This was greeted by a gale of laughter.
By general consent, it was accepted that the hunt was over for the day. It had been a fine run of over ten miles and if the fox escaped this time, well, he’d be around to provide sport another day.
The whippers-in collected the hounds and started them on the long walk back to their kennels. The field gathered around to investigate the balloon.
Verderan rode his handsome chestnut over to Emily. “Here you are with the hunt and the sky hasn’t fallen,” he remarked.
“No, merely an object from the sky,” she responded.
“You think your outrageous behavior brought down the balloon?” he queried. “We must convey this novel view of science to Mr. Sadler.”
His words were almost sharp, but his expression wasn’t. It melted her bones. She was a sad case and almost totally lost. “If you keep looking at me like that,” she murmured, “I’m going to fall out of the saddle.”
“If we went just a few fields away,” he murmured back, “I could take advantage of that admirably.”
“Growing bashful?” Emily asked sharply to cover the longing and confusion that swelled in her. “Sophie told me how you stripped virtually naked and went swimming at a public affair.”
“But not that I’ve ever made love to my future wife at a public affair,” he countered gently.
Emily took a deep breath to steady herself. “You’re too strong a wine for me,” she said.
“You underestimate yourself. And anyway, one develops a strong head after a while. A stolen glass of port will turn a boy tipsy. A man drinks a couple of bottles and can make his own way home.”
“And how am I to take that? A few words with you turns me giddy,” Emily translated. “So after a while, all day and night with you will leave me hardly affected at all?”
He grinned. “Unlikely, thank God.”
With that he left her, which seemed an ungentlemanly thing to do, though she hadn’t the faintest notion what to reply to such a statement.
If she pursued him brazenly through the crowd and said, “I will marry you,” would he ride with her into the sunset and teach her the pleasures of love?
Probably. But she knew that for her own satisfaction she had to pass the test of tomorrow.
She turned Corsair and began to ride home. Hooves thundered behind her and she paused hopefully.
It was Lord Randal. “It was worth the chase, wasn’t it?” he said. “Lonsdale’s even invited Sadler for dinner. I know you’re accustomed to riding about alone, but I think I should escort you. Not all Meltonians are true gentlemen.”
“I will be perfectly safe,” said Emily, gesturing about at the country people come to see the spectacle. “But thank you.”
“Very well.” Lord Randal pulled out a piece of paper. “When he left this morning, Ver asked me to give this to you if we should see you. It may not be necessary now you’ve spoken.”
Emily looked at her name in smooth, strong writing—the first written communication she had ever had from him. She thanked Lord Randal and headed for home. She wanted to be in the peaceful privacy of her room before she opened this letter.
It was doubtless just to do with High Burton, or the horses . . .
She hurried into the Hall and up to her room, stripped off her gloves and broke the seal.
My darling Emily.
In case you have any doubts, I still want, in fact need, to marry you. If you falter, please think of the consequences for both of us. If you refuse me, I will never rest easy knowing you are languishing in bondage. Will you rest easy, knowing I do not handle reverses graciously? If you should marry another, can you make him happy? If I should marry another, I know I cannot.
Blackmail, I know, but I am not too lofty for any trick that will win you.
Remember, this test is not of my making. If you don’t wish to hunt it is of no significance. I will give up hunting immediately if that is your desire. All I need is for you to put your hand in mine and say you will trust me with it forever.
As for the hunt, if you still wish to sell Nelson, it would go better if I were to ride him as I could then sell him as “my horse” at the club, which always brings the best price. If you wish to take part, I would like you to ride Beelzebub. He will take care of you, and you must allow me a little foolish, doting protectiveness.
I will send him over this evening for you to ride if you wish.
Emily thought of the horse he said no one but he was allowed to ride. Proof of devotion indeed. And, truth to tell, she had nothing against a little foolish, doting protectiveness.
There was little more to the note.
I am not an earthly paragon, and certainly not an angel. My desires are all too earthly. Make no doubt about it. That, however, is a subject for another letter which you have not yet given me the right to send.
It is written, though, and scorching a hole in a nasty old walnut desk here at Hume House. I hope tomorrow to give it to you, and perhaps demonstrate some of the finer points therein.
For now, my love, be of good courage. A daring deed, once done, becomes a commonplace. There is very little in life truly worth fearing.
It was signed simply, “Ver.”
It all clicked together. The need to see what was happening to Nelson out in the field, the fact that she’d been present today without the sky falling in, and Verderan.
He wanted her and was willing to lower his hard-won guard almost to nothing before her. Surely she could do her part.
12
I
T WAS, however, no easier than she had expected.
A Hume House groom walked Beelzebub over. Emily sent back Nelson and Oak-apple.
The man also brought a note from Sophie saying she and Randal would come by to collect Emily. It would be too easy, though, to allow herself to be swept up and carried along by the self-assured Ashbys, and so she replied gratefully but declined, saying she would make her own way to the meet.
Then, after the man had gone, wished she had taken the easy way.
Emily spent quite some time in communication with Bel, but the horse did not have anything to say about Verderan that she did not already know and seemed to have little sympathy with her predicament.
Just before dinner, Emily visited her father. She occupied the time with a lively account of the balloon descension. Sir Henry was in one of his better moods and laughed along with her, only once saying, “Damme, I wish I’d been there!”
As a visit it went very well, but Emily had intended to warn him of the next day’s events. If she was, in effect, going to accept an offer of marriage, her father should know. Her courage failed her, however, and she left to go to the dining room with the carefully planned words unsaid.
If she couldn’t even tell her father, could she go through with the deed?
She remembered her one disastrous foray into theatricals. Sir Arthur and Lady Overbrook had proposed a production of
The Unfortunate Couple
during Christmas some years back, and Emily had been reluctantly conscripted to play Lady Lydia’s maid. Though she was not thrilled at the opportunity she had managed the rehearsals well enough and had truly believed she could go through with it.
When the night came, however, and the Overbrook’s ballroom began to fill with the local gentry, she had peeped through the makeshift curtain and panicked. Her throat had seized up and she had been unable to utter a word.
Frantic reassurances and even a drop of brandy had achieved nothing. It had been fortunate that Miss Hardesty, who played Lady Lydia, had always brought her maid to the rehearsals, for that young woman proved to be word-perfect in the part and able to step into the breech admirably.
Could something equally ridiculous happen again? How could she be sure it wouldn’t?
After dinner she determined to have done with all this foolishness and prove her nerve. She marched along to her father’s room to reveal all. She knocked briskly and entered, finding him playing a desultory game of Patience.
“Care for a hand of Piquet?” she asked impulsively.
He brightened. “What stakes?”
“Father,” said Emily. “Are you trying to chouse me out of my pin money? A thousand a point is the highest I’ll go.” When he’d taught her this game years ago they had played for such fanciful high stakes.
With a laugh he agreed and the game progressed in great good humor, tallying up, despite the outrageous stakes, close to even at the end.
Emily realized how much their relationship had deteriorated since his accident, and how much she had neglected him of late. Certainly, Sir Henry had become unpleasant about business matters and misunderstood her in so many ways, but he was a well-intentioned father for all that and she had become so caught up in other matters that she had almost forgotten him.
As she put away the cards and he reminisced about other games and other times, she wondered if one could hire a male companion. Something was needed, especially if she were to marry . . .
She stopped, remembering why she had come here in the first place.
She even turned to speak.
Sir Henry smiled. “You’re a good daughter, Emily. I’m a fortunate man to have you and know you’ll never leave me. Come give me a kiss.”
Emily kissed him and left, a failure again, and now with a new burden. How could she leave her father to the care of strangers? And was this a genuine dilemma or just an excuse not to have to make a public spectacle of herself on the morrow?
She went up and sat by the window of her room, brushing her hair. She watched the breeze stir the trees in the moonlight and send the falling leaves whirling and scudding. Then she saw the figure.
Someone was making his way from the drive across the lawn towards the side of the house. It was Lord Randal Ashby. What had happened?
She flung up the window, leant out, and gave an unladylike whistle. He turned and came quickly over, miming that she should come down to speak to him. Emily flung her red woolen cloak around her shoulders and slipped down the backstairs to the kitchen.
The stove was already banked and the room deserted. She unlocked the back door and crept out into the night, her heart thundering with fear. Something terrible must have occurred.
Lord Randal met her at the corner of the house. “What is it?” Emily gasped.
He took her hand. “Did I frighten you? I’m sorry. Nothing too terrible . . . I don’t think, but Ver’s mother’s turned up.”
“Helen Sillitoe?”
“As was,” he agreed. “We were at the club—Ver sold Wallingford for eighty-five by the way—when his man came with the message. Osbaldeston somehow got wind of it, probably listening behind pillars again, and started making comments about Ver finally facing up to his Irish responsibilities, about his mother’s reaction to the debauch going on at Hume House . . . Ver hit him before your name could come into it.”
“Oh, heavens,” Emily moaned. “Will there be a duel?”
“I doubt it,” Randal said with a grin. “Osbaldeston was making fiery noises, but I pointed out that if he survived Ver he’d have to fight me, since he’d implied Sophie was taking part in a debauch. He decided to consider it a mill and forget about it.”
“So where is Ver?”
“At Hume House. After I’d dropped him off, I gave into impulse and came down here. I think he’ll need you.”
Emily gathered her cloak more firmly around herself. “Why?”
He looked away and frowned. “I don’t know how much you know about Ver and his family ...”
“Quite a lot, actually.”
“Well, then, perhaps you can guess. I don’t think I know the whole of it, but for all he’s grown a tough shell, it’s like a wound inside. I don’t know what’s going to happen, but I don’t see how his mother turning up can be pleasant for him.”
“But what can I do?”
“Be there.”
“Lord Randal,” Emily protested, “it’s eleven o’clock at night.”
“I know.”
Emily looked back helplessly at the house, then up at the man. He was disquietingly serious. “Very well. Did you say you’d driven?”
“Good girl. Yes, I’ve got the curricle. Come along.”
So when Mrs. Dobson, alerted by some noises in her kitchen, peered out of the window, she saw Emily and a gentleman sneaking down the driveway. “Lord love us,” she muttered. “She’s eloping!” She hurried off to tell Miss Junia.
When Randal brought the curricle to a halt before Hume House, delicately avoiding the worst depressions, all seemed quiet and normal. Candlelight shone in a number of rooms but there were no sounds.
Emily got cold feet. “Lord Randal, are you sure . . . ?”
“I’m sure.”
Emily climbed down and went with him into the house. The hall was deserted, but Kevin Renfrew came out of the billiard room in shirt sleeves, cue still in hand.
“Oh good,” he said, and it particularly seemed to be addressed to Emily. “They’re in the library.”
“In you go,” said Randal, indicating a door.
“But what about you?” Emily asked in panic.
“I’ll do vigil out here. This is, I think, family business.”
“But I’m not ...”
“Emily, you’re the closest thing to family Ver’s had since he was eight years old.” He gave her a little push and Emily went.
Her hand was sticky with sweat as she turned the knob and opened the door.
Verderan was standing by the fire facing a woman seated in a chair. Helen Sillitoe. Her hair was grey and some had escaped from its bun to straggle in wisps down the sides of her haggard face. She was no longer a beauty and looked much older than her contemporary, Junia, but the bones were still there, the bones she had passed on to her son.
She turned, startled and even frightened, to face the new arrival. She looked wounded and exhausted. Emily quietly shut the door behind her. She searched desperately for something to say to cut through the heavy painful atmosphere of the room.