The Swynden Necklace

by Mira Stables

  “And who do you suggest should administer this salutary treatment?”

  Percy looked thoroughly taken aback. “Why, you, sir, of course.” And then, in careful explanation, “There isn’t anybody else.”

  “High time for school,” murmured Mr. Jocelyn. “Permit me to point out to you that I have no vestige of a right to correct the error of your ways. I am not your guardian, I am not related to you. Why should I put myself to the trouble of attending to your moral welfare?”

  “Well as to that, sir, I’d just as lief you didn’t,” said Percy, much struck by this argument “But as for not being related to me—well—aren’t you and Honor—well—I mean—”

  With an almost superhuman effort Mr. Jocelyn maintained his gravity. “This is getting rather complicated,” he told Percy. “It is now my turn to fear misunderstanding. If I let you off the thrashing that you seem to feel is essential, will you not take this for bribery? An attempt to cajole you into lending your support to my pretensions? For you must be well aware that it is my dearest wish to persuade your sister to become my wife.”

  There was a swift sidelong glance for Honor as he spoke. How would she take it, that what should have been spoken in deepest tenderness was being made to sound as flippant jest?

  She was listening quietly, a little smile touching her mouth, though she tried to school it to severity as befitted Percy’s misdemeanours. His words about marrying her meant little. To her innocent mind, question and answer had been asked and given in that one gentle kiss. There would be difficulties of course. Mama would be sorely displeased. But as she had found her true love and he loved her in return, everything would arrange itself eventually. Meanwhile it warmed her heart to hear how skilfully he dealt with her brother. Some might have taken Percy’s attitude for sullen defiance. Not Mr. Jocelyn. And that was a queer thing. She was promised to marry him and did not even yet know his Christian name.

  She had missed part of the exchange between the two as she pondered this thought. Percy was grinning so they must have made their peace. She heard Mr. Jocelyn say coolly, “So you will understand that I have much to say to your sister and that your presence is quite superfluous,” and Percy gave her a swift rough hug and a kiss. “I wish you very happy, Honey,” he muttered shyly, using for once the old pet name of his baby days, and banged the door behind him.

  Honor turned eagerly towards her lover, a little breathless, expectant of the caresses that she had long dreamed of, only to find that with Percy’s going he had yielded at last to his hard-held laughter. She smiled herself, though she could not imagine what he found so comical. His laughter broke off abruptly at the sight of that puzzled little smile and he took her hands in his and kissed them, looking down at her half ruefully, wholly tenderly, as he said, “You and your brother are an education that I would not have missed for worlds. To think of being asked my intentions by a scrubby schoolboy! No! I beg his pardon. Not even a schoolboy. A heaven-sent deus ex machina. Bless his inventive genius! He has brought me where I longed to be. And I was wondering how I was ever to gather the courage to ask you to marry me. Now, my dear love, will you give me the answer I crave?”

  “But of course I will marry you,” said Honor, surprised. “You must have known as much when I returned your kiss. I suppose that was wrong in me, even if we are betrothed.” She gave a little skip of joyous excitement at that rapturous thought. “It did not seem wrong, though,” she added meditatively. “In fact it seemed perfectly right and very—” she hung her head a little—“very enjoyable,” she finished, with a demure glance to which there was obviously only one answer.

  Presently she raised her face all aglow from his kisses, gentle though he had been, and asked eagerly, “How soon can we be married?”

  That made him laugh again, but only briefly. She thought there was a faint cloud on his face as he said slowly, “I’m afraid it is not quite so simple as that. If I had my way it should be at once. And you’d come to me willingly, wouldn’t you, my sweet?”

  She nodded vigorously. “So why can’t I?”

  “Well it is customary to ask the permission of the lady’s guardian,” he pointed out. “In this case, I take it, your Mama.”

  Her hand flew to her lips in a gesture of dismay.

  “And from your expression I gather that she will not approve.”

  “No. At least not just at first,” she admitted ruefully. “It is just that she has set her heart on my marrying Sir Ralph. Once I have convinced her that nothing would persuade me to marry him I daresay she will be thankful enough to consent to our betrothal. She can’t really stop me marrying you because I’m of an age. But I should not like to distress her by going against her wishes. I suppose we must be patient and try to bring her round to our way of thinking. But it will be very hard to wait.”

  “Very hard indeed,” he agreed. “But since I had meant to wait until you went home before I put my fate to the test, it should not be impossible to be patient for a few more weeks.”

  “What a nonsensical notion,” said Honor indignantly. “You really meant to waste all those weeks when we could have been happy together? Why?”

  He pulled her into his arms again and tilted her face to his with strong fingers under her chin. “Because I was a little afraid you might say no,” he explained seriously, “and then I should have had to take myself off and leave you unprotected. And also because it was your first season and I wanted you to be free to enjoy it and to choose some other, younger man. Yes,” for she had coloured faintly and dropped her glance from his, “my advanced age, I perceive, is one of Mama’s objections. Probably the least of them, if I am any judge.”

  This time there could be no mistaking the blush. The shamed colour flooded her delicate skin from throat to brow. Seeing her quite unable to answer, he went on gently, “If your Mama suspected that you had some slight partiality for me, I expect she thought it her duty to warn you that my circumstances were unknown to her and that she very much doubted if I was in a position to support a wife.”

  The hazel eyes flashed wide in grateful adoration. “That was it exactly,” she breathed. “She is not mercenary. At least not for herself. It is only for her children that she wants all that is best.”

  “And more especially for Percy,” he reminded her evenly.

  She drooped a little in his hold. “Yes. But I daresay mothers are always partial to their sons and prefer them to daughters. Probably I shall be just as besotted when—” She stopped short, realising that her impetuous tongue was running away with her again and folded her soft lips firmly together in an absurd attempt to look dignified.

  The bleakness that had hardened Mr. Jocelyn’s expression at the mention of money matters, melted. The strong fingers were very gentle as they caressed the curve of her cheek. But his voice was firm as he said quietly, “I should not have offered for you, my love, if I could not provide for your comfort. But there are circumstances connected with my way of living that you may very much dislike.”

  She looked puzzled but trusting. Was he referring to his position as Lord Melborne’s agent? It was certainly not very grand or important, she supposed, but what could there be to dislike about it? “Things that I shall dislike?” she repeated on a note of enquiry.

  He smiled. “Yes. Dreadful secrets of Bluebeard’s castle that I shall not reveal until I have you safe in my hold, lest you should change your mind about me and cry off.”

  She longed to question him further but good manners forbade. And the teasing tone was reassuring. The ‘circumstances’ to which he referred could not be so very dreadful if he dismissed them so lightly. “Shall I like living in Bluebeard’s castle?” she asked mischievously. “Shall we live there when we are wed?”

  He answered her seriously. “I hope you will like it. We need not live there all the time if you do not. It was left to me by my father and naturally I am attached to it, but you may think it sadly old fashioned and inconvenient. I must have it put in order and refurbished f
or my bride. But first I must approach your Mama. Do you think that she will be able to receive me this morning if I stay until she comes in? Or will she take me in even greater dislike if I wait upon her in riding dress?”

  All thoughts of ‘Bluebeard’s castle’ and the tantalising mystery that it promised vanished from Honor’s mind. She looked at him in horrified dismay. “Oh! No!” she cried. “Pray do not ask Mama today! First I must make it plain that there is no hope of my consenting to marry Sir Ralph. And then she will be out of reason cross about this”—she indicated the scorched riding dress—“because it might have been very dangerous, you know. Percy could have been badly burned.”

  And so could you, my darling, he thought. And surely even Mama would have cared for that.

  But she was hurrying on, a rueful twinkle lightening her anxious expression, “And she is bound to blame us, because we were here when it happened.”

  He accepted this sample of feminine logic without comment but urged the need of seeking Mama’s approval as soon as possible. Honor would not hear of it. “Please, please, let us keep it to ourselves, just for a little while,” she begged. And he had not the heart to refuse the first thing she had asked of him.

  “Very well. It shall be as you wish,” he agreed reluctantly. “But not for very long. Bluebeard, you will recall, is of a fiercely jealous disposition. Now that you are promised to me I shall take leave to resent the attentions of Sir Ralph and the rest of your court.”

  It was lightly, humorously spoken, but there was an undercurrent of determination in the smooth voice. Honor was aware of a fierce surge of satisfaction, a primitive delight that acclaimed his right of possession.

  “A week,” she stipulated. “Give me a week to bring her to a more accommodating frame of mind. If, by then, I have not succeeded,” she chuckled. “Have you some very fast horses? It will have to be Gretna!”

  She had the satisfaction of startling Mr. Jocelyn out of his normal composure. He looked quite horrified. To be sure he made a quick recover, saying primly, “Nothing would persuade me to take part in anything so shocking as an elopement. A special license, now—and marriage in one of the private chapels—that is comparatively respectable. Could you not be content with that?”

  It was a sad come-down to have to explain that she would not even be able to ride with him tomorrow since the charred riding dress was the only one she possessed. He frowned, looking sterner than seemed appropriate to such a small mishap. “When we are married—” he began impetuously, and then broke off. His brow cleared. “I shall take you driving instead,” he said eagerly. “Be ready at the same time.” He grinned. “It will be good practice for the road to Gretna.” And swept her into his arms for a prolonged farewell.

  Chapter Twelve

  Mama was indeed sadly put out when she heard what had befallen in her absence. To hear her, one would have thought that the whole occurrence had been a dastardly plot. How her darling had come to escape comparatively unscathed (his eyebrows were a trifle scorched) she could not imagine, save by the direct intervention of providence. As for the ruin of a perfectly good habit, not to mention a rug and the window hangings that would have to be replaced, she could see that it would not be long before her daughter found herself quite at a standstill.

  How doubly fortunate, then, that, this very morning, Sir Ralph had asked her permission to pay his addresses in form. He had walked with them in the Spring Gardens. The good fortune that smiles upon lovers (said Mama) having diverted Thomasine’s attention to some old friends, he had taken the opportunity of the privacy so granted to broach the question of his aspirations to Miss Fenton’s hand. Mama had given him her blessing and told him that he might call upon her daughter the next morning. She would engage for it that the girl should be at home and should receive him alone. “That is, perhaps, going a little beyond what is strictly proper,” she said consideringly, “but it is not as though you were just out of the schoolroom and did not know how to conduct yourself with modesty.”

  “Mama!” reproached her unfilial child. “I have told you repeatedly that nothing would persuade me to accept Sir Ralph as a husband. How could you encourage him in the belief that I am ready to do so? Even though I have taken him in dislike, he doubtless has feelings like any other, and I have no wish to wound them by refusing him, when you have given him to believe that I am willing. What a shocking position you have placed me in! I must write to him at once and tell him that I shall not, after all, be able to receive him tomorrow, as I have an engagement of which you were unaware when you spoke with him. If he cannot read between the lines and spare himself the humiliation of a direct refusal, it will not be my blame. But I cannot, knowingly, permit him to call upon me only to be rejected.”

  Mama’s pretty eyes filled with easy tears. What had she done, she wailed, to have so undutiful a daughter? Even Papa’s memory was invoked in a final effort to bring Honor to a sense of what was due to her family. All the benefits that would accrue from her marriage to a man of substance were painstakingly rehearsed. The culprit could only listen in stubborn silence. No argument could persuade her to change her mind. She could only be thankful that, at least, Mama knew nothing of her dealings with Mr. Jocelyn. Better to let her squander her energy in reproaches for Honor’s selfishness in refusing an offer that might have meant so much to them all, rather than allow her to cloud the bubbling happiness within that sprang to life when she permitted her thoughts to dwell on her future.

  She went off to write her letter to Sir Ralph, despatched it by the hand of one of the young abigails, and curled up in the window seat of her bedchamber to indulge herself in day-dreaming about that nebulous future. The thought of a lifetime spent in the society of Mr. Jocelyn was blissful indeed, but she found the practical details surprisingly difficult to envisage. It was all very well for him to tease about Bluebeard’s castle, but now that the magic of his presence was removed she began to realise how little she really knew about him. He owned a house—but she did not know its whereabouts; and there was something about his way of living that she would dislike. For the first time she gave serious consideration to that thought. How did he earn his livelihood? He was not Lord Melborne’s steward, for that post was filled by Mr. Arthurson. Some kind of agent, then? Yet his mornings always seemed to be free and when she began to count the occasions on which they had met at other times of the day, she could only recall three of them—that first fortuitous encounter in Avon Street, the occasion of her début and the evening when he had come to her rescue after the theatre.

  It all seemed rather strange. She would have expected his days to be busy ones and his evenings free. It seemed that the reverse was the case. Perhaps tomorrow, when they could talk without fear of interruption, he would explain some of the things that puzzled her. And she must remember to ask about his name. She knew several intimidating matrons who always addressed their husbands by their titles—in public at any rate. But surely they did not do so when they were alone together? And certainly one could not dream satisfactorily about a future devoted to a husband who must be so formally approached.

  It so chanced that, for once, they were to spend the evening at home. Honor had dreaded it, fearing a renewal of Mama’s reproaches, but this she was fortunately spared by the intervention of several persons known to her only by name. Friends of Mama, named Knightley—well—acquaintances, at any rate, though by virtue of their present notoriety they seemed well in the way of becoming close friends, had suffered the shocking fate of a number of visitors to Bath in being held up by highwaymen and robbed of all their valuables. The treacherous attack had taken place just outside Keynsham, almost within hailing distance of the nearest houses, reported Mama in a failing voice. Two of the villains had held up the coach and covered the postilions while the third had relieved the gentleman of the party of his purse and the ladies of their jewels.

  “I doubt if they will have found much profit in that,” said Aunt Thomasine acidly. “Mrs. Knightley’s garnet
set, and her husband with no more than half a dozen guineas in his purse, for all they say he’s so well inlaid.”

  But Mama would not hear a word in disparagement of the victims and vowed it was enough to keep so timid a creature as herself cowering within doors until the villains were apprehended. Aunt Thomasine, never one to encourage an excessive display of sensibility, retorted that in that case she was likely to get little good of her sojourn in Bath and the subject was allowed to drop.

  Mama was inclined to be mildly triumphant next morning upon realising that Honor would be unable to go riding until something was done either to repair her riding dress or to furnish her with a new one. And Honor was guilty of blatant prevarication in not explaining that she still proposed to go out with Mr. Jocelyn. To be sure, Mama did not ask her outright, but it would have been natural to have mentioned her plans when she declined a pressing invitation to accompany the two elder ladies to the Pump Room. The Knightleys were sure to be there, making the most of their temporary importance, and even Aunt Thomasine owned to a desire to hear the tale of yesterday’s outrage at first hand. In the mild excitement Honor’s vagueness passed unchallenged and she was left in peace to make an unusually careful toilet. Her carriage dress was severely plain, almost masculine in style, but Jennet’s clever fingers had ensured that its very severity only enhanced her femininity, while the down swept brim of her big beaver hat was adorned by softly curling ostrich feathers dyed to a shade of brown that blended admirably with her richly glowing locks.

  All in all she presented a charming appearance, her countenance alight with that rainbow radiance that so surely marks out the girl in love. And when she saw the vehicle that Mr. Jocelyn was driving her eyes widened in awed admiration. It was the curricle that he had been driving on the night when her purse was snatched, but in the evening darkness she had not appreciated its full splendour. It was perfectly plain as became a sporting carriage, but gleaming woodwork, shining metal and supple leather proclaimed it just as much a thoroughbred as the beautiful dapple greys that were harnessed to it. The groom who had accompanied Mr. Jocelyn and held the horses while his master assisted Honor to mount to her place was dismissed with a pleasant nod. She found that a soft sheepskin rug had been placed for her feet to rest on. It had certainly not been there on that earlier occasion, and was scarcely necessary today, mild as the weather was, but she hugged to herself the sense of cherishing that its provision gave her. The lavish turn-out, the magnificent horses, belonged in all probability to the Marquess of Melborne, but the hands of love had set that rug for her comfort and this thought she turned over happily in her mind though she was too shy to put it into words.