To Win the Lady (2 page)

At that moment
Felicity herself appeared. At eighteen she was eight years younger than her
sister and tiny by comparison, and, though there was a family likeness if one
looked closely for it, it was masked by the elder girl’s masculine attire and
the younger’s pale frailty. Mrs Bertram looked from one to the other as Felicity,
in grey jaconet half-mourning, came forward and dropped a curtsy. ‘I am sorry I
was not here when you arrived, ma’am,’ she said. ‘I was visiting Mrs Wardle;
she is the gardener’s wife and helps in the house occasionally, but she was
taken sick two days ago.’

‘And is that
why this room is in such a parlous state?’ demanded Mrs Bertram, flicking a
lace handkerchief ineffectually over a chair before sitting on it.

Both girls
looked round the room as if seeing it with a stranger’s eyes; it had what
Georgie chose to call a lived-in look, but she could not deny it would have
been better for the use of a broom and feather duster. Felicity glanced at
Georgie with an eyebrow raised as if to ask who it was who had the temerity to
criticise someone else’s home, even if the criticism was a little justified.

‘Felicity, this
is our aunt Harriet,’ Georgie explained. ‘She has but lately arrived from
Brussels.’

‘Brussels! Oh,
were you there for the battle?’ The defects in the housekeeping were of less
importance to Felicity than news of the outside world. She plumped herself down
on a stool beside her aunt and leaned towards her. ‘How exciting that must have
been. Did you see it?’

‘The battle was
nine miles away at Waterloo,’ their aunt told them. ‘And that was certainly too
close for comfort. We could hear the guns from the city walls. But I did not
come to talk about war, though by the looks of this room there might have been
one here. Is the gardener’s wife your only servant?’

‘After Papa
died it seemed an extravagance to have a household of servants to look after
just two of us,’ Georgie said. ‘But there is Fanny, who is really a maid of all
work, bless her, and Mrs Thorogood, whom you met and who has been in the family
for years and years, and Mrs Wardle. Most of the outside staff have been kept
on because they are needed to run the farm and stud.’

Mrs Bertram
clucked her tongue and the plume on her hat nodded in unison as she commented
dryly that it was obvious where Georgiana’s priorities lay, but she would say
no more until her niece had washed and changed her clothes, for she did not
think she could abide the smell a moment longer.

‘My husband has
been a cavalry officer for the best part of twenty years and he would not dream
of bringing the odour of the stables into the drawing-room,’ she said,
wrinkling her nose. ‘And as for those dogs, why are they allowed in the house?’

‘Papa was
always used to let them in,’ Georgie said. ‘He said they were company for him and
they have grown accustomed to the run of the place.’ She looked down at herself
and then at the animals and conceded that her aunt had a point. She called to
the hounds and, when they went obediently to her side, gently put them out of
the low casement window, not withstanding the fact that they stood outside on
the terrace looking aggrieved. ‘I shall be back directly,’ she said, making for
her bedroom and the hot water Fanny had put out for her.

Half an hour
later she returned to the room in a simple grey sarcenet gown, and though the
colour did nothing for her, Harriet was forced to admit that her niece was as
comely as any young woman could be who spent half her life out of doors and was
prey to the elements.

‘Now,’ she
said, when all three were seated once more and Georgie was dispensing the tea.
‘It seems I have not arrived a moment too soon.’

The girls
looked at one another and then back at their aunt. Georgie’s spirits sank. She
knew she was in for a scolding and though she did not know what she could have
done differently she felt guilty and ill at ease.

‘What do you
mean, Aunt?’ Felicity asked innocently. ‘We know you could not have come any
sooner, what with Uncle Edward being in the army and the war and you travelling
with him and everything. How is Uncle Edward?’

‘He is well,
came through without a scratch, thank the good Lord. I left him in Belgium, but
now that pipsqueak Napoleon has finally been defeated he will be home in a
matter of weeks. I came ahead to open up the house in Holles Street.’

‘Did you know
that Papa...?’ Georgie gulped and made herself speak evenly. ‘Did you know Papa
had died?’

‘I received
your letter telling me of it, long after the funeral, of course, for it
followed me all over the Continent. I came as soon as I could to be with you.
Now, tell me all about it.’

‘He died as he
lived,’ Georgie said. ‘In the saddle.’

‘A fall?’

‘No, Warrior
would not unseat him. He had a heart seizure and though Dr Penreddy came almost
at once there was nothing he could do.’ She paused, remembering that dreadful
day and her own despair when she’d realised that the one person she had loved
and depended on above all others was no more and that she, being the elder,
must stifle her own misery to comfort and care for her sister. ‘I think Papa
would have approved of his end.’

‘What provision
did he make for you girls? Where are you to live?’

‘Live?’ queried
Georgiana. ‘Why, here, of course. It is our home.’

‘Alone? It is
out of the question.’

‘We are not
alone. We have servants. And it was Papa’s wish.’

The reading of
the will had taken only a few minutes and had shocked even Georgie, who was
used to her father’s idiosyncrasies. All Sir Henry’s assets were tied up in the
stud farm and he had left them solely to his elder daughter, just as if she had
been a son, and adjured her to take care of her sister, who was left only a
small annuity. Old Benson, who had been her father’s lawyer since time began,
had been embarrassed and unhappy, but Georgie had cheerfully told him she would
manage. And manage she had, but it was still a struggle. No one wanted to buy
horses from a woman and by continuing to live alone the girls had put
themselves beyond the pale as far as social visits were concerned.

‘He must have
been queer in the attic,’ Mrs Bertram said crisply. ‘How can you expect to find
husbands tucked away in the country with no one to bring you out?’

‘Aunt, I am six
and twenty - well past the age when I need bringing out,’ Georgie said. ‘And as
for Felicity, I shall bring her out myself, just as soon as I can come about.’

‘Come about?
What do you mean by that? Have you not been well provided for?’

‘Yes, Aunt,’
Georgiana said, determined to remain calm. ‘Papa left the house and farm and
all the horses to me. It is up to me to make a living for both of us from it. I
am saving hard to give Felicity a Season and a dowry, but when everyone thought
the war had ended last year the demand for horses fell. Not that I liked the
thought of any of our horses being killed, but...’

‘Child! You are
surely not trying to run a commercial undertaking?’ There was horror and
disbelief in her voice.

‘Of course I
am. How else can we live? Papa taught me how. Ever since I was big enough to
totter to the stables and sit in a saddle, he had me by his side and talked to
me about what he was doing. He has made me into a good judge of horseflesh.
Felicity manages the house and I look after everything out of doors. We have
been doing it for twelve months now.’

‘Good heavens!’
was all Mrs Bertram could manage, and again, after a pause, ‘Good heavens!’

‘I am going to
breed racehorses,’ Georgie said. ‘With the end of the war and so many of the
officers coming home, they will be looking for recreation, and as most are very
fond of a wager I think racing will take an upturn. Papa thought so, for he was
far-seeing enough to keep Grecian Warrior instead of selling him when he could
easily have done so and he bought a couple of good brood mares. You met Royal
Lady, didn’t you? Warrior Princess is her fifth foal.’

Mrs Bertram
seemed to be beyond words. She sat and stared at her niece as if she had gone
mad.

‘We are
managing very well,’ Felicity said in defence of her sister. ‘Georgie knows
what she is doing.’

‘Give me leave
to doubt that,’ Mrs Bertram said. ‘She cannot know that she is condemning you both
to a reputation for being eccentric or she would not countenance such a life.
Eccentric women do not make good marriages - in fact they rarely marry at all
unless it be to someone equally touched in the attic. I should have thought
that you, Georgie, were old enough and sensible enough to realise that.’

‘What else
could we do?’ Georgie asked.

‘Sell up. Buy
an annuity and live in gentility...’

‘Sell Rowan
Park?’ Georgie exclaimed. ‘We could not do that. Papa would turn in his
grave...’

‘It is a pity my
brother could not see he had a couple of females on his hands and not boys,’
Mrs Bertram said with some asperity. ‘He always did treat you more like a son
than a daughter, Georgiana. I warned him years ago but he would not listen. He
said you would go on very well and there was sure to be a sensible, well set up
young fellow who would appreciate your abilities.’ She paused but did not give
either girl an opportunity to reply before going on. ‘He was as blinkered as
one of his precious horses over the pair of you. Now we must do something about
it. You will put yourself in my hands.’ She sighed heavily and made room on the
cluttered side-table for her cup and saucer. ‘I shall do what I can for you,
though I think it may be too late for you, Georgiana.’

‘No, it isn’t,’
Felicity cried. ‘Georgie is a wonderful sister to me, so capable and caring,
and she will make an admirable wife for someone.’

‘We’ll see,’
their aunt said, though there was doubt in her tone. ‘If you wish to keep Rowan
Park, Georgie, we shall have to find some gentleman interested enough to take
that as a dowry. A more mature gentleman, obviously.’

‘Some old
bufflehead!’ exclaimed Georgie. ‘I would as lief remain single.’

‘And how much
longer do you think you can go on before the whole place goes to rack and
ruin?’

‘It won’t,’
Georgie said stubbornly.

‘Oh? You have
buyers and sellers beating a path to your door?’

‘No, not
exactly, but there have been a few. We have to give them time to become used to
the idea...’

‘That a woman
can run a business? Never! Anyone who did arrive could only be coming to gape
or gull you into bad bargains. You are not so lacking in wit that you cannot
see that, surely?’

‘Then they will
have their come-uppance, for I know a good horse from a bad one, so you need
have no fear I shall be gulled,’ Georgie said, and though it was no less than
the truth it did not stop her from recognising the accuracy of her aunt’s
assurance that men would not do business with a female. Those that had put in
an appearance had come out of curiosity or to try and cheat her, but when
they’d found they could not they’d gone away empty-handed. It might have given
her a sense of satisfaction, if it had not also meant that business was lost.

‘Late in the
Season as it is, you will come back to London with me, the pair of you, and I
will endeavour to introduce you to all the eligibles,’ her aunt said. ‘Henry
has been gone a year now and you have mourned long enough.’

‘I cannot be
spared from here,’ Georgie told her, though she recognised that her aunt was
right. Tucked away on the borders of Hertfordshire and Cambridgeshire, seeing
no company but each other, she and her sister were becoming almost bucolic, and
though she did not mind that for herself it was wrong for Felicity. She had
been mothering her sister ever since their mother died many years before and
she was determined, now that Papa had also passed away, that she would be a
father to her too. And that meant giving her a Season and doing her best to
find her a husband. She had decided on that before their aunt’s arrival; all
Mrs Bertram had done was to bring the decision forward. ‘But of course Felicity
must go, if she would like to. I am very grateful to you for offering to
sponsor her, for I could not have done it before next year at the earliest.
Neither do I have your contacts; you can open doors I never could.’

‘I should like
that above everything,’ Felicity said, trying to keep the eagerness from her
voice for her sister’s sake. ‘But I do not want to leave you here alone.’

‘I shan’t be
alone. There are servants and outside staff and more than enough to keep me
occupied. And there is the new filly...’

‘A filly?’
Felicity asked eagerly. ‘Oh, how wonderful! Did you have any trouble?’

‘None at all;
it came away as sweet as a nut.’

‘Georgiana!’ cried
Mrs Bertram, shocked to the core. ‘How can you mention such... such delicate
matters in the withdrawing room?’

Georgie
laughed. ‘It is hardly a delicate matter, Aunt, which is why I wear old clothes
for it.’ She turned to Felicity. ‘She is a little beauty. I’m going to call her
Warrior Princess.’

Felicity
clapped her hands and nothing else would do but that she must go immediately to
the stables and behold the paragon so their aunt temporarily gave up trying to
talk sense into them. She returned to the subject at dinner, by which time she
had been shown to her room by Fanny, changed her gown, inspected the house and
viewed the grounds from an upstairs window.