She was perfectly willing to tease her brother for his perceived laziness and greed, taunt her sister on her advanced age and manipulate her mother to give her whatever she wanted, but, in the main, she viewed the world in a positive manner. It was one of the advantages of her condition that she could neither look ahead with dread nor back with regret.
“Do you truly think everything may be covered with snow in the morning?” she asked brightly. “I wonder if they might have a sledge here which we could borrow? That would be such fun!”
“I would not advise setting off on a sledge from up here,” Miss Godmanton answered repressively.
“Why not? We were driving up a steep hill just before we stopped so there should be somewhere to go.”
“I think these hills are a little too steep for sledging,” Cecilia explained.
“How can they be too steep?”
“You would get up such a speed that you would be unable to stop,” the Earl explained, “and might find yourself at the bottom of a ravine.”
“Or you might drive into a tree and break your crown,” her brother suggested.
“Like Jack and Jill?”
“Indeed, although I don’t think vinegar and brown paper would answer.”
Phyllis looked disappointed and began to frown, a sign that she was engaging her brain in looking for a way round this setback, and Mrs Moss, aware that her youngest had already demonstrated the infantile nature of her mind, intervened in a vain attempt to prevent the Earl’s party from gauging the full extent of her daughter’s ignorance.
“We have so little snow in England that I don’t believe Phyllis has much experience of it beyond story books. I do hope you’re right, my lord, that it will not hold us up. We are in something of a hurry to reach Geneva and really cannot contemplate spending a great deal more time on the road.”
“It is not agreeable travelling at this time of year, is it?” Helen asked politely.
“No, I would never have chosen to do so if I had had any choice about the matter,” Mrs Moss agreed, settling more comfortably into her chair and directing a warm look at the young woman opposite.
“What is it that takes you to Geneva in such a rush?” Miss Godmanton asked, no doubt seeking to discountenance the large lady in the moss green.
Mrs Moss, put on the spot by such a very direct question, bridled and looked helplessly at her eldest child, who came reliably to the rescue.
“We have a relative there who has been taken ill,” she said. “We have been staying in Piedmont for some little time but, when we received the letter from Cousin Jane, nothing would do for Mama but to set off at once to offer succour.”
“I hope, when we have spent three months marooned up here, you will find her fully restored to health,” Miss Godmanton said.
Cecilia, who had made up the relative on the spot, looked thoughtful for a moment, as though paying some sort of respect to the ailing aunt, before turning the question back to the interlocutor with a spuriously innocent air.
“Are you too making for Geneva?” she asked.
“Yes, yes, we are. My – well, in point of fact, he is not in any way related to me – his lordship is attached to the Embassy there. He spent many years in Vienna, you know, and has only recently moved to Geneva.”
“Indeed? How do you find it compares to Vienna?” Cecilia asked, turning her turquoise gaze on to the Earl in the hope of diverting attention from the imaginary aunt.
“It is a not dissimilar climate although its position, on the edge of a ravishingly beautiful lake, is, I think, better. Politically, it is of course much more stable, even tranquil. It is by way of being a promotion for me and has so far proved to be far less taxing in a number of ways. I am enjoying living there.”
“I suppose you have been to Chillon?” she asked.
“Oh, yes, everybody goes there now. Indeed, if there is anything for a diplomat to do in Switzerland, it frequently involves tourists falling into trouble as they attempt to follow in Byron’s footsteps. Is that where you are going?”
“Not precisely,” she admitted, wishing she had said less for they had no plans to go anywhere in particular and certainly not to famous tourist sites. Finding enough to eat and a place to lay their heads where they would be safe and warm was as far as the Moss family looked in that autumn of 1819.
“But if you are going to Geneva you must undoubtedly visit Chillon,” the Earl said. “I shall be escorting my cousin and Miss Godmanton round the castle and would be delighted if you were to accompany us.”
Cecilia, feeling like a fly trapped in a pool of sugar, blushed uncomfortably and murmured something about what a pleasure it would be if Aunt Jane could spare them.
“Of course she can spare us for a day,” Mrs Moss said at once, not wanting to let an opportunity pass to further their acquaintance with a man who she had decided would be the perfect protector for her youngest daughter – particularly in view of the fact that Aunt Jane was entirely imaginary. “We would very much enjoy that, my lord.”
“Will you be staying with your aunt?” Miss Godmanton asked, looking down her nose at Cecilia in a way that made her suspect the companion – or governess or whatever she was – was by no means fooled.
“No, I don’t think she is well enough to have so many people descend upon her,” Cecilia said at once. “We will be looking for lodgings nearby.”
“Does she live in Geneva itself?” Helen asked, picking up on Cecilia’s discomfort and unable to resist the temptation to exacerbate it.
“I believe so. We have not of course visited her before.”
“If you give me her direction, I can help you to find it and perhaps suggest suitable lodgings nearby,” the Earl offered kindly.
“I do not know it offhand,” Cecilia protested. “But I am certain I have her last letter upstairs amongst my effects.”
“I daresay we can find it ourselves,” Endymion put in, coming to his sister’s rescue when he saw her floundering beneath this barrage of suggestions. “I believe she gave us detailed instructions on how to find her.”
“It is very kind of you to come all this way to visit her when she is unwell,” Helen said, unwilling to abandon a subject which began to look as though it would be infinitely more interesting than a discussion of the weather. “I presume she is a relative of whom you are fond?”
“Of course,” Endymion agreed at once, resting his eyes on the young woman’s face for so long that she flushed. “We are,” he added, “a fond family.”
“And footloose,” Miss Godmanton muttered, no doubt thinking that the arrival of the servant with a tray of crockery and cutlery would serve to make the waspish remark appear to have been uttered sotto voce, when in fact she had fully intended it to be heard.
Mrs Moss, whose sterling virtue had always been an easy friendliness which, while it rarely failed to infuriate starched women of the Miss Godmanton variety, took exception to this remark which she, rightly, saw as criticism.
“Travelling halfway across Europe to visit a sick relative is not, to my mind, a sign of being ‘footloose’,” she snapped, apparently forgetting that they had not, in point of fact, done any such thing.
Cecilia flushed, looked helplessly at her brother but was in the end saved by her sister, who said, “What is footloose? It sounds silly!”
“Indeed!” Endymion began to laugh while at the same time waving first one foot and then the other in such a way as to make it look as though they were blowing in the wind. “It only means we are not hidebound, as so many people are,” he explained.
This time it was Helen who laughed immoderately, delighted to see the tables turned on her preceptress.
Phyllis frowned for she was uncertain not only of the meaning of ‘hidebound’ but also of why Miss Lenham should find it so amusing.
“Do not trouble your head over it,” Cecilia said, seeing her confusion. “We are merely exercising our wit at other people’s expense.”
“I don’t think tha
t’s very kind,” Phyllis said with another frown.
“No, it is not – and we will cease at once. Tell me something of your travels so far, Miss Lenham,” she invited, arranging her features to represent interest.
“Oh, we have trailed all over France and Piedmont. We went as far as Rome but Miss Godmanton took exception to the gentlemen so we turned round before we had gone as far as Naples. My cousin met us in Venice and has been escorting us ever since. Have you visited Venice? It is a most remarkable place.”
“No, we did not go so far east.”
“We were summoned by Aunt Jane before we had got there,” Endymion put in. “We will have to go back that way. Was it in Rome that Miss Godmanton decided to turn round?”
“Yes. I thought it a wonderful city and was fascinated by so many of the sights – and the art. Miss Godmanton was not keen on some of that,” she added with a teasing sideways glance at her chaperone.
“I am sorry you find my company so irksome,” the older lady muttered but she did not sound apologetic.
“I do not think you should refine upon Helen’s criticisms,” the Earl said. “The young always like to complain about older people but I believe that is precisely our purpose – to disagree with them.”
“I own I don’t much like disagreeing with my family,” Mrs Moss said. “I want them to be happy and I prefer harmony to argument.”
“A laudable aim,” his lordship responded, smiling warmly at her. “And clearly you have been successful in encouraging them to express themselves in a forthright manner. It looks as though our dinner will arrive at any minute so shall we move to the table in anticipation?”
The party obediently rose and allowed themselves to be seated in the places to which the Earl directed them. He put Mrs Moss on his right and Cecilia on his left, which left Endymion to sit at the other end of the table with Helen on his right and Miss Godmanton on his left. Phyllis sat between Cecilia and Helen.
The dinner proved to be adequate so far as the food was concerned but memorable for the tendency, at least at first, for the ill-assorted guests to curdle. This was mostly caused by Miss Godmanton, whose sour face and disparaging remarks concerning the dinner cast a blight upon the whole table.
Helen, who generally contributed a heavy dose of acid to any situation, was so affected by sitting next to Endymion that she became almost saccharine and was hardly able to construct a coherent sentence in answer to his attempts at conversation.
It was not until he turned to speak to the chaperone, seated on his other side, that Helen, released from the nervous tension induced by finding herself at such close quarters with a man who made her heart race, addressed Phyllis, more in the line of duty than because she had any desire to learn more about the girl.
“Do you enjoy travelling?” she asked for want of anything else to discuss with a female whom she had already dismissed as vacuous.
“Not precisely, but we have seen some interesting things,” the girl replied carefully.
“Tell me about them,” Helen invited.
“I own I did not much care for the Shroud – I thought it positively ghoulish!”
“Indeed, although I own I found it quite fascinating. Do you think it was truly the cloth that was used to wrap Jesus after he died?”
“I don’t know; Mama seemed convinced although Dym, my brother, thought it was all a hum.”
“I liked the chocolate though,” Phyllis said with a rather secretive smile.
“Did you? Did you eat a great deal?”
“Yes, far too much, until Mama told me I would ruin my figure – and my teeth – if I went on that way.”
Chapter 7
Miss Godmanton was, for the first time in her life, basking in the dazzle of a man’s attention.
Whether Endymion viewed the conquest of the chaperone as a useful step on the road to one of his sisters becoming the Countess of Waldron or whether he had his own, selfish, reasons for wishing to have her on his side, he exerted himself to no small extent.
Most women, he had discovered, were almost alarmingly easy to secure: he had nothing much to do but smile at them from time to time – not too often - and appear fascinated by whatever they had to say, whether it was interesting or not. He barely had to bother to reply – a long, thoughtful stare from a pair of turquoise eyes generally achieved all he might desire.
He suspected that Miss Godmanton would prove something of a hard nut to crack: she was prejudiced against him, most probably on account of her visceral dislike and distrust of his womenfolk, and did not, in any event, give the impression of being the sort of woman who valued male admiration – if indeed she had ever been subject to it. Nevertheless, he was prepared to try, considering that even outright failure might in the end prove it to have been a worthwhile exercise.
He, like Helen when faced with having to find something to say to Phyllis, fell back on their travels. He supposed she was an experienced traveller and had seen the wonderful art in Europe, particularly that to be found in Tuscany.
“Yes,” she acknowledged, “although, to my mind, there is almost too much for one to be able to appreciate it.”
“An embarras de richesse?”
“Indeed. We stayed there for some considerable time and went again and again to the Uffizi, where I found myself wishing that I could take just one picture home so that I could spend a proper length of time looking at it without having to dodge around other people - or listen to their aperçus.”
Endymion, arranging his features into a sympathetic expression, hazarded, “But would you be able to choose one from amongst so many? I do not believe I could.”
“I would want to take several in succession – each one for a number of months. I have never been to Europe before and own to having felt almost stunned when we reached Florence.”
She did indeed look quite fired up, somewhat to Endymion’s surprise. He had thought that embarking on a discussion of Italian masterpieces would lead to the sort of risqué innuendo which he had vaguely intended as an introduction to the sort of flirtation which he suspected she had had little opportunity to experience when young, but which she might, now that she believed herself safe from an actual approach, enjoy.
He knew that his own looks generally prompted comparisons – in his favour – between his appearance and that of men depicted in a variety of well-known works of art. He had not expected her to display so much enthusiasm and found himself genuinely interested in what she had to say.
“Did you manage to look at any of them by yourself?” he asked. “I slipped away from my family from time to time to spend time on my own – as it were - for of course there were always a great many other people milling about all the time. I had begun to find the burden of searching for something positive to say about every artefact a trifle onerous. And then,” he added with a conscious look, “part of my job as the only male in my family is to keep an eye on my mother and sisters. It is difficult to do that whilst at the same time looking at pictures.”
She smiled – a rare occurrence in itself although he did not know that - because he had lit upon an experience they had in common. Perhaps for the first time in her life, somebody had understood something of the loneliness and frustration of her position.
“Indeed,” she acknowledged with feeling. “I was only there to keep an eye on my charge. We had not at that point joined his lordship.”
“No; I understand you met in Venice. There are many fine pictures there too. Did he accompany you round any of the galleries?”
“Oh no; I am sure he has seen them an infinite number of times. As soon as he joined us, we set off on this journey towards Switzerland. I don’t think people who are not on a sightseeing tour are much inclined to waste their time in galleries. He had been visiting an old acquaintance.”
“I daresay he has a good many fine pictures of his own.”
“Doubtless, but I have never been to his house.”
“Oh, I did not realise that; I had thought
you were connected.”
“We are, but very distantly. In any event, he has lived in Europe for many years now.”
“Who looks after his estate? I take it he has considerable property.”
“I believe so. He was orphaned at an early age and brought up by his uncle and aunt, whose daughter Miss Lenham is, but they, or rather his uncle, Lord Charles, has a property of his own. In truth, I am not sure whether Waldron has ever lived in his own house.”
“I see; perhaps it is in a ruinous condition and he cannot bear to deal with it.”
“I have no idea. He does not speak of his own affairs – at least he has not done so in my hearing. Are you wondering whether he is obliged – for financial reasons – to be in employment?”
“Not particularly, for surely that would be quite peculiar, especially if his paternal uncle owns a property of his own. Surely the entail would have made sure Waldron inherited the bulk of the estate along with the title?”
“I am afraid I am unable to enlighten you, but I do not think he is scratching around for a living – if so, it seems likely that he makes a good one.”
“I assume it is the family’s expectation that he will settle down with Miss Lenham in due course,” Endymion murmured. He did not phrase his remark as a question, but Miss Godmanton answered it.
“That is the whole point and purpose of this tour.”
When she had admitted this, seen the young man’s nod and been party to the conspiratorial smile he shared with her, she blushed and added, “Of course I do not know this for certain; it is merely an assumption on my part.”
“Of course; that is understood.”
While Endymion was investigating the situation between the Earl and his companions, his cousin was speaking to Phyllis – and, in her turn, endeavouring to clarify the Moss position.
Phyllis was so perfectly open in what she said, and so disinclined to prevarication, that it did not take Helen long to be convinced that, although she had no doubt the Mosses had a plan for their future, Phyllis was unaware of it. She had thought, when she began to interrogate the girl, that such a simple creature would soon give her family’s game away, but, lacking guile herself, failed to realise that the rest of the family might be more artful – and keep the youngest in a state of ignorance of any stratagems they had.
Cecilia Or Flight From A Shadow Page 6