by Sheila Walsh
With this, she turned on her heel and marched, head high, to the door. He was there before her, his hand flat against the panel.
‘Wait!’ he besought her earnestly, though the laughter still lingered in his eyes. ‘I beg you, don’t go.’
‘Really, sir ‒ this is beyond everything.’
‘Yes, I know. Grimsargh is quite right. I have behaved abominably and can only offer you my humblest apologies and crave a few minutes of your time in order to set matters right.’
She hesitated.
‘It is not enough? You want satisfaction?’ He leaned closer, the irony back in his eyes. ‘Well, here is my face for you. You may slap it, an’ you will, without fear of retaliation.’
Miss Radlett’s mouth quirked irrepressibly. ‘Now you are being ridiculous!’ She strove for dignity. ‘Oh, very well, Mr Benedict, I accept your apology. The matter is forgotten. Now, if you will be so good as to let me pass.’
He sighed and removed his hand from the door with a gesture of resignation.
‘As you will, Cousin Theo, though I’m bound to say I feel you are being over-hasty.’
Once more her eyes opened wide. ‘What did you call me?’
‘Cousin.’ His mouth twitched. ‘A small world, is it not?’
‘I would that it were smaller,’ she said crisply. ‘There might then be room for one jester the less.’
He chuckled. ‘Oh, cousin ‒ I begin to like your style! My life of late has been woefully short of stimulating company. But in this instance I do not jest. Ask old Grimsargh, if you don’t believe me, for he it was who misled you in the first place with his quaint way of addressing us all.’
But of course! Had not the landlord referred to her father as Mr John and his brother as Mr Geoffrey? She began to feel decidedly foolish.
‘Then you are …?’
‘Benedict Radlett.’ He made her a mocking bow. ‘Your father and mine were first cousins, which must make us cousins of a kind, wouldn’t you say?’
Theo stared at him a moment longer before going through the formality of seeking the landlord’s confirmation.
‘’Tis right enough, miss. If you had but met his lordship you’d not question it, for of all the Radletts it’s Mr Benedict as has the family look.’
‘I could wish that were more of a compliment,’ drawled her new-found cousin. ‘But I cannot deny the truth of it.’
Now that Theo had recovered from her initial surprise, she was not altogether displeased to discover that she had kin other than the ailing and reputedly difficult gentleman she had come so far to see. Mr Benedict Radlett might not have been her ideal choice as a relation, but aside from his odd manners and even odder sense of humour, there was something about his ‘damn you ‒ dare you’ brand of impudence that she found curiously engaging. Her spirits lightened a little.
‘So ‒ we are cousins, sir,’ she said, offering him her hand with a conciliating smile. ‘I am very pleased to make your acquaintance.’
He held on to her hand rather longer than politeness demanded, studying the slim member with its practical squared fingers, and then looking up into her face. ‘And I yours, coz,’ he drawled. ‘Though you are not at all what we were expecting.’
‘We?’ She eyed him with new interest. ‘Have I more relations, then?’
Benedict laughed ‒ a softly mocking sound. ‘Oh, my dear ‒ you have indeed!’ His eyes met the landlord’s vaguely troubled glance. ‘Bring us some coffee, Grimsargh, while I make my American cousin au fait with her new family. Pray sit down, Cousin Theo.’
As the landlord moved to oblige, Theo allowed herself to be led to the settle, though she protested that time was passing and she. had hoped that he might see her safe to her grandfather’s house.
‘Nothing would give me greater pleasure,’ he assured her suavely, moving one of the dining chairs away from the table a little so that he might sit facing her. ‘But tomorrow will be soon enough. Grimsargh?’ The landlord paused on the threshold. ‘Have a room made ready for Miss Radlett, will you, and ‒ if I am not mistaken, your wife is baking one of her excellent mutton pies …’
‘That’s true enough, sir … and you’d be very welcome to it, I’m sure.’
‘Good. And couple of bottles of your best claret, I think. My cousin and I can then get better acquainted over dinner.’
But Theo did not care for such high-handedness; she found Benedict Radlett’s way of taking matters completely out of her hands totally unacceptable and she did not scruple to tell him so, springing to her feet again and standing over him. Grimsargh looked from one to the other and closed the door upon them, shaking his head and muttering about chips off old blocks. He left behind him an atmosphere charged with indignation, fuelled by Benedict Radlett’s continuing to lounge in his chair looking up at Theo with maddening unconcern.
‘Spoken like a true Radlett,’ he said. ‘We don’t in general like to be bested. But in this instance you had much better be guided by me.’
‘Well, I don’t care to be,’ she said, drawing herself up to her full height, which was hardly sufficient to intimidate him, and what advantage she did gain was set at naught by the entrance of a maidservant bearing a steaming coffee jug and cups, and a plate of pastries. By the time the tray was deposited and the coffee poured, she felt that much of the force had gone out of her argument, and she concluded a little flatly, ‘If you don’t wish to accompany me, then be good enough to say so and I will make other arrangements. But don’t patronise me, sir! I am three and twenty, and have cut my eyeteeth!’
‘I’m sure you have.’ One eyebrow rose. ‘A young lady intrepid enough to have crossed the Atlantic unaccompanied must be well up to snuff!’
Theo knew that he was being deliberately provocative, yet still she felt obliged to defend herself. ‘As to that, I had little choice. The lady who was to have accompanied me was taken ill at the last moment.’
‘But you were undaunted,’ he drawled. ‘And still are. Yet all I am suggesting is a little time in which to recoup your resources before facing a pack of strangers. Besides, Mrs Grimsargh’s mutton pie is a treat not lightly to be cast aside, and her husband keeps a tolerable cellar. All this and a good night’s sleep, and you will be feeling much more the thing.’
Theo was not by nature perverse, so that, had she stopped to think, it must have struck her as odd indeed that with so pleasing a prospect put before her she should behave in a manner that was quite wilfully perverse as she asserted that there was nothing wrong with the way she felt ‒ she was as fit as a flea. This declaration showed so blatant a disregard for the truth that at any other time she would have blushed lest he should guess how every bone in her body was protesting of ill-usage from travelling so long on the coach. Her eyes dared him to challenge the assertion, but he refused to oblige her.
‘Of course you are,’ he murmured so soothingly that she longed to hit him. ‘I daresay it is only the exigencies of your long journey that have made you a trifle crabby.’
‘I am not crabby!’ she protested, wounded by the injustice of his observation. ‘Indeed, I have shown extraordinary forbearance with you until now. How would you react, I wonder, if a virtual stranger came along and proceeded to order your life in the most odiously high-handed fashion?’
‘Oh, I should undoubtedly plant him a facer,’ said her cousin with so much gravity that she found herself being obliged to smother a giggle.
‘A typically male remedy,’ she concluded unsteadily.
‘Yes.’ He nodded sagely. ‘You know, I have always thought it a pity that girls were not initiated into the noble art of fisticuffs ‒ so satisfying and immediate in its effect! I do urge you to try it sometime ‒ much better than nursing a grievance.’
Theo was fast discovering that it was possible to be infuriated beyond measure while at the same time falling prey to an irresistible desire to laugh. In an attempt to quell the latter, she sought for some cutting rejoinder that might be guaranteed to prick his conceit. But again he forest
alled her.
‘I expect you will have been told many times that your eyes fizz with yellow lights when you are angry?’ he observed conversationally, as though passing the time of day. While she was still robbed of speech, he added generously: ‘Remarkably handsome eyes they are, too ‒ quite your best feature in my humble opinion. Though I advise you to have a care, for they are also extremely eloquent. I trust you will restrain your present very evident impulse to grind me into dust beneath your feet. Have a pastry ‒ they are quite delicious.’
As Theo waved the plate away and sought for the words that would adequately sustain her wrath, she made the mistake of looking full at him. It was her undoing, for there was about him such a deceptively meek air that her ever-ready appreciation of the absurd overcame her and she finally succumbed to laughter. ‘Wretched man!’ she exclaimed. ‘To cut the ground from under me just as I was set to give you the father and mother of a trimming!’
He grinned lazily. ‘It would have been breath wasted, sweet coz. I am well known for my incivility and would most surely have given you back as good as you gave ‒ and more. And since your manners are clearly superior to mine, you would be bound to have come off worst.’
‘Don’t you underestimate me!’ she flashed.
‘Oh, I don’t. Believe me, I don’t.’
‘I still mean to finish my journey this afternoon,’ she insisted, determined now to prove her mettle.
He was looking at her in an oddly intent manner. ‘Are you then so eager to meet your fate?’
‘You make it sound ominous,’ she said lightly. ‘Is my grandfather such an ogre?’
‘He don’t readily inspire affection,’ came the dry response.
But Theo refused to be discouraged.
‘And my other relations? You were to tell me about them.’ She frowned. ‘Strange, but I had supposed that Lord Radlett lived alone but for his sister.’
‘Great-aunt Minta? Oh, she’s still there ‒ a bit queer in her attic, but harmless enough. Then there is Geoffrey’s relict and her skitterbrained son, Aubrey.’ He saw Theo’s brows lift. ‘Her son, not his, much to her chagrin, since he cannot inherit. You didn’t know Geoffrey had married? No, I suppose you wouldn’t. It happened only a few months ago, in the spring, when he was on the rebound from the army. How like Geoffrey to eschew matrimony all his life and then succumb to someone like Selina!’
‘You sound very disapproving, sir. My late uncle was surely old enough to choose a bride without incurring censure?’
Benedict uttered a short bark of laughter. ‘Too old, belike! Selina had buried one husband and was well up to snuff. The late Mr Fane had left her so purse-pinched that with a son to set up in the world, she was soon on the catch for his successor. Poor Geoffrey didn’t stand a chance. He was heir to both a title and a fortune, and it was common knowledge that the old man was on the way out. Selina had but to play the brave little woman and turn her china-blue eyes on him, and every ounce of chivalry in him responded as to an order of command.’ The sarcasm in his voice grew more pronounced. ‘What Selina had not allowed for, of course, was Boney’s escape from Elba and her new husband’s quixotic insistence upon having one more go at him ‒ with fatal results! To have been widowed twice within such a short space of time says much for the intervention of a benign Providence, don’t you think?’
‘What a cynic you are,’ said Theo pleasantly. ‘I feel quite sorry for the poor lady already.’
‘Save your compassion, coz. She won’t love you any the more for’t. In fact, the circumstances being what they are, she isn’t likely to love you at all!’
She was about to ask why, but Benedict was speaking again, and the soft vehemence in his voice startled her. ‘And then, of course, we must not forget Beau!’
It was the second time the name had been mentioned. ‘Beau?’
His lip curled. ‘Vincent Radlett, son of his lordship’s second brother ‒ a posturing dandy known to all as Beau. He would dearly like to add the title Viscount to his name.’ Benedict eyed her sardonically from under straight black brows. ‘Now, he will be pleased to see you, though he may do his damnedest to hide the fact.’
Theo moved her shoulders impatiently. ‘I do wish you would stop talking in riddles. It may amuse you to be enigmatic, but it is, let me tell you, an excessively irritating habit!’
‘My apologies.’ He didn’t sound in the least sorry.
‘If you’re trying to make me change my mind, Cousin Benedict, you won’t succeed. I don’t frighten that easily,’ she added, as much to convince herself as him. ‘And if I did, I have always held to the belief that the best way to conquer apprehension is to face its cause. So ‒ do you mean to take me to Shallowford, or must I go alone?’
Benedict rocked back in his chair, arms folded across his chest, contemplating those fizzing sparks in the dark eyes as they challenged his cool scrutiny. She was not precisely a beauty, in the accepted fashion, he mused. There was a great deal too much resolution in her face (sufficient in truth to have carried her alone across the Atlantic Ocean), and more than a hint of the Radlett obstinacy about the wide mouth and firmly rounded chin. No milk-and-water miss, this ‒ her qualities were of a more positive kind. From what little he had seen, he would judge her to be impetuous, good-humoured except when provoked, and a positive tiger in defence of her rights. Courage, she certainly had ‒ some might even call it wilful foolhardiness! But there was a leavening of practical common sense there too, which he suspected would more often than not hold sway, and a very ready sense of humour ‒ qualities that were likely to be tested to the full in the awkward days to come. He was suddenly intrigued to know how she would come to terms with her situation. His chair came down with a decisive thud and he stood up.
‘Very well,’ he said abruptly.
‘You will take me?’ she said eagerly.
‘I’ll take you.’ He swept his coat from the back of the chair. At the door, he paused and looked back at her. ‘I cannot, however, guarantee how his lordship will receive the news of your arrival. You should know that there is a strong possibility that he will refuse, point-blank, to see you.’
‘But he sent for me ‒ for us! I wrote to explain about Papa, and said that I would come.’ She stared, uncomprehending. ‘He is expecting me!’
‘Correction, sweet coz.’ The mocking drawl was back in Benedict Radlett’s voice. ‘What he is expecting ‒ indeed, it would not be an exaggeration to say what has kept him clinging to life these past weeks ‒ is the arrival of Theo Radlett.’
‘Well then …’
‘Theo Radlett,’ he repeated with soft emphasis. ‘His grandson and heir!’
Chapter Two
The curricle was travelling fast between high hedges, and with an evening mist drifting wheel-high across the road, Theo ought to have felt uneasy. But she was still busy turning over the extraordinary moment of revelation back in the parlour of the inn, her small soundless gasp of disbelief, followed by a moment of silence which only seemed to confirm her error. Then:
‘Your letter to Lord Radlett,’ Benedict said calmly, ‘was something less than explicit ‒ and was signed with ambiguous formality, “obediently yours, Theo Radlett”.’
‘And you all thought …? Oh, Lordy!’ Her lower lip caught ruefully between even white teeth said it all. She felt her cheeks grow warm and took refuge in indignation. ‘Well ‒ the ambiguity certainly wasn’t intentional, as you appear to imply.’
‘Don’t put words into my mouth, young lady.’
‘I’m not! But you said …’ She had met his quizzical glance and uttered a short vexed laugh. ‘Oh, what does it matter! Honestly, it never even crossed my mind that no one here knew of my existence. I assumed Papa would have written to someone when I was born …’ She broke off and began again. ‘Yes, indeed, the solicitor’s letter did begin “Dear Sir”, but I never appreciated the implications and thought it of no particular consequence. I guess it was a little unthinking of me, at that, but at the ti
me, there were so many things to be done …’ The anguish of her loss welled up in her once more with frightening intensity. Benedict Radlett’s outline blurred, and she saw instead her father’s image, grown skeletal with suffering, his voice a weary patient thread. ‘Go home, Theo ‒ to England … for me. I should have taken you years ago. Stupid things, family quarrels.’
It was very soon after his death that the letter had arrived from Lord Radlett’s solicitor. Its imperative summons, though couched in the formal language of the lawyer, seemed to give added point to her father’s wishes ‒ as if it was all meant to be. But how different was the reality! Not only must she face a less than amiable set of relations, but she was likely to be accused by some of them of misrepresentation. According to her cousin, Lord Radlett would certainly accuse her thus.
‘It was Geoffrey’s death, you see, which forced his lordship’s hand,’ Benedict had told her with some relish before they left the inn. ‘He became obsessed with the need to discover John’s whereabouts and make his peace with him so that there could be no possible chance of Beau’s inheriting the title. The news of your father’s death came as an added blow to him, but he seized on your letter as proof that an heir did exist, and that buoyed him up no end! Selina, too, was hopeful of being able to bring an impressionable young man round her finger and cajole him into supporting her in the manner to which she had expected to become accustomed …’ He paused, and then finished, ‘Beau, understandably, was furious!’ Again there was a hard edge to his voice as he mentioned the name.
‘And where does Benedict Radlett stand in all this?’ she asked.
‘I?’ He was instantly wary, as near to being disconcerted as she had seen him. ‘Oh, I am nowhere, cousin. A mere onlooker, I assure you. I do but keep the peace.’
She had not pressed him further. But could it really be that simple? Superficially charming though Benedict was, he remained something of an enigma. He had very carefully told her about everyone else and very little about himself, where he stood in line to the title, nothing at all, in fact, except ‒ and this more by what he had left unsaid ‒ that he disliked almost every member of the family. She had never felt more alone …