Courting Lord Dorney

COURTING LORD DORNEY

Sally James

Chapter 1

Bella twisted round in her seat and looked thoughtfully out of the window at the black clouds gathering ahead. She hoped they would reach home before the storm broke. Then her thoughts reverted to her own affairs. What did she really want? She had to resolve her dilemma before arriving at home. They were almost at the top of the pass, and in a few minutes would be rolling down towards Trahearne House, the large stone square-built house set in a deep valley which sheltered it from the worst north winds. It had been in her father’s family for hundreds of years, and named after them, although it had been sadly neglected since Mama died and Papa had retreated into his own world. Bella loved it deeply, however, as she loved the fells which surrounded it, and the river which flowed through its overgrown fields and woods.

As the chaise reached a stretch of level ground and picked up speed Bella came to a decision. With a brisk smile and a nod to her companion, she rapped on the panel and gave the postilion new directions. She would visit her cousin Jane before facing her father.

‘There won’t be time for visiting, Miss Bella, it’ll be dark before we get home as it is,’ Meg, the elderly maid, protested. She had been with the family long before her young mistress had been born, and didn’t fear to speak her mind. She had done so continuously for the first twenty minutes of their journey, and had subsided into an offended silence only when she realized that Bella wasn’t even listening to her tirade.

‘Don’t exaggerate, Meg. But we won’t be going home tonight. We’ll stay with Jane. Since Papa doesn’t know we’re coming he won’t worry, and Jane’s groom can drive us over in her carriage tomorrow. Stop being so grumpy.’

Not that he’d worry if he did expect them, she thought with amused acceptance. He’d most likely forget all about them.

Meg sighed loudly, but clearly decided she’d wasted enough breath.

Bella grinned at her. Meg knew she wouldn’t listen to anyone when she’d made up her mind to something. ‘Don’t fret, Meg, you’ll be home tomorrow, and then you can tell Cook all about it.’

Bella sank back into the corner of the chaise and shut her eyes, the better to think. She hoped she was a dutiful daughter. Indeed Papa, when he infrequently emerged from his obsessive study of Greek literature, often remarked on her compliant nature.

Perhaps, she reflected a trifle guiltily, it was because he was so withdrawn from the real world that he scarcely noticed her occasional lapses. He’d never enquired into the real reason for her governess, Miss Watson’s sudden and unexpected departure five years ago, for instance. If he had, and Bella’s action in forging his signature on her dismissal letter had been revealed, he would have received a severe shock. As it was, he’d accepted that at eighteen she had no more need of a governess, and since then she had run her own affairs.

This time the shock would not, she hoped, be severe. He could hardly fail to wonder why she was returning home so abruptly after a visit to Harrogate. He need not be told about the furious duenna whose lucrative employment had been abruptly terminated, the five disgruntled suitors whose offers she had rejected out of hand, and other hopefuls whose attentions she had equally briskly spurned.

If she had not been a dutiful daughter, Bella reflected as the post chaise crawled up the steep Pennine slopes, she would have deeply resented her Mama. If that lady had to die in giving birth to her, Bella heartily wished she had done so before settling on so ridiculous a name for her only child.

Rosabella, though a mouthful, was a pretty name, she conceded reluctantly, but she was not a pretty girl.

The name conjured up a vision of slender delicacy, golden hair which nature curled unaided, creamy skin with cheeks tinged a pale pink, and deeper pink lips. In fact, exactly like the portrait of Mama painted on her seventeenth birthday, a few months before her wedding.

Whereas she was dark-haired and brown-complexioned, too short, too fat, her eyes too large and her nose too small. Not even a besotted lover could call her pretty, let alone beautiful. And none of her would-be suitors had been besotted by her face or figure.

Her musings were halted as thunder crashed above them. The sudden April storm had caught them. Rain and hail stones clattered on the roof, and the coachman struggled to control the nervous horses who showed every desire to bolt. Meg clutched Bella’s arm and moaned in terror.

‘The horses will run away with us and overturn the chaise! We’ll be killed!’

Bella peered out of the window. ‘Nonsense, Meg! They’re under control, they’re slowing down and walking. And the sky’s lighter ahead.’

As the pounding rain diminished slightly Meg sat back, still muttering, and Bella sighed in exasperation. Meg was devoted to her, always had been, but she lacked common sense and Bella often resented having to calm her fears and control her sometimes annoying starts.

They were a mile from Jane’s home and the rain was still heavy when Bella glanced out of the chaise window and exclaimed in dismay. Once more she rapped on the panel and this time commanded a halt. As the vehicle drew to a stop she gathered her skimpy skirts about her and leapt nimbly down, ignoring Meg’s fretful demand to be told what in the world was the matter now.

Bella ran back a few yards until she could kneel beside a child huddled in the ditch. It was a boy, no more than six or seven, though his stunted frame might house an older lad. He was incredibly dirty and dressed, if having a few scraps of material clinging to his skinny frame could be called dressed, in a motley collection of indecent rags, and he was snivelling loudly.

‘I won’ go back, Miss! I’m ascared of ‘im!’

Bella lifted him bodily and thrust him into the chaise, ignoring Meg’s indignant protests.

‘Miss Bella! What are you up to now? What do you want with a scruffy urchin? And he’s soaking wet, he’ll ruin your gown,’ she added, pulling her own well away from the child, who was indeed wet though, his curly hair slicked down and hanging over his eyes, and his clothing clinging to his body.

‘It’s little Jed Tanner,’ Bella informed her maid curtly as she scrambled in after him. ‘He’s miles from home, and appears to be running away.’

There was a despairing howl from the child, and Bella was just quick enough to seize his arm and prevent him from leaping out of the chaise.

‘Stop that row and tell me what’s wrong!’ she commanded briskly, and recognizing a stronger will than his own Jed tearfully complied.

It emerged that he had been caught stealing hen’s eggs from the garden of his employer, Mr Josiah Ramsbottom, when he should have been at work in the latter’s mill mending the constantly breaking cotton threads.

‘Why did you steal, Jed? You know it’s wrong to steal,’ Bella said sternly.

‘I was ‘ungry,’ he replied simply. ‘E don’ gi’ us much food, an’ I didn’t fink ‘e’d miss a few eggs.’

‘You’re a naughty boy!’ Meg chastised him.

‘He’s no more than six years old, Meg, and working twelve hours a day in that awful mill!’ Bella protested.

‘I ‘as ter sleep there now, wi’ the work’ouse lot,’ Jed said, a sob escaping him.

‘With the children apprenticed to Mr Ramsbottom? In the mill?’ Bella asked. ‘What about your mother? And your sisters?’

‘Mam got caught in one o’ they machines,’ Jed whispered. ‘It cut off ‘er arm, an’ they buried ‘er last week. Sal and Bet were sent ter Liverpool, ter the work’ouse there, and I ‘ad to sleep in. I’ll not see ‘em ever agin.’

Bella put her arm about his skinny shoulders. He shuddered, but swallowed his sobs and went on.

‘At mill, they keeps us in a big ‘ouse, an’ mek us work all day. I ‘ates the noise! An’ they don’t gi’ us much food. We’m allus ‘ungry! An’ they meks us learn ter read an’ stuff like that what’s no good ter us,’ he added resentfully.

‘Well, you can’t run away, and live by stealing eggs. It’s not so bad with summer coming, I suppose, even when it’s raining, but what will you do in the cold weather? Your clothes are too thin. You’d soon die of cold and starvation.’

He looked at her, and the sheer misery in his eyes made her blink hard. He sobbed anew, and Bella, ignoring his filthy rags, gathered him to her and did her best to comfort him.

‘We’ll see about that!’ she declared. ‘You won’t have to go back, Jed, I promise. I’ll look after you, and we’ll find Sal and Bet too.’

‘But Miss Bella,’ Meg intervened. ‘What can you do with him? It’s not lawful to take away an apprentice! He’ll have to go back.’

‘But when I did summat wrong ‘e said ‘e’d send me ter work fer a chimney sweep!’ Jed burst out. ‘I’m ascared o’ chimneys! An’ they lights fires ter mek climbing lads go up!’

‘He won’t do that, Jed. Don’t worry. I doubt Mr Ramsbottom will take me to court!’ Bella said cynically. ‘He owed my uncle money, and still hasn’t settled his debt. Jane’s cook can feed you, Jem, and find you some decent dry clothes, then we’ll take you home. You can help in the garden for now. You’d like that, Jed, wouldn’t you? And we’ll go and find Sal and Bet, and somewhere you can all be together again. And you’ll have as much to eat as you want.’

‘Miss? Yer means it? Why?’

Because I’m sorry for you, she thought. Because I hate the idea of little children being forced to work twelve hours or more a day, and brothers and sisters separated when they have no parents and have to go to the workhouse.

‘Can you read?’

Jed looked at her suspiciously. ‘I dain’t like lessons,’ he insisted.

‘But did you learn to read?’

‘Bits, but what good’s that?’

‘It might help you to get a better job, when you’re older.’

‘Yer’ll not mek me ‘ave lessons?’ he asked apprehensively, and Bella suppressed a grin.

‘Not if you don’t care for it. Come on. I’m spending the night with a cousin, and she’ll give you some cleaner clothes, and a good supper.’

He smiled and sat up. ‘Cor, I ain’t never bin in a carriage afore,’ he said.

‘And ought not to be in one now,’ Meg said, breaking her offended silence. ‘Miss Bella, have you gone quite mad? He’s no doubt covered in fleas and lice!’

‘Then we’ll give him a bath and some clean clothes.’

‘ ‘Ere, I ain’t ‘avin’ no bath!’

‘You will if you want me to find Bet and Sal for you. Or shall I take you back to the mill?’

He snivelled, but subsided. Meg retreated into a corner as far away from Jed as she could get, and Bella was free to fume silently about the iniquities of the mill owners who ill-treated young children.

* * * *

Lord Dorney rode out of the short drive, thankful the rain had ceased, and pulled his horse to the side to let the carriage turn in. He hesitated and looked back at the house, wondering whether it was his friend’s wife returning. Though Philip Grant had been married for several years, their various duties, Philip’s in the navy, and his own in the army, had prevented meetings. He’d sold out after Waterloo, when his brother had died, but Philip was still involved in navy matters. A pity Mrs Grant had been out when he called, to deliver a book his and Philip’s importunate godmother had pressed on him when she’d heard he was visiting his small estate in Lancashire. He’d never met Mrs Grant, and she would have more recent news of Philip. It must be at least a year since they’d met.

He wondered whether to retrace his steps, whether it would be intrusive to call the moment Mrs Grant, if it were her, had just arrived home. The butler who had opened the door had seemed puzzled when he’d asked for her, but had simply muttered she was not there. Had he understood the message? He hadn’t seemed particularly bright. Perhaps he ought to make certain. Lady Fulwood would not have hesitated, and would call him a poltroon for doing so, but just as he decided to go back and make a brief explanation of his call, he was startled to observe an elderly maid, followed by an elegantly gowned young lady emerge from the chaise. She was too far away for him to distinguish her features, but he could see that her gown was soiled, clinging to her legs as though it were soaking wet, and her dark hair dishevelled. She seemed quite unconcerned as she lifted a small ragamuffin boy down from the chaise. Who on earth could she be, and what was she doing with such an urchin? She was too young to be Mrs Grant, who in any case was, Philip had told him, a blonde, and intrigued though he was, he decided it was inappropriate to become involved in whatever drama was happening. It was none of his affair, it was late in the afternoon, he had to decide whether to accept the somewhat paltry offer he had received for his house near Lancaster, and he would have to make haste if he were to reach the inn where he intended to meet his friend and stay that night.

* * * *

Jane Grant, Lady Hodder since her husband had unexpectedly inherited a cousin’s title six months before, lived alone while Philip, an officer in the Navy, was at sea. She had been out visiting a friend when Bella arrived, but reached her home almost immediately after Bella’s many trunks and valises had been transferred to the hall and the post chaise dismissed.