A Most Lamentable Comedy Read Online Free PDF Page A

fine one, milady. He and his master have been all over Europe and now Mr Congrevance has a fancy to return home, so they’re back in England.’
    ‘Home? Where is that exactly?’
    ‘He didn’t say rightly, milady. Some castle in Ireland and lands in the north somewhere. Beautiful shirts he has, milady. All silk.’
    I think of them at their ironing, elbow to elbow, gossiping about their master and mistress. It has a certain appeal. ‘And what did you tell him of me?’
    ‘Why, that you’re in no hurry to marry, as you’re comfortably off.’ Mary says it without a trace of irony. She adds, ‘And that you miss Lord Elmhurst.’
    I stand up so fast my chair tips over backwards. ‘That was completely unnecessary!’
    ‘Well, milady, I thought it might spur on him if—’
    ‘Pray do not make things up.’ A ludicrous command if ever there was one.
    She shrugs, not offended, and rights the chair. ‘And Mr Barton says he’ll take me to see a ferret.’
    ‘Very well. You be careful it is not a ferret he keeps in his trousers.’ I catch a sight of myself in the mirror. ‘Can we make this neckline higher?’
    ‘Higher?’ She stares at me as though I am mad. It is certainly a request I have never made before.
    ‘Never mind. It will do.’ I adjust my turban, fiddle around changing my earrings and putting the original pair on and leave for the drawing room.
    Another lady is headed in the same direction, tall, grey-haired and with a familiar look to her. She turns, hearing me behind her, and I sink into a curtsy as my heart sinks even lower. It’s Inigo Linsley’s terrifying mother, the Dowager Countess, given to odd outspoken bursts – she is never afraid to speak her mind. ‘Good evening, Lady Terrant.’
    ‘Ha. Lady Elmhurst.’ I haven’t seen her for some years, after she left London under a cloud, so I heard, while I was on honeymoon with Elmhurst. I know Linsley was frightened to death of her, although she liked him above all of her sons. She gives me a good inspection, and comments, ‘You’re ageing well.’
    Since I admit to three and twenty I do not take this as a compliment. She, however, is as handsome and bright-eyed as ever. I know she married very young, and she must now be well over fifty. Then she says, ‘I am Mrs Riley now. I married again, to an Admiral Riley. When you are my age one may do as one pleases.’
    ‘Oh. My felicitations, madam.’
    ‘I was sorry to hear of Elmhrst’s death. He was a handsome rogue.’ Before I can say anything, as taken aback as I am, she adds, ‘I shall have to talk to Otterwell about his gardeners. They should all be hanged.’
    Indeed, yes, the lady has a passion for gardening, I remember, and doubtless intends to make good use of her stay stuffing her pockets full of purloined cuttings from Otterwell’s garden. She turns on her heel and marches down the stairs ahead of me, and I am glad I have her preceding my entry into the drawing room. She may be a commoner now but the guests part before her like the Red Sea, bowing and scraping, and then almost fall over themselves in their haste to get away from her without seeming rude.
    Ignoring them, Mrs Riley makes a beeline for a white-haired, jovial-looking fellow, who must be her new husband, while I express an interest in the pictures on the walls. This gives me the chance to observe my fellow guests.
    A tall, brown-haired man I have not seen before escorts Mrs Gibbons, and they are both in lively conversation with Congrevance, who looks devastatingly handsome in his black coat and breeches. Lady Otterwell flutters around him with an inappropriate girlishness. I wonder about the extent of their acquaintance in Rome (surely he was not her lover?), and, not for the first time, why he pretended to be a French nobleman. Was he truly a spy? It is most romantic and exciting, if true, but I have found so many gentlemen claim they have been involved in espionage abroad that they might as well have donned uniforms