Jennifer was distracted. Mainwaring had left town with no more word to her. Lady Laverstoke’s strange silence continued and became every day more mysterious and somehow more menacing. The Duke of Devonshire had gone down to Chatsworth for a few days and she was left to the unremitting pursuit of Mandeville whom she increasingly detested. Lord Laverstoke tormented her by teasing innuendo in the intervals of his more and more assiduous courting of Pamela. Lady Beresford, fortunately for him as well as for Jennifer, had caught a feverish cold and stayed in her room solacing herself with laudanum drops, The Black Dwarf and the latest issue of La Belle Assemblée. The Duchess had a cold too and a new maid who reduced her to frequent explosions of bad temper by her ignorance.

Jennifer was only too grateful for the excuse this offered her to stay at home and entertain her benefactress. She read Tom Jones aloud by the yard—for the Duchess thought nothing of the anonymous author of Waverley and immensely enjoyed Jennifer’s blushes over the more scandalous passages in Fielding. When Jennifer’s voice failed, they played piquet and Jennifer lost imaginary thousands to her astute opponent. As a last resource, the Duchess demanded to be entertained with gossip. What folly was the Princess of Wales committing now? And Lady Caroline Lamb? Was she really shut up in an asylum? Failing to answer these, and many other similar questions, Jennifer was more and more tempted to take her kind-hearted, bad-tempered patroness into her entire confidence and ask her advice. Only the difficulty of explaining Mainwaring’s part in the affair held her back. She hesitated, somehow, at the thought of describing the ups and downs of their relationship to this all too acute listener. For she was only too well aware of the Duchess’s intentions for her grandson. They had been made almost brutally plain. He was to marry his Sussex heiress and lead the Whig party. Nor, she told herself, did she wish him any other fate, though she reserved the right to feel a little sorry for the unknown heiress. If it occurred to her, sometimes, that she was an heiress herself, and quite capable of handling a constituent or organising a political dinner, she suppressed the thought. It was perfectly clear to her that she would never marry: good causes and a companion were her fate.

Just the same, it would be an immense relief to have the Duchess’s advice as to how to extricate herself from her immediate predicament. In fact, one rainy morning when the hours had dragged by particularly slowly, when Tom Jones was finished, and the Duchess’s cough was worse, she decided to yield to temptation. After all, the story of the masquerade at Watier’s was calculated to delight the wicked old Duchess: it would be true kindness to tell her about it.

But they were interrupted. A footman came in with the post. None, of course, for Jennifer, whose total lack of out of town correspondence was, unknown to her, a source of much speculation in the servants’ hall.

The Duchess riffled through hers. ‘Ah,’ she said with satisfaction. ‘Mainwaring at last. Let us hope that milk-and-water miss of his has been prevailed upon to name the day.’ She read; she beamed upon Jennifer. It was settled. The wedding would be a quiet country affair in deference to the recent mourning of both parties. Telling Jennifer all this, the Duchess thought it best not to mention a certain lack of enthusiasm in Mainwaring’s tone. He was to be married; that was enough. Enthusiasm might—or might not—come later.

It was indeed enough for Jennifer. The room was stiffing hot. Her head ached. She jumped at the excuse offered by a dwindling supply of tincture of lavender. No, no need to send a footman, who would certainly return with the wrong kind. She knew exactly what the Duchess liked. She would get it herself.

If the Duchess saw through the pretext, she was, for once, too kind to say so. Instead, she urged Jennifer to take advantage of the rain’s having ceased and go for a turn in the Park. ‘Take that horse of yours with the absurd name. The air and exercise will do you good. I have been a selfish old monster to keep you here tied to a sick bed so long. And mind you talk to everyone you meet and bring me back a prime collection of the on dits of the town.’

It was dismissal and Jennifer took it, thankfully, as such. But she took her troubles with her. James, the groom, who had become something of a privileged companion, took one look at her ravaged face and left her undisturbed by his usual conversational openings. She rode on ahead of him, silent, preoccupied and wretched.

She was roused from her depressing thoughts by a shout from the other side of Park Lane. ‘Jenny! Hey, Jenny!’

She looked up in astonishment at the nickname, then paled at sight of her uncle’s ward, Edmund Butts. What was he doing in London? Was he helping in the search for her? For a moment she was tempted to put Starlight to an indecorous gallop and escape into the park, but wiser councils prevailed. There was no need to tell Edmund where she was staying, and no reason to suppose he was really looking for her. It had been all too clear at their last interview that there were few things he desired less than marriage with her. Away from his uncle, he might even prove an ally. She reined in Starlight and waited patiently while Edmund dodged between a smart barouche and a shabby travelling carriage and came over to join her.

‘Jenny, by all that’s wonderful. Where have you been hiding yourself all this time?’

She looked down at him gravely. ‘I do not know that I will tell you, Edmund.’

‘Not tell? But, Jenny, you quite mistake the matter. I am run away from Uncle Gurning too. That is why I am so glad to see you, for, to deal plainly with you, I have not a feather left to fly with. I had no notion life in London was so dear. And poor Elizabeth is in no better case.’

‘Elizabeth? Is she here too? What madness is this? But, come, we cannot stay talking here. Walk with me into the park and you shall tell me your whole history.’ She turned to the groom who had been an all too interested audience to their interchange, sent him off to fetch the Duchess’s tincture of lavender and told him to come back for her in half an hour. ‘My cousin will stay with me till you return.’

The man was too well trained to show his surprise at Miss Fairbank’s finding a strange cousin in Park Lane and went obediently off to do her bidding. Once in the park, Edmund looked up at Jennifer pleadingly. ‘Jenny, we are in the greatest straits, Elizabeth and I… And it is all your fault, too.’

She looked at him in amazement: ‘My fault? What absurdity is this?’

‘It is nothing of the kind. If you had not run off like that none of this would have happened to us. Indeed, you are in honour bound to help us.’

‘I will certainly do everything possible, if you will tell me what’s the matter. But lose no time about it, I beg. We may momently meet one of my acquaintance and I must know how to explain you to them. I am passing as Miss Fairbank, by the way.’

‘Miss Fairbank? I cannot think it right for you to be masquerading under an assumed name, Jenny. I am much afraid your whole proceedings are very far from being the thing. What Elizabeth’s feelings will be is more than I like to consider, and indeed I wonder whether I should ask you to visit her. The poor angel’s position is so delicate already I feel that I cannot be too careful.’

She lost patience with him as she so often had before. ‘For pity’s sake, Edmund, this is no time to be reading me a lecture. Tell me instead what you are doing in London and whether Elizabeth is truly here too. I only hope you have not ruined her, between you.’

‘Nothing of the kind, Jenny, and besides, I collect you are in no case to accuse me of impropriety. It is true that Elizabeth has left her father’s protection, but, I assure you, she could do no other. And since she was bound she would come I could not but offer her my escort for the journey. But I assure you she is very respectably settled with her mother’s sister, Mrs Foster, in Holborn.’

‘Holborn?’ Jennifer was enough in the social swim by now to recognise this as a deplorable address. ‘And no doubt you are in Cheapside?’

‘No, no,’ he said seriously. ‘Mrs Foster found me a very eligible lodging in the Strand, but,’ he hesitated for a moment, ‘but to deal plainly with you, Jenny, I am sadly pressed for money. It was like a miracle when I saw you.’

‘I hardly think you will find it one,’ said Jennifer dryly. ‘My pockets are far from well-lined either, but I will do my best to help, if you will but tell me what folly has brought you and Elizabeth jauntering to London without, I apprehend, my uncle’s permission.’

‘I should think so indeed,’ said Edmund proudly. ‘You think you are the only person with enough spirit to run away, Jenny, but believe me the case is quite other. You should have seen poor Elizabeth’s tears and her despair in the stage-coach.’

If Jennifer thought tears and despair an odd manifestation of spirit, she wisely forbore to say so, pressing instead for an explanation of their elopement.

‘Elopement?’ He reddened at the word. ‘It is no such thing, Jenny. I will not have Elizabeth so slandered. She has done me the great honour of entrusting herself to my protection and of course cannot but hope—but indeed, Jenny, no word of love has crossed my lips. The poor angel has been browbeaten enough as it is.’

‘Browbeaten? Elizabeth? But she was ever the apple of my uncle’s eye. I beg of you, Edmund, quit your prosing and explain.’

He looked affronted. ‘I am doing my poor best to do so, Jenny, only you will keep interrupting.’

‘I do no such thing,’ she began angrily, then caught his eye, laughed and apologised. ‘Proceed with your story. I am all ears.’

‘Well you must know that after you fled the house in that hoydenish way—for indeed climbing out of a window in the dark is what no right-minded young female would think of doing…’ He caught her furious eye and closed his parenthesis in a hurry. ‘Well, the long and the short of it is that Uncle Gurning went off after you in a rage and returned without you in—as you can imagine—no better temper. Even Aunt was afraid when she saw his face, and you know she does not usually notice his passions. As for me, I kept out of his way, for fear he should blame me for not wooing you harder, but how could I when my heart was another’s?’

‘Elizabeth’s?’

‘Always. How could one live in the same house with that angel without… But I digress. Uncle said nothing about you, but it was evident he had not found you. A few days passed. He went about the house like a thunder-cloud. Even his bitch Flora kept out of his way. Then, one day, all was changed. Uncle Gurning came to dinner all smiles—but Elizabeth’s eyes were red with weeping.’

‘Again?’ asked Jennifer, but luckily, he did not hear her.

‘She made an opportunity to be alone with me after tea and told me all. Would you believe such villainy, Jenny? Uncle Gurning insisted that she allow him to pass her off to Ferris —or whatever his name is now—as you.’

‘As me?’

‘Yes. He said Ferris had never met either of you and it could make no difference to him which he married. All he wants, it seems, is a girl who can act as hostess for his political parties—and, a fortune, of course, but uncle said that with his prospects it could not signify whether he got your £80,000 or what he can give Elizabeth.’

‘Infamous,’ said Jennifer. ‘And what did Elizabeth do? Wept I apprehend.’

‘You do not understand her sensibility, Jenny. Her own father, too! How could she hold out against him? Particularly—well, you know Uncle Gurning. He is not of the gentlest when his temper is up.’

‘No,’ agreed Jennifer. ‘He most certainly is not. So, my cousin Elizabeth was prepared to masquerade as me. What, I wonder, caused her to change her mind?’

‘Why, the man himself. He came next day to make his proposal in form. A great black-browed brute of a Corinthian, Jenny, old enough to be my poor angel’s father. A bow-window dandy if ever I saw one, polished and prinked as if he was in St James’s instead of Sussex, and proud as the devil with it all. Treats me as if I were a country lobby, scarce grants a polite word to my uncle and aunt—not that I cared a fig for that—and reduces my poor little Lizzy to strong hysterics.’

‘To his face? What a droll betrothal!’

‘No, no. After he had left. You must understand that he merely stayed one night; had not even the courtesy to stay to dinner next day after he had seen poor Lizzy, but called for his curricle and was off, back no doubt to his boon companions at Watier’s. And leaves us in a fine pucker, with Lizzy in the vapours, my uncle swearing at her for not encouraging my lord’s suit—as if that brute needed encouraging. Why, he’d make a mouthful of Lizzy. Someone like you would be more up to his weight, Jenny. You were never troubled with my poor darling’s sensibility.’

‘No, I collect you think me a complete amazon. But tell me how this fragile Elizabeth of yours nerved herself to so desperate an expedient as flight.’

‘What else could she do? With her father talking settlements and her mother talking bride-gowns!’

‘She did not think to tell her wooer of the deceit that was being practised on him? That I apprehend would have settled his business fast enough.’

‘Tell him? Why the poor child was too terrified even to look at him. And besides, my uncle was listening outside the door the whole time.’

‘Oh,’ said Jennifer. ‘That, I grant you, is another story. So, the poor child took her courage in both hands and ran away with you.’

‘Yes, was it not famous? We planned it that very day, but of course we waited until her situation became desperate before we put it into execution. If only there had been more time… But hardly two weeks passed before my lord wrote another of his bullying letters: he is urgent to have the knot tied as soon as possible. He will do himself the honour of visiting us the next day (no more notice than that, Jenny) in the hope that Miss Purchas (of course he calls poor Lizzy that) may be persuaded to name the day. And all this, I may tell you, without one word of kindness for my poor little Lizzy, but as curt and matter of fact as if he had been taking delivery of a bale of goods. It was too much for Lizzy: I feared she might be too affected to put our plan into execution.’

‘Strong hysterics again?’ asked Jennifer.

‘No, the vapours. But she mastered herself heroically next morning and told my aunt she needed a ride in the park to cool her head. Of course, Aunt sent me along as her escort and we showed them a clean pair of heels. Only I could wish that when Lizzy went to my uncle’s desk she had found more than ten pounds in it.’

‘She robbed her father’s desk, did she? Most exquisitely sensitive.’

He reddened angrily. ‘Jenny, you are not kind. What else could we do? You know what a short stint my uncle keeps us on. I could not even have paid our shot on the stage-coach to London. And, besides, it is hardly robbery when it is her own father. But the devil of it is, it was not more. For though her Aunt Foster received her kindly enough, it is all too plain she is terrified of her brother and dares not shelter her for more than a day or so at the most. By a fortunate chance, my uncle is promised to speak at a meeting of the Hampden Club tonight and will not, I apprehend, miss it even to seek for Lizzy who, besides, left him a most confusing missive which will, I trust, keep him for some time in a puzzle as to what she intends.’

Jennifer laughed. ‘Every moment, my cousin and my uncle reveal new depths. She is a mistress of duplicity and he cares more for his political career than for his daughter. But I have no doubt you are right. Only, what advantage do you propose to take of these few days’ start?’

‘Why, marry Lizzy, of course. Then we are safe.’

‘Edmund, you amaze me. I thought you had not spoken one word of love to her.’

‘And no more have I, for how could I take such advantage of the poor innocent? But I must be able to protect her. Have you forgot, Jenny, that when I marry I obtain control of my fortune and can snap my fingers at my uncle? It is but to obtain a special licence and we can marry tomorrow. I have no fears of Lizzy…’

‘A special licence? But are they not vastly expensive?’

‘Yes, and that is why I am so glad to see you, Jenny. If you could lend me £50, purely as a loan, of course, until I am in control of my own estate, I will be indebted to you for ever.’

‘£50!’ She looked at him in amazement. ‘But, Edmund, I have not £5.’

‘What! Jenny, you are roasting me. That hat you have on cost more.’

Jennifer coloured. It was as impossible as it was distasteful to explain her real circumstances to Edmund. ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘I suppose I do give an appearance of affluence, but truly Edmund it is deception, I am as much to pieces as you are.’

‘I must, of course, believe you.’ He clearly did nothing of the kind. ‘Then we are undone. My uncle will certainly reach town tomorrow and if we are not married by then my poor little Lizzy will never be able to stand up to him.’

‘No,’ said Jenny, ‘I do not suppose that she will. But wait a minute. I have an idea. I have my pearls with me. If I can but sell them. But how?’

‘Sell your mother’s pearls! Jenny, you must not. But you could borrow on them.’

‘No, I thank you Edmund. I am not such a gudgeon as that. If I sell them, it’s done; if I borrow on them, there’s no end to it. I remember too well the lecture my father read Richard when he went to Howard and Gibbs for money to pay his college debts: I never saw him so angry. No, I have quite made up my mind. I will take the pearls to Gray’s the jewellers. I have some acquaintance with Mr Gray and he will do the business for me. And I will visit you and Lizzy tomorrow and bring the money with me.’

He was too pleased at the idea of the loan to quibble over how it was to be procured. ‘I knew you would stand our friend, Jenny. I will never forget this. How overjoyed Lizzy will be when she hears my good news.’ He wrung her hand warmly and was turning to leave her when she called him back.

‘Stay a minute, Edmund.’ She had been thinking rapidly. ‘I believe it would be best if you accompanied me to Gray’s tomorrow. I could not easily explain such an errand, but if you will meet me here at this time it will be easy for me to find some pretext to send the groom home with Starlight and accompany you to Holborn. Then you will be able to take the money and obtain your special licence at once. And indeed, I think that would be wise. I cannot believe that even politics will keep my uncle in the country beyond tomorrow.’

‘I very much fear you are right. Till tomorrow then. For here, if I mistake not, is your groom. You are mighty well attended, Jenny.’

‘Am I not?’ she smiled, said no more, and left him.