‘How could I have been so stupid as to want to run away?’ she asked herself again and again.
Then she was worrying that Lord Seabrook might guess how happy she was to stay at the castle and be so close to him.
The race was a great success. Lord Seabrook with a superb exhibition of riding managed to arrange that he won by only half a length from Simon with Lolita a respectable third.
She pulled in her horse when she realised what Lord Seabrook was planning to do and she found Simon’s excitement at such a close finish was very lovable.
She wanted to hug him and Lord Seabrook too, but she told herself that was the sort of thing she must not think about.
They rode slowly back to the castle and when they had handed their horses over to the grooms, Simon called,
“I’m very hungry.”
“And I am too,” said Lord Seabrook. “So we will just go straight into the breakfast room and change our boots and everything else afterwards.”
Lolita just took off her riding jacket and her hat.
Barty had a large breakfast waiting for them and Simon enjoyed every mouthful.
When they had finished Lord Seabrook said,
“I expect as it is a lovely warm day you will be going down to the lake to swim. I will come and join you, but I have some letters to sign first.”
“I want to race you in the lake as well,” challenged Simon. “But I expect you will be too fast for me.”
“I would hope so, but it is a long time since I swam and I may have forgotten how to. So if I sink, you will have to rescue me.”
“I think Lolo would save you.”
“And if she could not manage it, I would drown, and what would you do then?”
Simon put his hand into his uncle’s.
“I love you, Uncle James, and I love being here at the castle with Bracken and my pony. You must promise me to be very careful, because if you drowned or died like Papa, Lolo and I would have nowhere to go.”
“You are quite right,” answered Lord Seabrook, visibly touched by Simon’s words, “and I promise you I will be very careful of myself and of you.”
They were talking as they left the breakfast room and climbed upstairs.
Lord Seabrook left Lolita at the first floor and walked towards the Master Suite.
The maid was waiting in the schoolroom to take off Simon’s riding boots and Lolita went on to her own room, wondering as she took off her riding clothes,
‘Would it be embarrassing to swim in my bathing suit in front of Lord Seabrook? Perhaps it would be wiser if I watched him and Simon from the shore.’
It only took her a second or two to make up her mind and firmly she put on one of the light dresses she had brought with her.
She was just tying the band round her waist when she heard a carriage draw up on the gravel outside as the windows of the schoolroom and her bedroom overlooked the front of the house.
Hoping it was not a visitor who would delay Lord Seabrook, she ran to the window and looked out.
There was a carriage below which she knew was a post-chaise and it was drawn by two horses which meant it had travelled some distance.
She wondered who it could be.
And then with a feeling of horror she recognised the head and shoulders of the man who was alighting.
It was her stepfather.
She gave a sudden cry.
Then running across the bedroom she opened the door and ran down the stairs to the first landing.
It flashed through Lolita’s mind that Lord Seabrook might be changed by now and have gone down to his study.
But as she rushed along the passage to the Master Suite, she saw his valet coming out of the room carrying his Lordship’s riding boots and breeches.
She swept past the valet who looked at her in surprise and, pulling open the door without knocking, she burst into Lord Seabrook’s bedroom.
He was standing in front of his dressing table putting the finishing touches to the tie he had just fastened round his neck.
As Lolita ran towards him he stared at her in astonishment.
Without pausing she flung herself against him.
“Hide me! Hide me!” she pleaded almost incoherently. “Take me where he cannot find me.”
Lord Seabrook’s arms went straight round her.
“What is the matter?” he implored her. “What has upset you?”
“It’s my – stepfather,” Lolita gasped. “He has found out – where I am and has come – to take me away. Oh,please, please hide me!”
Lord Seabrook held her a little closer.
“No one shall take you away if you do not wish to go,” he said stoutly.
“But he can,” screamed Lolita frantically. “He is my – Guardian and by law I have to do – what he tells me.”
“And what does he want you to do?”
“He wants – me to marry a – ghastly awful man – because he is rich – and important.”
He could hardly hear her words as they tumbled out.
As if the agony of telling him was too much for her,
Lolita hid her face against his shoulder.
“So this is why you ran away,” said Lord Seabrook quietly, “and it was a very sensible action for you to take. Now tell me what is your name and the name of your stepfather?”
Lolita paused and with an effort, she managed to say,
“I am – Lolita Vernon and my father – was the last – Earl of Walcott.”
Lord Seabrook gave a gasp.
“Why on earth didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I knew my stepfather would search for me and – take me back.”
“I told you I will not allow him to do so.”
“How can you – stop him?”
Lolita raised her head and looked up at him and he could see the terror in her eyes and feel the fear which made her tremble in his arms.
“Do you really think, my lovely one,” he asked softly,
“I could possibly lose you now? You need not be afraid. I promise you that your stepfather will not take you away.”
He realised that Lolita was trying to believe what he was saying.
Lord Seabrook released her from his tight hold.
“I will go downstairs,” he said, “and talk to your stepfather and you shall hear every word I say to him.”
“I cannot see him,” cried Lolita. “Just tell him – I am not here – I have left and you have – no idea where I am.”
“And where would you go?” he enquired, “where you would not be afraid he would follow you and find you? And how could you possibly leave Simon and me alone?”
Lolita looked at him, but she did not answer.
He smiled at her tenderly.
“You will have to trust me and I promise you that your stepfather will leave without you and that you will stay here with me.”
“How can you be sure? He is very powerful – because he is so rich.”
“I suppose that is why your mother married him.”
“Of course it was. She loved Papa and no one could ever take his place in her life. But she was so worried about me because we were so very, very poor and so she married him – although he was not in any way like Papa.”
“I know now,” he said, “why you prayed to your mother yesterday in the Chapel at the Priory. I think you should trust her and me to prevent you from having to do anything which would make you unhappy and miserable.”
“I want to believe you, but be very careful of Stepfather. He is very powerful as I have already told you and he has the law on his side.”
Even as she finished speaking there was a knock on the door. Lord Seabrook moved a little further away from her. “Come in.”
It was Barty who entered the bedroom.
“Excuse me, my Lord,” he said, “but there’s a gentleman called Mr. Piran who wishes to see you on what he says is a most important matter.”
“I am just coming down, Barty. Offer him some refresh
ment and I presume you have put him in my study.”
“Yes, my Lord.”
Barty left the room closing the door behind him.
Lord Seabrook reached out his hands to Lolita.
“I have asked you to trust me and I promise you again faithfully that whatever your stepfather says or does you will remain here at the castle with me and Simon.”
He took Lolita’s hands in his as he finished speaking. They were very cold and her fingers were trembling.
“You have been very brave and very clever,” he told her quietly, “and you will have to go on being brave and clever for a little while longer yet. Then it will all be over and you can be yourself as I have always wanted you to be.”
Lolita drew in her breath.
“How can you be – so sure?” she asked him with pleading eyes.
“That is what you are going to overhear.”
“I – cannot – meet – him,” whispered Lolita.
“I said you are going to hear what I am going to say and I will show you how it will be done.”
He drew her out of the room along the passage and down the stairs.
They walked towards the study and Lolita was just about to protest again that she could not meet her stepfather when Lord Seabrook stopped and opened a door.
It was, Lolita knew, the door to the tapestry room.
They had not used it since she had been at the castle.
It was quite an attractive room, the walls hung with ancient tapestries instead of pictures, which gave the room a rather doleful atmosphere.
There was a fireplace at one end of the room and on either side of it were bookcases.
Lord Seabrook took her to the one to the left of the fireplace and to her surprise when they reached it, he touched something on one side and the two top rows swung open.
She realised that there was a small opening in the side nearest the fireplace and through it she could look right into the study.
It was an ancient listening place, which must have been made hundreds of years earlier and this, she thought, had helped to ensure the safety of whoever was in charge of the castle in those times.
It meant that the Chieftain was always under the surveillance of his bodyguard, even when anyone he was interviewing believed they were alone with him.
Before opening the bookcase Lord Seabrook had put his finger to his lips as he moved away from Lolita.
Walking as lightly as he could on the carpet so that he would not be heard, he closed the door behind him without making a sound and Lolita could hear his footsteps in the passage leading to the door of the study.
She held her breath as she heard the door open and she put her eye to the watch-hole.
She could see her stepfather quite clearly as he rose from the chair where he had been sitting in front of the fireplace.
He was looking just as she had remembered – somewhat overwhelming and pleased with himself.
Yet when Lord Seabrook joined him, Ralph Piran suddenly seemed to look somewhat inferior.
The bluster so characteristic of his personality was an unpleasant contrast to the quiet politeness of Lord Seabrook.
“You have asked to see me, Mr. Piran,” he began as he reached him and held out his hand.
“I will come straight to the point, Lord Seabrook. I have come here because I understand you have in your household a young woman who calls herself Mrs. Bell and who is acting as governess to your nephew.”
“I should be interested to know who gave you this particular information.”
“I was having luncheon in White’s Club three days ago with Lord Stapleford, who is on the Board of one of my companies. He was greeted by a young man called Captain Michael Duncan, who I learned had recently been staying with you.”
“That is true.”
“He informed Lord Stapleford that the jewellery which had been stolen from his father had now been recovered and it had been found in your castle.”
Lord Seabrook nodded but did not reply.
Listening Lolita thought no one watching him would think he was wondering why this information should concern him in any way.
“When Lord Stapleford asked how you were,” Ralph Piran continued, “Captain Duncan replied that you were in excellent form and had employed, in his opinion, the most beautiful governess for your nephew he had ever seen in his whole life!”
His voice sharpened as he went on,
“In fact he described her so accurately that I recognised the ‘Mrs. Bell’ he was talking about as my stepdaughter, who had run away from me in an extremely annoying fashion just a short time ago.”
“Your stepdaughter!” exclaimed Lord Seabrook. “But why should she have run away?”
“For no sensible reason. But as you will not know, her name is not Mrs. Bell but Lady Lolita Vernon. As her legal Guardian, now that her father is dead, I am here to take her back with me.”
There was a pause before Lord Seabrook declared,
“I am afraid that is impossible.”
“What do you mean impossible?” Ralph Piran demanded in a very different tone of voice. “I need my stepdaughter with me and she must return to London to take her place in the Social world in which she has just made her debut.”
“I think, as she has just recently learnt of her mother’s death,” said Lord Seabrook quietly, “that is something she will have no wish to do. In fact she does not wish to go to London at all, but to stay here in Ullswater.”
“If that is your attitude, my Lord,” snarled Ralph Piran angrily, “it is something I am prepared to fight. When I leave here I shall go straight to see the Senior Police Officer of the district and demand his assistance in making my position as my stepdaughter’s Guardian crystal clear to you.”
“I am afraid whatever steps you may take,” Lord Seabrook told him, “they will be too late.”
“What do you mean by that?” demanded Ralph Piran. “How could what I demand possibly be too late? The law, as your Lordship well knows, is the law.”
“I am well aware of the law of the land, but I think the Senior Police Officer, who of course I know well, will be reluctant to bring into action any aspect of the law against my wife.”
There was a sudden silence while Ralph Piran stared at Lord Seabrook.
Then as Lolita held her breath, he managed to blurt out, “Did you say your – wife?”
“We are actually,” replied Lord Seabrook calmly,“being married tonight by the Bishop of Carlisle who is incidentally a relative of mine. I think, Mr. Piran, if you attempted to prevent the ceremony taking place, you would become the victim of the Press who would make a laughingstock of you.”
Again there was a silence.
“You really intend to marry my stepdaughter?”
“We love each other,” said Lord Seabrook, “and I know we will be very happy. As it would obviously upset Lolita to have to meet you and to be forced to listen to any reproaches or criticism of her behaviour, I can only ask you to leave my castle quietly and at once without seeing her.”
He waited for Ralph Piran to respond and as he did not do so he continued,
“Perhaps, after we have had our honeymoon and settled down, I will bring Lolita to London, and if you wish to meet her at my house in Grosvenor Square, I am sure she would wish to hear about her mother’s funeral from you and to collect any personal belongings she may have left behind.”
Ralph Piran was defeated.
He was too intelligent not to realise the obvious and with an obvious effort he managed to mutter,
“There is nothing I can say, my Lord, except that I hope Lolita will be very happy with you. As you have suggested, we could meet when you visit London.”
He made a gesture with his hands.
“I would of course like to be present at your wedding,but as that might prove embarrassing I will keep all I have to tell her until we meet.”
“Thank you, Mr. Piran, for understanding the situation and accepting it, as I thought y
ou would, in a manner which will make Lolita very happy.”
He spoke in a more friendly tone as he added,
“She has, I know, no wish to quarrel with anyone, but I can only comment on her courage in running away, and it was most fortunate I was able to offer her the security of my castle.”
“Of course, of course,” Ralph Piran agreed. “And now, as there is nothing more which need concern us, I will return to Penrith, where I can easily catch a train to London.”
“That is indeed true, and it would be extremely kind of you, Mr. Piran, if you would send here as soon as possible all Lolita’s clothes which she left behind in London.”
The two men were moving towards the door as he spoke.
Just for a moment Ralph Piran hesitated.
It was as if he thought he was being made use of, which was something he resented.
Then because he had always been impressed by titles and those who held them, he managed to reply quite pleasantly,
“Of course I will do so, my Lord. The trunks shall be brought to you by one of my staff so there will be no chance of their being stolen on the journey.”
“That is most kind of you and I am indeed grateful.”
They walked out of the study and Lolita heard them moving down the passage towards the hall.
As they passed the door of the tapestry room she stood very still and listened intently until she could no longer hear any footsteps.
Her stepfather was leaving and when he was gone she would be safe.
He could no longer hurt her and no longer drag her back to London to make her accept the advances and the touch of the repulsive Murdock Tanner.
She was free and she could be herself again at last.
She was her father and mother’s daughter and need no longer be afraid.
The door of the tapestry room opened and Lord Seabrook entered, closing the door behind him and standing still.
He was looking at Lolita as if he had never seen her before. As their eyes met he held out his arms.
Without thinking of anything except that he had saved her, she ran towards him and flung herself against him just as she had when she had run into his bedroom.
“Thank you – thank you,” she tried to say.
Love by the Lake Page 13