Evelyn Richardson (3 page)

The prospective bride was the only daughter of the Earl of Hunsford, a personage of enough importance to be known even in rural Somerset, and it was generally accepted that in marrying the only daughter of such an ancient and respected family. Lord Granville was making a most advantageous match. It only remained to see the lady in person to make this marriage the finishing touch to a man already loved and honored by his tenants and his neighbors.

Lady Catherine had not disappointed expectations. A decade younger than her husband, she was all that was charming, equally friendly and easy with the cottagers and the gentry, but retaining a touch of reserve that gave dignity to her youth and her position.

And if she was not so fashionable nor so much of an Incomparable as some of the more romantically inclined members of the female population had hoped, she was decidedly pretty, with large, sparkling, hazel eyes, a fresh complexion, and a lively expression that drew everyone to her. Her clothes were like her person, in quiet good taste, becoming rather than
a la mode
, but obviously of the very best quality.

In short, the countryside had almost instantly approved, and Lady Catherine Granville had soon become a much beloved fixture in the community, so beloved that when Lord Granville died and a new Lady Granville appeared on the scene, she was not welcomed with any evidence of enthusiasm, despite her outstanding beauty and the decided air of fashion so lacking in Lady Catherine.

It was this lack of enthusiasm which had prompted the new Lord Granville to move his uncle’s relict to the dower house as quickly as possible, isolating her as best he could from the devoted servants and adoring tenants of Granville Park.

However, removing a beloved mistress from the immediate vicinity had done nothing to improve the popularity of the new Lady Granville who, with her London airs and graces, had soon alienated even those initially attracted by her fashionable appearance. And the new Lady Granville had only made matters worse by declaring herself utterly bored with the country. She had soon returned lo London, leaving her husband to deal with the rustics of Granville Park as best he could.

“But you would still welcome the marquess’s niece as a pupil at the academy in spite of her father’s reputation, would you not?” Margaret broke into her friend’s reverie.

Catherine did not answer. Staring blindly off over the gardens of the houses around them she saw neither the graceful Lombardy poplars in the garden next door, nor the elaborate espalier on the garden wall of the house on the other side; instead she pictured an angular aristocratic face whose gray eyes glinted with ironic amusement and whose lips curled in a mocking smile except when they had smiled at her. Then the eyes had been warmed with the gleam of shared humor and the smile had been a private acknowledgment of the ridiculousness of it all.

Lucian’s daughter. It was not the reputation of the father that gave her pause. Oh no, it was something far more unnerving than that. It was the thought of his flesh and blood here in her world, the calm, quiet, orderly world she had worked so hard to create for herself after he had disappeared from it. What would happen to that world of hers if she had to see his eyes looking at her every day or watch his smile transforming the face of one of her pupils? What would become of that calm, orderly world then?

Chapter Three

Catherine dressed with greater care than usual the next morning, which is to say that she spent time selecting her gown. It was a plain round dress of black bombazine trimmed in black crape whose sole ornamentation, a white crape frill that stood up around her throat, only emphasized the sober respectability of her attire. She pulled her hair into a braid and coiled it on top of her head, but no matter how ruthlessly she pulled it back, she could do nothing to keep a few dark curls from escaping.

She frowned at her reflection in the looking glass—too youthful by half. If only she had a pair of spectacles to counteract the softening effect of the curls clustering at her temples. There was simply no help for it; she would just have to adopt a suitably severe expression and hope for the best. Primming her lips she tried to school her features into a look more appropriate to a headmistress but succeeded only in appearing what she was, a lively young woman trying to look older and more serious than her years.

Shaking her head at her reflection, she gathered up her bonnet and gloves and taking a last sip of chocolate from the cup her maid had brought her, headed down to the waiting carriage. However little else had been stipulated in her husband’s will, it had been left so abundantly clear that the dower house included a carriage and pair that even the effrontery of the new Lord Granville did not extend to denying her that luxury. She had taken full advantage of that provision to order the most beautifully sprung, well-appointed carriage she could from Bath’s finest coachmaker and had provided it with a team that was the envy of every whip in the surrounding countryside.

Surveying the magnificent equipage now she permitted herself just the tiniest smirk of satisfaction as she allowed John Coachman to help her into the carriage.

In the days following her husband’s death, Lady Catherine had felt so utterly powerless in the face of Lord Granville’s ambitions that she had savored every little victory she had been able to achieve, every scrap of freedom and independence that she had been able to hang onto in the face of his determination to cow her into subservient insignificance and respectability.

“The academy, my lady?” John helped her up the step and closed the door behind her.

“Yes, John, but first I should like to stop at the home farm.”

“Very good, my lady.” The coachman grinned as he climbed onto the box. His mistress could no more pass the home farm without stopping to see the baby than she could spend a day without taking a vigorous walk in the countryside, whatever the weather. And why shouldn’t she take pleasure where she could in spite of his lordship’s determination that her life should be as dull and confined as he could possibly make it?

A few minutes later the carriage pulled into the neat-looking farmyard and a liver-colored hound ran out to greet them, barking energetically. John had not even reined in the horses before the mistress of the establishment came bustling out of the kitchen. “Good morning, my lady. Come to see the baby, have you? Betty is just finishing up with the milking, but our Tom is feeling fine as five pence this morning, cooing and smiling with all his wee might. I never did see such a contented baby as our lad here.” She led Catherine into a kitchen filled with the enticing smells of baking bread and bramble preserves and stooped over the cradle near the fire from which came happy gurgling sounds, interrupted now and again with an occasional chirp.

“My, we are looking chipper today, are we not?” Catherine stroked the soft cheek and held out a finger to be clutched by one of the chubby waving hands. “I do believe he has grown since I saw him last.”

Mrs. Griggs smiled fondly at the cradle’s occupant. “That he has, my lady. It’s a right good appetite our boy has.”

“And Betty?”

“Merry as a grig and that grateful to you for taking her in when her time came. That family of hers…” Farmer Griggs’s wife shook her head resignedly. “To think that they would deny a child of theirs in trouble. You know me, my lady, I am as respectable as the next person, but when being respectable comes down to turning away your own flesh and blood, well, I am against it. But then the Wantages always did hold a very high opinion of themselves, and what with Mrs. Wantage giving herself airs because her daughter had become maid to a great lady of fashion, well, I say that such pride was well served when her daughter returned home carrying the great lord’s baby. But to turn her out in disgrace, a girl six months gone without a penny to her name, why, it is downright cruel, not to mention unchristian. I am surprised they can hold up their heads in church. And I shudder to think what would have become of Betty and the baby if you had not taken her in.”

Mrs. Griggs also leaned over to stroke a downy cheek. “And to think they would deprive themselves of this little laddie here, all for the sake of their precious respectability. I ask you, is there any one among us who has not made a mistake in their lives that we can be so hard on those who have?”

Catherine’s gaze traveled from the baby’s big dark blue eyes to his button nose and rose bud lips and, smiling, she shook her head slowly. “No, Mrs. Griggs, there is not.”

Even though this was the answer her rhetorical question had anticipated, the farmer’s wife was somewhat surprised at her visitor’s tone of regret. That, and the hint of sadness in her eyes, almost made it appear as though the young widow herself were thinking of some past indiscretion of her own. But it was impossible to imagine someone as levelheaded and sensible as Lady Catherine Granville ever giving in to youthful folly, or folly of any kind for that matter. In fact, it was difficult to picture Lady Catherine as anything but the perfect image of well-brought up gentility whose unshakable decorum could be counted on to carry her through even the most unnerving and distressing of situations with coolness and aplomb.

In fact, Catherine felt all her coolness and aplomb evaporating as she bestowed a last kiss on the baby’s cheek. Casting a reluctant glance around the cheery kitchen, she sighed gently. “Well, I must be off. I shall just stop by the pasture on my way out.”

Betty was just filling the last of the milk pails when she caught sight of her benefactress. “Good morning, my lady,” she called, her fresh, open face lighting up at the sight of Catherine standing in the gate between the farmyard and the pasture. “Have you been visiting our Tom? Is he not a dear wee thing? Such a delight as he is to his mama’s heart and so good. If you had told me six months ago what a comfort to us all that lad would be I would have thought you fit for Bedlam, but there, life is funny, is it not?”

Betty gave a final pat to the cow’s sleek rump, rose, and wiping her hands on her apron picked up her stool and her pail. “Nor would I have believed you if two years ago you had told me that I would be able to say that I prefer a simple existence in Somerset to all the excitement of London.” Her blue eyes shone suspiciously and she blinked rapidly. “And it is all owing to you, my lady. If you had not taken me in in my hour of need and let me help out at the dower house until the baby came, I do not know what would have become of me. Young Tom and I owe you a debt as we can never repay, and we shall never forget it.”

“Think nothing of it, Betty. I am only sorry that my household is too small to need another maid on a permanent basis.”

“Oh no, my lady. Farm work is what I truly love. There is something honest and true about it, hard as it is, that makes it more satisfying than waiting on the finest lady in the land, your ladyship excepted, of course. And the Griggses are that kind. I could not be happier where I am, nor more grateful. But now, if you will excuse me, our Tom will be wanting his breakfast.”

Catherine bade the young mother goodbye and climbed back into the carriage well satisfied that both mother and baby were flourishing. Indeed, as she recalled Betty’s proud smile when she spoke of the baby and the air of contentment she radiated, Catherine could not help feeling the tiniest bit envious. If she had been fortunate enough to have a child, her days would have been a good deal less lonely and a good deal more busy than they were now. Of course she had the academy to keep her occupied and the welfare of her students that required her attention, but it was not the same as having a family of one’s own to belong to.

And, an ignoble little voice in her head reminded her, if the child had been a son, she herself would still be at Granville Park and Hugo Granville nothing more than a harmless country gentleman living out his insignificant existence in a small manor house in an obscure corner of Gloucestershire. Ruthlessly Catherine stifled this unworthy thought, forcing herself instead to concentrate on the impending visit of the Marquess of Charlmont.

This man would expect an air of capability in the headmistress of the establishment to which he was willing to entrust the education of his niece. She must not betray any feminine weakness, no matter how much he reminded her of—no, she would not think about it, any of it, not her Season in London, not her husband, not the quiet years of married life. It was gone, all of it, buried in the past. There was nothing left but the present to attend to.

* * * *

The carriage pulled up in front of the graceful classical facade of the Royal Crescent and halted at the door of Lady Catherine Granville’s Select Academy for Genteel Young Ladies. The academy’s footman, her one concession to ostentation, hurried out to help her alight, and head held high, chin up, back straight, Lady Catherine marched in, prepared for any and all of the challenges the day might bring her.

Entering her office she pulled off her bonnet, removed her pelisse, stripped off her gloves, seated herself at her husband’s impressive mahogany desk that had been dismissed by the current Lady Granville as being too heavy and old-fashioned, and opened her account books. There was nothing like adding up columns of numbers to steady a person and take her mind off whatever worries might plague it. It also would not be a bad thing for the Marquess of Charlmont to see that the head of Lady Catherine’s Academy was a businesslike woman with a practical turn of mind.

There was a slight sound in the doorway and Catherine looked up as the tall, lean figure entered the room. The blood drained from her face. Her heart seemed to drop to her feet, and the pen slipped from her fingers, spilling ink on the neat columns of figures on the ledger before her. “Lord Charlmont!”

Chapter Four

Summoning every ounce of strength she had, Catherine rose to face him. The planes of the angular face were sharper, the lines of dissipation were deeper, and there was a touch of gray in the jet-black hair, but the gray eyes still held their ironic gleam. Yes, it was indeed Lucian Verney, an older Lucian than the one who occasionally haunted her dreams, but the same Lucian Verney, nevertheless.