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‘You are marrying whom?’ His mother’s voice was shrill and disbelieving.
Both his sisters sat very still at the dinner table, their eating utensils poised to listen.
‘Miss Amethyst Amelia Cameron.’
‘And you say her father is a man of trade?’
‘Mr Robert Cameron is a successful timber merchant and is far wealthier than the Montcliffes have any hope of ever being.’
He hated that he should have to qualify his choice of bride in monetary value, but it seemed such an explanation was all Janet Montcliffe understood. She looked furious.
‘Amethyst? What sort of name is that?’
‘Hers.’ Daniel was tired of being careful and polite. His mother’s frown deepened.
‘We will be the laughing stock of the ton.’
‘I doubt that sincerely, Mother.’
‘Do you love her, then?’ This question came from his oldest sister Gwen, the sort of light shining in her eyes that could only belong to a naive and unworldly girl.
‘Of course he does not.’ His mother answered for him. ‘The interloper has simply tipped her cap at the title and managed to do what a hundred well-brought-up daughters of society have not been able to. She has brought your brother to heel and he will regret it, mark my words. You are marrying well beneath your station in life, Daniel, but any remorse afterwards will be useless. You will be tied to the upstart for life.’
‘I am taking it that you will not be attending the wedding ceremony then, Mother?’
‘None of us will be. I could not bear to look on Miss Amethyst Cameron’s face and see the gleam of victory within it. The girls should not be allowed anywhere near such...tradespeople either.’ She almost spat the word out. ‘As for your grandfather, he is sick and hasn’t the energy for all this nonsense so you are alone in your foolish choice of bride. I had such high hopes for you, too.’
Daniel stood as the resulting silence lengthened. ‘Then I shall bid you goodnight.’
With that he simply walked to the door and left.
* * *
He found himself lingering in the confines of Grosvenor Square. The Cameron house was dark save for a light on the second floor where the curtains had been drawn. The shadow of a woman caught in candlelight moved in a way that made him frown. His wife-to-be was dancing alone in her room and the outline showed no sign of the shape of her wig. A waltz, he determined by the beat of steps she took, a practice of the dance of love.
The tension he felt began to lessen and lighting a cheroot he leant back and watched. Janet Montcliffe and her bitterness had been a constant in his life, the anger and the rancour almost normal.
Amethyst Cameron, unlike his mother, was a logical and reasonable woman and one who held to the tenet of wording differences of opinion in a sane and sensible way. She did not whine or moan or berate. He liked her smile and her dimples and the low timbre of her voice. Her clothes might be shapeless and ill-formed but when the wind had caught her riding attire and pressed the material against her body he saw that there was a surprisingly shapely form beneath. He was intrigued by the description of her hair. Light and curly. Velvet-brown eyes would complement such a shade admirably.
After the scene at the dinner table tonight he wished he was anywhere but in London town. A different life was one he had been dreaming of for quite a while now. He smiled as the shadow drifted closer to the window and hoped she might pull the curtain back to look down and see him.
He liked talking to her. He liked her blushes and the quiet way she had dealt with the snobbery of Lady Charlotte Mackay. He liked her father.
Breathing out heavily, he wondered what all this meant.
He had always felt homeless, but Amethyst Cameron had had the effect of anchoring him. His father had been a man who was melancholic and weak and as his bitterness grew he had sworn that no offspring from his unhappy marriage would ever see a penny of the family money. An unhappy coupling that had brought out the worst in both of them, Daniel suddenly reasoned, and the thought made him drop his cigar beneath his boot and stomp out the embers. Nigel and he had been caught in the crossfire of their parents’ shortcomings. The spending of great sums of money and long holidays apart had dammed up the resentments for a while, but even that had not altered their basic dislike of each other. When his father had fallen from his horse after a long drinking binge his mother had buried him with a smile on her face.
Daniel did not look back as he strode into Upper Brook Street and hailed a passing cabriolet.
Chapter Six (#ub8a770ca-9628-5db0-b61b-d1566b4cd026)
‘No, this is a far better colour on you, Amethyst. See how the gold brings out the shade in your eyes.’ Lady Christine Howard smiled as she wound a darker gold band about the neckline. ‘With just a bit of manoeuvring we can lower the bodice and attach it. If I fashion it carefully, it will fold like this to show off your curves.’
Lord Ross’s sister was like a small whirlwind, her clever fingers pushing the fabric into a shape that was indeed flattering.
‘You do not think it a little daring?’
‘Absolutely not. Compared to some of the other gowns on display you will look like a novice newly released from a French convent.’ Christine laughed loudly and Amethyst joined in. Nowhere at all lingered the depression or sadness that her brother had spoken of, though the large ruby ring she wore on her marriage finger alluded to a lost betrothed.
‘The trick of it is to believe you are the most beautiful woman in the room and act like it.’
Amethyst’s face fell. Such a thing sounded impossibly difficult.
‘Your hair will need to be done differently, of course, to have any hope of pulling it off. The wig must go.’
‘You knew I wore one?’
‘Does not everybody? You could look so much prettier than you do now with it gone and I love the art of dressing hair.’
Like a shop dress form, Amethyst was pulled this way and that and the strangest thing of it all was that she was beginning to actually enjoy the unfamiliar pampering and the rapid conversation.
‘Your husband-to-be has most of the women of the ton panting after him and why would he not, for he is beautiful.’
‘Too beautiful for me.’
The words were out before she realised she had said them, but Christine appeared completely unfazed.
‘You hide what you have, that is the trouble, but it is time to come out from the shadows. More importantly you have a fortune and is that not what all of the men of the ton need these days? I know Lucien does. It is a great pity you do not have a sister for then he could marry her and we would be related and no longer poor. I do hate how money, or rather the lack of it, defines one.’
‘In my circle of acquaintances it doesn’t, really.’
‘That is why you are such a refreshing find, Amethyst, and why I like being here to help you.’
Christine reached into the case she had brought with her for another piece of fabric, this time the lightest shade of red and held it to Amy’s face. ‘Next time you buy a gown, choose this shade. See how it suits your skin? What colour is your real hair, by the way, or do you have none?’
Because there was no artifice or malice in the question Amy undid the pins and lifted the dull brown wig away, fluffing out her curls beneath.
‘There was a carriage accident,’ she explained as Christine stood in silence. ‘It has only just begun to grow back properly again.’
‘I did not expect you to be so blonde,’ the other woman finally said. ‘Has Montcliffe seen you without your wig?’
‘No.’
The resulting laughter worried her. ‘Then we will be able to greatly surprise him come Saturday and I for one cannot wait to see the look on Lady Charlotte Mackay’s face when she understands what she is up against.’
‘I have met her already.’
‘Where?’
‘In the park riding the other day. She barely talked to me.’
‘That is because she is formidable and scary and so are all her friends. So be warned, while she is undeniably beautiful, she also finds people’s weaknesses and uses them to her full advantage. Word has it she wants Lord Montcliffe back and will do anything to achieve her goal, so don’t be fooled. Beneath her pale and refined appearance lies a character of pure steel.’
‘She would not have been pleased to see our marriage notice in the paper, then?’
‘Indeed. It is a wonder Lady Mackay has not been around here already saying all that she imagines you would want to hear whilst searching around for the secrets that you don’t want revealed.’
Gerald Whitely.
The thought struck Amethyst with a blinding ferocity. How easy would it be for her to find out about him? A cloud of worry descended, though when Christine brought forth a folded cloth threaded with glass-headed pins, she decided not to think about her many problems.
Gerald belonged in the past and that is where she wished for him to stay. Nobody in the ton had the slightest idea of who the Camerons were and where they had come from. She would tell Daniel, of course, about her first husband and a few of her reasons for being most grateful when he had died, but that was all.
Perhaps she could have a conversation with him about it all at the ball on Saturday. If she asked the Earl to take her home afterwards that might give her a moment of privacy to try to make him understand the nature of her past.
When Christine indicated that she had finished attaching the band of cloth to her gown Amy turned to the mirror and was astonished. The gold in the silken cloth brought out the colour in her eyes and her hair and made her complexion appear almost flawless.
‘I cannot believe that this is me.’
‘It will be even better on Saturday,’ her new friend returned, ‘because I will put your hair up like this and fashion it with flowers.’
Clever fingers arranged the curls in a way that gave the impression of far more hair than she had and Amethyst smiled.
‘See,’ Christine exclaimed. ‘With a simple smile everything comes together in exactly the way that it should.’
* * *
On the evening of the Herringworth ball Daniel Wylde and Lucien Howard waited in the salon downstairs with Robert Cameron.
‘My daughter will be down presently. Your sister, Lord Ross, is helping her to dress as we speak and I have been banned from going anywhere near the upstairs bed chambers.’
Looking at a clock on the opposite wall, Daniel nodded. It was still considered early in society terms and so they had all the time in the world to wait. Besides the brandy that Robert had plied them with upon their arrival was both smooth and rich.
He wondered as he took the first sip whether he should have asked his sister Gwen to help Christine with Amethyst’s preparation for the ball, but dismissed the thought as most unworkable. Perhaps after the wedding he could make certain that both Gwen and Caroline spent more time with them at either Montcliffe Manor or Dunstan House in the hope that his mother’s influence over the young girls might lessen. He envied Lucien for the smooth ease of the Howard family dynamics, in spite of Lucien’s contrary grandfather.
‘I have not known Amethyst to take quite this much trouble with her appearance before.’ Robert Cameron was peering at the clock.
‘It will be the influence of my sister, Mr Cameron, for she is meticulous in her observation of detail. Your daughter will not have a chance to take breath once Christine hits her stride.’
‘Well, people and things have been coming and going all day, my lords. Let us pray she won’t be disappointed with the outcome for her hair is still so...’ He stopped and fidgeted with the brandy bottle, seeming uncertain in the present company as to whether he should go on or not.
‘Short.’ Daniel finished the sentence off. ‘She told me of it whilst we were riding in the park the other day.’
Robert Cameron smiled and leant back in his chair. He was still far too thin, but he looked healthier and more relaxed. ‘Then that is a relief to hear, for I doubt my daughter has confided in anybody else and sometimes I wish she would.’
‘You have no other relatives at all?’
‘None. I was an only child and so was Susannah.’
Daniel thought for a moment how freeing that must be in the light of all the difficulties with his mother. Lucien’s frown had deepened, though. The Howards had generally always been a close-knit family and he was probably wondering at how the Camerons could have been so isolated. Robert, however, was expounding on their aloneness in a voice that sounded worried.
‘The business has taken much of our time, you see, but in the past week I have sold a great deal of it off to a competitor who has always expressed an interest in buying it. I hope now that Dunstan House might be my principal place of residence, a quieter life with the horses, you understand. A home where we might become part of a community.’
Their conversation was interrupted by a butler who appeared at the door. ‘Miss Cameron and Lady Christine have instructed me to tell you that they are ready, sir.’
The rustle of silk was followed by small steps on the marble floor and then his wife-to-be was before him. Daniel could barely recognise her.
Gone was the dull brown lustreless wig, replaced by light blonde curls tucked up into a band of small yellow roses, the honey, straw and gold of her tresses making her dark eyes and eyebrows stand out in a way they had not before. In the light of the candles her skin looked transparent, the previously sallow tone of her skin transformed now into almost alabaster.
Daniel found himself on his feet, speechless at the transformation. Her golden gown clung, too, displaying the curves only hinted at in the shapeless clothes she normally favoured. She filled out the bodice of her dress admirably though her waist was tiny. When she saw where he looked she began to speak immediately.
‘Christine assures me that this neckline is most tasteful and not at all racy and that other women wear far more revealing outfits.’ Her fingers tugged at the darker shade of material that swathed the bodice. Gloves, the lightest of gossamer lace, barely covered the glow of her skin.
‘You look...different.’ He hardly recognised his own voice as the dimples marking her cheeks deepened, her bones elegant and sculpted in the light. Her lips were painted with a quiet pink and it emphasised the fullness of them. He could barely breathe properly with the transformation.
Palms open, she gestured to the dress. ‘This is the result of hours and hours of work on Christine’s behalf, I am afraid, my lord. Tomorrow I shall be just as I was.’
But for Daniel time seemed to stand still, caught in astonishment and trepidation. Before Amethyst Cameron might have been largely invisible in a society ballroom, but now...now the knives could be out and sharper than they might otherwise have been.
When he glanced across he could see the same sort of astonishment on Lucien’s face that must have been evident upon his own. Christine simply looked as though she might laugh out loud.
God, he wished they did not have to go out at all, society and its expectations bearing down upon them with all its infatuation with beauty and grace. Her father was watching him too, eyes keen and his smile broad, giving Daniel the impression that he had known all along how truly lovely his daughter was.
‘I think we should ask Lady Christine to help again in the preparation for the wedding day, my dear. You have not looked so pretty in an age and I want a full report tomorrow on all the happenings at the ball,’ Robert said.
Only pretty? Daniel swallowed the words back and looked over at Lucien. There was a definite challenge in his green eyes.
‘I am more than certain tonight shall prove a most interesting experience, Mr Cameron.’ Lucien’s drawl was slow and languid.
* * *
‘Lord Montcliffe, Miss Amethyst Cameron, Lord Ross and Lady Christine Howard.’
As their names rang out across the ballroom the conversations filling the generous space quietened and heads turned their way.
This was exactly what Amethyst had been dreading, this exposure coupled with a public knowledge that she was from the lowly echelons of trade. She held in her breath and wondered if she might ever release it.
‘I always pretend there is a field of grass before me at this moment,’ Christine trilled, ‘and that the colourful gowns are flowers. And I never look anyone in the eye.’
Despite her trepidation Amethyst smiled and the awful horror of being so very visible faded into something she was more able to cope with. Daniel did not look even vaguely nonplussed by all the attention. Rather he seemed almost bored, an Earl who had graced countless ballrooms and endless society functions just like this.
His world, Amethyst thought. His heritage. Today he wore a large ring on the first finger of his left hand. She had not noticed him sport any jewellery before and this one was substantial— the crest impaled with a lion in red on one half and a series of white crosses in gold on the other. The family badges of a noble birth passed down from father to son. Just another small token of an exalted lineage and a further example of how unsuitably matched they were.
She had decided in the end not to wear any jewellery at all, letting the golden gown speak for itself with its intricate folds and detailing, but in this room with all the glamour of the ton she wondered if such lack was a mistake. Here, she felt out of place, the lessons from Gaskell Street leaving her totally unprepared for such opulence. She wanted to take Daniel’s hand and hold it close, an anchor in a world that was foreign and a man who could easily overcome any difficulties. But she did not, of course, for he had moved away slightly, making no attempt to claim her.
As they came to the group of people standing at the bottom of the steps she smiled politely and waited for Daniel to speak.
‘When did you get back, Francis?’ he asked one of the men.
