A Poor Relation (8 page)

Aunt Hermione beamed. Millicent was receiving her due, and she herself was enjoying a certain triumph. A number of callers were there to see with their own eyes that Lord Farleigh was paying his second visit to Grove Park before honouring any other neighbours with his presence. Mrs. Berry-Browning had congratulated her and Lady Amelia Thorncrest was positively green with envy.

Anne had her own court, consisting of three young ladies and young Mr. Berry-Browning, a discerning youth who had known Millie since she was in leading strings. Rowena had met them all, but there were no free chairs nearby. She retired to a window seat, to gaze out into the garden and try to pretend she did not feel forlorn.

A few minutes later, Captain Cartwright joined her.

“Are you tired after your walk, Miss Caxton?” he enquired. “I took a turn about the shrubbery this morning and felt none the worse for it. I believe I shall soon buy a horse. Do you ride?”

“I love to ride. Before I came here I had the prettiest sorrel mare...”

“Rowena!” Millicent’s voice was sharp. “Pray fetch the Chinese puzzle from my dressing table.” She turned back to the earl. “It is an amusing trifle, my lord, though I expect you will soon see the trick of it.”

Rowena was seething with rebellion, but Miss Pinkerton’s training was too strong to allow her to create an ill-bred scene before guests in her aunt’s parlour. Avoiding the captain’s eyes, she trailed out. It took her several minutes to find the wretched trinket, a wooden octahedron made of several odd-shaped pieces ingeniously fitted together. She trudged downstairs again.

“Oh, we do not want it now,” said her cousin brightly as she approached the group. “You have taken so long we have got onto quite another subject.”

“On the contrary.” Lord Farleigh rose gallantly to the occasion and his feet. “I should like to see it, Miss Caxton. Let us take it over here where there is more light.”

A moment later Rowena was once again ensconced on the window seat, this time with the earl at her side. Millicent threw her a fulminating glance and turned to flirt with Mr. Ruddle.

“I have seen a similar puzzle, though that was a cube,” his lordship was saying. “I expect the principle is the same. Let me see if I can remember. Ah, here we are.” He pressed and pulled and the toy collapsed into its components on the seat between them.

Rowena smiled at his triumph. “That is the easy part, sir. Can you put it together?”

He picked up two of the pieces and turned them over in his lean, tanned fingers. “To tell the truth, I have not the first notion how to set about it,” he confessed with a laugh. “I hope Miss Grove will not be too displeased with me.”

“Not for that, at least,” she said cryptically. He watched in admiration as she quickly reassembled the octahedron.

“Like the puzzle, there is more to you than meets the eye. Show me how to do it, if you please. I will not confess myself beaten by a few scraps of wood.”

She had scarce begun to take it apart again when Millicent called a question to the earl. With a word of apology he left her.

She watched him. He was a splendid sight in his dark brown coat and close-fitting buckskins, broad shouldered, well-muscled, his dark hair slightly ruffled. What had he meant by his remark, that there was more to her than met the eye? At best, it indicated his lack of regard for her appearance, so it might be construed as an insult. She knew he had not intended it that way. He was a straightforward man, uncomprehending of deviousness.

She was prepared to wager that he had not recognized the spite in Millicent’s behaviour. He had acted out of politeness, and perhaps compassion for Rowena’s unhappy situation, not in disgust at her cousin’s unkindness.

The Chinese puzzle fell to pieces in her agitated fingers. In a mute gesture of defiance she left the parts scattered on the window seat.

The latest issue of the
Ladies’ Magazine
lay on a nearby table. She picked it up and was riffling through it disconsolately when a page of advertisements caught her eye. Among the pleas for governesses able to teach French, embroidery and deportment were several requesting applications from respectable, active young women to companion elderly dowagers. Clutching the magazine, Rowena slipped unnoticed from the room and went up to her chamber to write some letters.

Being a paid companion could not possibly be worse than living at her cousin’s beck and call. At least she would have a little money in her pocket, and surely a half day off now and then.

Millicent had deliberately humiliated her before a dozen people. It was not the first time, but today Lord Farleigh had been there. Somehow that made it much worse.

CHAPTER SEVEN

“People will stare if Rowena accepts any invitations.” Millicent helped herself lavishly from a dish of asparagus. “She is in mourning still, and for her father, not some distant relative.”

“I must not dance, of course,” Rowena said, “but I cannot think it would be disrespectful to go into company. I shall not be in mourning much longer.”

For once Aunt Hermione backed her. “A number of people have specifically named Rowena on their invitations, though they must know she is in mourning. It would be shocking to offend our neighbours by refusing.”

“I daresay the others meant to include her in the family,” Anne put in.

This drew Millicent’s ire. “Anne has not made her come out in London yet. It is not at all proper for her to go to parties before she has her Season.”

“You did,” protested her sister. “Besides, I am not at all sure that I want a Season, yet I do not mean to be a hermit all my life.”

“I am not surprised that you do not want a Season. Antidotes have a miserable time of it in London, watching everyone else dancing.”

This was too much even for Aunt Hermione’s prejudiced mind. “Millicent, that was unkind.” In her agitation, she reached for the parsley potatoes. “It will not hurt for Anne to attend a few informal gatherings. Indeed it will be better for her to be comfortable among friends before she is presented to Society, since she cannot expect your instant success.”

“Enough!” Sir Henry, who had been steadily eating his way through an extraordinary quantity of dinner for so thin a man, for once took a hand in his family’s affairs. “Rowena and Anne shall both attend those events to which they are invited and I don’t want to hear another word on the matter. Pass the pigeon pie, Rowena my dear.”

With a grateful look, she complied. Six letters of application had gone out in the morning post, but at least she was to have a chance to enjoy herself before taking up her duties as a paid companion.

“Thank you, Papa,” cried Anne.

Aunt Hermione patted Millicent’s hand, which was curled into an impotent fist. “You cannot want people to think you selfish, love. I know you are justly concerned for the proprieties, but it would present an odd appearance to keep your sister and your cousin mewed up.”

“Millie’s jealous because Lord Farleigh deserted her for Rowena for quite five minutes this morning, and Captain Cartwright was talking to me for half an hour. Mama, Rowena needs some new dresses. She does not have many and they are growing shockingly shabby.”

“Oh, dear, we shall have to find time to drive into Cheltenham, for there is not a decent seamstress to be found in Evesham and no choice of fabrics.”

“It is pointless to buy new gowns while she is still in mourning, Mama, unless she means to wear grey forever.” Millicent paused to consider. “Or perhaps that would be best, after all.”

“Oh, no, so depressing. But you are right as always, love—we had best wait until your cousin is out of mourning. As you said, Rowena, it will not be long.”

Rowena’s spirits sank at the thought of her drab wardrobe. As usual she would fade into the woodwork and Lord... everyone would ignore her.

Sighing, she finished her plum tart and followed her well-intentioned aunt out of the dining room. Another endless evening of sorting embroidery silks and turning music pages loomed ahead.

* * * *

Another endless morning of account books loomed ahead. Chris sighed and hoped for visitors. Quite apart from the inherent tedium of his task, he did not like the look of what he was learning.

“Why did you halve the rents on the farms?” he asked Deakins. “Let me see, that was just a year ago.”

“Aye, my lord, right after the old earl went to his reward. Mr. Verity approved the cuts. I wouldn’t take it upon myself to do something like that without approval.”

“Of course, but why?” Chris tried to be patient but the bailiff’s talent for roundaboutation defeated him at every turn.

“You’ll need to look back through the past twenty years, my lord.” He shook his grey head. “Never a thought of the consequences.”

“I have looked. Rents rose steadily.”

“Aye, my lord, and that was the problem. Oh, I’m not saying some increase wasn’t natural. Prices are up all over, after all. Something to do with the war, they say, but that’s all over now, with Boney safe tucked away on Elba, thanks to you and the captain and the other brave lads, my lord.”

“What,” said Chris through clenched teeth, “was the problem?”

“Why, I’ve just been telling you.” The man was surprised! “Rents went up so steeply the tenants hadn’t a penny to spare for improvements. You can’t just let farmland sit there, you know, my lord.”

“No, I didn’t know. What needs to be done?”

“Now that’s a long list, if you like. Put a shilling in, get a pound out, I say, and it may be a bit of an exaggeration but there’s truth in it yet. The late earl, God rest his soul, wrung every groat out of the land for his building and never ploughed a farthing back. You can do that for a while, my lord, but it tells in the end, make no doubt.”

“So I gather.” Chris had reached the end of his patience. “I believe I had best go and talk to my tenants.”

“You do that, my lord! Just what I was going to suggest. They’ll give you the straight tale without roundaboutation and glad to do it.”

His lordship counted silently to ten and went to find Bernard.

It was obvious even to Chris’s untutored eye that the farms they visited were in a shockingly dilapidated state. Since he had not thought to give notice of his inspection, the farmers themselves were out at the harvest. Their wives took one look at his obviously expensive curricle and greeted him with reserve. As they drove away from the last one, he ran his fingers through his hair.

“What am I to do? I cannot have my tenants living in such disgraceful conditions, yet when I ask Deakins what is to be done I cannot get a straight answer out of the man. I don’t know if it’s lack of knowledge or a simple inability to explain himself.”

“Have you considered that maybe he has been lining his own pockets?” Bernard knew his friend’s trusting nature.

Chris frowned. “I had not thought of that possibility. No, I doubt it. The books are well kept, and Lady F. herself admitted that her husband took little care of the land. Only, when I ride about, I see nothing wrong! The trees are green, with fruit growing on them. I need advice, dammit.”

“If you cannot get it from your bailiff, perhaps you had best approach your neighbours. There were a couple visiting the other day who own orchards nearby. Mr. Thorncrest, for one, and I believe Lord William Desborough also.”

“I daresay you’re right. I hate to make a cake of myself by exposing my ignorance to them.”

“Not so much ignorance as lack of experience. You would not hesitate to go to Beau Douro for advice on tactics or strategy. Thorncrest and Desborough have doubtless been bred up to the business. Better yet, they both have marriageable daughters so you will need no excuse for calling.”

“If I remember aright, Miss Thorncrest is muffin-faced and Miss Desborough is a trifle long in the tooth, with a laugh like a horse’s neigh into the bargain.”

“What’s that to the purpose? It’s their fond papas you wish to consult.”

“True, but it will be as well not to find oneself too much indebted to the fathers of such daughters! It’s a pity Sir Henry Grove grows sheep, not fruit. However, I owe them visits, and we have received invitations from both, so I shall scout the territory before committing myself.”

“No doubt Wellington would approve,” said Bernard dryly.

* * * *

The dinner party to which the Desboroughs had invited Lord Farleigh and Captain Cartwright took place a week later. The first person Chris noticed on his arrival was Miss Grove. Not for a moment did he suspect that she had chosen her seat to ensure this result. Nor had he an inkling that the debate as to whether to arrive early for this purpose, or late so as to make a grand entrance, had made life uncomfortable at Grove Park for days. He saw, as he was meant to, the shining golden curls, the blue eyes gazing meltingly into his own, the rosy lips pouting in sweet reproach that she had not seen him this age.

Under these circumstances it was difficult to tear himself away to do the pretty to Miss Desborough. When at last he succeeded, he found that despite her unfortunate equine laugh, she had a dry wit that made her pleasant company.

He really must not allow himself to be monopolized by the fair Millicent, he decided. As Miss Desborough turned to speak to someone else, he spotted Miss Caxton across the room, dowdy in her half-mourning, and went over to greet her.

“Good evening, my lord.” Though friendly enough, she seemed a trifle wary. “Your arrival in the neighbourhood has made a fine excuse for any number of parties. We less exalted souls can only be grateful.”

He laughed. “I am sure any newcomer in a country district must be cause for a round of entertainments.”

“You underrate yourself, sir. My appearance went quite unnoticed, I assure you.”

Chris was taken aback. He had thought her a mouse, and now it seemed he had a tiger by the tail. She intrigued him but he had no pretty speech ready to answer her wry comment. He was glad when at that instant dinner was announced.

“May I take you in?” he requested.

For a moment stars shone in her eyes, then she shook her head wistfully. “You are truly unaware of your status, my lord,” she marvelled. “As ranking guest it is your duty to take in Lady William. But I thank you for your kind offer.”