A Marriage of Convenience (8 page)

But when Markenfield had been let, the old servants had left, adding to the void left by Clinton’s father’s sudden death and his own departure. The chain had been broken. The idea, the real bond, was something
remembered
now; but no longer living. He had come to Norfolk, certain that there were no choices left—that
Markenfield
was sacrosanct and marriage inescapable. Only now, at the moment of decision, did he know consciously what he had
half-sensed
by the roadside an hour ago. His father was wrong; a nobleman’s land did not always outweigh all else. The choice was still there to be made: to sell his inheritance and not himself.

And beside him, the girl still watched his every expression, waiting, hoping, making him ashamed that he had needed to be pushed to the very brink before knowing his mind. He longed in some way to make amends for the pain he was about to cause her. Perhaps if he could explain about the married lives of the officers at his club. But why should this sheltered girl ever believe him?

When they reached the end of the border walk, he took Sophie’s arm and said gently:

‘Have you ever heard that cynical bachelors have a catch phrase about marrying for money and loving for pleasure?’

She looked up at him with a brave attempt at light-heartedness.

‘I daresay they often come to love their rich wives in spite of their cynicism.’ She turned away as if about to cry, but when she met his gaze, her eyes were bright with anger. ‘Do you think I ever thought you loved me? I’m not a fool. If people only married for love, how many marriages would there be?’

‘I can’t marry you,’ he whispered, dreading that she would weep and scream at him for having allowed her to hope. Instead she said in an insistent voice:

‘Why can’t you?’

‘It would dishonour us.’

‘Only if you love someone else. Do you, Clinton?’

He shook his head, amazed by her calmness.

‘If I gave you a dozen reasons,’ he murmured, ‘they’d only be poor attempts to justify what I want to do.’

‘So you reject me without a word?’

He tried to take her hands, but she moved away at once.

‘Ask yourself,’ he said, ‘how long can any woman live without bitterness, when every day brings her fresh proofs that her love is not returned?’

‘Do you think I care about bitterness?’ she cried. ‘Would bitterness be worse than never to see your face or hear your voice? Is bitterness more cruel than the misery of life without the one person who makes it possible? I don’t care who you’ve loved or who you’ll love. If you’d be faithful even for a year, I’d pay any price. I’d barter my soul for it.’

The hint of hysteria in her voice horrified him.

‘I’m not worth your devotion. I never was. I’m nothing like the person you think you love.’

She stood rocking her weight from heel to toe with a faint twisted smile on her face; an absorbed introspective look.

‘All that time you used to spend with the farm people; how I hated you for that, preferring the company of those dolts to mine. Then going out with the fishermen at Overstrand, your fool of a
father letting you in any weather. I used to pray for you.’ She suddenly touched his arm and looked into his eyes. ‘I could find the tree where you stripped off the bark in your embarrassment when I first told you I loved you … can say what you said when we watched the flocks of starlings over the village the week before you left Markenfield. I used to walk alone to the spot where you’d caught perch as a boy … sit where you’d sat.’ She fell silent and covered her face with her hands. ‘I shan’t give you up, Clinton. I’ll never do that. Never.’ She stifled a small choking sob and pressed his hands between hers. Before he could think of any words of comfort, she had swung away from him and was running down the long strip of green between the borders towards the terrace steps, her blouse a vivid splash of colour against the softer blues and whites of the flowers.

Sunday morning, church bells ringing, and in the wide squares and crescents between Brompton and Knightsbridge well-dressed
families
hurrying to church, some walking, others in carriages. Almost impossible to believe it, but a mere decade earlier the whole of this spacious suburb of South Kensington had been largely a district of farms and market gardens. As Clinton walked towards Esmond’s square, he watched the broughams, barouches and victorias carrying the church-goers to their various destinations, neo-classical,
neo-gothic
, the sun catching on wheel hubs, curb chains and carriage lamps. Under a pale blue sky stippled with light mackerel clouds, the white stucco of the houses and the recently watered streets looked as fresh and laundered as the white gloves and breeches of the coachmen and grooms. The slums and rookeries of Lambeth and Seven Dials were as remote as another continent, shut out from this Eden by the oramented gates and railings, which now closed off the best residential streets from the public highway. A hundred yards from Esmond’s house a uniformed gatekeeper with a
cockaded
hat kept away the street musicians, hawkers and beggars whose presence was prohibited by notices on the gates.

Informed by the butler that Mr Danvers was at church, Clinton once more prepared to wait, this time at his own request in his brother’s library, among the leather chairs and the glass-fronted bookcases containing rows of creamy vellum, antique brown calf and dull red morocco. Through the half-open windows came the twitter of sparrows and the distant clamour of the bells; in the room the stately ticking of a Louis Quinze clock. Clinton was idly examining the spines of the books, quite expecting to see some rare Decameron or Caxton bible, when he heard the rustle of a dress. A soft low voice.

‘Lord Ardmore?’

He turned and saw Theresa watching him.

‘Not at church, Miss Simmonds?’

She passed through a square of sunlight on the polished floor and gestured vaguely with a hand.

‘Religion to me is more an aspiration than a matter of formal observance.’

As at the theatre, he had no idea whether she was speaking sincerely. He nodded as if in agreement.

‘I’ve
nothing against the deity myself; it’s some of his followers I find it harder to get along with.’

She sat down on the chesterfield in the window, the sunlit panes haloing her auburn hair with wisps of smokey gold. Her dress was plain grey silk, tight-waisted with a high collar and a loose black velvet bow at the neck. Having himself decided against marriage, Clinton no longer had any interest in Theresa’s motives for keeping Esmond waiting. And with the urgent matter of the sale of Markenfield preoccupying him, he was not pleased by the prospect of making polite conversation while waiting to break to Esmond what would undoubtedly be most unwelcome news. But even in these circumstances, he could not help recognising the woman’s unusual beauty. Her face was composed and secretive, with a hint of a smile playing about her lips and eyes.

‘So we meet again after all, my lord.’

‘Indeed,’ he replied crisply, vexed by her smile; certain that she would have told Esmond about his visit to the theatre. Inevitably Esmond would have mentioned Sophie. If she thought she was going to have more fun at his expense, Clinton was determined to make her think again. He carried on blandly: ‘I daresay my brother told you why I’d be returning so soon?’

‘I know he advises your trustees.’

‘He said nothing about my business in the country?’

‘Nothing about business anywhere, Lord Ardmore.’

‘But that’s too bad, Miss Simmonds.’ He sounded both sympathetic and surprised. ‘You mean he never told you I went to Norfolk to get a wife? I was never half so secretive with my mistresses.’ He grinned at her. ‘Esmond’s going to be delighted with me. He gets a heap of money when I marry.’ He caught her look of bewilderment. ‘You don’t mean that’s something else he never mentioned?’ He clicked his tongue. ‘He can be a dark one, that brother of mine. There’s nothing very secret about it … We can carve up the trust as soon as I marry a lady of
substance
.’

‘Should I offer my congratulations?’

Her unsmiling face pleased Clinton. Of course Esmond had never said a word about the money to her.

‘Certainly you should,’ he replied brightly. ‘Miss Lucas will have a dozen bridesmaids, six in white and six in blue. You’ve seen wax dolls at charity fairs? Just so. A mitred bishop to do the honours. St
George’s Hanover Square has the right tone, and most conveniently placed. I shall insist that you’re invited, Miss Simmonds.’

‘Would that be quite proper, Lord Ardmore?’

Clinton raised a hand to his brow.

‘I see what you mean. Awkward.’ He paused. ‘Perhaps it would be better if you and Esmond didn’t come in the same carriage. Absurd of course.’ He saw the slight tightening of her lips. ‘Actually;’ he went on reflectively, ‘I can’t help finding hypocrisy rather touching. It’s only a kind of modesty to set such store by other people’s opinions.’ He sat back in his chair and crossed his legs. His affable expression turned to listlessness. Stifling a yawn, he picked a hair from the sleeve of his dark green morning coat, and murmured: ‘Do you disapprove of me, Miss Simmonds?’

‘I hardly know you well enough to say.’

He smiled at her knowingly.

‘Rather prim for an actress. Frankly I think we’ve a lot in common. The workhouse may be the gate of heaven for saints, but we sinners prefer an easier passage.’

‘I’m flattered you think us so alike. I’m afraid I don’t deserve the comparison.’

‘Very deftly done,’ laughed Clinton, clapping as though in the theatre.

She looked at him with the unswerving directness that had been his undoing in her dressing room.

‘Is it fun ridiculing people?’

‘I often think so,’ he replied, smiling.

Theresa left her sofa and strolled across the room as far as the long glass-fronted bookcase.

‘Could Esmond have helped you?’

‘Ask him if you’re interested.’

Clinton hid his amusement. He had puzzled and disquieted her. Esmond would not enjoy the sort of questions she was likely to ask.

*

An hour after Clinton had left the house, Theresa was facing Esmond across the luncheon table. Because she was sure that Clinton would have described their conversation, she decided to make no secret of it.

‘Your brother’s business went well, I hear,’ she remarked neutrally.

Esmond looked up sharply, spilling some wine on the cloth.

‘I’m not in the mood for jokes, Theresa.’

‘You wanted him to marry, didn’t you?’ she asked with
confusion
.

Esmond sat motionless in his chair; his unnatural stillness emphasising his pent-up anger. Theresa felt confused. ‘You’re surely not angry I spoke to him?’

‘I meant no reproach for that,’ he said impatiently. ‘I merely expected that you might have had the taste and sense to …’ He broke off helplessly, letting his hands fall to his sides. The fury in his eyes was now all addressed to his absent brother. ‘I’d swear he went there knowing what he was going to do. He knew all along. How he expects me to face the girl’s father after it … quite apart from the total disregard for her feelings.’

Theresa gazed at him, dumbfounded.

‘He turned her down?’

‘What else do you think I’m talking about?’ moaned Esmond.

As Theresa started to laugh, he jumped up overturning his chair, and strode from the room. Had Theresa understood the reason for Esmond’s anger, she would undoubtedly have been less amused. But, since she assumed that he was only suffering from indignation at the cavalier way in which his brother had once more turned a blind eye to necessity, Theresa was not unduely alarmed.

When Esmond slammed his study door and sat down at his desk, his face though calmer gave no better indication of his true feelings than before. Though open with Theresa in other ways, Esmond’s hard schooling in the city had taught him to draw a veil over important financial matters, especially over reverses. The worst monetary crises could usually be survived if they remained quietly hidden in ledgers and not shouted about. The last course Esmond ever contemplated in times of difficulty was to reduce his personal expenditure. To do so would be to invite speculation about the soundess of his business. The City’s confidence was as important to a bill broker as coal and iron to a foundry owner.

Though his discount house was doing more business than ever and its profits were substantial, Esmond had been drawn into another area, which, even when he had first met Theresa, had been causing him anxious nights. Had Clinton ever discovered Esmond’s principal reason for trying to force him into marriage, it would have astonished him far more than the revelation of his brother’s passion for an actress. Esmond had done his level best to promote Miss Lucas’s cause because he too needed his share of capital from the trust. His failure had damaged much more than his pride.

For some time because of the expansion of his business, and more recently because of his involvement with Theresa, Esmond had delegated more and more of the lengthy but vitally important work of examining the securities of those seeking advances. One of his managers had made a disastrous error in assessing the
creditworthiness 
of a shipping line. When the Greek & Oriental Navigation Company failed to meet the bills which his house had discounted, Esmond had bailed out the line with a loan of £60,000 secured against its ships. He had hoped to save face in the City and protect his original loan. But since then it had become steadily more apparent that he would only recover his capital by replacing the company’s oldest steamships. Unless he could now find funds far in excess of the regular requirements of his business, Esmond faced the certain prospect of losing all his earlier loans. Quite unintentionally, he had become the owner in all but name of an insolvent shipping line, which he could not allow to fail without ruining himself. Staring at the papers on his desk, he knew that he would be prepared to take considerable risks to restore his position.

Over the years, especially at times when credit had been tight, Esmond had given more than passing thought to ways of freeing his trust capital, but had always shrunk from positive action for fear that the necessary legal sleight of hand might later come to light and be represented as fraud. But as he sat in his study that Sunday afternoon, the gravity of his situation, and the shock of Clinton’s capricious and entirely unlooked for volte-face with Sophie, brought a decisive shift in his thinking. For the first time he began to see breaking the trust as more than a subject for self-indulgent
speculation
.

In many ways the present moment seemed remarkably auspicious for preparatory work on such a venture. Clinton had asked him to begin negotiations with the principal mortgagees of the Markenfield estate for a sale at the end of the current lease, so Esmond expected to be meeting the trustees quite frequently in the next few months. He could hardly hope to get better opportunity for winning their unquestioning confidence. From his occasional dealings with them in his capacity of unpaid adviser on trust investment, Esmond considered the trustees financial innocents. Nevertheless, in spite of his growing optimism, Esmond could not avoid all misgivings about proceedings, which if successful would link Clinton’s future fortunes, as well as his own, to the survival of an ailing shipping line. But as he had learned at times of crisis in the City, the only dependable maxim in extremis was sauve qui peut. Nothing in their shared past made him feel that he owed Clinton any special immunity.