Adam, p.1
Adam, page 1
COPYRIGHT
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without written permission from the publisher, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review or article.
Copyright © 2022 Sydney Jane Baily
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions.
Second Ebook Edition, 2024
ISBN: 978-1-957421-55-1
Published by Cat Whisker Press
Cover: Dar Albert, Wicked Smart Designs
Book Design: Cat Whisker Studio
Editor: Chris Hall
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Introduction to DIAMONDS OF THE FIRST WATER
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Epilogue
Introducing ... Lady Radiance
Other Works
About the Author
Dedication
To all those who see beyond
the shields we “wear” in one form or another
You know it is what’s inside that matters.
Introduction to DIAMONDS OF THE FIRST WATER
Once upon a time, an Irish family by the name of O’Diamáin emigrated to England from the north of Ireland, from County Doire to be specific. You may know the area as Derry or even Londonderry, if you are thinking of it after King James I granted the city a royal charter.
Felim O’Diamáin, who was the youngest son, sailed across the Irish Sea to make his fortune, bringing his pretty wife and two young children with him. As the story goes, they stopped on the Isle of Man for a perfectly peaceful night before landing at Ravenglass the next day and traipsing through the Lake District.
Another version swears they took the shorter but far more dangerous route north across the sea to Portpatrick, finding themselves in the southernmost part of Scotland. From there, if they indeed came that way, they headed east toward Gretna Green. Not for any quick anvil marriage, mind you, but to traverse the border to England.
No one knows for sure the veracity of either tale, nor particularly cares. Once they arrived in England, Felim did very well for himself, as did his descendants.
At some point during the twelve-year reign of George I, another O’Diamáin by the name of Liam was made an earl for his devoted service to the Crown. During those years in the early eighteenth century, King George also created a few dukes, at least one marquess, some barons, a single viscount, and other earls. But we’re not interested in any of them, although some may have helped to quell the riots that ensued when Hanoverian George outmaneuvered any pesky residual Stuarts hoping to claim the English throne.
Nevertheless, our interest lies with Liam. With his new earldom came much wealth and land, specifically in Derbyshire. And naturally, a title. However, George I, being of Germanic descent, didn’t find the Celtic name of O’Diamáin tripped easily off his tongue. Neither did he master Gaelic or Manx, for that matter. In any case, with a little persuasion and an extra thousand acres, Liam became William, the Earl Diamond, as his male descendants have been known ever since.
Over the years, the earls have enlarged the original house to be an impressive manor, always named Oak Grove Hall, which is the translation of their long-ago home of County Doire.
Generations later, while inheriting the earldom and all its assets, Geoffrey, Lord Diamond and his beloved wife, Caroline, have wealth of a different nature as well — five healthy children: Clarity, Purity, Adam, Radiance, and Brilliance. They are known as the Diamonds of the First Water, at least by their parents.
This is Adam’s story . . .
Prologue
Bath, England, 1851
Adam saw the small package slip from the grasp of the lady ahead of him. He might not have noticed, except he had been watching the pleasant sway of her hips as she strolled along Great Pulteney Street. Despite the attractive Palladian architecture rising up on either side of him, the honey-haired beauty had all his attention.
When the package slipped from amongst the others she carried, he darted forward, wondering why her maid who walked beside her wasn’t carrying more.
“My lady, a moment,” he said to catch her attention and get her to halt. He knew her to be one not only because her gown was well-made of a pretty summer cream-and-lavender cotton, but also because she had a lady’s maid beside her in the plainer clothing of her class.
At his words, however, she kept walking.
“My lady,” he tried again, feeling a little awkward as he dogged her steps, until the maid glanced over her shoulder before tugging on her lady’s arm.
At last, she stopped and turned.
Adam had been right to think her a lady. A patrician nose, amethyst earbobs, and an intelligent silvery-green gaze with which she took his measure confirmed his assumption.
“Have we been introduced?” she asked, as any upper-class female would when accosted in public.
“No,” he confessed. “And I never would be so presumptuous as to approach an unfamiliar lady upon the street except you dropped this.”
Holding out her package, he felt like a supplicant. Her generous mouth suddenly opened in an O of surprise. Then she nodded, but she didn’t move forward to retrieve it, remaining motionless as she stared at him.
Instead, her maid finally took the paper-wrapped item, which had felt like something light and frivolous. Perhaps lace gloves for a ball.
Glancing at her hands, they were ensconced in gloves that weren’t nearly as fine as the ones he’d imagined but perfectly clean.
“Thank you, my lord,” she said when she found her voice, wresting his attention back to her stunning face. “I would have been sorely disgruntled to arrive home and find I had lost my purchase.”
“Indeed,” he said, for he could think of nothing else to say, no way to keep her talking. Yet Adam couldn’t help wishing propriety allowed him to ask her name or introduce himself. But that would be too forward. On the other hand, he could let her know of his interest.
“I hope I shall see you again, my lady. Perhaps at an assembly one evening.”
She paled. “Unlikely, my lord. Again, my gratitude. Good day.”
Then she turned and walked away.
Chapter One
London, 1846
“Upstairs,” Alice ordered the two young ladies in her charge. They were spoiled by their mother. But they were also smart and eager to learn whatever Alice could teach them. They rarely talked back, nor complained when made to conjugate French verbs or practice the violin.
Today was going to be a geography lesson followed by a discussion in French, and as their governess of the past two years, Alice was proud of the girls’ progress. Their education had been less than satisfactorily handled by the ones who came before her. And their eldest sister, Susanne, who was now out in society and eager to marry, suffered from a distinct lack of learning.
Luckily, the young lady in question was also sweet and pretty, but Alice felt badly at how few significant thoughts Susanne had in her head. Moreover, she was unable to speak a second language, nor play an instrument. She was, in a word, uncivilized.
On the other hand, the eldest Beasley daughter had her entire life ahead, full of promise, with every door open and every opportunity still afforded her. Alice, taking her seat in the salon they used for lessons, had grown up with the best education money could buy, and her future had fallen like an unfortunate squirrel down a well. Despite being the only offspring of a depleted, nearly bankrupt earl — at low tide, as her mother called it — Alice’s prospects were now limited to working as a governess for Lord and Lady Beasley’s daughters until they outgrew her.
Then, with an ounce of luck, Alice hoped she would find another position equally fulfilling with younger children who would need her longer. Then she could settle into the next household, perhaps for a decade.
And after that? Maybe another situation of equal length before she could retire to the country in a small, tidy cottage.
It sounded pleasant. Not the least bit dreadful, dreary, and tedious, she promised herself. And after the drama of her own early twenties, she ought to be glad of a calm respite — for the rest of her life.
So why did she want to put her head into a pillow and scream, at least once every day?
“Mrs. Malcolm,” Pauline got her attention. “Would you please speak to my mother about piano lessons again? I think I prefer the pianoforte to the violin.”
“Since I cannot play it well,” Alice told her, “Lady Beasley would have to hire another teacher for your music lessons. If she is willing, then I will find a suitable piano instructor who will make you learn your scales and practice daily so you can become proficient.”
“Oh,” Pauline said before sniffing and sitting back in her chair, looking instantly disinterested. The girl wasn’t lazy exactly, but she did like to take the easy way whenever possible. Sadly, she had no innate talent for a musical instrument.
“Well, I prefer Mrs. Malcolm,” Pauline’s sister, a year younger, declared. Leila had a better knack for the violin. However, her French accent was atrocious no matter how well she handled the grammar.
Alice only wished she could convince Lady Beasley to allow her to instruct Susanne on the rudimentary knowledge she ought to have learned. The last time they spoke about it, Lady Beasley had been adamant.
“Susanne is the prettiest of my three girls. Thus, she won’t need the other skills necessary to capture a husband.”
Skills like basic mathematics, knowing Spain from Germany, or being able to have an informed discussion about anything other than textiles. But Alice had been forced to give up.
As if she’d conjured the buffle-headed young lady whose only interest was in fashion and how attractive she looked, Susanne appeared at the door.
“Mother has a favor to ask you, Mrs. Malcolm,” the brown-haired eldest Beasley daughter said.
Alice frowned. She was rarely summoned by Lady Beasley, who trusted Alice completely by this time with her younger daughters’ education. Rising, she considered the best use of their time while alone.
“Come up with a discussion you might wish to have upon traveling to the Continent or meeting with a visitor from France.”
“Is he a male visitor?” Pauline asked.
Alice, who knew how the mind of a female on the cusp of womanhood worked, nodded. “If you wish, then yes. Pretend you are the dining companion of a handsome man whom you wish to impress. Leila, you can be the gentleman. When I get back, you two shall present your dialogue to me.”
“Like a play,” Leila said with an enthusiastic clap, not minding being the male lead. “Bonjour, mademoiselle,” she said to her sister.
Alice nodded and followed Susanne downstairs to Lady Beasley’s private salon where she was writing her daily correspondence and taking tea.
“Ah, there you are, Mrs. Malcolm.”
She said it as if Alice had been off gallivanting around instead of in her normal place upstairs, tutoring the girls.
“You wished to speak with me,” Alice said, sitting without being asked. It was a nasty habit, but she had been born and raised as a titled lady. In her daily dealings with others, it was sometimes difficult to remember how far she had fallen in her station.
Lady Beasley briefly frowned at the governess taking a seat, but then she got to the point.
“I shall not be able to accompany Susanne to the ball.”
“Which ball, my lady?” Alice wondered at her ladyship assuming she had any idea of the social schedule of Bath’s finer people.
“Two nights from now at the assembly rooms.”
“I see.” Alice waited, wondering what it had to do with her.
“I would like you to be her chaperone.”
Oh dear! Alice tamped down the instant apprehension. This was her life now, hardly above that of a servant. And as if she were an old married woman or someone’s mother, she was being called upon to observe a young lady’s manners and protect her virtue.
If only someone had done that for her!
She would refuse. It was not in her employment description, and it would cause her personal discomfort to be thrust into a situation that was as familiar as breathing, but in which she no longer belonged. Moreover, in such a situation, there was the danger of being recognized.
Susanne had stayed in the room to listen. Now she spoke up with genuine enthusiasm.
“How fun it will be for you, Mrs. Malcolm, to see all the lovely gowns and to listen to the music. I know how you love music.”
“Nearly as much as you love gowns,” Alice said to her without malice. “However, I do not believe I can attend.”
“If additional pay is the issue,” Lady Beasley began, causing Alice’s cheeks to heat.
“No, my lady.” Although she would accept any extra wages since she saved every penny. The sooner she had enough, the sooner she could retire to the country — in twenty years or so.
“I only ask because I will, in fact, pay you well to attend my Susanne. I trust you implicitly, Mrs. Malcolm, not to be foolish or flighty or let my daughter take the smallest of risks.”
Alice tried to breathe steadily. Even if she could bear the reminder of her life that once was...
“I have nothing to wear to a ball,” she pointed out. The two women in the room would be surprised to see the wardrobe she had owned merely two years earlier. Gowns of satin and fine silk for dancing with dukes and dining with earls and even for falling prey to a debauched viscount.
“We shall take care of that,” Lady Beasley insisted. “If one of Susanne’s dresses does not fit you, then we shall go to the dressmaker on Pulteney Bridge. She nearly always has something already sewn that can be tightened with a ribbon or two at the waist. Luckily, you are neither unusually short nor unbearably tall, but as perfectly proportioned as my own girls.”
The comparison was nearly accurate except for two items. The Beasley females were on the daintier, less fulsome side of the scale, whereas Alice took after her own mother, who was exceedingly shapely when it came to her bosom.
In any case, at the mere thought of entering a ballroom, she was beginning to feel queasy.
“Is there not a close friend of yours, my lady, who would be more suitable, someone accustomed to the social life of Bath?”
“I wish there was, but on short notice, I can think of no one I can ask. Susanne could attend with a friend, but I do not trust that another girl’s mother will look after her as her own. She might become distracted. Worse, I have heard of someone letting a young lady stray with the specific intent of her ruin.”
Alice gasped as if she’d been found out. Susanne gasped at the awful notion.
“Mother!” she exclaimed. “Who would do such a thing on purpose?”
Lady Beasley sighed. “You are so lovely and naïve, dear girl. And you have a titled father and a large dowry. You can have any man in Bath or, next year, in London. Many others cannot say the same thing. Thus, your competition may try to get rid of you in any manner they can.”
Alice could barely breathe. Then, all at once, she blurted, “I shall chaperone her!”
Indeed, she would. Lord and Lady Beasley had given her employment on the basis of a fraudulent letter of recommendation and treated her with kindness. What’s more, Lady Susanne was all wide-eyed innocence. Alice would rather be flayed alive before she let the girl experience anything like what had happened to her.
The matter was settled. When she climbed the stairs to the salon, she could hardly credit she was going to attend a ball at her age, in her circumstances, as a chaperone!
Adam alighted from a sedan chair in front of his mother’s friend’s townhouse on The Paragon, a street running parallel to the River Avon. He thought the river itself, one of five Avons in England, to be an interesting phenomenon, winding narrow and long for seventy-five miles, yet only traversing nineteen miles westward from its source to its mouth, all the way to Portishead. It spilled into the Severn Estuary and the Bristol Channel.
Adam considered life to be much like the River Avon, or at least he hoped it would be — taking him through many and varied places and, of course, being many long years, like his grandparents, all four of whom were still living.
In any case, he liked to try new things, such as the wretched sedan chair, a box suspended on two poles. His mother had told him the chair used to be much in fashion in Bath when she was a girl, not only for the infirm but as a for-hire conveyance. Its popularity was currently giving way to a wheeled version. Thus, the Countess Diamond had advised him to try it before it vanished forever like the unfortunate dodo bird.
