Mistress of the Hunt (2 page)

As Philippa entered the stair hall, the great mahogany flying staircase with its carved balusters, their newels formed as Tuscan columns and surmounted by round glass candle-holders, seemed to swoop around and above her. The walls of the staircase, as well as those of the passageway leading from its upper landing, were hung with portraits of Elizabethan statesmen, of the royal Stuarts, and of the Raynard and Wakefield families, but Philippa, having seen them all before, hurried up the stair and along the passageway to the morning room, where she had been helping to search for a recent inventory of the house’s contents when Bickerstaff had come to inform her of Mr. Quinlan’s arrival.

When she entered the cheerful yellow-and-white room, a lady of late middle years and comfortable figure, who was attired in lavender silk and seated at a deal table strewn with papers, looked up from her intent perusal of one of these, her severe expression softening noticeably. By the time she had removed the silver-rimmed pince-nez from the bridge of her button nose, her pale blue eyes were twinkling.

“Another one, my dear—this Mr. Quinlan?”

“Indeed, ma’am, and most insistent.”

Miss Adeliza Pellerin clicked her tongue in annoyance. “Mercy me, I knew I ought to have accompanied you. ’Tis not seemly for you to meet with young men without a chaperon, my dear, and that’s the nut with no bark on it.”

“Nonsense, Cousin, it is quite customary for a lady to receive a proposal of marriage privately.”

“Not without the young man applies first to her papa, it isn’t,” countered Miss Pellerin.

“Well, for him to ride into Yorkshire to seek Papa’s permission to pay his addresses to me and then back here to find me afterward would be absurd. Not only have I had more than my share of experience dealing with would-be suitors, but having been a widow these two years and more, I am scarcely a green girl who wants careful watching.”

“I collect that you were able to speed Mr. Quinlan on his way, then?”

“Easily, for despite his insistence, he was not nearly so determined or so arrogant as some I have encountered since poor Wakefield was so obliging as to leave me a wealthy widow. Beyond pointing out that he had pursued me into the wilds of Leicestershire—”

“Wilds?”

“Indeed, his very word. But aside from that, he was rather docile.”

“Disappointingly so, perhaps?”

“No, of course not. I was grateful that he was no worse.” Philippa sighed, taking a seat opposite Miss Pellerin. “I truly believed I should escape all this attention by coming here. I never thought any of them would follow me.”

“Well, they say Leicestershire is a man’s county, after all. You won’t escape the company of gentlemen altogether by coming here.”

“Oh, but they never paid any heed to me here before. They thought of nothing but their hunting and shooting. Even when I hunted with the Belvoir, the men ignored me and the other ladies entirely, fixing their concentration upon the hounds and the fox.”

“Your husband was nearby,” Miss Pellerin pointed out gently.

“True, but he was amused rather than angry whenever men flirted with me. He always said it was no more than he would expect of any intelligent young man, and he always made it clear that he knew I had too much sense to be impressed by such stuff. Schoolboys, he thought most of them.” Philippa was silent for a moment, collecting her thoughts, but when she looked at Miss Pellerin and realized from her sympathetic expression that the older lady was misinterpreting her silence, she smiled to reassure her. “Truly, ma’am, I held Wakefield in the greatest esteem and affection, but he was many years my senior, and it was in the nature of things that he should predecease me. Indeed, he prepared me for widowhood much more carefully than my parents had prepared me for marriage, and after his long illness, I am sure that no one of compassion could have wished for him to linger. I confess, I felt little more than sad relief at his passing.”

“But you scarcely saw anyone after his death, my dear. Except for your servants—excellent folk, I am sure—you were alone at Wakefield Priory for an entire year and more.”

“At first I was exhausted,” Philippa explained. “Despite the servants, I did much of the nursing myself, you know, because he fretted at having others attend to him and he liked to talk with me, to instruct me with regard to such matters as I should have to attend to after his passing. The last months were particularly difficult. For a long time afterward I wanted only to rest.” Her quick grin flashed, showing even white teeth. “I look dreadful in black, if you must have the truth, and there was no one I particularly wished to see and nothing I particularly wished to do, beyond setting our affairs in order. And that, I daresay, I managed to accomplish only because of Wakefield’s careful teaching, for when Edward and Jessalyn were down for the long vacation that first summer, I attended to them more as though they were characters in a dream than as a proper stepmother ought to have done. But somehow the months just disappeared until one day I realized that the year was well behind me and a new London Season lay before me. It was the most astonishing thing, as though I had wakened from a long, refreshing sleep.”

“That was when you wrote to me,” said Miss Pellerin with a reminiscent smile.

“Indeed, it was,” Philippa replied, reaching across the table to squeeze the older woman’s plump beringed hand affectionately. “My friends and the family had been urging me for some time to pick up the threads of my old social life, but I wanted to do nothing that would reflect dishonorably upon Wakefield’s memory. Since you go everywhere and know everyone while maintaining a reputation of the highest respectability, I knew you could only add to my consequence.” The saucy grin peeked out again and was reflected by amusement in the older lady’s eyes.

“I must say, my dear, that considering the size of your fortune, there is little else needed to add to your consequence. I do think your husband was a mite peculiar, however, to have put you so completely in charge of your own affairs as he did—and the children’s affairs as well.”

Philippa’s eyes continued to twinkle. “After teaching me everything he knew, he could scarcely say I was unfit, ma’am. Moreover, he would have thought himself bound to name his brother principal trustee otherwise, and that he could not bring himself to do. He had no wish to offend Mr. Raynard-Wakefield, so he did name him as adviser to me, but he did so knowing I should have no need for such advice as he might give me. And, I must tell you, ma’am, I certainly prefer being my own mistress to having to answer to a trustee. Imagine how annoying, always to have had to have my expenditures authorized. We should never have had such a good time in London as we did.”

“You did enjoy the gaiety and all the attention at the outset, did you not?” Miss Pellerin said.

“Indeed, I found it quite stimulating,” Philippa admitted. “But then the pressures increased, with everyone encouraging me to marry again, and it began to feel as though several of the more obdurate of my suitors were beginning to claw at my skirts. I remembered Wakefield’s hunting box as a place of marvelous privacy, and since he left it to my use for my lifetime, it seemed the perfect haven.”

“Hunting box,” repeated Miss Pellerin with a chuckle. “I certainly envisioned something quite different from this when you told me where you wished to go, my dear. Like Mr. Quinlan, I quite thought we should find ourselves in the wilds, but this place is scarcely that. Why, this house is wanting in none of those accessories which would be considered indispensable in a house in London.”

“No,” Philippa agreed, “although in London the paintings on the walls would be by Constable or Gainsborough rather than by John Ferneley or Ben Marshall. But in Leicestershire, no house can be complete without at least several hunting portraits. I particularly like the Ferneley over there by the chimneypiece—the short-tailed horse falling neck and crop over a flight of rails, whilst the thoroughbred, who ought to be advancing, viciously kicks at the leap his rider desires him to face.”

Obediently Miss Pellerin glanced at the picture, but her interests did not include hunting or hunting portraits. “I daresay it is very nice,” she said. “You mentioned riding with the Belvoir when you were down here with Wakefield. Do you intend to hunt whilst we are here? I cannot think it a seemly activity for a woman of quality.”

“Well, I enjoy the sport immensely,” Philippa informed her with a smile, “and I should like very much to attempt it here in the shires again, but not,” she added, glad of her newfound knowledge, “until the scent is high. Have you discovered the inventory amongst all that litter, ma’am?”

Recalled to her duty, Miss Pellerin sniffed in exasperation. “I declare, Philippa, no one seems to have attended to this business properly since eighteen-aught-four. You may count yourself fortunate if we discover that your servants have not fleeced you prettily in the meantime.”

Philippa grinned at her. “I should be well served, should I not, Cousin? You will forgive me, however, if I do not mention your concern to Mrs. Bickerstaff, since it was her sister who looked after the house in our absence.” Amused by her companion’s grim look but having no wish to hear again her opinion of the way the household had been run, she added quickly, “Is a ten-year-old list truly the most recent one you have discovered?”

“Indeed.” Miss Pellerin replaced her pince-nez, scanned the papers before her, then selected and offered several yellowed sheets to Philippa. “See for yourself, my dear. ’Tis a disgrace.”

“Well, it is not my disgrace, after all,” Philippa said, taking the lists from her. “I was no more than sixteen then and didn’t marry Wakefield until three years later. We spent a bare month here the first year of our marriage and less than six weeks altogether during the second and third, which is when he first fell ill. The last two years, as you know, his illness precluded our leaving Wakefield Priory.”

“That is still three years you were in residence here, however,” Miss Pellerin pointed out in her prim voice.

Philippa chuckled. “Have a heart, ma’am. I was no match for Mrs. Bickerstaff then, not at the Priory and certainly not here, where during the hunting season I was treated like an accessory whose value was placed slightly higher than that of my lord’s favorite dogs but far and away below that of the least of his hunters.”

“My poor child!” exclaimed Miss Pellerin, instantly sympathetic.

“Not a bit of it, ma’am.” Philippa’s eyes danced. “I should scarcely have chosen to return to Chase Charley had my memories been unhappy ones.”

“Why on earth did the Raynard-Wakefields call this place by such an extraordinary name?” demanded her companion.

“
They
didn’t. Until some fifteen years ago, it was Raynard Hall, for you must know that the Raynard-Wakefield connection is little more than a hundred years old, and this estate belonged originally to the Raynard branch. It was Wakefield’s son—Edward, you know—who renamed it. When he was small, it seems there was a slight misunderstanding about where his papa was going when he said he was going to ‘chase Charley.’ Hunters refer to the fox, any fox, as Charley, of course, but Edward did not know that, for he had never been here himself then. His mama did not enjoy the solitude.”

“But you did?”

“Indeed, I had my books, my own horses to ride, and my music. To be sure, despite my lord’s numerous guests, I was generally the only female in the house who was not a servant; however, we visited Belvoir Castle several times, and the duchess and her mama-in-law are delightful hostesses, I promise you.”

“I have known Isabella for years, of course,” said Miss Pellerin, referring to the Dowager Duchess of Rutland, “but although I have encountered the young duchess from time to time, I know little about her, except of course that she is Carlisle’s fifth daughter. I have heard it said that she prefers to spend most of her time at Belvoir.”

“Yes, but despite a near-eight-year difference in our ages, we have more in common than both of us being daughters of earls,” Philippa said with a laugh. “Her eldest child—called Elizabeth after herself—is with Jessalyn in Bath at Miss Blandamore’s Seminary for Young Gentlewomen. The duchess and I, as a result, enjoy a somewhat haphazard correspondence, exchanging views on the proper rearing of young ladies.”

“It is devoutly to be hoped that the Lady Elizabeth Manners is not such a romp as your harum-scarum stepdaughter,” said Miss Pellerin with a grimace.

Philippa managed to smile again, but her companion had unwittingly struck a nerve. There had been no word from Miss Jessalyn Raynard-Wakefield for more than a month, despite the fact that Philippa had made a point of keeping that young lady apprised of her frequent movements. That she had likewise received no word during that same period from the thirteenth Baron Wakefield did not weigh so heavily with her. Edward was an indifferent correspondent at the best of times, and being heavily engaged in his first year at Oxford, he would no doubt have found better use for his time than to waste it writing to his stepmother. Jessalyn was another matter. If a letter did not arrive from her within the week, Philippa knew she would no longer be able to put off sending a letter of inquiry to Miss Blandamore, and she was quite certain that Jessalyn would prefer that she do nothing of the sort.

She did not speak of these concerns to her companion, however, and the conversation drifted to household matters. There was, despite the fact that the pair of them had now been at Chase Charley for nearly a week, still a good deal to be done. The skeleton staff had done an adequate job of keeping the place habitable during their mistress’s long absence, but there were still many chores that must be attended to before the beautiful house would meet the high standards of such a stickler as Miss Pellerin. Philippa had no qualms about turning most of the household management over to her companion and the excellent Mrs. Bickerstaff while she dealt with matters of business with her late husband’s bailiff, Mr. Weems, and it was to his office in the stable pavilion that she repaired an hour later.

Lord Wakefield had chosen his servants well, and she had quickly discovered that everything about the Leicestershire estate was in good trim. The rents were up again, and her tenants were a contented lot. Mr. Weems’s only concern seemed to be that the hunting season reach its peak as quickly as possible, giving Philippa to assume that he wanted the sport over and done so that spring planting might begin as early as the weather would allow. She submitted today to an explanation of his system of bookkeeping, knowing full well that while he was flattered to have her attention, he would firmly resist any suggestion she might be foolhardy enough to make to him. At the moment she had no reason to question his methods, however, so she was able to compliment his skills with sincerity.