The Castle of Love (3 page)

"Well, he'd not met her, of course, but he started writing to her and she to him. During the whole year she was convalescing, they exchanged letters."

Sarah fell silent. Jacina waited. She could not understand why her heart seemed to be beating so quickly. She watched as the old Nanny sighed and wiped her eyes with her apron.

 "So they were writing to each other." Jacina prompted.

Sarah looked dazed for a moment. "Who, my lovely?"

"Felice and – Hugo."

"Oh, yes. Yes, they were. And some sort of understanding was growing between them, it seems. Because when the old Earl became ill, he asked Master Hugo to declare his intentions. So Master Hugo wrote back promising to marry Felice. The old Earl told me about it shortly before he died. It made him very happy."

Jacina drew in a deep breath before she spoke. "And will they marry, Sarah?"

Sarah frowned. "The talk now is that it won't happen. 'What young woman would want to yoke herself to aninvalid', that's what they're all saying. But they're fools. Master Hugo is still a great catch. There's many a young lady of nobility round here wants him, if Miss Felice should change her mind. But she won't. Mark my words. The new Earl and Felice Delisle will marry here at Ruven before the year is out."

Before the year is out –

The blood rushed to Jacina's face and she looked away.

Why did the thought of Hugo Ruven getting married affect her so? After all, she had not had so much as a glimpse of him since that incident long ago when he rescued her bonnet.

From far below the open nursery window there came the sound of wheels on gravel. Jacina jumped up and ran to the sill. She leaned out to look.

Approaching the castle was a coach drawn by four white horses. Visible on the side of the coach as it swerved round the head of the driveway was the Ruven coat of arms.

The new Earl of Ruven was home.

 Jacina hurried down the stairs. In the Great Hall, the servants were gathering to greet the new master of Castle Ruven. Jacina saw her father and ran to his side. He glanced down at her and smiled but his eyes betrayed anxiety.

How would everyone respond to the sight of the blinded Earl?

The huge front door stood open. Jarrold the butler stood at the top of the flight of wide steps that led down to the driveway. He would be the first to greet the new Earl. He stood very upright as should befit his position.

The coach had drawn to a halt. The white horses pawed the ground and champed at the bit. They knew they were at the end of their journey and looked forward to mashed oats and the comfortable straw of their stables.

A footman, dressed in the Ruven colours of deep maroon and black, approached the coach. He pulled down the folding steps. Then he stood aside and with one smooth movement opened the coach door.

The first to step out was the Earl's valet. He turned at the bottom of the folding steps and waited.

From within the coach, a hand appeared and grasped the frame of the door. In one swift move, the Earl was out on the coach steps, straightened to his full height. So firm and unfaltering was his bearing, that those watching barely noticed him extend his right hand to the valet. The valet guided him down and then released his hand.

 The Earl strode with head held high toward the castle steps.

Jacina's heart missed a beat. He was darker and leaner than when she had last seen him, but the tilt of the head and the firm stride were the same.

The butler hastily descended the steps just as the Earl reached them.

"The first step, my Lord," he whispered.

For a moment, a frown crossed the Earl's forehead and the unseeing eyes seemed to darken. But he controlled whatever impatient thought was within.

"Thank you, Jarrold," he said. "It is Jarrold, isn't it?"

Jarrold bristled with importance. "Oh, yes, indeed, my Lord. It is Jarrold the butler here, sir. The household is in the Great Hall waiting to greet you."

"Good. Then remind me, Jarrold. How many steps are here before me?"

"Just five, my Lord."

"Thank you," said the Earl.

He ascended the steps without a stumble and passed into the Great Hall.

There was a stir amongst the waiting household. The mouths of the younger maids, those who had not been at the castle when Hugo was a young man, dropped open when they saw him. He was so tall and his shoulders so broad. His features were proud and even haughty, but he had the firm jaw of a man who kept his passions under control. His brow was dark and there was the hint of a sardonic twist to the full, red mouth.

His eyes were black and liquid. Their unseeing gaze was disconcerting.

Jacina thought how tired he must be after the long journey, but he was most gracious as he moved along the line of waiting servants. Jarrold walked alongside him and told him whom he was meeting. The Earl inclined his head and spoke a few words to each person.

 Cook had put on a clean apron. Her round, rosy face beamed as he asked if her cooking was as good as he remembered.

The Earl was coming to the end of the line of servants. He was very close now to Jacina. She could see the lines of fatigue on his face. She also saw for the first time a scar across his brow. This was surely from the injury that had blinded him.

Next to cook was Nancy. She impulsively put her hand out as the Earl approached, as if she wanted to touch him and be sure he was real. The Earl seemed to sense her hovering hand. He caught it in his own.

"Nancy, my Lord," said Jarrold, with a frown at Nancy. She had overstepped the bounds.

"What, the little scold who used to help Sarah in the nursery, and scrub my head in the big tub by the fire?" asked the Earl with a lift of his brow.

"Oh, yes, sir, that's me, sir," cried Nancy excitedly. The Earl had remembered her! "Only I'm not so little now, you wouldn't recognise me if you saw me – "

There was a barely audible gasp from the onlookers. Nancy's voice trailed off in dismay as she realised what she had said.

The Earl dropped her hand. Only Jacina noticed the faint flinch that crossed his features.

"It must be borne," she heard him say under his breath. She knew it was meant for himself and not for Nancy.

Jarrold furiously motioned Nancy away. She scurried back to the kitchen, her apron over her head. Since Nancy had been at the end of the line, the other servants felt equally dismissed and started to hurry after her. They were eager to get out of earshot so they could discuss the events of the last few minutes.

 "My Lord," said Jarrold in a low voice, " I shall severely reprimand Nancy – "

"Jarrold," said the Earl wearily, "there are to be no repercussions."

Jacina understood what the Earl was thinking. There were likely to be many such blunders ahead of him.

Jarrold drew himself up. "Very well, my Lord. And now, it remains for me to introduce you to Doctor Carlton and his daughter."

"Let me take your hand, Doctor Carlton," said the Earl. "We shall not stand on ceremony with each other. I have heard a great deal about you from my grandfather's letters. You were a conscientious doctor to him and a firm friend. I believe you even beat him at cards!"

"Not as often as he beat me," smiled the doctor. "He was a singular gentleman and I shall miss him greatly."

"I should like to talk more with you." said the Earl. "But first I wish to change out of my travelling attire."

"We can return another time at your convenience," said the doctor.

"Oh, no, I mean you to stay and take some refreshment with me. If you do not mind waiting a little. I will change and then go and say hello to Sarah. She will be most displeased if I do not. But I shall not be long."

"We can wait in the library," said the doctor.

Jacina was standing by with downcast eyes. Jarrold had quite properly acknowledged her presence, but since that moment the Earl and her father seemed to have forgotten she was there. She was feeling rather as if she did not exist when she suddenly heard her name spoken.

"Allow me to present my daughter, Jacina," said the doctor.

 Looking up, Jacina saw that the Earl had turned his head to the right of her father and not to the left where she actually stood.

"My Lord," she said quickly.

Earl Hugo turned his head in her direction. She dropped a curtsy. He might not be able to see it, but she knew he would hear the sweep of her muslin skirt on the stone floor. For a second, she fancied she saw his lip curl in a faint smile.

She could not be sure, for a moment later he held his hand out for her to take and she felt the blood rush to her face. Hesitatingly, she placed her hand in his. It seemed to disappear in his strong grasp.

"Jacina," he murmured. "An unusual name. I do not believe I have heard it before."

"It was my mother's, my Lord," said Jacina, her heart flooded with disappointment. He had remembered the cook and he had remembered Nancy, but he had not in the least remembered her!

The Earl bowed over her hand and then turned back to her father.

"Let us meet in the library in half an hour," he said. "I trust you can entertain yourselves until then. What can I order for you?"

"We will wait until you join us," smiled the doctor.

Jarrold gestured to the valet, who had been waiting in the background all this while. The valet came forward. The Earl was tired now and grateful to put his hand on his valet's shoulder. His valet guided him to the foot of the grand stairway and the two figures ascended.

"Come, Jacina," said the doctor.

Together father and daughter walked to the library.

*

 An hour later the doctor and the Earl were ensconced in deep wing chairs, drawn up on either side of a fire that was not lit. It was still only September and rather warm.

A maid had brought in tea and biscuits for Jacina. The Earl had ordered a rare bottle of Scotch whisky to be brought up from the cellar. He prevailed upon the doctor to partake of a glass with him.

"I should not," laughed the doctor. "I have rounds to finish."

"Surely you will join me in a toast to my grandfather?" coaxed the Earl wickedly.

"Ah, now that I cannot resist," said the doctor. He and the Earl lifted their glasses and drank.

Jacina sat on the window seat, her hands in her lap. She could feel the warmth of the sun on the nape of her neck. She knew the Earl could not see her and yet she was still too shy and too sensitive to stare brazenly in his direction. The glances she cast at him were surreptitious.

He had changed into a dark green velvet waistcoat and white silk shirt. One hand trailed over the side of the wing chair. The other nursed the crystal glass of whisky.

What a silly fool she was, she told herself. Why should the Earl have remembered her? Even had he been able to see her, he could not possibly have recognised her. She had been a child of eight when he had encountered her and now she was a young woman of eighteen. Besides, for ten years he had been living a life of such adventure in India, that the mere rescuing of a bonnet would have paled into insignificance.

She, on the other hand, had remained here in the locale of Ruven, where over the years she had had plenty of opportunity to hear about Hugo and his exploits.

Hugo Ruven had been her childhood hero. No other

young gallant in the neighbourhood had ever quite matched up. Since she was sixteen she had had a number of suitors but none of them interested her.

 Her father laughed and called her a singular young lady.

The loss of her mother when she was ten had introduced a certain solemnity to her character. Helping her father at his surgery, accompanying him on his rounds and the hardships she had witnessed had taught her to curb her youthful wilfulness. She was neither a flirt nor had she a frivolous nature.

Yet she still had a sense of fun and she was very lovely to look at. The red gold tones of her hair were more muted but still lustrous. Her dazzling smile smote many a wouldbe suitor's heart.

None of this was of any consolation to her now that she was once again in the presence of Hugo Ruven.

What beauty she had was immaterial. He could not see. Her smile, her green eyes, her translucent skin – inherited from her Highland mother – were wasted.

Even if he could see her, even if he did then admire her, what good would it do? She was a mere country doctor's daughter, while he was an Earl.

He was also a man who was already engaged to be married.

Whenever Jacina pictured Felice Deslisle she pictured someone breathtakingly exotic. Felice was French. She was an orphan. She had spent her life abroad. She had endured the tragic loss of her first fiancé. She read deeply and obviously wrote such romantic letters that a man she had never met proposed to her. She was like the heroine of a novel!

Jacina sighed.

She had no right at all to yearn after the Earl. All she

could do was gaze on him from afar. This thought made her feel like a cat, hiding under a chair, gazing up at a King.

 "Jacina, Jacina, are you dreaming?"

She started at the sound of her name. "I am sorry, Papa. The sun here at the window is making me sleepy."

"I was telling the Earl that you are my little helper," said the doctor.

"I am happy to be so," said Jacina simply.

The doctor turned back to the Earl. "Most young women would flinch at some of the sights we see on my rounds. Not my daughter!"

The Earl listened quietly. "You are lucky to have her."

"She sat with your grandfather a good many night, when Sarah was too tired, and I was not available."

"I am grateful indeed," said the Earl. He turned his glass slowly in his hand. "Tell me, did my grandfather suffer much at the end?"

"I am happy to tell you that he did not. His heart just grew weaker and weaker. He was confined to bed for a month and died in his sleep." The doctor paused. "He was never the same after your brother's death. It was a mortal blow to him. He longed for your return."

"Alas, I could not resign my commission immediately," said the Earl. "There was a great deal of unrest in India. Lord Dalhousie had alienated many traditionalists with his reforms of ancient institutions."