Lord Kiniston, of course, was well aware of how furious Lady Lillian was at the announcement of his engagement.
He understood exactly that by flirting with the Frenchman she was telling him in no uncertain language that there were other men in the world besides himself.
At the same time he did not underestimate her feelings for him and he knew that sooner or later he would have to face an unpleasant scene, although he hoped to avoid it.
In order to put it off for as long as possible, he left the house as soon as he could, saying that he was wanted at the Barracks and the Duke was expecting him.
Once he had gone, the rest of the house party also disappeared, some to write letters.
Alecia was sure that Mrs. Belton was hastening to write to her friends in England, describing her journey and without doubt Lord Kiniston’s engagement to Lady Charis.
When she left the salon, Lady Lillian was seated on the sofa with the Duc de St. Brière. He was holding one of her hands in both of his and they were talking together in low voices in a very intimate manner.
She was not quite certain what she should do with herself and went to a room where she had seen a lot of books and beyond it she walked into a large conservatory that had been built at a later date onto the side of the house.
There were not many flowers to be seen, but there was a cage of small birds that she thought was very attractive.
As she stood gazing at them, she heard some strange voices below the floor and wondered what they could be.
Looking out through the glass, she saw two men coming from beneath the conservatory and she guessed they had been attending to the heating, which rose through iron grids in the floor.
It was something that she had seen in England at her uncle’s house and she knew that if the conservatory contained any exotic or what were called ‘hothouse’ plants, they needed to be kept at a high temperature, even in the summer.
The men slammed down the cover over the exit from which they had emerged, then talking together, using a strange argot that Alecia found hard to understand, they walked away.
As they did so, she heard one of the men say to the other,
“Ce qui nous manque maintenant est le cosmetique.”
She knew this meant, ‘all we need now is le cosmetique’, but she could not understand what they meant by le cosmetique in this context and she supposed that it must be some slang expression with which, of course, she was unfamiliar.
Then, as she looked once more at the birds and the flowers, which were not particularly impressive, she supposed that the Duc had not had much time since Napoleon’s defeat and his return to France to refurbish the conservatory.
She went into the salon next door, where the books were to be found, and had some difficulty in choosing from a large collection what she would really like to read.
When at last she had found two that she knew she would enjoy, she sat down in the window seat against the shutter that was folded back. The long crimson velvet curtains, which were very ornately tasselled and braided, were like a screen between her and the rest of the room.
She had read several pages and was just becoming interested in the plot when she heard the door open and two people came into the room.
Because she had no wish to be disturbed, she tucked in her legs, which she had stretched out on the cushioned seat and hoped that they would go away without seeing her.
Then she heard the Duc de St. Brière say in French to the Major Domo, who she knew was in charge of the household,
“Has everything been arranged?”
“Oui, Monsieur le Duc, everything is exactly as you requested.”
“Bon! Now I want to know his Lordship’s plans for the next few days.”
The Major Domo hesitated for a moment before he answered,
“Tonight there is to be a small dinner party. For tomorrow, I have not yet been given any orders about luncheon, but Monsieur le Duc de Wellington is coming to dinner.”
“That is what I have heard,” the Duc remarked. “It is a large party?”
“Non, monsieur, just about twenty, I think.”
“Bon!” the Duc said again. “Merci, Beauvais, for your help.”
“It is for la belle France, monsieur!”
The Duc did not reply and Alecia heard him go from the room with the Major Domo following him.
As the door closed behind them she gave a sigh of relief and returned to her reading.
*
Lord Kiniston returned at about five o’clock to the château.
Going to his private room, he had only just begun to read the pile of papers that were waiting for him on his desk, when Lady Lillian came in.
She was looking extremely alluring and he was experienced enough with women to know that she had taken a great deal of trouble over her appearance.
He rose perfunctorily as she walked towards him and then sat down again to say,
“I am very busy, Lillian, as you can see.”
“Not too busy to talk to me, Drogo!”
“Must we talk? There is very little for us to say.”
“I have a great deal to say, but I will not, as you suspect I will, berate you for your cruelty in not telling me of your intentions before you announced them in public.”
To Lord Kiniston’s surprise, she spoke quite pleasantly, but he knew by the expression in her eyes, which she could not disguise, that she was keeping a tight control on herself and was deliberately not raising her voice, but keeping it low and dispassionate.
“I am relieved about that,” Lord Kiniston answered, “and I hope, Lillian, that you will be pleasant to my future wife.”
“You know what I feel about her without my saying so,” Lady Lillian replied. “But the real question, is it not, Drogo dear, is what about us?”
“I can only thank you,” Lord Kiniston said hastily, “for the happiness you have given me and hope that you will be tactful enough to understand that you should leave here as soon as possible.”
Lady Lillian sat down on a chair in front of the desk before she replied,
“I hardly think that solution is worthy of you, Drogo! You intend to be married, very well, I suppose you have a good reason for it, although I can hardly believe that an unfledged girl who is not long out of the schoolroom will keep you amused for long. But you and I mean something to each other that cannot be obliterated by an announcement in The Gazette or, for that matter, an engagement ring on another woman’s finger.”
Lord Kiniston drew in his breath.
Then he said in a cold austere voice that those who disliked him knew so well,
“If you are suggesting what I think you are, Lillian, all I can say is that my answer is ‘no!’, most definitely ‘no!’ If I am to be a married man, then I will behave with propriety and like a gentleman.”
Lady Lillian threw back her head and laughed.
“Darling Drogo, do you really think such a puritanical existence will keep you amused for long? Have you already forgotten the fire we can engender in each other? The wild passion that made us forget everything but ourselves?”
Lord Kiniston looked down at the papers in front of him as if for inspiration before he said,
“I think, Lillian, this conversation is in extremely bad taste! I have just announced my engagement and, although I appreciate that this may have come as a shock, you know as well as I do that you have many admirers waiting for you in London and Paris and it would be impossible in the circumstances for you to remain here.”
“Why?” Lady Lillian asked. “Do you think I will tell your smug little bride-to-be the truth about us? After all she will have to leant that you are not exactly what you appear – a man, but also a very attractive, ardent and irresistible lover!”
Lady Lillian deliberately softened her voice as she said the last word, but Lord Kiniston was scowling and after a moment he said,
“This conversation, Lillian, is getting us nowhere! I would like you to leave this château
tomorrow or the next day at the very latest.”
Lady Lillian’s eyes narrowed and after a moment he thought that she was about to rage at him.
Then, clasping her hands together, she said,
“How can you be so cruel, so heartless to me, Drogo? If you will not marry me, I refuse, utterly and completely refuse, to be cut out of your life.”
“Nevertheless, I am afraid that is something that has to happen,” Lord Kiniston retorted.
“But why? Marriage is one thing, love is another, as you well know. Have you no idea how much you will miss me after I am no longer here?”
“I daresay I shall survive,” Lord Kiniston said sarcastically, “but one thing is quite obvious, Lillian, that you cannot continue to stay here as my hostess at the same time as the girl I am to marry.”
“Send her away!” Lady Lillian said. “Send her back to London. You can follow her sooner or later. In the meantime we shall be very happy, as we have been before she came.”
Lord Kiniston rose to his feet.
“I am sorry, Lillian,” he said. “I can only repeat what I have already said, that you must leave at the very latest by Thursday.”
Lady Lillian rose too and moving slowly, as if she invited him to notice her grace and the sensuous movements of her body, she came round to his side of the desk to stand beside him.
“And if I refuse to go,” she asked very softly, “what will you do then?”
“It would be regrettable and might cause a lot of gossip,” Lord Kiniston replied, “but I would take Lady Charis to Paris and find some distinguished and respectable chaperone for her and then spend as much time with her as is possible.”
“But you could come back here to me?”
He shook his head.
“If you imagine I would do that, you are mistaken. If I have to return, I will stay with the Duke, who can always find room for me in his château.”
The way he spoke was quiet and calm, yet there was an obvious steel in his words that made Lady Lillian know that she had lost the battle.
It was then, so quickly that she took him off his guard, that she flung herself at him, putting her arms around his neck and pulling his face down to hers.
“I love you! Oh, Drogo, I love you!” she cried and pressed her body closely against his so that he could feel her warmth.
But before she could succeed in kissing him, Lord Kiniston firmly removed her arms from around his neck and pushed her away from him.
“Behave yourself, Lillian!” he said. “I have told you, I hope politely, that I am grateful for the happiness you have given me. Don’t spoil it by making a quite unnecessary and what would be, for both of us, an unpleasant scene.”
For a moment Lady Lillian just glared at him and it struck him that she was like a wild animal deprived of its prey.
Then without another word she turned and walked from the room, slamming the door noisily behind her.
For a moment Lord Kiniston stood where she had left him and then, as he sat down again at the desk, he felt that he had been through a traumatic experience and yet, surprisingly, the roof had not fallen in on him.
For the moment he had escaped the tears and abuse that so often had terminated his love affairs.
‘Dammit all,’ he told himself. ‘It is time I was properly married and preserved from enduring this sort of thing again!’
At the same time he could not help being apprehensive that Lillian might not obey him and would refuse to leave the château no matter what he said to her about it.
*
Lady Lillian had in fact left him with a feeling of anger that contorted her face and made her feel as if a thousand knives were churning their way into her breast.
She had been so completely confident that Lord Kiniston would finally succumb to her blandishments and marry her, as she wished him to do, that she could hardly believe he had become engaged to another woman and thrown her out of his life.
‘I will kill him!’ she told herself as she walked up the stairs.
Then, just before she reached her own bedroom, she saw Alecia coming out of hers.
Alecia had gone upstairs to tidy herself before tea. She knew that it was something that was not served in a French household, but which the English ladies staying with Lord Kiniston would expect.
As Lady Lillian saw Alecia, her anger flared and, moving quickly towards her, she said,
“I wish to speak to you, Lady Charis!”
“Yes, of course,” Alecia replied.
She thought that Lady Lillian would expect her to go with her, but the elder woman pushed past her into her bedroom.
Then, as Alecia followed her, she said,
“I suppose you are aware that in becoming engaged to Drogo Kiniston you are stealing him from me and that he is behaving in an outrageous manner? I believed he would marry me!”
Alecia’s eyes widened, but she was frightened by the way that Lady Lillian was speaking to her and also by the hatred and fury that she could see in her eyes.
“I-I am sorry,” she said after a moment, “if you are – upset.”
“Upset! What do you expect?” Lady Lillian demanded. “His Lordship has been my lover since the beginning of the year! Does that shock and surprise you? Yes? Well, listen to the truth for once, instead of living in some juvenile ‘Cloud Cuckoo Land’. He loves me, he is mine and you have no right to take him from me!”
Her voice, as she said the last word, sounded like a snarl and Alecia, looking at her, wondered how Charis would cope with such a situation and what she should say.
She was aware that if she was in love with Lord Kiniston and really wanted to marry him, it would have been a terrible blow to have a woman like Lady Lillian saying such things to her and would in fact have made her very unhappy.
First of all she wanted to tell Lady Lillian that as far as she was concerned, she could marry Lord Kiniston and it would not disturb her in the slightest.
At the same time she knew that Lady Lillian was a bad woman and both her mother and her father would have been extremely shocked at her behaviour.
Although Lady Lillian was the daughter of a Duke, she was certainly not behaving as a lady should.
“Well, what are you going to do about it?” Lady Lillian asked.
“What do you expect me to do?”
“It is quite obvious, unless you are half-witted, that you should refuse to marry him and tell him to find somebody of his own age who understands what a man like him wants in a woman, which is certainly not a soppy milk-and-water unfledged girl!”
She seemed to spit the last words and Alecia said after a moment,
“I-I am sorry, Lady Lillian. Of course I will speak to Lord Kiniston and – ask him if he prefers to marry you, in which case – I will naturally set him free.”
She felt as she spoke that she had been rather clever, and she knew that her reply surprised Lady Lillian.
As if she found Alecia’s behaviour a little bewildering, Lady Lillian screeched at her,
“Why do you not go back to where you have come from? Why have you come here upsetting everything and persuading Drogo Kiniston to marry you when he has often sworn that he would never marry? What hold have you over him? Can it be possible you are blackmailing him?”
The words seemed to spill out of Lady Lillian’s crimson lips and almost as if she threatened her with physical violence, Alecia took a step back.
“I am sorry, Lady Lillian,” she said again, “but I do not think – I can help you. You must talk to Lord Kiniston and, of course, I can say only that I will do – anything he asks me to do.”
As she finished speaking she turned, opened her bedroom door and went into the passage.
She thought she heard Lady Lillian murmur something, but she was not certain what it was.
All she wanted was to escape – to get away from a woman who she knew was immoral, if not evil, and have nothing more to do with her.
Because she was frightened, even though sh
e had managed to keep her head and behave calmly, she ran down the stairs very quickly.
As she reached the hall, she ran across it, but before she could reach the door into the salon she suddenly bumped into Lord Kiniston.
He put out his hands to steady her and then, as she looked up at him, he saw the expression in her eyes and knew that something had upset her.
“What is the matter?” he asked. “What has occurred?”
Alecia was so out of breath that she could not answer him for a moment and Lord Kiniston took her hand in his and drew her back down the passage to the room he had just left.
She did not protest. She was only struggling to get over her feelings of disgust at Lady Lillian’s behaviour and also, although it seemed stupid, she was afraid.
Still holding her hand, Lord Kiniston drew her to the sofa and, as she sat down on it, he lowered himself beside her.
“Now, what has happened to make you look like that?” he asked gently. “Can it be that Lady Lillian has upset you?”
Because it was impossible for her to speak, Alecia merely nodded her head.
“I am sorry about that,” he said. “She was very angry with me when she left me here a few minutes ago and I suppose that she had to vent her anger on somebody and you were the first person she met.”
“She – she wants you to – marry her,” Alecia managed to say in a small voice.
“I know that,” Lord Kiniston said, “but I have no intention of marrying Lady Lillian, or anyone else, except yourself!”
Having released her hand, Alecia clasped her fingers together and said still in a small frightened voice,
“She said how much more suitable – she would be for – you than I could be and – I am sure she is right.”
It flashed through Alecia’s mind that, while she had been frightened by Lady Lillian’s violence and the things she had said, what was actually true was that she would make Lord Kiniston a far more suitable wife than somebody like Charis would.
Her cousin was, like herself, for the idealist love that had made her mother run away with her father.
Love Casts Out Fear Page 9