Читаем Forever Amber полностью

Amber derived a great deal of malicious amusement from the etiquette which decreed that persons of inferior rank might sit in the presence of a duchess only with her permission, and then upon armless chairs. It pleased her every time a woman who had once ignored or sneered at her was forced to rise or to move to a less comfortable seat because she had entered a room.

Flinging the towel to Herman she slipped into a dressing-gown held by one of the maids, stuck her toes into a pair of mules and taking the bodkins from her hair gave it a vigorous shake. The glowing warmth which filled her each time she saw Bruce still lingered, and she had a wonderful sense of vigorous well-being. It seemed to her that life had never been more delicious or more satisfying.

“They say that Lord Carlton has a most wicked reputation,” Southesk told her now and Amber gave her a half-smile, one eyebrow raised. “I’m afraid your Grace’s reputation will suffer if he’s seen leaving your apartments very often.”

Before Amber could reply Middleton was prattling again.

“Lord, but he’s the finest person, let me die! I swear he’s the handsomest male I’ve ever clapped eyes on! But every time I’ve seen ’im he’s been so furiously absorbed in his wife! How the devil did your Grace contrive to make his acquaintance so neatly?”

“Oh, didn’t you know?” cried Southesk. “Why, her Grace has known ’im for years!” She turned back to Amber and smiled sweetly. “Haven’t you, madame?”

Amber laughed. “I protest—you ladies are much better informed about all this than I.”

They stayed a few minutes longer, all three of them gossiping with idle viciousness of the doings of their friends and acquaintances. But Southesk and Middleton had found out what they had come for and soon they went off to spread the news through Whitehall and Covent Garden. Bruce, however, never spoke of it to Amber and, whenever she saw her, Corinna was as friendly and gracious as she always had been. It was obvious that she, at least, had no slightest suspicion regarding the Duchess of Ravenspur and her husband.

Then at last, some eight weeks after Lord and Lady Carlton had arrived, Amber went to call upon her—carefully choosing a day when she knew that Bruce had gone to hunt with the King. Corinna met her at the entrance to the sitting-room of their apartments in Almsbury House, and she smiled with genuine pleasure when she saw who her guest was. The two women curtsied but did not kiss for Corinna had not yet contracted the London habit and Amber could not have brought herself to it—though she habitually kissed and was kissed by many women she liked but little better.

“How kind of your Grace to call on me!”

Amber began to pull off her gloves, and in spite of herself her resentment and jealousy began to rise as her eyes flickered over Corinna. “Not at all!” she protested, very careless. “I should have called much sooner. But, Lord! there’s always such a deal of business here in London! One must go here and there—do this and that and the other! It’s barbarous!” She dropped into a chair. “You must find it a mighty great change from America.” Her tone implied that America must be a very dull place where there was little to do but tend babies and work embroidery.

But even as she talked her eyes were observing Corinna carefully, noticing every detail of her coiffure and clothes, the way she walked and held her head and sat. Lady Carlton was wearing a gown of pearl-grey satin with pink musk-roses thrust into the bodice and there was a fine strand of sapphires about her throat; she wore no other jewels except her gold-and-sapphire wedding-ring.

“It is different,” agreed Corinna. “But though it may sound strange I find there’s less to do in London—for me, at least—than in America.”

“Oh, we have a thousand diversions here—one needs only get acquainted with ‘em. How d’you like London? It must seem a great city to you.” Try as she would, Amber found that she could not speak without sarcastic overtones, belittling suggestions, a hint of superiority she was by no means secure in feeling.

“Oh, I love London! I’m only sorry that I couldn’t have seen it before the Fire. We left here before I was quite five, you see, and I couldn’t remember anything about it. I’ve always wanted to come back, though, for in America we all think of England as ‘home.’ ”

She was so poised, so quietly yet radiantly happy that Amber longed to say something which would shatter that serene protected world in which she lived. But she dared not. She could only murmur: “But isn’t it furiously dull—living on a plantation? I suppose you never see a living soul, save blackamoors and wild Indians.”