesh. She liked Penelope Green. But it was still embarrassing to watch and whenever the Squire turned toward Penelope instead of her mother, Cordelia felt her heart sink.

They had all gone riding yesterday. Cordelia still wasn't certain how it had happened. There had been another barbed conversation at dinner and one thing had led to another.

"Do you ride, then?" Evangeline had asked.

"Badly," Penelope answered, with disarming frankness. "I can just about stay on the horse if the horse decides to let me."

"Samuel and I were talking of going on a ride tomorrow, but of course, if you don't enjoy it…"

Mrs. Green's eyes crinkled up as she smiled. "Oh, I might manage something. The weather looks to be glorious. Samuel, do you still have Dancer in the stable?"

"Good heavens, Penelope, that gelding is as old as I am!"

"Yes, and we understand each other very well."

Cordelia had been twisting her napkin under the table and hoping that her mother wouldn't swoop in with some other jab, when suddenly Mrs. Green had turned and looked across the table. "Cordelia, my dear, do you ride?"

"I… uh…"

"She does," said Evangeline coolly.

"Wonderful. Then please, I beg you, come with us." She waved her hand at the Squire and Cordelia's mother. "That way when these two gallop off like proper equestrians, flying over fences, we can amble happily along."

Cordelia had wanted to protest that she had never ridden any horse but Falada, but of course she couldn't. No one knew that Falada wasn't an ordinary horse. And she could remember, at that awful obedient dinner, all the chatter with the Squire about horses and riding horses, so what choice did she have?

"Yes," she said. "Yes, of course. Thank you for inviting me."

The shocking thing was that it hadn't been bad. The groom had brought her a pony named Minnow, who was round and placid and good-natured. Cordelia had mounted and immediately learned that she had no idea how to control a regular horse. Fortunately Minnow followed Dancer, who was just as good-natured, and Mrs. Green chatted gaily about the weather and the scenery while Cordelia tried to sort out what to do with the reins and how hard to squeeze with her knees.

A snort had shaken her from her concentration, and she'd looked up. Falada walked beside her, lifting his head high so that he looked down at her on Minnow's back. Cordelia looked up into Falada's eye, light green framed with dark pink skin that stood out against the shining whiteness of his coat. The paleness of his eyes made it easy to see what most people forgot—that a horse's pupils are slotted like a goat's, and Falada's held sly mockery that would have put any goat to shame.

He gazed down at her, her mother's familiar, so much taller than Minnow, and then very deliberately, he winked.

A spasm of fury had clenched like a fist around Cordelia's heart. All the old betrayal washed over her. She'd dropped her eyes and stared at Minnow's mane, the long black hairs trailing over her riding gloves, and thought I loved you.

She could not remember ever thinking that about her mother.

Luckily, Evangeline had then announced that she wanted a good gallop, "to shake the fidgets out," and the Squire said "Capital!" and the two raced off across the field. Cordelia reached out and patted Minnow's neck, which was warm and solid and ordinary, and felt the fist at her heart unclench a little.

Penelope had looked over at Lord Evermore, who was looking after the riders wistfully. "Well, go on! Don't sit here when you really want a good run."

"And leave you lovely ladies unattended?"

Penelope made a rude noise. "Samuel's estate may not be so well run as yours, but there aren't brigands lying in wait twenty yards from the house. Go on."

"Well… if you insist…" He had grinned at them both, looking briefly much younger, then galloped off after the other two.

"Just as I suspected," Penelope said cheerfully. "Richard is a lovely man, and occasionally gallant to the point of obnoxiousness."

"Mother wants me to flirt with him," Cordelia confessed. "But I don't know how."

The older woman looked over, startled. "There's not much point to it. He's hopelessly in love with Hester."

Cordelia blinked. "Really?"

"Really. Now listen to that bird singing in the trees. I've absolutely no idea what it is. Do you?"

Cordelia shook her head.

"Then it is probably a new species, and we shall name it for science. Does it sound like a crested mouse-warbler to you?"

Cordelia was beginning to understand Penelope's sense of humor by now. "I think it's a white-throated babbler," she said solemnly.

"My goodness! At this time of year? Well, you may be right." Mrs. Green adjusted her riding habit. " That, however, was definitely a willowy frog-warbler, don't you think?"

The sun was warm on their faces. They meandered across the field, inventing increasingly outrageous names for birds that probably didn't deserve them. Minnow grabbed mouthfuls of grass and Cordelia was absolutely at a loss for how to stop her—did she haul on the reins? really? she'd never even considered doing that with Falada—but Penelope didn't seem troubled by it at all.

"Not much of a ride, was it?" asked the stablemaster, when Dancer and Minnow strolled back into the stableyard an hour later.

"It was exactly the sort I prefer," said Penelope firmly. "A lovely day on a very peaceful horse. And Cordelia's good company." She grinned over at Cordelia. "Let me know if you'd like to amble around another day."

Cordelia must have said something appropriate, but what she was thinking, in pure amazement, was Good company? Me?

No one had ever said such a thing before. It was such a small bit of praise, but it stood in splendid isolation inside her skull. Good company.

Another person wanted to be around her. She was not imposing on someone's time. It was staggering. Her friends at school had been temporary alliances, and even then she was on the outside looking in. Ellen had ridden with her out of courtesy and habit and… well, probably pity, if she was being honest. Hester was a kind hostess and a generally good-natured person.

Cordelia was aware of how pathetic it was to be so warmed by such a minor statement, and yet it wrapped around her anyway, a bit of praise that she had won for herself, by herself.

"I hate her," Evangeline growled again, wrenching Cordelia's attention back to the present. "I've got to get her out of here. The Squire likes her entirely too much, God knows why, and he's known her for years. Nostalgia for their lost youth is like an aphrodisiac for middle-aged men." She scowled, then caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror over the mantel and spent a moment smoothing out the lines in her face. "Cordelia!"

Cordelia jerked, startled. "Yes, Mother?"

"You've spent time with her. Has she let anything useful drop?"

"Useful?" All she could think was good company, and surely that was of no use to anyone else.

"Something I can use against her, stupid girl! Something damning!"

Cordelia didn't have the faintest idea what such a thing would look like. "I… I don't know… like what?"

Evangeline hurled herself into a chair. "Something scandalous. Something that paints her in a bad light. Gambling debts or affairs with married men or secret Catholicism. Something. "

Cordelia tried to think of anything that might count, then realized that if she did know anything, she would never tell her mother. I have to tell her something, though. She could make me obedient and send me to spy on Hester and Penelope and Imogene if she doesn't think I'd do a good enough job. "I think she uses a lemon-water rinse on her hair?" she said cautiously.

"Not enough. Other women might care, but the Squire certainly wouldn't." She raked her nails down the arm of the chair. "I will not be outdone by a mere dabbler!"

"Dabbler…?"

Evangeline's laugh held no humor. "You didn't notice? No, of course not. She's a sorcerer. Oh, not a trained one." She laughed again, probably at Cordelia's expression. "Wouldn't make even half a hedge-witch. I doubt she knows she's doing anything. Why do you think all these fools adore her?"

Because she's funny and kind to people? But maybe she wasn't. Maybe it was magic after all.

But no, good company had been real. And they really had made up silly bird names together. Maybe the sorcery made people more inclined to like Mrs. Green, or maybe that was why she seemed taller, but she was… well… nice. And Evangeline had a lot more sorcery, and no one thought she was nice, unless the Squire did.

Cordelia licked her lips nervously. "I'll keep listening for something useful," she promised. "I really haven't talked to her that much, but I'll keep listening."

"Do that," said Evangeline broodingly. "Otherwise I might have to take desperate measures."

Cordelia shuddered at the thought.

When Cordelia arrived in the solar, Lady Strauss and Mrs. Green were already there. She thought of leaving again, but Mrs. Green immediately patted the divan beside herself. "Come, sit, my dear Cordelia! You must save me."

Cordelia sat. She tried to study Mrs. Green covertly, wondering if she could feel some kind of sorcery radiating off her skin. "Save you?"

"Yes. Imogene is trying to persuade me to play cards. If you join in, she'll at least be reasonable and play for sugar lumps instead of trying to wring my life savings from my poor tender flesh."

Lady Strauss rolled her eyes. "Oh, very well. If you insist." She began to deal the cards out. The pack was worn, the edges showing little nicks of white. They matched the teapot on the tray, which had faint white marks around the rim where the painted design had begun to wear away.

"I don't know how to play," Cordelia protested.

"Oh, we're for it now," said Mrs. Green. "Look at the unholy light in her eyes! Imogene, be gentle. She is young and I am poor."

"You are not poor," said Lady Strauss. "I refuse to believe it. No one who wears gowns like yours could be poor."

Mrs. Green scoffed. "Do not mistake genius for price, dear Imogene. I know precisely what suits me and I refuse to chase the latest fashions. There is nothing like fashion to make one look terribly dated." She swept her hand down the length of her dress, a sleek wrap in glowing saffron silk. "Last year's fashions were all lace and ruffles. I refused to add a single ruffle, which means that I may continue wearing this gown in style and that I did not spend last year looking like a birthday cake. An enormous savings in both money and dignity." She caught Cordelia looking at her and added, "Beautiful women have an easier time of it, at least while they're young and beautiful. The rest of us must develop style. It's not so easy as beauty, but it lasts longer, and it's less brittle."

"Brittle?" asked Cordelia, puzzled.

"Oh lord, here she goes," muttered Imogene.

"Brittle," said Penelope, nodding. "Physical beauty is fragile, my dear Cordelia. Say that you are a great beauty, a diamond of the first water, beloved and admired by all."

Cordelia tried to imagine such a thing and found it vaguely horrifying. "Wouldn't people be staring at you all the time ?"

"Yes, and that's exhausting, too. You can never scratch an itch or blow your nose or do any of the indelicate deeds that come of mortal flesh. God forbid you get the hiccups." She sat up very straight, sweeping her hands as if she was lecturing from a podium. Imogene rolled her eyes and rescued the deck of cards before she knocked it on the floor.

"Now," Penelope went on, "say that you, our diamond, are at an assembly. There is dancing, there are refreshments, and some fellow bumps into another one and both are drunk and they launch themselves at each other in a bout of impassioned male fisticuffs. Right! Left! Parry! Jab!"

"Careful!" Hester had to duck the jab. "This isn't a boxing ring."

"Neither is the assembly. In fact, they are battling by the refreshment table. An immense ice sculpture stands atop it, crowned by a frozen representation of a herring—"

"Why a herring?"

"It's the Herring Ball, obviously. Don't try to distract me with trivia, Imogene. At any rate, a careless blow strikes the sculpted herring's tail! It flies off the table and you, our diamond, are in its path! The sharp ice slashes across your flawless cheek, blood goes everywhere, ladies faint in the aisles, the two gentlemen immediately challenge one another to a duel for having injured you, and you are carried away to the doctor."

Cordelia's eyes were very round. Imogene nudged her and said, "This is one of her better ones. Last time she gave this speech, it was a fall from a horse spooked by a rare butterfly released by a rogue lepidopterist."

"The doctor does his best," Penelope continued, pretending not to hear. She clasped her hands to her bosom. "But alas! The stitches, no matter how perfectly aligned, are stitches still. The side of your face has an immense scar, from eye to chin, and your beauty is forever marred in the eyes of the world." She turned on Cordelia. "Now! What do you wear? "

"I… uh… I…" Cordelia had no idea how to answer. "A veil?"

"The most practical answer, yes, but it dooms you to live forever behind a veil, lest you expose your fractured beauty to the assembly. Such is the problem of beauty. Once it is imperfect, the admiration it has won you is at an end. Whereas if you have invested your time into cultivating style —" She swept her hand down the length of her gown again. "—you simply do what you can with face powder, put on a particularly daring hat, and go out to the next assembly. People will think you are terribly brave and fall all over themselves to compliment your hat." She lifted her chin and winked at Cordelia. "So ends the lecture."

"I f-feel like I should applaud," Cordelia said. Was that sorcery? She said all that, and it really seemed like it meant something, but maybe the sorcery made me feel like it meant more?

"Oh, don't. It only encourages her." Imogene looked over the top of her cards. "Also, it's your turn."

"Bah. And here I hoped to distract you so that you will not take all of my meager savings."

"Surely you must have some gentleman who is even now showering you with expensive gifts?" said Hester.

"Alas," said Mrs. Green mournfully. "My last benefactor fell in love, if you can imagine it. I begrudge nothing for love, you understand, and I would dance at their wedding if it were not totally inappropriate to invite one's former mistress to your wedding, but it has left me in a sad state of affairs."

Wait… is she saying that she was someone's mistress? And everyone knows about it?

The thought was far more shocking than mere sorcery. Cordelia thought she must certainly be mistaken. Except that Lady Strauss, dealing out cards to all three players, said, "And here I would swear that I heard you were passing the time with young Baronet Vann."

Mrs. Green curled her lip. "That puppy. Oh, he fancies he's in love with me, but I am not so desperate as to take a child's allowance, even if he could afford me, which he can't. That is part of why I came out here, dear Hester, not merely for your company. I am hoping that he will find someone else to trail after. The boy makes me feel positively maternal. "

It occurred to Cordelia that this was the sort of thing that her mother might like to know. Being a mistress wasn't respectable. Would she try to use it against Mrs. Green, even having been one herself?

Silly question. Of course she would. Cordelia looked up at the side of Mrs. Green's face, with its network of smallpox scars that had left the skin there sunken and cobbled. Not so far-fetched as a herring ice sculpture, but still, Cordelia suspected that she understood why Penelope set such a premium on style.

She wrenched her gaze back down to her cards. Hester leaned forward and tapped one. "Play that," she said, "it'll take the trick."

"No helping," said Lady Strauss.

"You didn't bother to explain the rules," said Hester, "so it's the least I can do. Play the three next, Cordelia."

"Pah." Lady Strauss tossed her hand down in defeat and dealt out another round. She glanced over at Penelope. "You could do worse, you know. Vann's father will leave him a fortune."

Mrs. Green snorted. "If I thought it had a chance of giving the old tyrant apoplexy, I might take up with the boy after all, simply to rid the world of a dreadful wretch. But you can never count on people to die just because it would make your life easier."

Don't listen, Cordelia told herself, concentrating on the cards in front of her. What you don't hear can't be used against them. She bit her lower lip, but it was impossible to close her ears completely.

"… heard Vann's sister ran off with a schoolteacher…"

"… good for her if she did…"

"… not something I can fix…"

"… Cordelia…"

She caught her name and looked up, surprised. "Sorry?"

"It's your turn, dear," said Lady Strauss gently, and Cordelia played a card completely at random and ended up winning the hand, entirely by accident.