by Amanda Scott
Her son did not respond to this gambit, so she looked at him closely, then directed her gaze at Sarah and smiled a little smile. It disappeared almost immediately, however, and she turned to Penny, who was quietly working a bit of elegant petit point.
“Pray forgive our manners, Miss Penistone,” she said cordially. “It must be difficult to pretend that one’s mind is otherwhere during a family quarrel.”
“But my mind was not otherwhere, your ladyship,” replied Penny in her usual placid way, as she set another stitch. “It would be quite impossible to ignore speech in a room as small as this one is, you know. But I promise you I shan’t regard it.”
“Indeed?” Simple respect dawned in her ladyship’s eyes, and Sarah, finding it impossible to repress a chuckle, was grateful that Dasher chose that particular moment to announce dinner in tones stentorian enough to compete with the most experienced London butler.
XII
AFTER SHE HAD SAID good night to Lizzie, Sarah thought back over an evening that had been a good deal livelier than its predecessors. She was quite certain that Penny disapproved of Lady Packwood, for were not Penny’s watchwords, “poise, posture, and propriety”? The three P’s. And no matter how much her ladyship possessed of the first two, she certainly had little notion of the third. What was more, she seemed proud of it!
Sarah snuggled under the coverlet, found the perfect place for her head on the down pillow, and thought about Lady Packwood. She had been prepared to like Nicholas’s mother, but she had never expected Lady Packwood to be exactly the sort of woman she would like to be herself. And, she had set them all by the ears!
Heretofore, their conversation at the dinner table had been, for the most part, polite and conventional. Sarah chuckled, thinking that tonight had been neither. Lady Packwood had barely taken her seat before she demanded to know why Sarah was dressed as a crow.
“Darcy was her husband,” Nicholas said sternly into the stunned silence. “It is expected that his widow wear deep mourning.”
“Poppycock!” announced her ladyship with bland disregard for his subtle gestures toward Dasher, the footman, and two maidservants who were serving the first course. “Anyone with sense knows how poor Sarah came to marry that lobcock, and no one believes she really mourns his loss. No one with sense,” she repeated. “Well, I mean, how could they? How could anyone mourn the loss of such a ninnyhammer?”
“Nevertheless,” Nicholas pronounced stonily, “Lady Moreland will not flout convention. She will appear appropriately garbed for the customary year.”
“Gothic! That’s what you are! Isn’t he, my love?”
“If you say so, my sweet,” replied her amiable spouse, applying his attention to the succulent pigeon pie upon his plate.
“Relicts always wear black for at least a year, just as Cousin Nicholas says,” declared Lionel in accents perilously near a lisp.
“Rot!” retorted his stepmama, rounding on him. “You keep your tongue between your teeth until you’ve learnt some sense. Nicky is not your cousin, and you shall address him by his title until he gives you leave to do otherwise. And you are not to call Sarah a relict. Abominable word!”
“Papa!” protested Lionel.
“He’s right, my sweet,” mumbled Sir Percival through his pie. “‘Relict’ is a perfectly respectable word.”
“Well, I don’t like it. Never did.”
“Ah, now that’s another matter entirely,” responded her love, turning a withering eye upon his son. “She don’t like it, Lionel. Don’t use it again.”
Flushing, Lionel muttered, “She shouldn’t speak to me so. I don’t like it.”
“Nonsense!” Sir Percival retorted. “Daresay it’s good for you. May learn sense yet, if your stepmama pounds it into you.”
“Yes, that’s very true, Lionel,” added her ladyship, “for whatever has been said against my own children, no one has ever yet accused them of lacking sense. But I shan’t have time to do it properly, you know, for your papa and I shall soon be leaving for the Continent, and you will be quite on your own. I daresay you’ll make a muck of it, but that cannot be helped. Pass me that dish of dressed salmon again, Dasher, if you please.”
Lionel looked slightly cheered as a result of what Sarah thought to be a rather daunting speech, and she glanced at Nicholas, surprised to see amusement in his eyes. His gaze met hers, and a delicate flush tinged her cheeks. She looked away only to encounter a direct and rather speculative look from Lady Packwood. But her ladyship had not finished with Nicholas.
“I daresay he’s right, you know,” she mused, “and it would be another matter entirely if black were a color that flattered you, Sarah, but it don’t. Makes you look old-cattish when you’ve not seen eighteen yet. Your skin looks pasty, and your hair looks dull. You need colors with a bit of warmth to ’em. Isn’t that right, my love?”
Thus appealed to, Sir Percival dragged his eyes from the truffled rice and creamed squab and even went so far as to lift his eyeglass, the better to examine Sarah. “I daresay. Damned pretty piece though, whatever color she be.”
“This discussion is pointless,” said Nicholas, jaws clenched. “She will wear black because I want no more scandal. It is the color she is expected to wear to show proper respect for her husband.”
“Respect for that—” But Lady Packwood broke off the sentence in response to a wrathful glint in her son’s eye. “Oh, very well, my dear. I suppose I have plucked that crow quite bald. But is it necessary that Sarah wallow in her mourning when there is none to see her save ourselves?”
Sarah caught her breath as Lady Packwood’s intent became clear. It would be wonderful if Nicholas would allow her to wear colors, even dull colors, at home. She looked at him, willing him to agree. But he was frowning.
“I cannot believe hypocrisy is the answer, madam.”
“Piffle! ’Tis the height of hypocrisy to dress a lie. Better she should do it as little as. possible. I see no reason why she should not dress as usual here. If she goes elsewhere, she can don her respect.”
“And if we have callers? A fine thing it would be for someone to encounter a recent widow dressed in colors!”
“Fustian! What on earth do you keep Dasher for, if not to delay or get rid of unwanted company? If he cannot arrange it so that she has adequate warning of callers, he’s not much of a butler. He’s not much of a butler anyway, come to think of it. You really ought to get yourself a proper one, Nicky, to puff up your consequence.”
“He’ll do for the present. He knows my ways,” Nicholas said absently. He glanced at Sarah. “Would you prefer to wear your other clothes, Countess?”
“Oh, yes,” she breathed.
“Well, I shall take the matter under consideration,” he said finally.
Lady Packwood asserted that she, for one, was glad she would soon be in Paris where English manners and customs were thought to be mildly amusing and where no one would expect her to mourn her first husband’s grandson. Declaring that she would rig herself out in the first style of elegance, she drifted easily from that topic to details of the honeymoon itinerary and the latest letter from the Lady Honoria, whom she was planning to meet either in Brussels or Rome—she could not recall precisely which.
“How she will stare when she sees Percy!” her ladyship chuckled. “I merely wrote that I should be going over, never a word about him. Do you think your mama will be surprised?” she asked Colin.
“I should say!” the boy exclaimed. He had been staring, awestricken, as Sir Percival methodically devoured the contents of one plateful after another.
When they left the gentlemen to their port, Sarah thought privately that Nicholas looked a bit harassed, but whether it was a result of his mother’s forthright speech or the prospect of sharing his excellent port with Sir Percival and Lionel, she could not tell.
In the library, she was able to sit back and relax, while Lady Packwood exerted herself to become better acquainted with Miss Penistone. The conversation was mor
e restrained, and there was little in it to put anyone to the blush, but Sarah was not at all amazed by this phenomenon, for there was something about Penny’s placid, ladylike demeanor that usually put others on their best behavior.
They had been speaking for some ten minutes or so when the library door opened and Colin slipped inside. “Is it all right, Gram?” he asked in an undertone. “May I come in?”
“Of course, dear boy. Come in and tell us how you have been amusing yourself since you left school.” She patted the cushion beside her invitingly, but Colin looked toward Sarah instead.
“If you like,” he said absently, “but I didn’t come for that. That is … well, I came to find out what happened this morning. I didn’t want to go to bed.”
“I’m sure that’s not to be wondered at,” observed his grandmother, giving him a curious look. “Your uncle never wanted to go to bed directly after dinner either. But then, he was rarely allowed to dine with the grown-ups. What about this morning?” Sarah flushed, and Colin looked conscious of having spoken out of turn. Miss Penistone’s expression did not change. “Come, come, children, what’s toward here? I thought Nicky had told me everything, but he said nothing about this morning. Cut line—as old Moreland used to say.”
Sarah glanced at Colin and then at Penny. She had intended to tell Colin exactly how outrageously his uncle had behaved, but somehow with both Penny and Lady Packwood watching her, she could not do it. She knew suddenly that Penny had been right, that he had been angry because she had sidestepped his arrangements for her safety. She had been foolish. As for the other thing that had happened in the wood, she would say nothing about it.
Briefly, she described her plan and Nicholas’s reaction; including his prohibition of her riding without his express permission, but she recited the facts calmly and without any comment as to her own feelings. There was a small silence when she had finished. Colin broke it.
“I suppose it wasn’t a very good idea,” he said quietly.
“No, it was not,” agreed Lady Packwood, “but it shows you’ve got spunk, my dear, and so I shall tell Nicky. He needn’t have been so harsh.”
“Oh, please,” Sarah begged, aghast that the incident might be revived and, with it, his lordship’s temper. “Please, my lady, I was wrong to go out by myself, and I feel dreadfully that Jem got into trouble through following my orders. Please, say nothing.”
Lady Packwood smiled at her but would not promise to keep silent; therefore, Sarah greeted the entrance of the gentlemen with some trepidation. After a nod from Dasher, moments before, Colin had slipped quietly out the French doors onto the terrace. She supposed he would get in again through the kitchen door.
Nicholas did not seem restored to his normal self but, instead, was nearly sullen. Lady Packwood greeted him cheerfully, saying he looked exactly like an undertaker’s mute. “And that puts me in mind of something I meant to ask you, dear boy,” she added thoughtfully, “whom did you get to build the deplorable Darcy’s coffin?”
Nicholas raised an eyebrow. “One of the tenants,” he replied. “You probably remember him. A man named Randolph.”
“Of course, and I’m glad to hear it. An excellent man. Sure to have done a proper job of it. We had our own carpenter when your father died, you know, and he was buried in solid oak, polished to perfection and lined with silk pillows. But when William and Maria went—Darcy’s parents, you know,” she added for Sarah’s benefit, “that Tom did up two pine boxes that were little more than crates. Leaky, I’m sure, and certainly none too comfortable. I am certain Mr. Randolph did better by the deplor—well, for Darcy. Not that he deserved better,” she added with a challenging look at her son.
But he had relaxed at last, amused, and let the comment pass. The conversation drifted after that, until her ladyship proposed a game of lottery tickets, saying she hadn’t played since Nicholas’s last holiday from school. But her notion was squashed flat by both her spouse and stepson, before anyone else had an opportunity to comment.
Lionel said, “Lottery tickets!” in tones of deep loathing, while Sir Percival merely observed that such a game was not his style, adding that he wouldn’t mind taking a hand at whist. Lionel seemed to feel the same about whist as he did about lottery tickets, but he allowed as how he would very much like to teach Sarah—Lady Moreland, that was—how to play piquet.
Sarah, who already played better-than-average piquet, thanks to Penny’s having a fondness for it, declined politely, whereupon Lady Packwood advised her stepson not to be a ninny.
“If your papa wishes to play whist, then you should be graceful about it, Lionel—not that you possess much grace, of course, but one never knows what a little practice may achieve.”
“But I don’t wish to play whist,” complained Lionel.
“Then don’t! Take a turn in the garden instead. I daresay Miss Penistone plays an excellent hand and will oblige. I do not wish to do so myself, for I wish to pursue my acquaintance with Sarah.”
But Lionel, who had clearly hoped to do that very thing himself, pointed out that it was dark outside and very likely damp as well, which wouldn’t suit his constitution. At that point, Lady Packwood lost her patience with him and recommended that he cease his nattering and decide for himself what to do, since she could not be bothered racking her brain for his amusement.
Miss Penistone, after a glance at Nicholas, promptly agreed to take a hand, and a card table was soon set up for the three of them near the fireplace. Rather sulkily, Lionel stood watching the play, first over one shoulder, then over another, until ordered sharply by his father to busy himself elsewhere or take himself off to bed. He had been gazing at Sarah even more avidly than at the cards, much to that young lady’s discomfort, and now shot her a look of helpless frustration that made her long to smack him. Evidently, Lady Packwood was similarly affected.
“Yes, do go away, Lionel. You are making your papa nervous, which is a thing he don’t like when he’s trying to concentrate, and the way you have been making sheep’s eyes at poor Sarah is enough to give anyone a blue megrim. Go to bed.”
Lionel might have protested had Nicholas not suddenly raised his eyes, but something in that look caused him to shrug his shoulders and slump off. Lady Packwood turned back to Sarah.
They were seated away from the others, toward the back of the room in a cozy little corner, and Sarah was ruthlessly being made to tell her ladyship all about herself. Surprisingly, it was not difficult, for Lady Packwood proved to be a very good listener. She sympathized over the death of Sarah’s parents, nodded understanding when told about Lord and Lady Hartley’s sense of duty, and exclaimed indignantly over the eccentricities of Sir Malcolm Lennox-Matthews. Sarah even found herself relating the tale of one of the few times during her upbringing that she had come to her aunt’s attention.
“I was eleven, I think,” she confided. “At any rate, it was not so very long after I went to live with them. There was a child next door who looked to be near my own age. I saw him over the garden wall, but I didn’t wish to call out for I had been forbidden to climb the trees next to the wall. I tried whispering. You know—psst, psst!—but it did no good, for he was facing away from me. Finally, I pulled a walnut from the tree and launched it at him. Unfortunately, I missed and broke a window instead. I don’t think I ever scrambled down from a tree so fast in all my life.”
Lady Packwood laughed heartily, drawing brief notice from the cardplayers. “I daresay the attention you received was not in compliment to your aim.”
“No,” Sarah agreed with a twinkle, “and it was no laughing matter then, I assure you. The woman next door complained to Aunt Aurelia that I had been throwing rocks at her nephew, and I was promptly summoned to Aunt’s dressing room. I was not even granted an opportunity to explain, for Aunt Aurelia was absolutely livid!”
Her ladyship chuckled again. “Well, you seem to have survived your childhood well enough, though I don’t envy you such encounters with your aunt. I was always turne
d over to my governess when I misbehaved.”
“Oh, well, Penny would never have been so severe,” Sarah said, casting a fond glance at that placid lady. “Did you love your governess, too?”
“Dear me, no! She was a dried up prune of a woman with a face like a split cod. Her favorite pastime was building card castles, and she was very strict. My father got her because he thought all girls of the first circles had them. I would much rather have gone to school, but he was determined to do things properly. He was in trade then, you know.”
“In trade!” Sarah couldn’t help it. She simply couldn’t believe Lady Packwood came from a family with its roots in trade.
“Indeed,” replied her ladyship with a grin. “Though he became nearly respectable later on through having made pots of money at it. When he sold out he owned thirteen textile mills in Yorkshire. Nicky inherited his money, and it served as the foundation of his own fortune. He is as rich as Golden Ball, you know.”
“He is! That is, no, I didn’t know. Is he really?”
“Certainly, though he doesn’t puff off his consequence, so I daresay very few people realize it. If the deplorable Darcy had known, it’s likely Nicky would have been the murder victim. It was on account of Waterloo, you see.”
“Waterloo!”
Her ladyship nodded, glancing at the card table as though to be certain they were not being overheard. “Yes, you see when Nicky went with the Duke, he left all his money invested in the Funds. He had a man of affairs, of course—same one as my Papa always had in London—but Nicky went off without leaving Mr. Thompson any real authorization to handle the money. When the Funds started slipping I went myself to see him—Mr. Thompson, that is. He was nearly frantic, and I must admit, so was I. Both of us saw poor Nicky coming home a pauper. But there was nothing to do. Mr. Thompson wrote him, of course, but received nothing in reply, and without proper authorization he simply couldn’t sell out. Nearly everyone else did, you know, thinking Napoleon would win the war at last. But when Wellington held the day at Waterloo, the Funds soared, and the few who were left in made what old Moreland was used to call a real killing. Nicky came out of it worth five or six times what he had been worth going in.”