“Of course he will,” Lolita encouraged him. “You must also show him how obedient Bracken is, and how he comes to you at once when you call him.”
Barty was uncertain whether his Lordship would arrive in time for luncheon, but it was not yet noon when, crossing the garden after they had been swimming, Lolita and Simon spied the horses coming up the drive.
Simon gave a hoot of joy and ran to the front of the house.
Lolita moved after him more slowly and already she could hear Simon telling his uncle how he could now swim – how obedient Bracken was and how he could now ride so fast on his pony that the groom had difficulty in keeping up with him.
It all bubbled out of his mouth from sheer excitement.
Lord Seabrook was smiling as he walked towards Lolita.
“I gather, Mrs. Bell, that you have been very busy since I left.”
“Simon can swim really quite well, my Lord,” she informed him. “He has taken to it like ‘a duck to water’.”
Lord Seabrook laughed, looking straight at Lolita with his piercing blue eyes.
“Of course, and I suppose you can swim like a mermaid.”
“I would hope so,” replied Lolita demurely.
Simon was so excited by his uncle’s return, while Lolita was finding it impossible to suppress a strange feeling within herself. It seemed to move up through her body and into her breasts.
He was back and looking more handsome than when he had left.
“I haven’t swum for years,” he said as they walked into the castle, “but I am quite prepared to race you both if that is what you would like.”
“I expect you will win,” said Simon.
“I shall be very annoyed if I cannot beat you both, but actually I have another idea for us this afternoon.”
“What is that?” asked Simon cautiously.
“I remember that Mrs. Bell wanted you to see Walcott Priory and I thought we might go there unless you have already done so whilst I have been away.”
He looked at Lolita as he spoke and she answered,
“I did think about it, my Lord, and then as I understand there is a caretaker in residence, I thought he might not let us in without your assistance.”
“Then I will assist you by taking you there myself this afternoon. It is a long time since I visited the Priory and I would like to see it again.”
“Lolo will tell me lots and lots of stories about Walcott Priory,” said Simon with satisfaction. “I would really like that.”
They enjoyed a delicious luncheon and it seemed to Lolita very different from the meals they had been served for the last two days, especially with Lord Seabrook now present again.
He told Simon several stories which made him laugh, but Lolita had the strange feeling they were really meant for her.
As soon as luncheon was over another chaise was brought to the door. This was drawn by a pair of perfectly matched stallions which Lord Seabrook told Simon he had owned for nearly three years.
They were still, in his opinion, the best in his stables.
“I want to drive a chaise please, Uncle James,” pleaded Simon.
“I will teach you how, as soon as you are proficient enough on your pony to jump a hedge without falling off.”
“I will soon be jumping. I am riding so quickly now that Tom the groom keeps asking me to go slower because his horse cannot keep up with me!”
Lord Seabrook smiled.
“I can see we will have to give Tom a faster horse to accompany you. I know your father would be very pleased that you can ride so well.”
“Lolo is very pleased with me,” added Simon. “She told me this morning that when I am a little older I will ride as well as you do.”
Lord Seabrook looked at Lolita.
“That is a somewhat twisted compliment, but still I accept it with pleasure.”
There was something in the tone of his voice that made Lolita blush, but she could not imagine why.
She knew that it was very delightful that Lord Seabrook was back at the castle.
It was as if the sun had come out the moment he appeared.
Now as they drove towards the Priory she was thinking what fun it was now there was no Lady Cressington finding fault and disparaging her and no Captain Duncan to divert Lord Seabrook’s attention from Simon and of course herself.
When Walcott Priory loomed up in front of them it was much larger than she had expected and it was also extremely beautiful.
Lord Seabrook told her that the present owner had spent a great deal of money on it and she appreciated that it would not have looked the same in her father and mother’s time.
However, when they entered through the front door, Lolita felt a thrill of excitement.
She was seeing where her father had lived since he was born and where her mother had lived with him when they had first married.
The caretaker, as Lolita expected was only too pleased to allow Lord Seabrook into the Priory and invited them to look round without his assistance.
“I know I can trust you, my Lord,” he said, “but I wouldn’t trust most of those who comes here out of curiosity. But my leg’s paining me and I’ve no wish to walk more than I has to.”
“You can trust us,” Lord Seabrook assured him, “not to touch anything and to close all the doors behind us.”
They set off alone on what Lolita felt was an exciting voyage of discovery.
Her father and mother had talked so much about the Priory and how it had meant everything to them when they were first married.
She could understand how it had almost broken her father’s heart to have to leave it when they had moved to London.
She had always wondered why her father had gone so far away from his home and now when she saw the Priory she realised it would have been agony for him to have lived nearby and not own it.
What she had not expected was that he would have left behind so many of the family treasures, especially the portraits of her family’s ancestors.
Then she remembered that her father had said the man who had bought the Priory had insisted on purchasing it ‘lock, stock and barrel’, as he put it.
“As no one else wished to pay such a large sum for an enormous house,” he added, “I had to accept his offer because I needed the money so desperately.”
It had enabled him to pay off all his father’s debts and as well he had been able to pension off the old servants who had served the family for many years.
There was just enough money left to buy the house in London where Lolita had been brought up. It had been small but comfortable and being Elizabethan held a beauty all of its own.
At the same time it was impossible to compare it with the Priory.
Lolita had learned that over one hundred monks had lived here and now she could see the size of the building she realised there was room for more.
They entered the huge hall at the front where the monks dined and where any travellers were entitled to join them.
It was just as it had always been since the time the Priory had been built. The walls were covered with oak panelling and the long refectory tables and the great medieval fireplace were untouched by the passing centuries.
Lord Seabrook had visited the Priory before and he led them next to what had been, Lolita believed, her grandmother’s drawing room.
It was a lovely room with its diamond-paned bow windows looking over the garden and here, as in a number of other rooms, the mantelpieces had been added much later. Many were carved with skill and imagination by the Italian sculptors who had come to England to enhance the houses of the aristocracy.
It was, however, the pictures which Lolita liked the most. Each one gave her a pang of pain because they were no longer in the possession of her family.
There were portraits of the Earls of Walcott and of their wives and children all down the centuries. Every great artist in turn had apparently painted them.
It was miserable for Lolita to think that they would
pass on to another rich man with whom they had no connection and he would doubtless not appreciate them or love them as the Walcotts had done.
She had no idea that Lord Seabrook was watching her intently as she moved from picture to picture.
He was thinking that the rapt expression on her face was something he would not have expected from any woman – let alone from someone as young as Mrs. Bell.
He led her up the wide oak carved staircase to the first floor and here they found the State bedrooms.
The huge four-poster beds had been added by every succeeding Earl and some of the most elaborate and unusual ones had actually been brought from France during and after the French Revolution.
Lolita remembered the story of how much furniture had been bought for practically nothing from the revolutionaries by the Prince of Wales, who later became George IV. He had been obliged to send his chef to buy what he wanted, because he was the only member of his staff who spoke French.
She would have liked to know if her ancestor had gone himself or merely sent an agent to act for him. Whoever it had been, his taste had been impeccable.
There was, however, no one to answer the questions she was burning to have answered.
Lolita now wished that she had asked her mother more about Walcott Priory after her father had died.
‘If only I could have come here once with Papa,’ she told herself regretfully.
Lord Seabrook wondered why she was looking unhappy and he longed to put his arms around her and comfort her, but then he told himself severely again that this was something he should not feel.
It was the reason he had hurried back to the castle and although his host and hostess had pressed him to stay longer at Inglewood, he could not suppress his eagerness to return.
They moved into another room and once again he asked himself how it was possible to feel like this for a woman he had only just met.
It was impossible for her to be of any consequence in his life, as he was very much aware of his position as head of the Brook family.
There were a great number of Brooks scattered through every part of England and Scotland and they all looked to him to uphold their name and to set an example to them all.
How, knowing that, could he do anything but marry someone whose lineage was as ancient and aristocratic as his own? Someone who would give him the son who would take his place in the castle when he died?
They wandered on from room to room.
As they ended up in the Picture Gallery, Lord Seabrook found himself puzzled by Lolita’s intense interest and the emotions he could see clearly in her eyes and face.
‘Why should any woman,’ he mused, ‘be so deeply moved by this undoubtedly beautiful and interesting building, but which is of no particular consequence to her?’
They walked downstairs to where at the back of the building was the Chapel which had been built by the monks. It was extremely beautiful and the stained glass windows would have been impressive even in a Cathedral.
The altar was of white marble and on it stood a jewelled cross which had been placed there when the Chapel was first completed.
Lolita felt as if her father had been with her ever since she had entered the Priory.
Now as they moved into the Chapel, she was vividly aware of her mother, almost as if she could see her.
She could feel her arms reaching out towards her and she could see the love in her eyes, which had always been there before she had been taken ill.
She forgot for a moment that she was with Lord Seabrook and Simon and without thinking she knelt down in the first pew facing the altar.
She clasped her hands together and closed her eyes.
She sensed that her mother was speaking to her and telling her how much she loved her and how both she and her father were looking after her. It was something Lolita had wanted to believe ever since she had run away.
Now it was as if her parents were speaking to her and reassuring her that she must never doubt again.
Lord Seabrook and Simon had just stood looking at her as she knelt down and now her eyes were closed in prayer.
Almost as if she had told Simon what to do he moved forward and knelt beside her.
Watching them Lord Seabrook drew in his breath. It was a long time since he had seen a woman praying so fervently.
He knew that for the moment everything was forgotten including Simon and himself.
It was at that instant that he admitted to himself that he could not bear to lose Mrs. Bell, whoever she might be.
Somehow he must contrive to keep her at the castle, whatever else she might want to do.
When they drove home Lolita was very silent.
But Simon was talking again. He was more interested in his pony, his dog and his swimming than in the big house they had just left.
“I will come swimming with you tomorrow morning,” Lord Seabrook promised him. “Now I suggest, as I have some letters to write, that you ask Mrs. Bell to tell you more about the medieval monks who lived in the Priory.”
“I want first to take Bracken for a walk,” said Simon. “I know he’s been very good while I have been away, but he will have missed me.”
“Of course he has, so take him for a run in the garden before you go upstairs.”
He was talking to Simon, but he kept looking at Lolita.
He still found it strange that she had been so overcome by the pictures and by the Priory itself.
Was it possible, he wondered, that her father had been an artist or perhaps her mother had been very religious.
The questions he wanted to ask her were tantalising him and yet he knew instinctively it would be a mistake for him to show too much curiosity.
Tea was waiting for them as soon as Simon had taken Bracken for a run over the lawns.
On Lord Seabrook’s instructions Lolita poured out the tea.
“You are very silent,” he said to her.
Simon had moved across the room with a plate on which he had crumbled a few biscuits for Bracken and he fed him on the bare boards by the window so that the dog did not make a mess on the carpet.
“I was thinking,” said Lolita in reply to Lord Seabrook.
“That is obvious, but I am curious to know what is in your mind.”
She paused for a moment.
“Actually I was wondering why you do not buy the Priory, my Lord. Your estate borders it and Simon will need somewhere to live one day when he marries.”
Lord Seabrook stared at her in astonishment.
“I never thought of that and of course you are quite right. The Priory estate does indeed border with mine, although it is not so large. There is no reason why I should not farm more acres than I do already.”
“It would be a great pity for anything so beautiful to pass into the hands of someone who would not really appreciate it,” added Lolita. “And the pictures are so superb.”
“I agree with you and I will certainly think about your idea. As I understand it the present owner is having difficulty in selling the Priory, so I should be able to obtain it at a reasonable price.”
He rose from the table as he spoke and walked to the window.
He was not only thinking about the Priory, but how Lolita was unlike any other woman he had ever known.
If he had taken Catherine Cressington or any other London beauty round the Priory, they would have spoken effusively about the pictures and yet they would have made it very clear that they wanted them or others like them, as a present for themselves.
It seemed to him extraordinary that anyone so lovely as Lolita should have thought of Simon rather than herself and he was still mystified as to why she had been so moved by the Priory, especially when they were in the Chapel.
*
Lolita put Simon to bed and when she had wished him goodnight, she could not help wondering if Lord Seabrook, now they were alone in the castle, would ask her to join him for dinner.
There were no reasons why he should do so, but it w
ould in fact be incorrect, as she was only a governess.
At the same time she thought he might feel lonely without someone to talk to.
She was quite right and when she walked into her own bedroom half-an-hour before it was time for dinner, there was a knock on the door.
When she opened it Lolita found Barty outside.
“His Lordship’s compliments, Mrs. Bell, and he asks if you’ll dine with him tonight as he wishes to discuss the future of Walcott Priory with you.”
Lolita felt her heart turn a somersault.
“Tell his Lordship,” she said in a controlled voice, “that I shall be delighted to join him for dinner.”
When she closed the door she ran to the wardrobe to look at what was hanging there.
She wished she had some of the pretty gowns she had worn to parties in London, as she had brought only the lightest and plainest of her dresses as she had no wish to look conspicuous wherever she went.
The gown she chose was white as was correct for a debutante and clung to her figure.
When she walked into the study to find Lord Seabrook waiting for her, he thought she looked even more like a Goddess from Olympus than ever before.
Because he had only given her a little time to make herself ready, Lolita had merely brushed her hair until it was neat and tidy.
The only jewels she wore were a single row of small pearls and her mother’s ring was still on her finger. She was careful not to show the palm of her hand as if anyone could see the diamonds they would know it was not a wedding ring.
Lord Seabrook in his evening clothes looked even more distinguished than in the daytime.
As Lolita walked towards him she thought that, if he was escorting her to the smartest ball ever given in London, she would be proud that he was her partner.
Lord Seabrook was thinking exactly the same.
There was no beauty, including Lady Cressington, who could compare with the loveliness of Lolita.
‘She shines because her beauty is natural and uncontrived,’ he thought. ‘She is like a lily in a garden or a star in the sky above.’
Barty announced that dinner was served and Lord Seabrook escorted Lolita into the dining room.
Because he did not want to talk about buying the Priory in front of the servants, they discussed its contents, most especially the pictures.
Love by the Lake Page 11