The air of merriment was infectious. Rachel relaxed and began to glance around at their fellow guests. She could feel Richard’s expectation.
‘Well? Do you see any acquaintances here, Mrs Weekes? I understood you had some, in Bath?’ he asked, impatiently.
‘Had, at one time, indeed. But I see none yet. Shall we take a turn on the floor for the next dance, Mr Weekes?’ she said, raising her voice to be heard. Richard looked hot and unhappy, and answered her question with a shake of his head.
‘I shall need something to drink first of all.’
‘Very well. Can you see no acquaintances of your own, Mr Weekes? Some of your clients, perhaps?’
‘I’m looking, I’m looking,’ he muttered, and they resumed their slow procession around the room. Then, against all expectation, Rachel did see some faces she knew. An elderly couple, a Mr and Mrs Brommel, who had been her neighbours the year her family had taken the apartment in Camden Crescent. Mr Brommel wore a heavily powdered wig, and Mrs Brommel a gown of burgundy velvet cut after the fashion of twenty years past. She had been quite deaf when Rachel knew her before, and her condition had not improved with the passage of thirteen years. It took a great deal of prompting for her to know who Rachel was, and when she finally exclaimed:
‘Rachel Crofton, yes of course, I remember your family now,’ still Rachel suspected that she did not. Rachel thought Richard would be pleased, as the introductions were made, but he didn’t seem so. Perhaps the Brommels were too old, their garb too dated, their conversation too slow.
They moved on, into the Octagon room, where men and women played cards and gambled in a cluttered maze of tables and chairs. The roar of voices was lower, and underneath it was the soft slap and scrape of cards, the rattle of coins and dice and occasional exclamations of delight, or muttered displeasure. A steady stream of revellers made their way across the Octagon from the hallway and the ballroom to the tea room, and vice versa, and were scowled at by the players for the distraction they caused. At the far side of the room was the doorway to an additional card room, quieter and more private, where the stakes were higher and the mood more sombre. Richard and Rachel paused by the hall doors to enjoy a breath of cooler air, and then Richard stood up straighter, and smiled.
‘There! Captain Sutton!’ he cried, and was off at once towards a wiry-haired man in military dress. ‘Captain Sutton, what a great pleasure to find you here,’ he said, smiling as he gave a short bow. ‘And Mrs Sutton, you are looking extremely well.’ This was spoken to a tiny woman with mousy hair and lively blue eyes. She and her husband both appeared to be past forty, with touches of grey in their hair; they had an air of open happiness and vitality that immediately put Rachel at her ease.
‘Mr Weekes! Well met, sir; and who is this charming young lady?’
‘Captain Sutton, may I present my wife, Mrs Rachel Weekes? Mrs Weekes, this is Captain Sutton, a valued client and acquaintance of mine, and his wife Mrs Harriet Sutton.’
‘How do you do?’ Rachel said, as she curtsied.
‘How do you do. And may I offer you my congratulations on your recent marriage,’ said Harriet Sutton; a soft and gentle voice, perfectly matched with her appearance. Captain Sutton towered over his wife, though he was not of excessive height. Mrs Sutton stood only as high as his shoulder, and her narrow frame and tiny hands were childlike. The captain was not a handsome man – his nose was too large and too bent, and his ears stood proud of his skull – but like his wife’s, his voice and expression were so genial it was impossible not to warm to him.
With the introductions made and a polite conversation about health, family and recent events exchanged, the men drifted away towards a game of pontoon while the ladies found seats against the wall. Mrs Sutton had a painted fan which she used constantly, and angled so that Rachel might also feel the benefit.
‘Do you often come to the assemblies, Mrs Weekes?’ she asked.
‘This is the first time as a married woman, and the first time in thirteen years, truth be told,’ said Rachel. ‘I came as a girl, with my family. But then we left Bath and I had not been back since, until I wed Mr Weekes.’
‘Ah! So you are no stranger to our lovely city.’ Mrs Sutton smiled. ‘I have heard people say that Bath is out of fashion now – the haunt of invalids, widows and spinsters! Let such nay-sayers stay away, I say. It has been our home these past twenty years, and I would live nowhere else. My daughter has known no other home.’
‘And how old is your daughter?’
‘She is nine years old now. Her name is Cassandra, and she is a source of constant delight to her father and me.’ Mrs Sutton laughed at her own effusiveness, and Rachel hid her surprise that the girl was not older, since Mrs Sutton herself was no longer young.
‘That is a very beautiful name.’
‘She is a very beautiful girl. Thankfully, she has inherited only a measure of my stature, and nothing whatsoever of my husband’s beauty.’ She smiled. ‘You have the joy of motherhood all before you yet, Mrs Weekes, and I envy you.’
‘Well, yes.’ Rachel fumbled for something to say. ‘I do look forward to the condition, of course.’ She shouldn’t say that she couldn’t envisage raising a child in the small, dark lodgings in Abbeygate Street, where he or she would always have no choice but to share the one bedchamber with them; yet something about Mrs Sutton encouraged confidence. ‘Mr Weekes’s business increases all the time. Before long we hope to move to more spacious lodgings, so our family will have more room to grow.’
‘Ah, it can be hard, in the early days of a marriage. When I first wed Captain Sutton, we had just one room to live in, at a boarding house near his regiment. We slept on a bed of our own clothes, since the mattress was so thin! My family were none too pleased with my choice, I can confess. I did not marry for fortune! Thankfully, things have improved since then. We have an apartment on Guinea Lane now. And you must come to call! Do you know where that is?’
‘I think I do – near the Paragon Buildings?’
‘Just so. So, have you remade any old acquaintances in Bath since your return?’
‘No, I… I was just a girl when I was here, and not a great deal out in society. I met Mr and Mrs Brommel just now,’ she said, but Mrs Sutton didn’t know them. ‘I have made just one other acquaintance of late. A client and patroness of my husband, a Mrs Alleyn, who has a very fine house on Lansdown Crescent.’
Mrs Sutton put one hand to her mouth in surprise.
‘Oh! But I know Mrs Alleyn, of course,’ she said. ‘My husband fought alongside Jonathan Alleyn against Napoleon’s French.’ As she spoke, a new gravity came into her tone, and Rachel understood that she knew of Jonathan Alleyn’s decline. ‘His mother was once one of the most celebrated beauties in Bath. I understand she is beautiful still, though I have not seen her in a good few years.’
‘Does she never come out into society?’
‘I daresay she does, but only rarely. And never to a public ball any more. I think she prefers quieter gatherings, of close friends.’
‘I have met her on two occasions now.’
‘So… you understand that she is greatly troubled,’ Mrs Sutton said carefully.
‘This last time, I also met her son, Mr Jonathan Alleyn,’ said Rachel. At this Mrs Sutton’s eyes opened wide, and she grasped Rachel’s hand.
‘In truth? You saw him? How was he?’
‘He was… clearly most unwell,’ she said. To her surprise, Mrs Sutton’s eyes glittered with tears, and she blotted them with her gloved fingertips before giving herself a little shake.