Contrary Cousins by Judith Harkness

Author:Judith Harkness [Harkness, Judith]
Language: eng, eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780786755141
Publisher: Argo-Navis

Chapter XV

If Lady Pendleton had some difficulty in getting any news about her young guests on the previous evening, she was probably the only soul in London so unfortunate. From Regent Street to Hyde Park Corner, the name of Powell was on the tip of everybody’s tongue. “The beautiful Misses Powell,” “the stylish American ladies,” “the very rich Americans,” were talked of, as if they were a whole army of handsome females, instead of two.

As this was in large part due to the exertions of Bentley, at the behest of his mistress, Lady Pendleton ought to have been gratified. The word had gone out only two days before, to various well-placed ears on that great grapevine of service which inhabits the downstairs of the English Aristocracy, and those half-dozen valets, major-domos, and housekeepers had done their work exceedingly well. No more than two hours after Bentley’s little round of calls on Wednesday, the Misses Powell were famous. By Thursday they were mentioned at least a thousand times by a thousand wags, and looked for everywhere. They were spotted at last in a box at the Italian Opera, and gratified everyone by appearing shortly thereafter at the Assembly Rooms of Almack’s. Here, as we already know, they were much perused, and Antonia, at least, made much of. Serena, so unaware of everyone save Mr. Lytton-Smythe, had scarcely noticed the interest she had stirred, and, by her attention to that gentleman, raised a good many eyebrows.

It was said they were both as rich as Croesus, and, in that way in which gossip tends to be the arbiter of truth, their fortunes were supposed to have been made in the tea trade in the French Indies. Tobacco was sometimes held accountable for their great wealth, but this was generally denied. Tea it had most certainly been; and their fathers were great nabobs, with several mansions apiece, and hundreds of slaves. It was even suggested that one of them was one quarter redskin, her mother having been the daughter of an Indian chieftain, who gave his children the shrunken heads of the enemies he killed in battle. Such was the quality of information being passed about before the ball. Afterward, of course, it grew a little closer to the truth, for the young ladies were quickly judged to be quite fair-skinned, and had nothing of the savage in their look. Antonia was generally accounted the prettiest, and had endeared half the Horse Guards by dancing with them, but Serena was thought more elegant, and the most perfectly handsome of the two.

It was said one of them was very likely to become the next Countess of Cumberford, hence their visit to Lady Pendleton. But no one could see the Viscount Rollins anywhere about them; indeed, it looked as if he had not come to Almack’s at all. As his younger brother—whom it was well-known had no great love for his elder sibling—hung about looking forlornly at the smaller and more vivacious Miss Powell all evening, it was generally thought that this must be a mistake on somebody’s part.

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