Helen was nineteen and full of life. She'd had a privileged upbringing in a large house, with servants and acres of garden to play in. Her mother Beatrice, Emily's mother's sister, had married a stock broker who'd died at a young age and left her a fortune. She'd never remarried and brought Helen and James up by herself. We've been invited to a party by Roger Carruthers, it's his twenty-first birthday. Do you know the Carruthers family?
No, I don't, Emily said looking at the gold colored card in Helen's hand.
Well, they are very rich, and all of society will be there. I know you are feeling melancholy about your father, but you can't do anything about the situation. You need to start eating more, you're so thin. We'll find you a beautiful dress and a lovely pair of shoes, and we'll go to the party and enjoy ourselves.
Enough Emily told herself. Helen was right, she couldn't change the situation, so she would begin to live her life. Do you have a dress I can borrow? All my dresses went into the auction when they sold our house.
We will do better than that. I'll ask mother if we can go shopping. We'll both buy a new dress and new shoes and new everything, Helen threw her hands into the air in a gesture of jubilation. Emily laughed, Helen's mood was infectious.
Helen somehow managed to convince her mother that she and Emily desperately needed a new dress each, and new shoes, and if mother could possibly afford it, new shawls. Aunt Beatrice was concerned about Emily and thought it would do her good to go out into town and be treated. Helen jumped up and down when he mother nodded in agreement. Can we go today mother, please? she begged.
That evening, Emily and Helen stood in Emily's room and looked at the spread of new clothes in front of them. Two dresses, two pairs of shoes and two magnificent shawls. Come on, let's dress up, Helen suggested. When Emily nodded, she rang for her lady's maid. When Jane arrived, she was confronted by two giggly girls standing in their undergarments. Jane was twenty-three and had been with the family for two years. She was from Yorkshire, a no-nonsense woman with a dry sense of humor.
Right, Miss Helen, stop dancing around and stand still, she said as she put the dress over Helen's head. It was a navy blue and made of satin. Helen raised her arms, and it fell down over her. Mrs Jones really has a good eye, doesn't she, Helen said of the lady who owned the dress shop in town.
She does. You look lovely, Emily said looking at the way the dress hugged Helen's large cleavage. Jane fastened the back of the dress, and Helen did some twirls in front of the mirror.
Jane turned her attention to Emily whose dress was red. Jane liked Emily. She was a sensible woman who had the same kind of humor as she did. Unlike Helen, who Jane found shallow and excitable, Emily had depth to her character. She was intelligent, well read and interested in more than parties. Whenever Jane helped Emily to dress, she was impressed when Emily talked about the situation in the Crimea and the plight of the poor. Jane also liked dressing Emily for another reason. Emily was a beautiful woman with a perfect figure, and she carried her clothes so elegantly. Helen was stocky, but Emily was tall and slender, with a decent bust and curvaceous hips.
Helen looked on jealously as Jane fastened the back of Emily's dress and stood away to look at her. You look very elegant, indeed, Jane said. Helen wondered why she hadn't said that about her. Emily looked in the mirror and gasped. The dress flowed over her beautiful body touching all the places gentlemen so admired. Emily liked the color, it was between deep red and maroon. The edging around the puff sleeves was the same color as her eyes, Mediterranean blue.
It was a windy April evening when Helen and Emily set off in the coach to the Carruthers residence. The horses pulling the carriage were restless, and they pulled at a rate the coachman didn't agree with. As he held them on the reigns, the coach lurched from slow to fast in sequence, throwing Emily and Helen around until they both began to feel travel sick. Helen leaned out of the window and shouted, Driver please, we are being thrown around mercilessly, kindly do something about it.
When they arrived, the two ladies clambered out of the coach, grateful to be on firm ground. Emily looked at the house. It was a large English manor house with a great lawn in front of it. The oak tree in the middle reminded Emily of the tree at their previous home in Kingston. The one her father had made a tree house in. A footman in a wig and breeches accompanied them to the ballroom in a side wing to the house. When they went inside, the party was already underway.
The ballroom was the most magnificent room Emily had ever seen. A highly decorated ceiling held six large chandeliers which she noted were swinging gently back and forth as the warm air rose to them. The dance floor was full of couples dancing in rings around each other. Emily so hoped she'd fill her dance card because she loved dancing. Her mother had taught her all the popular dances, and on the odd occasion she had gone to a ball, she'd received compliment after compliment about her dancing.