The Homecoming (9 page)

She rang the bell, and waited and waited while the clock began to chime out nine silvery strokes.

Wondering why no one was answering the bell, she opened the window and looked out. The west wing curved round and so she had a perfect picture of the duke, two horses, one groom—and Sarah Walters standing outside the house.

Lizzie stared. Sarah was in riding-dress. Her own doors were locked and no one came. And then there was that glass of milk. Her green eyes hardened. A stout creeper grew outside the window. Lizzie hitched up her riding-dress and climbed over the sill.

“It is very kind of you to offer yourself as a riding companion,” the duke was saying frostily to Sarah. “But I am sure Miss Beverley will be here directly.”

“I am always punctual,” said Sarah, “and cannot quite understand anyone who is not.”

Sarah was supremely confident that Lizzie would not appear. She, Sarah Walters, had thought of everything. If the laudanum had not worked, then the doors were locked, and if Lizzie rang the bell, then no one would answer it, for Sarah had remembered at the last minute that, of course, she would ring, and so had been lucky in finding the servants’ hall empty, as all were about their duties, and had cut the bell-wire which led to Lizzie’s room.

The duke had been brought up to be supremely aware of his great position in the social scale. Lizzie should not find him waiting. On the other hand, he had no intention of encouraging the pretentions of Sarah Walters, and he also found it highly suspicious that she should be so conveniently on hand and at the right time attired in riding-dress.

“I have decided that I will keep to my own company, Miss Walters,” he said. “Good day to you.”

“Oh, I see I will have to tell you the truth,” said Sarah, thinking quickly. “Lizzie Beverley sent me in her stead.”

“Why? Is she ill?”

“No, she said she could not be troubled. She would rather go riding later with Mr. Parkes.”

“Be damned to her,” muttered the duke. He turned to glare at the west wing and then froze. A slight figure in green velvet was climbing nimbly down a creeper.

He gave an exclamation and sprang onto his horse and rode until he was under that descending figure.

“What are you about, Miss Beverley?” he called up to her.

She twisted round and shouted down to him. “Someone locked me in my room.”

He dismounted and held up his arms. “I seem destined to lift you down out of shrubbery.”

Sarah saw Lizzie tumbling down into the duke’s waiting arms and with a little gasp of fright ran back into the house. She replaced the keys in the doors of Lizzie’s bedroom and sitting-room. Shaking with fright, she wondered what to do about the cut bell-wire. But there was nothing she could do about it. She went to her own room and sat there, trembling and biting her nails.

“I find it most odd,” said the duke, “that you should be locked in your room, that your bell does not work, and that Miss Walters should tell me that you had told her to go in your stead. I think we should both go in and confront her and then I will send her packing.”

Lizzie felt all her fury at Sarah ebbing away. Peter must find out for himself how awful she was. Poor Peter. And he would be heartbroken were Sarah to be sent away in disgrace.

“I think you must forgive her,” said Lizzie. “Miss Walters is under great pressure from her father, I think. You see, the Walters family do not know that the invitation really came from Mr. Bond. They think that for some reason you have decided to look their daughter over as a possible candidate to become duchess.”

“No one can be so vain or so stupid!”

“When it comes to the prospect of having a daughter who might become a duchess, most of the world can turn vain and stupid. I did tell Miss Walters that her invitation was due entirely to Mr. Bond, but perhaps she did not believe me.”

“But if your bell did not ring in the servants’ hall because she had cut the wire, then I cannot let it go past without saying something. Wait here. I shall not be long.”

The duke went to the servants’ hall and looked at the cut wire. Then he went straight up to Sarah’s room and opened her sitting-room door. Sarah was crouched in a chair by the window, her eyes red with weeping.

She gasped when she saw him and struggled to her feet.

“You have behaved disgracefully,” said the duke. “You locked Miss Beverley in her rooms, you cut the bell-wire, and you lied to me. I have a good mind to send you packing, although for some charitable reason, Miss Beverley has begged me not to.”

Sarah fell to her knees and raised her clasped hands to him. “I beg you, Your Grace,” she said in a choked voice, “do not send me away. My father will beat me.”

Squire Walters, for all his parsimony and verbal bullying, had never struck his daughter. He sometimes hit his wife when he had drunk too much, but so far had not laid a hand on his daughter.

The duke suddenly felt a great weariness and distaste. “I believe Miss Beverley told you that you had been invited here solely because of Mr. Bond. It is an invitation that I regret.” Great tears rolled down Sarah’s wan cheeks.

“There, now,” said the duke, relenting. “Your father will not get to hear of this and you may stay. But there must be no repetition of your behaviour this morning.”

Sarah seized his hand and kissed it.

“Please rise, Miss Walters. Such behaviour is undignified and does you no credit. I am not the Pope.”

Sarah got to her feet and stood before him, the picture of misery.

He patted her on the head. “You silly girl,” he said gently. “We will say no more about it.”

He strode from the room. Sarah sat down shakily. He had taken pity on her. He had patted her hair! They had had their first row. How they would look back on it and laugh! Dreams flooded her brain, which only a few minutes ago had been black with misery.

“I am beginning to wonder if Miss Walters is quite sane,” said the duke when he rejoined Lizzie.

But Lizzie was determined to be loyal to Mr. Bond and try to support this odd object of his love. “I think her parents’ ambitions temporarily overset her mind,” she said. “She appears quite a gentle, dreamy creature.”

“I think she has wasted enough of the day. Shall we be on our way, Miss Beverley?”

Lady Verity stood by the window of her bedroom, stretching and yawning. And then she saw the duke and Lizzie riding off down the drive.

She had not considered Lizzie any competition at all. Such an odd little girl. What was going on?

Her usually doting father had alarmed her the evening before by calling on her before she went to sleep. “Severnshire don’t seem interested in you, Verity,” he said bluntly. “You ain’t going to secure a duke, so if you take my advice, you’ll come down off your high horse and take the next offer you get, or you’ll end up an ape-leader.”

For the very first time it began to dawn on Verity that she might be left on the shelf. The invitation to the duke’s had meant to her that she had been right in refusing previous offers and so saving herself for the prize. That this prize might be snatched away from her by a redhead barely out of the schoolroom was past bearing. She needed an ally. Celia was her rival. But Celia might be of help in blocking the pretentions of this Beverley.

She rang for her maid and stood impatiently while she was dressed. Then she went to Celia’s room and walked in. Celia was fast asleep. Verity shook her awake.

“What is it?” demanded Celia sleepily. “Oh, it’s you.”

Verity sat on the end of Celia’s bed. “Something has to be done about Lizzie Beverley,” she began.

“Who? What?”

“Oh, do wake up,” said Verity crossly. “I never thought of Lizzie as a rival. But she has gone off riding with the duke.”

Celia struggled up against the pillows. “Well, she’s local. Gone to see a sick tenant or something.”

Verity got up and began to pace up and down the room. “I think there is more to it than that. Do you remember all the gossip about the Beverleys? How they plotted and schemed to get Mannerling back? And the duke watched her a lot last night, and then he drew her aside and began to talk to her. I think we have a serious rival there.”

“But what can we do?” asked Celia, fully awake now. “And we cannot both marry him.”

“Agreed, but unless we get Lizzie out of the field, then neither of us is going to marry him. Let’s deal with her first and then let the best lady win!”

“But how?”

“We must think of something.”

After an energetic gallop, the duke slowed his mount and finally stopped on a rise overlooking the market town of Hedgefield. “You are a good rider,” he said to Lizzie.

“It is a good horse,” said Lizzie, patting the animal’s neck. “The countryside looks beautiful today.”

Small neat fields lay spread out before them in the warm sun. A dog barked nearby and a flock of rooks wheeled up to the blue sky.

Lizzie looked at him curiously. His face was handsome but there was a hardness about the mouth and his hooded eyes, and yet it was not a cruel face.

“Why do you look at me so, miss?”

“I was wondering why you had never married.”

His silvery eyes glinted with sudden amusement. “Do you want to marry me, Miss Lizzie?”

“No, I do not think that would be a very good idea.”

“Why?”

“You are too…hard. Uncompromising. I feel that a wife to you would be another sort of servant, expected to do her job impeccably in return for your title and fortune. I do not think you would expect her either to argue with you or disapprove of you in any way. In fact, you would probably be shocked if she did so.”

“What makes you think you know me so well after such a short acquaintanceship?”

“I can recognize pride,” said Lizzie with a little sigh. “And who better than I to do so. The Beverleys were famous for their hauteur.”

“You are wrong in your assessment of my character. I do not cut worthy people, only pretentious people.”

“It is just that I think you do not really notice other people’s feelings.”

“And why should I? I do not ill-treat anyone.”

“But perhaps you might have to consider another person’s feelings were you to marry.”

“You are romantical. When in this day and age does a husband worry his head about his wife’s maundering sensibilities? A good wife obeys her husband and sees that his establishment is well-run.”

“What of happiness?”

“Happiness? There is enjoyment in good books, good exercise, and in good heart.”

“If I were to marry for that kind of happiness, I would be less than my sisters.”

“You are young, Miss Lizzie. You will grow out of such longings and fantasies.”

“But you did not have to.”

“I do not understand you,” said the duke.

“I mean,” said Lizzie patiently, “that having never been plagued with either longings or fantasies in your youth, you had nothing to grow out of.”

“Pert, but true.” Then that mirror image flashed before the duke’s eyes, that terrible old man, and he shifted uneasily in the saddle.

“How do you see me when I become really old?” he asked.

Lizzie tilted her head on one side and surveyed him curiously. “Very stately, still upright, grim-faced, autocratic. The glimmer of kindness which inspired you to invite Sarah for Peter will not return.”

“Peter? You mean Mr. Bond?”

“Yes, he is my friend, so I call him Peter, but not in company.”

“So you consider me unkind?”

“Unthinking.”

“You do not have a very high opinion of my character, Miss Lizzie.”

“I am being very rude,” said Lizzie contritely. “I do apologize.”

“You possibly do not understand me because of the difference in our ages,” he said stiffly.

“I do not think that is the case. Your aunt is very old and yet she has a youthful spirit. I converse with her on easy terms.”

“So you find me uncomfortable company?”

“A trifle intimidating, Your Grace, that I do admit.”

He smiled down at her, the rather harsh lines of his face softening, and she felt a treacherous tug at her heart. “Where shall we go now?” he asked.

“What is your pleasure?”

“I am thirsty. My pleasure is a long, cold drink.”

“Then we will ride to the Green Man in Hedgefield,” said Lizzie. “Normally it would not be quite correct for me to be seen in the taproom, but we could sit at a table outside in the sun.”

He nodded and spurred his horse and Lizzie flew after him, watching his tall figure and wondering why he did not tire of her company, especially after all the rude things she had said about him.

At that very moment, Peter was in a quandary. He was walking in the gardens with Sarah and listening in increasing dismay to her tale about how the duke had formed a tendre for her. She told him that she had been frightened that Lizzie would engage the duke’s affections and so she had tried to go in her stead.

“My dear Miss Walters!” exclaimed Peter when she had finished, “I beg of you to be sensible. A whole bottle of laudanum might have killed Miss Beverley. Have you thought of that? It is a miracle my master did not send you away. Miss Beverley told nothing but the truth. It was because of me that you were invited.”

She turned glowing eyes to his worried face. “Ah, yes, I understand that now. But if you could have seen the gentle way he patted my head.”

“Miss Walters, I beg of you to stop this folly. His Grace would never propose to you.”

“You are jealous!”

“I am distressed.”

I think you are mad, he thought bleakly. I must warn my master. What have I done?

“Excuse me,” he said abruptly. “I have business to attend to.”

But he went into the house and changed into his riding clothes. He was very much shaken. His darling Sarah had turned into an unstable monster. His master had gone out riding. He could not wait. He must warn him.

Farmer Moon’s daughter, Tiffin, was jolting along in a post-chaise by the walls of the Mannerling estate next to her acidulous aunt, Bertha, and wishing she were dead. Like many wealthy farmers, Jack Moon aspired to the ways and manners of the gentry. His wife had died some years ago, a sensible woman, and so there was no one to curb his ambition. He had sent Tiffany, nicknamed Tiffin, a sweet-faced girl with wide brown eyes and brown curly hair, to a seminary for young ladies in Bath. Tiffin’s schooldays were now over. Her grim aunt had been sent to escort her home. Already she missed the friends she had made at the seminary, but knew that because of their higher social position she would never see them again.