The Secrets of Armstrong House

by A. O'Connor

  Burchill sighed as he waved the carriage off.

  “Monsieur Burchill! You look relieved they go,” Isabelle chastised him as she saw him rest against one of the Roman pillars in front of the house and light himself a cigarette.

  “I’m delighted that circus has left town for a couple of weeks,” said Burchill cheerily. “You have to remember this house was only opened for a couple of months every summer before them two arrived. It was nice and relaxing around here before it became their party house with their posh awful nosh . . . first thing I’m going to do now is order me in some good old-fashioned Irish stew!”

  “Irish stew!” Isabelle looked horrified. “Monsieur Huppert will not allow!”

  “Monsieur Huppert can stick it up his Versailles, for all I care!”

  Arabella observed Charles’ smiling face as he played with Prudence in the carriage.

  “Well, at least you seem in better form recently,” commented Arabella.

  “I am, dear, I am!”

  “It must be the thought of seeing all your family again at the wedding,” she mused.

  “It must be, it must be!”

  “All your family except Harrison,” she said.

  “Nobody is keeping Harrison away. It’s his choice if he doesn’t want to attend his own sister’s wedding. Selfish, if you ask me.”

  She stared at him, trying to figure him out. “It’s quite obvious why he isn’t coming – he doesn’t want to see either of us! Or put the rest of the family in a compromising position. We were only invited after Harrison declined.”

  “Nonsense! Do you know, you can be quite deluded at times. As if I wouldn’t be invited to Daphne’s wedding!”

  “I wouldn’t test their loyalties, Charles, not after everything that’s happened,” she said, turning and looking out the window.

  When their carriage pulled up outside Armstrong House, Charles helped Arabella descend and she looked up at the building with trepidation.

  The front door swung open and Emily came rushing out, shouting “Charles!” as she jumped into his arms and hugged him.

  “Well, this is a welcome home!” said Charles.

  Emily turned to Arabella who was holding Prudence and smiled at her. “Hello again, Arabella.”

  “You’re looking very well, Emily. Say hello to your Aunt Emily, Prudence.” Arabella held the toddler out to her.

  Emily looked at the child with disinterest.

  “What do you think of your niece?” asked Charles.

  “There was a little girl, who had a little curl, right in the middle of her forehead – When she was good she was very good indeed, but when she was bad she was horrid!” sang Emily, before holding on to Charles’ arm tightly and leading him up the steps to the front door. “I’m so glad you’re here, Charles. You can rescue me from all this wedding talk around here!”

  Arabella raised her eyes to heaven as she followed them into the house.

  Arabella found Margaret courteous but inclined to keep her distance, her smile not carrying to her eyes. Lawrence was as pleasant as ever. Emily fawned over Charles, and Daphne was too wrapped up in her wedding arrangements to be concerned about anything else.

  That night Charles and Arabella joined the family in the dining room.

  “Gwyneth hasn’t arrived yet?” asked Arabella.

  “No, she and His Grace are coming the day before the wedding, along with the other guests,” said Margaret.

  “The Foxes aren’t coming,” said Daphne.

  “Why not?” asked Charles.

  “The Land War!” snapped Lawrence. “Have you forgotten about that while busy being a socialite in London?”

  “Of course not, Father. I just wonder why it’s stopping the Foxes from coming.” He looked at his father challengingly.

  “Because their estate has become embroiled in it,” said Margaret.

  “They are being boycotted, you see,” said Emily. “They had to bring in workers from England to save the harvest.”

  “And all their house staff walked out. Mrs Foxe has had to send for a cook from England through an agency.”

  “How terrible!” said Arabella. “Is there nothing you can do to help?”

  “Of course there isn’t!” snapped Margaret impatiently. “Or else we’d get dragged into the cursed war ourselves! Your gilded life in London seems to have made you forget the harsh realities of the politics of your home country.”

  Lawrence sat back and drank from his glass of wine. “The Foxes are probably our oldest friends in the county, but they know they can’t expect us to come to their assistance. If I sent some men over to help with their work, we would end up being boycotted too.”

  Arabella nodded sympathetically. With all the grandeur, power and lavish socialising at Armstrong House she knew it wouldn’t take much to have hatred spill out against them and put them under siege.

  “They felt it would be unfair on us if they came to the wedding as we would be seen to be siding with them, and so they have diplomatically chosen to stay away.”

  Margaret fixed Arabella with a steely look as she thought of Harrison in New York. “And they are not the only ones not attending out of diplomacy.”

  Charles waited until he was sure everyone was asleep in the house before he got out of bed and slipped on his dressing gown. He then went to the wardrobe and took out the leather case hidden there. He left the room, crept along the corridor and down the stairs to the library.

  The room was still dimly lit from the embers in the fireplace and he crossed over to the oil lamp and lit it. Putting the case on Lawrence’s desk, he crossed over to a shelf. He picked a book on trout fishing and placed it open on the desk. If anyone came upon him he would say he couldn’t sleep and had come downstairs for a book to read. Then he took a file down from another shelf and brought it to the desk where he opened it. He studied Lawrence’s signature on some documents inside. Taking a sheaf of paper from his case he copied the signature again and again. Then steadying his nerve he took the documents for the new mortgage he had arranged for the house in London out of the case and forged Lawrence’s signature on them. Finally he closely compared the forged signatures with the originals and was confident there was no telling them apart. He then put back the file, put out the oil lamp, took the case and returned upstairs to bed.

  chapter 29

  Returning to Armstrong House brought back all the memories to Arabella: coming there with Harrison when they were in love, meeting Charles there, the beginning of their affair and on to the horrible confrontation that resulted in their marriage. Over the next few days she took a back seat and watched while the Armstrongs did what they did best – entertaining on a grand scale and organising a big social occasion to perfection.

  On the day of Daphne’s wedding they made their way down to the church in the estate village which was crammed with wedding guests. As she watched Daphne and her bridegroom exchange their wedding vows, she couldn’t help but marvel at how opposite this occasion was to her own meagre rushed and absent-of-ceremony marriage. But as she looked at Charles sitting beside her in the pew and contemplated her life, she was happy with her present state, even though it had been a rough journey to get there.

  The rest of the day passed in a whirl of excellent food, amusing speeches and dances back at Armstrong House.

  Margaret observed Daphne dancing with her bridegroom in the ballroom and turned to Gwyneth who was seated beside her.

  “Well, that’s two daughters successfully launched and happily married,” said Margaret.

  “Yes, they make a lovely couple,” said Gwyneth.

  “Daphne is such a social butterfly she accepted every invitation going and had the good sense to meet and fall in love with a brewery heir without ever even needing to be presented and do the season in London.”

  “It’s seems a love match all right.”

  Margaret sighed. “There will be no such luck with Emily. She accepts no invitations that come her way. I sometimes de
spair of her. She definitely needs to be presented in London for her to find a suitable husband. I had hoped to take her to London next year.”

  “Well, why don’t you? Her education seems complete to me.”

  “She’s flatly refusing to go! Silly girl.” Margaret looked over at Arabella who was chatting amicably with guests. “If we do go, I don’t fancy living at Hanover Terrace for the summer months with Arabella and Charles and their French cook either.”

  “It’s your house – you shouldn’t feel uncomfortable staying there,” objected Gwyneth, concerned.

  “Well, I do! Arabella was quite rude to me on our last visit there.”

  “Arabella – rude? I can’t see that.” Gwyneth was surprised.

  “Well, more outspoken.”

  “You didn’t provoke her, did you?” Gwyneth eyed her mother knowingly.

  “I just tried to talk to her about the future . . . of course it’s very hard to discuss the future with someone when all you can think about is her past.”

  Gwyneth heaved a sigh. “Mama, I meet Arabella regularly in Regent’s Park when we are walking the babies, and she’s lovely.”

  “She’s good at putting on acts all right . . . I can never forgive her for what she did to this family, what she did to Harrison.”

  “It was all very unfortunate, but the past is the past. She fell in love with Charles and unfortunately that meant breaking Harrison’s heart.”

  “If that was all she did!” snapped Margaret bitterly.

  “What do you mean?” asked Gwyneth.

  Margaret had an overwhelming desire to tell her trusted and most adored daughter about the affair and the pregnancy but knew she could never tell the truth, even to Gwyneth. “Just poor Harrison!”

  “Any word from him?”

  “No. We write to him all the time, but he hardly ever responds. We got a card at Christmas. And then he wrote to Daphne saying he was unable to attend the wedding. It’s like he switched off from us all after what happened. I wanted myself and your father to go to New York to see him.”

  “Well, why don’t you?”

  “We can’t with all the trouble now at the Foxes. Your father won’t leave in case the mess spills over to our estate.”

  Emily linked her arm through Charles’ as they walked through the gardens.

  “I miss this – the walks and horse rides we had together,” she said. “I wish you’d move back.”

  “Well, you’ll be married yourself soon with your own house and family, if Mother has anything to do with it.”

  Emily pulled a face. “Mama can force me to do many things, from German grammar to needlework, but she can’t force me to say ‘I do’ before an altar.”

  “Don’t destroy your own life in trying to be disobedient to Mama.”

  “Destroy my life? I can’t think of any better way to destroy my life than getting married to some fool I don’t love and churning out child after child.”

  “Not necessarily.”

  “Do you know Felicity Keane? She got married three years ago and has had three children in that space of time! It’s an awful life! Stuck in some marriage and having baby after baby like a prize heifer. And that’s what Mother has tried to make me into.”

  “What’s the alternative, Emily? Stay here a spinster minding Mother and Father into their old age?”

  Emily sighed loudly. “I just want to be free.”

  “Unfortunately freedom costs a lot. We’d better be getting back to the wedding,” he said, turning around and heading back to the house.

  Arabella had not being feeling well all afternoon and as the evening progressed she began feeling worse. She turned to Charles at the table.

  “I think I might go upstairs to lie down,” she said.

  “If you must,” said Charles, feeling anxious. He had signed many cheques before leaving London and was anxious to get back as soon as possible to execute the mortgage and have the money put into his account for fear they would bounce.

  “I won’t drag you away from the fun,” said Arabella sarcastically, standing up, irritated that Charles hadn’t offered to walk her up.

  She set off walking across the dance floor, but suddenly the room started to swirl and she blacked out.

  Charles waited anxiously with his parents and Emily in the drawing room while the doctor tended to Arabella upstairs.

  “You know, I always suspected she may have a weak disposition. Do you remember that sea-sickness nonsense she claimed to have?” said Margaret. “I only hope the baby is all right.”

  “It was probably the journey over was too tiring for her,” suggested Emily.

  “I’m sure it’s something or nothing,” Charles said, not looking too worried.

  The doctor came in.

  “Well?” asked Charles.

  “She needs rest, and plenty of it until the baby is born. I’ve advised her not to come down for the rest of the day and to try to get some sleep.”

  “See – as I said it’s something or nothing,” dismissed Charles.

  “Well, I wouldn’t call it that either. It’s important she gets rest and stays off her feet as much as possible,” contradicted the doctor.

  “And I’ll make sure she does just that when we get back to London,” Charles assured him.

  “Oh, there can be no returning to London until after the baby is born, I’m afraid,” said the doctor.

  “What?” shouted Charles.

  “Oh yes, I’m afraid that’s out of the question. She’ll have to stay here – she can’t risk that journey back to London.”

  Emily was delighted at the prospect of Charles staying and volunteered, “I’ll help mind her.”

  “You’ll do no such thing!” snapped Margaret.

  “But, doctor, it’s paramount I get back to London as quickly as possible!” said Charles.

  “You’ll have to delay all such plans. Travel at this point would endanger both your wife and the baby.” The doctor turned to go. “Enjoy the rest of the wedding day.”

  Charles stared into the fire in a mixture of fury and annoyance.

  Margaret leaned over to Lawrence and whispered, “That girl can’t seem to have a pregnancy without attaching the greatest drama possible to it.”

  Charles went up to check on Arabella and found her sleeping in their bed. He then returned to the wedding where he caught up with old friends. The doctor’s statement that Arabella was unfit to travel worried him greatly. He simply could not be stuck in Armstrong House for another month. He had to get back and get that money into his bank account before those cheques started to bounce. Everything from the staff wages to the money he owed to his gambling circle would bounce and how would he explain it all? What would Arabella say if she found out? He needed to get back as soon as possible.

  Charles was the last to go up to bed that night. As the staff finished clearing up and went themselves exhausted to bed, he walked out to the forecourt and had a cigar while he contemplated what he must do. Then he went up to their room.

  To his surprise he found Arabella awake and sitting in her dressing gown beside a roaring fire.

  “How are you feeling now?” he asked as he sat on the bed.

  “Still very weak. I’m mortified that I collapsed in front of everyone like that.”

  “Not half as mortified as I was. If you were feeling so unwell, why didn’t you go up sooner?” he said with irritation.

  She looked at him angrily. “Your concern is touching, Charles! If you had bothered to get up and walk me out I might not have collapsed so spectacularly!”

  “Had I done that you would have brought me down with you!” he said.

  “I don’t think you’ll ever need any assistance to bring yourself down,” she sneered.

  Both sat fuming for a while and then Charles said, “The doctor says you can’t travel.”

  “I know. I’m annoyed with being trapped here as much as I’m sure you are.”

  “Felicity Keane was out on a hunt the
week before she gave birth, my mother was saying.”

  “Well, you should have gone and got her pregnant then, shouldn’t you?”

  Arabella sat back and closed her eyes.

  “Well . . . you should be quite all right here with Mother and Father, and Emily has said she’ll wait on you hand and foot.”

  Arabella’s eyes sprang open. “And where do you suggest you’ll be?”

  “I have to return to London – pressing business which I can’t delay.”

  “Return to London!” Arabella’s voice rose.

  “There’s nothing I can do. I’ll be back before the birth, naturally.”

  Arabella stood up and walked towards him. “Do you honestly think you are going to walk out on me for a second time while I’m pregnant?”

  “I’m not walking out on you – don’t be so ridiculous.”

  “Forget it, Charles! You’re going nowhere!”

  “I have to!”

  “And leave me here with your horrid mother and . . . and . . .” Arabella rarely cried, and certainly never in front of others, but the tears started to well up in her eyes. But as she glared at Charles she knew she must never let him see her cry and she willed the tears to go away.

  “I’m going and that’s an end to it!” His voice was raised now.

  “You are not going – and that’s an end to it!” she screamed at the top of her voice.

  He looked at her in horror and shouted back, “You’re going to wake the bloody house up!”

  “I don’t care – you selfish bastard!”

  They stared at each other angrily.

  “You don’t understand, I’ve made no arrangements to be away, the staff wages, the . . .” He stopped speaking, aware he could not let her know the predicament they were in financially. He couldn’t let anyone know.

  “You can post them cheques. I take it you brought your cheque book? You take it bloody everywhere with you.”

  “I forgot it!”

  “Well, tough! Write to Jones in the bank to sort it – but you are not walking out on me. Not when I’m about to give birth to your heir! Not now – not ever!”