With All My Worldly Goods (5 page)

However, she was anxious not to be critical, and she thanked Miss Mickleham and assured her that she would be very comfortable there.

When she had been left alone, Leonora unpacked her few belongings. She put her various little personal treasures about the room, where they promptly seemed to become lost, and hung her clothes in the enormous fitted wardrobe.

She stared thoughtfully at the two or three dresses swinging in the vast spaces of the wardrobe.

“Heiress to seventy thousand pounds,” she said aloud. Then she looked at her reflection in the mirror and shook her head. It didn’t seem any more real simply because she put it into words.

It was just as dreamlike as everything else in her life now.

Oh, if only she
could
wake up and find it was all a dream, she thought passionately. Find that she was still in the train on the way to Southampton. She would willingly have given every penny of the seventy thousand pounds in exchange for the certainty that she was on her way to meet her father once more.

Leonora sat down slowly at the writing desk by the window. And then the remembrance of the journey to Southampton and the sight of a writing-pad on the desk combined to bring the comforting thought that there was always Martin—and she could write to him and tell him everything.

It was quite easy describing the actual events. Her pen flew over the paper. But it was when she came to write about her guardian that she began to find it difficult to put her thoughts into words.

“In a way, he is terribly attractive,”
she wrote. That at least was true.
“And even when he is horrid, I don’t know that he exactly means to be.”
She was not so sure about the accuracy of that and, after sucking the top of her pen thoughtfully, she decided to modify it.
“That is to say—I think, for some reason, he is not a very happy person, and that makes him hard. He is a man of terrifically strong personality, and I suppose that’s why you can’t help noticing everything about him in a slightly exaggerated degree.

“To be quite frank, at the moment I would just as soon never have to see him again. But from one or two little things that have happened, I have an idea that he is a person you might like immensely if you had to get to know him better. So, since it seems I must go on living in this house, I am hoping we shall end by liking each other very well.

“If not, I’m afraid it will be a case of hating each other most cordially, for I don’t think half measures are possible with him.”

Leonora read over what she had written, and wondered a little guiltily if she had been altogether too eager to put her feelings on paper. But if she could not write frankly to Martin, what
could
she do? For there was absolutely no one with whom she could talk things over.

In the end she wrote a hasty last paragraph, signed herself simply “Yours—Leonora,” and despatched the letter without alteration. And, once it was safely out of the house and in the pillar box, she felt much better about it.

During the next few days, Leonora did her utmost to adjust herself to the change in her life. By nature, she was eager to please and eager to be loved. “But there doesn’t seem a great deal to get hold of here,” she thought worriedly.

Miss Mickleham was quite likeable but scarcely lovable and her brother—Well, of course, one didn’t think the word “lovable” in connection with Bruce Mickleham either. But there was some quality about him that made him vital and disturbingly interesting.

From Martin she received a letter by return post It was full of sympathy—rather indignant sympathy—and was a great deal more affectionate than Leonora had let herself expect.

She read the letter several times, and each time she dared to look into a not too distant future in which Martin played a very large part, and Bruce Mickleham no part whatever.

“I hate to take your thoughts from anything so obviously pleasant, Lora—”

“What?” Lora looked up quickly, to find her guardian watching her rather amusedly across the breakfast table. She flushed deeply, and then could have kicked herself.

“What is it you want?” she asked a little coldly, as she folded Martin’s letter and put it back again in the envelope.

“If you are free this morning”—he paused politely, although he must know that she was singularly without engagements—“I think it would be just as well if you came with me to the lawyer.”

“Why?”

“Well, don’t you think you had better know just
how
you stand financially? Inspect your father’s papers—and my credentials, too, come to that. They haven’t all arrived yet, of course, but there is plenty for you to see to, you know.”

“I see,” Leonora said slowly. “I hadn’t thought—Oh, well, I suppose there are a lot of tiresome formalities?”

“A good many, I am afraid,” her guardian admitted, still slightly amused, she could see. “You take rather too much on trust, Lora. Now you are a woman of property you must develop a more worldly outlook.
I
might be an impostor, for all you know.”

“Oh—” Leonora looked at him thoughtfully. “I don’t think you’re
that,
somehow,” she said with rather naive emphasis.

“Many unpleasant things, but not that?” he suggested, in amplification of her remark.

Leonora bit her lip and looked slightly confused.

“Well, I’m not, as a matter of fact,” he told her coolly, as he got up from the table. “But don’t forget there are adventurers about, my child—even if they write the most charming of letters.”

“How dare you!” she exclaimed angrily, lifting her flushed face to his.

“I really don’t know,” he said with a smile, and he just touched her cheek again in that electrifying manner, before he turned away, leaving her wordless.

Leonora caught her breath quickly. It was extraordinary that she was unable to decide whether that touch was a caress or an unwelcome sign of guardianly patronage.

In any case, she resented the way it made her heart beat. And for that reason she tried to maintain a cool, remote manner to him during the interview with the lawyer.

But her efforts were not made specially easy by the fact that he seemed entirely unaware of her annoyance.

She was not a little surprised to find that it was the attitude of Mr. Meerwell—senior partner in the firm of Messrs. Meerwell & Roup, Solicitors—which finally brought home to her position as heiress to her father’s fantastic fortune.

Hitherto her only dealings with a solicitor had been when her aunt had died. Then she had just been Aunt Sophie’s insignificant little niece who wanted to sell up a houseful of old-fashioned furniture.

But now Mr. Meerwell’s air of genial but respectful congratulation established her unassailably as “a woman of property,” as Bruce had said.

The sensation was odd, but by no means unpleasing.

Leonora listened with great attention while he explained the meaning of certain share certificates, deeds of sale and so on. Some of it she understood. Some of it she certainly did not. But, because Bruce Mickleham was sitting there with that slight smile of amused interest, she tried to appear as though the whole business were quite clear to her.

It was a little disconcerting when Mr. Meerwell ended by saying: “But, of course, Mr. Mickleham will attend to most of this for you until you are twenty-one.”

She realized then that her guardian had scarcely said a word during the whole interview. It was as though he wished to leave the matter entirely between her and the lawyer, and not say anything that would prejudice or confuse her.

Possessed of a keen sense of honor herself, Leonora was touched and pleased at this entirely disinterested attitude. And at that moment she even found it in her heart to forgive him for his remark about “adventurers”, for she felt now that it was probably his own scrupulousness which made him critical.

When they were outside once more, driving homewards, she made an effort to put her feelings into words.

“Thank you very much indeed for—for taking me,” she said a little diffidently.

He looked surprised.

“It was a necessary formality,” he told her with a shrug.

“Yes, I know. But—oh, well, I suppose there are very different ways of doing these things.”

“Are there?” He laughed at that “Then thank
you,
Lora, for mentioning it.”

She liked him when he laughed, Lora decided suddenly. It was not just that she felt he was less disagreeable or anything. She did definitely like him then. In fact she could almost have explained about Martin.

But the next moment she realized how absurd that impulse was. And, in any case, what was she thinking of? she asked herself sharply. There was nothing about Martin for her to explain—except silly, happy thoughts which were entirely her own.

Then two days later, something happened which suggested that those thoughts about Martin had not been so silly, after all.

Leonora had been most of the afternoon in the library, which was her favorite room in the house. Not that it was any less gloomy than the rest of the place. But long, lonely hours in Aunt Sophie’s house had made her an ardent reader, and there were more than enough books here to satisfy even her appetite.

The servant’s knock brought her back from a world entirely her own, and for a moment she could scarcely take in what the girl was saying.

“Mr. Velnott to see me? Here! But he’s in the North of England. Oh,
Martin
!” For the next moment Martin himself had followed the servant into the room, without waiting for any further announcement.

Almost before the door had closed again she had both her hands in his, and was greeting him in a manner not entirely in accordance with the upbringing of Aunt Sophie.

“Lora, dear, I’m so relieved to see you.”

She laughed a little then.

“Relieved? That’s a funny word to use isn’t it? And, anyway, Martin, how did you
get
here? I thought your business was going to keep you in the north much longer than this.”

“Yes, it is—or, rather, should—” Martin broke off and laughed too. “I have to go back in less than an hour, but I just managed to wangle a dash here because—”

“Martin! Do you mean to say that you came all that way just for about an hour?”

“Well—I was worried about you.” He smiled and tightened his grip on her hands. Which reminded her that she was still letting him hold them. “Don’t be cross,” he begged boyishly.

“Cross! Why I could almost burst into tears this very minute because I’m so touched,” Leonora told him. And indeed her smile was not at all steady.

“Poor little Lora. Come and sit down, and tell me all about everything.”

Leonora allowed herself to be drawn down on to the settee, and although the “telling him about everything” did not amount to much more than a repetition of what she had already said in her letter, the relief of talking things over with Martin was exquisite.

“I don’t specially like the sound of it all,” Martin said with a frown. “It really was an extraordinary idea of your father’s to put a complete stranger more or less in authority over you.”

“I know.” Leonora sighed. “I still can’t imagine why he did it. It wasn’t much like daddy, as I remember him, to do such a thing.”

“You don’t think—” Martin paused. “I don’t want to jump to conclusions—but you don’t thing this Mickleham fellow used any undue influence with him, do you?”

“Oh no.” Leonora was surprised to find how positive she was. “There’s really
nothing
like that at all, Martin. I don’t like having to have a guardian—at least, I mean, a stranger for a guardian—but he is absolutely and entirely disinterested. Of that I’m certain.”

“Are you?” Martin seemed more doubtful. “You don’t really know much about him, and it does seem such an odd business.”

“I’m
sure
he’s perfectly trustworthy,” Leonora insisted, and for a moment she felt amused that Martin warned her against Bruce, just as Bruce had, in a sense, warned her against Martin.

Actually, she realized, she was as willing to trust the one as the other.

“Well, Lora, I don’t know quite what I expected to be able to do for you, dashing here like this,” Martin confessed with a smile. “But I felt I shouldn’t have an easy mind until I had seen you.”

“And have you now?” Leonora returned his smile very warmly.

“Not entirely. But I suppose if you say it’s all right, I must accept that.”

“Really,” Leonora said earnestly, “there isn’t anything to worry about I’m well looked after, and if I do have an occasional scrap with my guardian—well, one can get over that.”

Martin gave her a very affectionate look as he got up to go.

“I’m very glad I came, anyway.”

“Oh, Martin, so am I!”

She came out into the hall with him, reluctant to see the last of him.

“Good-bye, my dear. It won’t be long now before I’m back in London.” He seemed to sense her reluctance to be left, and to want to reassure her.

“Yes, I know. And I’m so glad of it.”

He took her hand.

“And you’ll be pleased to see me back?”

“You know I shall.”

“Bless you. May I kiss you?” he asked as he had at the station that time.

Leonora nodded and, bending his head, he kissed her very gravely. She returned the kiss equally gravely, and then stood at the door to wave to him.

As he got into a taxi, she closed the front door with a sigh and turned back into the hall.

It was then she saw her guardian was standing regarding her from the doorway of his study, his hands in his pockets.

It gave her the oddest feeling of startled guilt, which was followed immediately by quick anger that he should look at her like that.

“Do you want me for anything?” she said sharply.

“Not exactly.” He seemed entirely unaffected by her tone. “I was just wondering—in my capacity of guardian, of course—whether you always kiss your young men friends so fervently.” And he turned and went back into his study.

Scarlet with anger, Leonora followed him. She shut the door and leant against it, breathing rather quickly.

“We had better have this quite straight
now
,” she said icily. “Martin is a very particular friend of mine.”

“Quite so.” Bruce picked up a book and turned the pages casually. ‘That was really why I thought I had better mention it. In case you were thinking that you might perhaps marry him.”

Leonora was so astounded that for a moment she could say nothing. Then anger gave her words.

“And suppose I were? Could you have any possible objection?”

“Oh yes.” He smiled a little at the page in front of him. “I don’t intend that this—Martin shall marry you.”

“But you don’t even know him. What
is
your objection to him?”

“As a person—nothing at all.”

“Then do you mind telling me why you ‘don’t intend that he shall marry me’?”

It was then, and only then, that her guardian looked up and smiled straight at her.

“Because, Lora, I don’t intend that any one shall marry you but myself.”