The Youngest Dowager_A Regency romance

by Louise Allen

  Her fingers were on the bonnet strings when Marcus said, ‘Stop.’ He was close again, his eyes fixed on her face. ‘You have sand on your cheekbone,’ he murmured. ‘Here, let me.’

  Before she could raise her hand his fingertips were stroking the fine grains from her skin, brushing them away from her lashes. She closed her eyes at the gentle touch and for a long moment she stood there, his fingers tracing the curves of her face.

  Marissa turned her face into his hand, and in response his palm cupped her cheek. His breath whispered warmly on her mouth…

  There was the thud of hooves on the turf and a rattle of wheels. Marissa opened her eyes to find Marcus standing a good three strides away from her and a groom hastening around the edge of the dune where the track petered out onto the beach.

  ‘My lady, Miss Venables sent me to tell you that – Oh, your lordship, I did not know you were here. Begging your pardon, my lord. Miss Venables was wishful of letting her ladyship know you had arrived.’

  ‘Yes, I saw her ladyship on the dunes and rode down to greet her.’ Marcus turned to hand Marissa up into the gig and swung up onto his patiently waiting horse. ‘I will ride with you,’ he said as the gig moved off along the sandy track.

  Marissa pulled herself together with an effort. ‘I am sorry we were so ill-prepared for you, my lord. Nicole received your letter this morning and we had not looked to see you for at least the next three days. Miss Venables is even now at the Hall putting in hand preparations for your arrival. Your sister, I am afraid, is at the Vicarage, at her dancing class.’ She felt she was prattling mindlessly, acutely conscious of the presence of the groom beside her.

  The man cleared his throat. ‘Pardon me, my lady, but James has gone in the carriage to collect Lady Nicole. Miss Venables sent him off as soon as his lordship’s baggage coach and carriage arrived.’

  Jane was once again rising to the occasion, Marissa thought with relief. She could be relied on to know exactly what to do under any set of circumstances, which, considering that she herself could hardly string two words together sensibly just at the moment, was a very good thing.

  ‘Your journey was smooth I trust, my lord,’ she asked, watching his hands, strong and brown on the reins. Unaccountably she could not meet his eyes. It was the embarrassment of being caught out in such hoydenish behaviour, of course. She had intended meeting him graciously, assured in her new role as the Dowager, and instead had been discovered romping in a way which would have been inexcusable even for Nicci.

  ‘I was fortunate with the winds and landed in Bristol a week ago. I can only assume that the ship bearing my letter was delayed.’

  Marissa could well believe it had not occurred to Marcus to write from Bristol. In her experience men rarely considered the problems of domestic arrangements and all that was involved in making a great house ready for its master. ‘What a delightful surprise for Nicole,’ she said.

  Marcus turned in the saddle, blue eyes creased in amusement. ‘That is a very polite way of telling me I should have sent word from Bristol and that I have caused the household a great deal of work,’ he remarked. ‘I have no doubt that I will be due a severe scold from Miss Venables. Tell me, how should I best make my apologies?’ His smile was broad and white and quite shameless.

  ‘Southwood Hall stands ready for your lordship whenever you choose to arrive. But I can only apologise that the London house was so unprepared. As you will recall, Matthews is here at the Hall, and there is only a skeleton staff left in Town.’

  ‘No matter. I had no intention of setting everyone in a bustle for one night. I stayed at Fenton’s Hotel and was perfectly comfortable.’

  Marissa was taken aback by such consideration for the servants. Her late husband would have expected to be able to walk into any of his establishments at any hour of the day and night and find all in perfect readiness and order.

  ‘And how is my sister? Has she led you a merry dance this past year? From her letters I have lived in daily expectation of a communication from you demanding that I remove her from your household immediately.’

  Beside her the groom repressed a snort, bending over the reins to hide what she suspected was a broad grin. Nicci was a favourite with the servants who appeared to be enchanted by her friendly ways. They do not have to try and turn her into a young lady, Marissa thought ruefully.

  ‘It has been a pleasure to have her with us,’ she said repressively. What had Nicci been writing? ‘We have been living very quietly, of course. I can only hope Nicole has not been intolerably bored.’

  Marcus did not reply, merely smiled. Nicci’s early letters had shown all the frustration to be expected from a lively young woman suddenly placed with strangers in a cold, new world of formality, but his sister had soon stopped bemoaning her life and gradually a picture of a happy trio of ladies had emerged. It had intrigued him to see Marissa through his sister’s innocent eyes. Nicci had written a few months ago:

  I love her very much. She is kind and funny, but there is a great sadness at the heart of her which I do not understand. She never speaks of his late lordship, but it cannot be that she is missing him, surely, for he was very old…

  Marcus had smiled wryly at the thought that a man of forty-five could be considered very old and could only assume his sister saw him, seventeen years younger than the Earl, as middle-aged.

  ‘There’s Lady Nicole now, ma’am,’ the groom said, pointing to the coast road where a small carriage had just turned out of the Vicarage drive.

  ‘My lord, please ride to meet your sister. I will join you at the Hall.’

  Marcus urged the horse into a brisk canter and intercepted the carriage. Nicci’s shrieks of delight as she came tumbling out of the gig in a flurry of petticoats and flung herself at his horse were probably audible in the next parish, he thought.

  He had dismounted by the time Marissa’s gig came up with them, and he was laughingly attempting to disentangle Nicci’s arms from around his neck before she throttled him.

  They formed quite a procession on the way back to the Hall, Nicci leaning over the side of the gig bombarding her brother with questions as he rode alongside. Marissa shook her head in despair at the her behaviour but there was no hope of curbing it in her present state of excitement.

  The baggage coach and the travelling carriage were pulling away from the front of the Hall as they drew up but the great doors stood open and the scene glimpsed through them resembled nothing so much as a disturbed anthill.

  Jane, flanked by Matthews, stood in the centre of activity directing footmen and maidservants as they scurried to disperse the piles of baggage which stood heaped around. Marissa, following Marcus and Nicci up the steps, became aware of Whiting who was regarding two male strangers with an expression as near to horror on his well-schooled countenance as she had ever seen.

  A dapper individual guarding a dressing case was doubtless his lordship’s valet but it was his companion who seemed to be causing Whiting’s discomfiture.

  Marissa was not surprised. Judging by his immaculate clothing the man was an upper servant of some sort but the correctness of his dress was in shocking contrast to his appearance. Built like a prize-fighter, he was standing with folded arms, the upper muscles straining the cloth. His face, tanned like leather, was crossed by a wicked scar which bisected his eyebrow from temple to cheekbone leaving a slash as white in his cropped hair. Standing in the hallway surrounded by Classical perfection and the scurrying English servants he appeared foreign, dangerous and utterly out of place. In fact the only place where Marissa could envisage him looking at home was on the deck of a pirate ship.

  Nicci, saw him, released her brother’s arm and with a shriek of ‘Jackson!’ threw herself into his arms to be enveloped in a bear-like hug. Jane’s eyebrows rose almost to her hairline at this behaviour, but before she could intervene Nicci was set firmly back on her feet and the man was admonishing her in a surprisingly cultured voice. ‘Lady Nicci, please conduct yourself with deco
rum. What will Miss Venables be thinking of you?’

  To almost universal amazement Nicci lowered her eyes and said meekly, ‘Yes, Jackson, but I am so very pleased to see you, you know.’

  ‘Well, you can best show that by helping Miss Venables,’ the man said repressively, but there was a twinkle in his grey eyes.

  Jane crossed the chequerboard tiles to Marcus. ‘My lord, welcome home to Southwood. It is a great pleasure to have you back amongst us.’

  ‘Thank you, Miss Venables.’ He smiled down at her over their clasped hands. ‘I must apologise for my lack of forethought in advising you of my arrival, but I see that the usual high standards here have not slipped.’ He nodded pleasantly at Matthews and Mr and Mrs Whiting. ‘Matthews, I would like a word with you this evening after dinner about the future domestic arrangements, meanwhile Jackson and Laurent will accompany me to my suite.’

  ‘Very good, my lord.’ Matthews bowed. ‘A cold collation is set out in the small dining room if you and the ladies would care to partake.’

  ‘Lady Longminster, if you would excuse me for half an hour to remove the dust of the road, I will join you shortly.’ Marcus was gone, his two servants at his heels.

  Alone in the dining room, with the hubbub of the hall shut out, Nicci burst out, ‘Oh, I am so pleased that Marcus brought Jackson with him. I was so afraid he would leave him to look after the Jamaica estates.’

  Jane fixed her with a gimlet stare from her position in one of the window seats. ‘And just who is this Jackson, if I might enquire?’

  ‘Why, our butler, of course. But he is much more than that. He has been with us for years, originally as captain of one of my father’s schooners. But no one is quite sure where he came from – he will never speak of it. And then when Marcus was seventeen he saved his life when the schooner was attacked by privateers. Jackson was terribly injured, almost given up for dead, but Marcus brought him back home and he has been our butler ever since old Peters had his heart attack. Why,’ she added disingenuously, ‘Jackson has almost brought me up. He is terribly strict, you know.’

  Marissa almost laughed at Jane’s shudder. ‘I am not reassured. No doubt this Jackson is a good man, in his rough way, but he is hardly suitable as butler in a great house.’

  ‘Wait and see. You will get used to him,’ Nicci promised airily. ‘Oh, where is Marcus? I am starving.’

  ‘Nicole, dear, ladies do not speak of their appetite, it is most improper.’ Jane appeared to notice Marissa’s appearance for the first time. ‘Why do you not remove your bonnet and pelisse, Marissa?’

  Reluctantly Marissa did so, sending her hair tumbling onto her shoulders and releasing a small shower of fine sand onto the polished boards.

  ‘What on earth have you been doing?’

  ‘Rolling in the sand by the look of it,’ Nicci said gleefully. ‘Marcus did not see you, did he, Marissa?’

  ‘I tripped,’ she said with a snap. ‘I must go and tidy myself before luncheon.’

  She was very conscious of two pairs of eyes – one censorious, one teasing, and both speculative – as she left the room, and was still feeling flustered when she returned, her hair brushed and pinned and her face washed.

  Marcus arrived at the door as she did. He was freshly shaven and dressed in clean riding clothes. Marissa kept her eyes down as he opened the door for her and ushered her to her place at table.

  The meal was punctuated by the tale of Marcus’s journey and the many people he had brought messages from for his sister. Marissa watched him from under her lashes as he spoke. He seemed to bring warmth and energy with him and to infect everyone around him with his vitality. It was as though the warm Caribbean sea and the hot sands were just outside this chilly mausoleum of a house.

  ‘We must have a ball to celebrate your return,’ Nicci was urging as Marissa came back to herself with a start.

  Jane coughed warningly and, with a swift look at Marissa, Marcus said, ‘I do not think that would be appropriate Nicci. We are still in mourning.’

  Nicci, who Marissa knew might be impulsive, but who was never insensitive, bit her lip, clearly mortified by the suggestion that she might be upsetting Marissa. ‘Oh, I am sorry. That was very thoughtless of me. I did not mean to distress you.’

  Marissa leaned across the table and touched her hand. ‘Do not worry, Nicci, I know what you meant. A ball is not suitable but it would be a pity if our neighbours did not have the opportunity to meet the Earl as soon as possible. I do not think a small dinner party would be out of place, if your brother agrees.’

  ‘A capital idea.’ Marcus sat back and smiled at all three of them. ‘How long would it take to arrange such a dinner, and,’ he grinned at Nicci, ‘order your new gowns?’

  Chapter Eight

  Laurent smoothed an imaginary wrinkle from the dark blue superfine cloth across his master’s shoulders, then stood back and viewed the finished effect critically.

  ‘For heaven’s sake, man,’ Marcus protested as the valet made another dart forward with the clothes brush. ‘We have been at this long enough. The guests will be here shortly.’ He grimaced down at his legs. ‘Knee breeches. Anyone would think we were in London instead of the depths of Norfolk.’

  ‘It is à la mode, my lord,’ Laurent demurred. ‘It is expected and, after all, it will be a social event spoken of for months afterwards in the neighbourhood.’ He gave a final, unnecessary polish to Marcus’s shoe buckles and added gloomily, ‘After all, what else is there to talk of in this place which le bon Dieu has undoubtedly forsaken?’

  Marcus fixed him with a stern eye. ‘If I have to learn to be a respectable earl, then you must learn to be a respectable valet, Laurent.’

  ‘Pah.’ He picked up Marcus’s discarded linen and stalked towards the door. ‘I will be respectable, my lord, but do not demand that I like this place. I will die of the pneumonia, sans doute, if I do not first expire from the food.’

  Marcus grinned at his own reflection in the glass. The man had been with him for years. He had tried to encourage him to stay in Jamaica, knowing he would hate England, but the valet had insisted that his place was at his master’s side, although it would be the death of him.

  Not that Marcus couldn’t see his point. He too yearned for the warmth, not just of the weather, but of the people. The social mores of English society came hard when one had lived a life characterised by informality, driven by the climate and the dictates of nature. And he missed the Caribbean sea. The cold, grey waves washing against the coast here bore no resemblance to the inviting blue depths of Jamaican waters, filled with fish as bright as jewels.

  There was little point in dwelling on all that. It was the past and his new life as the fourth Earl of Longminster was waiting for him. Tonight’s soirée was his first foray into county Society, and for the sake of Nicci’s future – and his own – he had to make it a success.

  Marcus strolled over to the window, resisting the urge to run one finger under his collar, resenting the control that the formal evening clothes imposed. But Marissa would be expecting to entertain in this style and he could not let her down. He had not failed to notice the air of rigidly suppressed excitement under her perfect poise. Like a cat’s fur in a thunderstorm, her mass of hair seemed to crackle with energy under the restraint of its pins. It reminded him of the night she had found him in the Long Gallery and the one long hair that had curled itself around his finger like a living thing was still where he had placed it, between the pages of his pocketbook.

  A mile away across the park Marissa was completing her toilette. Seated in front of her dressing table mirror, Gyp curled up at her feet, she watched Mary’s deft fingers capture, twist and pin up her hair.

  On an impulse Marissa reached up and teased out the short curls around her hairline.

  ‘Oh, that is pretty, my lady,’ Mary murmured.

  ‘Yes. Yes, I think it will do,’ Marissa decided, rather surprised at her own reflection. She had never permitted the slightest curl to es
cape from its tight chignon but it became her, she realised, emphasising her cheekbones and softening the curve of her brow. ‘Now, the diamond set, I think, Mary.’

  The maid fastened the necklace, then began to secure the coiled hair on her crown with matching combs.

  Marissa adjusted the cold stones on her throat, then lifted the drop earrings and fastened them to her lobes. She had never particularly cared for the set, although her husband had insisted she wear it often. Now, against the severity of black silk, the stones sparked with a hot fire she had never seen before.

  Mary helped her with the long white kid gloves, clasped a diamond bracelet around her wrist then, as she stood, bent to tweak out the heavy flounce around the hem. She puffed up the little sleeves before draping a white silk stole with a long fringe over Marissa’s elbows.

  With a tap on the door Jane entered, resplendent in a new plum satin gown. ‘My dear, you look lovely. The carriage is here, and we must be off. It is six o’clock and we promised the Earl that we would be there to help him receive.’

  The shadows were lengthening in the park as the barouche pulled up at the front door and Marissa was seized by the strangeness of arriving as a guest at what, until so recently, had been her own house. She was looking forward to this dinner party, she realised. For the first time she would not have to sit in constant fear that some detail would be found wanting, a shortcoming that would be visited upon her later by her lord. It was not the only reason for her anticipation, but it was the only one that she was prepared to acknowledge to herself.

  The door was opened by Jackson, dignified in evening black, but still managing to look dangerously out of place. He bowed the ladies in, handed their cloaks to a footman, conducted them past a small string ensemble who were tuning up on the landing and into the Salon.

  ‘Lady Longminster, Miss Venables, my lord.’