Page 66 of The Duke's Rules Of Engagement
Vauxhall Gardens was more enchanting than ever. It was a perfect night, and though one rarely saw stars through London’s coal-blackened sky, the air was somewhat fresher here on the south side of the Thames. At least, it felt clean thanks to the fresh late-spring breeze.
Jo and Lilly paid the penny toll and traversed the new Vauxhall Bridge across the Thames for the first time—for previous visits, they’d had to take a boat. After Jo doled out seven shillings for their entry, she and Lilly linked arms and stepped into the world of wonder that was Vauxhall Gardens.
A little man dressed in old-fashioned breeches with black tights, black pumps embellished with large black bows, a black tailcoat, and carrying a tasseled cane whisked his high beaver hat off his head and drew a low bow in their direction. “Welcome to the royal properties, my ladies!”
Lilly literally jumped back, then turned to Jo in alarm. After all, neither of them had been properly introduced to this man.
But Jo knew who it was. She remembered him coming to their supper box on one of their previous visits. Mr. Simpson had been a staple here since before the turn of the century, and was known to almost all Londoners as the voice and face of Vauxhall Gardens—also as a silly, unctuous man who was widely known to treat lampposts and the prince regent with equal deference.
She smiled at Lilly. “My dear Lilly, surely you recall Mr. Simpson, the Master of Ceremonies.” She dropped a curtsy in his direction. “Good evening, sir.”
Simpson looked shocked. He clutched his hat to his chest. “My humblest and sincere thanks for deigning to wish me a good evening, my fair lady. I shall be, from this point and forevermore, your devoted servant.” With his hat-holding hand, he made a grand flourish toward the interior of the park. “With my deepest respect and sincerity, I wish you and your dear Lilly a marvelous evening.”
He swept his hat back to his chest and bowed low, not rising again until Lilly and Jo were several steps away from him. Lilly giggled as Jo glanced back and saw him bowing again and saying the exact same words to a pair of older ladies entering the grounds behind them.
Jo and Lilly spent the remainder of the afternoon touring their favorite places in the gardens before returning to the front of the park as Vauxhall’s star singer, Mrs. Bland, was walking to the balcony of the octagonal orchestra building to begin her set. There, the scents of savory roasting meat and fresh bread wafted from behind the wide arc of the surrounding supper boxes.
A quarter of an hour later everyone in the crowd had gone still and silent, their senses filled by the delicious smells and the dulcet ballads sung by Mrs. Bland. Well, everyone was still but Lilly. She was anxious, glancing furtively around and shifting restlessly on her feet. Jo and Lilly had been at the gardens for nearly three hours, and they’d seen no sign of the Cherrington sisters.
The song ended to much applause, then Mr. Dignum came to join Mrs. Bland on the balcony, and they began to sing a duet.
“Ooh! I see them!” Lilly exclaimed, then dragged Jo to where the Cherringtons had gathered on a small mound of the lawn between two tall trees.
As soon as she saw them, Jo knew why Lilly had begged so fervently to come tonight. Like a raven among swans, Charles Cherrington looked sleek in his black hat, tailcoat, pantaloons, and boots, surrounded by his five feminine and fashionable sisters, all dressed in white.
Jo cut Lilly a stern look and murmured, “You did not tell me Mr. Cherrington would be here.”
“I didn’t?” Lilly grinned. “So sorry.”
She didn’t sound the slightest bit sorry. Jo shook her head but didn’t say anything more as they approached the Cherringtons, who all smiled broadly at them save Frances—though even she had a faint upturn to her lips.
After everyone greeted everyone else, Charles suggested in a low voice that after the concert, they should go see the cascade, then find a supper box where they’d enjoy some refreshments while awaiting the midnight appearance of the rope-dancer and the fireworks. Then, they all turned back toward the orchestra and listened as Mr. Dignum belted his heart out.
When the concert ended about an hour later, a bell rang to signal the demonstration of the cascade. Their party rushed, along with about a thousand others, under the vaulted colonnade of the Grand Walk until they reached the location of the waterworks. They gathered before a curtain that rose to a scene of bucolic delight: rolling green hills in the background bracketing a wide, mechanical waterfall, the “water” crashing down in a roar into a stream, where it frothed and bubbled under the rotating wheel of a watermill.
Mechanical moving figures populated each side of the stream, and a bridge spanned it. A mail coach rattled along, horses’ legs jerking up and down, until it stopped on the bridge, its driver lowering his gun to point at the back of a fleeing robber, a sack of mail strung over his back. The gun went off with a greatbang!, and the man jerked and tumbled behind a hedge.
On the opposite side of the stream, a man sat, ostensibly ignoring the hubbub of the mail coach drama and rocking in his chair as smoke curled up from the pipe he sucked on. All the people had an authentic quality about them, though by their lurching movements, they were clearly as mechanical as the stream.
It was a miracle, thought Jo, even though hundreds of people crowded her and she could only catch peeks of the scene between the many bodies blocking her view. In all of her visits to Vauxhall, this display never ceased to delight her. The water looked real, but it wasn’t water—it was tin, its movement facilitated by mechanical devices beneath the scene, its shimmering surface made to look like sunlight shining on the stream by the myriad lanterns glowing overhead.
To her side, Charles Cherrington lifted Lilly by the waist so she could sneak a better view. Jo’s protective-chaperone instincts roared to life, and she almost yanked Lilly down—someone might see Charles with his hands on her! But she forced the thought away. They would, if all went as planned, marry soon. And, as she glanced around at the crowd, she noticed that no one paid any heed to what Charles and Lilly were doing. They were all singularly focused on the cascade and all the antics happening around it.
In any case, Vauxhall was famous for liaisons of a sort far more scandalous than the one happening beside her. Jo resolved to let Charles and Lilly enjoy this moment.
From behind the man on the rocking chair, a mad ox appeared, at first sauntering closer, then stopping as if noticing the man for the first time, blowing steam from its broad nostrils. With a bellow the crowd heard but the mechanical pipe-smoking man did not, the massive beast lowered its horns and charged straight at the oblivious man’s backside. The ox struck its target, and the man tumbled forward and out of the chair, his torn trousers exposing his bare, hairy rump. The audience roared with laughter. Charles lowered Lilly and playfully covered her eyes. Laughing, she pushed his hands away and smiled up at him as he returned her smile, looking more a besotted fool than a young gentleman of theton.
With a selfish pang in her chest, Jo wished someone would smile at her that way. She wished she had someone of her own who could lift her high above the crowd, so she could take in every single detail of the scene before her.
But that was never to be. The best she could hope for was to someday come to Vauxhall alone and sneak here during the concert and be at the very front of the crowd when the display began so she could soak in every incredible detail.
It was a lonely thought, the resulting ache inside her a familiar one.
The spectacle lasted a few minutes longer as the ox chased the mail coach over the bridge. Once the curtain was finally drawn, the satisfied crowd drifted off in every direction, chattering about what they’d seen.
Considering the density of the crowd in attendance tonight, Jo, Lilly, and the Cherringtons were lucky to find a supper box close to the orchestra, and Charles ordered them a spread of the foods Vauxhall was most famous for: miniature whole chickens and dishes of ham sliced into paper-thin sheets, an assortment of cakes and tarts, and fresh bread, as well as a pitcher of arrack punch.
Before the food arrived, a whistle was blown, and not one moment later, it seemed as if all of Vauxhall Gardens’ twelve thousand lanterns came to life at once. Multicolored hanging lanterns lit the rose-scented paths in rainbows of soft light, and the pavilion, orchestra area, and supper boxes twinkled with star-lights.
