Never Call It Love (19 page)

He
needed to get away from her, as soon as possible, so as to sort out his feeling
about her. On the tenth, taking a sum of money with him, he was to meet with
some men at a Dublin inn. There was no reason why he should not go up there a
few days ahead of time. He would start out at daylight tomorrow.

He
sat up, thumped the bolster several times with his fist, and then lay down
again.

***

In
his bedroom off the opposite side of the gallery, Colin Stanford also lay
awake. His sister-in-law was not at all what he had expected. Somehow he had
pictured her as a plump, rather languid blond. Certainly he had not expected a
slender girl with glossy brown hair and clear gray eyes. Now that he had met
her, he wondered even more at the brutality to which his brother had subjected
her.

True,
he himself had known Anne Reardon, and been fond of her, and so he could
understand Patrick's bitter grief and rage over her fate. But still, to avenge
himself as he had...

Well,
Patrick had made whatever amends he could. Besides, Colin reminded himself, the
whole matter was something that should be no concern of his.

Colin
long ago had become reconciled to the fact that he was a bastard, and a
cripple. On the whole, he considered himself a fortunate man, with a number of
blessings: an occupation he enjoyed, plenty of books, and
the
companionship of the pleasant woman whose bed he often shared. Most of the
time, he was content.

He
found that tonight he was not.

He
groped for his box of flints, found it, and lit the candelabrum on the stand
beside his bed. Then he took a copy of Jonathan Swift's
A Modest Proposal
from
the low bookcase on the other side of the bed and began to read.

A
knock on the door, blending with the patter of rain against the windows,
brought Elizabeth awake. She sat up in bed. "Come in."

The
door opened slightly. Rose backed into the room, nudging the door farther open
with her hip, and then turned around. She carried a mahogany lap tray holding a
silver teapot and a teacup and saucer of pink china. "Good morning,
milady." With another deft nudge of her hip, she sent the door swinging
closed. Then she moved to the bed and placed the tray across Elizabeth's lap.

"Thank
you, Rose." As she poured the fragrant brew, Elizabeth saw her reflection
in the teapot's rounded side. "How beautifully this silver is
polished."

Rose
beamed. "I did it myself, this morning. And I have something else for you,
milady." She plunged a hand into the pocket of her black dress and then
laid a folded and sealed sheet of paper on the tray. "From Sir Patrick.
Gave it to me himself, he did, just before he left."

"Left?"

"For
Dublin. He rode off two hours ago."

"In
the rain?"

Rose
laughed. "If the Irish let rain keep us home, we would almost never stir
out-of-doors."

Hands
respectfully folded, she waited at the foot of the bed, hoping that Lady
Stanford would open the note. She felt concern as well as curiosity. It was
strange that Sir Patrick should ride off like that the morning after he had
brought his bride to her new home, and such a lovely bride, too. Had they
quarreled last night? Rose hoped not.

"You
mustn't wait," Elizabeth said, smiling. "I like to take my time over
morning tea."

When
the door closed behind the reluctant Rose, Elizabeth broke the seal on the
note. With neither salutation nor signature, it said, "I shall be away for
about a week. I trust Mrs. Corcoran will do everything possible to make you
comfortable."

Elizabeth
felt annoyed, and wondered why. True, his message was curt to the point of
rudeness. But she ought to welcome the news that tonight she and his pleasant
brother would dine alone, with no glowering Patrick at the end of the long
table.

Rain
fell most of that day, and for nearly a week thereafter. Elizabeth did not
mind. She had much to occupy her indoors. With Mrs. Corcoran, she toured the
house from attic to scullery, and looked into each of Stanford Hall's forty-odd
rooms. Many of them, unused for about a century, were so filled with rotting
fabrics and cobwebs that Elizabeth abandoned all thought of having them
cleaned. But there was much that she could accomplish. Before the week was out,
the huge chandelier in the entrance hall had been taken down by two footmen
working from tall ladders, disassembled, washed, and then, when put back
together again, hung from its long iron chain. Windows had been washed,
fireplaces cleaned, andirons polished. Housemaids' caps had been mended, and
footmen
appeared with a full complement of buttons, all of them shining. She had been
prepared to hear a certain amount of grumbling from a staff used to an
easygoing bachelor regime. But there was only a little complaining, even at
first. And by the end of the week it became evident that the servants, as she
had hoped, had begun to take pride in the new, smart appearance of both the
house and themselves.

The
evenings were pleasant. At no time during her suppers with Colin did she ask
him why her husband had gone to Dublin, nor did he volunteer any information.
In fact, they scarcely mentioned Patrick. Instead they talked of farming,
books, and of the still-not-suppressed rebellion of the American colonists.
After the meal they would go into the library to leaf through the now-dusted
books, or to play chess. Although she never won, not even when Colin handicapped
himself by removing one of his rooks from the board, she enjoyed those games.

She
awoke one morning to see sunlight lying on the lovely old carpet. Delighted,
she went to a pair of the mullioned windows and flung them wide. A blue sky,
apparently cloudless, arched over a world that was even more brilliantly green
than it had been a week earlier.

Rose
knocked, and then came in with the tea tray. "A good morning to you,
milady."

"A
good morning to you, Rose, and a fine one it is." With amusement Elizabeth
realized that already her speech had taken on some of the rhythms, if not the
accent, of the Irish. "Will you please tell Joseph that I would like to
ride this morning? I'll let him select a mount for me."

An
hour later, wearing a plain brown habit that was more than five years old, she
emerged into the rear courtyard. A pack of about a dozen foxhounds penned in a
kennel against the far wall, set up a chorus of barks. In front of the stable
door, Joseph stood holding the bridle
of a sleek black mare with one white
stocking. A thin man with dark hair, a long face, and prominent front teeth,
Joseph himself looked rather like one of the animals in his care.

"Here
she is, milady. There's not a more delicate foot or a softer mouth in all of
Ireland. And she's spirited, but not too spirited. Her name is Satin."

Elizabeth
looked with appreciation at the gleaming flanks, the slender legs. "A good
name for her."

Something
cold and moist touched the back of her hand. She looked down, to see a dog of
wildly mixed breed looking hopefully up at her. The curly black coat and tufted
tail suggested poodle. The ears, one erect and the other drooping, hinted at
collie. The friendly amber eyes, partially obscured by hair, might have been
those of an English sheepdog.

"Away
with you!" Joseph waved one arm. "Don't pester her ladyship."

"He's
not pestering me." She put her hand on the dog's head. "Is he
yours?"

"No,
milady. And I should have put him down before this. To tell you the truth, I
haven't had the heart."

"Put
him down! But why? Why should he be killed?"

"Oh,
milady! Two of Sir Patrick's prize bitches will soon be in heat. We can't risk
them throwing whelps sired by that one, now, can we?"

"Surely
you can prevent that from happening."

He
said, after a moment, "We can, if we take care. And if you have taken a
fancy to the animal, milady, there will be no question of putting him
down."

With
interlaced fingers, Joseph made a stirrup of his two hands, and helped
Elizabeth swing into the saddle. The dog still looked up at her, waving his
tufted tail and making eager noises deep in his throat. Elizabeth asked,
"Where did he come from?"

"I
think he belonged to a band of Gypsies who were
camped near here until about two
weeks ago. Somehow he got left behind. Off chasing a coney, I'll wager, when
the caravans moved on."

"Have
you given him a name?"

"Certainly
not, milady. Give an animal a name, and you find yourself getting fond of
him."

"Well,
he has a name now." She struck her riding crop lightly against her thigh.
"Would you like to come with me, Gypsy?"

Perhaps
he understood her tone and gesture rather than the words. In a frenzy of
anticipation he chased his tail for perhaps twenty seconds, barking wildly.
Then, as Elizabeth and her mount started across the courtyard, he trotted,
grinning, at the mare's heels.

Elizabeth
struck off toward the southeast, because Colin had told her that the nearest
approach to the sea lay in that direction. A few fluffy white clouds, scudding
before currents in the upper air, had appeared in the sky, but they only added
to the beauty of the day. Their shadows flew across grassy meadows, stone
walls, still-blossoming orchards. Elizabeth followed a narrow lane for a while,
passing a thatched cottage where a sow and her piglets rooted in the yard, and
then took an even narrower path across uncultivated land that sloped upward.
When she reached the hill's crest, she halted. From here the land fell away, in
gentle green folds, to the still-distant blue of the sea.

She
heard a scurrying sound through the long grass and small clumps of gorse.
Turning in the saddle, she saw a small brown shape bound down the hill's
opposite slope, a steeper one than that the mare had just climbed. With a
joyful yelp, Gypsy darted after the rabbit. "Come back!" she called,
but already he was at the foot of the slope and racing along a narrow gully,
invisible among the grass and bushes except for his tufted tail. Then even the
tail
disappeared, as suddenly and completely as if the earth had swallowed him up.

Puzzled
and a little alarmed, she dismounted. There was no path down the slope. Best to
descend it on foot. She tied the mare to a birch sapling and then made a
cautious descent, holding her skirt close around her to keep it from the spiny
clutch of the gorse bushes.

There
seemed to be a path of sorts leading through the gully. She moved along it,
calling for Gypsy. After a few yards, having caught neither sight nor sound of
him, she halted and stood undecided.

A
current of cool air touched her right cheek. At almost the same moment, she
heard a faint scratching sound. She turned and looked at a tangle of gorse and
tall Scotch broom just coming into flower.

So
that was it. Cautious of the gorse spines, and steeling herself to the
possibility that furry dark shapes might fly out at her, she parted the
vegetation with her gloved hands and moved forward. At the threshold of the
irregular opening, about five feet high, in the hillside, she stopped.

She
need not have feared bats in this particular cave. If such creatures had ever
lived here, they must have abandoned the place to human invaders, because she
could see no bat droppings on the hard-packed floor, not on the large wooden
cases stacked against one rocky wall. There were four of them, each tightly
secured with rope.

What
did they hold? Tea from Ceylon? Tobacco from Virginia? Whatever their contents,
she was sure no duty had been paid upon them. Smugglers had brought these cases
ashore at night, and then, through the darkness, carried them up to this
natural hiding place.

Elizabeth
felt no impulse to inform the authorities. Like most people, she registered
smugglers almost as public benefactors. To finance his Majesty's far-flung
wars, the government had raised impost taxes so high that, in England,
many otherwise
law-abiding middle-class folk knowingly bought smuggled goods. And here in
impoverished Ireland, surely most of the people would be without even the
comfort of an occasional cup of tea were it not for the smugglers.

Again
that scratching sound. By now her eyes had grown sufficiently used to the
dimness that she could see the dog at the back of the cave, scratching at some
hole through which the rabbit had disappeared. It must have been a small
opening indeed, because his body hid it completely from her view.

"Give
it up, you idiot," she called. "You'll never get that rabbit."

Evidently
Gypsy had come to the same conclusion, because he backed away, turned, and
looking sheepish, moved toward her. With the dog following, Elizabeth returned
to her tethered mount. She led the mare to a small boulder, and using the rock
as a mounting block, swung into the saddle. When she had ridden a hundred yards
or so along the hill's crest, she saw that the path, turning left, led down
over the gentle folds of green earth to the sea.