‘I spent ten years in Ind-yah with my first husband – in Madras. Which part are you from?’ she asked.
Odilie flushed slightly but kept her composure. ‘I’ve never been to India, I’m afraid,’ she said.
‘Really…’ drawled Lady Augusta and glanced round the company. ‘Gel says she’s never been to Ind-yah,’ she told them and then laughed as if Odilie had either told an outrageous lie or made a joke. They laughed too, and then returned to their own conversations. Odilie felt her colour rising as Lady Augusta turned back and addressed a spot above the girl’s head as if she was not there. ‘I remember those half-caste gels, so lovely when they’re young but it doesn’t last long. How old is this one, I wonder – eighteen, nineteen? They get fat and much darker as the years go on. They end up black as coal in the end. And none of them can sing. They croak like crows – quite funny, really.’
She gave a witchlike cackle and someone behind Odilie laughed too, which encouraged Lady Augusta so she looked directly at the girl again and asked pointedly, ‘You didn’t say how old you are – and can you sing, my dear?’ ‘I’m eighteen and I leave singing to paid entertainers,’ said Odilie boldly. In fact she could sing quite well but was not going to admit it to this horrible old woman.
‘What did I tell you?’ asked Lady Augusta of the company who, although they were pretending to be otherwise engrossed, were listening with unconcealed delight. Odilie glanced round at her father and saw that, like her, he burned with resentment. Their host stood with his back to the fireplace and a fatuous smile on his face. He did not have the courtesy to smooth the way for Odilie and she felt angry that he had presented her to the wicked old woman like a Christian being thrown to the lions. Her surge of anger made any nervousness or fear of rejection she might have still felt, disappear entirely. For the rest of the evening she was determined to adopt an attitude of bored indifference.
It was soon made obvious to the Rutherfords that if they imagined the dinner had ben laid on in Odilie’s honour, they were mistaken. The other guests were all the Duke’s friends or relations who cared little or nothing about her and it was even doubtful if they all knew that she had been suggested as a possible bride for their host.
Around a massive table in the dining room at Sloebank Castle sat a very mixed company. At the top of the table on her host’s left, Lady Augusta held forth about her distinguished past to male sporting friends of the Duke who had come up to visit the Fair and follow that with some shooting. They were accompanied by a bevy of painted and brightly dressed women with cackling voices which became progressively more raucous as the night wore on.
In a company of twenty there were a few people of title – only a Sir This or Lady That with a Countess and a foreign Marquis thrown in for good measure but none of them were particularly distinguished and they all looked and sounded like the sort of people who would go anywhere for a free bed and a hot dinner. Canny Rutherford took note of them and realised that he had met many people of similar sort in distant parts of the world.
He was proud that Odilie remained cool and self-contained as she was led to a seat on the right side of the Duke. When she looked at the place settings however, she realised that it was Lady Augusta and not she who was in the place of honour because the Duke’s cutlery was laid out in reverse order with the wine glasses and knives ranked on his left. The host was left-handed. She remembered that Aunt Martha’s word for someone who was sinister-handed was ‘Foxy-pawed’. So left-handedness must be a Fox characteristic too – like the curse, thought Odilie with a faint smile.
The food, when it appeared after a long wait, was tepid which meant there had been a considerable trip from the kitchens. The menu was uninspiring and would not have been appetising even if served hot, so it was not difficult for Odilie to conform with the polite code of behaviour for young ladies and send most of her meal back untouched. She was not alone in that for many of the guests did the same although they made up their abstinence by drinking heavily. If the food was bad, the wine was of a very superior quality, for Sloebank possessed a famous cellar which had been laid down by a previous Duke and not yet drunk up in entirety by succeeding incumbents.
The Duke ate and drank with gusto and only every now and again would he suddenly remember the girl by his side and address a remark to her in much the same way as he would have tossed a scrap of meat to a pet dog. His comments were usually banal and easy to answer for he did not expect anything of moment to be said in reply to such things as, ‘Fine weather… Hope it holds up for the Fair…’ Not that he noticed her lack of communication because he was far more interested in drinking claret than in talking at any great length. It was the man on her left who told her about the Sloebank library. He asked her if she enjoyed reading and when she said she did, he went on, ‘There used to be a splendid library here. The previous Duke collected it.’
‘Used to be?’ she asked with raised eyebrows. Their host, catching a snatch of their conversation, leaned over and said, ‘My brother bought books. I’m selling them off.’
‘That’s a pity. Don’t you share your brother’s interests?’ she asked him.
‘Which ones? Don’t worry my pretty, I’m not keen on boys if that’s your meaning. Girls are more to my taste.’ He laughed and put a freckled hand on her thigh, squeezing it so tight that she gave an involuntary gasp of pain.
After a second, she collected herself sufficiently to say, ‘I meant, aren’t you interested in books?’
‘I sent the whole damned lot down to London. There was an awful fuss about the sale for some reason. People were buying like mad but it raised a good bit of money. They weren’t doing any good up here, taking up space and gathering dust. Besides, nobody ever reads the things.’ Regretting the dispersed library Odilie stared around the dining room and noted how shabby everything was when she looked really hard. The gilding on most of the pictures was flaking, the centrepieces lined along the middle of the table were tarnished, the curtains looked threadbare and the dessert china proved to be chipped when she ran her fingertip around the edge of her plate. The Duke either didn’t care or he was more in need of money than even the locals imagined – he certainly was in need of taste.
She knew that by the rules of the game she should have been flirting with him by now but she deliberately desisted from doing so. They could go on standing on ceremony with each other for ever as far as she was concerned and as the night wore on her spirits sank. She saw him to be a boor and disliked him more and more. By the time the ladies rose and left the dining table, it had become a strain to talk to him.
When the party reassembled in the adjoining salon, there was a great deal of laughing and shouting by exuberant people who’d had a great deal to drink. Odilie stifled a yawn and looked curiously around. This room was hung with dusty tapestries of hunting scenes, and gaming tables, covered with cards and counters, were laid out around the two fireplaces, one at each end of the room. Lady Augusta led the rush to find a seat near the most comforting blaze. Her eyes glittered as she started to ruffle the cards with adroit sharper’s hands while she called out to Canny Rutherford, ‘You look like a gaming man to me. D’you fancy a hand of loo?’
He smiled cherubically. ‘I was a gambling man once but my gaming days are over, my Lady. I stopped that long ago.’
She glared back at him, obviously disappointed for she had selected him as a likely bird for plucking but he did not give up his feathers easily. ‘Tight pursed are you?’ she asked rudely.
He smiled seraphically. ‘Very tight pursed and it’s a good thing I have been, I think.’ His last remark was pointed and marked the end of the night’s strained socialising as far as he and his daughter were concerned. His next move was to pull out his watch and say with a note of false surprise in his voice, ‘How late it’s growing! It’s time we went home.’ No one argued.
They left immediately and when the Duke took his leave of her, Odilie was given the unhappy impression that as far as he was concerned, she
had scored a great success. As they rode back down the hill to Lauriston neither Canny nor Odilie dared to start talking about the subject that was uppermost in both of their minds. They wanted to retire to their beds and do a lot of private thinking first, for to talk without premeditation would have been like opening a basket of coiling snakes. They were both wrestling with the same problem, however, for they were wondering how Odilie could possibly become the wife of that particular Duke of Maudesley.
Chapter 5
Saturday, 1 August
Both Odilie and her father endured wretched sleeplessness that night but when dawn was about to break, they drifted into dreamless slumbers that made them oversleep their normal hours of rising.
Canny awoke liverish and in a grim mood. As he sat up in bed and scowled at Joe who had wakened him, it was possible to discern the iron in him which had made it possible to survive and thrive in a lawless society. His brows were lowered, his mouth thin and his blue eyes half-hidden by dropped eyelids. He looked menacing and Joe threw up his hands exclaiming, ‘Lord a’ mercy, what’s bothering you this morning?’
‘It’s Odilie. I can’t do it to her,’ Canny snapped, shoving his feet out of bed.
‘It was a mad idea from the beginning,’ said Joe unsympathetically. ‘You went off too fast as usual. You should have asked her if she wanted him.’
‘Don’t tell me what I did or didn’t do! Send a messenger and fetch that lawyer down here. Tell him it’s urgent. Then make me my coffee.’
Joe was impossible to deflate. ‘You know what coffee does to your liver. Miss Martha says you’re not to have it,’ he told his employer.
Canny gave a roar like a wounded bull. ‘I want my coffee and I don’t give a damn what Martha says! And I want that lawyer here…’ The last words were directed at Joe’s disappearing back.
Even before Canny had drunk his first cup of breakfast coffee, a beverage he had become used to in the Indies and which he imported for his own use, Grace was taking a folded note from the hand of the boy who had carried it from Havanah Court. ‘Maister Rutherford’s man said that I was to make sure the lawyer gets this at once,’ the boy told her. ‘He said Canny’s in a wax, lowerin’ like thunder.’
The girl nodded and ran with the message to her father, who was dressing for the office which opened on Saturday mornings. Because he was tying his neckcloth he tut-tutted irritably at the sight of the paper in her hand and told her to read it out to him.
‘“Come AT ONCE. Do not delay. Important business”,’ read Grace. ‘The “at once” is underlined three times, Father.’
‘Canny Rutherford!’ said Elliot in a voice of disgust and started stamping about the little dressing room. ‘What a damned man! Thinks I’ve no clients except himself. He and his daughter were up at Sloebank Castle for dinner last night, weren’t they? This must have something to do with that business. I’ll need to be quick and get it over with. Go and saddle the horse, girl.’
As Andrew Elliot was leaving the house he called over his shoulder to his daughter, ‘Come down to town later and fetch the horse from Havanah Court stable. I’ll leave her there and go straight to the office. Don’t forget.’
He found Canny waiting for him, still clad in his white nightshirt, with a long Paisley wrapper around his shoulders and a red velvet nightcap on his head. In spite of two cups of coffee, he still looked thunderous and as soon as Elliot’s head showed round the door, he called out impatiently, ‘Come in, come in, what took you so long? I’ve decided to back out now. I can’t marry my lassie to that man. I’ve seen too many of his kind – he’s not good enough for her. You’ve got to get us out of it.’
Elliot closed the door carefully behind him and, as was his habit when he needed time to think, leaned his back against it for a few seconds before saying, ‘The Duke’s the same man as he was last Wednesday morning when you were so pleased to be claiming him as a future son-in-law. What’s happened to change your mind?’
Canny stared bleakly across the room. ‘He’s a fool. If he’s not a drunk already, he soon will be. He’s a lecher too or I’m vastly mistaken. He’s greedy and stupid and insensitive and he’ll never appreciate Odilie.’
‘Who could?’ asked Elliot, with only the faintest note of sarcasm in his voice.
Canny shot a sharp glance at him but went on regardless, ‘I don’t care about the money. I’ve plenty more where the ten thousand came from. What’s been bothering me all night is what I’d have on my conscience if I were to do this to my girl. Her spirit would shrivel up if she was married to a man like that.’
Elliott pulled out a chair from the side of the table in the middle of the floor and sat down heavily in it. He sighed. ‘You’re a bit late thinking like this. You agreed to his first letter; you went to dinner at Sloebank; he showed her off to his friends. If he wants to go through with it, you’ll find it hard to back out. Cool down: perhaps you’re only overreacting, Mr Rutherford. You’d never met him before had you? What happened at the dinner? Did he insult you or something – has the girl been complaining?’
Canny shook his head. ‘No, none of those things. He was cordial enough. It was just that I saw what sort of life Odilie would have with him. I could see that she disliked him too, though to do her justice she never said a word about it, but I noticed if he brushed against her, she recoiled as if he was a snake.’
Elliot clicked his tongue. ‘My dear man, that’s normal. She’s virginal and probably terrified of men. Girls are often like that. It’s rather appealing. I sometimes think they do it deliberately.’
Canny glared. ‘My girl’s not like that. You don’t know Odilie if you even think it. No, I could tell that she didn’t like him. He repelled her. Remember, I gave her my promise that I’d call it off if she felt she couldn’t go through with it. So I want you to write to him and cancel our agreement today.’
Elliot gave a heavy shrug. ‘On your own head be it, but I hope you realise what’s likely to happen. He’ll crucicy you and all your family.’ He said nothing about what was likely to happen to his own career but he was thinking about it with disquiet.
‘It’s only money. I’ve plenty,’ said Canny.
The lawyer looked doleful. ‘It’s not just money, I wish it was. Who’s going to marry your girl after all this? It’ll be put about that the Duke turned her down because she’s coloured or ill-mannered or sickly – they could say anything. No one’ll believe that she was the one who did the rejecting. No one’ll ever believe that she refused a Duke.’
‘Odilie will easily find a husband. You’ve only to look at her to see that,’ said her loving father.
‘But what kind of a husband?’ said Elliot in an insinuating tone. ‘Certainly no man of rank and position will offer for her… the Duke’ll see to that.’
Canny frowned but held to his decision. ‘Don’t try to change my mind. Just work out what we can do. You’re a lawyer, you should know how to phrase it,’ he said.
Elliot frowned. ‘Mmm, perhaps we can say she’s been taken ill. I know! We can say she’s gone mad and you had to send her back to Jamaica. Thompson the surgeon’s come to town from Edinburgh. I saw him arriving at the Cross Keys yesterday. He’s an old friend of yours, isn’t he? He’ll give a medical opinion… He’ll say anything you want.’
Canny gasped in protest. ‘Odilie gone mad! I couldn’t say that, of course not. There must be another way. Can’t you think of something else?’
Elliot mused with his chin on his fist. ‘We could say you’ve gone mad and need her at home – no, that wouldn’t work because if she married him, she’d only be a mile and a half up the road. You could tell the Duke there’s madness in your family and she’s been advised not to have any children – but that mightn’t put him off because of the size of the dowry.’ He looked across at Canny and asked, ‘Are you sure this is what you want to do? It’s a tremendous chance for the girl and you know what those society marriages are like. They won’t even need to see much of each other once the
deed’s done. They can maintain separate households if they like – no one will think anything about it.’
‘I know all that and I can see the trouble with the excuses but I know how much she dislikes him and I gave her my promise,’ said Odilie’s father, who was weakening slightly.
Elliot pressed his advantage. ‘As I’ve said before, you’re far too indulgent. Sometimes parents have to be firm for a girl’s own good. She might not be very enthusiastic at the moment but in the years to come she’ll bless you for this. Did she say anything to you about calling it off last night? No? Then she might not be as against it as you imagine. Think of the advantages of contracting this wedding against the disadvantages of backing out – and I don’t only mean financial. You ought to speak to Odilie about this.’
‘She’s not up yet and when we came home from Sloebank last night we were both so depressed we couldn’t even mention it.’
‘In that case, I’ll go over to my office for an hour until you’ve had time to talk with her. Then I’ll come back and we’ll make up our minds what to do.’
Odilie was in her lace-edged wrapper and yawning when her father tapped on the door. He made no pretence about the object of his visit and came straight to the point. ‘What did you think of him, my dear?’ he asked.
She gazed at him and her caramel eyes were bleak. ‘I disliked him, Father.’
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