by Mira Stables
The military review brought her a new and distinctly intimidating acquaintance. They were about to climb into the carriage for their return when an elderly gentleman in a very neat curricle pulled up his horses and attracted Lady Preston’s attention. She recognised him at once. But it scarcely needed her hissed, “Your grandfather,” to apprise Harriet of the gentleman’s identity. Somehow she had expected him to look just as he did – neat, spare and ill-tempered.
His voice matched his looks. It bit like a saw.
“Lady Preston, ma’am?”
Even that was an assertion rather than a question. Her ladyship bowed politely. Harriet was pleased to note that she was not in the least discommoded by the abrupt address.
“Sir?” she responded.
He wasted no time on courtesies. “You may permit me two minutes conversation with this young woman, if you will be so good,” he said stiffly.
Lady Preston smiled sweetly at Harriet. “Are you willing to let bygones be bygones and to acknowledge your grandfather?” she said gently, and succeeded only in discomposing Harriet. The colonel was quite unmoved. Harriet’s colour rose, and since she could think of nothing polite to say she contented herself with the smallest of curtsies.
“I am grown weary of rebuffing the enquiries of the curious,” said Colonel Pendeniston with an air of chill indifference. “Insolent persons who scarcely know me appear to feel it incumbent upon them to enquire whether the Miss Pendeniston who is making some stir in fashionable circles is indeed my granddaughter. It will be convenient to have the facts established beyond conjecture. I have decided that you had better spend a week or two at Pendeniston Place during August. Bring your maid. She can act as chaperone. I will instruct my housekeeper to have rooms prepared for you.”
He inclined his head, said, “Servant, ma’am,” to Lady Preston, and turned away as though there was no more to be said.
Chapter Twelve
There was, of course, a great deal more to be said. The circumstances of her upbringing had moulded Harriet into a reasonably docile creature, and when Mrs Pauncefoot and Lady Preston had both shown her such kindness it went sorely against the grain to run counter to their advice. But did they really expect her to submit meekly to her grandfather’s dictum and go and stay in his house? From all she had heard of it – and since it lay only three or four miles from Furzedown she had heard a good deal – she had as soon go to prison. She told them bluntly that she felt herself under no kind of obligation to her grandfather. Even the money that had paid for her schooling had not really been of his providing but had come from his wife’s estate. Perhaps if he had been frail in health or alone and friendless she might have felt more kindly disposed towards him. As it was she could see no reason why she should accept his invitation. It would be more accurate to say why she should bow to his command, for his instructions had been given so coldly and impersonally that no one could imagine that he had any real desire for her presence. He himself had said that it was purely a matter of convenience. He wished to put himself right in the eyes of the world.
Her two advisers were obliged to concede all this, but were far more conscious than was Harriet herself of the advantages that could accrue to a girl whom the colonel was prepared to acknowledge as his granddaughter. He was not a likeable man, but great wealth can do much to make a man acceptable to his fellows. If the colonel could be persuaded to provide a marriage portion for Harriet, together with the protection of his name and a settled home of her own, Lady Preston and Mrs Pauncefoot could forgive him a good deal. They tried to persuade Harriet that his cold speech and autocratic ways stemmed from long years spent in India with far too many servants obedient to his lightest whim.
Harriet stood firm. She would be grateful for the help of her friends in seeking a new post, but she would not go to Pendeniston Place. The last weeks of the Season were upon them, nothing had been arranged about her future, and to make matters worse she had received two offers of marriage and had declined them both. Even kind Lady Preston scolded, and said she was an ungrateful improvident chit, and then wept, which was worse. Harriet soothed and petted her, admitted that it was very bad, and agreed that either Mr Repton or Mr Wilbraham would have made her a kind, comfortable sort of husband. It was just that she didn’t want to be married.
That, alas, was untrue. She did very much wish to be married, but the man on whom her heart was set was far above her, and if she could not have him she would rather go single all her days. Once or twice, when the distractions of her fashionable existence failed her, she had turned wistfully to the memory of the dance and the supper that they had shared on the night of her party, and had wondered how she could have been so completely mistaken in her reading of the situation. She had been so sure that he liked her; that he thought her pretty. So sure that he would seek her out again, and soon. He had not done so. His thanks for hospitality received had been written in a polite note which Lady Preston had handed over to her to read. He had not even called when he came up to Town to collect his new phaeton. True, he had only stayed a night or two. She had heard of the visit quite casually through Dorothea. She supposed that one should not expect dreams to come true in real life. He had been kind and generous and had helped her to a more comfortable way of living. No doubt he was thankful enough to be free of any further responsibility for her. To imagine, even tentatively, that he might like her well enough to desire to make her his wife, had been the height of folly. After all, at several of the parties that she had attended, she had seen the woman whom he had wished to marry, Viscountess Erridge. She had not cared for her a great deal, thinking her languid manner affected and suspecting that she had been spoiled by an over-indulgent husband, but she was very lovely, even if something of her beauty derived from the attentions of a skilled lady’s maid, and she was unmistakably an aristocrat, blue blood in every vein of her slender, fine-boned body. Poor Harriet, only too conscious of her own humbler birth, had thought that she was like the princess in a fairy-tale. She might not be very much use in an everyday existence, nor as a comrade in arms in time of trouble, but she was just the kind of dream creature that a gallant knight expected as the reward for his endeavours. Harriet was just too young and too serious to feel sorry for the knight when he woke up to reality.
Matters moved to a crisis when Lady Preston received word from her sister-in-law, also a widow, residing in Bath, that she was in poor health and very low spirits. The poor health was the aftermath of a severe attack of the jaundice. The sufferer was mending but was still weak and sickly. The poor spirits were caused by the behaviour of her daughter who, rejecting all her Mama’s efforts to get her suitably riveted, was determined to pursue a career in supervising the education of young ladies, following in the footsteps of the distinguished Mrs Trimmer. The unfortunate parent could not imagine how she had come to produce such an unnatural child, and felt that a visit from her sister-in-law, so sensible and so cheerful, might help to bring her misguided child to her senses and would certainly help to elevate her own spirits. Lady Preston was naturally anxious to respond to this pathetic appeal. After all the excitements of the Season, a month spent in the more leisurely atmosphere of Bath would be very much to her taste. But what was she to do with Harriet?
She was too kind to point out to the girl that she had become something of an embarrassment but she was quite unable to restrain herself from discussing her sister-in-law’s predicament. Since the Pauncefoot family, with the exception of Papa, was going to Worthing for the month of August, it was plain to a sensitive girl that there was only one place for her and that was her grandfather’s home. It made no difference that both her friends suggested that she should accompany them, to Bath or to Worthing respectively. Her presence could add nothing to their comfort and might, indeed, stretch accommodation already limited to the point of discomfort. With a sick heart – for it hurt to be superfluous – and a composed demeanour, Harriet announced that she had decided after all to go to Pendeniston Place.
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br /> She was overwhelmed with approval and offers of support. Not only was she following the course of conduct that her friends had sincerely advocated for her own good; it also chanced to be the one that best suited their present convenience. Mrs Pauncefoot offered the use of her light chaise to convey her to her destination. Lady Preston volunteered the services of her invaluable Benworthy as dresser and chaperone during the all-important visit, declaring that she could perfectly well dispense with the good creature during her visit to Bath. Once assured that Benworthy was very willing to fall in with this suggestion, regarding it rather as a challenge, Harriet was only too thankful to accept. She had a suspicion that familiar friendly faces would be at a premium in Pendeniston Place.
The suspicion proved to be well founded. The atmosphere of rigid propriety began at the gates, which were closed and locked. Quite an imposing gateway, with a solidly built stone lodge enclosing it on either side and impressive armorial bearings carved above the central arch. So far as Harriet was aware the Pendenistons were not entitled to bear arms. Presumably this was her Cousin Vernon’s badge. Studying it – she was afforded ample opportunity of doing so by the slow and ponderous folding back of the heavy gates – she could see that the carving was of fairly recent date.
Despite this early intimation of rigidity, the Place itself gave a pleasant impression. It was not over-large, soundly built during the Jacobean age, and intended as a comfortable family home. Unfortunately, its present owner’s idiosyncrasies had been so severely impressed upon his servants that it was conducted with a formality more suited to a palace, and the pleasant homely air was lost. No one smiled. Indeed the servants rarely raised their eyes beyond a point situated some few inches in front of Harriet’s breast, to which they addressed all necessary information. She was luxuriously accommodated in a suite of rooms that overlooked the rose garden, its furnishings and hangings of the first stare and an atmosphere that dared her to leave a thing out of place. She found herself tiptoeing about the elegant parlour, starting nervously at the tiny sounds that drifted in from the garden. Nothing more alarming than two gardeners at work, she saw with relief, and wondered what she had expected. She scolded herself for growing fanciful but the sense of discomfort persisted. The house and its inmates appeared to be waiting in taut expectation for some coming event.
Her grandfather had greeted her with more civility than she had expected from her first impression of him. He actually expressed the wish that she might enjoy her stay and regretted that there were no other young people staying in the house with whom she might pass her time. This state of affairs would be remedied within a few days, when her cousin was expected. Meanwhile, he trusted that she would be able to amuse herself in strolling about the grounds or with such needlework or sketching as she favoured. One of the grooms had been appointed to attend her if she wished to ride and a carriage would be at her disposal if she preferred to drive. She would not, of course, set foot out of doors without the attendance of maid or manservant.
Harriet knew that such restrictions were quite commonplace in the upper echelons of society. She might have guessed that her grandfather, with his obsession with all matters of rank and pedigree, would be a high stickler for rigid formality, and while she was a guest under his roof she could hardly ignore his wishes, but she had never been so bored in her life. Once or twice she ordered the carriage, but there was nowhere in particular to go, and she knew none of the neighbours, and to be turning out a carriage and pair, a coachman, a footman and her maid in order to drive one unimportant girl in aimless fashion about the dusty lanes struck her as impossibly pompous, while the business of locking and unlocking the gates behind her each time the carriage passed through them began to get on her nerves. Lapped in luxury as she was, needing only to ask to have her least wish gratified, she felt as though she was imprisoned. She could not help comparing the Place with beloved Furzedown, where gates stood open all day long unless some farmer was moving stock along the lane and the animals had to be dissuaded from browsing over the flower beds. Wistfully she wished that she could have had herself driven over there – see dear Mrs Bedford and her precious Mandy. But such a visit must inevitably present the possibility of a meeting with Simon, and after the hopes that had sprung up in her heart at their last meeting, only to perish so miserably, that she could not endure.
The air of expectation that she had sensed, even in the decorous elderly servants, was intensified on the day that her Cousin Vernon was expected. Harriet herself was aware of a certain degree of anticipation. After the deadly monotony of the past few days, even a fresh face would be stimulating. Moreover her cousin was young. Surely he would not be so eaten up with pride of race as was her grandfather. He would be someone to talk to, to ride with, or play cards. He might even prove to be a sympathetic companion. After all, a cousin was the nearest thing to a brother. She went down to dinner with some hopes of pleasant diversion, having heard the sounds of arrival while she was changing her dress. Even Benworthy suggested dressing her hair in one of its more elegant Town styles. “Though if I may drop a word in season, Miss, you’ll be on your guard with the young man. Very wild, I’ve heard tell. Not that anyone here says a word against him. To be sure they don’t say many words about anything. Never known such a close-mouthed lot. But if you’ll forgive me, Miss, being as how milady said I was to keep a special eye on you, you not having a mother to warn you of possible danger, it’s a funny thing that there’s not a young maidservant in the house. Footmen, and lads in stable and kitchen. No girls. It could just be that the young man’s a bit of a rake, and the colonel’s taken precautions accordingly. I hope I’m not exceeding my duty in speaking so plain, but I couldn’t reconcile it with my conscience to keep mum.”
Harriet reassured her anxious attendant and promised to be very circumspect, though it seemed unlikely that even the most dissolute rake would attempt to seduce her under her grandfather’s roof. In fact her first impression of her cousin was quite pleasant. He was, as she had been told, extremely good-looking, his colouring dark, his features classically perfect. Tall and rather slender in build he was dressed in the height of fashion. Indeed a more experienced woman might have thought him a trifle over-dressed for a quiet family dinner in his own home. Certainly Mr Warhurst had never dressed so fine. Cousin Vernon’s voluptuously embroidered waistcoat was magnificent to behold, even if Harriet vaguely felt that it would have been more appropriate on the stage. Mrs Jordan had worn one very similar in the part of Sir Harry Wildair.
In contrast to his pleasant appearance, Cousin Vernon’s manner was cool. He was perfectly polite, said all that was proper on first meeting so close a connection, and, when prompted by his grandfather, took his share in an exchange of civil small talk throughout dinner. Yes, indeed, there were some very pretty bursts of country quite close at hand, and it would be his pleasure to show them to his cousin. He was pleased to hear that she preferred riding to driving, since the preference matched his own. At this point Colonel Pendeniston threw in an unexpected caveat.
“Very well so,” he grunted, “but none of your neck or nothing tricks when you’re riding with your cousin. I don’t want either of you brought home on a hurdle.”
Harriet was surprised. She had not suspected him of such human warmth.
Cousin Vernon smiled, a trifle frostily she thought. “Nothing of the sort, Sir,” he assured. “I shall take the utmost care of my cousin, I promise you.”
The colonel did not seem quite satisfied. “See that you do,” he said gruffly, and intimated to Harriet that he and his heir would join her in the drawing-room after they had drunk their brandy. Harriet, who had never before found herself in the rôle of the hostess who gives the signal for the withdrawal of the ladies, was positively grateful for the hint, finding herself in real charity with her grandfather for the first time.
Only her cousin came to join her in the drawing-room, their grandfather, he said, having business to attend to that would not keep. His mood was
now remote, almost surly. Had he been twenty years younger she would have suspected that he had been spanked and told to mend his manners. As it was they exchanged platitudinous views on the London Season and discussed the possible direction in which they might ride next day until the tea-tray was brought in. No point in waiting for Grandpapa, announced Cousin Vernon. He was engaged in dealing with some poaching threat. So Harriet poured the tea for the two of them and was thankful when it was drunk. Far from proving the congenial companion and possible ally that she had hoped, her cousin showed signs of adding to the tensions that already burdened the atmosphere of the Place. It was with a sense of relief that she bade him goodnight.
Chapter Thirteen
They rode together next morning. It did not take Harriet long to decide that a solemn progress attended at a discreet distance by a stolid groom was much to be preferred to riding with her cousin. Not that she actually did ride with him. He left it to the groom to put her up, did not wait to see her comfortably settled, and was urging his own mount to a gallop before they were well clear of the stable yard. Since the mare that her grandfather considered suitable for a lady was a placid creature of sluggish habits, she was left far behind. Not that she had any ambition to emulate her cousin. When she caught an occasional glimpse of him he was either spurring his unfortunate horse to greater efforts or putting it at obstacles that must, she felt, procure a crashing fall. When she finally came up with him as she turned stablewards once more, she was not surprised to see that the poor brute was going dead lame, nor that her cousin was still in the saddle. He was not the kind of man to seek to ease the animal’s suffering.