A Night of Gaiety Read online

  Now as they drove along she suddenly said:

  “I’ve got an idea!”

  “What is it?” Lord Mundesley enquired.

  “It’s a way you can get even with the Marquis, if that’s what you want.”

  “Get even with him?” Lord Mundesley echoed. “I want to knock him down—annihilate him! I would shoot him, if it were not for the thought of facing the hangman.”

  “Then listen to me ...” Violet began.

  She put her arm round Lord Mundesley’s neck to pull his head down so that she could whisper in his ear.

  Davita knew she must not listen, so she bent forward, trying to free herself from Lord Mundesley’s arm round her waist, and said to Lord William:

  “There are so many things I want to see while I am in London that I do not know where to begin.”

  “I will show you some of them with pleasure,” Lord William replied.

  “I did not mean that,” Davita said quickly. “I was just thinking that it would be very exciting to go sight-seeing, but first I have to find myself some sort of employment.”

  “Are you thinking of going on the stage with Violet?” Lord William enquired.

  Davita shook her head.

  “I knew tonight it would be something I could never do. To begin with, I have no talent, and for another, it would frighten me terribly!”

  “All you have to do is to look beautiful, and that should not be difficult,” Lord William said.

  “I have no intention of going on the stage,” Davita said firmly. “There must be other things I can do.”

  “My mother was saying the other day that there are only two careers open to a lady,” Lord William replied, “either to be a Governess or a Companion.”

  Davita thought that was the same idea that Mr. Stirling had suggested.

  “There must be others,” she said.

  “I expect there are,” Lord William said vaguely, “but if you ask me, you would have a far better time if George Edwardes could find a place for you.”

  Davita felt there was no point in reiterating once again that she had no wish to go on the stage, but before she could speak, Lord Mundesley exclaimed:

  “My God, Violet! I believe you have something there! It is certainly an idea!”

  “Well, think it over,” Violet answered.

  As she spoke the horses came to a standstill and Davita saw that they were outside Mrs. Jenkins’s tall, dingy house.

  “Good-night, Bertie,” Violet said to Lord Mundesley, “and thanks! You’re always the perfect host, as you well know.”

  “Good-night, my dear. I will be in touch with you tomorrow, and I will have a word with Boris. He’s the man we want for this.”

  “Yes, of course. The Marquis would never refuse one of the Prince’s parties,” Violet replied.

  So they were back talking once again about the Marquis, Davita thought, as she followed Violet out of the carriage, and she had a feeling, although she could not be sure, that they were plotting something against him.

  Lord Mundesley kissed Violet good-night in the small, dark hallway, and Lord William also kissed her on the cheek.

  “You have been rather unkind to me this evening,” Davita heard him say. “Will you have supper with me tomorrow?”

  “I’ll think about it,” Violet replied.

  She looked at Lord Mundesley as she spoke, but he was raising Davita’s hand to his lips.

  “Good-night, and thank you very, very much,” she said. “It was the most exciting evening I have ever spent.”

  She did not wait for his reply because when he had kissed her hand she had been half-afraid that he would try to kiss her cheek, and she knew she had no wish for him to touch her.

  She had in fact hated the feeling of his lips on her skin.

  As she reached the turn in the stairway she looked back to see that Violet had not followed her but was talking to the two men.

  She was speaking in a low voice and very earnestly, and both Lord Mundesley and Lord William were listening to her intently.

  Davita could not be sure, but she felt that once again they were talking about the Marquis.

  “It is ridiculous for them to hate him so violently!’ she thought, and remembered how he had advised her to return to Scotland.

  It was none of his business, but she went on thinking of what he had said even when she was in bed, and so tired after such a long day that she expected to fall asleep immediately.

  Instead, in the darkness she kept seeing the Marquis’s handsome face, his cynical, almost contemptuous expression, and that penetrating look in his eyes.

  To her surprise, when he had told her to go back to Scotland she had felt as if he was speaking sincerely and was really thinking it was the best thing for her.

  Then she told herself quickly that there must be a very good reason for Lord Mundesley and Violet to dislike him so much.

  Rosie obviously loved him, and he must have done something to make her fall in love with him so frantically.

  Thinking back, Davita remembered Violet saying that the Marquis had turned her out “bag and baggage.”

  She wondered what that meant and why he should have done such a thing.

  Had she been staying with him as his guest? And what had Violet meant when she said the Marquis had remarked that she was lucky to be able to keep the jewellery?

  Davita remembered her mother saying that no lady accepted presents from a gentleman unless she was engaged to marry him.

  It was then that she understood.

  Of course! The Marquis must have asked Rosie to marry him, then perhaps because they had quarrelled the engagement had been broken off.

  That was why Violet had said they must find her a husband, and Lord Mundesley had said sarcastically that the one person who would not marry her would be Vange.

  It struck Davita that Rosie must have been very stupid to have lost the Marquis once he had asked her to be his wife.

  She was well aware that because actresses had such a bad reputation it was unusual for them to marry into the aristocracy.

  But it had happened, as when her father had married Katie King, and, as Violet had mentioned this evening, another Gaiety Girl, Belle Bilston, had married Lord Dunlo, who afterwards had become the Earl of Clancarty.

  Katie had told her that they lived in Ireland and had twin sons, and she had laughed when she said it.

  “That’s something your father and I aren’t likely to have, so don’t worry that you might lose your inheritance.”

  Davita had assured her at the time that she had not thought of such a thing, and, thinking of it now, she could not help feeling that she would have had a small inheritance indeed if she had had to share the one hundred ninety-nine pounds with twin half-brothers.

  Katie had mentioned another Gaiety Girl called Katie Vaughan, who she had said was the biggest star the Gaiety had ever known, and she had married the Honourable Arthur Frederick Wellesley, nephew of the great Duke of Wellington.

  “But that marriage,” she had said in her gossipy way, “ended upside-down in the Divorce Courts.”

  ‘That might have happened to Papa,’ Davita thought, ‘if he had wanted to re-marry after Katie had left him.’ Instead he had just taken to drink, and she wondered if the Gaiety Girls did in fact make such very good wives.

  She was just dropping off to sleep when it seemed she could almost hear the Marquis’s voice saying:

  “Go back to Scotland!”

  The next morning Davita awoke at what seemed to her to be a disgracefully late hour, and she sat up staring at the clock beside her bed incredulously to find it was a quarter-to-ten.

  ‘Violet will think I am very lazy,’ she thought.

  Then she knew she was being foolish because Violet certainly would not yet be awake.

  However, she washed herself in the cold water that was in a china ewer in the corner of her tiny room, extracted a day-gown from her trunk, and went downstairs to the kitchen.


  Mrs. Jenkins, with her hair in curling-rags, was cooking on the range.

  “Good-morning, Mrs. Jenkins,” Davita said.

  “I suppose you’re looking for breakfast,” Mrs. Jenkins replied. “Well, yer’re a bit early, but I’ll see wot I can do.”

  “Early!” Davita exclaimed.

  Mrs. Jenkins laughed.

  “Those as come ’ere from the country all starts by appearing at the crack o’ dawn. Then they soon gets into the Theatre ways. Yer’ll find yer friend Violet won’t open her blue eyes ’til after noon, and then only if she’s lunching with one o’ the ‘Nobs.’ ”

  “I would love some breakfast, if it is no trouble,” Davita said. “I am hungry.”

  “Then sit down and I’ll fry yer some eggs,” Mrs. Jenkins said. “Yer’ll find a pot of tea on the stove. There’s a cup and saucer in the cupboard.”

  Davita fetched the cup and saucer, poured the tea out of the brown china pot, and found that it was so strong that it would be impossible to drink it unless she added some hot water.

  Fortunately, there was also a kettle boiling with which to dilute what seemed more like stew than ordinary tea, and in a cupboard she found a jug filled with very thin, watery-looking milk.

  Because she was genuinely hungry and had drunk very little champagne last night, she ate a hearty breakfast for which she thanked Mrs. Jenkins profusely.

  “Don’t thank me,” the Landlady replied, “yer’re payin’ for it, as yer’ll find when you gets the bill at the end o’ the week!”

  She thought there was a frightened expression in Davita’s eyes, and added kindly:

  “Now don’t yer fret yerself, child. I’ll not over-charge yer. And one day yer might find yerself in the lead an’ drawing two hundred pounds a week like Lottie Collins.”

  “Two hundred pounds a week!” Davita exclaimed. She began to think that perhaps she was being stupid about not going on the stage. Then she remembered Lottie Collins’s performance, and knew that Lord Mundesley had been right. It had indeed shocked her!

  Even though she was acting, for a woman to appear so abandoned, so out of control, had made her feel ashamed.

  She knew in her heart that she wanted to be like her mother, soft, sweet, feminine, and at the same time intelligent and able to do almost anything well.

  That was not to say that riding, fishing, shooting, and making a house a happy place were accomplishments for which anyone would employ her.

  Then uncomfortably she knew the answer.

  What her mother had been was a very accomplished wife, and Mr. Stirling had been right when he had said she ought to get married.

  “Perhaps I shall meet someone here in London,’ she thought, and knew, although she had no reason for thinking so, that it was unlikely.

  She was quite sure that whatever Katie might have said about Gaiety Girls getting married, the men she had seen last night were out to enjoy themselves and were not looking for a wife amongst the glamorous, lovely actresses they escorted to Romano’s.

  They were fascinated, amused, and certainly entertained by the charmers sitting under the flowery bells inscribed with their names, or leaning towards them across the table in a manner which made the lowness of their elaborate gowns seem somewhat immodest. But that did not mean marriage.

  “Besides,” Davita said to herself, “if I married into that sort of life, I would be like a fish out of water.”

  As if it was something somebody had said aloud, she knew she would never marry any man unless she loved him.

  When Lord Mundesley had put his arm round her she had felt a little shiver of distaste go through her, and when he had kissed her hand good-night she had wanted to snatch it away from him.

  Why did she feel like that, when he had been far more affectionate towards Violet and had kissed her on the lips?

  Davita shuddered as she thought of how unpleasant it would be to feel his mouth touch hers, and she told herself, although she knew it was very stupid, that she hoped she would never see him again.

  “I will have to find out about a Domestic Bureau today,’ she thought, and said aloud to Mrs. Jenkins:

  “Is there a Domestic Bureau near here where employers engage staff?”

  Mrs. Jenkins turned from the stove to ask:

  “What do yer want a Domestic Bureau for?”

  “I have to find myself some work, Mrs. Jenkins.”

  “Yer mean yer’re not planning to go on the stage like yer friend?”

  Davita shook her head. Then she said anxiously: “You would not refuse to keep me because I have said that? I know you only take Theatrical people, but I am very happy here with you.”

  “Don’t fret yerself,” Mrs. Jenkins replied. “I’ll not turn yer away. I can see yer’re a lidy without knowing who yer father was. But wot sort of work was yer planning on gettin’?”

  “I really do not know,” Davita replied. “It is ... difficult. I have no experience and everything I have been taught seems particularly unsaleable.”

  She thought Mrs. Jenkins looked at her in a rather strange way before she replied:

  “Perhaps Violet’ll ’ave some ideas on the subject. She can look after ’erself, that one can!”

  “She is so beautiful,” Davita said. “I can understand her getting good parts in the Theatre, even if she does not act.”

  Mrs. Jenkins did not reply but returned to her cooking, and Davita went on as if following the train of her thoughts:

  ‘Perhaps she will get married ...’

  She stopped as she thought she had been very stupid. Of course Violet would marry Lord Mundesley!

  She had made it very clear that he belonged to her, and he certainly had behaved in a very possessive manner. Why otherwise should she have kissed him?

  “You see, Mrs. Jenkins,” she said, “if Violet gets married, then I should have to find someone else to be with, and ...”

  “What makes yer think she’s likely to be married?” Mrs. Jenkins interrupted.

  “I was thinking that perhaps she is secretly engaged, although she has ... not told me so, to Lord Mundesley.”

  Mrs. Jenkins gave a short laugh without much humour in it.

  “Now yer’re barking up the wrong tree,” she said. “ ’Ow d’yer expect Violet to marry Lord Mundesley, when he’s married already!”

  Later that day, when she was shopping with Violet, who was ordering herself a new gown and a hat to go with it, Davita told herself that she had been very stupid.

  It had never struck her for one moment that Lord Mundesley, and perhaps a great number of other men amongst those she had seen last night, were enjoying themselves without the company of their wives.

  She supposed she was ignorant in such matters because her father and mother had always been so happy together, and it had never entered her head that there could be anyone else in their lives.

  Her first feeling had been one of indignation that Lord Mundesley should behave as he did, kissing Violet and flattering her when he had a wife all the time.

  Then she felt very lost and ignorant and even more afraid of the glittering world in which she found herself than she had been before. She wondered if Lord William was a married man, or the Marquis.

  But if the Marquis was married he could not have been engaged to Rosie. In which case, why had he invited her to stay in his house in Chelsea, then turned her out?

  It all seemed incomprehensible, and although Davita longed to ask Violet a lot of questions, she felt it was impertinent and she might resent it.

  So instead she tried to concentrate on the gown which Violet was choosing in what seemed to Davita a large and impressive shop in Regent Street.

  Finally when Violet was satisfied that she had found what she wanted, she ordered some alterations to be made and insisted that the dressmaker added more lace and ribbon to the already elaborate dress.

  Only when she had finished did Davita ask:

  “What are we going to do now?”

  “We’l
l have some tea at Gunters in Berkeley Square,” Violet answered, “and while you’re enjoying one of the best ice-creams you’ve ever tasted in your life, I want to talk to you.”

  She spoke in a mysterious manner which made Davita look at her apprehensively, but she did not say anything as Violet, dressed once again in her own gown, pinned her hat covered in flowers on her fair hair with jewelled hat-pins and picked up her handbag.

  “The gown will be ready tomorrow afternoon, Ma’am,” the dressmaker promised, “and may I add that it is always a great pleasure to have the privilege of dressing you, Miss Lock.”

  “Thank you,” Violet replied.

  “I went to the Gaiety the other night for the fifth time! I thought you looked wonderful, you really did!”

  “Thank you.”

  “Shall I send the gown to the same address?” the dressmaker enquired.

  “Yes, please.”

  “And the bill as usual to Lord Mundesley?”

  Violet nodded.

  As they walked away, Davita felt as though somebody had struck her a sharp blow on the head.

  The person who was paying for the gown was Lord Mundesley, who was a married man, and Davita was certain that the bill would be astronomical.

  It was something that would have shocked her mother considerably, and Davita was not quite certain whether she should tell Violet she thought it wrong, or say nothing.

  Then she remembered the bills her father had run up, which she had found after he had died.

  Of course the gowns and dozens of other things he had ordered had been for Katie, whom he had married, which was a very different thing.

  But even that was wrong, for a man to dress a woman before she was actually his wife.

  “I wish somebody could explain it to me,’ Davita thought unhappily.

  Then she told herself it was something that need not concern her, as long as she behaved in a way that she knew was right and of which her mother would have approved.

  They drove in a hackney-carriage to Berkeley Square, where on one corner of Hay Hill was a bow-fronted shop filled with small tables.

  It was quite early in the afternoon, but there were a number of people already seated, and when Violet had ordered two strawberry ice-creams Davita understood why.