The Nightingale Girls

CHAPTER Nineteen



THE CLAREMONTS’ FAMILY home, Lyford, was some thirty miles away. It was a beautiful Georgian house, far grander than Billinghurst, with its elegant symmetry and imposing frontage of Corinthian columns sitting in the centre of beautifully manicured parkland, surrounded by intricate flowerbeds and topiary.

As Felix the chauffeur drove the Daimler through the gates and up the sweeping drive illuminated by flaming torches, Millie could almost feel her grandmother’s bristling resentment. She and the Dowager Duchess of Claremont were distant cousins, and there were rumours that Grandmother and the old Duke had once been romantically involved before Cecilia swept in and snapped him up.

Millie understood why her grandmother might covet such a grand house, but she much preferred the homeliness of Billinghurst.

As she stepped from the car, her grandmother said, ‘Now remember, Amelia, Richard will be here this evening. I hope you will make a point of speaking to him?’

‘Try to catch his eye, you mean?’

‘Don’t be vulgar, child. But if you must put it that way – why not? He is Claremont’s eldest son, and one day all this will be his. And he always had rather a soft spot for you, as I recall. Don’t look at me like that,’ she added, as Millie frowned at her. ‘I dare say there will be a great many young women here tonight hoping to catch his eye, as you so crudely put it.’

Then they’re welcome to him, Millie thought. Sophia’s older brother Richard was an officer in the Guards, and one of the most pompous men Millie had ever met.

She had visited Lyford many times as a guest of her friend, but the impressive entrance hall, with its grand sweeping staircase, still took her breath away. It looked even more beautiful this evening, lit by the glow of hundreds of candles. The sound of a string quartet mingled with laughter and chatter and the clink of glasses from the ballroom beyond.

The Duke and Duchess greeted their arrival. Caroline Claremont was in her late forties, elegant and even more regal than Millie’s grandmother, if that were possible. Millie could never meet her without fighting the urge to bob a quick curtsey.

‘Rettingham, how wonderful to see you.’ The Duke was a very genial man, and a close friend of her father’s. They had served as officers together during the Great War. But unlike her handsome father, years of good living had left Claremont with a rounded figure and a red, hearty face. ‘And Lady Rettingham, you’re looking very well.’

‘Thomas,’ her grandmother greeted him. ‘How is your dear mother?’

‘Alas, she is indisposed and will not be joining us this evening.’

‘Oh, how very sad.’ Only Millie spotted the slight lifting of the corners of her grandmother’s mouth. ‘Do give her my very best wishes, won’t you?’

‘Amelia, how wonderful that you could join us.’ Millie felt unnerved as their host looked her up and down with a speculative gleam in his eyes. She was well aware of the Duke’s reputation as an old roué.

‘We were rather afraid you would be too busy nursing the sick to join us this evening.’ Caroline Claremont looked amused.

‘I’m still training, they haven’t let me loose on any sick people yet,’ Millie replied.

‘How fascinating. We can’t wait to hear all about it.’ Then, just in case Millie thought she meant it, the Duchess immediately changed the subject. ‘Sophia is longing to see you. I believe she has some rather exciting news for you.’ She gave Millie a meaningful look.

Millie could already guess what it might be. But she didn’t have to wait long to find out as Sophia rushed up to greet her as soon as she entered the glittering ballroom.

‘I’m engaged!’ she blurted out, waggling her left hand under Millie’s nose. The impressive diamond sparkled in the light of the chandeliers.

‘That’s wonderful!’ Millie embraced her friend. ‘When did it happen?’

‘On Christmas Eve. Oh, Millie, it was so romantic. We were walking on the terrace, and suddenly he just took my hand, and . . .’ She sighed with happiness. ‘I can’t believe it.’

‘Why not? Anyone can see he’s besotted by you.’ And rightly too, she thought. Sophia was every inch the duchess in waiting, so beautiful and graceful and as elegant as her mother. Everything Millie wasn’t, in fact. She also understood her duty and was happy to submit to it in a way that Millie never would.

But it wasn’t just duty with Sophia. She was genuinely in love with David, and probably would have been even if he hadn’t been the son and heir of the Duke of Cleveland.

‘I want you to be a bridesmaid,’ Sophia said, her dark eyes shining with excitement. Millie stared at her.

‘Are you sure? I’m terribly clumsy, you know. I’ll probably trip over your train and ruin everything.’

‘You won’t.’

‘How can you be so certain? Remember the awful hash I made of my presentation?’

‘How could I forget?’ Sophia giggled.

Millie blushed at the memory. It had sounded so simple. Make one curtsey to the King, then rise, step to the side and make another to the Queen. Except somehow she had become entangled in her own train and almost pitched headlong at Her Majesty’s feet.

She didn’t know which infuriated her grandmother more, her dreadful faux-pas or the fact that she’d laughed about it so much afterwards.

They were still laughing when Sophia’s brother Seb joined them.

‘What are you two giggling about, as if I couldn’t guess?’ He was a year older than Sophia, and in his last year at Oxford. He was as good-looking as his sister, but as fair as Sophia was dark. He reminded Millie of a poet, with his fine-boned, sensitive face, long thin nose and clear grey eyes.

‘Your sister has just made the mistake of asking me to be her bridesmaid,’ Millie said. ‘Although now I come to think of it, I think it’s only fair I should ruin your day, since you’re ruining my life,’ she added. ‘You do realise that once news of your engagement gets out, my life won’t be worth living?’ she explained, as Sophia looked puzzled. ‘My grandmother will be completely relentless in her pursuit of a husband for me.’

‘Perhaps we should help her?’ Seb looked around the room. ‘Is there anyone you like the look of?’

‘I don’t know about that, but I have been told to keep my eye on your brother,’ she said.

‘Oh, God, not you too?’ Sophia laughed. ‘Richard is awfully popular, isn’t he?’

‘Undeservedly so,’ Seb said. ‘He’s a frightful bore. But it seems wit and intelligence count for very little compared to a title,’ he sighed. ‘Which is probably why I’m destined to spend the rest of my life on the shelf.’

‘At least you’ll have me for company,’ Millie grinned, taking his arm.

‘Unless Miss Farsley has other ideas,’ Sophia said mischievously. ‘Don’t look now, Seb darling, but she’s just walked in.’

‘Oh God,’ Seb groaned.

Millie followed their gaze to where a tall, raven-haired beauty stood in the doorway surveying the crowd. ‘Who is that?’

‘Georgina Farsley,’ Sophia said. ‘She arrived in England this summer with her family. American, and disgustingly wealthy.’

‘Obscenely,’ said Seb.

‘Her father buys his darling Georgina everything she wants. Except the one thing she really craves, that is.’

‘Which is?’

Sophia looked at her brother. ‘Have a guess.’

‘You mean Seb?’

‘Don’t sound so surprised.’ Seb looked hurt.

‘She’s been pursuing him around Lyford like a hound after a hare for the past two days,’ Sophia said. It’s simply too funny to watch.’

‘The poor girl,’ Millie said.

‘Poor girl? What about poor me?’ Seb said, outraged.

They went in to dinner shortly afterwards, and as she’d hoped, Millie found herself seated beside Sebastian.

‘Are you terribly disappointed?’ he asked. ‘I could arrange for you to sit next to Richard, if you’d prefer?’

‘That’s quite all right. I can make my play for him after dinner. I shall dazzle him with my dancing.’

‘That should be entertaining. Richard is an even worse dancer than you are.’

It was fun, sitting next to Seb. He wasn’t like the usual men one met during the Season, great bellowing bores who talked about nothing but hunting, shooting and fishing, and expected girls to hang on their every word. Seb was intelligent, witty and well read. He rode and loved the outdoors as much as Millie, but not to the point of being tedious. He was also interested in her nursing, something everyone else seemed to regard as rather an embarrassment. Millie entertained him with tales of her training, and he filled her in with lots of amusing gossip about his undergraduate friends.

After dinner, it was time for dancing.

‘Please tell me your dance card isn’t already full?’ Seb said as he escorted her in to the ballroom.

Millie pulled a face. ‘It’s completely empty, I’m afraid.’

‘Then allow me.’ Seb took out his pen and scribbled his initials gallantly beside every dance.

‘You really don’t have to, you know. I’ll only stamp all over your toes,’ Millie warned him as they took to the floor.

‘Sooner me than some other poor blighter.’

‘Miss Farsley looks as if she is far lighter on her feet than I am,’ Millie commented, as the mysterious Georgina skimmed around them, whirled around the floor by another admirer. ‘Are you sure you wouldn’t rather dance with her?’

‘Even having my feet crushed by you is preferable to fighting off her attentions, I assure you.’

‘Why don’t you want to marry an American heiress? It might be rather fun.’ Millie glanced at Georgina as they whisked by each other. ‘And she is very beautiful.’

‘So is a Ming vase, but I wouldn’t like to be married to one. Although come to think of it, I would probably get more entertaining conversation out of a piece of ancient pottery than I ever would out of Miss Farsley.’

Finally, after an exhausting couple of hours’ dancing, the clock struck midnight and they all poured out on to the terrace to watch the firework display the Claremonts had arranged.

‘Happy New Year,’ Millie said to Seb.

‘It will be for some people.’ He nodded over to where Sophia was entwined in the arms of her fiancé David, their happy faces illuminated by bursts of colour overhead.

‘Perhaps it will be for you, too?’ Millie smiled. ‘I think nineteen thirty-five will be the year someone finally notices your excellent qualities.’

He smiled back at her in the moonlight. ‘We can but hope,’ he murmured.