The Saint and the Sinner (11 page)

“That comes well from you!” Hettie replied. “You were completely bosky, as you well know, and Richard was as tight as a Lord.”

“That reminds me, I have not seen our host this morning,” Clive said. “I thought he was coming riding with us.”

“I think he had other things to do,” Pandora said.

“Well, if he did them with you,” Hettie remarked, “Kitty will scratch your eyes out. I’m warning you, she’s very jealous, and she doesn’t talk – she acts!”

“There is no reason for Kitty to be jealous of me,” Pandora answered. “I am just the poor relation and nobody ever worries about them!”

The two men laughed and Hettie said: “Well, don’t say I didn’t warn you!”

The Earl appeared, and, looking at him, Pandora knew without being told that he had enjoyed himself. She had the feeling that he liked getting his teeth into something difficult.

It was characteristic of many of the Charts and she thought that perhaps one of his troubles was that since he had inherited a great fortune he had had nothing more arduous to do than to be entertained. Her mother had always said that men were at their best when they were doing something.

“They are like children,” she had said. “When a child asks: ‘What shall I do?’ you know they are bored, and that is when they get into mischief.”

“Where have you been all the morning?” Freddie asked as the Earl joined them. “Clive and I felt better after a gallop on your excellent horses, but it does not look as though you have sat on anything except a chair.”

“I have been rather busy with affairs concerning the house and the Estate,” the Earl replied. He looked at Pandora as he spoke and his eyes were twinkling.

Without really thinking what she was doing, she slipped her hand into his.

“It has been very exciting!” she said in a low voice. The Earl’s fingers squeezed hers and only as she saw the suspicious look on Hettie’s face did she wonder if she had been indiscreet.

Chapter Four

When luncheon was over the Earl rose to his feet and said:

“I am going riding.”

He had eaten very little and Pandora was sure that his mind was on other things.

He certainly paid very little attention to what Hettie was saying, and he answered his friends absent-mindedly.

She had been relieved to find that there was no sign of Sir Gilbert.

Although she did not ask about him, Richard told her what she wanted to know when he mentioned that last night Sir Gilbert had made an arrangement to see Sir Edward Trentham today.

Clive and Richard now looked at the Earl enquiringly as if they expected him to invite them to ride with him, but before they could speak the Earl said,

“If you are not too tired, Pandora, I would like you to come with me. There are things I want to see which I feel only you can show me.”

“Of course, Cousin Norvin.”

She hurried excitedly upstairs to change into a riding-habit. She had put one in her trunk with the faint hope that there would be a chance of her riding again over the land she loved.

Because she knew that men hated to be kept waiting, she pulled off her gown and hurried into the pretty green habit that she had worn for several years but which still fitted her.

It might be old, but it was well cut.

However much they economised on their ordinary gowns, her father had always insisted that she and her mother were properly dressed in the hunting field.

Arranging her hair in a chignon at the back of her head, she put on the high-crowned hat she wore for riding, which had a gauze veil of the same colour as her habit to float out behind it.

Then she ran downstairs to find the Earl waiting for her in the hall, and outside were two magnificent horses, better bred than anything she had ever before ridden or her father could have afforded to buy. The Earl lifted her into the saddle, and as his hands went to either side of her small waist she realised how strong he was.

She looked down at him, met his eyes, and what she had been about to say suddenly left her mind. She knew only that he was smiling and that some of the lines seemed to have gone from his face.

He looked up at her for what seemed to be a long time, but could in fact have been only a few seconds, before he turned and mounted his own horse.

Pandora supposed it must be the excitement of riding again at Chart, but her heart was beating in a strange manner and she felt as if it was hard to breathe.

They had reached the bridge before she managed to say,

“Where do you wish to go?”

“I thought you might like to show me the part of the Estate I have not yet seen,” the Earl answered.

“What have you seen already?”

“Very little,” he admitted. “At Christmastime the weather was bad and we were all excessively drunk. The last time I was here I spent my time with a fair charmer who did not ride.”

Pandora had the idea that he was deliberately saying such things because he thought they would shock her.

They were duelling with each other, she thought, not only in words but as if they were well-matched fencers and every move was calculated.

“Then I will show you the farms,” she said, “and tell you a little about the men who run them for you. I suppose you know that you have two thousand acres in hand. The rest is let to tenant-farmers who have been with us for many years.”

She realised as she spoke that she was identifying herself with Chart, then silently asked herself, ‘Why not?’

She was as much a part of it as he was, except that he had the power and – if he wished it – the glory.

They rode to the largest farm, which was let to a family who had lived there ever since she could remember.

There were four sons, who did the majority of the work as their father was getting old, and they were now out in the fields.

The father was feeding some new-born calves and his wife was feeding a flock of geese and collecting the eggs.

As soon as Pandora appeared they greeted her effusively, but when she introduced them to the Earl there was a cold silence and they looked at him apprehensively.

“If ye’ve come t’ turn me out, M’Lord,” the farmer said, “there’s nought Oi can do about it. Ye’ve bled us white this last six months, an’ the only way Oi can pay what Oi owes is to sell me stock, an’ that, as any farmer knows, be the beginning of the end!”

“Are you referring to the rent?” the Earl enquired.

“What else?” the farmer asked aggressively. “How much more are you paying since I inherited than you paid before?”

The farmer looked at him incredulously.

“Oi understood as the rises were directly on Ye Lordship’s orders.”

“Then you were mistaken!” the Earl said sharply. “Tell His Lordship the difference,” Pandora said softly.

“Over twice as much, M’Lord, an’ we’ve been told that ten percent of everythin’ we sells at the market has to be given to Ye Lordship.”

Pandora gasped.

She knew this was exorbitant to say the least of it, and she wondered if the Earl would understand that it would be impossible for any farmer to meet such demands honestly.

It seemed to her that there was a long silence before the Earl said,

“There has obviously been some mistake. You will pay in rent exactly what you used to pay in the past, and your sales do not concern me and are the reward you receive for your labour.”

The incredulous expression on the farmer’s face made Pandora feel that she wanted to cry.

“D-do ye mean th-that, M’Lord?” the old man managed to stammer.

“My new manager, Mr. Michael Farrow, will, I am sure, explain to you that what has been happening recently has not been on my instructions.”

“Oi canna believe it!” the farmer said slowly. “Thank ye, M’Lord, thank ye! Ye’ve taken a load off me shoulders, an’ the Missus’ll sleep sound again at night.”

They insisted on Pandora and the Earl going into the farm-house to drink a glass of their homebrewed cider and eat a slice of their home-cured ham.

Pandora was glad to see that the Earl was very much at his ease with these simple people.

Although the farmer’s wife had burst into tears when she was first told the good news, she dried them quickly and was all smiles and happiness when finally they left.

“God bless ye, Miss Pandora,” she added as they said good-bye. “This be a happy day for us and Oi knows as how yer father, God bless him, would rejoice to know that things up at th’ Hall are going to be as they was.”

“I am sure he would,” Pandora said softly.

She and the Earl rode away, and when they reached the next farm almost the identical scene took place.

She had a feeling that now the Earl was positively enjoying himself.

She was perceptive enough to realise that, after years of poverty, it was pleasant for him to feel that he was in the seat of power and his people relied on him.

That was the right word, she thought, and as they rode on again she said:

“Now you understand, I think, how important the Earl of Chartwood is! Not only in London in attendance upon the King, but here where you reign supreme.”

“I shall become conceited and very puffed up with my own importance if you talk to me like that,” the Earl replied.

“What I am saying is true,” Pandora said. “Papa said once that Chart is like a State within a State. You see, we are almost self-sufficient. There are not only farmers, but stone-masons, wood-cutters, carpenters, iron-workers, and smithies, and of course all the offices which directly serve the house.”

“I have seen none of these places,” the Earl replied. “I am quite certain you will have something scathing to say about my negligence.”

“I am prepared to accept it as ignorance,” Pandora said teasingly.

“Well, Miss Know-All, this is your glorious hour,” he replied. “I will allow you to bully me for the moment, but I have always fancied myself as being an efficient organiser, so once you have served your purpose I shall have no further use for you!”

Pandora knew he was joking in the spirit in which she had teased him, but she felt as they turned for home that there was many a true word spoken in jest.

They had seen only a tenth of what there was to be seen, and yet she realised he was grasping the organisation of the great Estate with an intelligence and a capacity to learn that she would not have expected of him.

He asked extremely pertinent questions not only of her but of the farmers and the other people they met, and, as they rode back through the village, he looked at the Vicarage and said:

“I wish your father were still here. I am sure he would be able to tell me a great many other things I want to know.”

“What sort of things?” Pandora asked, curious. “About the people themselves, the men of the village, the sort of lives they lead when they are not at work. Do you think it would seem strange if I went to the Inn and ordered myself a drink?”

Pandora smiled.

“I think Mr. Tubb, who keeps the Dog and Fox, would be delighted if you called on him. He has been there for twenty-five years and his father kept it before him.”

“Very well, I will go there tomorrow,” the Earl said. “I cannot believe that an Inn is the sort of place that you could visit.”

Pandora laughed.

“You are not in London now and I assure you that the Dog and Fox is very respectable.”

Because she thought he looked surprised, she added:

“Of course I would not be allowed to enter an Inn or what they call a ‘Public House’ in Lindchester. Uncle Augustus would have a stroke at the idea!”

She laughed again and went on,

“But Mrs. Tubb always had a glass of apple-juice for me when I was a little girl, and actually Mr. Tubb would never serve anyone who had over-indulged. So drunkenness in Chart village is very, very rare.”

“Rather different from Chart Hall,” the Earl remarked dryly.

Pandora did not reply for a moment. Then she said,

“You will think it very ignorant of me, but I cannot understand why anyone wants to drink so much that they are ill the next day. It seems such a waste when life is so short.”

“You talk as though you were an octogenarian,” the Earl replied. “You have long years ahead of you.”

“It is not long enough to do all the things I want to do,” Pandora said, and gave a little sigh. “If I had the ... chance.”

“What do you want to do?”

“Read, for one thing; travel, for another; and see Chart as it used to be in all its glory.”

“Is it not glorious enough for you now?”

“Not really,” Pandora answered. “You see, the people who work for the house want appreciation even more than the owner of it. It is no use for the gardeners to grow beautiful flowers and magnificent fruit if there is nobody to enjoy them.”

She glanced at the Earl under her eye-lashes and continued,

“The horses get fat and lazy in the stables because there is no point in exercising them if they are not going to be ridden by somebody who really appreciates how fit they are.”

“Are you seriously suggesting that I should live at Chart?” the Earl asked.

“Why not? Grandpapa, when he was young, used to be at Chart for nine months of the year. It was lovely in the summer, and there was shooting and hunting in the autumn. If it had not been for the war, he always said, he would have gone to Rome or to the South of France in the spring.”

The Earl did not speak and after a pause Pandora went on:

“Chart House in London was opened for the Season. That was all, but there was a magnificent party given in the Ball-Room when Mama made her debut. She often told me about it.”

“And that is what you would have liked for yourself,” the Earl said.

“Shall I tell you how I spent my eighteenth birthday?” Pandora asked.

“Tell me.”

“I spent the morning delivering religious tracts to some old women in the Almshouses who did not want them but were quite glad to have a chat.”

The Earl gave a little laugh and she went on:

“In the afternoon my aunt was extremely angry because I had not washed some tablecloths as well as she would have wished. She made me do them again twice as a punishment, deliberately rubbing soot into them after I had spent an hour pressing them with a hot iron.”