Her morning star, p.1
Her Morning Star, page 1
Her Morning Star
Violet Cowper
Copyright © 2022 by Violet Cowper
All rights reserved.
No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher or author, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law.
Editing: Kelly Hartigan
Cover design: Erin Dameron Hill
Contents
1. Chapter 1
2. Chapter 2
3. Chapter 3
4. Chapter 4
5. Chapter 5
6. Chapter 6
7. Chapter 7
8. Chapter 8
9. Chapter 9
10. Chapter 10
11. Chapter 11
12. Chapter 12
13. Chapter 13
14. Chapter 14
15. Epilogue
Chapter 1
When Melanie had stepped inside Viscount Howick’s ballroom for the first time, her heart had been full of hopes.
This was supposed to be her first entry into society since the scandal – the nightmare that began that terrible morning more than a year ago, unspooling into days ahead and blackening them with ruin. Lady Evelyn’s arm had been firmly, if rather stiffly, linked with hers, assuring her of the promised support.
Technically, the promise had been made by Lady Evelyn’s uncle, but Melanie was sure that even such a headstrong lady as the raven-haired heiress was reputed to be would not defy Sir Owen in such a way.
The setting seemed so beautiful it could have been constructed by the gods of bygone antiquity as a platform for her triumph. The chandelier was blazing with light reflected in a myriad of crystals, the candles weeping with white bridal wax. Deities of old with soft curls and creamy skin ran across the ceiling. Melanie was unsure which myth these belonged to.
Melanie had been greeted warmly by the host, but his attention had turned to Lady Evelyn rather quickly. Melanie did not begrudge him his quick loss of interest. As Sir Owen Prynne’s niece and the daughter of the earl of Marsden, Evelyn outranked her in every possible way.
Melanie had been staying with Evelyn as her companion for a year now, and in that time, their goals had been wildly different. Evelyn’s was to keep her uncle’s household in town while he was away in the north, canvassing for the next election. Melanie’s was to glue her life back together.
Melanie positioned herself by the western wall, feeling like a callow debutante again, floating in an unknown world, unsure where salvation or disaster awaited, and watched the other guests dancing. She wasn’t as sprightly a dancer as some of the girls, but she could have acquitted herself well in the country dances. The final notes of the gentle and conservative ‘Flowers of Edinburgh’ faded away, and her breath caught when the orchestra struck up a waltz.
She had been discouraged from dancing the waltz during her first and only season, and she had never been the kind of daughter who would require a stern ban to dissuade her from improper behaviour.
On the other hand…
Melanie hesitated by the wall. It was only fitting that her new life started with a new dance.
She blushed, gazing at the closeness of the couples gliding across the well waxed floor. She couldn’t blame the matrons frowning on the benches: of course, they would worry with their charges pressed so closely against their gentlemen partners.
The movements of the dance seemed easy enough to remember, and Melanie would never allow anyone to think that she lacked bravery.
She straightened her back, seeing herself in her mind’s eye: a chaste and lovely figure draped in a high-waisted gown of pale muslin – thank God for the Prynnes’ generosity – that made her look like a classical goddess or a bride.
Or a sacrificial offering.
She silenced her inner voice and waited for an invitation.
The music started winding to a close. Melanie swallowed, her gaze darting back and forth across the ballroom with a growing desperation. She had never been a complete wallflower; even during her frugal debut, her dance card had never lacked invitations.
You know why. You know why very well.
Is the scandal following me still?
Do you think the ton has much to talk about? Or do you suppose it is every day that a respectable gentry squire from Yorkshire divorces his adulterous wife?
This was wrong; this was completely wrong. This was supposed to be a thing of purity, the start of a new life –
The waltz ended, and Melanie smiled when the orchestra began playing another one.
This time, Melanie vowed, she was going to be bolder. She had never been a coquette, but she gave one of the gentlemen in attendance a lingering glance, as if inviting him to invite her. He nodded, as if acknowledging her presence, and then crossed the ballroom to where a lady in a plum gown stood.
Melanie’s cheeks were burning. She cast her glance around the room once again, her sight attracted by a splash of scarlet – the uniform of an officer.
Doing her best not to bother anyone, she crossed the ballroom as though desiring to converse with him. Her over-fevered imagination made her believe several heads had turned towards her, and fear told her everyone's lips moved in venomous whispers.
The ballroom was grand, but crossing it felt as if she were walking on a tightrope over a churning mountain river.
The officer turned to her, regarding her with interest – although she also detected surprise in his eyes. Of course, he is surprised. It is probably not every day that he sees ladies who are so bold as to offer themselves up for an invitation instead of waiting as they are bound to.
Truth be told, she would have much preferred waiting.
They were now a mere three steps away from each other. Melanie looked into his eyes, pressed her fan against her chest, the white feathers brushing the bare skin of her décolletage, and unclenched her fingers. The fan fluttered to the ground.
‘How clumsy of me,’ Melanie whispered, feeling herself an utter harlot.
‘It is nothing to worry about,’ the officer replied courteously, leaned down, and picked the fan up. He handed it to Melanie, and she gave him the barest of smiles in case he was as timid as she and needed further encouragement.
He smiled with the utmost politeness. And then he walked away without a single word.
Had her gown burst at its seams and left her standing in the middle of the ballroom in nothing but her unmentionables, Melanie would not have felt more utterly ashamed. There was no greater way to tell her she was not welcome – except spitting in her face or strong-arming her out of the stone palace altogether. Or possibly both, in whichever order.
She had never been stupid. She knew when to acknowledge her defeat.
Her head hung low, Melanie went to the benches lining one of the walls and sat down among the matrons.
‘I say, Lady Evelyn.’ Charles Grey, Viscount Howick and the foreign secretary, was genial is always. However, there was no mistaking the worry in his eyes. ‘I have heard about your dream of travelling, and I cannot say I approve of it.’
You are not my uncle, to approve or disprove my conduct, Evelyn thought. Even Father has lost that right long ago.
Aloud, however, she only said: ‘I understand that Europe is clogged with armies and no traveller, however careful, is welcome there. But surely no army might forbid me to have my dreams.’
‘We all have to wait in England until the Corsican ogre can be dealt with.’
‘I am afraid to become too decrepit to travel by the time this happens.’
‘You seem to have a poor opinion on our soldiers, Lady Evelyn.’
‘Certainly not. Merely an accurate opinion on my own age. I am no debutante anymore.’
Evelyn was only two years away from the dreaded age of thirty. An age of full living for a man, certainly; a woman, however, would have done well to acquire a husband by the time disaster struck unless she wanted to be relegated to the dusty world of old maids.
Once upon a time, Evelyn had hopes of a great and passionate marriage.
Such hopes were dead and gone. Only her purpose remained.
‘Surely not.’ Lord Howick coughed politely. ‘Where would you have gone if you had a full run of the world?’
‘That seems like a fine parlour game to play.’ Evelyn dodged the question and turned to the lady listening in avidly. ‘I concede the right of the first answer to you.’
‘Oh, France,’ she replied.
Evelyn’s blood ran cold. She couldn’t possibly know, could she?
‘But only if the Almighty had somehow granted me the power to turns the years back and travel to the time before that horrid revolution. My mother spent some time in Paris when my father had been to our embassy, and she said once there was no finer city in the world, nor a court more magnificent.’
For a second, Evelyn’s body felt light with relief. It was merely a nostalgia for a more gallant age. It had nothing to do with her own plans.
‘And you, Lady Evelyn?’ the woman asked, her smile thin.
She had to think something up quickly. ‘The East,’ Evelyn said. ‘I am not sure where. Perhaps Constantinople. Perhaps Lebanon. Perhaps Egypt.’
The last word came out quieter than the others with a barely perceptible pause before it – a stumble, a crack, and the blackness peered from within.
As if on cue, the eyes of the conversationalists lit up with pity.
Evelyn did not know if there was a reaction she hated more.
‘I say.’ Lord Howick raised his eyebrows ‘Const
‘Don’t blame her,’ the female guest intervened, her own smile just as insincere. ‘Lady Evelyn could have hardly helped inheriting her father’s adventurous spirit.’
Evelyn had lived long enough to know that wasn’t a compliment. The references to her father rarely were.
The scar beneath her string of pearls started itching again.
‘Adventures have little to do with it,’ she replied smoothly. Once, she would have lashed out; however, years as a hostess for her bachelor uncle’s political gatherings had trained her well. ‘The language lessons I have received I received from my uncle.’ My perfectly respectable uncle.
‘I take it you speak French,’ the guest said in a tone just polite enough not to let the statement sound as dismissive as it was.
‘As well as German, Turkish, and Arabic.’
‘Arabic!’ Lord Howick exclaimed. ‘By Jove, why would a lady have a need of that? Or a gentleman, for that matter, unless he goes to serve in India. I’ve heard they speak it in some provinces.’
‘My uncle says there is no such thing as a useless knowledge.’ She sipped her ratafia. ‘And I agree with him wholeheartedly.’
Thank God, they did not pry further than that. Not that her insinuations hurt Evelyn – at least not in the way they would have done only a few years ago when she was still smarting from every reference to her wild father.
Or to put it a different way, when she could still feel.
It did not hurt, truly. Not anymore. If anything, it gave her a peculiar power – as if she were floating above this bejewelled, bird-bright crowd, her true spirit too far away from them to be harmed, her body protected with an ice shield of grief.
They made keening goddesses in marble.
‘London is not the safest place for a young lady alone. Too many temptations,’ Lord Howick commented. His tone was warm and genuinely concerned; Evelyn could easily imagine how he had managed to win over the Whigs. It was not an easy thing to be foreign secretary after the great Fox.
‘If you are referring to the gin, I have no interest in sweet oblivion,’ Evelyn noted nonchalantly, as if referring to an after-dinner stroll. ‘One’s mind has to be kept keen, in my opinion. Besides, even if I were so inclined, my uncle made sure I had a companion to take care of me.’ She did her best not to let her voice sound resentful. ‘I am sure Miss Bright is going to keep my conscience on the straight and narrow path. She is sweet, and level-headed, and rather perfect. Sometimes it seems to me that she had stepped into the world straight from the pages of etiquette books.’
Which is why I cannot wait to part with her company. Where I would be going soon, I would need no companion, young or old.
Evelyn indicated with her eyes the spot where Melanie was, no doubt, receiving compliments from the young officers in attendance – only to find out she was no longer there. Feeling rather silly, Evelyn scanned the whirlwind of silks that was the floor in search of the familiar white garment and the golden head crowning it. There was no sign of her.
Finally, she spotted the colours she had been looking for –the colours of innocence – far away and half hidden, huddled among the benches where stout mothers were sitting.
‘I don’t understand,’ Evelyn murmured, frowning. In truth, she did understand. She understood rather well – better than most women present, to be sure. She knew how a parent’s shame could stain a daughter’s future.
Compared to her own father’s political proclivities and domestic habits, the Brights’ divorce seemed to her a tawdry and paltry thing – something to drone on about for a year – that wasn’t earthshaking enough to continue cutting the debutante of the family afterwards.
Evidently, she was wrong.
She looked again, noticing new details. Melanie Bright’s gaze held no rancour – only the kind of Christian resignation advised by conduct manuals and preached to the mothers of dead children.
‘Forgive me.’ Evelyn turned to the host. A resolute plan was ripening in her head. She had no reason to bear Miss Bright any love; however, some things were, simply and plainly, not right, and the girl had clearly done nothing to injure her. ‘I have a rather unusual request…’
How much time had passed? Forty minutes? An hour? Melanie was not sure.
There is nothing to cry about. Her fingers curled and uncurled in their pristine pale gloves. This was her own fault for having expected too much. It was the fate of every presumptuous, vain girl who wanted more than she deserved from the world than it was willing to give her. Every tale she had ever read pointed to that conclusion.
She should not have been expecting any better. She should not have been expecting the ton to forget and forgive her mother’s sin. How could she blame them for suspecting the signs of the same wantonness in the daughter?
Her yes continued to prickle hotly with unshed tears, the unseen muscles contorting in a vain attempt to keep them in. Melanie couldn’t even imagine the reaction of the good society if she actually burst into tears at the foreign secretary’s ball. If she did, she would likely drown the last shreds of good opinion anyone had been holding of her.
‘Miss Bright,’ someone with a slightly amused voice called above her, sounding like a call from heaven, ‘may I have this dance?’ For all its velvet-like deepness, the voice belonged, unmistakably, to a woman. And not just any woman.
Lady Evelyn Prynne, the daughter of an earl and the niece to a great politician, was standing in front of her, her gown of dark verdant green making the pallor of her skin shine like a pearl.
‘Lady Evelyn?’ Melanie swallowed. ‘I… I beg your pardon… What is the meaning of this?’
‘Have you never seen women who have ill luck with partners dancing together?’ The dark-haired heiress smiled as if the matrons regarding her with distasteful shock did not exist.
‘Yes, but country dances most often. Not the waltz.’ Melanie looked at her and whispered, ‘Is that allowed? Would the master of ceremonies, I mean, the host, not look askance at this?’ She could not have picked a worse moment to remind the world that her experience with genteel entertainments had consisted, before the catastrophe, of rare visits to the assembly rooms in Halifax, not of grand private balls.
‘He graciously gave me the permission to help you when I asked him.’
‘You’ve asked Lord Howick this?’ Melanie couldn’t help but feel slightly awed. ‘For me?’
‘I see no other lonely maiden with fair complexion in this room,’ Evelyn teased her slightly, her eyes growing impatient. ‘So, what do you say, Miss Bright? Does your dance card have a little room for me?’
Melanie knew she should have demurred. Even though this kind of solution would be hardly unheard of for a partner-less lady, she did not want to compound her already damaged reputation with new oddities.
On the other hand, she reasoned, Lady Evelyn was Sir Owen’s niece and one with whom she was going to be sharing a long year. Offending her would not do. She rose from the bench, inclined her head, and said with as much ceremoniousness as she could muster, ‘I would be delighted to.’
There were a few gasps and a flurry of whispers when Lady Evelyn led her to the floor. But the heavens did not burst open and the ground did not gape into a chasm to swallow the audacious sinner as Melanie had feared. She placed her right arm upon Lady Evelyn’s left and felt her partner’s hand grasp hers.
‘Have you ever waltzed?’ Lady Evelyn whispered in her ear, her breath suddenly warm against her skin.
‘No.’ Melanie shook her head. ‘But I have watched. I have always watched.’
Their first few steps were careful and slow. Melanie had little experience with the dance just as her partner, no doubt, had little experience with leading as a man would. However, if their movements were over careful and lacked the ease of those of the men and women whirling around them, they were no less enjoyable for that.
‘Have you read Lady Mary Montagu’s Turkish Letters?’ Lady Evelyn asked when the dance grew on them enough to sustain a conversation.
‘Oh, many times!’ Melanie exclaimed, inwardly chiding herself for such a burst of passion. ‘Our subscription library must have tired of me. I have taken every account of foreign adventure they happened to host.’
‘I suppose these were not numerous,’ Lady Evelyn guessed, her amused tone returning.
