"No, this trick won't work... How on earth are you ever going to explain in terms of chemistry and physics so important a biological phenomenon as first love? " Albert Einstein
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III.
"I think a little tighter, perhaps a half inch there ... at the bust," Mrs Martin mused as she inspected Cressie's gown, or what would be her gown when Belle Desjardins was finished with it.
Cressie could not believe how quickly Miss Desjardins, or Mrs Denham, she supposed, had worked, to create the bones of her debutante gown. The Season's opening was imminent, and Mrs Martin had visited nearly every modiste in Town to procure a gown, but she was unable to get any credit. The news that Belle Desjardins was opening a shop for couture gowns was fortuitous, and the kind-hearted lady had done them all a great service. Mrs Martin was certainly paying for her services, but Belle Desjardins had not charged them anywhere near what a gown such as this would usually fetch.
"Are you certain, Madame?" Miss Desjardins asked with an uncertain brow. "Her measurements are correct. I would worry that tightening the bust would make the gown ... indecent."
Cressie felt her cheeks flush a crimson red. What was her mother thinking of? Such a request stank of desperation. Cressie understood her mother's desperation, certainly, but she did not want to walk into the Season dressed like it! Having to debut and marry in itself was horrid enough.
Miss Desjardins worked diligently during the fitting, managing Mrs Martin's requests with gentle professionalism as she refused them. Cressie couldn't help but admire her tact. It was obvious to anyone that Miss Desjardins knew what she was doing. She was certainly an incredibly talented dressmaker whose eye was second to none. She did not need external opinions, especially from anxious mothers.
Cressie, however, still felt the sense of shock in her stomach as she saw the thin gold band on Miss Desjardins' ring finger. Cressie remembered her standing beside the elder Mr Denham at the Winter Assembly last November. She then, of course, saw the newspapers that spread her awful experience about the country for the next month. If she suffered, or if she was still suffering from the pain of it all, it did not show on the flawless face of Belle Desjardins. Hearing Miss Desjardins reveal her marriage had startled Cressie.
But thoughts of the Winter Assembly, and thoughts of the name 'Denham', sparked another memory in Cressie. She thought of the boy who danced like a newborn fawn, but whose eyes and smile were filled with youthful vibrance. Cressie's thoughts often drifted to Mr Jem when she was sitting idly. How could they not? It was not very often one received a proposal, especially in the way that Cressie had received it from Jem Denham.
The whole ordeal still confounded her, and to this day she certainly had no idea what Mr Jem had been thinking of proposing to her after such a short acquaintance.
Cressie's initial shock regarding Mr Jem's proposal had faded. She still vehemently maintained her position that someone his age ought not to be marrying if he did not need to, just as Cressie had no desire to. Cressie was not at all certain that love would even persuade her to marry, not that she had much say in the matter. What she felt mostly now when she thought of Mr Jem was sadness and regret at how she had rejected him. Cressie had never been proposed to before. She had never been the subject of romantic interest before. She could blame her youth and inexperience, but she still knew how to behave, and turning her back on a young man who had done nothing remotely cruel to her was wrong.
Cressie wondered if she might ever see Mr Jem again. In meeting with Belle Denham, here and now, the idea was at the forefront of her mind. Should she ever meet with him again, Cressie would apologise and be done with it.
Cressie was quite certain that after quashing her guilt, her mind would never trouble her with thoughts of Jem Denham again.
"Oh, Cressie, my dear, you are going to be the most beautiful debutante this Season. I just know it." Mrs Martin clapped her hands together with pride as she took a step back to take in Cressie's appearance.
It hurt Cressie to see her mother so excited for her, because it meant that her determination and resolve to fight Mrs Martin fizzled. When she saw such hope in her mother's grey-green eyes, Cressie saw her own fate. No matter what, she would be wed before the Season was over. To whom, she had no idea.
Cressie prayed the man would not be an ogre.
Her head turned towards the sound of laughter. It sounded faintly outside, and peering through the front of the shop, Cressie saw a handful of children running past the window. What were they playing? What were they laughing about? Whatever it was, they sounded jovial and free from care or worry, or burdens to marry.
Cressie longed to join them. She longed to run. She didn't remember the last time she had moved faster than a lady-like promenade.
"Don't you agree?" Mrs Martin asked Miss Desjardins. "Is not my daughter a true beauty?" Mrs Martin had mentioned several dozen times how Cressie's beauty was as good as a dowry for some gentlemen, and that they would be relying upon her fair face and handsome features to bewitch her suitors into not caring for a dowry.
Miss Desjardins smiled politely. "Miss Martin is très beau," she agreed. "Would you care to wait out in the shop, Madame?" Miss Desjardins suggested to Mrs Martin. "I will assist Miss Martin in changing."
Mrs Martin nodded gleefully as she flitted back out into the shop. Cressie could see from where she was standing that her mother had immediately found a bin of fabric bolts and was inspecting the patterns with keen interest.
Miss Desjardins helped Cressie to step out of the gown in silence, before she spoke under her breath.
"Are you excited for the Season, Miss Martin?"
From the tone and volume of her voice, Cressie could tell that Miss Desjardins did not want Mrs Martin to overhear the conversation. What did she expect Cressie to say? Was Cressie really so transparent?
Her eyes found her mother once more and Cressie bit down on her bottom lip. Cressie's heart told her to fight, but her head told her to grow up. When she thought of what her mother had been through, and what she had done to essentially survive throughout her entire childhood, Cressie felt immense guilt for stomping her feet like a child when Mrs Martin spoke of her marriage.
Cressie understood she would need to marry eventually. All women did. For what were they without a husband? She would be seventeen soon. She was certainly not the youngest bride there ever was, nor ever would be.
Mrs Martin had sold every possession they had of value, giving them enough to participate in one Season, and one Season only. They bore a respectable name, even if the man who had given it to Mrs Martin was not at all gentlemanlike. They had taken a small but comfortable house for the summer off the main street of Grosvenor Square, and would be in a fit situation to receive callers.
It was certainly a charade, and one that would leave them destitute at Season's end if Cressie did not marry.
It was a heavy and heartbreaking burden weighing upon her young shoulders.
Cressie didn't want to marry. She wanted to run and swim and play and laugh and live.
But Cressie needed to marry, and she hated every bit of that knowledge.
Taking a breath, Cressie put on a smile, and replied, "Terribly. I cannot wait."
***
A fortnight later, Cressie sat at her dressing table, staring at her reflection, hardly recognising herself. She suddenly didn't look like a girl. Cressie certainly still felt every bit a mere girl, but she didn't look it. She looked like a lady ... and one who would not dive into a pond and splash about at her first opportunity.
Cressie's pale blonde hair was fastened in a style so intricate, it had taken the maid an hour and a quarter to complete it. Soft curls framed her cheeks which were flushed with rouge. The same rouge had been applied to her lips, which were the colour of pink roses.
She sat in what was perhaps the most exquisite dress she had ever seen, and certainly had ever worn. The white masterpiece featured a beaded bodice that fit her perfectly. The tulip sleeves were soft and weightless, and the skirt was made up of a half dozen layers of floating silk that had such elegant movement when she walked, Cressie would not have minded promenading.
The only part of herself that Cressie recognised were her dark brown eyes, which stared back at her showing her fear at what was to happen this evening.
Cressie was to debut. She was to be escorted into a grand hall before the queen and presented to all as a marriageable prospect. They were then to attend a ball. Their first invitation of the Season had arrived a week ago, and Mrs Martin had paraded it in front of Cressie's face as proof that making the acquaintance of the Duke and Duchess of Ashwood had been as important as she had originally said.
The duke and duchess were giving the opening ball of the Season. Cressie was already anxious to be attending a ball at all, but in knowing that she might once again meet with Mr Jem only increased her apprehension. She did not at all understand why, when she had so previously convinced herself that apologising to Mr Jem would allay all feelings of guilt.
"You are an angel, an angel," gushed Mrs Martin as she looked upon Cressie with tears in her eyes. "I cannot tell you how proud I am of you, my beautiful Cressida."
Cressie really had no idea what to say to her mother. She supposed she was glad that her apparent beauty pleased Mrs Martin, but she could not bring herself to say, 'you're welcome' for agreeing to debut when all she wanted to do was run away. She wondered if it would always be such a battle between her head and her heart.
Mrs Martin produced a necklace as she came up behind Cressie. She laid it delicately around her neck and fastened it at the back. "This was the necklace your father gave to me when we became engaged during my Season," Mrs Martin explained. "I had the diamonds replaced with glass long ago, but the setting remains beautiful, just like you. I hope it brings you infinite luck, as it did me. After all, it led me to you."
Tears sprung to Cressie's eyes as the familiar guilt weighed in her chest.
Mrs Martin kissed Cressie's cheek as she rested her hands on her shoulders. "I am certain you will fall passionately in love this season, my dear. I am certain that when it happens, marriage will not seem like such a foreign frightening thing to you as it does now."
"I don't know if I agree with you, Mama," Cressie whispered.
"Just look at you," replied Mrs Martin. "Any man would make a fool of himself to have your heart. And the gentleman who does secure it will be a fortunate man indeed."
***
Jem had never been in such a room in his life. Not even the grand halls of Ashwood House could compare to the Royal Court. And here he, the fifth child of a tailor and his wife, stood in a sea of England's elite and genteel, not fifteen feet from the queen herself. Jem could hardly breathe, let alone form coherent thoughts.
Adam, and now Grace, belonged to this world. They, alongside Cecily, were received by the people in this room as one of their own. Jem felt like quite an imposter dressed in an old suit of Adam's that his mother had altered for him.
And as the debutantes began arriving on the arms of their escorts, Jem wondered if his facial expression mirrored theirs. They, too, looked like they might be sick on the hems of their terribly elaborate gowns.
"You stand up tall now, Jem," Grace whispered, only for him. "Cecily gave me some very valuable advice during my time in London several years ago. People will say what they will, and it is those who talk who envy us most. Waste not your time dwelling on the follies of others, but on your own endeavours."
A small smile twitched at the corner of Jem's lips.
"Do not forget the second part of the advice that I gave you, Grace," murmured Cecily, having overheard Grace's words.
Both Grace and Jem's heads turned towards Cecily.
"Waste not your time dwelling on others, of course, but should anyone require a dressing down, I am perfectly contented to spend my time doing the Lord's work." Cecily smiled smugly. "It's been quite a while since my tongue has delivered a lashing."
"Cecily!" admonished Grace, but Jem could hear the amusement in his sister's voice.
What an ally his sister had in the dowager duchess. Jem certainly would never wish to go against a woman like her.
"The Honourable Miss Jane Hartfield, escorted by her mother, the Lady Hartfield."
"Miss Catherine Allerton, escorted by her mother, Mrs Allerton."
"Lady Mary Liston, escorted by her mother, the Duchess of Kenwood."
The debutantes were announced one after the other, and all floated down the aisle as pictures of nervous beauty before they came before the queen to curtsey and receive her nod of approval.
"It seems only yesterday I walked into this room with Susanna for her first Season," mused Cecily. "You will blink, Grace, and suddenly it will be you and Perrie walking into this room upon her debut."
"Not bloody likely," muttered Adam. "I will glue my eyelids open if it only takes blinking for that to happen. Perrie is four."
"Going on fifteen," retorted Cecily with a sly smile. "Every day I grow curiouser and curiouser about the sort of match my eldest granddaughter will make. And then, of course, there is Lily who –"
"Who is only just two!" hissed Adam as he interrupted his mother. "Stop frightening me with images of my daughters leaving my house."
Grace held onto Adam's arm comfortingly as she leaned into his side. Adam seemed to visibly relax as she did this. Meanwhile, Cecily seemed very pleased with herself. Jem had no doubt Cecily could handle any one of these aristocrats with her eyes closed.
Jem had been so distracted by the quiet argument between Adam and Cecily that he was quite startled when the next debutante was announced.
"Miss Cressida Martin, escorted by her mother, Mrs Martin."
And there she was.
They were once again in the same room, and Jem stared at her openly. How could he not?
Cressie appeared like an angel in white, draped in a gown so soft and stunning it only accentuated her natural beauty. She walked on her mother's arm, her doe brown eyes focussed forward as she moved towards the queen.
She did not see him, of course, but as she neared him, and Jem could better study her face, his initial trance lessened. At a glance, anyone would see what a beautiful creature was Miss Cressie Martin, but upon closer inspection, Jem could see a tightness in her eyes and a stiffness in her jaw. Her posture was rigid, and her mother's grip was tight, as though Mrs Martin was preventing Cressie from turning around and running in the other direction.
But she walked past him gracefully, making it down the aisle of aristocrats to curtsey deeply before the queen, who in turn, have her a nod of approval, as she had done for the other debutantes.
"Belle has outdone herself," marvelled Cecily quietly. "That gown is divine."
While Jem would never disparage his sister-in-law's talents, he was quite of the opinion that in this case, it was the lady who maketh the gown.
"A fine choice indeed, Jem," whispered Grace. "I hope she is deserving of you."
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Hope you enjoyed it!!
I had the sweetest interaction today. I had to go to the ATM to get some cash out, and I walked into the bank (which was closed except for the ATMs as it's a Saturday) and there's an elderly man at one of them. He looked relieved when he saw me, and he asked me for help, before telling me that his wife had died and he didn't know how to work the ATM. I helped him and he was so, so grateful. He was so sweet and he honestly put me in a good mood for the rest of the day.
Which was needed as I was up until 2:30am last night after having binge watched season 2 of Bridgerton in one go hahaha. I was VERY tired today lol. But I loved it! I love an enemies to lovers trope best of all.
... and the next book in this series is a MAJOR enemies to lovers story hehehe.
But the season of 1812 has only just begun! What drama awaits? Only this evil author knows ;)
Let's be honest. You all know me by now. It's a lot. A lot of drama. A whole lot. Therapists on stand by and all that.
I'm sorry Jem and Cressie. I hope you'll forgive me ... but I have to make my readers work for it, I hope you understand *holds out mug in anticipation for reader tears*
Alright, better get to bed and recover from my binge watching lack of sleep.
Night xxx
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