Carola Dunn (20 page)

“He extolled her to me as a pattern-card of perfection, guaranteed to please his parents and to become an admirable countess.”

“I daresay she will.”

“I don’t recall that he ever mentioned her good nature, or her warm heart.”

“Nor to me. I don’t believe she possesses either! No, that is not fair, Miriam. I never made her acquaintance and ought not to judge her. I only hope she will make him happy.”

Yet that was not quite true. Fanny nurtured a tiny, secret hope that Felix had forgotten the Goddess. As the days passed he never spoke of her, made no move to leave Nettledene, appeared perfectly contented with Fanny’s company, and the Cohens’, and the children’s. Fanny found it more and more difficult to keep reminding herself of his determination to take a bride of rank and fortune.

She abandoned herself to the joy of being with him, enhanced by the rapid improvement in Frank’s health, and by the Cohens’ friendship.

In fact, she was perfectly at home at Nettledene, as Felix noted. He had no excuse for lingering. He woke one morning to the realization that over a fortnight had passed since Rothschild presented him with that incredible bank draft--and his parents still knew nothing of his luck.

“I must go to Westwood,” he announced at breakfast. “I haven’t been home since before I went to Vienna, ten months ago.”

“And I daresay you have not written to your mama since Waterloo to tell her you are unscathed!” said Miriam. “What of Lady Sophia? Shall you go via London to see her?”

Startled, Felix sought to conceal the fact that the object of his attentions had somehow slipped his mind. “The Daventrys are unlikely to be in Town in July,” he said. “Their place is in Northamptonshire, in quite the wrong direction. My first duty is to my parents. Besides, it’s only proper that I should inform them of my intentions before I offer for Lady Sophia.”

“Naturally.” Isaac frowned at Miriam, who appeared unaccountably amused. Felix had more than once been baffled by her sense of humour at his expense. At least when Fanny laughed at him he always knew why.

Fanny was not amused now. Her woebegone eyes caused a peculiar pang somewhere beneath his waistcoat.

“Cheer up,” he said. “I’ll be back long before Frank is fit to report to Horse Guards’ Parade, either to tell you I’ve won Lady Sophia’s hand, or to weep on your shoulder because she refused me.”

She made a pitiful attempt to smile. “Pray do not disappear to Vienna again in the interim. We cannot keep Frank abed much longer, can we, ma’am?”

“No, he is by no means the docile kind of patient I prefer,” said Miriam lightly. “How shall you travel, Felix? Do you want to borrow a carriage?”

“Thank you, no, I shall ride. It’s quicker cross country via Salisbury than trying to stick to the post roads. Poor Trevor will have to endure yet another journey by the Mail.”

They talked of the route to Somerset. Fanny gradually recovered her countenance, but Felix could not forget her dismay at the news of his departure. Before he went up to say goodbye to Frank and the children, he asked her outright, “Are you uncomfortable here?”

“Oh no. The Cohens are all that is kind; indeed, they have made us feel a part of the family.” She could not blame him for the cold, hollow sense of desolation that engulfed her. It was entirely her own fault for allowing that tiny seed of hope to take root. Yet he had seen her unhappiness and it distressed him. She did her best to disguise its cause. “I...I am a widgeon to worry a little about what we shall do when Frank is recovered.”

“A great widgeon,” he said severely. “I imagine the army will have a new posting for Frank, but if you find yourselves in any difficulty, I shall not abandon you. Did you not say that you trust me?”

“We do,” she assented, dismayed, wishing she had thought of a reason for her low spirits that would not make him doubt her faith in him. Of course she trusted him. Had he not come to the rescue in Brussels when she was on the verge of despair?

But her trust did not lessen her heartache when he rode off down the drive.

* * * *

As Felix rode west through the green countryside, Fanny’s sad face haunted him. Did she really trust him not to leave her in the lurch? Her agreement had been subdued, not the hearty confirmation he had hoped for.

Perhaps she guessed that he had forgotten Lady Sophia’s existence for days on end. Perhaps she thought it was “out of sight, out of mind” with him. He hadn’t told her it was a vision of her sufferings that had taken him back to Brussels, only that Rothschild had sent him with a letter for Wellington.

Yet the closer he came to Westwood, the more persuaded he was that he had made the right decision. The knowledge that he had returned for her sake could only have aroused unwarranted expectations, even in so sensible and modest a young lady as Fanny.

Riding across the Somerset plain, he fixed his mind on his parents’ delight when he told them about his windfall and his intention of asking for Lady Sophia’s hand.

The neatly pollarded willows along the drainage channel hid the house from Felix until he cantered across a flat wooden bridge. On the far side he drew rein and gazed at his birthright.

Marble pillars glowed pinkly in the evening sun. Challenging the precipitous limestone slope of the Mendip Hills that rose behind the mansion, the Palladian façade was Felix’s grandfather’s ostentatious contribution to Westwood. The family had nearly been bankrupted by his father’s determination to modernize the interior of the sprawling Tudor house, after an elaborate and expensive design by Robert Adam.

There was no place here for the Ingrams, Felix thought sadly. If Fanny had at first found Nettledene alarmingly grand, his home would overwhelm her, though lack of funds had reduced the ceremony observed by the household.

For instance, a groom permanently on the watch for visitors was a luxury long since dispensed with. Felix rode around the side of the house to the stables. A stable boy he didn’t recognize received his hired horse with scorn, his announcement that he was Lord Roworth with suspicion. It was a long time since he had spent more than a few days at Westwood.

At least the butler knew him, though it would have been beneath his dignity to give even his master’s heir a welcome as warm as Samuels’.

“The family are dressing, my lord,” he said. “I shall send a footman to wait upon your lordship.”

The direst poverty could not have prevented the earl and countess dressing for dinner, however threadbare their evening clothes. Nor would they appreciate being interrupted, even by the arrival of their son and heir. Felix changed quickly out of his riding coat and breeches and went down to the gallery where the family always gathered before dinner in the summer. Windows opening onto the garden all along the west side made it drafty in winter but delightful on a warm July evening.

“Felix!” Lady Victoria pounced in a flurry of white muslin. A plump, pretty sixteen-year-old, she wore her long blond hair tied back simply with a pink ribbon, to denote her schoolroom status. She hung on his arm, merry blue eyes sparkling. “So you deign to grace us with your noble presence.”

“Where did you learn such high-flown language, Vickie?” he drawled.

“She has been reading romances from the lending library. Pay her no mind. Felix, how good it is to see you.”

He took Constantia’s hands in his and kissed her cheek. At twenty-two she was as beautiful as at eighteen, even in a high-necked, far from modish gown of blue jaconet. Golden ringlets, eyes of a deeper blue than the rest of the family, tender mouth in a heart-shaped face whose usual shy gravity was dispelled now by a joyous smile.

Connie was his favourite sister, though Augusta, now a married matron, was nearer his age. In their youth, Connie had worshipped him and followed him into many a scrape. The chattering tomboy had metamorphosed into a quiet, graceful young lady without lessening the affection between them. Felix knew very well that her retiring, compliant manner hid a will as resolute as Miriam’s, a heart as steadfast--and as kind--as Fanny’s.

“Connie was afraid you had been killed at Waterloo,” said Vickie with a ghoulish relish that reminded him of little Jane Prynne. “Were you there? Was it very horrid?”

“Dreadful. But it brought me a stroke of luck I’ll tell you about when Mama and my father come down.”

“The vicar and his wife and the curate are dining with us this evening,” Connie said doubtfully.

“He can tell us anyway.”

Felix shook his head. “No, this is family business. It will have to wait.”

“Then I shall have to make sure they leave early,” declared Vickie.

Her brother and sister rounded on her with dire threats of retribution if she misbehaved and put the earl in a tweak on Felix’s first evening home.

“I’ll fill your favourite reticule with snails,” Felix promised.

“Pooh, you are too fine a gentleman to go hunting sn...” She choked on the last word as Lord Westwood entered the gallery.

“Too fine to go hunting?” queried the earl with a smile. “Have you joined the dandy set, Felix? I hear Brummell will not go beyond the first field for fear of muddying his boot-tops. My dear boy, it is a pleasure to have you with us again.”

“My pleasure, sir.” He bowed and shook his father’s hand. “I hope I find you well?”

Despite his lined face and grizzled hair, the earl looked very like his heir, tall and broad-shouldered, with a still handsome, patrician countenance. A decade of struggling to stay one step ahead of the bailiffs had not crushed his haughty air, so innate that even his evident pleasure at greeting his only son scarcely softened it. Felix admired his determination to keep up the standards of his class through thick and thin.

Lady Westwood came in, a
grande dame
still though a necklace of pearls and jet gleamed where once diamonds had sparkled. Her pale blonde hair showed no touch of grey, her calm face was almost unlined. Felix bowed and kissed her hand.

“An unexpected pleasure, Felix,” she said coolly.

“I beg your pardon, ma’am, for not having advised you of my visit--indeed, for not having written in some time. I have been excessively occupied with business of late.” Except for the past fortnight, he thought guiltily, when his friends’ company and Fanny’s comfort had been his sole concerns. He was glad of the interruption when their guests were announced.

Mr Beneton, the dignified, elderly vicar, had christened Felix, and his wife’s toad-eating was too familiar to be offensive. The curate, Enoch Jones, was a stranger, however. A dark, wiry young man with the long, narrow face of a melancholy mule, he never took his worshipful eyes from Lady Constantia’s face. Connie was kind to him in an absent way, but Felix observed no sign that she returned his all too obvious affections. Just as well, for if she set her heart on a doubtless penniless cleric, he suspected she’d have him, come hell or high water.

After dinner, when the gentlemen joined the ladies in the perfectly proportioned drawing room, Vickie beckoned Mr Jones to her side with an imperious gesture. He cast a yearning glance at her sister but obeyed. Suspicious, Felix lingered nearby, leaning against the elegant Adam mantelpiece.

“I fear you are unwell, sir,” she said with the utmost solicitude as the curate took a seat beside her on a crocodile-legged sofa.

“Unwell?” he asked in alarm. “I assure you, Lady Victoria, apart from the usual touch of dyspepsia, I am very well.”

“But you are so pale! Perhaps you are sickening for some horrid illness.”

“I confess I felt an unusual palpitation of the heart as we drove up from the village.”

“You did? I wonder that you have ventured out. The evenings are monstrous treacherous at this season.”

“They are?”

“Why yes. The warmth of the day does not prepare one’s constitution for the cool evenings. If I were you, I should...”

Lady Westwood called Felix to come and satisfy Mrs Beneton’s curiosity about English Society in Brussels. His own curiosity as to what remedy his devilish youngest sister proposed was soon satisfied. Mr Jones crossed the room to speak to the vicar; the vicar came to speak to his wife. With a discontented air, Mrs Beneton turned to the countess and said, “Mr Jones is unwell, I regret to say. We shall have to beg your ladyship’s indulgence and take our leave before tea.”

As the vicarage party left, Vickie threw a triumphant glance at Felix and Connie. Her triumph was shortlived.

“Victoria, it is time for you to retire,” said her mother.

Few were those who dared argue with Lady Westwood. Vickie retired. The eloquent plea in her eyes as she bade her brother goodnight made him grin. He must remember to tell Fanny. Vickie’s cunning victory and subsequent defeat would amuse her no end.

“I trust Victoria is not developing a tendre for that young puppy,” said the earl with a frown.

“Good Lord, no, sir,” Felix exclaimed. “On the contrary, she was...” Connie shook her head at him in warning and he realized he had been about to reveal their sister’s devious stratagem.

“She was protecting me from his attentions, Papa.”

“Has Mr Jones been troubling you, Constantia?” asked Lady Westwood censoriously.

“Oh no, Mama.”

It was Felix’s turn to rescue her, or rather young Mr Jones. “I daresay Vickie’s imagination is run wild.” His mother’s stare told him that imagination in a young girl was no more acceptable than presumption in a curate. He hurried to change the subject. “Now that we are alone, I can tell you my news. Mr Rothschild has given me a bonus, a very large bonus, as a reward for what he is kind enough to regard as an extraordinary service.”

“Felix, that is wonderful,” cried Connie, but Lord Westwood’s frown returned. He walked restlessly to the window.

Watching him, his wife said, “Constantia, you may leave us. Talk of business is not at all suitable for a young lady’s ears.”

Felix received another eloquently beseeching glance as Connie swallowed a protest and departed.

The earl turned. “I cannot like to be obliged to a Jew moneylender,” he said, vexed. “It is bad enough that the fellow has employed you these past four years. You know my opinion of your decision in that regard.”