Jane and the Stillroom Maid (31 page)

“Carry Hary-O into Town!” cried Lady Elizabeth, before the young lady could express her thanks. “What an excellent notion, Lady Bessborough! The very thing! We are excessively obliged to you! For Lady Harriot cannot have many eligible young men thrown in her way in Derbyshire, you know,” she added, with cruel disregard for the Danforth brothers, “and she does not grow the younger, as our happy occasion must only emphasise.”

“I see you regard the improvement of her circumstances in the proper light,” murmured Lady Bessborough ironically.

“Canis and I shall be at Devonshire House by Christmas,” Lady Elizabeth continued insensibly. “I should dearly love to chaperone our little Hary-O this winter, and I am sure that Georgiana would have wished me to stand in her place—but I fear my delicate condition of health forbids it.” At this, Lady Elizabeth managed an example of her peculiar, hacking cough.

That she should put herself forward, as Hary-O’s chaperone—an office belonging first to the married elder sister, and more properly to Lady Harriot’s aunt—defied belief! That the Duke’s
mistress
should carry his
daughter
into Society! Was Lady Elizabeth so blind to
the impropriety of her own position, as to imagine it went unnoticed by all around her?

Lady Harriot rolled her eyes towards Heaven. Lord Harold’s composure was excessively correct; but his eyes met mine with the most satiric look.

“We may take it as settled, then,” interposed Leveson-Gower briskly. “When the Duke is once more in residence at Devonshire House, Lady Harriot shall naturally make her home there; but until that time, she shall remain with the Countess.”

Lady Bessborough reached across the table and squeezed Hary-O’s hand. “You must let us spoil you a little, my dear—and afford us all the pleasure of your wit and intelligence during a most dullish period. Parliament is in recess, you know, and everyone off shooting; but if you consent to remain with us until December—”

“Then you shall succeed in drawing every available
parti
to Town, and shooting be damned,” Lord Harold concluded.

“What are birds, to the most fascinating young lady in London?” enquired Andrew Danforth. “I have had enough of country life! Charles may moulder in the Midlands all he cares—it suits his temperament to be melancholy and retired. But I am for Town!”

However teazing the gentleman’s looks—however lighthearted his air—I judged him to speak in the greatest earnestness. Lady Elizabeth might consider Andrew Danforth the least eligible match in Derbyshire; but that gentleman was not about to let slip his chance at a Duke’s daughter.

“And you will have your career in Parliament to prepare for,” I observed. “There must be all the formality of the hustings, to be sure; but with His Grace’s influence, much might be done in a very little time. Of course you must go to London, Mr. Danforth! There is not a moment to be lost, if you would take your borough at the next offering!”

“Do you mean to stand, then?” Leveson-Gower’s gaze was arrested. He stared first at Andrew, and then at the silent, absorbed face of his brother, Charles, who had contributed nothing to the conversation. At the question, however, Charles Danforth stirred.

“You might better enquire, Granville, how he intends to fund his bid! My brother’s taste in horseflesh and wine—not to mention the cost of his tailor and his hounds!—runs to considerable expense. A commission in the Life Guards might better suit his style; but we may regard public office as a luxury he may ill-afford.”

The words were as biting as a schoolmaster’s to an errant headboy; and Andrew Danforth flushed. It was the first evidence of discomposure I had ever witnessed in that smooth and plausible gentleman—but an instant only was suffered to pass, before he summoned his answer.

“Were we all as close with the purse-strings as Charles, my dear Leveson-Gower, the kingdom would falter for lack of commerce! Besides—he must know quite well that sitting Members cannot be seized for debt! Who would account the cost of attaining office, when it affords such liberal terms?”

Everyone laughed at this sally; and Andrew Danforth was acquitted of folly. His brother, however, had emerged the worse from the exchange—for where Andrew retained his charm in the face of insult, Charles could appear only grasping and mean. I wondered how often the ill-disposed talents of both served the elder to disadvantage.

“You shall be following in your dear mother’s path, Lady Harriot, do you intend to take up the cause of politics,” observed Granville Leveson-Gower quietly, “for there was never a greater hostess, nor a better judge of a man’s character, than the late Duchess. Pray inform me when you set up your
salon
—for I shall be constantly in attendance.”

Lady Harriot smiled—she cast a wistful, searching
gaze at the handsome Leveson-Gower—and so their conversation ended. I do not think they exchanged more than ten words for the remainder of that dinner; but Lady Harriot was able to lift up her eyes, and throw off her contempt for her mother’s rival, and enjoy the attentions of all at the party who wished her well. For this, if nothing else, I regarded Granville Leveson-Gower with gratitude—whatever his reprehensible attentions to another man’s wife. There is more disinterested good in the fellow than reputation would allow.

W
E SURFEITED OURSELVES ON WHITE SOUP AND PLAICE
, chickens and tongue, a fricasee of turnips and buttered prawns. There were forcemeat balls and macaroni, a ragout of celery with wine, dressed lamb and asparagus; sole with mushrooms. There was a gooseberry pie, and a quince preserve; a jaune mange and a marmalade of apricots; almonds and raisins and lemon ice. We drank negus and Madeira and smugglers’ claret; we sat while the covers were twice exchanged. And at last, when nearly three hours had been suffered to pass away, the ladies retired and left the men to discuss the prospects for government and Charles James Fox.

I felt myself to have grown quite flushed with food and spirits, and suspected that not even Cassandra’s grey silk might disguise the damage to my complexion. The great French windows had been thrown open to the night, affording a pleasant coolness. While Lady Swithin went cheerfully in search of her needlework, and Lady Harriot stood in closest conversation with her aunt, and Lady Elizabeth enquired fretfully of Georgiana Morpeth how her youngest child did—whether the danger of quinsy was
entirely
past—I wandered over to the open window, and saw that a broad stone terrace lay just beyond. It overlooked the parterres of the formal garden that flanked the eastern facade of the Great House. A wave of scent rose up from the boxhedge and
flowers; I stepped out into the darkness, and breathed deep.

The moon was now fuller and stronger than it had been on the night of the maid’s death. The stars shone out, in a bewildering pattern overhead; owls called from the Spanish oaks, from the heavy coverts of trees lapping Chatsworth for mile upon mile; a deep stillness lay over the countryside, beautiful in its peace—an ageless stillness, such as must have obtained in this part of the world from time immemorial. Its illusion of measureless happiness was utterly bewitching. Great power was sunk in the stones of this house, great brilliance and talent in those who commanded its halls. I could not deny its seductive force; everything in my heart and soul longed to claim a part of this world.
Lord Harold’s world
.

Naked with ambition, grasping in its ruthless drive for self, and glittering in its possibilities, the chances it risked. There was great happiness—great sorrow—but always
passion
in such a world. Better to throw oneself on the wheel, to rise and fall with its whims, than remain forever bound to the earth—

Perhaps the Madeira and the French wine had quite gone to my head. The age of thirty was a trifle late to adopt the role of romantic heroine—to pin all of life on an excess of sensibility, and die when the object of love was denied. As I stood in the darkness above the spreading parterre, awash in that tide of scent, I acknowledged that Lord Harold alone could form my idea of happiness; and knew, with all the finality of earth thudding down upon the grave, that such happiness must be denied.

“Your ladyship has ever been the soul of forbearance.”

His voice, as though I had conjured him from the darkness, spoke softly from the shelter of the neighbouring window.

“It is just that I feel it my
severe duty
, Lord Harold, to be the next Duchess of Devonshire,” Lady Elizabeth
replied, her voice breaking with tears. “Poor Canis is quite lost without me! But no one knows with what
dread
I regard the prospect! No one takes my part—no one feels the depth of my suffering, to stand in the place of
she
who was dearest to me in all the world!”

“I am sure we can none of us be in ignorance of what you feel, Bess,” Lord Harold equably replied. “Perhaps with time—”

“Yes,” she faltered. “Perhaps with time, I shall see better what path I must follow—which duty should be regarded as the most pressing. I do not speak of one’s duty to
oneself—that
cannot be held in the balance. I learned long ago to disregard self entirely.”

“You were always a creature of sacrifice,” Lord Harold murmured.

“And it is in the nature of sacrifice to be misjudged, and ill-regarded,” she returned bitterly. “I am sure I should be quite lost without such good friends as you and Lady Bessborough. The young people positively blame me for their mother’s death!”

“Surely not.”

“Lord Hartington most certainly does! As though I, who nursed Her Grace to the last—through those horrible final hours, when she neither spoke nor knew anyone, and suffered the most fearful agony—as though I could have wished Georgiana ill! I cannot tell you, Harry, how the cloud of suspicion and neglect has deepened my grief! It is a wonder I have not already found my own grave!” Lady Elizabeth blew her nose rather noisily into a handkerchief. “But for the thought of dear Canis, and his helplessness—I believe I should have been carried off!”

“Lord Hartington must be very foolish,” Lord Harold observed. “There can be no possible cause for accusation. Indeed, I cannot believe it even of
him
. Though I know the young fellow to be yet in the grip of grief, surely his reason must urge restraint.”

“It is all on account of that wretched maid.” Lady
Elizabeth sighed. “I wish that she had never been born, with her schemes and her remedies and her incantations!”

“Of whom are you speaking?”

I knew that note in Lord Harold’s voice; he was instantly alive to every possibility, and determined never to betray it. Lady Elizabeth was the merest trout—a slippery fish that had taken the Rogue’s lure. I waited, my breath suspended, for my lord to play the line.

“The stillroom maid, from Penfolds Hall,” Lady Elizabeth retorted peevishly. “The great healer you all cannot be done talking of—the girl so viciously murdered. Young Hart made quite a pet of her, you know.”

“Did he, indeed?” Lord Harold managed to suggest the faintest air of distaste, as though schoolboys who dallied with maidservants were decidedly
not
the thing.

“It is vastly shocking, I am sure—Hart is rather young, and so awkward in his ways—but I assure you, Harry, that we knew nothing of the matter until last month! Canis had occasion to run across the boy on horseback, and observed him parting from the maid. It seems that Hart had been riding over to Tideswell to see the girl ever since his dear mother died.”

No word to Lord Harold, of her own use for the stillroom witch. Lady Bess, I thought, was a subtle character, and vicious in her manipulation.

“Did Hart offer an explanation for such attentions?”

“Not at all. Canis and I both demanded the entire history of the affair, in separate applications; we threatened and cajoled him by turns; and it ended in Hart’s being forbidden to ride in the direction of Tideswell. I persuaded Canis to forbid the boy the use of his horses, indeed, did he contrive to disobey his father. And the sum of it is, that Hart has taken me in severe dislike!”

“I do understand. It is a most prickly age. At fifteen a boy may be wounded by every trifle, and harbour unreasonable resentments.”

Lord Harold’s mind was revolving the intelligence
as thoroughly as my own; but he had not yet read the stillroom book. He knew nothing of Lord Harrington’s attempts to cure his deafness, and must assume the visits to Tess Arnold—which I knew to have long predated his mother’s death—were nothing more than infatuation.

Had there been such a calf love, indeed? Had the Marquess fallen in love with a woman ten years his senior, and followed her about with silent devotion? Until he discovered her one day, as Mrs. Haskell had done, in a state of undress or another man’s arms?

I’d hoped the witch had died in agony
.

What would such a boy have done, at the prickly age of fifteen? I saw again in memory the hideous gouts of blood at the rock’s base. Did the delivery of owe wound demand the blow of another?

And what kind of shot had the Duke taught his heir to be?

“Not a kind word have I heard from Hartington’s lips since April,” Lady Elizabeth cried fretfully, “when we buried Georgiana in the Devonshire crypt! He, who has been almost a
son
—”

Here she broke off, with the faintest suggestion of having been caught out in an indelicacy. Whatever the true nature of the Marquess’s parentage, it would not be Lady Elizabeth who dispelled the mystery. It should be in her interest, I surmised, to foster doubt; and she was never the lady to disregard her own interest.

“Perhaps when all your friends have left you,” Lord Harold said comfortingly, “you may be quiet for a little, Bess, and recover your spirits.”

“Yes,” she gasped. “Solitude is all I require. It is a great thing, Hary-O’s going with her aunt.”

“You will not be lonely?”

“Lonely! With Canis for company!”

I could imagine the scene: Lady Elizabeth’s eyes wide with shock at her friend Harry’s suggestion, one hand pressed against her palpitating heart.