Page 103 of The English Wife

“Return to the fold and all will be forgiven?” Georgie smiled narrowly. “But you see, we couldn’t possibly return to town just now. Not with Anne coming to stay. Oh, hadn’t you heard? She’s left Teddy.”

“Anne,” said Mrs. Van Duyvil through clenched teeth, “has not left Teddy, as you so crassly put it. She is merely resting from the rigors of foreign travel. It is very considerate of her husband to spare her.”

Georgie abandoned subtlety. “She wrote that Teddy wants a divorce.”

Mrs. Van Duyvil’s lips thinned. “She might have managed him better. But what can one expect from Anne? She has always been determined to make a scandal of herself.”

Georgie might not love Anne, but that was a bit rich. “She had some help in it, don’t you think? If Teddy hadn’t taken mistresses—”

Mrs. Van Duyvil set her cup down on the pie-crust table beside her with an audible clink. “Some men take mistresses. Others bury themselves in books. One doesn’t marry for the man. One marries to please one’s parents. I did. Peter Van Duyvil was twenty years my senior, but did I complain? Certainly not. I did my duty. And if I found him tedious—” Mrs. Van Duyvil broke off, her lips clamping shut. “There will be no divorce.”

Georgie sipped her own tea, taking her time with it. “Have you considered that Anne might not wish to remain married to Teddy? By all accounts, the man is a sot and a lecher.”

The very sot and lecher Mrs. Van Duyvil had wanted for her own daughter. Would Mrs. Van Duyvil be so stern if it were her own child? The answer, Georgie realized, was undoubtedly yes. It wasn’t Janie’s happiness that mattered, it was the appearance of propriety. Perhaps, for Mrs. Van Duyvil, that was happiness. It was a distinctly disquieting thought.

There was no mercy in Mrs. Van Duyvil’s face. “Then she should have thought of that before she took vows. Members of our family do not divorce. No matter the provocation.”

There was a bitter note in Mrs. Van Duyvil’s voice that made Georgie look at her a little more closely.

“She’s made her bed and she must lie on it?” Georgie took a large bite of her biscuit. “Mrs. Vanderbilt doesn’t seem to think so.”

“The Vanderbilts? They would have been shown the tradesmen’s entrance when I was a girl.” Mrs. Van Duyvil recalled herself with an effort, saying, with the air of one forced into a great concession, “There is no reason one may not engage in a discreet flirtation so long as the proprieties are observed.”

“In other words, I can cuckold Bay with whomever I like so long as there’s no talk?”

Mrs. Van Duyvil bristled, her grosgrain skirts rustling. “I didn’t say that.”

“No, you didn’t.” Georgie’s anger died to ash, leaving her feeling as gray as the sky outside the window. Lifting her teacup, she said grimly, “I can assure you, Mother Van Duyvil, I have done nothing to make you or anyone else blush.”

What would Mrs. Van Duyvil say if she told her that it was her precious son who was having the affair, that it was Bay who crept down the corridors to David’s room at night?

Georgie could have wept. Familiarity hadn’t bred contempt; taste hadn’t spoiled appetite. It was insult upon injury to be accused of the very infraction she was forced, night after night, to condone.

Mrs. Van Duyvil regarded her suspiciously. “That’s all very well,” she said grudgingly, “but it must be seen that you are above reproach.”

Mrs. Van Duyvil didn’t believe her. Of course she didn’t believe her. Who would? Only Anne. The irony of that struck Georgie forcibly.

“Oh, they shall see,” she said, rising from her chair to indicate that the interview was over. “Once Bay and I open the house, there will be no doubt as to how Mr. Pruyn has occupied himself these many months.”

She didn’t mean to say it, hadn’t planned to say it, but it just came out.

“You will be coming to our ball, I presume?”

Cold Spring, 1898

November

“We’re holding a ball?” Watery sunlight filtered through the bedroom window. Bay hadn’t been there when Georgie went to bed last night, but he had been there when she woke up in the morning, rolled in more than his share of the coverlet.

“In January.” Georgie wiggled up to a sitting position against the headboard. “My temper got the better of me.”

Bay propped himself up on one arm. “No, my mother got the better of you. I wouldn’t be surprised if this was what she wanted all along.”

“She came to rake me over the coals about David.” Georgie twisted her long braid to the front of her nightdress. There had been a time when she had slept with her hair down, because Bay had thought it was beautiful. Now, she kept it chastely braided. Doing her best to keep her tone light, she said, “Apparently, society is convinced that we’re living in sin beneath your very nose. A suspiciously dark-haired child is expected at any moment.”

“You have dark hair,” said Bay. Georgie just looked at him. Bay’s eyes dropped. He poked at a blue flower embroidered on the counterpane before looking up again. “I’m sorry, Georgie. I should have known what people would think.”

It was Bay’s earnestness that was always so disarming, that made her want to protect him, to shield him from the world.