by Carola Dunn
She sat down beside him and began to unwind the bandage. Acutely conscious of her closeness, Luke watched her intent face. Her cropped hair had grown out into dark, glossy ringlets; long lashes veiled her eyes; her mouth was soft, serious, the tip of her tongue visible as she concentrated. He was shaken by a fierce desire to hold her in his arms, yet he hardly dared breathe for fear of drawing her attention to his emotion.
Her hand brushed his skin. As if the shock that ran through him touched her also, she raised her eyes to his momentarily and a deeper rose tinged her cheeks.
“There!” she said quickly, handing the soiled linen to Billy, who passed it on to the hovering Tombaugh. “It is bleeding only a little now, and I can see no sign of infection. If you promise to follow instructions faithfully, I will not send for the doctor. Tombaugh, bring fresh linen and the basilicum powder, if you please. And tell Mrs Tombaugh that Mr Luke will be staying here tonight.”
Luke grinned. “She will have to make up a pallet for Billy beside my bed,” he said. “A large pallet. I cannot persuade him to leave my side until we return to London and Davis relieves him of his duties.”
“Very well,” said Gabrielle, looking up at Billy, who nodded. “I hope Baxter will not take it as a reflection upon his abilities. Now put your feet up, Luke, and while we wait for Tombaugh you shall tell me what you have been doing since you left.”
Luke complied. He had just reached the village of Goudhurst and removed his sling, to Gabrielle’s exasperation, when Lady Harrison rustled in, looking not a day older than thirty-five in a gown of blue and grey striped silk.
“Mr Everett, you have seen Oswald? Who is ce gros garçon and what does he here? Gabrielle, it is not at all convenable for a young lady to consort with a gentleman demi-nu!”
Gabrielle draped Luke’s shirt across his chest.
“He has been telling me about his interview with Mr Hubble, madame, and had nearly come to Sir Oswald.”
“Recommencez!” requested her ladyship. “I cannot follow a story begun in the middle.”
Luke stopped gaping at the transformation of elderly dowager into handsome matron, pulled himself together, and obligingly returned to Lincoln’s Inn.
The story had to be repeated again when Gerard returned from visiting Rolf at the Great House. He was inclined to be disappointed that no duels had been fought, but Lady Harrison and Gabrielle were as grateful and admiring as Luke could have hoped. That Alain de Vignard had returned to London only added to his expectation of an enjoyable recuperation, and he retired to bed at an early hour, somewhat greyer in the face than Gabrielle liked but in high spirits.
Gabrielle kept him at the Dower House for three days. He was not difficult to persuade. All his family came to see him there, except Rolf who was, however, suffering more now from boredom than anything else.
No trace of boredom marred Luke’s convalescence. When there were no visitors, he sat with Gabrielle in the parlour or in the sunny garden, talking quietly or simply enjoying each other’s company.
Billy was their constant chaperon, but he managed to make himself remarkably unobtrusive in spite of his bulk. He would sit just out of earshot, watching them with a benevolent expression. After a voluble explanation on his side and no more than a pair of words on the other, he had come to terms with Baxter. Luke had never been better looked after in his life.
Nor had he ever been happier. It was his nature to anticipate problems—to consider alternatives, ponder possibilities, lay out a course of action. But with Gabrielle beside him, he found it easy to live in the present. He was no nearer being able to support a wife, let alone her brother and her possibly indigent father, if and when that gentleman appeared, so he deliberately avoided thinking of the future.
Gabrielle, once she was satisfied that Luke’s wound was healing properly, was happy too. Not until he removed to the Great House did she ask herself why.
The answer shocked her.
She was in love.
How comfortable, in retrospect, it had been to have Luke for a friend! Ever since her arrival in England she had had someone to turn to for advice and assistance. She had considered the possibility of marrying him, but only if Papa failed to turn up. Now the thought appalled her: to be married to a man who was merely fond of her, when she adored him! Not that he had ever given her the slightest hint of wishing to marry her. She was sure that he was fond of her, that he liked to be with her. It was not enough.
She sat up in bed, hugging her knees. Papa, come quick! she cried silently, desolately. I need you!
* * * *
Lady Harrison was already making plans to return to London. With her finances at last in order, she had decided the time was ripe to refurbish her house in preparation for the Little Season in the autumn. Rolf and Dorothea were both dismayed at the prospect of losing their new friends, the one still confined to his bed, the other in the megrims after bidding Alain farewell. The Everetts invited the Darcys to move up to the Great House for a few more weeks. That satisfied Rolf and Gerard, but Dorothea was all too conscious that, with Lady Harrison gone, Alain would have no more excuse for visiting Wrotham.
Gabrielle was torn. Luke was well enough now to go back to his work. If she went with Madame, she might see him in town; but how painful it would be if he was too busy, or not inclined to visit. She opted to stay with his family and hope that he would come down often.
As for Luke, forced at last to consider the future, he came to the conclusion that there was no hope for his courtship. There was simply no way he could support a wife In desperation he cast about for reasons to stop loving Gabrielle, and could find none.
He and Billy escorted Lady Harrison back to London, borrowing the Everett travelling carriage for the purpose.
Lady Cecilia waved goodbye, then turned to her husband.
“A word with you, my lord,” she requested.
His arm about her waist, he led her to the study. She sat down on a sofa, pulled him down beside her and kissed his cheek. For several minutes he was too busy to ask what was on her mind. At last she moved away a little and took his hands.
“My dear,” she said, “I am sure you no longer doubt Luke’s feelings for Gabrielle.”
He stood up, crossed to the window, and gazed out. “No more than I doubt my own feelings for you, Cecy. But of what is to be done I am less sure. I have no more idea who Miss Darcy is than I had when she first came here. What is her father? An adventurer, a black sheep, the skeleton in some noble family's closet? Or a mere nobody who thought to make good abroad? I told you I found her face familiar, which leads to concerns...as to legitimacy.”
“You still have not recalled whom she reminds you of?”
“No. It cannot be anyone I know well. And even if it is her real name, there are a hundred families called Darcy. I daresay I never met more than two or three of them in my life.”
“Well, no matter. You remember that I told you I should not let pride stand in the way of Luke’s happiness. I was not thinking of pride of birth at the time, but in the end it is as unimportant as any other kind. If Luke loves her and wants to marry her, neither her lineage nor his straitened means shall prevent it, if I have any say in the matter.
“Henry, I had a letter this morning saying that my parents will travel to Tunbridge Wells next week, to take the waters. Wrotham is not far out of their way and I should in any case have invited them to break their journey here.” She went to him, put her arms around him and laid her cheek against his back. He was rigid, breathing shallowly. “When they come, I am going to ask them for money.”
He turned in her arms and held her tight.
* * * *
The Earl and Countess of Ipswich arrived in due course, with three carriages, eight servants and a mountain of baggage. They brought with them another guest, whose train consisted only of two carriages and five servants.
“I made sure you could have no objection, Cecilia,” said Lady Ipswich, a majestic figure in purple gros de Napl
es, topped with a huge frothy hat adorned with no less than five dyed ostrich plumes. “Lord Charing is practically a neighbor of yours, after all. He happened to mention to Ipswich that he intended to stay the night in Wrotham. His health is not good, unlike your father’s, and he does not care to travel above thirty miles in a day. He and Ipswich were friends many years ago. We did not like to think of him languishing at an inn when our daughter resides not a mile distant.”
“Of course, Mama. We are happy to welcome Lord Charing, are we not, Henry?” She nudged her husband, who sighed and said everything proper.
The Marquis of Charing, suffering severely from gout, was carried into the house by his servants. Some seventy years of age, he looked much older than the Ipswiches, his contemporaries. He wore his hair unfashionably long, tied behind, and it was as white as if it had been powdered in the mode of his youth. His lean face was deeply lined, giving an impression of constant weariness and regret.
Lord Everett took one look at him and reached for his wife’s hand. Squeezing it meaningfully, he whispered, “Family name: Darcy!”
She turned to him, startled, and when she resumed the duties of a hostess, greeting the unexpected guest and directing the servants to see to his comfort, she scrutinised his face intently.
Lord Charing retired to a hastily prepared bedchamber. The countess went straight to the schoolroom to see her younger grandchildren, while the earl visited Rolf on his sickbed.
“I see no resemblance,” said Lady Cecilia to her husband.
“It is not obvious,” Lord Everett responded. “I caught a hint of young Gerard about the eyes. But he is the one the Darcys reminded me of, I’d wager on it. The resemblance must have been closer when he was younger.”
“He is something of a hermit, is he not? I know nothing of his family.”
“I was never well acquainted with him. He is older, and his heir, Lord Darcy, younger than I. I have a vague recollection of seeing in the Gazette, oh, perhaps fifteen months past, that Darcy was killed in some sort of accident.”
“Where does that leave Gerard and Gabrielle?”
“Precisely where they were, except that we can guess at a connection. Just what it is, is still a matter for conjecture. There must be cadet branches of the house, and the connection might be distant, the resemblance pure chance.”
“My parents probably know more.”
Lord Everett frowned. “Don’t ask them, Cecilia. We have no right to delve into the matter.”
“As you wish. But I shall invite the marquis to stay for a few days, until his leg pains him less. We shall soon find out if you are right.”
“We shall?”
“To be sure. Either he knows about the relationship, in which case he may repudiate it and leave at once, or he may wish to further it, so he will stay. Or else he does not know of it, in which case he will stay to investigate, if he has only an ounce of curiosity in him! But if you are mistaken in the resemblance, he will hum and haw and make a to-do about putting us out, and consider a thousand pros and cons.”
“All right, all right!” The baron laughed. “I daresay you have the right of it, unless Charing happens to be a man of quick decisions, or fails to note a resemblance which is there. In which case we shall learn precisely nothing!”
Lord Ipswich made Gerard’s acquaintance in Rolf’s room, and his wife met Gabrielle when she returned with Dorothea from a walk to the village. They were pronounced respectively “a promising youth” and “a pretty-behaved young woman.” Neither the earl nor the countess remarked upon the coincidence of surnames, nor appeared to notice any likeness.
Of the rest of the household, children and staff alike, only Lord Charing’s servants were aware of their master’s family name. They were a taciturn lot, not given to gossiping in the servants’ hail or stables; if they felt any unusual interest in the young Darcys, they kept it to themselves.
When the marquis limped into the long gallery before dinner, on the arm of his footman, Lady Cecilia’s gaze never left his face. She presented Dorothea to him, but was pleased to note that his eyes kept straying to Gabrielle and Gerard, who were waiting to be introduced. When he heard their name, his look of puzzlement changed to a wary interest.
Gabrielle, having but recently nursed her brother and Luke, was quite ready to practise her new skills on another invalid. She took charge of Lord Charing, brought a stool for his bad leg, a screen to shield him from the draught, a cushion to set behind him. All was done with such an utter lack of self-consciousness that he could not possibly suppose that he was being toad-eaten. She sat down beside him and conversed politely on subjects of general interest, the very picture of a demure, well-bred young lady in her evening gown of apricot mull.
“Do you make a long stay at Wrotham, Miss Darcy?” he asked abruptly.
“Until next month, sir. Lady Cecilia has been kind enough to ask us to stay several more weeks.”
“And then?”
“Then we return to town, sir.”
“To your parents, no doubt.”
Gabrielle chose to disregard this query. His sudden curiosity seemed odd compared to his previous courtly, somewhat old-fashioned manner.
“We have very much enjoyed spending the summer here,” she said. “The countryside is magnificent, is it not? If it were only the view across the Weald from the top of the hill, it would be worth a visit.”
The marquis looked a little put out at her evasion but did not press his question. Instead he described his home to her, the village of timbered houses and the remains of a palace once belonging to the Archbishop of Canterbury.
“You can still see the Great Hall,” he said, “where both Henry VII and Henry VIII were entertained. It is within my grounds, so I have never had to construct an artificial Gothic ruin to please romantic ladies.”
She laughed. “It sounds delightful! Are you close to Canterbury?”
“Some twelve miles.”
“You must often have visited the Cathedral then. Describe it to me, pray. Is it not the oldest in England?”
“It was founded in 597, burned down in 1067, and subsequently rebuilt. It is something of a hodgepodge of styles, but well worth a visit. As is the city, which has still a great many medieval buildings.”
“I should like to see it,” said Gabrielle, “but Mr Everett said it is much too far for a day’s outing.”
Lord Charing fell silent, looking thoughtful. They soon went in to dinner, where he ate so sparingly that Lady Cecilia felt every justification, later in the evening, when she invited him to stay until he felt more the thing.
He agreed with alacrity.
Lady Cecilia was not in the least surprised, the next day, when the marquis asked to meet Rolf. After all, Gerard spent most of his time with his friend. With a touching wistfulness, his lordship angled to be included in their limited pastimes; and since they both had excellent manners, he frequently succeeded.
“Imagine having a bad leg all the time!” said Rolf to Gerard, aghast at the thought.
Lady Cecilia was mystified, however, by the marquis's determined cultivation of her daughter. Dorothea had grown worrisomely pale and wan since Alain’s departure. Never talkative, she had lately become silent, and if it had not been for Gabrielle’s animating presence she would have retired to her chamber to mope the days away.
Heartsick herself, Gabrielle was not one to go into a decline. She conceived it her duty to her kind hosts to encourage Dorothea to exert herself, and when Lord Charing arrived she did her utmost to see that the charge of entertaining him did not fall on Lady Cecilia.
The Everetts were grateful. When Lady Cecilia at last found an opportunity to approach her father on the subject of money, she did it as much for Gabrielle as for Luke.
Lord Ipswich was entirely unsurprised when she laid the situation before him.
“Had a notion it was low tide with you, Cecy,” he said. “‘Well, I mean, your old father knows the time of day, what? Stands to reason you can�
�t play deep for as many years as Everett did without getting a trifle scorched. You would marry him though.”
“And I have never regretted it, Papa.”
“Was going to offer a helping hand when he came down here. Reformed character, what? Your mother thought he’d be insulted.”
“She was right. But things have changed now.”
“Not run off your legs, are you? I’ve been looking about the place, and it looks as if Everett’s brought the land into good heart, doing well.”
“It is. He has a touch for estate management, now that he has put his mind to it. It’s the old debts: mortgages and liens and other things I don’t understand. If it was just the two of us we could get by, but the children are growing up. So far, Luke has provided for them, but . . .”
“Not another word, my love! Your stepson is an admirable young man, but there’s no call for him to take care of my grandchildren when your mother and I don’t spend the half of our income—in spite of her wretched hats! I shan’t live forever, and when I go there will be a fair bit coming your way, without embarrassing your brother in the least. You shall have it at once, no strings attached, except I’ll thank you not to let Everett gamble it away again!”
“Papa! If I didn’t think you were roasting me . . . But I knew I could count on you.” Lady Cecilia hugged her father, feeling like a little girl given a shilling to spend at the fair. With the debts paid off, the estate could easily support Luke with a wife and family.
Now all she had to do was to make sure he married Gabrielle!
Chapter 21
Gabrielle had come to like Lord Charing. She felt she was genuinely useful to him, and though she had heard him cursing his servants when his leg was particularly painful, he was unfailingly polite, even charming, to her.
She was walking in the garden one morning when she overheard a snippet of conversation. Unaware of her presence, Lady Cecilia’s parents were sitting on a bench on the other side of a bed of gloriously scented red roses.