The Romance (17 page)

‘Mr. Fitzwilliam will be with you shortly,’ said the caretaker. He indicated the decanter of wine, glasses, and plate of sliced cake on a table, bowed, and left.

‘Just look at this place,’ said St. Clair. They both looked about them in awe.

Stuffed heads of deer, foxes, and badgers stared down at them from the walls. The furniture was heavy and Jacobean: high carved chairs and a massive table gleaming like black glass with two centuries of polish. A huge grandfather clock ticked and tocked sonorously from the corner. Above the fireplace was the portrait of a lady in the dress of the last century. She had an autocratic face, bulbous eyes, and a contemptuous stare.

‘Your great-aunt,’ whispered Belinda.

‘Fright, ain’t she? I remember her now. Used to terrify me to death.’

Belinda giggled. ‘Perhaps she has only left you that portrait?’

‘Then I shall burn it. Imagine having those eyes staring at you, day in and day out. Let’s have some wine. What is keeping that lawyer fellow?’

Lord Gyre had tethered his horse some way down the road from the house and then walked forward. A man who looked like a caretaker had let them in. He had not taken St. Clair’s horses and curricle to the stables but had merely tethered the team to a post at the entrance to the short drive. Gyre, who had begun to fear a romantic assignation, began to relax. But what on earth were they doing?

He heard the clop of a horse’s hooves coming along the quiet road and drew even farther back. He felt ashamed of himself now for spying on what appeared to be a supremely happy couple.

A man in lawyer’s garb, his face shielded by a broad-brimmed hat worn over a bag-wig, dismounted and went into the house. Gyre was about to turn away when, to his surprise, the lawyer came out again and, after a furtive look all around, went round to the back of the house.

His curiosity now rampant, Gyre slid out of his hiding-place and went quietly round to the back of the house as well.

*      *      *

Inside, Belinda and St. Clair heard footsteps mounting the staircase and pausing outside the
drawing-room door. Both rose to their feet. Then there was the click of a key in the lock and they could hear the footsteps rapidly retreating.

‘Well, what the deuce!’ exclaimed St. Clair, striding to the door and trying to open it. He swung round, his face the picture of amazement. ‘We’ve been locked in!’

‘There must be some mistake,’ cried Belinda.

‘There isn’t!’

Belinda ran to one of the windows, but they were mullioned and made of old bottle-glass. ‘I can’t see a thing,’ she said desperately.

Saint Clair’s face turned white in the gloom.

‘Perry,’ he said.

‘Mr. Vane? What has he to do with this?’

‘Only that Mrs. Ingram said she thought he would try to kill me.’

‘Did you meet this lawyer?’

‘No, I only had a couple of letters from him. Wait! What’s that smell?’

‘Smoke,’ said Belinda in a hollow voice. ‘I smell smoke.’

‘We’ve got to get out of here!’ St. Clair picked up a chair and smashed it against one of the windows, but the chair only bent the lead holding the little glass panes.

‘Help!’ screamed St. Clair. ‘We’re going to be roasted alive!’

*      *      *

Lord Gyre moved very quietly around the side of the house and then peered round the corner into the back garden.

The lawyer, if he was a lawyer, was piling bales of hay against the back of the house. Then he took a can of oil and began to splash the oil on the hay.

The marquess was to wonder often afterwards why he did not move more quickly, but he could not quite believe his eyes until the man took out a tinder-box. The first bale of hay went up in a sheet of flame.

Gyre ran forward. The man turned, and this time, despite the disguise, Gyre recognized the Honourable Peregrine Vane.

He threw himself on him, forcing him back into the burning hay, while Perry fought like a madman. Then finally the marquess was able to land one enormous punch and Perry lay still, his wig and his coat in flames. The marquess began to pull the burning hay away from the building, scattering it about the garden, jumping on it, cursing, demented with fear. He saw Perry’s clothes were on fire, but could not bring himself to help him, in case the house went up and burned St. Clair and Belinda.

*      *      *

Perry regained consciousness. He brushed dizzily at his blazing clothes and then let out a shriek as a last great wave of pain engulfed him.

And then he began to smile. Because it had all been a bad dream and he was back at Mannerling, in the drawing-room, standing by the fireplace. A footman came in carrying a basket of logs.

‘Fetch me some claret,’ said Perry.

But the footman walked right through him, placed the logs beside the fire and walked out again, quietly closing the door behind him.

*      *      *

The marquess, seeing that the fire was not going to take hold of the house, then ran indoors and up the staircase, where he could hear St. Clair’s cries for help. The key was still in the door. He swung it open.

‘It was you, you bastard!’ shrieked St. Clair and burst into tears.

‘No, it was your cousin. I fear he is dead.’

‘Mr. Vane?’ asked Belinda through white lips.

She swayed slightly. He moved to take her in his arms and then backed away, saying instead, ‘You are both safe now. How did this come about?’

*      *      *

It took some time for St. Clair to recover from his fright. When they were seated and drinking wine, St. Clair at last told Lord Gyre how he had been tricked.

‘Someone will need to break the news to Earl Durbridge,’ said Gyre. ‘This will need to be hushed up. He will not want such a scandal. You have both had a bad fright, but now you are both safe and can look forward to your marriage.’

To his surprise, St. Clair’s eyes filled with tears again and he said to Belinda, ‘Oh, dear, now I am going to have to marry you after all.’

‘No, you don’t,’ said Belinda. ‘I don’t want you, you don’t want me.’ A mischievous smile lit up her still white face. ‘I know you want to marry Mrs. Ingram.’

‘But I can’t marry her unless I have money of my own.’

‘Mrs. Ingram is a very wealthy woman,’ said Belinda. ‘Surely she will have enough for both of you.’

‘But the shame and the scandal. Living off a woman!’

‘It is done the whole time in society, I believe,’ said Belinda drily.

‘But I saw you on the road to Hammersmith,’ said Lord Gyre, exasperated. ‘You looked the picture of a happy couple.’

Saint Clair dried his eyes. ‘That’s because Belinda told me she didn’t want to marry me and that was why she was being so rude to me. What were you doing, following us?’

‘I wondered why you were both driving out of London without servants. Besides, you have gained a reputation for beating your fiancée. I
was worried about her.’

‘Well, we’re deuced lucky you came,’ said St. Clair. ‘You saved our lives. You sure Perry is dead?’

‘I think so. I will attend to matters here, Saint Clair. I think you will find when your father hears the whole story, he will be so shocked he will give you what you want.’

‘He will never countenance a marriage to Mrs. Ingram.’

‘Then you must be firm and tell him you are determined to marry her anyway.’

‘Your poor hands,’ exclaimed Belinda to Lord Gyre. ‘You have been badly burned.’

‘I will survive. Please go quickly. We will put about the story that Mr. Vane died in an unfortunate accident. I will need to find the caretaker and pay him to keep quiet. Please do go. The house is quite isolated but someone may have seen the smoke.’

*      *      *

Saint Clair and Belinda made their way slowly back to London. ‘What a fright!’ said St. Clair.

‘Yes,’ said Belinda in a little voice.

‘Funny thing, you know,’ said St. Clair cheerfully, ‘I would have thought Gyre would have popped the question the minute he knew you were free. I mean, he came round last night and punched my nose because he’d heard I hit you. Then he follows us like a man obsessed.’

‘I think Lord Gyre is heartily sick of the Beverley family and their ambitions to regain Mannerling,’ said Belinda in a low voice. ‘He is under the impression that if he proposed to me, I would ask him to buy Mannerling for me.’

‘Never could understand the lot of you and that house. Great barn of a place in the middle of nowhere.’

For once, Belinda did not feel like leaping to the defence of her precious home. Mannerling had brought nothing to her family but humiliation and danger. If Lord Gyre had not followed them, they would probably have both been burned to death. No one would have ever found out who it was who had tricked them and Perry Vane would have become the owner of Mannerling.

*      *      *

Belinda told a horrified audience consisting of Miss Trumble and Barry, Lizzie and Lady Beverley, and Abigail and her husband, Burfield, of her adventure.

‘This is dreadful,’ said Lady Beverley faintly. ‘Mr. Vane must have been mad and we never knew it.’

‘He was driven mad by his desire for Mannerling,’ said Miss Trumble.

‘Well, at least he will never get his hands on it now,’ said Lady Beverley. ‘And Saint Clair and my beloved daughter will be there and—’

‘Mama,’ said Belinda quietly, ‘I have told Lord Saint Clair that I will never marry him.’

‘What? What? Oh, you are overset, my poor child, and do not know what you are saying.’

‘On the contrary, Mama, that is the case. I have told Lord Saint Clair I do not want to marry him and he doesn’t want to marry me either.’

And Lady Beverley, who had listened with surprising calm to Belinda’s adventures, suddenly fainted dead away.

*      *      *

Shortly after Belinda had dropped her bombshell, Lord St. Clair was telling his story to Mrs. Ingram. When she had heard him out, she said, ‘We had forgot to be on our guard. But it is over now. I think perhaps we should go to Gretna after all. I have enough money.’

‘You know that would not answer. Pa would disinherit me.’

‘But you have never cared much for anything other than enjoying yourself.’

‘I care now, and demme, I don’t see why I can’t have you and my inheritance. Put on your best bonnet; we are going to call on Pa.’

*      *      *

They found another amazed and horrified audience in Earl Durbridge. Mrs. Ingram had chosen to wear a gown of irreproachable
modesty and a plain bonnet. She did hope St. Clair would have enough wit to turn his father’s shock to his advantage.

‘So you see, Pa,’ said St. Clair finally, ‘it was a day of shocks, for Belinda Beverley told me she doesn’t want to marry me after all and I don’t want to marry her.’

‘Fustian!’

‘I am going to marry Mrs. Ingram here.’

‘What?’

‘And you ain’t going to stop me either. You were always holding your precious Perry up to me as a fine example. Look what your fine example turned out to be while I am damned as a useless fop.’

Bewildered, the earl looked at Mrs. Ingram, who said quietly, ‘I love your son and will make him a good wife. I am a wealthy woman and we would not be a burden on your estate.’

‘My son would live off his wife?’

Mrs. Ingram smiled sweetly. ‘Only if you drive him to it. Lord Gyre is hushing up matters beautifully. There will be no scandal unless Lord Saint Clair and myself decide to be open about it.’

‘Are you blackmailing me?’ demanded the earl wrathfully.

‘I am only showing you what a suitable member of your family I could be,’ said Mrs. Ingram. ‘You were quite happy to blackmail your son into marriage by threatening to cut off his inheritance. You were even prepared to countenance the Beverleys’ schemes to regain Mannerling.’

‘I suppose you want the place yourself,’ sneered the earl.

‘I hate the place. I don’t want it.’

‘I don’t want it either,’ said St. Clair, taking her hand. ‘You should give me your blessing, Pa, and apologize to me for having held Perry up as a good example.’

His normally weak face looked quite determined. ‘And furthermore, the Durbridge lands are by right mine, so don’t be getting any mad ideas of leaving them to the kitchen cat!’

The earl put his head in his hands. Saint Clair and Mrs. Ingram waited. Then the earl pulled the bell-rope beside his chair and said to the footman who answered its summons, ‘Fetch champagne. I have something to celebrate.’

*      *      *

Saint Clair returned to his town house sometime later, happy and tipsy. He flicked through the morning’s post, which he had not yet opened. There were various invitations and then a large letter, of stiff parchment and with an unfamiliar seal. He cracked it open. It was from a reputable firm of lawyers in Lincoln’s Inn Fields. They were honoured to inform his lordship that his late great-aunt, Amy Wainfield, had left him her considerable
fortune.

Saint Clair fell to the floor, holding the letter above his head, kicking up his heels and laughing hysterically.

Belinda felt weary and sad. A whole week had gone by since the death of Mr. Vane, and yet Lord Gyre had not called. She feared he had gone back to the country. She curst her folly in having been so open with him about her silly ambitions. That very evening there was to be a grand ball at the Duke and Duchess of Hadshire’s in Grosvenor Square. It was to be a glittering end to the Season.

She longed to cry off, to say she was ill, but Lizzie was so racked with guilt that Belinda was sure her sister would be made even more miserable by her not going. It was hard to put a brave face on things, to chatter to Lizzie as she was dressed in a new gown of silver tissue just as if her heart was not breaking.

Memories of Lord Gyre flooded her mind. She decided that once they were safely back at
Brookfield House, she would never look at or go near Mannerling again.

Lord St. Clair had called to tell her of his inheritance and of how Mannerling was once more to be sold. He and Mrs. Ingram were to be married before Christmas, and Belinda promised to dance at his wedding.