A Corpse in Shining Armour. Caro Peacock

more than a week at a time. He’s totally devoted to agricultural improvement, especially pigs. How many other women do you know whose chief rival for their husband’s attention weighs thirty stone and grunts?’

      People were beginning to turn towards us. She was laughing about her husband, but her voice was full of love for him and she was clearly happy. My dread began to melt away. Celia might claim to have been thinking of me, but she lived almost entirely in the present and after that first reference she didn’t want to talk or think about the past. She brought her face close to mine.

      ‘And I must tell you, I’m breeding.’

      It took me a while to jump from pigs to people and offer her my sincere congratulations.

      ‘Yes, it will soon be showing, so there won’t be many more parties this season. It’s due in November–isn’t that convenient, such a dull time of year with no parties.’

      We’d reached the doorway. Our hostess was standing at the other side of it so before we were allowed to reach the refreshments we had to pay tribute to her performance. Celia told her the mazurka thing was so cheerful you wanted to dance to it, meaning it as a compliment, and got a sour look. I said the performance was charming, meaning it as an insult, and received a thin smile. We progressed to the buffet and a gentleman who knew Celia fussed round us with plates and glasses. Skilfully, she managed to keep the food and wine but lose the gentleman, and found us two chairs on our own. She forked up poached salmon with eager appetite.

      ‘And you, my dear, are you…?’

      She glanced at my ring finger. I shook my head. She gave a disappointed pout.

      ‘I was sure you would be by now. I hope you have friends looking out for you.’

      I laughed.

      ‘My friends know all too well what I’d say if they did any such thing.’

      ‘Is there somebody?’

      I shook my head and forked up salmon. She looked into my face.

      ‘Was there nearly somebody?’

      ‘Well, yes, perhaps nearly.’

      ‘And did he marry somebody else?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘Oh, my dear, I’m sorry.’

      ‘Not at all. I’m glad of it. She’s a far better wife for him than I’d ever have been.’

      She put down her fork and touched the inside of my wrist.

      ‘My dear, I admire you for putting a brave face on things. So it’s up and on with the hunt.’

      ‘Celia, it isn’t a hunt. You don’t bring a husband home over your shoulder like a haunch of venison.’

      Her laugh brought people looking towards us again.

      ‘Oh, how convenient if one could.’

      ‘Celia, you married for love. My mother and father married for love. If I can’t do the same, then I shan’t marry at all.’

      ‘Nonsense. You’re far too pretty and agreeable to be an old maid. But one really can’t be too fussy.’

      I finished my salmon, remembering that with Celia the impulses to hug her and hit her with a heavy object were never far apart. What I couldn’t explain to her, because there was nothing in her life that would help her understand, was the delight that I was beginning to take in my independence. I’d fallen into it by accident, and the shock had been like a plunge into cold water, but now I’d learned to swim in it and the water didn’t seem so cold after all. It would take a more remarkable man than any I was likely to meet on the social circuit to understand that.

      Luckily, something had happened to change the subject. Two women had arrived late and, instead of being annoyed because they’d missed her performance, our hostess was fawning over them like royalty. The older one was tall and middle-aged, the younger one in her early twenties. Celia caught her breath.

      ‘Look, it’s Rosa Fitzwilliam.’

      She was staring at the younger woman like an astronomer seeing a comet. Rosa Fitzwilliam was a little above average height, slimly built but with a good bust and beautiful sloping shoulders. Her face was a perfect oval, complexion like alabaster with moonlight on it. Her chestnut brown hair, swept up into elaborate spirals, was pinned with a diamond aigrette that caught the light from the chandeliers as she graciously nodded at her hostess’s words. Celia wasn’t the only one looking at her. A hush had fallen on the room. Some people were staring at her openly, others trying to carry on their conversations while looking at her sidelong.

      ‘Who is she?’ I said.

      ‘Oh, my dear, where have you been? She’s positively the Beauty of the season. Just come over from Dublin, or everyone would have known about her long before. Just look at those eyebrows. Do you suppose she plucks them?’

      They were two flawless arches; her lips, equally flawless, could have come from a classical statue. I looked and puzzled about this question of beauty. In my opinion, Celia was at least equally beautiful, and there were several other women in the room of whom you could say the same. And yet they were staring at Rosa Fitzwilliam without envy, as if she came from another planet and they could not be expected to compete. For some reason, every now and then, society chooses to pick out a lovely woman and raise her to the status of the Beauty. There was no arguing with it.

      Rosa Fitzwilliam graciously accepted a glass of champagne and moved across the room to talk to a group of people she obviously knew. Conversation swelled again, but there was an excitement in the room that hadn’t been there before she arrived, the way the air quivers after lightning strikes.

      ‘I suppose they’ll have to put off the marriage if his father dies,’ Celia said.

      ‘Whose father?’

      ‘The whole thing is terribly hard for her, although you’d never guess it to look at her. After all, she couldn’t possibly have known when she accepted him at Christmas time. Nobody had the least idea then.’

      ‘Least idea about what?’

      ‘If it came to it, I suppose he’d have to release her from the engagement. It would be the only honourable thing to do, don’t you think?’

      ‘Celia, I haven’t the slightest notion what you’re talking about.’

      She stared at me.

      ‘Surely you’ve heard about the Brinkburns? Everybody’s known for weeks.’

      I bit my tongue. Even if everybody had known for weeks, my promise to Disraeli of secrecy still held.

      ‘Known what?’

      She handed her empty plate to a passing servant and brought her head closer to mine.

      ‘Rosa’s engaged to Stephen Brinkburn. His father’s madder than poor old King George was, and he’s going to die any day now. Only there’s some doubt about Stephen’s right to inherit…apparently his father wasn’t…well, you know.’

      If I hadn’t heard the story already from a more coherent source, no, I shouldn’t have known. But one thing was clear. However hard Disraeli and his friends were trying to keep the scandal within a small circle, it was already the talk of the London drawing rooms.

      ‘But she’s still engaged to him whatever happens, isn’t she?’ I said. ‘She can’t just send him back like a pair of gloves that aren’t the right colour.’

      ‘My dear, what pictures you’re painting. It seems quite clear to me. If it turns out that he isn’t and the younger brother is, then strictly speaking it’s the younger brother she should be engaged to, and since he’s supposed to be in love with her too, like all the other young men, it wouldn’t make a lot of difference. Except to poor Stephen, of course, but then…’

      She stopped talking because another of