by Mira Stables
There was a mist before his eyes and sheer rage choked his utterance. Through the pounding of the blood at his temples he heard his father’s voice say smoothly, “She has grown to be quite a pretty creature in spite of her disability. But at two-and-twenty I never thought to receive an offer for her. However, it seems that Maxwell chanced to see her on her way to church and was much taken with her. He is prepared to make a very handsome settlement,” he ended pensively.
Somehow Marcus managed to contain his fury and speak soberly, though the hoarseness of his utterance betrayed the strain under which he laboured.
“You cannot be serious, sir. Maxwell — and my sister! Why, I would not trust him with a dog that I was fond of. Far less a human being!”
“Oh, come, my boy! You make too much of it. To be sure his reputation is not of the best, but rumour was ever a lying jade. No doubt it is exaggerated. As his wife, Deborah will enjoy every luxury that his wealth can command. And he is even wealthier than Pennington. A man of culture, too. He was so kind as to say that Deborah put him strongly in mind of some female of Roman times. Now what did he say she was called? Ah, yes! I have it! Lucretia! Shakespeare, he said, wrote of Lucretia’s purity and beauty. A pity that I am not scholar enough to recognise the reference.”
And that was a lie, thought Marcus, who recognised the reference all too well. His father was laughing at him. “You cannot do it, sir,” he insisted impetuously. “You — her father.”
The air of calm enquiry on Lord Blayden’s face was answer sufficient. His rage broke bounds. “You’re reckoned to be a fair shot,” he said savagely. “Better to put a bullet through her. It would be kinder.”
“But less profitable,” pointed out Lord Blayden simply.
Wild thoughts of having some eminent physician examine his father with a view to having him put under restraint came into Marcus’s mind, only to be dismissed. Save for this one warped and twisted facet of his mind he was as sane as any man. There were even those who would contend that in disposing of his daughter’s hand to a man of wealth and position he was perfectly within his paternal rights, despite the prospective bridegroom’s age and unsavoury reputation.
He thrust back his chair without ceremony and began to prowl up and down the room. “Does Deb know of your plans for her?” he shot at his father, thinking that here, probably, lay the cause of the headache that had prostrated her.
“But naturally,” his father said, eyebrows a little lifted in surprise. “She was startled, of course. Perhaps a little overwhelmed by the honour done her, she having lived so secluded. I did not press her to give her suitor an immediate answer. I do not think they have even so much as met, though naturally she knows him by repute. But I do not doubt her readiness to oblige me in this. Like Miss Pennington, she has been well instructed in filial obedience.”
The deliberate mention of the Pennington girl reminded Marcus that there was still one way in which he could save his sister from the nightmarish horror of marriage with Maxwell. A way which, however reluctantly, he would take if no other escape offered.
“I must see Deb. Talk with her,” he said abruptly.
“By all means,” rejoined his father politely. And as his son flung angrily out of the room, permitted himself to smile reflectively into the ruby heart of his wine glass. The business was proceeding better than he had dared to hope. Deb’s pitiful revulsion would assuredly take the trick.
Chapter Two
THE schoolroom at High Barrows had never been remarkable for comfort or charm. Mr Pennington, having decided that only females or menials would use it, had caused it to be furnished with the minimum of outlay. He was not one to squander his blunt where the results would go unnoticed. But since he, himself, never set foot in it, deeming that his new consequence required that all his dependants should wait upon him when he chose to summon them to his presence, the shabby room attained a status of its own as sanctuary. The dining-room and parlours in all their garish opulence might be the setting for hours of social endurance, the library frequently the scene of painful reckoning; the schoolroom on the second floor of the west wing was a haven, where loud, hectoring voices did not penetrate. Insofar as these were ever attainable to those subjected to Mr Pennington’s whims and tyrannical temper, it represented peace and safety.
Since Fleur had been sent to school the room had gradually been denuded of the small homely objects that once had softened its ugly outlines. The books had been packed away, save for a much beloved and sadly tattered volume of Perrault’s tales that shared the top of the pianoforte with a pile of music. The pianoforte that Grandpapa had insisted upon buying. The room might be bare and dingy, but there was money enough and to spare for anything that might add to her social accomplishments, and since she had no aptitude for singing or for sketching in water colours she should learn to perform on this new-fangled and extremely expensive instrument.
Maman, already a talented performer on spinet and harpsichord, had loved it, but to Fleur the lessons had been burdensome, the necessary practice a drudgery, even though she loved the music and could listen contentedly for hours when Maman played. Nowadays the pianoforte was rarely opened. Grandpapa had abandoned hope of turning his plebeian duckling into a social swan. The painstaking practice of studies and sonatas was spared her, and for that, at least, she could be thankful.
There was not a great deal to be thankful for, thought Fleur gloomily. Not since Maman went away. Dutifully, as she had been taught from babyhood, she reminded herself that she should be thankful to Grandpapa for a comfortable home and a good education. Had it not been for his generosity they might have starved to death. But starvation, to a little girl who had never gone hungry, was only a word. And Grandpapa, who was bad tempered and a bully, shouted at Maman and made her cry. So how could Fleur love him, even if it her duty to do so?
But there had been weeks and blessed weeks when Grandpapa was away on business, and then Maman and Fleur could be happy together, though quietly, for fear that someone should tell Grandpapa about their foolish gaiety. Once he had stayed away for a whole summer. It was their second summer at High Barrows. In the unaccustomed freedom from constant criticism, Maman had grown quite brave. That was when she had arranged for the long mirror to be hung in the schoolroom and had persuaded the estate carpenter to fix a barre along one wall so that Fleur might do her exercises properly. It was perfectly understood between them that, in case of enquiry, the mirror was necessary for the practice of proper deportment, while the barre was hung with writing copies or the sampler that Fleur was stitching to make it appear educationally desirable.
For the dancing was their special secret. Grandpapa would be furious if he knew of it. Maman had never dared to tell him that she had been an opera dancer for several months when first she came to London. It was not at all a proper thing for a lady to be, but what would you? One must eat! And at the time Maman had not known that it was improper. Such things were regarded differently in France. Maman was only sixteen, and at the ducal court where she had grown up her dancing had been much admired. Now she had been proud when she had been permitted to dance in the ballets that her papa had arranged and produced for the Duc’s guests! But in England, it appeared, things were quite different. In England, being an opera dancer meant that ill-conducted gentlemen were at liberty to tease and pester one with unwanted attentions. That was how Maman had come to meet Papa. Not that he had been one of the badly behaved gentlemen, of course. But he had chanced to walk down the street when Maman was trying to hold off the advances of a horrid creature who, overcome by wine and admiration, was insisting that she accompany him in his carriage to a ‘snug little nest’ where he would undertake to prove his devotion by such lavish entertainment as the little lady had never dreamed of. Papa had given this unpleasant person something known as a ‘leveller’. Fleur did not know what that was, but it had persuaded him to cease from distressing Maman with his importunities and Papa had escorted her back to the humble lodging that she
shared with Grandpère.
Maman, in fact, in her desperate loneliness, had talked a good deal more to her small daughter than was either seemly or prudent. But since they had only each other to talk to, no harm was done. And so long as Fleur had Maman for her constant companion, she, at least, was perfectly happy. Maman was gay and amusing. She had a fund of wonderful stories of her life in France before the Terror had driven her father to take the desperate step of fleeing to England — a flight dictated mainly by his fears for the safety of his precious only daughter.
In England they had fallen on hard times. Their small store of money dwindled rapidly and London was crammed with refugees, many of them of distinguished family, all of them only too eager to give lessons in music or dancing or painting — anything that would earn them a few sous for food and lodging. M. Lavelle managed to find one or two music pupils, but such work was poorly paid and, truth to tell, he was not very good at it. Without capital to purchase an interest, there was little hope of finding an opening in the world of ballet production. But at least his careful training had enabled his daughter to find employment. The ballet was becoming increasingly popular. Perhaps his little Martine would achieve fame and fortune. She had undoubted talent and had been well taught from babyhood.
Those dreams had ended with Martine’s marriage, but in their place he had the comfort of knowing that her future was assured. Alexander Pennington seemed to him an estimable young man. He was in a good situation and well able to provide for a wife and family. Moreover he was perfectly willing to house his father-in-law. Life went on very comfortably in the bright little house in Hans Town. Alexander was even able to put M. Lavelle in the way of meeting one or two people in the theatrical world who might help him to find an opening for his talents. The future had promised fair, especially with the birth of his grand-daughter, Fleur. Martine was more settled with the coming of the child. Her feeling for her husband was no more than a gentle affection grown out of gratitude. It was not that undying passionate fervour of which the poets sang, but how many people, thought practical M. Lavelle, could hope to find that in marriage? His son-in-law seemed well content with his pretty, docile wife and Martine adored her baby. It was more than many people ever achieved. He had a shrewd suspicion that Martine’s young heart had been given, once for all, to one who had probably perished on the guillotine with the rest of his family. In any case, nothing could ever have come of that affair. Young Paul de Trèvy had been drawn into their circle only through his passionate love of music. A delicate young man, a distant connection of the late Duchesse, he had been employed in some secretarial capacity in the ducal household because his disability — he had a clubfoot — rendered more active occupation ineligible. He had been carelessly kind to Martine — the unthinking kindness of a sweetnatured young man to a charming child. He had taken a friendly interest in her progress, given her one or two small gifts — a box of bon-bons — a perfume sachet — a riband for her hair. In return Martine had bestowed upon him the innocent adoration of her fifteen-year-old heart. Fate had intervened to separate them. And just as well, thought M. Lavelle, since nothing but heartbreak could have come of his daughter’s love for one so far above her. No. She was better as she was. Though he wished that Alexander would summon up the courage to tell his father of his marriage. He had planned to do so if the child had been a boy, trusting in his father’s satisfaction at the birth of an heir to the Pennington name to overcome his annoyance that his son should have married a girl who had neither rank nor fortune to recommend her and was a Frenchwoman to boot.
Alas! The marriage had not been blessed by the much desired son. Instead, when his daughter was but two years old, Alexander Pennington had died, and his father, outraged and furious at the deception that had been practised upon him rather than grief-stricken by bereavement, had descended upon the pleasant little house in Hans Town to see for himself the wife and child of whose existence he had first learned from his son’s will.
A young man at the start of his career, Alexander had had little to leave apart from the house. He had commended his wife and child to his father’s care. Mr Pennington proceeded to issue edicts which Martine was too subdued to question. She and the child were to live with him and all decisions as to the rearing and education of his granddaughter would be his. She might endow her father with such moneys as Alexander had bequeathed to her. Properly invested, the sum would bring in a tiny pittance which would make it possible for him to eke out a living if she allowed him the use of the Hans Town house in addition to his scanty earnings. His fierce energy had dominated the bewildered household and he had swept off his two hapless dependants to his grim establishment on the outskirts of Leeds before Martine had recovered from the shock of her husband’s sudden death.
Fleur could just remember the Leeds house, but most of her childish memories were centred on High Barrows. Not all of them were unhappy. Until she was twelve there had always been Maman. Maman, who played with her and taught her her lessons and her music and, above all, her dancing. Daily practice, said Maman, was the secret of good style. And without good style, even pronounced talent would not suffice. Then she would tell Fleur of the beautiful ballets that she had seen, and dance snatches of the various rôles as she described them, until the child was caught up in a world of enchantment far remote from the bleak Cumbrian fells that surrounded their new home and the squat looming shadow of Grandpapa.
But the nymphs and goddesses, the princes and magicians were only figments of Maman’s creating. Grandpapa’s dour presence most effectively banished them. And it was Grandpapa who put an end to the idyllic days of childhood by his announcement that Fleur was to go to school. He had secured a place for her at a very select seminary in Harrogate. It was time, he said, that she should learn to support the character of a lady and to mix with damsels who would be her contemporaries and her rivals in the marriage mart in a few years’ time. For once Maman forgot her fear of him and found the courage to oppose this decision, appealing against the threat of separation and begging that, if her own simple accomplishments were judged inadequate, a governess might be employed to instruct Fleur at home.
“Don’t be so daft, woman,” grunted Grandpapa with his customary courtesy. “It’s not book learning the lass needs. She’s going to school to rub shoulders with the nobs and learn how to go on in society. She can’t learn that at home.”
There could be no further appeal. Grandpapa’s word was law. In due time, Fleur went to school.
She found it tolerable. She was not exactly happy, but it was new and interesting and she looked forward eagerly to the holidays when she would be able to tell Maman all those details that she had sense enough to omit from the carefully scrutinised letters that she dutifully penned on alternate Sunday afternoons. So it was deeply disappointing to be told that Miss Melling was to accompany her on the journey to Cumberland and would spend the holiday at High Barrows. Miss Melling was one of the junior governesses and Fleur liked her well enough, but she did not want anyone to share the precious hours of the holiday with Maman.
But those precious hours were to be wholly denied her. The mounting anticipation of the last weeks at school, the hours spent in painstakingly hemming a handkerchief for Maman’s present, the long miles of the journey home in the new and gleaming carriage that Grandpapa had sent for them, the race of eager flying feet up the grand staircase to Maman’s room — all to end in desolation. The room was empty. Not only empty, but swept bare. It held no breath, no faint lingering perfume of Maman’s presence.
Millicent Melling had done her kindly best to soothe and comfort the terrified sobbing child; had tried to hearten her, after that devastating interview with Grandpapa. Of course her mother would come home again. She had only gone on a visit to her own papa in London. Why! She might even now be on her way, delayed, belike, by bad roads or some minor mishap. Fleur had listened and tried to believe the encouraging words. But in her inmost heart she had known, from her first glimpse of th
e bare little room that once had been so warmly, fragrantly feminine, that Maman would never return. It was with no surprise that she received, a few months later, a curt message from her grandsire announcing that her mama — he had always insisted on the English form — had married again. ‘Some Frenchman with whom she was acquainted before her flight to England,’ said the letter. At least he had told her the truth, she thought drearily. No more need for anxious wondering about Maman’s fate, since now she had a husband to protect her. No more room for hope that one day Maman might return to High Barrows. It seemed that she had no further need of her daughter’s love, since she had not troubled to write to that daughter. Fleur was still only a child and saw everything as black or white. She could not envisage Maman’s feelings, left alone in a household that she had always felt to be hostile, bereft of all that had made life worth living, until she had felt that she must escape and had taken the impulsive decision to visit her father. Nor could she guess at the strange encounter with the past that had awaited her upon arrival. She felt herself discarded and was almost inclined to sympathise with Grandpapa’s pronouncement that Maman had no further part to play in her life and that from now on she must look to him for all her needs.
To do him justice, in material ways, he had made ample provision. Though she was a sad disappointment to him, he had done his best for her. But despite her expensive education and every advantage that money could buy, nothing would turn Fleur into the image of his dreams. That she was not bookish he found forgivable — after all, no one really admired clever females. It was harder to accept her lack of ladylike accomplishments, especially when he recalled the money he had spent on their attainment. But worst of all, she was such a plain little piece. Mr Pennington’s notion of feminine beauty was something delicately pink and white, with big blue eyes and winsome dimples and a prettily rounded figure. His grand-daughter bore no resemblance at all to this delight-picture. In fact, with her thin, immature body and ivory wedge of a face with its enormous shadowed eyes, she looked more like some starveling from the slums, as he frequently assured her. But he was, he claimed, a fair-minded man, and he grudgingly allowed that his grandchild possessed two admirable assets. She carried herself like a princess, with a lovely, fluid serenity that stemmed, had he but known it, from the daily practising instituted by Maman and still faithfully followed by her daughter. And on horseback she was the finest and the pluckiest little rider that ever he had seen. Mr Pennington, who had come late in life to equestrian exercise, was not much addicted to it himself. He was not sure that Fleur’s performance was strictly ladylike, shrewdly suspecting that a more restrained and timid bearing would better beseem a female. But the tough fighting spirit in himself which, together with a shrewd brain, had raised him from humble beginning to his present position of power and affluence, recognised and saluted the courage that informed his grand-daughter’s slight frame, and though he could not bring himself to commend her in words he saw to it that she was well turned out and superbly mounted.