Lady Elizabeth's Comet

by Sheila Simonson

  I sanded the sheet, sealed it before cowardice or prudence could make me throw it in the fire, and took it downstairs. Agnew was snuffing the candles and started at my sudden reappearance as if he had seen a ghost. When he recovered he assured me that he would see the letter in the post himself.

  Chapter 26

  I tried to put my audacity from my mind as we settled back into our routine at home. The truth was I felt some discomfort in having addressed Clanross directly. It was one thing for Maggie and Jean to write him. He had asked them to. He would probably read my unlooked-for letter with surprise. I did not believe he would take offence, but I was sufficiently my stepmother's daughter to feel social unease--as if I had been caught riding unescorted on Rotten Row or bowling down Bond Street in an open carriage.

  The weather lowered, so I could not distract myself with my observations. I kept busy writing up my last notes. I writ Anne a soothing letter and Kitty one full of social chitchat. I sent Bella Forster my formal congratulations. I took several damp rides in the deserted park. Nothing helped.

  Brecon looked uncommonly desolate squatting hugely on its hill. In one of the icy corridors Mrs. Smollet retailed her woes. Jenkins was ill of the rheumaticks. An underhousemaid had quit out of boredom and gone to work in Chacton's mill. When was his lordship coming home?

  Then Charles Wharton, full of his bride and his infirmary, called at the Dower House to ask impatiently after Clanross. In the stables, Jem asked shyly after his lordship. Even the rector, an incurious man with whom Clanross had established only the most distant acquaintance, wondered aloud when the earl would be coming home. It was unnerving. Wherever I turned, people were asking me Clanross's plans. I could only assure them all that I did not know what he meant to do.

  On the fifth day of obstinately dripping skies I bundled the girls in the barouche and drove to Hazeldell to call on Cecilia Wharton (she and Charles had decided not to be Wharton-Conway-Gore). Marriage had given Cecilia confidence. She said several connected sentences in my presence and allowed that Willoughby's betrothal was a splendid thing, was it not, Lady Elizabeth? I agreed. Cecilia's mother was reported to be in such elevated spirits that she had had to take the Bath waters as a restorative from too much joy.

  Jean and Maggie were bored with this twaddle, but they had the satisfaction of showing off their new gowns and of telling a sympathetic Mary Wharton the gruesome particulars of Mme. Tussaud's, so their morning was not entirely wasted.

  The roads were heavy. We returned in good time for a late nuncheon to find Clanross in the withdrawing room.

  After the first shock of surprise, I realised that I had been expecting him.

  As we entered, he and Miss Bluestone broke off what sounded like a debate on Ireland. He fended off the girls' enthusiasm with absentminded hugs, made Alice a perfunctory bow, and kept his eyes on me.

  "Hullo, Elizabeth." Golden syllables.

  "Clanross!" I gathered my wits. "A pleasant surprise. What brings you home?"

  "Your letter," he said succinctly. He looked stern and rather tired. That was not to be wondered at. He had dropped everything and come north as soon as he got my letter. Probably he had spent two nights on the road. "Will you walk with me by the lake?" he asked, as if there were some doubt of my response.

  Even as I murmured my assent, Miss Bluestone was explaining firmly to the girls that they were wanted in the schoolroom and could not join us. Alice looked puzzled.

  I cast Miss Bluestone a grateful look and Alice an apologetic one and went out to ask Agnew to restore my wraps. No one commented on the peculiarity of two people choosing to take a stroll through the autumn mizzle. The door of the Dower House closed gently behind us.

  "I thought you were fixed in Town until Parliament rises." I kept my tone light.

  We moved off along the mist-shrouded path to the lake. Clanross took a moment to reply. At last he said wryly, "My worst foe couldn't wish me to bear with more than a fortnight of their lordships tuttutting at each other."

  I smiled. "Well, I don't wish it. I hope my plan for bringing the little girls south meets with your approval."

  "If you're determined. I think they'll drive you mad in a week." He fell silent again.

  I was baffled. If that hadn't brought him, what had? I looked up at him and was startled to see that he seemed abstracted, my small sisters' fate the last thing on his mind. I decided to keep still.

  We walked slowly along the edge of the wood. I could taste the fog on my lips. When his silence had lengthened unbearably, I blurted, "I did like your speech. You sounded so composed, as if you'd been addressing the Lords every day of your life."

  "You're kind. I haven't been that terrified since we stormed Badajoz."

  I ventured an uncertain smile.

  "Elizabeth..."

  "Yes?"

  "I've something to ask of you. Will you hear me out?"

  I glanced up. A painful frown knit his brows. "Of course."

  He looked away. "Your Aunt Whitby is a tactless old witch, but she's as shrewd as she can hold together. I wish you'd give her suggestion of this spring some thought."

  "What?" My heart began to bang away in my throat like a trip-hammer.

  He turned back to me, his eyes grave. "You would do me great honour if you would marry me."

  I made a strangled noise. I don't think he heard. He had turned away and begun to walk on along the wet, leaf-strewn path. I commanded my paralysed limbs to move.

  "I'm aware of the drawbacks marrying anyone will present you," he was saying as I regained his side. "At least I think I am. And I know you've been mourning Bevis. When I saw how calmly you dealt with him in London I ventured to hope..."

  "Tom..."

  "I meant to say something at Wharton's wedding, but I hadn't the courage to press the matter then. I won't now, God knows. But I'd like you to think about it."

  I might make my feet move but my tongue seemed beyond my command.

  He had stopped again and was looking at me now, searchingly, with the same slight frown I had seen so many times when something troubled him. "There would be some advantage to you."

  I returned his stare like a mesmerized bird.

  "You'd have a sure position in the world, and I wouldn't wish to interfere with your work. Your sisters--Lady Anne and Lady Kinnaird, I mean--couldn't very well harass you if you were Countess of Clanross, and even Lady Whitby would be pleased--when she forgives me my latest Jacobin excesses." A flicker of humour lit his eyes for a moment. "Besides," he added, as matter-of-fact as if he were discussing the price of a quartern loaf, "I love you very much."

  "Tom..." I seemed unable to say anything else.

  He smiled a little. "If that's an inducement."

  "Tom." I took hold of myself and contrived to say, "Yes, I'll marry you," though rather indistinctly.

  His eyes widened.

  "Yes," I said very clearly. "Yes. Please."

  We stared at each other.

  After a long moment, frowning slightly, he reached out and tilted my chin up. I thought he meant to say something else, but he bent and kissed me with grave deliberation on the mouth.

  My paralysis vanished. My kiss may have been inexpert, but it made up in enthusiasm what it lacked in practice.

  I have no idea how long we stood there scandalising the Brecon rabbits. When we finally disentwined, my bonnet had tipped over one ear and I gasped for breath in an unladylike fashion. Clanross was rather breathless himself.

  A flush tinged his cheekbones and his eyes were bright, partly with amusement. "Elizabeth, my fraudulent dove, I perceive I've been unnecessarily diffident. Shall we run for the border?"

  "Gretna Green," I croaked.

  We both began to laugh. It was too absurd. I sobered first. "I'll have to explain, Tom."

  "Hush." He removed my bonnet, still smiling. "I have no questions at all, Elizabeth. And never will."

  "Oh, Tom, I do love you."

  "It's nothing to cry about, witling."<
br />
  I sniffed. "Not now."

  He drew me close. "Come along, then. I can see you mean to tell me everything, but I warn you I'm too much in alt to hear more than half of it."

  It was wonderfully comforting to be walking beside him through the damp autumn air with the leaves rattling at our steps and his arm heavy and warm on my shoulder.

  I explained. I don't think I was eloquent or even very clear. He was always a good listener, however, and did not interrupt me now. When I faltered once, he gave my shoulder a gentle squeeze of encouragement, and presently it was all over. I felt light as air.

  I couldn't help adding in a chastened voice, "I've been so wretched. And I used Bevis. I can't forgive myself that."

  He said crisply, "Nonsense. He used you, too. Dunarvon gave him an ultimatum. Let Miss Carr console Bevis." After a pause he added, in considering tones, "I very nearly called him out that afternoon in Hyde Park for hurting you so abominably."

  I stood stock still. "You did?"

  He smiled at my expression. "You're not the only one capable of mixed emotions, my heart. Portrait of a man frozen between outrage and delight."

  I recalled Clanross standing beside Bevis in the park as I rode off in Winton Peverel's phaeton. How exceedingly blank he had looked. I had to smile, too.

  "That's more the thing. If you're troubled about Bevis's sensibilities, we can let him think we've made a marriage of convenience."

  "You're completely unscrupulous."

  "A coxcomb," he agreed, shameless.

  "It won't do, Tom. He knows me too well. He'll see through me in an instant. I feel transparent."

  "You don't look transparent. You look rosy and very substantial, considering I'm dreaming all this."

  I hastened to assure him he wasn't dreaming.

  We sat on one of Papa's marble benches, for we had reached the margin of the lake, and there followed another satisfactory interlude.

  I came up for air again. "Where's my bonnet?"

  "Mmmm? Safe as houses. I chucked it beneath a bush."

  "Wretch!" I considered the trouble Anne had taken to see that I bought that bonnet and I fear I snickered.

  "You shouldn't hide your hair," he said seriously.

  "Do you like it?"

  "The bonnet?"

  "My hair! I feel dreadful, Tom."

  He straightened, alarmed. "Good God, and I was flattering myself that you were feeling everything appropriate to the occasion."

  "I'll be an object of loathing among all the matchmaking mamas. You must know you're a Prime Catch."

  If I hoped to disconcert him I failed. He chuckled. "Yes, and very gratifying it is, too, considering I spent my salad years being warned off by stern papas."

  "Poor Tom. How I wish we'd met then."

  "No, you don't. My feet were too large and my ears turned red whenever I was embarrassed, which was most of the time."

  "Your ears still turn red--bright red."

  "But the rest of me has caught up with my feet," he replied, composed. "I prefer a mature and elevating attachment to the idiocies of calf love. Far more dignified, don't you think?" He kissed my hair. Thence another interlude--elevated, of course.

  At last he said reluctantly, into my hair, "We ought to go in, Elizabeth. I'm more or less waterproof, but you're not."

  "I daresay I do look bedraggled."

  He assured me in the most flattering terms that looking bedraggled suited me. That took time. I, too, was reluctant to go in. I didn't feel at all cold. On the contrary. Also, the prospect of everyone's delight (Miss Bluestone), astonishment (Alice and Maggie), and jealousy (Jean) was rather daunting.

  "We could walk up to Brecon. Sims must be told."

  "By God, yes." Clanross rose and gave me his hand. "I wonder what the odds are now?"

  "Odds?"

  "Sims regards my pretensions with pessimism. He'll probably lose his shirt to Mrs. Smollet. But Brecon can wait. I have the feeling Miss Bluestone can't."

  "Has she been your ally?" Miss Bluestone, the recipient of my confidences. Surely she could not have been meddling. I felt my cheeks burn.

  Clanross kissed my nose. "No, my love. I stormed the bastion unassisted. She did give me a speaking look as we left, I thought, and she removed the twins with suspicious dexterity."

  "Miss Bluestone will be delighted. She thinks you're worth ten of Bevis." I cast him a sidelong glance and had the satisfaction of watching his ears turn scarlet. "I hope in future you'll consider the consequences of bribing respectable ladies with fossils."

  He grinned. "I should have chipped one out for you."

  "Oh, Tom, I wish you had. How I pored over the rocks and the twins' spelling lists, and there was nothing for me. Why did you not write to me?"

  "I thought you might think it an impertinence."

  "Your letters to the girls always sounded so cheerful."

  "All lies. My friends felt sure I was going into a decline and kept pressing tonics on me."

  "Were you visiting military friends?" For some reason, I always overlooked the possibility that he had connexions outside my family, though that was absurd.

  "Yes. Between scaling cliffs and riding across moors and leaping off mountains--what a lot of mountains there are in Scotland--and rowing skiffs. I did considerable rowing." He regarded his left arm ruefully. "Mostly in circles."

  "Very strenuous." I smiled.

  He did not. Instead he said, rather dryly, "Very. You may take it, I think, that there won't be a repeat of last November."

  "What do you mean?" But I knew the answer and went cold.

  "I mean that if there were any further fragments of bone or metal to jar loose I'd have found out."

  "You're mad!"

  "You can't imagine I'd propose marriage to any woman, least of all you, Elizabeth, with that hanging over me."

  I had begun to tremble with anger and fright. "If ever you do anything so flea-witted again, I'll--I'll--"

  "What?" He smiled at me.

  I was not amused. "I don't know. How could you take such a risk, Tom? I'd a hundred times rather be married and you in a Bath chair than see you dead. A thousand times."

  "Well, I wouldn't. Too frustrating, my dear." He spoke mildly, but he looked at me in such a way that I blushed to the roots of my hair. "Come along before I throw you over my saddlebow and gallop for the Border. It won't do to offend Mrs. Finch's sensibilities."

  His light tone did not reassure me. He had frightened me to the core and he knew it. We walked along the path in silence, our hands twined. Presently I stopped shaking. He was there, after all, not dead in a clump of heather.

  In truth, I hadn't even considered that the injury might cause further trouble, my surgical adventure had been so dramatic and seemed so complete. For Clanross it could only have been the latest in a series of crises. That he was determined it would be the last, one way or another, I knew. I pride myself on a logical mind. I should have followed through to the consequences.

  "There's your bonnet. Shall we find a windmill to fling it over?"

  I knelt by the sodden object, mostly to hide my tear-streaked face. "That seems to be all it's good for."

  He pulled me up and held me very close. "If I'd known you were attached to the blasted thing, I'd have guarded it with my life."

  If his voice was unsteady, mine must have been nearly incomprehensible, but I was able to assure him that my attachment was not for the bonnet.

  As we came out of the woods Maggie pranced up from the direction of the stables. "Oh, it's you. I say, Clanross, isn't it wonderful!"

  For a moment I thought she had been eavesdropping.

  Apparently the same mad thought struck Clanross. He sounded flustered. "Er, yes. That is, what?"

  "Una is going to whelp," Maggie said soulfully.

  Clanross kept a straight face with visible difficulty. "Isn't she a bit young?"

  Maggie's face fell. "That's what Jem says." She deigned to notice me. "What happened to your bonn
et, Liz?"

  "I flung it over the windmill." In the interest of clarity, I added, "I've agreed to wed Clanross, Maggie."

  Maggie stared, wide-eyed, then brightened. "Oh, by Jove, I'll give you a puppy for a bridegift."

  "Thank you, darling." I cleared my throat. "Whenever Una, er, feels up to it. And I hope you and Jean will be my bridesmaids."

  "Crikey! Wait till I tell Jean!"

  She was poised to dash off. Clanross intercepted her. "Come in with us, Maggie, and we'll all tell Jean."

  My stomach knotted with apprehension. It was true that Jean had in the last months transferred her visible affections to the curate, but Clanross had been her First Love. I did not wish to hurt Jean. We moved to the door, Clanross's hand warm on mine, and I fumbled for tactful phrases.

  As we entered the warm foyer--had it been cold outside? I hadn't felt the damp--Miss Bluestone descended the stair. She was carrying several letters and what looked like the unbound copy of a journal in one hand. She saw us and beamed at Clanross.

  "My lord, may I tender my congratulations? How proud you must be."

  I cast Clanross a bewildered look. The corners of his mouth quirked, but he said merely, "Is it out so soon? I've not seen it."

  Miss Bluestone's eyes shone. She was so moved her back hair had begun to fall down. "Jem has just brought it in the post. I'm very much obliged to you for asking them to send me a copy. Are you not pleased?"

  "What in the world?" I began.

  Clanross released my hand and went forward to assist Miss Bluestone down the last steps, for she had fumbled the journal open and clearly meant to negotiate the stairs blind, being caught up in her reading.

  "I've not seen it yet, ma'am." He was half laughing. "Don't trip. There. Very timely, indeed, but I believe you must felicitate me in another cause altogether."

  Miss Bluestone dropped the journal. "You've offered for Lady Elizabeth?"

  He retrieved the mysterious publication and handed it to her. "Yes, and what's more surprising, she's agreed to have me."

  Miss Bluestone clutched the journal to her bosom. "Oh, my dears! Oh, my word, how gratifying!"

  He smiled down at her. "Shall you kiss the groom, Miss Bluestone?"