The Lost Garden (The Purchas Family Series Book 5)

by Jane Aiken Hodge

  ‘I was sure of it,’ said Grant heartily. ‘I said as much to his Grace himself. “She’s a member of the family,” I told him. “She’ll do nothing to injure it.”’

  ‘You were quite right.’

  ‘Satisfactory. Most satisfactory. I will give his Grace your solemn assurance, and now we can get on to the pleasanter side of my visit. His Grace feels that all things considered it will save a deal of awkwardness if you and Mr Tremadoc settle somewhere out of town. There is a living in his gift which has just fallen vacant. Mrs Tremadoc did not seem to think her son would wish to take Holy Orders, but I am sure you will be able to persuade him. It’s a good living; £1,000 a year clear; he would be able to appoint a curate if he found the duty too onerous. Oldchurch is a thriving little town, you will find, and the vicarage a good one, I believe. Big but not too big, and a convenient distance from the church, not hanging over the graveyard the way some of them do. I am sure you will find it a most eligible situation, Mrs Tremadoc.’

  ‘You will think me very ignorant,’ she said. ‘But where is Oldchurch, Mr Grant? I confess I never heard of it.’

  ‘Why should you have?’ He thought ignorance most suitable in a woman. ‘It’s on Romney Marsh, Mrs Tremadoc, wool country, of course; you will find it similar to Cley in some ways.’

  ‘Then the farming will have been hit by this endless war as it has been at Cley,’ she said. ‘And the £1,000 a year is presumably in tithes, Mr Grant?’

  ‘Why, yes.’ He looked at her with surprised respect. He had raised this aspect of the case with the Duke, being a man who liked to be prepared for every eventuality, and the Duke had laughed it off.

  ‘They’ll never think of that,’ he had said, ‘but if they do, tell them I’ll make the income up to £1,000 if necessary.’

  He told Caroline this now, glad to be able to do so.

  ‘It’s good of the Duke,’ she said. ‘And I understand from Mrs Tremadoc that he has paid my…’ She boggled for a moment. ‘Mr Tremadoc’s debts. Please tell him how very grateful I am. And that I will do my very best to persuade Mr Tremadoc that he should accept this kind offer.’

  ‘Tell him there won’t be another one,’ said Grant. ‘You know the Duke, ma’am.’

  She gave him a very straight look. ‘I do indeed,’ she said.

  ‘For all the world like her father,’ he told his clerk afterwards. ‘Gave me a real turn, it did.’

  For the moment, he put his hand in the capacious pocket of his coat and produced two notes. ‘For you, ma’am,’ he told her. ‘One of them got mislaid, somehow, at Chevenham House, which explains the direction.’

  From Blakeney? She took them eagerly, noticing that one was addressed, in a hand she did not know, to Miss Thorpe. The other, addressed to her as Mrs Tremadoc, was in the Duchess’ well known, flowing hand. ‘Thank you.’ She concealed her disappointment gallantly. ‘Any messages, Mr Grant?’ But how should there be?

  ‘No ma’am.’ Suddenly, to his own surprise, he felt unspeakably sorry for her. ‘But the Duchess…’

  ‘Of course. Stupid of me. Thank you, Mr Grant.’ It was dismissal, and he accepted it as such, rising to his feet.

  ‘I shall hope to hear from your husband.’

  ‘As soon as possible.’ She was eagerly opening the Duchess’ note as he took his leave.

  It was short and to the point:

  Dear Child,

  The Duke has told me what he intends to do for you, and I hope you will feel, as I do, that he has been kindness itself. But I would like to feel that you had a little independence of your own, and mean to allow you £50 a year pin money out of my own funds. I do hope you will accept this, and let it be a secret between you and me. I have asked my friend Mr Coutts to make the arrangements for me, and you should be hearing from him shortly. Dear child, I wish you so very well.

  A tear fell on the signature as Caroline opened the other letter. Dated the day after that disastrous outing to Richmond Park, it was even shorter than the Duchess’ and quite as much to the point:

  Dear Miss Thorpe,

  I was sorry not to be able to see you this morning. You will forgive me if I speak plainly, as to a friend. It strikes me that you will find yourself awkwardly situated, just now, at Chevenham House. It would make me both proud and happy if you would consent to change your state by becoming my wife.

  [And the bold signature] Charles Mattingley.

  Mattingley. If she had only known. He would have helped her. There was a postscript:

  I must leave town for a couple of days. I will hope to hear from you on my return.

  He must have come back to the news of her elopement with Tremadoc. But why had she not had his note at the time? The answer stared her in the face. Someone at Chevenham House had intercepted it. Had also intercepted her note to Blakeney? Of course. No wonder he had not come to her rescue. It is more than I can bear, she thought. And then, but I have to bear it.

  Chapter Twelve

  Visiting the Cinque Ports, Queen Elizabeth the First had called Oldchurch the brightest jewel in her crown, and Caroline, seeing the little hill town for the first time in silhouette against the sunset, could understand why. It looked a fairy palace, rising from the high flint walls that still defended its loop of river to the bold outline of its church tower at the top of the hill. The sea that had made it useful as a harbour to the Tudor fleet was three miles away now, beyond the marsh that was so like and yet so unlike her beloved marshes at Cley.

  Tired from the journey, and from Tremadoc’s constant, habitual grumbling, she felt this darkening marsh as alien, unfriendly, and could not suppress a superstitious shiver as the carriage drove in through the Land Gate and up the steep hill towards the church. Timber-framed houses overhung the street, their upper storeys almost meeting, so that it was suddenly dark in the carriage.

  Beside her, too close for comfort in the confined space, Tremadoc shifted uneasily. ‘The back of beyond,’ he exclaimed. ‘It’s too much! I shall die, and it will be entirely your fault for making me come to this dreadful place. And don’t forget the income from the living will die with me, so no use to be planning to set up as a merry widow when I am gone. My mother wouldn’t help you if you were starving, not after the way you have behaved. Pretending you have no influence with the Duke! Making me take orders! Bringing me down to this deadly hole to burn out my genius in the wilderness. We poets need company, the interplay of lively minds. What shall I do in this black hole?’

  ‘We will find out soon enough,’ she said as the carriage emerged from the dark little street into what seemed almost a Cathedral Close of pleasant brick-fronted houses set around a well-kept green. It was still warmed by the last rays of the setting sun striking almost horizontally past the looming shape of the church. The windows of the house outside which the carriage stopped reflected the sunset with a crimson glow that made her shiver again, thinking of blood.

  ‘I’m too ill to move,’ said Tremadoc. ‘Send Jenkins with my cordial. He can help me into the house when you have found if there is a room fit to receive me. If not, I shall go to the Castle Inn until you have made your arrangements.’ He did not trouble to move his feet, and she climbed awkwardly across him to emerge by the carriage door nearest the house. The front door was open now, and Jenkins and Tench stood there, smiling a welcome.

  She hurried up the two shelving steps to greet them, warmed and reassured by their friendly looks.

  ‘All’s ready for you, ma’am.’ Tench bobbed a curtsey. ‘Mr Jenkins and I have been busy as can be and I hope you’ll be pleased with what we’ve done. And a fire ready for the master, like Jenkins says he always wants after a journey.’

  ‘He wants his cordial too, Jenkins,’ said Caroline. ‘Before he even gets out of the carriage. The journey was too much for him, I am afraid.’

  ‘Very good, ma’am. I’ll see to it at once.’

  She thought the two servants exchanged some kind of understanding glance before Jenkins turned back into the
house and Tench took Caroline’s arm to urge her in.

  ‘You look white as a sheet, ma’am. I hope the journey’s not been too much for you.’

  ‘I’m a little tired,’ admitted Caroline. ‘And so grateful to you, Tench, for coming on ahead and seeing to things for me.’

  ‘I hope it’s all as you’d like it.’ She led Caroline across a surprisingly spacious hall and opened a panelled door. ‘The drawing room. I had a fire lit here as well as in the master’s study.’

  ‘Oh, thank you, Tench.’ She was glad to let her maid undo her bonnet strings and ease it off her aching head. ‘I don’t know how I’d manage without you.’

  ‘You’ve got two of us now, miss…ma’am, I should say,’ said Tench surprisingly. ‘Mr Jenkins has been at me and at me all the time we’ve been down here, and I don’t know how it come about, but just this morning I up and heard myself saying yes. You won’t mind it, ma’am?’

  ‘Of course not! Why, Tench, I’m delighted. I’ve always thought Mr Jenkins a kind, good man ever since that dreadful journey to Gretna.’

  ‘And so he is,’ said Tench, ‘and that fond of you, ma’am. Only one thing, I hope you won’t mind it, but he thinks best not to tell the master. Mr Tremadoc don’t like married servants, it seems.’

  ‘Oh?’ It seemed to her that she learned a disconcerting new thing about this husband of hers every day. ‘But…he’s the vicar, Tench, how can you marry?’

  ‘We’re Chapel, Mr Jenkins and I. We’ve spoke to the minister already. He’s agreeable; it’s just to wait a bit, and that’ll do Jenkins no harm, I reckon.’

  ‘But how will you manage?’ Caroline put a hand to her aching brow. Every instinct revolted at the idea of keeping secrets from her husband, but the fact remained that Jenkins knew him much better than she did.

  ‘Oh, as to that, we’ve got it fixed up all right and tight. You’ll understand in the morning when I take you round the house. For tonight, what you need is your supper and your bed. I’ve contrived a dressing room for Mr Tremadoc like he had in town. And a cot in it, too, like he had there. And here he comes now, ma’am.’

  The warning note in Tench’s voice and the arrangements she had made showed Caroline that her maid was under no illusions as to the state of her marriage.

  She reached up to press her hand. ‘I’m so happy for you, Tench,’ she said.

  Tremadoc drank some more of his cordial with the light supper sent in by the new cook, and mellowed a little.

  ‘The house don’t look half bad now it’s got some furnishings,’ he told Caroline over dessert. ‘I tell you, I quite despaired when I came down for my induction, but that woman of yours seems to have done pretty well. And the cook is quite out of the way; I wouldn’t be surprised to find these pastries on a select London table.’ He helped himself to another.

  ‘The cook is a Frenchman,’ said Caroline, who had made a point of visiting the kitchen as soon as she had changed her dress, and whose fluent French had made her instant friends with the fiery little refugee installed there. ‘I think it best not to ask just how he got over here.’

  ‘No, indeed. Let me warn you, Caroline, that there are many things here in Oldchurch about which one should not ask. It was all explained to me when I came down before and I have promised on both our parts that we will never interfere in what does not concern us.’

  ‘And what, exactly, does that mean?’

  He took another pastry. ‘That’s what I am saying to you, madam. That it does not concern you.’

  The callers began next day. Luckily for Caroline, Tench had warned her of them and made her wear her second-best mourning dress.

  ‘And an apron,’ advised Tench. ‘Then if one of the old tabbies should come early hoping to catch you out, she can’t say you don’t hold housekeeping. And I’m not your maid, ma’am, don’t forget, but your housekeeper now.’

  ‘Then I don’t know what you are doing brushing my hair.’ Caroline kept her voice low, remembering her husband asleep in the next room.

  ‘That’s between ourselves, ma’am. And because I love to do it. Besides it gives me a chance to talk to you, when none of those Oldchurch servants are on the listen. You want to be careful what you say in front of them, Miss Caroline. From what I can find out, they’re all cousins, and all related to staff in the other houses. If you sneeze at breakfast, it will be all over town by dinner that you’ve taken cold.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ sighed Caroline.

  ‘And their employers no better.’ Tench changed the brush to her left hand and warmed to her theme. ‘They’re all kin, too, from what I can make out, all Tories, and all ready to be scandalised at anything you do.’ Her eyes met Caroline’s in the glass. ‘I’m sorry, ma’am, I hate to worry you, but facts is best faced and there’s no doubt but there has been talk.’

  ‘Oh, no!’ But she had been afraid of it.

  ‘And Mr Tremadoc not much help neither.’ Tench lowered her voice with a quick glance at the door to the bedroom. ‘By what Jenkins has heard in the tap at the Castle he talked pretty free when the Oldchurch Club dined him there. Jenkins come home mad as fire the first night we was here. He’d a’ quit the post long since, he says, if it wan’t for you — and me, ma’am. A proper nodcock, he reckons the master is, with his cordial and his travel sickness and his blabbermouth.’

  ‘Tench, you are not to speak to me like that about my husband…That will be all, thank you, I will finish dressing myself.’

  ‘I’m sure I beg your pardon, ma’am.’ Tench dropped a quick curtsy and left her with one backward glance in which surprise and respect were equally mingled.

  Left alone, Caroline sat for a moment, gazing forlornly at the white face in the glass. She had had to do it, but was afraid she might have lost a useful pair of allies, and very much wished she had been able to find out just what indiscretions Tremadoc had committed. Then, with a little sigh, she rose to her feet, finished dressing and went downstairs to drink tea in the sunny dining room at the back of the house.

  To her relief, Tench was awaiting her there, now very much in her capacity as housekeeper and quite as eager as she was herself to pretend that the rebuke had neither been earned nor spoken. After breakfast, they toured the house together and Caroline was delighted with it. It was much larger than its narrow frontage on the green suggested. At the back, it was L-shaped. A wing thrown out on the north end sheltered the neglected garden lying between the house and the steep cliff that made a town wall unnecessary on this side of the hill. Since only a low wall ran along the cliff, the eastward facing garden was full of morning sunshine.

  ‘You’ll be quite private in it,’ Tench told her. ‘Servants’ quarters are in the wing, see, looking the other way, and there’s a very strange old gentleman lives in the house next door behind that high wall. Knows no one and goes nowhere. He won’t trouble you, that’s for sure, and Jenkins asked me to tell you he’d be happy to get the garden in order for you, if you’ll just tell him what to do.’

  ‘Oh, he is kind!’ exclaimed Caroline. ‘I do thank you both, Tench.’

  The first caller was announced half an hour later. ‘It’s Mrs Bowles, ma’am, the Mayor’s lady,’ Tench told her. ‘There’s cakes and wine ready in the drawing room.’ She was untying Caroline’s apron strings. ‘There,’ she gave her a loving little push. ‘You look every inch the lady, and that’s what counts.’

  An enormous woman in purple satin and a turban, Mrs Bowles looked Caroline up and down with frank curiosity.

  ‘Well,’ she said at last, ‘you don’t look like the scarlet woman to me.’

  ‘I beg your pardon, ma’am?’

  ‘My husband, the Mayor, gave me strict orders to be your first visitor.’ Mrs Bowles selected the largest chair and settled herself in it with a little sigh. ‘I’m too big to stand. If you’d just give me a footstool, dearie, we could be cosy, you and I. The others won’t be here for ten minutes, or I’ll have something to say to them. That’s right.’ She lifted swollen
ankles on to the stool Caroline pushed up. ‘And then a glass of madeira, and one of those queen cakes, though I shouldn’t, and you tell me all about it, dearie.’

  ‘All about what, ma’am?’ Caroline obediently filled the glass and passed the plate of cakes.

  ‘About all this talk. If you don’t speak up for yourself, who else will, that’s what I want to know. Well, now,’ she took a hearty sip of madeira, ‘We know all about your father, that’s of course, seeing as how it’s his living, but this story of you and that half-brother with the French name, that’s what we can’t stomach, and, frankly, dearie, now I’ve seen you, what I find hard to believe.’

  ‘Me and Gaston?’ Caroline sat down rather suddenly on a straight chair. ‘What story, ma’am?’

  ‘Gastong. That’s the name.’ Mrs Bowles ate half a queen cake at a mouthful. ‘That’s what I thought,’ she said. ‘The minute I clapped eyes on you, I thought, nohow will I believe it.’

  ‘Believe what, ma’am? I beg you will take me with you.’

  ‘Why, that you ran off with your half-brother and Mr Tremadoc took you out of pity and to oblige the Duke. Well,’ said Mrs Bowles, daunted by Caroline’s look of silent shock, ‘it’s what Mr Tremadoc said himself, or as good as, that night at the Castle, only Mr Bowles, he said the lad had drink taken and didn’t rightly know what he was saying. Kind of in a daze he seemed to be, Bowles told me. Funny kind of clergyman, if you ask me. Now, dearie, if you’re over the first shock of it, and I can see it was a shock, just you tell me the truth of the matter, once and for all, and I’ll see it gets where it matters. If we women don’t stick together, who’s going to look out for us, that’s what I want to know.’

  ‘Thank you, ma’am.’ Caroline said it from the heart. ‘But as to telling you what really happened, that’s what I can’t do, because it concerns other people, but I beg you to believe that I have committed no greater folly than that of running off with Mr Tremadoc.’