by Beth Andrews
However, at this juncture, Lydia began to entertain doubts as to whether marrying John was the right step for her to be taking. Louisa, for all her romantic rattle, had settled for money rather than love. Aunt Camilla, on the other hand, had cast aside intellect in favor of overwhelming emotion.
Lydia could honestly say that there was nothing mercenary in her determination to wed John. His father was plump in the pocket, true enough, but she knew nothing of John’s own prospects. It was neither security nor wealth that she desired.
On the other hand, judged by her aunt’s standards, their marriage would not be founded on romantic passion either. She truly esteemed John. She certainly enjoyed his kisses and looked forward to whatever pleasure the marriage bed might provide. But she did not consider him to be the most handsome man on earth. Her heart skipped no beat when she beheld his face. Being in his arms was a pleasant experience, to be sure, but she felt no inclination to swoon in his presence. The mention of his name did not drive all other thoughts from her mind, and she would have to think very carefully before she could be convinced to give up all she held dear for his sake.
No. She was not in love with John. But she did love him. It was a steady, strong affection and a recognition within herself that they were much alike and would be able to build a good and happy life together. There might be no peaks of ecstasy, as Aunt Camilla would surely know with d’Almain, but there would be no valleys of despair either. They would be companions throughout life. In good times they would share a placid contentment and much laughter; in times of crisis, they would be united in facing whatever might come to them.
The question remained, however: was that enough? After due consideration, the answer was that, for herself, it was more than enough. But what of John? Perhaps he expected more from marriage. Could she, in all conscience, deprive him of that emotional whirlwind which love provided those who enjoyed being giddy and foolish?
She was seriously contemplating breaking their engagement. Her mind told her that they were well suited, but the fashion nowadays was for men and women to wed for no other reason than that they conceived a wild attraction for one another - however ill-suited they might be, and however little prospect of lasting happiness their union could provide.
Of course, John did not seem to be a slave to fashion, but one never knew. In the end, the only thing she supposed that she could do was to speak to him about it and find out what he thought of the matter. With a brief prayer that he would be honest with her (but then, John was not one to practice deception), she turned on her side and fell asleep almost immediately.
Chapter Twenty
OF LOVE AND MARRIAGE
When she awoke the next morning, Lydia soon discovered that her father had already taken himself off. His expressed destination, she was informed, was the Golden Cockerel. It was plain that his mission was to become better acquainted with John, and perhaps to speak with the young man’s father as well. Although Lydia fully expected a positive outcome from the meeting, she still could feel a small twinge of apprehension as she waited quietly with Aunt Camilla, who was not a very loquacious companion, being preoccupied with her own dilemma and thoughts of her beloved which must be anything but comforting.
Positioning herself strategically beside the front window, it was a full two hours before the figure Lydia sought passed by. To be precise, it was not one but two figures which came into view as they made their way to the front door. Papa had brought John back with him.
They seemed to be on very good terms, and Lydia breathed a sigh of relief that things had gone so smoothly. Her father was as eager to accept her intended as anyone could reasonably wish.
John informed them that they were all invited to the inn that evening to dine with him and his father.
‘And I understand that it will be in the nature of a celebration.’ He gave a broad wink. ‘It seems that someone in this room will be marking a particular milestone on the morrow.’
‘Good gracious!’ Lydia exclaimed. She had completely forgotten that tomorrow was her eighteenth birthday.
‘How could you forget something so important?’ her aunt wondered aloud.
‘With so much happening,’ Mr Bramwell remarked, ‘it is little wonder that the poor child should be forgetful.’
‘But you are a day early, sir!’ Aunt Camilla admonished John.
‘Unfortunately, I shall be leaving tomorrow,’ Mr Bramwell explained apologetically. ‘I therefore thought it best to commemorate the occasion tonight. I have a small gift which you can open tomorrow, my dear.’
It was an odd gathering that evening, Lydia thought as she looked around her. They were in a small but well-appointed salon, separated from the main dining space of the inn by a heavy brocade curtain. From the other side, she could hear muted conversations and occasional bursts of laughter.
Their own party was rather subdued. How could it be otherwise? Papa was spending his last night with them for some weeks; Aunt Camilla was severely blue-devilled by thoughts of her incarcerated lover, and rather cold in her attitude to her host, whom she considered to be a minion of Lucifer. Lydia was feeling unusually anxious because she wanted to speak privately with John but had been granted no such opportunity as yet. John and his father were the only two who seemed perfectly at ease. The elder Savidge was more cordial since he had learned that Lydia’s sister was expecting an offer from a gentleman whose name might be found in the Peerage. John was his usual placid, smiling self.
Lydia’s health was toasted and she received gifts from everyone, for which she thanked them most sincerely and promised to open them the next morning. The food was excellent, for Mr Savidge always prided himself on the quality of the fare offered at his establishment.
Only when the party was about to disperse was Lydia finally able to snatch a few precious moments alone with John. Thomas Savidge had made his own carriage ready to convey them to their home, but Lydia protested that it was such a short distance that there was no need. She would much prefer to walk.
‘Walk, my dear Miss Bramwell!’ Mr Savidge expostulated, appalled at such a suggestion. ‘Never let it be said that Thomas Savidge behaved in so shabby a fashion toward his guests.’
Part of the reason for his insistence was his burning desire to show off to all his acquaintance his latest acquisition: a smart new landau which he lost no time in having his coachman bring round for their delectation. Like a child with a new toy, he must be pointing out every detail of its manifold charms - from the folding roof, which he kept down tonight to enjoy the balmy air, to special lanterns which proclaimed its presence even on the darkest night.
‘I must admit,’ Mr Bramwell said, eyeing this impressive conveyance with approval, ‘that I am quite fagged to death, and look forward to a short carriage ride. But for young people, no doubt an evening walk is far more pleasant.’
‘If you will permit me, sir,’ John said, taking Lydia’s arm, ‘I would be pleased to escort Miss Bramwell home. We shall not be very many minutes, I assure you.’
‘Do you think it is wise?’ Aunt Camilla asked, uncertain whether this exceeded the bounds of strict propriety. Besides, with a murderer loose among them, who could tell what might happen?
‘My dear sister,’ Mr Bramwell told her, ‘when an engaged couple cannot take a stroll in the moonlight, on the village high street, things have come to a pretty pass in this country!’
So it was settled. While their elders enjoyed the comforts of their host’s carriage, John and Lydia began to walk towards the cottage. It was only a few minutes after ten o’clock. The air was cool, but not unpleasantly so: just enough, in fact, to make walking a pleasant exercise rather than a chore.
The young couple watched the carriage bump along the road and out of sight before they ventured to speak to each other.
‘John,’ Lydia ventured at last, ‘do you think that we should continue with this?’
‘With what?’ he asked, perhaps pardonably perplexed.
‘Our
engagement, I mean.’
‘Do you intend to jilt me?’ he queried, placid as always.
‘No, no,’ she said hurriedly. ‘But do you think that we are doing the right thing?’
‘Perhaps I should ask you why you seem to think that we are not?’
There was a brief pause while Lydia drew closer and pulled the skirt of her gown towards her in order to avoid being caught in the branch of a low bush which protruded onto the pavement beside them. When she at last spoke, the words came out in a rush, as if she had been holding them in with her breath and must release them all at once.
‘It’s just that I do not think that we are in love with each other, John: at least, not in the way that my aunt and Monsieur d’Almain are.’
‘But we are not your aunt and d’Almain,’ he pointed out. ‘Our natures are not the same, and neither are our feelings.’
‘Tell me honestly, John,’ she begged. ‘Do you think of nothing else but me, day and night?’
‘Of course not!’ he objected strongly. ‘You are often in my thoughts, to be sure, but I have many things to think about, particularly just now. What with saving d’Almain and trying to keep my father in check....’
‘Just so.’ But she was not finished with him yet. ‘If we marry,’ she continued with determination, ‘and I were to perish in childbirth or something, would you put a bullet through your brains?’
‘Certainly not.’ He stopped and looked down at her with a frown. ‘What has put all this nonsense into your head?’
‘It is merely that all the heroes in romantic novels do such things. Their love is everything in the world to them. Nothing else matters.’
John snorted contemptuously. ‘That is all very well in books,’ he informed her, ‘but life is quite different. One would have to be decidedly touched in the upper works to do anything so silly.’
‘And if I were to die ...’ she continued doggedly.
‘Whyever should you?’ he demanded. ‘You are young and perfectly healthy.’
‘Yes, but if I should, would you marry again?’
‘Very likely,’ he said. ‘Particularly if we had children, and if I were not so old as to be content with no more than a lapdog for company.’
‘Do you think,’ she persevered, coming to the heart of the matter, ‘that there is only one person - one love - for each person on earth?’
‘Most unlikely, I should say,’ he stated flatly. ‘Frankly, I would have thought you would have more sense than this, Lydia.’
‘Oh, I do!’ she cried. ‘I was merely wondering if you might not.’
Having resumed their perambulation, they were now within sight of Aunt Camilla’s cottage. However, John stopped her once more, and turned her about to face him.
‘Look here, Lydia,’ he said. ‘I have every intention - and indeed every desire - to marry you. But if you do not wish to marry me, I will not force you to do so.’
‘Of course I wish to marry you, John!’ she cried, feeling as if a great weight had been lifted from her shoulders.
‘Then we may consider the matter as settled.’
They walked on several more paces, and were at the front of the cottage before Lydia wondered aloud, ‘Do you think that Aunt Camilla and Monsieur d’Almain will find happiness together?’
‘I think,’ John said, after considering the question for several moments, ‘that neither one of them is ever truly happy unless they are unhappy.’
‘They are perfectly matched, then,’ she said cheerfully.
‘Unquestionably.’
John bent his head and gave her a most encouraging kiss. She heard no angels singing, nor did her heart leap like the fallow deer, but it was most enjoyable and she was rather annoyed when it ended.
‘We must,’ he told her, with a complete change of subject, ‘see what we can do about clearing d’Almain of this crime.’
‘It is absolutely imperative,’ she agreed.
‘I will return tomorrow to see your father off.’ John escorted her the last few paces to the front door. ‘We will make our plans then.’
Chapter Twenty-one
THE SCENT OF MURDER
Lydia was more than pleased with the gifts which she received on her birthday. Papa had purchased a richly plumed bonnet which he assured her was all the crack in town. Aunt Camilla presented her with delicately embroidered handkerchiefs - an absolute necessity for young ladies. John’s gift was an unusual cross suspended on a slender golden chain. It was, he explained, carved from a kind of jade found not in the Orient but from the equally distant shores of South America. It was not merely lovely to behold, but had the added attraction of the exotic.
Under other circumstances, it might well have been a perfect birthday. However, there was still the danger facing Monsieur d’Almain, which oppressed her aunt’s spirits so dreadfully and was a constant thorn in Lydia’s own side since she could not at present see any way to clear his name. In addition, Mr Bramwell’s departure took away a significant source of happiness and some measure of hope. She had convinced herself that her father would be able to assist her in her efforts to find the truth about the recent crimes in Diddlington, but he had no answer to the riddles which still perplexed her.
‘Can you not stay one more day?’ she begged, clutching his coat sleeve even while the hired conveyance waited outside in the high street.
‘I’m afraid that it is impossible, my dear.’ Mr Bramwell sighed, and it was clear that he quit them with no enthusiasm. He smiled warmly at her, and then turned his gaze upon John. ‘But I know that I leave you in good hands here, and I am certain that your French friend will have cause to thank you at last.’
‘I hope that I shall be seeing you again soon, sir,’ his future son-in-law said, shaking his hand.
‘I shall doubtless be permitted to return to you once my eldest child has managed to capture her titled gudgeon.’
‘Pray, give mama and Louisa my love!’ Lydia cried, belatedly remembering her duty. ‘I trust that I shall soon be hearing glad tidings from my sister.’
‘You may hear that she is to be married,’ papa answered drily. ‘Whether such tidings are glad or gloomy, it is not for me to say.’
Lydia laughed. ‘At least Louisa will achieve her ambition to wed a title.’
‘And an ancient title it is too,’ Mr Bramwell said with a wicked reference to the gentleman’s advanced years. ‘Not the handsome young buck she once imagined, I fear.’
‘A baronet,’ John reminded him, ‘is still a baronet at any age.’
‘True,’ Mr Bramwell admitted. ‘And she would certainly be foolish to refuse him, should he offer his heart and hand.’
‘Never mind,’ Lydia added, ‘that the hand of a man of sixty is not so strong or so smooth as a man of twenty.’
‘If his flesh be withered, it is no great matter - so long as his pockets are plump!’
Lydia turned to John, expecting him to join in their inappropriate merriment, but was surprised to see a look of utter amazement upon his usually smiling countenance. He was not smiling now, but looked from father to daughter as if he beheld them anew.
‘I must be going,’ Mr Bramwell announced, having put off the evil moment for as long as possible.
‘Goodbye, Papa.’
Amid the bustle naturally attending any departure, Lydia momentarily forgot the strange reaction of her fiancé, and was busy in hugging her father and dabbing a spot of moisture from her cheek with Aunt Camilla’s gift. Only when the carriage had disappeared around the corner did her attention return to John. The startled look was gone, she was glad to see, but its substitute was equally interesting. John now looked more grave than she had ever seen him.
‘What is it, John?’ she could not help but ask him.
‘Lydia,’ he intoned with the solemnity of a priest administering the last rites, ‘we must speak.’
This had a most inauspicious ring to it, but she nodded quietly and led him back into the house. They had been standing on
the grass verge beside the street, but now made their way back into her aunt’s house. Camilla herself had already fled indoors, overcome as always by the strain of parting from anyone for whom she felt even the mildest affection.
‘Tell me again,’ John insisted as soon as they had seated themselves in the parlor, ‘just what Kate said to you that day at Bellefleur.’
‘I am sure I have told you more than once,’ she replied, not annoyed but curious as to why he should desire to hear it again.
‘Bear with me a moment,’ he pleaded.
She began to recount their conversation, as far as her memory served, and he interrupted her again, to ask what were her very last words.
‘She said, “It wasn’t his hands, miss”,’ Lydia answered confidently.
‘How did she say the words?’
‘As though she were surprised about something.’
‘No, no,’ he almost growled in his intensity. ‘How did she say them? Did she say, “It wasn’t his hands, miss?” Or did she say, “It wasn’t his hands, miss?” ‘
‘Does it matter?’ Lydia was mystified.
John ignored the question, asking instead, ‘Of whom was she speaking?’
‘I really cannot be sure.’
‘Think, Lydia!’ he cried. ‘Had she not been telling you something just before that?’
Lydia closed her eyes, summoning to mind all that had happened that day at Bellefleur. The little maid had been eager to tell her anything that she knew, although it had not seemed to be much at the time.
‘She had been telling me how she went into Sir Hector’s room one day, quite unexpectedly, when she heard something fall.’
‘And what happened when she went in?’
‘The room was very dark, being lit by just one candle.’ Lydia compressed her lips in an effort of concentration. ‘Sir Hector reached over and snuffed out the candle at once, and flung some very - colorful - words at her.’