George Fraser - Mr American

Mr Franklin was not certain whether to take these confidences as a compliment or not; he guessed she would have gone to the stake rather than make them to one of her English acquaintances, but presumably he, not being of that charmed circle, and therefore unimportant, was a suitable recipient. But he could guess that for all her pretended indifference, the strain of preparing for the King’s visit, of minor crises about ginger biscuits and ptarmigan, of anxiety about being thought “not up to scratch”, of imagining arch looks and raised eyebrows, must be considerable even on this self-confident young beauty; it all mattered, in her world.

“I’m sorry your brother isn’t here,” he said. “Perhaps I’ll see him later on, though?”

Peggy giggled. “He’ll probably want to fight you again, if you do. I think he was awfully disappointed that you wouldn’t square up to him this afternoon.”

“I can imagine. And I’d guess he’s a pretty useful scrapper, too.”

“Oh, he was Universities Heavy-weight Champion – before he went to Sandhurst.” She smiled mischievously. “So perhaps it’s just as well you didn’t take him on.”

But Mr Franklin was not to be drawn. “Yes, just as well, I guess. For one thing, he seems like a nice fellow. And I make it a rule never to fight a nice fellow in front of his sister.”

“Why ever not?”

“Well, if he beats you, she won’t admire you – and if you beat him, she won’t like you.”

But Peggy was not to be drawn either. She smiled and sipped her white wine. “I take it your rule applies only with brothers and sisters. If it had been Frank Lacy?”

“Who? Oh, ‘milord”, the polite one. No, I guess I wouldn’t have minded too much if he’d become violent – for a moment this afternoon I thought he was going to.”

“You mean you hoped he was going to. I was watching, remember – do you know, Jarvie said you looked ready to do murder?” She laughed cheerfully. “Were you?”

“Not quite.” He glanced round the table. “Where is he, by the way? – he looked like the kind who would get fitted in somehow.”

“Oh, he was – until the King invited you to dinner. You’re occupying his place, you know.” She eyed him with amusement. “He wasn’t very pleased, I can tell you.”

Mr Franklin studied her thoughtfully. “No, he wouldn’t be. Would this be … his usual place?”

“He thinks it ought to be,” said Peggy carelessly. “And what Frank thinks ought to be – well, ought to be, you know.” She shrugged. “I don’t mind in the least, I may say. Do him good to have his nose out of joint for a change – Frank thinks he owns the earth, as well as half the county.”

“I see.” Mr Franklin nodded pensively, and found himself glancing across at Sir Charles. “Not two beans to rub together,” Thornhill had said, and it was confirmed by what he had seen. Good-looking daughter, wealthy young landowner showing interest – uh-huh. No wonder Sir Charles’s enforced invitation had been chilly. But his daughter didn’t seem to mind; Mr Franklin imagined that she was not the kind to be a dutiful child unless it suited her, or that she would find a nature like Lord Lacy’s to be entirely to her taste. He turned to look at her; she was catching the butler’s eye, and fish was coming to replace the pâté. She met Mr Franklin’s look and sighed.

“Let us pray for the success of poached salmon,” she said solemnly. “Cook wanted trout, but I overruled her, and it would be just like her to ruin it. Oh, well, if Kingie doesn’t like it, he doesn’t like it, and that’s that.”

Mr Franklin considered his fish, and took a sip of his wine. “You don’t care for entertaining too much?”

“Not this sort – well, who would? It’s like having a particularly bad-tempered baby on one’s hands. Oh, I know he can be jolly enough, but he sulks so much, and shows how bored he is, and the people who traipse about after him are the giddy limit. Mrs Keppel’s a darling, and the Marquis is a pet …” She turned to Soveral and said: “I’m just telling Mr Franklin how divvy you are, marquis. Aren’t you flattered?”

Soveral laughed and bowed. “Alas, I am far too fierce-looking, and far too grown-up to be ‘divvy’ any longer, Miss Peggy. Don’t you agree, Mr Franklin?”

“I might if I knew what divvy meant,” said Mr Franklin, and was promptly informed by his hostess that it was short for divine. “I don’t know what we’d do without the Marquis and La Keppel, anyway,” Peggy went on. “But isn’t it ghastly, so many people having to kowtow and scrape and butter up, just to keep one odious old man from being thoroughly ill-natured all the time?”

Mr Franklin stole a glance at the table, but everyone was talking animatedly, presumably to compensate for the royal silence, and Peggy’s indiscretions went unheard. “Well, he doesn’t seem too bad, you know,” he said. “I guess when I’m his age I’ll be pretty cranky, too.” Privately, he thought on short acquaintance that his majesty had probably had too much of his own way all his life, but no doubt that went with kingship, he decided. The King, after a mouthful of his fish, had laid down his fork and was muttering to Mrs Keppel, who preserved her bland smile in the face of what was obviously a royal complaint.

“Wait till he’s had the ptarmigan pie, and he’ll wish he’d eaten his fish,” remarked Peggy. “Did you ever see anything so disagreeable? I mean, honestly, even if the fish is rotten, would you sit mumping like that if you had Alice beside you, positively slaving to cheer you up?”

“I hope not. I’d try not to, anyway.”

“I think she’s a gorgeous creature,” said Peggy, looking across the table. “And one of those lucky people who are even nicer than they look.”

He smiled at her. “You don’t need to be jealous, you know. She’s not the prettiest girl in this room.”

“Oh, come off it!” Peggy glanced at him sidelong, and her mouth took on the tiny sneer which he had noticed in the hall, but she looked pleased nonetheless. “Every woman would be jealous of looking like that, including yours truly. Anyway, look where it’s got her.”

“Is that such a happy position? I wonder what Mr Keppel thinks about it.”

She turned to stare at him, and the little sneer seemed to him even more marked; at that, he decided, that angel face was still something that Mrs Keppel, for all her beauty, might have envied.

“Don’t tell me you’re shocked? A Puritan Uncle Sam? Really!” She shrugged. “Well, I suppose he feels quite honoured, don’t you?”

“I can’t imagine it. Can’t see that any man would be. In fact, I feel sorry for him. And for Mrs Keppel. Don’t you? I mean, would …” He realized what he had been going to say, and stopped. “I beg your pardon. I …”

“You were going to say, ‘would I, if I were Mrs Keppel’, weren’t you?” He was slightly shocked to see that she was regarding him with amusement. She glanced across the table. “It’s a dreadful thought. Still, if I were her age, I suppose I might. I don’t know.”

Mr Franklin felt decidedly uncomfortable. He was far from being a prude, by his own lights, but that had nothing to do with it. What he disliked was what seemed to him a deliberate display of cynicism, assumed by this lovely young woman presumably because it was the smart, advanced thing to do; it was so much part of the hard, artificial atmosphere which he could feel round that dinner-table, and it annoyed him quite unreasonably. How old was she? Nineteen, perhaps twenty, and she was trying to pretend that she held the views and values of the women who made up the royal circle – well, he didn’t know what they were like, but he could guess. Peggy was so obviously not their sort, and he felt somehow demeaned that she should try to convince him that she was. Still, she was young, and no doubt it was natural enough that she should want to appear worldly; it couldn’t be easy for a young girl, having to play hostess to the smartest set in the world for a week-end. Mr Franklin began to eat his ptarmigan pie. It was awful, and automatically he glanced towards the King, to see how it was being received there. Sure enough, his majesty was looking displeased; his pie was untouched, and he was staring round the table, frowning.