"Translate for Her, She's Only the Nursemaid," the Countess Said — The Ambassador Bowed to Her
Chapter 7
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"Then Your Grace knows more than Mr. Pomfret.""Which is why I am uneasy about tonight." He looked at the dispatch box. "Lord Stanwick has prepared a toast. It touches on the war. It is well meant. If it is translated by a man who confuses milk with mother, I do not like to think where it may land.""I shall not be at the dinner, Your Grace.""No," he said. "I suppose you will not."The door opened. Lady Honoria stood in it in the blue dress."Marlow," she said, "Frances is crying for her book, and Mama wants to know why the nursery is unattended."The nursery was not unattended; Mrs. Bragg was in it. But Theodora curtsied and went past Lady Honoria, who did not move aside, so that the gray sleeve brushed the blue.And Lady Honoria said to the Duke with a bright laugh, "You must forgive the servants, Your Grace. Mama lets them wander.""I have not found that they wander," said the Duke. "I have found that they fetch books."By 8:00, the house blazed. Every candle in Berkeley Square seemed to have been lit in one dining room. The silver had been got out, the Sèvres had been got out, and the Countess of Stanwick in crimson had got out the one thing she valued above all her children, which was her ability to make a room believe she had been born to it.Count Zabelin sat at her right in a dark coat with a single star on it. The Duke of Calderwood sat at her left. Lady Honoria sat where she could be seen by the Duke across the epergne and spent the soup making sure of it. Mr. Pomfret sat at the foot of the table beside the Earl, ready, as he said, to be the Count's English voice, and drank a good deal of claret to oil it.The Count spoke French to the table beautifully, like any Russian gentleman. He spoke of the Tsar's health, and the London weather, and the extraordinary size of English horses. He was courteous, and he was watchful. He had been an envoy for twenty years, and he had learned to tell a house that wanted something from a house that liked him.Upstairs, the nursery was in a fever. The Countess had sent word that the younger children were to be brought down at dessert, washed and ribboned, to be shown to His Excellency as a family is shown. The Count had sent word that he would be glad of it, and would be glad of his own daughter, too.