Parfit Knight

by Riley, Stella

  Rising, he crossed the space between them to sit at her side and take her hands in his.

  ‘My dear, I think I understand. And there’s no need to talk of it if you’d rather not.’

  ‘But you want me to.’ It was not a question.

  ‘I would like to know how it happened, yes. But only if you are content to tell me.’

  Rosalind drew a long breath and, unconsciously, her fingers clung to his. ‘Very well.’

  No premonition of disaster warned Amberley of the axe that was about to fall and, if Nemesis laughed, he did not hear her. Instead, he went on lightly holding Rosalind’s hands and was merely glad that she seemed to have relaxed a little.

  ‘We were playing, Phil and I,’ she said quietly, ‘and I was chasing him into the wood. I ran up the lane and I remember Phil suddenly shouting at me to stop – only, of course, I didn’t. I thought he was just teasing. And though I could hear the carriage too, I thought it was passing on the road.’ She paused, trying to smile. ‘So it was quite my own fault, you see. And when the coach came round the bend, its driver must have been just as shocked as I was.’

  Grim fingers of fear clutched at Amberley’s heart and he was suddenly very cold. Ghostly images invaded his mind; of the crumpled leaf-green figure of a child, her face waxy-pale, her eyes closed and her long black hair tumbled in the dust. ‘It isn’t possible,’ he told himself numbly. ‘Please God – it can’t be. Not that.’

  ‘Is that all you remember?’ His throat was dry and aching.

  She nodded. ‘I saw the horses sweeping down on me – chestnuts, I think – and then … nothing. I suppose Phil came running. He was only fourteen and for a long time afterwards I think he felt responsible.’ She paused again, then went on. ‘When they found I couldn’t see, they started summoning first one doctor and then another. My uncle brought them from every place you can imagine and each one had a different theory and a new remedy. I tried them all … but nothing worked.’

  The Marquis was no longer capable of listening. If he had been pale before, he now had no more colour to lose. The air hurt his skin and his stomach coiled with revulsion; in horror and guilt … and bitter, crippling devastation.

  ~ * * * ~

  SIX

  It was a waking nightmare which wouldn’t go away. And coming hard on the heels of the discovery that he loved her, its effect was cataclysmic. He had managed – and God only knew how – to make a reasonably collected exit from the parlour so that he was able to succumb, in private, to the urgent need to be sick. And after that the night was an endless torment in which he did not even try to sleep.

  Instead, plagued by twelve-year-old memories that were enshrined in his mind like flies in amber, he lay open-eyed on his bed and stared sightlessly into the fire-lit gloom. It had happened on the day that his father, after years of ceaseless persuasion, had at last agreed to buy him a commission - and he, elated, exuberant and still unable to believe his luck, had been on fire to tell his mother. Even in those days, she had preferred the Richmond house to that in Hanover Square and so he had leapt eagerly into his chaise and shouted to Pierce to spring the horses.

  Over what happened next he tried to pass lightly but ended by dwelling on it in excruciating detail. He tried to understand how he had failed to recognise either Rosalind or the portrait of her younger self as the child he’d lifted from the dust that day … but cogent thought was lost in a chanNancyed groove of repetition.

  ‘I wasn’t driving,’ went the plea to himself.

  ‘What difference does that make?’ came the harsh reply. ‘You told Pierce to take the short cut through the lane.’

  Concussion, the doctor had said and had seemed so sure. No bones broken, no damage save a hard, glancing blow to the head. A headache, then; a few days rest and all would be well. And the uncle – what had been the fellow’s name? Furnival? Yes – George Furnival - had, like himself, been too relieved to question it.

  ‘I wasn’t driving.’

  ‘No. But you might as well have been.’

  They had not wanted him, Furnival and the doctor, so he had repeated his apologies and travelled on to Richmond, blithely unaware that he had robbed a child of her sight, her youth. And now that child had become a woman – bright, gallant, unique – and his love.

  ‘I wasn’t driving.’

  ‘Fine. Tell that to Rosalind.’

  He flinched and sat up, driving his face into the cold comfort of his fingers in an attempt to shut out fear. How did you tell the girl you were deeply and helplessly in love with that you were responsible for shrinking her world to a place of darkness and solitary monotony? And, having told her, what then? Even if she didn’t draw back in revulsion, it could scarcely be described as an auspicious overture to an offer of marriage.

  He was torn between relief and regret and he had not made that offer when first he had thought it – before that second, damnable discovery. He had held her hand and wanted to say simply, ‘I love you. Marry me.’ That he had not done so was due to other considerations; adherence to propriety made necessary by the defencelessness of her position and, more importantly, awareness of her inexperience which meant that she had no yardstick by which to judge him. Both of which, as things turned out, were mere bullets to a cannon-ball. He tried to appreciate the macabre irony of it but his sense of humour had deserted him and the sound that escaped him was not of laughter.

  This knowledge of his own culpability was the worst thing he had ever faced. That he should have so harmed anyone – especially a child – was appalling enough; that the child had been Rosalind put him in hell. But there was no going back and his problem now was whether or not he should tell her.

  Leaning back, he clasped his hands behind his head and spent the next half-hour convincing himself that there was no point. There could be no possibility now of any close relationship between them, so to tell her wouldn’t serve any useful purpose and might well cause her unnecessary pain. Better, far better, to leave it alone and then he need not put his courage to the test only to discover that, for this one thing, it was inadequate. It would be no help, on top of everything else, to find that he was a coward.

  There was only one sensible course and that was to leave before the damage spread any further. As yet she regarded him as no more than a friend – paradoxically, his only consolation in the whole, sorry mess – and the least that he could do for her now was to take steps to ensure that it stayed that way.

  ‘But if I leave, she’ll be alone – just as she was before,’ something in him protested.

  ‘And if she is?’ replied Reason coldly. ‘Be thankful it’s no worse. She managed without you before and she will again.’

  Indisputably true but no comfort.

  When Saunders came bearing his shaving water, he was already up and gazing out of the window, clad in his opulent dressing-gown. He answered the valet’s routine greeting automatically and without turning round; then he said abruptly, ‘Pack, Jim. We’re leaving.’

  ‘Leaving, my lord?’ repeated Saunders, shaken. ‘Today?’

  The Marquis opened his mouth to deliver a bald affirmative and then hesitated. Since go he must, he desperately wanted to go quickly … but there was Rosalind to be considered and such a sudden departure wouldn’t be kind. He owed it to her to stay just one more day … and had somehow to find the strength both to endure it and to appear his usual self.

  He said, ‘No. Tomorrow – as early as possible. Make what arrangements you can for Chard’s comfort and leave out my driving coat and top boots.’

  Still at a loss, Saunders said weakly, ‘You’ll drive yourself then, sir?’

  Amberley wheeled to face him. ‘Obviously. Unless you feel equal to the task?’

  If the sarcastic tone came as a shock, the look on his lordship’s face was a greater one. A white shade tinged the normally humorous mouth and the grey-green eyes were frowning bleakly. Thrown completely off balance, Saunders made the mistake of answering the question. ‘No, my
lord. But I thought you might stay a few days longer till the snow’s more or less gone.’

  The Marquis lost his last, frail hold on his temper and his voice took on a note of dangerous sweetness as he said, ‘Did you so? Then perhaps I should remind you that you are paid neither to think nor to question my orders. Especially – though it would seem to have escaped your notice – when I am waiting to dress.’

  He was dimly aware, as he turned away, that never in fifteen years had he spoken to Saunders like that – and rarely to anyone else. But though later he would be ashamed and would apologise, as yet it did not have the power to touch him for his whole focus was on avoiding discussion.

  He announced his decision to Rosalind soon after breakfast and the violet eyes filled with startled dismay. ‘So soon?’

  ‘I’m afraid so, yes.’

  ‘But the snow hasn’t quite gone, has it?’

  ‘Not entirely.’ He knew he sounded abrupt and tried to mend it. ‘It will be some days before it vanishes completely and, by then, the roads will be like quagmires. Just now, they’re bad but not impassable.’

  ‘Oh. You’ve been out?’

  ‘No. I had Lawson send out a groom early this morning.’

  She smiled faintly. ‘Like Noah.’

  Even mild attempts at humour were beyond Amberley this morning and he was momentarily at a loss. Then he said lamely, ‘Oh – the raven. Yes.’

  This uncharacteristic response brought a crease to Rosalind’s brow.

  ‘No. The raven didn’t come back.’ She tilted her head and a wry smile touched her mouth. ‘Your groom was like the dove. But I think I’d have preferred the raven.’

  His lordship’s breath leaked away and he stared at her helplessly whilst telling himself that this was no more than he should have expected. Then, as he sought desperately for a reply, reinforcements arrived in the shape of Lawson. Mistress Vernon, it seemed, had visitors.

  ‘Lady Warriston and Letty?’ echoed Rosalind blankly. ‘Good God! What on earth do you suppose they want, Lawson?’

  ‘I really couldn’t say, Mistress Rosalind.’ The butler contrived to camouflage with reproof what was, in fact, a blatant lie - whilst simultaneously casting the Marquis a glance of acute warning. ‘Shall I show the ladies in?’

  She sighed. ‘I suppose so. And you’d better ask Mrs Thorne to send up some suitable refreshments.’ Lawson bowed and withdrew and Rosalind turned back to Amberley with a swift whisper of, ‘She is the most odious woman!’ before her guests were at the door.

  At any other time, the Marquis would probably have found the next hour hugely entertaining for Lady Warriston was neither intelligent nor particularly well-bred and he had her measure inside five minutes. Wife of the local magistrate to whom he had sent word of the highwayman’s corpse, she had learned of the presence at Oakleigh of a real, live Marquis and had only been kept at home so long by the snow. Now she had come primarily to discover as much as she could for the delectation of her neighbours and also for the purpose of contriving that the real, live Marquis should meet her daughter.

  In between helping Rosalind answer her ladyship’s questions with a semblance of candour that, in fact, said very little, the Marquis toyed with the incomprehensible idiocy that allowed even a fond Mama to suppose that any man was going to look twice at Mistress Letitia while Rosalind was in the room. Letty put him in mind of an over-blown rose and would, he thought, grow up with as little elegance of mind as her mother. Then he became aware that both ladies were treating Rosalind with a brand of condescension which suggested they thought her of no account; and from there the reason was not far to seek.

  A slow, cold anger began to burn in Amberley’s breast and, from that point on, his manner became progressively haughtier and his answers to Lady Warriston’s impertinent enquiries much less amicably couched. And when she cut Rosalind out of the conversation by talking of London and bemoaning the fact that he had been in Paris during ‘dearest Letty’s season’ and so missed the pleasure of dancing with her, he resolved to teach them both a lesson.

  Directing an indifferent yet somehow mocking glance at Letty, he said, languidly, ‘I am afraid I never dance.’

  Startled out of her discretion by this blithe disregard for the truth, Rosalind said incautiously, ‘But you danced with me.’

  ‘Ah.’ He smiled suddenly. ‘With you, my dear. That is different.’ And watched with derisive amusement as Letty visibly deflated and her mother swelled with disbelief.

  Before either of them could reply, Broody decided to make himself noticed.

  ‘Wark!’ he screeched, spitting a seed at Letty. ‘Bloody pirates! Heave, you buggers! Wark!’ And began hurling seeds with gay abandon.

  Letty squealed and leapt from her seat, covering her ears and Lady Warriston’s eyes bulged with disgust. His lordship’s lip quivered and he looked instinctively at Rosalind. Her head was bent, one hand was pressed tightly over her mouth and her shoulders were shaking.

  ‘That bird,’ announced her ladyship throbbingly, ‘is vicious!’

  ‘Vicious, vicious, vicious!’ chanted Broody. He was very pleased with himself. ‘Damn the Captain – sod the mate! Wark! Clear for action?’ And added a couple of his choicest phrases.

  These proved too much for Rosalind’s self-control. She laughed out loud.

  The ladies left soon after that, bristling with affronted disapproval and, no sooner had the door closed behind them than Rosalind lifted a flushed countenance to the Marquis and said unsteadily, ‘That wretched bird – and you too! You should be ashamed of yourselves.’

  Absently rewarding Broody by flicking back such seeds as he could find, his lordship said unrepentantly, ‘I know. But they deserved it. Her ladyship has the mind of a weasel and ‘dearest Letty’ has no mind at all. Do you have to tolerate them very often?’

  She shook her head. ‘Hardly ever. They came to pry, didn’t they?’

  ‘That was certainly part of it.’

  ‘A husband for Letty and a titled gentleman at Oakleigh being the other? Yes. Lady Warriston was hoping to catch Philip, you know – and Letty certainly tried hard enough before his betrothal was announced – but he didn’t like her at all.’

  ‘You do surprise me. I wonder why?’

  ‘He s-said she was about as subtle as a springer spaniel but not nearly as good-looking,’ replied Rosalind. And dissolved again into laughter.

  *

  Absently fingering the single, burnished ringlet that lay against her breast, Rosalind sat at her dressing table and wondered what had happened to disturb his lordship’s serenity. The day had passed much like the ones before it; he had read to her, they’d tried to teach Broody a new and more polite phrase, they’d taken the air in the garden. But all the time she sensed that, for him, these things had become a refuge; that he was using them to avoid having to talk to her. And all day she had followed his lead and tried to make it easy for him.

  The prospect of his imminent departure caused a lead weight to settle in her chest and her hands dropped nervelessly into her lap. She had tried not to mind, not to ask him to stay just a little longer … but it was hard when all there was to look forward to was the old existence that no longer seemed enough. He had given her life; made her think and laugh and feel; but, as he had given it, so he would take it away with him – for those things would cease to exist when she was alone again. And surely, she thought, there was more to say than the few words that had passed between them this morning? She didn’t know what – only that it seemed so little.

  She stood up, shaking out the folds of her pale pink taffeta skirts and admonishing herself for the selfish folly that was making her forget to be grateful for what she’d had. Then the door opened and Mrs Reed swept in like a tidal wave.

  She fixed Rosalind with a gimlet stare which did not miss the aura of wistful uncertainty and said, more sharply than she meant, ‘Whatever ails his lordship to be in such a hurry – and that poor man of his only just fit to travel?’
>
  ‘Lord Amberley is bound by the state of the roads,’ replied Rosalind composedly. She had no intention of exposing her own lack of comprehension if she could help it. ‘They will get worse if he delays any longer and, since the coachman is fit to travel, there’s no reason why he should linger.’

  To herself, Mrs Reed said, ‘Is there not? And the selfish scoundrel all set to leave you worse off than you were before!’ To Rosalind, she remarked obscurely that it was no more than she should have expected since green eyes invariably meant an unsteady disposition.

  Her hand on the door-latch, Rosalind turned back and, wrinkling her brow, said, ‘Green? He told me they were grey.’

  Mrs Reed sniffed. ‘He can say aught he likes. But the plain truth is that he has only to put on a green coat and there they are – green as grass.’

  A tiny, reflective smile curled Rosalind’s mouth. ‘And is he handsome?’

  There was a scornful pause and then, ‘Handsome is as handsome does, I always say. And, to my mind, he’s proving a disappointment!’

  *

  When dinner was over they retired, as usual, to Rosalind’s parlour and sat facing each other across the hearth. The Marquis stared at her as though he would engrave every feature on his memory and a black despair filled his heart and dried up the light flow of insubstantial words on his tongue. Seconds ticked by in silence, then Rosalind said diffidently, but as one who could no longer help herself, ‘Must you really go?’

  His jaw tightened. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Is there any particular reason?’

  He hesitated, aware that she already knew something was wrong and that any further mistakes would land him in very deep waters indeed. There appeared to be only one way out and so, in a flippant tone utterly belied by the grimness of his expression, he took it.