A Lady's Guide to Fortune-Hunting(7)

She leant back in her seat as the performance started, but even as the audience began to gasp and laugh, Kitty could not take her eyes from the de Lacys. What must it be like, to know from birth that your future was an assuredly safe and happy one? To tower over the rest of society, in that exclusive box? They looked as though they belonged there, Kitty could admit, high above. Could there ever have been a world in which she herself might have belonged up there with them? Her father had been born a gentleman, after all, and before his marriage would have mixed with lords and ladies such as them without thinking. Had events unravelled a little differently … Kitty felt a nonsensical pang of jealousy for this alternate version of herself, who might have shared a set with the golden de Lacy family. It was not until Aunt Dorothy nudged her with her elbow that Kitty finally looked away.

At the interval, Kitty and Cecily were kept busy by their aunt, who introduced them to all manner of men and women, wealthy merchants and their sons, daughters and wives, lawyers, military men dressed in dashing colours and the prettily dressed women on their arms. It was more people in one night than Kitty had met in her life to date, and she could not help but feel a little daunted – as if she were again a girl of fifteen, approaching the Linfield manor for her very first evening soirée and feeling terribly frightened of doing something wrong. She remembered her mother whispering reassurances into her ear that night, the scent of her rosewater perfume tickling her nose. Eyes and ears, my darling, she had said. Watch and listen and do as they do, it is not so hard.

Kitty took in a breath so deep that she fancied she could almost detect that rosewater scent upon the air, mustered her courage, and set herself out to impress. As one would mould a hat to suit a fashion, she moulded herself to suit her conversational partner: to the men who fancied themselves great wits, she provided a ready laugh, to the vain she was admiring, and to the shy she smiled often and spoke more. Dorothy was in transports on the return home.

‘Mr Melbury, now he’s one thousand a year,’ she relayed to them in the carriage, ‘Mr Wilcox looked quite taken with Cecily, and—’

‘And we agreed Cecily is not here to make a match,’ Kitty interjected. Beside her, Cecily’s shoulders relaxed once more.

‘Fine, fine.’ Aunt Dorothy waved a dismissive hand. ‘Mr Pears was a little harder to read, but he has a lovely shipping fortune of two thousand a year coming his way upon his father’s death. And Mr Cleaver—’

‘Are there any men of your acquaintance who value more than two thousand a year?’ Kitty interrupted again.

‘More than two thousand a year?’ her aunt asked. ‘What on earth were you expecting, my child?’

‘Mr Linfield had a fortune of four thousand a year,’ Kitty said, her brow wrinkling.

‘Four?’ her aunt repeated incredulously. ‘Goodness me, the Squire must have done very well for himself. But you cannot expect such a miracle to be repeated, my dears. One would be hard pressed to have such a fortune without land, my darling, and you won’t find many landed gentlemen in my circles.’

Kitty digested this unpleasant news. She had known Mr Linfield was wealthy, wealthy enough that paying off their considerable debts would be no issue – but she had assumed they would be able to find many more of his kind in London.

‘I should not expect to encounter men of equivalent fortune?’ Kitty clarified, stomach clenching unpleasantly.

‘Not in my set,’ Aunt Dorothy laughed.

Kitty felt hot and foolish. She yearned to be back at Wimpole Street again, so that she might have ink and paper to sit down with the numbers calmly. Would two thousand a year suit, when she had her sisters to support and eventually dower too? Was it enough?

‘How much debt do you have?’ Dorothy asked, shrewdly.

Kitty told her. Cecily – who Kitty had not thought to be listening – gasped, and Aunt Dorothy granted herself the indulgence of an unladylike whistle.

‘Oh my,’ she said, eyes wide. ‘Mr Pears it shall have to be then.’

‘Yes,’ Kitty agreed, though a little dubiously. Two thousand a year was certainly better than nothing, but there was more to it than simply paying the debt. Was two thousand a year enough to clear their not inconsiderable sum, keep Netley, and then after, to secure her sisters’ futures, too? For what if one of her sisters should need a dowry, to secure the gentleman of their choice? What if all of them did? What if, instead, one needed funds to marry a poor man? Or Cecily, who would surely be happiest with no husband, but a great number of expensive books in her possession. She would have expected Mr Linfield to do all this, but the kindest man in the world, with only two thousand a year to spend, would not be able to promise her the same.

‘Would a place such as … Almack’s be where gentlemen of more fortune frequented?’ she asked thoughtfully.

‘Almack’s Assembly Rooms? Kitty, you would be reaching for the stars,’ Dorothy said, much exasperated. ‘There is a vast difference between polite society and high society. High society – the world of lords and ladies, land and fortune – is not a place to which I can give you access. You must be born to that world and there is no other way to secure an invitation. Put these dangerous notions aside and focus your attention instead on the likes of Mr Pears – you would be lucky indeed to have such a husband.’

They had arrived at Wimpole Street. Kitty went up to their bedroom without speaking further. In a state of some melancholy, she ruminated over Dorothy’s words all the way through her nightly ablutions and was still not done when Cecily blew out their candle and got into bed beside her. Her sister fell instantly asleep, and Kitty listened to her breathing in the dark, jealous of the ease with which Cecily could cast aside the worries of the day.