1 ~1890

"I do not want to be unkind," the new Countess of Berrington said, "but I do feel that as I am only thirty-five it would be quite incongruous for me to chaperon a young girl."

She looked at her niece by marriage almost defiantly as she spoke - they both knew that Lady Berrington would be forty next birthday.

"Do not upset yourself, Aunt Kitty," Marisa replied, "I have no intention of being launched into the social world, I have done it once and I assure you it was the most unpleasant experience of my life."

"Nonsense!" Lady Berrington said, "you must have enjoyed your Season in London."

"I hated every moment of it!" Marisa answered almost passionately. "Cousin Octavia certainly did her best. She took me to ball after ball, to Hurlingham, to Henley and Ranelagh. I was in the Royal Enclosure at Ascot and I was presented to the Queen at Buckingham Palace."

She paused and her eyes twinkled.

"Her Majesty looked at me down her nose, and my curtsey was so awkward that I very nearly sprawled at her feet."

"You were only seventeen then," Lady Berrington said. "You would enjoy London now. The only difficulty is whom we can find to chaperon you."

"I have already said," Marisa replied, "that I have no intention of coming to London. But I do need your help, Aunt Kitty."

"My help?" Lady Berrington exclaimed and raised her eyebrows.

It was, as she was well aware, one of her most attractive mannerisms and was continually admired by the dashing young men who frequented her house and who apparently were tolerated without comment by her good-natured husband.

"I need your help, Aunt Kitty, Marisa explained, "because I intend to become a Governess."

"A Governess?"

The Countess of Berrington could not have been more astonished if a bomb had exploded in the room.

"But why? For what reason?"

To her surprise her niece looked over her shoulder as if to be quite certain that no-one was listening.

"If I let you into a secret, Aunt Kitty," she said, "will you swear not to reveal it to Uncle George, or to anyone else?"

"Yes, of course," Lady Berrington replied, "but I cannot imagine what on earth your secret could be."

"I am writing a book," Marisa said.

"A book?" Again the pretty, dark eyebrows arched upwards. "Do you mean a novel?"

"I mean nothing of the sort," Marisa replied positively. "I am in fact writing about the scandals of Society."

"Marisa, you must be joking!" Lady Berrington cried. "And it is not in particularly good taste."

"No, I am serious," Marisa answered. "Mr. Charles Bradlaugh, before he became a Member of Parliament, prepared a pamphlet entitled "Impeachment of the House of Brunswick". Papa was very amused by it, but I thought it was too pompously written to have any real impact."

"What on earth do you mean by that?" Lady Berrington asked.

"I mean," Marisa replied, "that I intend to write an amusing, scandalous, gossipy book that everyone will read and which will show up Society in its true colours."

"And what may that be?" Lady Berrington enquired in bewilderment.

"In my opinion," Marisa answered, "it is a hotbed of immorality, extravagance and irresponsibility."

The Countess put back her head and laughed, but at the same time she looked uneasy.

"You must be playing a joke on me, Marisa. I cannot conceive for one moment that you would really do anything so outrageous, so calculated to upset Uncle George and myself, as even to talk in such a manner, let alone write it down."

"I am deadly serious," Marisa said. "But I promise you, Aunt Kitty, that you and Uncle George will be quite safe. I will naturally not sign the book with my own name."

"That is a relief at any rate," the Countess said, "but at the same time the whole idea is completely ridiculous. What do you know about Society?"

"If you are interested I will tell you," Marisa answered. "When I was going through the family papers, I discovered the diaries of Great-Aunt Augusta."

"Who was she?" Lady Berrington asked wrinkling her smooth white brow.

"She lived a hundred years ago when the Prince of Wales, later George IV, was causing scandal after scandal, when it was considered smart to be eccentric and the extravagance of the bucks and rakes frequenting Carlton House was an appalling contrast to the abject poverty and misery to be seen everywhere in the streets of London."

"What had your Great-Aunt Augusta got to do with it?" the Countess asked in a bewildered tone.

"She wrote a very amusing and graphic diary of what was going on in social circles," Marisa answered. "I intend to use her diary to reveal the behaviour not only of Royal personages, but of Society toadying them up to the present day."

"You certainly know nothing of what is going on now," Kitty Berrington said sharply. "You would be surprised at what one learns just from the pages of The Times," Marisa answered. "Look at what was happening in the 60s! What about the nephew and heir of the Earl of Wicklow who died in a brothel and whose wife tried to pass off an adopted child as his next of kin? And Papa knew Lord Willoughby d'Eresby, Joint Hereditary Grand Chamberlain of England, who fleeced his French mistress of thousands of pounds and then ran off with her maid!"

"I do not believe it!" the Countess said in a strangled tone.

"I assure you it is true," Marisa answered, "and Lord Euston, son and heir of Grafton, made a disastrous marriage with a very vulgar woman and thought he was free when he discovered she was a bigamist, only to learn later that he was legally married, because her first husband had also been a bigamist."

"I cannot think where you get hold of such stories!" Lady Berrington cried. "And anyway that is all in the past."

"Is it?" Marisa asked. "What about the Prince of Wales' infatuation for Mrs. Lily Langtry? The letters he wrote to Lady Aylesford, which Lord Randolph Churchill threatened to publish and the Tranby Croft scandal this year when His Royal Highness had to appear in the witness box? You must have read what the paper said about 'the Prince's gambling, baccarat-playing friends'!"

"Will you be quiet." Lady Berrington began.

"And no-one knows better than you, Aunt Kitty," Marisa continued relentlessly, "that everyone's now gossiping about H.R.H.'s passion for the fascinating Lady Brooke."

"I will not listen to any more!" Lady Berrington shouted in a furious tone. "Do you realise, Marisa, that if one word of this conversation was even whispered at Marlborough House, George and I would be completely ruined?"

Her voice dropped as she continued.

"We would not be asked to any of the houses we visit now, and the Prince would refuse to have us included in any dinner-party where he was present. What is more you would doubtless be had up for libel, and we should see our names emblazoned all over the newspapers!"

"I promise you, Aunt Kitty, my book will be far too clever for that," Marisa answered. "There will be dashes and dots instead of full names, but everybody will know to whom I am referring. It is very unlikely that anyone will come forward to challenge the assertions I make, when a great number of them have already been aired in public."

"You are crazy!" Lady Berrington cried. "I wash my hands of you! It is all your father's fault. George has said often enough that if his brother had not been an Earl, he would have been a revolutionary or an anarchist."

Marisa laughed, a soft musical laugh of pure amusement.

"We call ourselves radicals. But dear Papa was very revolutionary and he hated Society."

"For a very good reason," Lady Berrington said with a spiteful note in her voice.

"If you are referring to my Mama," Marisa answered, "of course Papa was jealous and upset when she ran away with Lord Geltsdale. But after all, as he refused to divorce her it was not the sort of scandal that you fear, it was not headlined in the press."

"But everyone knew," Lady Berrington said, "of course they knew. George said he was humiliated even in his clubs at the things that were said. Your mother caused terrible family scandal, Marisa, and it seems as if you are going to try to do the same thing."

"Well I can promise you one thing," Marisa replied, "I am going to run away with no-one and as I do not intend ever to get married, you need not fear that I shall disgrace you by turning up in the Divorce Court."

"What do you mean, you do not intend to get married?" Lady Berrington asked crossly. "It is the best thing that could happen to you. Get married, Marisa, to the first man who asks you, and stop all this nonsense about writing books that will destroy us all."

"You mean it might destroy your social life," Marina said coolly. "Well, as long as you will help me, Aunt Kitt, I promise you I will take the greatest care not to do anything that might in any way implicate you or Uncle George."

"What do you want me to do?" Lady Berrington asked apprehensively.

"I want you to get me a situation as a Governess in some really important household. I want to see for myself how its owners behave. I want to be quite certain that the stories I have been told are true and that Papa was not exaggerating. You know how violently antagonistic he was towards the nobility, typified of course by Lord Geltsdale."

"Your father was a...