Page 47 of Henrietta

Hetty wavered. There could be no reassuring herself, from now on, that she was merely going along with a fiction of Trixie’s making. The Belgian paramour was a real person now, and anything she uttered from this moment onward was a choice. ‘Yes,’ she said, wondering if she would live to regret this. ‘Yes, he was just the same as always.’

She only hoped she would not live to regret this.

CHAPTER XIV.

IT was a widely held custom of many universities to invite, on occasion, a visiting professor to lecture upon their particular area of expertise, and in the education of Hetty Clithero, Arthur felt no hesitation in following suit. When it came to ridding oneself of an unwanted guest, conversation or dance partner, he counted himself competent, but Lady Allerton was the expert.

Fortunately, he had only to broach the subject to his mother for her to deem it an excellent idea (though Arthur felt this had as much to do with her unwillingness to discuss her most recent bill from Gunter’s than anything else).

‘Do we truly need lessons in such a thing?’ Trixie wondered sceptically, for Lady Allerton had thought her tutelage would benefit her daughter, too. ‘It is so easy to get rid of people. One says one’s grandmother is unwell, or one has a pressing appointment on the other side of the room – or that one expects one will soon be sick and then one can simply leave!’

Lady Allerton, who did not subscribe to the belief that sickliness was a beguiling trait in young women, forbade this instantly.

‘I suppose it does look rather obvious when one does not vomit,’ Trixie allowed. ‘Unless one can pretend, briefly—’

‘There will be no sickness or fainting,’ Lady Allerton instructed, ‘however brief or pretend. Such fictional excuses may always be uncovered, and that is unforgiveable, no matter whom one is trying to escape: to alert a person to their own tedium is the height of discourtesy.’

At this, Arthur – who had retreated to a corner table with a pile of correspondence – raised his gaze to exchange an appreciative glance with Hetty.

‘What else is there to be done?’

‘One simply has to utter the following phrase.’ Lady Allerton took a fortifying draught of tea, straightened and then uttered: ‘It was so wonderful to see you!’

‘That is it?’ Trixie’s tone was rather derisive.

Lady Allerton turned to Hetty, who was sitting beside her upon the sofa. ‘It was so wonderful to see you.’ Her ladyship gestured authoritatively to her own face. ‘Beaming smile, profound warmth and a light …’ She reached out to press Hetty’s arm in such a way that Hetty felt – without quite knowing how – gently propelled from her presence.

It was quite magical. As ever, Hetty found herself deeply impressed by Lady Allerton’s prowess, and just as deeply certain that she would never be able to replicate it herself.

‘We shall practise upon our morning callers,’ Lady Allerton proclaimed, when Hetty voiced this doubt. ‘You will see.’

Ordinarily, of course, Lady Allerton managed the morning visits to Berkeley Square with elegant efficiency: even the most lingering of gentlemen found themselves, after no more than twenty minutes inside her drawing room, stepping happily on to the pavement without the faintest idea that they had been as good as thrust from the premises.

Predictably, in Trixie’s hands, the effect was a little less elegant. On the one hand, she took to the technique as a duck to water, but on the other, she disposed of Messrs Welham, Sinclair and Fakenham all within half an hour.

‘Perhaps allow them to stay a little longer, darling,’ Lady Allerton advised.

Hetty, just as predictably, had a little more trouble: when Sir Marcus Kirkham had spent twenty minutes upon the sofa with them, with no sign of departing, she managed to utter the fateful words, but rather bungled the execution: ‘It is so wonderful to see you!’

With an accompanying pat upon the arm, Sir Marcus took this as encouragement to remain for a further ten minutes before Lady Allerton dispensed with him. ‘It was so wonderful seeing you! Was!’ she told Hetty severely. ‘The tense is crucial! The touch upon the arm is a press away not a pat – never a pat!’

Hetty had better luck with Lord Fenton, who arrived soon afterwards, and even more so with Colonel Davenport, who followed on his heels full of vim from a recent visit to Tattersall’s.

‘I saw the most magnificent bays imaginable,’ he told Hetty. ‘In fact, several of the fellows thought they looked the spitting image of your pair, Allerton, though I told them, of course, that you would not part with them for the world – isn’t that right?’

Arthur’s smile became rather fixed, and Hetty reached out a hasty arm. ‘It was so wonderful to see you!’

‘Very good, Hetty!’ Lady Allerton praised her. ‘That was perfect.’

Such was her ensuing success that when Timothy came into the room at two o’clock to tarry a little with his family, Hetty was struck by a spirit of mischief and managed to utter – ‘It was so wonderful to see you’ – with such perfect inflection that Timothy found himself rising from the sofa before he quite knew what he was about.

‘Dash it,’ he said indignantly, catching himself. ‘This is my home, too, you know!’

When Mr Hargan came, however, Hetty refused to chase him away, for he had come to educate her on a subject of particular interest.

‘What’, Timothy said with a great deal of suspicion, ‘is a mangel-wurzel?’

Mr Hargan coloured, but between them, Hetty and Arthur soon reassured him of his welcome, asking a great many questions to which Mr Hargan provided a surprisingly knowledgeable array of answers, and even giving Arthur the direction of a gentleman named Coke who had been heard of doing marvellous things with the Rotherham plough.