Page 14 of Lady Like
Behind the hothouse, a long pergola is draped in yellow wisteria, blooming riotously. Pollen of the same color drifts through the air, and fuzzy bees weave drunken paths between the blossoms. The air seems to hum with them.
There is no one there when Harry arrives, though, after purchasing her way into filling the dance card of her rival—Miss Emily Sergeant, Mr. Baker had reported to her in exchange for an upgraded box at the Palace—she had gone looking for Alexander and found him absent.
A gent in the card room finally mentioned that last he heard, Rochester was meeting someone in the garden.
Which is when Harry realized that Miss Segreant too had vanished from the dance floor, and Harry may be rubbish at sums, but even she can do math that simple.
The pergola seems the likeliest place for a rendezvous, secluded and romantic as it is, and indeed, within only a few minutes of arriving, Harry hears footsteps on the gravel path behind her.
She turns.
“Oh.” Miss Emily Sergeant steps into a patch of moonlight, buttery and warm as it filters through the foliage. “I thought you were someone else.”
And Harry—for a moment—is struck dumb.
The immaculate Miss Sergeant from the dance floor is gone, replaced by a ferocious fury.
She has unfastened her hair so that it falls in sweat-damp cords over her shoulders, and her dress is creased.
Her cosmetics have been wiped from her face, leaving only her mouth stained faintly red, like she has just taken a bite of a ripe pomegranate.
Harry recovers enough to raise her hand and call jovially, “Good evening. Have you just been pulled from a lake?”
The muscles of Miss Sergeant’s throat tighten as she swallows, though, to her credit, when she speaks her voice remains demure. “Forgive me, but I must ask you to leave.”
“Why is that?” Harry asks.
“I’m meant to meet someone here.”
“As am I.”
“Perhaps you might meet them somewhere else.”
“Perhaps you might,” Harry says, “as I was here first, and I suspect you followed me.”
Miss Sergeant’s cheeks pink. “I think I’ll wait,” she says. “If you don’t mind.”
“I do,” Harry replies. “But I don’t suppose that will stop you.”
Miss Sergeant gives her a smile so withering it could salt the earth.
Harry almost takes a step backward, out of swinging distance, but she’s certain the cut of Miss Sergeant’s dress would not allow her to raise her arms above her shoulders.
“I don’t believe we’ve been introduced,” she says, offering Harry her hand. “Miss Emily Sergeant, at your service.”
“Who is he?” Harry asks, ignoring the gesture of friendship.
When Miss Sergeant looks confused, she says, “The man you’re meeting.
A lover? It’s not—but I shouldn’t speculate.
” She presses her fingers to her lips. “Gossip is such a low vice. But I saw you with so many men tonight it’s difficult to choose just one. ”
Emily’s cheeks go from pink to red, and Harry knows the implication has poked a particular bruise.
“What is it he likes about you?” she continues. “Desire can be a heady substitute for self-worth, you know.”
Harry expects a jape in return—she certainly set herself up for one, just to see if Miss Sergeant would trip the snare—but Emily turns away, back toward the gilded light of the hothouse.
Good lord, has this chit given up already?
Harry thought she might put up a fight, and she would be forced to try a different approach, such as whipping off her own wig and exclaiming, Do you know how many suitable men in London would let me keep my hair this short?
There is only one, and he’s here, and I’m sorry, but I must do everything possible to marry him, even if it means sacrificing your prospects!
“Or,” Harry asks, “is it his estate you’re so keen on?”
Emily Sergeant turns her face upward to the wisteria like she’s calling on God for patience.
“Has anyone called you a fortune hunter yet, or may I be the first? Do they have those in whatever provincial hamlet you come from? Or,” Harry continues, unable to resist digging in her heels, “maybe it’s just that he looked at you. All some ladies want in a man is a pulse, a title, and a giant—”
“Oh sod off!”
Miss Sergeant whirls around, her modesty shed suddenly as a dressing gown dropped to the floor. Harry is struck dumb. She had expected tears, not a virulent curse paired with smoldering eyes.
“Yes, you, you contemptible twat!” Miss Sergeant stalks forward and pokes Harry in the chest, each word sharp and savage as that punctuative finger.
“I want you to sod off and leave me alone, you meddling, cow-faced harpy.” Emily reaches down and wrenches off her slippers.
“I hate these shoes and I hate this dress and I hate the imbecile who decided to host their goddamn ball in a goddamn hothouse. I hate you and I hate every inbred, mouth-breathing, clap-ridden fruitcake who went along with your pathetic”—and here she flings one shoe at Harry—“juvenile”—the other follows—“scheme to ruin my evening.”
Harry raises her hands. “Steady on.”
But Emily isn’t finished. “Does it make you feel better about yourself? To treat me like dirt and embarrass me and ruin my chance at happiness? I’m sorry I’m thinner than you and prettier than you and have better posture and teeth and don’t need to dress like a common whore to catch a man’s eye.
How justified you must feel in being a childish bitch!
” Miss Sergeant throws her arms wide. “Well congratulations, you ruined my night, now kindly sod off and leave me alone.”
Harry gapes. She has never heard a ton lady use language so blue.
Even the brothel bullies at the Covent Garden houses would have blushed at such vocabulary.
And what diametric opposition, all those vulgar words tumbling from the small, rouged mouth of a slender lady in classical white.
Harry could not have been more surprised if one of the caged canaries around the hothouse dance floor had asked her for a cigar.
It is also maddeningly— maddeningly! —arousing. Harry is never so drawn to a woman as when they are yelling at her. The cursing, it would seem, is an even more powerful aphrodisiac.
“That,” Harry says, “was beautiful.”
“Oh God.” Miss Sergeant raises a small hand and presses it to her mouth, eyes wide with horror. “Please don’t tell anyone.”
“Tell what? That you lost your temper and called me a fat, ugly, cow-faced whore?”
“I can’t believe I…I promise, I never…I apologize, I don’t know what came over me.”
“What would your suitor say about that? Ah, here he is now!” Harry raises her hand to the pretend figure down the path, and Emily spins around with a squeak of terror. Finding no one there, she whirls back on Harry, and Harry thinks for a moment she might cry. Or start cursing again.
“Please,” Emily says seriously. “That is not a reflection of my character. I am tired and overheated and I am…not myself.”
And her eyes are so big and wet and pleading that Harry feels an unexpected stab of guilt wiggle between her ribs like a blade.
She has the distinct impression that Emily’s outburst was the equivalent of champagne, shaken and shaken and shaken for years until the cork finally popped.
Nothing to take to heart—she just happened to be the one holding the bottle when the pressure became too much.
It should be Harry who apologizes—she has ruined this woman’s night, after all, whether or not her ulterior motives were benevolent.
Self-servingly benevolent, yes, but the two were not mutually exclusive.
But admitting wrongdoing, no matter how righteous, will force her to surrender any high ground she has won.
And she cannot surrender Alexander just yet.
Miss Emily Sergeant, with her small waist and delicate hands and flat chest that sits perfectly in a Grecian gown, will have many men who could make her happy. For Harry, there is only one.
“I’ll keep silent,” Harry says, “if you leave.”
Emily glares up at her. A petal falls from the wisteria and lands on her shoulder. Harry almost reaches out to brush it away.
Emily bends slowly, retrieving her shoes from where they landed on the path.
She takes a step forward, face turned up so she and Harry are nose to nose, and for a delirious, delusional, absolutely insane moment, Harry thinks Emily might kiss her.
She feels suddenly light-headed and reaches to steady herself on the pergola.
But then Emily says, “Go to hell,” before she turns and stomps away, leaving Harry under the wisteria, dazed, alone, and still maddeningly— maddeningly! —aroused.