Despite her refusal he swiftly poured two huge brandies into heavy cut glass tumblers and setting them down onto a nearby mahogany card table, grabbed Selena and drew her against his chest.
“Selena, my beautiful girl,” he breathed to her in a voice husky with passion. “You must know how I feel about you.”
Then he bent and kissed her.
Selena struggled to release herself, revolted by the nearness of him, but his arms felt like iron clamped around her slim body.
His lips fastened insistently on hers, working at her mouth, trying to force it open.
Frantically she attempted to push her hands against his chest, but gradually he forced her across the floor down onto the many-cushioned couch.
Just as Selena was beginning to despair, the door of the drawing room opened and in came Beatrice.
“Albert!” she shrieked. “Selena! How dare you – and in my own home and me in my condition!”
She fainted gracefully into a chair.
He immediately released Selena, who ran for some smelling salts, leaving him to fan Beatrice saying over and over,
“My dear, it was nothing – nothing.”
When she returned with the salts, Beatrice opened her eyes and screamed,
“Send her away at once, Albert. I just cannot bear to look at her. And after all I have done for the wretched minx.”
The next day there had been a painful conversation between Selena and her stepfather.
“I tried to explain to her that I was only giving you a Christmas kiss, but you know how it is with Beatrice at the moment. She is unable to be rational about anything. We shall have to make arrangements for you to go and live elsewhere until after the baby is born. I am sure that then relations between you two will return to normal.”
Beatrice had agreed to see Selena, but only so that she could accuse her of trying to seduce her husband.
Her words had been vile, but when Selena tried to tell her that she had no intention of stealing his affections, Beatrice exploded,
“Are you really suggesting that my dear Albert would have looked at you unless you had used your feminine wiles on him? Particularly at this most precious of times? Are there no depths to your duplicity?”
She immediately sent a telegraph to an aristocratic Belgian Countess, a friend of hers who, she claimed, could accommodate girls of impeccable background, who needed to improve their use of French and achieve a polish to their talents as young ladies about to enter Society.
It was such a relief to Selena to be able to leave the Anstruther household.
Even the formality severely imposed by the Belgian Countess had been refreshing.
If only the Count had not started to behave in just the same way as Mr. Anstruther, she could have enjoyed her stay in Belgium.
After he had caught her in the music room looking for a piece of sheet music, she realised that there was only one answer to the situation.
Escape!
Now here Selena was in a railway carriage with a strange man.
She should be feeling frightened of a repetition of all those other occasions when men had tried to kiss her.
But the Earl of Wakefield, whilst very friendly, did not seem at all attracted to her.
“You see,” she added, after skimming as lightly as she could over the rest of her story, “I was supposed to stay at the château until Beatrice gives birth, which will not be for at least another six weeks. I feel certain she will refuse to take me back now and despite everything I do not want to upset her at this delicate time.”
The awfulness of her predicament pressed hard on Selena.
What on earth, she wondered, was the Earl making of her story?
“Poor you,” he sympathised. “I never realised how unfortunate looking so beautiful could be.”
From any other man Selena would have taken such words as a prelude to a flirtation, but this man sounded no more than friendly and interested.
Of course, she told herself, he was still grieving for the wife he had lost.
No woman could ever mean anything to him now.
“Do you have any ideas as to what you can do?” he asked, leaning forward and looking concerned.
Desolation flowed through Selena.
“I cannot go back to the Anstruthers. I know the Bathursts would not welcome me. And I cannot return to the Countess. She was kind to me and I would hate her to know how her husband behaved.”
“Did you leave her a note?”
“I said I had received bad news from home and had to leave. I naturally thanked her for her care of me.”
“And you have no other friends or relations?”
Selena shook her head sadly.
“Mama and Papa were always very private. I had a governess at home rather than going to school. I attended a Ladies’ Academy when I was with Great-Aunt Selma and continued there when I was with the Bathursts. The girls at the Academy were very nice, but I did not make any great friends.”
She looked out of the window of the carriage at the country flying past.
“I thought I might find a job,” she muttered finally, turning back to the Earl.
She thought she saw a trace of a smile on his face, but it vanished almost at once.
“What sort of a job were you thinking of?”
“Maybe I could be a governess? My French is now fluent and my drawing is excellent. I am good at figures, too. Mama always used to give me her household accounts. She said I was so much better at them than she was. That was before Mr. Anstruther, of course.”
Now the Earl really did smile.
“I am sure your skills are all that you say, but, you know, I really don’t think that, young as you are, anyone would hire you to educate their children.”
“I am afraid you are probably right,” Selena agreed mournfully.
There was also the usual problem of how she would handle a husband or a grown-up son should they decide they wanted to make advances to her.
“Perhaps I could be a lady’s maid,” she suggested brightly. “I learned a great deal about arranging hair from mine. I did not have a maid in Belgium and managed very well and I am also a very good seamstress.”
“Again I think you are too young, and too beautiful for anyone to take you on. Nor do I think you would enjoy being at the beck and call of a Mistress.”
Selena had a sudden vision of Beatrice snapping at her maid, making her redo her hair, having her wait up to all hours to undress her after late parties, shouting because a particular gown had not been washed and ironed when she had expressly said it was another that she intended to wear that day.
She shuddered.
No, the Earl was right, it would not be pleasant, but what alternative did she have?
“Hmm – ” mumbled the Earl. “Did you not tell me that you enjoyed designing a garden?”
Selena nodded.
“Well now, I have an idea. In one of the houses on my estate there is a Miss Jerrold who is a garden designer.”
At once Selena felt a thrill.
How wonderful it would be to meet such a woman! She had not realised such a profession even existed.
In her experience male gardeners, like her beloved Field, always planned gardens.
“When she can spare enough time from her various commissions, Miss Jerrold is trying to redesign my gardens as they have been sadly neglected. She has frequently said to me that she really needs a trained assistant. It sounds as though you could be exactly what she is looking for.”
He looked at her with an expectant expression.
For the first time she noticed that there was a button missing on his shirt and that his collar was frayed.
Did he not have a valet to look after his clothes, she wondered.
“Well, what do you say?” he enquired, just a trifle impatiently.
“What do I say to what?”
It had not occurred to Selena that he had posed a question.
“Would you consider living
with Miss Jerrold and being her assistant?”
“Oh, yes!” Selena clapped her hands together and looked at him with heartfelt gratitude. “I think it would be wonderful!”
He looked relieved.
“That’s all right, then.”
“But what about Miss Jerrold? She might not like me.”
“If you talk to her about your love of plants the way you told me, I am sure she will,” he replied and looked out of the window.
“I think we are arriving at our station.”
Once again Selena felt bewildered.
“But I thought you bought tickets for London.”
The Earl smiled a little sheepishly.
“That was when I thought I would have to see you safely to your destination.”
Selena felt a surge of gratitude.
The Earl reached up and pulled her bag down from the rack before retrieving his own case.
“My groom, Morland, should be meeting us. I was going to tell him to go home and await instructions whilst I continued on to London but, as it is, nothing could be more convenient.”
For a moment Selena felt a scintilla of doubt.
Was it right to entrust herself to this man she knew nothing about?
He seemed very kind and, though he appeared to have no interest in her as a girl he would like to kiss, perhaps he was hiding his desire?
Maybe when she let her guard down, he would just pounce on her like the other men had done?
The train slowed down and came to a halt.
The Earl opened the door of the carriage and placed first his and then her bag outside.
He stepped down, then turned back to offer Selena his hand.
She took a deep breath.
Was everything going to come right – or was she going to end up in even more trouble than she was already?
The Earl gave her a smile.
“Let me help you onto the platform,” he offered in his kind slightly casual manner.
Selena made her choice.
“Thank you,” she muttered, placing her hand in his and smiling as she stepped onto the platform beside him.
A moment later the groom appeared.
He did not seem surprised that his employer should be accompanied by a young and pretty girl, merely picking up their bags and saying,
“I have the trap, my Lord, all ready for you.”
“Excellent, Morland. This is Miss Norton.”
The groom nodded at Selena and touched his cap.
“Nice to meet you, miss”
Soon they were in the trap with the Earl driving and Selena sitting beside him and Morland in the back.
“If I had known you would be accompanying me, I would have arranged for a smarter carriage,” the Earl told her as they set off.
“This is fine,” Selena assured him, clutching at the side of the trap as they rattled round a sharp bend.
The Earl seemed a good, though fast, driver and she soon relaxed and began to enjoy the countryside. They had left the built-up area round the station behind them and the rolling hills and woods were very pleasant.
It was not very far to their destination.
Morland got down, unlocked and opened a large set of wrought iron gates that looked in need of repair.
“We usually take the back entrance, but I feel that you should see the house as it should be viewed,” the Earl informed Selena, driving through and waiting for Morland to lock the gates again.
They drove through a large park where deer grazed beneath ancient trees on one side of the drive and a flock of sheep on the other.
“Charles II gave the house and estate to my family after he returned from exile. It was a reward for the money they lent to him when he was a refugee in France after escaping from the clutches of Cromwell in the last battle of the Civil War.”
The Earl paused for a moment before adding,
“I don’t think the money was ever repaid. We were rich once, but one after another my ancestors proved much better at spending money than making it and I find keeping the old place up is a bit of a battle.”
“Papa used to say exactly the same,” Selena assured him. “If the Norton estate had not been entailed, I think he would have sold it. I know Mama was quite happy to hand it over to the cousin who inherited after Papa died.”
“But how about you? It must have been a wrench to leave your childhood home.”
Selena thought again how very sympathetic he was.
She gave a little shrug of her shoulders.
“I always knew I would have to leave some day. I just thought it would be when I married.”
She tried not to recall the many tears she had shed when they left.
Then she gave a gasp as they turned a corner and a beautiful Elizabethan mansion came into view.
“Oh, how lovely!”
“It does look its best from a distance. I struggle to keep it in shape. Friends have suggested that I charge for the public to come and view the place, but the cost of putting it into any sort of shape would be more than I could afford.”
As they approached the house, Selena began to see that parts of the building needed a great deal of attention – stone was broken, many of the windows were boarded up and everywhere there was an air of neglect.
They drove round to the back of the house, where there was a stable yard that seemed in slightly better shape than the house.
Telling Morland to bring the cases, the Earl helped Selena down from the trap and took her inside.
“I hope you will not feel insulted by being brought in the back way,” he said, as he led her through a side door.
Selena laughed.
“Just to know that I shall not have to face Beatrice is such a relief that nothing else matters!”
The door opened into a dim passage that eventually led to an equally dim hall.
As Selena’s eyes grew used to the light she saw that it was delightfully panelled with a minstrel’s gallery and that there were superb portraits on the walls.
“Are they all your ancestors?”
The Earl looked up at a Cavalier in red velvet with a sweeping hat adorned by a long white feather.
“That is the first Earl, who lent Charles II so much money – and that’s his Countess.”
Selena turned to see a portrait of a beautiful woman in a white silk gown displaying a great deal of bosom.
She, too, wore a hat not dissimilar to her husband’s. In it was an enormous green stone.
“That cannot be an emerald!”
The Earl sighed.
“It’s the ‘Wakefield Gem’ itself. It’s a legend in my family and it was stolen with many other valuable pieces of jewellery.
“It was thought that a servant was responsible. He was interrogated but denied the theft. The jewels could not be found anywhere and shortly afterwards he drowned in the river. Legend suggests that he was absconding with his booty and it was lost with him.
“The river was searched thoroughly but without any success – no doubt it was swept down to the sea. I look at that picture sometimes and think that if only I still owned the Wakefield Gem, I could set this whole place in order.”
Selena glanced swiftly round the hall with its faded curtains, worn carpet and half the windows shuttered.
“I think it looks charming – ”
At that moment a pleasant-looking homely woman bustled into the hall.
“You’re back, my Lord. You’ll be wanting tea, I’ll be bound,” she greeted him in a comfortable voice.
“If you please, Mrs. Cropper. This is Miss Norton, who might be joining Miss Jerrold as her assistant. Mrs. Cropper is my housekeeper,” he told Selena.
“Very good, my Lord.”
Mrs. Cropper did not appear to be at all surprised at Selena suddenly appearing with her employer or with the suggestion that she might become Miss Jerrold’s assistant.
Selena concluded that the Earl’s servants seemed to accept that their Master had strange ways.
*
By the time Selena rejoined the Earl in a snug little room littered with papers and made cheerful by a blazing fire, a tray of tea had arrived and sat on a low table in front of a battered old sofa.
“Would you like to do the honours or shall I?” the Earl asked brightly.
“Please, you do,” she replied, suddenly feeling shy as she settled herself in a wing chair with a lumpy seat.
She was alone with a man she had only just met and the safe feeling he had given her on the train was beginning to melt away.
Then she had been so totally panic-stricken by her circumstances that she had not really taken in his appearance, so now she looked at him more closely.
In the soft light filtering in through diamond-paned windows, Selena saw he was actually a very attractive man.
She had noted his height and lean figure on the ferry and in the train she had seen that his grey eyes were very kind.
Now she took in the wavy thick dark hair, his well shaped ears and the fine bones of his face.
The hand that passed her a cup of tea was, with its long elegant fingers, one of the most beautiful she could ever remember seeing.
An extraordinary sensation ran through Selena.
It was as though a small electric current sparkled through her veins. It was a sensation that made everything appear more brightly coloured as if she was more alive than she had ever been and everything was more exciting.
“I thought,” said the Earl, seating himself opposite her, “that I should go over to see Miss Jerrold to sound her out on my proposition.”
“In case she hates the whole idea?” asked Selena, nervously.
He nodded.
“I don’t for a moment suppose that she will, but it will give her a chance to tell me exactly what she thinks,” he added with a laugh. “Miss Jerrold never hesitates to say what is on her mind.”
Selena was still anxious.
Then she saw a small vase of lily of the valley on a side table.
“Oh – ” she sighed, leaping up to go and plunge her nose into the flowers. “Oh, they smell wonderful.”
Love Came From Heaven Page 3