This woman—straight, thin, upright, alert—was different altogether. “Don’t let her hook you,” Mrs. King had warned her. “Whatever you do.”
Hephzibah paused at the threshold. She could leave, right now. Claim another appointment, feign illness, call the whole thing off.
Slowly, Miss de Vries rose to her feet. “Your Grace,” she said, in a voice that startled Hephzibah. It was low and calm. Hephzibah longed for a voice like that herself.
She studied Miss de Vries. Something was working furiously in the girl’s mind. Surprise, delight, fear. “The other neighbors are cutting her,” Winnie had told her earlier, per Alice’s regular report. “It’s got her right in the neck. She’s desperate for a lady to come calling. A real lady. So do your worst.”
“Miss de Vries,” Hephzibah said, in a thrilling voice of her own, and extended her gloved hand. She wanted her fingers to be touched reverently—to be kissed, as if she were a queen.
Inside Hephzibah was the creeping, shrunken ghost of a scullery maid, shaking violently, but the Duchess of Montagu had a steady hand.
Miss de Vries extended her own. “How do you do?” she said.
Hephzibah smiled. Curtain up, she thought.
They drank tea. Hephzibah remembered the advice Mrs. King had given her.
“Don’t aggravate her. At least, not straight away. Her father trained her well. She’s his perfect creation. She’ll observe etiquette.”
“So what do I do?”
“Tickle her. Give her a little fight. It’ll make her feel like your equal. She’ll like the game.”
Easy, Hephzibah told herself, fingers trembling. Miss de Vries’s skin glistened as if someone had rubbed it with oil.
“Do sit down,” Hephzibah said, indicating Miss de Vries’s own chair with a careless toss of her hand.
Miss de Vries’s gaze tightened. Her nostrils flared, just a fraction, as if she could smell blood on the wind. “Thank you.” She ignored her chair, the plump-cushioned, gilt-framed seat in the middle of the room, and perched on a humble stool, back as straight as a soldier’s. “Ah,” she said. “Refreshments.”
Hephzibah turned, fast. A milky-looking boy in dark tails was carrying an enormous tea tray through the door. “Madam?” he said.
“Yes, perfect. Do bring it in.” She smiled as she said it. And her smile wrong-footed Hephzibah. It was gentle.
“I’m parched,” Hephzibah said. “Don’t spare the sugar.”
Miss de Vries bowed her head. “I never would.”
Her wrists were small and faintly blueish, as if the veins ran close together. She wore no jewelry, no ornaments of any kind. She looked like meat that had been well wrapped in muslin, to keep her fresh and away from flies. The water poured out scalding hot, steam rising in a vicious cloud. Hephzibah thought, with sudden conviction, I don’t want to stay in this room a moment longer than I need to.
“Miss de Vries,” she said, summoning her courage. “I come to you today as an emissary of the royal household. I received your letter of invitation. The private secretary passed it to me. I’m sorry it’s taken us such a terribly long time to respond.”
“Not a terribly long time at all,” said Miss de Vries, passing a cup and saucer.
“We’ve been quite run off our feet. We’ve any number of engagements. You know how it is.”
The boy took the tea tray and began backing out of the room.
“I do,” Miss de Vries said. Her eyes were lizard like, unreadable. Then she added, with a tiny twist in her voice, “Was it considered—an impertinence?”
“An impertinence?”
“My invitation, my letter to the palace. Did it cause offence?”
Something was moving in Miss de Vries’s eyes. Something uneasy. She was doubting herself.
“Good heavens,” said Hephzibah. “All approaches to the palace must be considered an offence. To request the attention of Their Royal Highnesses is an impertinence by its very nature. It cannot be helped. Now, tell me, I hear this is a costumed ball, correct?”
“Indeed.”
“But that is too enchanting. As what shall you go? A Van Dyck? A masked temptress?”
Miss de Vries’s smile grew colder. “I shall have to keep it a secret, Your Grace.”
“But you must confide in me. I’m dying to know. Will you be a sorceress? A sea serpent? A succubus?”
Miss de Vries stared at her.
“Oh, don’t let me torture you. I’m being such a gorgon. But tell me you’ll make the papers. Did you go to the Devonshires’ ball?”
“I did not.”
“No? A pity. It’s helpful to measure the competition, I find. People bore so easily. Have you hired Whitman for the entertainments?” Mrs. King had told her exactly how to put the question. Gently, gently, almost like it was nothing at all…
Miss de Vries frowned. “I’ve not heard of Whitman.”
Whitman was one of Hephzibah’s greatest gifts to Mrs. King: a costumier and impresario who came from the Rookery in Spitalfields, and who kept a splendid side business in pickpocketing. Between Whitman, Hephzibah and the Janes, there wasn’t a music-hall troupe or traveling fair they couldn’t hire for this job.
“Of course you haven’t. He doesn’t advertise.” Hephzibah fiddled in her reticule, drew out a card. “I doubt you’d get him now. Not worth asking. Perhaps next year.” She tossed the card on the table, then sipped her tea. “He does the most stupendous entertainments. And by the by, in case you’re wondering, I did mention your ball to the Princess Victoria.”
“You did?”
“But of course! She was dreadfully shocked.”
Miss de Vries considered this. Said, slowly, “I do not think there is anything about it that should shock Her Royal Highness.”
“Oh, but it’s such a deliciously loathsome thing to do! To hold a ball, when you’re in full mourning, not even half. We’re agog with it.”
Miss de Vries’s face was immobile.
“Have I said something amiss?” Hephzibah patted her on the hand. “Don’t fret. It’s a new century, dear. We’re all ripe for a shake-up. And you needn’t stand on ceremony about HRH. She’s slipping down the pecking order every year, poor thing. One day you’ll be able to drag her to any old bazaar or rose sale you like. I can’t see her making any great marriage, can you?” Hephzibah shifted in her seat. “But for now, of course, things are managed terribly, particularly in her household.”
“Of course.”
“It’s the question of security that really gets us all stirred up. We are living in such awfully violent times. Now, if you wanted to secure the royal presence, I would have to assure the household that there would be exceptional care taken for Her Royal Highness’s safety.”
Only Miss de Vries’s knuckles, the faintest cracking of the skin, betrayed her interest. “Of course,” she said.
“She does not, you understand, go out in society a great deal.”
“I hear she’s very close to the queen.”
“Quite right,” said Hephzibah severely, “and we forget, all too often, they are first and foremost a family. The first family in the land, bound as tightly in blood and bond as any—” she paused, casting around for the right words “—tradesman and his daughter.”