Garth Nix - Newt’s Emerald

None of it was of any significance to Truthful. She felt as if she was a play-actor, and not a very good one at that, speaking her lines and treading the boards to her appointed place at the appointed time, but with no feeling. The only real emotion she felt was towards one o’clock in the morning, when Lady Badgery emerged from the library and bore down upon her as she was escorted from the latest country dance by her current swain.

“Ah, Truthful,” said Lady Badgery. She tapped Truthful’s partner painfully on the elbow with the knob of her walking stick and added, “Sir Arthur Tennant, I believe. Ain’t you the one they call ‘Dingle’ on account of being lost in Ireland that time?”

An embarrassed mumble, a fumbled bow and a fast retreat indicated that as per usual, Lady Badgery was correct.

“Enjoying the ball?” asked Lady Badgery. “You are a veritable hit, Truthful. Got all the mamas talking, and the men . . . well, look at them!”

She waved her stick around dangerously, making several young gentleman step back and several who had clearly been hoping to engage Truthful’s attention suddenly sheer away.

“Yes, Great-aunt,” said Truthful dutifully. “But I am tired now and if it would not displease you, would like to go home.”

“What?” asked Lady Badgery shrewdly. She peered at Truthful, then looked fiercely around. “Something’s upset you, puss, that I can see. One of these fellows overstepped the line?”

“No, nothing like that,” said Truthful. “I just have the headache a little. I suppose I am not used to such a crush.”

“That fellow Harnett’s not here,” said Lady Badgery. “Is he?”

“I haven’t seen him,” said Truthful, avoiding her great-aunt’s gaze. “But . . . but I did meet Miss Gough, his . . . his betrothed.”

“Ah, that was . . . unfortunate,” said Lady Badgery, with a curious sideways glance at Truthful. “Well if you have the headache I suppose we must go home. Certainly I have had no luck at cards, and the champagne is not of the best. Mournbeck always does try to scrimp and Cecilie doesn’t touch the stuff, so he gets away with it. Come then. Out of my way, spider-shanks! Fellow with calves like that shouldn’t be seen in knee breeches.”

Truthful followed her great-aunt, pretending she couldn’t hear the imprecations Lady Badgery bestowed on anyone foolish enough to get in her way as she sailed through the crowd. At least until the unstoppable force met an immoveable object, in this case an elderly peer and his wife, who rather than moving aside smiled and spoke in unison, almost as if they had practiced doing so.

“Ermintrude!”

Truthful, half a pace behind her great-aunt, recognised the man immediately. It was Lord Otterbrook, the Marquis of Poole, who had run her post-chaise into a ditch.

“Otterbrook, Lucy,” replied Lady Badgery. “How nice to see you. Allow me to present my great-niece, Venetia’s daughter. Lady Truthful, the Marquis and Marchioness of Poole, Lord and Lady Otterbrook.”

“But we’ve met!” exclaimed the Marquis, raising his quizzing glass to look at Truthful. “I ran your post-chaise into a ditch near Maidstone some weeks ago, didn’t I?”

“Ah, yes, my lord,” said Truthful doubtfully, glancing at the Marchioness, a woman who looked as formidable as her own great-aunt, though she was considerably plumper and not so eccentric in her dress, save for the number of rings she wore, including one set with a very large ruby and on her left hand, and another with an enormous sapphire on her right. She was staring at Truthful’s bracelet, but looked up at Truthful’s face as she spoke.

“You do take after dear Venetia,” said the Marchioness, taking Truthful’s hands and holding them so she might look straight at her face. “I am delighted to make your acquaintance, my dear. Athelstan, we must invite Lady Truthful to our masquerade ball!”

“Already have,” said the Marquis. “At least, sent Ermintrude a card last week, Lady Truthful naturally presumed to be included.”

“I saw it,” sniffed Lady Badgery. “But why you should presume to hold a masquerade in Brighton before the end of the season . . . I doubt not it will be a sparse, ill-attended affair.”

“That’s where you’re wrong, Ermintrude,” said the Marchioness. “Athelstan has already seen it in the fire, a vast throng and such elegant costumes! It will be the envy of everyone!”

“Athelstan saw it!” exclaimed Lady Badgery. “A third-rate divination is no surety.”

“Prinny’s coming,” said the Marquis, ignoring this slight on his sorcerous powers. “He’s going down to look at the progress Nash is making on the pavilion, I told him he might as well make a night of it. Suggested he come as Canute, have some footmen costumed as waves so he can send them back and forth. Bit of fun, hey?”

“I would like to see Brighton,” said Truthful, thinking that anywhere would be better than London at the moment, where she might encounter Harnett at any time. She felt defeated and lost. The search for the Emerald had gone into other hands, more capable hands, she told herself, and she felt no joy in London society. Perhaps Brighton and a masquerade ball would distract her. Not to mention a sight of the Prince Regent. It would be interesting to see one of the royal princes her father detested so much.

“Where would we stay?” asked Lady Badgery. “My house there won’t be ready for a month, and there’s nowhere else fit for habitation in the damned place. Damp sheets and cold chops!”

“Stay with us,” said the Marchioness. “I sent Yardley down last week to furbish everything up. Plenty of room. No other guests.”

“Unless my nevvy graces us with his presence,” said the Marquis. “Unlikely, but possible. Busy fellow, you know.”

“I should like to go, Great-aunt,” said Truthful. “I think . . . I think some sea air might do me good.”

But even as she spoke, she was thinking of other sea air. Of being in the barrel, close to Harnett, and the breeze through the cracks, heavy with salt . . . she blinked and resolutely tried to put those memories out of her mind.

“Very well,” said Lady Badgery, with an alacrity that surprised Truthful. “When are we to come to you, Lucy?”

“The masquerade is Thursday, at the Old Ship,” said the Marchioness. “Wednesday?”

“Thank you for the kind invitation, my lord Marquis,” said Truthful, remembering her manners. But she also remembered something else.

“Oh, I had forgotten!” she said. “We are currently encumbered with law-officers, or not precisely . . . but government people, set to protect me from . . . it is an unusual circumstance, but we might need to bring many more servants—”

“Pish!” said the Marquis. “I know all about that!”

Truthful stared at him. Lady Badgery coughed, and the Marchioness sighed.

“That is to say, in the government now you know!” said Lord Otterbrook. “On a committee with Ned Leye, matter came up. Not poking my nose into your affairs, Lady Truthful!”

“Oh, I see,” said Truthful. “But if we do still have them with us, would it not be a frightful crowd for your servants?”

“No, no, there really is plenty of room, we do not have a large staff there,” said the Marchioness.

“My predecessor, distant cousin you know, bought the place. He used to go to Brighthelmstone as it was, to take the seawater cure,” explained the Marquis. “Not that it did him any good. Terrible fellow, but a good eye for a house. Or two, in this case, on the Marine Parade. He had ’em joined together, you know. So you need not fear we’ll all be elbow-jostling each other at breakfast. We look forward to you joining us, Lady Badgery, Lady Truthful.”

He bowed, Lady Otterbrook took his arm, and they continued on deeper into the ballroom, as Truthful curtseyed and Lady Badgery gave a kind of nod of farewell.

They continued on their way in the opposite direction, towards the entrance hall, but just before passing through the jam of people in the double doorway, Truthful stumbled and in regaining her balance, thrust out her arm.

By unlucky chance, her bracelet touched the bare skin above the elbow of a lady, between her glove and the spider-gauze sleeve of her dress. There was a flash of harsh blue light, followed a moment later by a scream. The lady in question, a moment before a vision of youth and beauty, now appeared at least fifteen years older. Her skin had lost its glow, and her clear blue eyes were clouded and lit not with innocence but fierce anger. Even her dress had lost the sheen of new silk and the diamonds at her neck had grown dull and likely to be paste.

Fortunately she did not know who had dispelled her glamour, and Lady Badgery hustled Truthful away even as her great-niece opened her mouth to apologise. Behind them they heard the stir of voices, many of them raised in amusement rather than concern, and another angry scream and a shouted denial.

“Oh no,” said Truthful, glancing back. “She has slapped some poor innocent! It is my fault! I must go back and explain.”

“No you must not,” said Lady Badgery. “That was Lady Linniston, and she has got no more than she deserves, the cat! How she has led poor Linniston a dance, with her ‘cicibeos’ and fancy men. Now all the world can see her as she really is.”

“But the woman she slapped—”

“Cordelia Bassingthwaite can more than hold her own,” said Lady Badgery. They were in the entrance hall now, and an alert Mournbeck footman had already raced outside. They heard him shouting as other servants brought them their cloaks.

“Lady Badgery’s carriage! Lady Badgery’s carriage!”

The short return journey to Grosvenor Square was untroubled by any attempted kidnappings, allowing Truthful to gratefully go to her bed just before two in the morning. But even though she was very tired, sleep evaded her for some considerable time. It was distinctly more difficult in the deep dark of the night to put Harnett out of her mind than it was in the bright daylight, or even when dancing at the ball. But she knew she must. He was clearly not to be trusted, perhaps addicted to the shadowy world of espionage and half-truths or even outright dissimulation.

In any case, he disliked her and was probably still angry she had deceived him with her masquerade.

And he was going to be married.

Truthful tried to tell herself that she didn’t care, that it was impossible to care for someone she had met so recently. She hardly knew him, after all, and most of what she did know of him was how he had behaved when he thought she was a man.

Sleep came to her eventually, but not before tears came that she was ashamed to shed, but somehow couldn’t stop.

The next morning, barely seen by Truthful as she rose at half past eleven, was bright and cheerful. Sun shone through all the windows, the sky was blue, and the faint sounds of a street-sweeper singing “Enchantress Farewell” came from the corner of the Square and South Audley Street.

Truthful looked out with a jaundiced eye. She saw Sergeant Ruggins across the road by the garden railing, pacing backwards and forwards, glancing every now and then at the house and occasionally back into the garden square. There were a few children and their nannies in the garden, and a cluster of gardeners doing something to a flower bed that required them to gather around and lean on their shovels and forks. Several gentlemen on horseback were riding through on the northern side of the Square, a chaise was letting several ladies alight on the eastern side by Number Four . . . all was serene.

Truthful went downstairs and found her great-aunt finishing off a hearty breakfast while looking at a number of charcoal illustrations, character sketches of outlandish style, the uppermost some kind of pirate. The author of these sketches — a large bearded man wearing a strange kind of smock and a knitted cap of violently purple wool — sat at the other end of the table in front of an open drawing box and several blank sheets of paper.

“Ah, Lady Truthful,” said her great-aunt. “This is Signor Fraticelli, who makes all my masquerade costumes. He is a genius. He will make yours also.”

“What is it that you wish to be at the masquerade, Lady Truthful?” asked Signor Fraticelli. “A swan perhaps? A Valkyrie? A Wood Fay?”

Truthful blinked sleepily.

“I do not know, signor,” she said helplessly. “Perhaps after breakfast . . .”

“I am to be a pirate,” said Lady Badgery with satisfaction. “In scarlet, with a belt of linked gold moidores, purple breeches and a cutlass. I already have several actual cutlasses, of course, from Badgery’s grandfather. Get yourself something to eat, Truthful, and think about a costume. Signor Fraticelli is a busy man and we only have four days before we must leave for Brighton. A first-rate costume will take all that time to make.”