A Battle of Brains (11 page)

*

That night he took her to dine with an old friend of her mother's who he also knew well.

As they entered the drawing room, Yolanda could see that there were six young men present beside her host and hostess and their daughters.

Suddenly she felt a sense of fear and it made her want to turn round and run away.

Then she told herself she was being very stupid.

How could she be frightened of these young men who were all gentlemen?

They would never behave like Cecil Watson!

Yet still the horror she had felt when he had thrown himself on top of her was present once again.

Then her hostess was saying very charmingly,

“It is so lovely to see you, Yolanda.  Your mother was such a dear friend of mine and I am so anxious for you to meet my family.”

She introduced first her daughters, then two of the young men who were her sons.

As they took her hand, Yolanda wanted to snatch it away and it was with the greatest difficulty she prevented herself from doing so.

‘I am being so stupid, foolish and idiotic!' she told herself angrily.

Yet when they went into dinner she disliked putting her hand onto the arm of the hostess's eldest son who was escorting her.

But it was his father, who said to her,

“You are the prettiest girl I have seen for a long time.  I cannot think why you have been hiding away from us for so long!”

It was difficult for Yolanda to look at him.

“We have been in the country,” she murmured.

“Well, now you must make up for it by being the belle of the ball at every party,” he said, “and undoubtedly all the critics in White's will be lifting their glasses to you!”

The mere idea of it made Yolanda shiver.

Then she saw her stepfather watching her from the other side of the table.

With an effort she forced herself to smile and knew that was what he wanted her to do.

‘I am
not
frightened.  I am not frightened,' she repeated silently to herself.

She was well aware that this was an inward battle that she must face alone without being a coward.

Two weeks later everything was different.

Yolanda had won her battle.

She no longer shuddered when a young man put his arm around her waist to dance and she could now accept a compliment without feeling shy.

She was an undoubted success.

Hostesses, who had paid no attention to her at first, fell over themselves to invite her to parties.

Everyone was talking about her.

As her stepfather had so astutely predicted, she was undoubtedly ‘the belle of the ball'.

There was only one somewhat unfortunate incident during the first week.

She had gone to a rather bigger dance than she had attended before and there was a garden at the back of the house.

She danced twice, or perhaps it was three times, with a young man who had interested her.

He had been in the Royal Navy and was telling her about the recent modern improvements that had been made to the ship in which he was serving.

It was very warm and when the dance finished, they went into the garden to sit under a tree where it was cool.

Mr. Garrack was sitting in the drawing room when Yolanda came running up to him.

“
I want to go home
,” she told him breathlessly.

He looked at her in surprise.

Then without asking her any questions, he replied,

“Of course, Yolanda, if that is what you want.”

She hurried down the stairs in front of him and they waited without speaking until their carriage was brought to the door.

Only when they drove off, did Mr. Garrack ask,

“What has happened? What has upset you?”

For a moment he thought Yolanda was not going to reply and then she murmured,

“The man I was dancing with asked me to marry him.”

There was a short pause, before he commented,

“Yolanda, I suppose you realise that is the greatest compliment you can be paid
and
the most expensive one.”

He paused to smile at her before continuing,

“After all, the gentleman in question is taking you ‘
for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, until death do
us part
'.  By that time you may be sightless, toothless and extremely irritable.  No man could offer you more!”

For a moment there was silence and then Yolanda began to laugh.

As her stepfather laughed too, she moved closer to him and put her head on his shoulder.

“You are quite right, Step-papa.  I am a fool, but he took me by surprise, so I ran away.”

“He will certainly not think you are running after
him
,” Mr. Garrack remarked dryly.

Yolanda laughed again.

“I just don't know why I am so stupid, but I am no longer as frightened as I was.”

“I do realise that, Yolanda, but I think that now you are such an overwhelming success, you will think as I do that it is silly to worry about anything in the past.  After all what is done is done and cannot be altered.  It is
tomorrow
that is important.”

“Of course it is,” agreed Yolanda, “and you must forgive me for behaving so badly.”

“It was getting late anyway and as I have to be in my office early tomorrow morning, I am actually delighted to be going home to bed.”

Yolanda knew that he was making things easier for her.

When they arrived back at his house, she kissed him affectionately.

“I am so sorry I behaved so stupidly,” she told him.

“Forget it, Yolanda, I think tomorrow may be very exciting for you.”

He made it exciting by giving her an attractive and very expensive present.

He knew only too well that he was spoiling her.

Because Yolanda was such a social success, she and her stepfather were invited to endless parties given by the most exclusive hostesses.

They would certainly not have been invited to them in the past.

In her new dresses for the daytime, as well as new gowns for the evening, she recognised that her stepfather was proud of her.

*

At the end of the third week, he said to her casually,

“Oh, by the way, Yolanda, we are travelling to the country for the weekend.”

Yolanda's eyes lit up.

“To the country!  How wonderful!”

“There are several new horses for you to see and there are three pictures I have just bought that I think will interest you.”

“Why did you not tell me before?” asked Yolanda.  “You knew I would be thrilled.”

“I could not go to the sale myself, but my secretary did well and brought back a Van Dyck, which I am sure will delight you, as well as two more by Stubbs.”

Yolanda clapped her hands together.

“Oh, Step-papa, that
is
exciting.  You know I love the Stubbs you have already and I did think it was a pity there were not more horses inside the house when there are so many outside!”

Her stepfather chuckled.

“I hope you will approve of my new purchases and they will certainly add lustre to my collection.”

“You have many fine pictures here in London.”

“They are the first purchases I ever made and to be quite honest I could have done better.”

“Some of them are very lovely,” argued Yolanda.

“But nothing as fine as those in the country.  I took a great deal of trouble to learn much more about art than I knew before – and I had a good teacher.”

Yolanda smiled at this reference to her mother.

She thought it impossible not to admire a man who could work so hard – not only at making money but also on improving his own brain.

She was just going to ask more questions about the pictures when he added,

“We are entertaining a guest this weekend and he is coming to see my Stubbs.  I also want to know a little more about his interests in America and the automatic air brakes that have been invented for trains.”

Yolanda looked at him wide-eyed.

“I am hoping that you and I will be clever enough to make him talk about it.  His name, by the way, is Lord Milborne.”

He was about to say more when his secretary came into the room.

“I am sorry to bother you, sir,” he said, “but there is a man here from the country who wishes to talk to you about the gas lighting you ordered for the servants' quarters.  I understand there is some difficulty regarding the roof.”

“I will come and speak to him.”

He left the room.

When he had gone, Yolanda stood where he had left her, thinking over what he had just said.

She knew Lord Milborne.

He was the gentleman who had been exceedingly kind to her father when they were living in Baden-Baden.

Her father was having one of his bad periods at the gaming tables and his luck seemed to have deserted him.

They had arrived in Baden-Baden after he had been gambling very successfully in Hamburg and they had taken rooms in the
Stephanie Hotel
, which was undoubtedly the best and the most famous of all the many sumptuous hotels in the town.

Baden-Baden itself was beautiful and Yolanda, who was then only fourteen, was thrilled with the stream running through it and the gardens filled with flowers and blossom.

She, of course, was not allowed to enter the Casino, but she was well aware how important it was in their lives.

The first night her father had won and they were all laughing and happy the next morning.

He took her mother and her to the races.  He won again and Yolanda spent an exciting time with her parents before she was sent to bed.

The next morning was totally different.

Her father had apparently had a disastrous evening at the Casino and her mother was trying to console him by saying that things would be better today.

Unfortunately things were not better that day or the next and by the third day her father was completely broke.

They were sitting out in the garden of the
Stephanie
Hotel
wondering what they should do next.

How, her father asked over and over again, could he pay for the rooms in the hotel?

Lord Milborne then passed by and greeted them.

He was a very good-looking man, Yolanda thought, perhaps a little older than her father.

It seemed they knew each other well – they both belonged to White's Club in London.

Lord Milborne exclaimed when he saw the Earl and his family,

“I was looking for you, Longwood.  I hear you had a bad day yesterday!  If you are intending to go to the races this afternoon I have a winner for you!”

He rose and walked towards Lord Milborne.

“I have a sad story to tell you,” he began.

“I believe that I can guess what it is,” replied Lord Milborne.

As he spoke, the two men turned and walked away along the side of the stream.

As they did so, Yolanda's mother put out her hand and laid it on her daughter's.

“I am praying,” she whispered, “that Lord Milborne will help Papa.  Otherwise, dearest we are in a terrible fix.”

An hour passed before Yolanda saw that her father was coming back to them.

By the way he walked and the smile on his face she knew that all was well.

He came to where they were sitting and bent down to kiss her mother before he said,

“Everything is all right, my darling.  Your prayers are answered and we will not be thrown out of the hotel or be forced to walk home.”

“Lord Milborne has helped you?”

“He has been very generous and what is more, he has given me the winner of the big race this afternoon.”

The horse had indeed won and they then spent two very happy weeks in Baden-Baden before moving on.

It was Lord Milborne who had rescued them, but Yolanda had not thought of him since.

Yet she realised now that she could not allow her stepfather to outwit him as she suspected he wanted to.

She had heard several people talking at the dinner table about the new automatic air brakes.  Everyone thought they would prevent the accidents, which kept occurring on the railways.

The Stockton and Darlington railway was designed in 1825 to carry coal from the mines to the waterways and it had proved immensely successful.

In the following years England was covered with a vast railway network and soon other countries in Europe began to build their own railway systems.

There were many unfortunate accidents because it was easy to start a train, but difficult to stop it.

Several men working on manual handbrakes had to be co-ordinated, but if this procedure failed, a dangerous accident was likely.

Now there was talk about a Mr. Westinghouse in America who had developed an automatic air brake, which was being adopted by a number of American railways.

Yolanda realised from the look on her stepfather's face and the many questions he asked when the air brake was being discussed that he was interested in the product.

And it meant that he would want to buy it before anyone else in England could.

Yolanda was not concerned – it did not matter to her from whom he obtained the air brakes.

But she was aware that she could not permit him to trick Lord Milborne, who had saved her father, her mother and herself from disaster.

‘I have no wish to hurt Step-papa,' she determined.  ‘But at the same time he has so much.  Perhaps Lord Milborne needs a helping hand now, just as Papa needed one all those years ago in Baden-Baden.'

*

That afternoon she had arranged for some fittings in Bond Street and afterwards she asked the coachman to take her to Grosvenor Square.

She believed that her stepfather's secretary would keep a list of the people he knew and where they lived.

So she looked at the book on his desk while he was at luncheon and found, just as she had expected, Lord Milborne's address listed – Milborne House, Number 93 Grosvenor Square.