The Season Read online

  Also by the Author

  CORONET AMONG THE WEEDS

  LUCINDA

  CORONET AMONG THE GRASS

  THE BUSINESS

  IN SUNSHINE OR IN SHADOW

  STARDUST

  NANNY

  CHANGE OF HEART

  GRAND AFFAIR

  LOVE SONG

  THE KISSING GARDEN

  THE BLUE NOTE

  SUMMERTIME

  DISTANT MUSIC

  THE MAGIC HOUR

  FRIDAY'S GIRL

  OUT OF THE BLUE

  IN DISTANT FIELDS

  THE WHITE MARRIAGE

  GOODNIGHT SWEETHEART

  THE ENCHANTED

  THE LAND OF SUMMER

  THE DAISY CLUB

  The Belgravia series

  BELGRAVIA

  COUNTRY LIFE

  AT HOME

  BY INVITATION

  The Nightingale series

  TO HEAR A NIGHTINGALE

  THE NIGHTINGALE SINGS

  The Debutantes series

  DEBUTANTES

  THE SEASON

  The Eden series

  DAUGHTERS OF EDEN

  THE HOUSE OF FLOWERS

  The Bexham trilogy

  THE CHESTNUT TREE

  THE WIND OFF THE SEA

  THE MOON AT MIDNIGHT

  Novels with Terence Brady

  VICTORIA

  VICTORIA AND COMPANY

  ROSE'S STORY

  YES HONESTLY

  Television Drama Series with Terence Brady

  TAKE THREE GIRLS

  UPSTAIRS DOWNSTAIRS

  THOMAS AND SARAH

  NANNY

  FOREVER GREEN

  Television Comedy Series with Terence Brady

  NO HONESTLY

  YES HONESTLY

  PIG IN THE MIDDLE

  OH MADELINE! (USA)

  FATHER MATTHEW'S DAUGHTER

  Television Plays with Terence Brady

  MAKING THE PLAY

  SUCH A SMALL WORLD

  ONE OF THE FAMILY

  Films with Terence Brady

  LOVE WITH A PERFECT STRANGER

  MAGIC MOMENT

  Stage Plays with Terence Brady

  I WISH I WISH

  THE SHELL SEEKERS

  (adaptation from the novel by Rosamunde Pilcher)

  BELOW STAIRS

  For more information on Charlotte Bingham and her books,

  see her website at www.charlottebingham.com

  Contents

  Cover

  Also by Charlotte Bingham

  Copyright

  Prologue

  The Season

  Part One

  The Agreement

  Past Participants

  The Name of the Month

  Sea Breezes

  On with the Dance

  Secrets

  Intrigues

  Part Two

  Giving Back

  Comings and Goings

  The Ball

  Old Friends

  New Beginnings

  Interlude

  Old Enemies

  Epilogue

  This eBook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

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  RANDOM HOUSE (PTY) LTD

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  Published 2001 by Doubleday

  a division of Transworld Publishers

  Copyright © 2001 by Charlotte Bingham

  The right of Charlotte Bingham to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All the characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  ISBN 0385 60064X

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.

  SPRING 1913

  ‘The world’s great age begins anew,

  The golden years return …’

  Shelley

  CHARLOTTE

  BINGHAM

  THE SEASON

  Prologue

  There was so much to be done now that their daughters had turned seventeen, but rich though the two women might be, they knew that there was only one place to meet, and that was London, although journeying from their country estates, even in the new age of the motor car, was still long and tiresome, and involved many stops. Of course they were both aware that this new London was not the London of their youth, which meant that as the portmanteaux were dusted down by their footmen, and the family trustees diplomatically warned of the expenses that might lie ahead, they individually sighed and looked back to that gaily giddy time now remembered with such affection – the year of their own first London Season.

  That had been the real time, naturally; now could not be the same. They had already resigned themselves to that idea – that the present was not, could never be, as brilliant and as beautiful as the past. There was too much trouble abroad, too many disasters that seemed to threaten, too much talk of liberation everywhere – not to mention the hideous new fashion of the ‘V-neck’ or ‘pneumonia blouse’, as the small opening to the front of ladies’ tops had been recently dubbed. Doctors and vicars might declaim against it, but, as the ladies well knew, if women liked a fashion, it stayed.

  No, it was sad, but true, that unlike the past the present had a habit of being full of tedious troubles. Happily of course there was still a king on the throne – a more sober individual than their beloved King Edward, but still a king and still Emperor of India, even if he did lack his father’s love of wine, women and food. For despite the scandals of his many mistresses, King Edward VII had been a very popular fellow. The reason for this was that he had really enjoyed being king, and his people had known it. And he had been popular not just in England, but also in France, forging a new and cordial relationship with the French, who dearly loved a man who appreciated the good things of this world.

  Not that any of this really mattered to the two ladies advancing on the capital in their great, old-fashioned carriages with their husbands’ coats of arms emblazoned on the side. Their thoughts were not with politics, but with their young. Mrs Pankhurst and her suffragettes might have followers being force-fed in prisons all over the land, but these ladies had other more pressing problems on their minds. All they were concerned with was that their children were of an age to be married, and it was up to their mothers to find them suitable partners.

  Never an easy task at the best of times, nowadays the battles fought in ballrooms had become more intense than ever, for the fact was that blue-blooded Englishmen ev
erywhere had not dreamed of English roses for some long while, but of American heiresses; and while their girls might be from rich backgrounds, while they might have blood as blue as any ducal heir, they could never begin to compete with the mother of an heiress prepared to lavish thousands on a wardrobe from the House of Worth, priceless jewels and stables full of thoroughbred horses.

  And yet, it had to be done, for without a husband a young girl was still merely a cast-off from last year’s fashions, to be hidden away in some country house somewhere, an anxious sort of figure, always a little too willing to help with the young, or fill in for governesses, the desperate expression in her sad eyes a reminder of her failure to attract a husband.

  So there was one thing of which these mothers were quite certain, whatever Mrs Pankhurst and the suffragettes might have to say on the matter: a lonely life lived between the servants and the drawing room was not going to be their daughters’ fate. However difficult or plain, their daughters had to find husbands, and soon, before the girls’ bloom wore off, before they reached twenty-one, unmarried and unwanted, or worse, they gathered for themselves a ‘reputation’, or caused a scandal.

  PART ONE

  The Agreement

  It would be too good to be true if they had found that she was dead, but the truth was that she was no more dead than they were. In fact, she was very much alive, and what was worse, ready to do battle.

  ‘Dear heavens, I had thought that the Countess – well, that she would be at least retired to respectability by now, particularly after that dreadful incident when that Yorkshire fellow who sponsored dear May through her Season – what was his name, Forrester – when he so humiliated her. You would have thought she would have called it curtains after that, really you would.’

  Emily O’Connor stared at Portia Childhays. They had both only, but only, just arrived in London. As they tasted the deliciously fresh ices set before them, they smiled appreciatively at each other from under their new modish hats, knowing that each was experiencing that particular contentment that comes from having been intimate friends when they were young and skittish.

  They also had the satisfaction of knowing that as the ices grew lower in the tall, crystal glasses, the covers at the London addresses at which they were staying were even now being thrown off the old-fashioned furniture, and the ancestors and the mirrors in the ballrooms and the saloons were being dusted furiously by excited servants. The new London Season was opening, battle was about to commence.

  ‘Oh, I don’t think that women like the Countess of Evesham ever retire, do they, Emily? Besides, London would not be the same without them, would it? Indeed not. As a matter of fact, it is so long since I was in London, dearest,’ Portia exclaimed, ‘I had almost thought never to see it, or indeed her, again.’

  ‘It’s a wonder that you’re here at all, considering your adventuring, Lady Childhays, ma’am,’ Emily teased, waving her long-handled, Italianate spoon with gay Irish abandon at her old friend. ‘How long did your voyage in the Belvedere take you, and to where? Tell me, dearest, do, for I know it will make hunting with the Galway Blazers sound terribly tame. I must hear. Was the China Sea rougher than the Channel, and did you find a new kind of dog like Lady Brassey and her famous black pugs?’

  ‘We took somewhat the same route as Lady Brassey on our voyage, but we made better time for the good reason that Belvedere III is as fast as any vessel built, and in any sea, I may tell you.’ Portia stopped, shaking her head suddenly. ‘But at any rate, enough of that. My days of travel are now over, and we must face the future.’

  Discretion forbade Emily to remark on what she already knew, namely that the long and at times perilous voyage in the Belvedere III had been undertaken by the present Lady Childhays with the sole purpose of recovering from the loss of her husband some two years previously.

  ‘Yes, dearest, of course. Even so, you must allow your old friend to be impressed by your intrepid undertaking.’

  Portia shook her head again. ‘Don’t be impressed, Emily, please, dearest. Believe me, there is only one reason for travel and discomfort, for cutting oneself off from everything that one knows and loves, and that is sorrow. There were times when, selfishly, as the Belvedere seemed to become like a matchbox bobbing on those wild waves, when the sea grew so high above us that it might as well have been the Himalayas and we just pygmies standing beneath it – there were times when had I not had my family with me I might have just slipped into the sea and ended it all, such was my unhappiness.’

  Emily was silent, herself now feeling not so much selfish as positively ashamed, for the truth was that she had been glad to come to London from Ireland, at last, for the Season, leaving her husband, Rory, and their Irish estates behind her. Indeed, it had been more than a pleasure – it had been a positive relief.

  ‘What a blessing you have always been such a superb sailor, my dear Portia. Your brilliance at the helm must have finally worked the miracle. How you must have thanked God for such a gift as you have with a boat. Myself I hate the sea, but I envy you your skill.’

  ‘It was the saving of me, Emily, it truly was.’

  There was a short silence and then Portia remarked, a little over-brightly, ‘Well, dearest, to change the subject to something more cheerful. Tell me, how is your dear Mr O’Connor?’

  She dabbed delicately at her small, perfectly shaped mouth and fixed her large grey eyes on Emily’s green ones with her usual direct interest. She had never met her friend’s husband, but knew him to have been a stalwart in the swerving fortunes of Emily’s family, stepping in to buy Glendarvan House and their estates in Ireland just when the family were themselves threatened with eviction, something more usual among tenants than landlords.

  ‘My dear, Mr O’Connor is at present as well as can be expected considering his hunting accident. Apart from that inconvenience, I believe he is, yes, in the best of health,’ Emily replied briskly. ‘He has, I am happy to say, over the last years improved our estates beyond measure, but unhappily he is involving himself with country house politics. He has joined the Celtic Club, much encouraged by our American friends across the ocean, and is busy inciting madness, as if there is not enough abroad already.’

  ‘Oh, so the two of you are presently not in agreement?’

  ‘No, we are not, for it seems that despite my family’s having lived four hundred years in Ireland I am not now Irish. It seems that he is native Irish, and that I am not! Such balderdash, such tosh, dearest, you must agree!’

  Portia stared at her friend, her head slightly on one side. Emily had always been hot-headed, as she would be, given her russet-coloured hair, but now that this same hair was silky white – a beautiful contrast to her green eyes as it happened – it was somehow surprising to hear her still so full of vim and brimming over with the same sense of indignation.

  ‘Still the same old Lady Angry Heart,’ Portia murmured affectionately. ‘Lord Childhays and myself could hardly agree about anything other than that the sky was blue, or that it was raining, but we always enjoyed ourselves so much in the disagreeing, if you understand me?’

  ‘No doubt of it, dearest,’ Emily concurred, nodding her head rapidly so that her fashionably low-set hat appeared to be agreeing with Portia even more violently than its owner. ‘Husband and wife need never be of the same opinion. Isn’t that why I am over here with my dearest Edith, rather than over there with him, draped around some damp old pianoforte listening to his Irish friends caterwauling on about the Celtic twilight, while the candles gutter and the wind whistles and all the horses in the stables go unshod?’

  Emily’s eyes glittered with mockery and she raised her gloved hands to shoulder level and spread them out dramatically, just missing a busy waiter bustling past her as she mimicked her husband’s Celtic friends.

  ‘Oooh, but Lady Emily, surely you must believe in the Celtic past, shur-allee? Ooh, but you must know, Lady Emily, we are reviving the true history of Eirann – we shall all soon be speaking in the
Gaelic at dinner, mark my words. Lah-di-dah, lah-di-dah, I say to them. You and your mincing theatricals. What good will that do when it comes to feeding all those poor little Irish babies under the Spanish Arch in Galway city? Humph, and humph again, says I!’ Emily squinted humorously at Portia as the feathers at the front of her head nodded in complete agreement with their wearer.

  There was a short silence during which Portia reflected on what Emily had said, and diplomatically allowed time for her friend to calm down. Any more imitations of the Celtic Revivalists and, Portia felt, Mr Gunter’s famous strawberry ices, being carried past them so hectically by the busy waiters, would undoubtedly be in jeopardy.

  ‘And now to our young,’ she stated, thinking that since Emily was in England she might feel it appropriate to leave her indignation on the other side of the Irish Sea. ‘You have your darling Edith to launch on Society, and I have my dearest Phyllis. I suppose they must meet?’

  Emily’s feet, well concealed under the table, and shod in new and expensive shoes, nevertheless shifted a little at this. Her daughter Edith must of course meet Portia’s daughter Phyllis. They had not known each other at all while growing up, Edith being confined for her whole childhood to the Glendarvan estates in the West of Ireland, and Phyllis being brought up between her Childhays’ homes in Sussex, London, Leicestershire and Italy.

  ‘I dare say they will take to each other?’

  Emily looked at Portia, doubt in her eyes, her heart sinking. If Portia had found Emily wild in her youth what would she, if you please, find Edith? Edith was the wildest of the wild, being half O’Connor and half Persse, and wholly devilish. There was no other word for it, she was unacceptably wild.

  ‘I am sure they will take to each other,’ Portia agreed, while her heart too sank as she thought of her elder daughter, Phyllis. Such a hoyden. Not at all restrained, wild and mischievous, and, when not wild or mischievous, odd – all characteristics for which Portia’s family, the Tradescants, were, alas, somewhat famously known.