“So that is what you have been told?” the Dowager answered. “Some sneaking spy or paid informer has told you a lot of lies and you imagine that you can come here and arrest a Lynche! The impudence of it astounds me. Do you really believe that you can dishonour a name that has been respected in this place for over five centuries?”
“I am sorry, madam, but I must obey my orders,” Major Hartley replied. “And if a man, whoever he may be, is evading the law, he must be brought to justice.”
“Bring him then!” the Dowager retorted. “Try and find him! Try and drag him like a rat from his hole, but you will have your work cut out!”
‘She is magnificent!’ Carina thought, full of compassion at the stand the old lady was making.
But she knew that there was nothing any of them could do to check the inevitable and nothing to prevent Major Hartley and his men from acting on Sir Percy’s information and finding Giles Lynche and taking him away.
Yet the Dowager was fighting for her son, fighting as a tiger fights for its life until the very last breath.
“I regret the necessity, madam, but I must do my duty,” Major Hartley said, moving a little up the stairs.
It was then that the Dowager laughed.
“I hope you enjoy it!”
She put out her hands as she spoke and pushed with all her might against the great oil lamp that had been illuminating her as she stood there.
Someone gave a scream, Carina thought it was herself, and she heard an oath come from one of the Policemen as they realised what was happening.
The oil lamp fell forward, hitting the stairs, and with a resounding crash exploded and burst into flames!
The flames leapt upwards between the Chief Constable and the Dowager, who stood watching and laughing at the consternation below her.
For a moment Carina thought that she looked young and lovely as she must have been when she first came to The Castle as a bride.
Then, in horror, Carina saw that behind Lady Lynche there were more flames, and a cloud of dark smoke came belching from the corridor.
She put out her hand to clutch Lord Lynche’s arm to draw his attention to what she had seen and even as she did so someone behind her shrieked,
“The Castle is on fire – on fire, my Lord!”
It was a footman who had come running helter-skelter into the hall from below the staircase.
Someone yelled,
“Water! Get some water! Where is the fire engine?”
In the distance Carina heard a bell begin to toll and she realised that it was the fire bell.
She looked up again at the top of the stairs.
The Dowager had disappeared, but now the smoke in great thick clouds interspersed with leaping yellow flames was running along the ceiling and creeping along the floor to the banisters.
She felt Lord Lynche take her arm and propel her forcibly towards the door.
“Your mother – ” she tried to say, but they were moving too quickly for her to get her breath.
“Hurry!” he urged. “I must get you out of this.”
He hurried her through the hall.
Servants appeared from every direction, footmen, housemaids and the kitchen staff. Carina realised that they would have been having their evening meal and therefore were all on the ground floor.
The noise was incredible, the bell, tolling louder and louder as they reached the outer door, seemed almost deafening.
“There is a fire engine on the estate,” Lord Lynche shouted to one of the Policemen. “You will find it in one of the stables.”
“Very good, my Lord.”
He rushed off followed by several of the footmen.
Then Carina found herself outside with the cold air brushing against her cheeks.
“Dipa! Dipa!” she cried. “He is in bed in the nursery!”
“I will get him,” Lord Lynche replied.
He turned and left her as she reached the foot of the steps and she saw him plunge back into The Castle.
Carina looked up at the first floor. It was vivid with light and the flames were clearly visible in several rooms. She looked up further and saw that the second floor was also beginning to blaze.
Only the nurseries were dark and she found herself praying that Lord Lynche would find Dipa and bring him down to safety.
“It has got a real hold!” someone said beside her.
She suddenly realised that Lord Lynche might not return and that he and Dipa might be trapped up there!
A woman was being carried through the outer door by two men. It was Matthews.
“Her Ladyship! I can’t leave her Ladyship!” she sobbed.
“You can’t get to her,” one of the men said kindly, “the first floor is ablaze.”
The fire engine, small and somehow pitifully inadequate, came trundling round the side of The Castle. They had not waited to harness the horses. The grooms and men from the estate were pushing it and they started to unravel the long hose down to the lake.
But Carina’s eyes were on The Castle.
There was a sudden light in the nursery window and paralysed she watched the first flames creeping slowly up the curtains. Frantically she ran forward to shake Major Hartley’s arm as he stood on the steps giving orders.
“Lord Lynche – he is trying to save a child on the top floor!” she said. “Help him! Surely someone can help him!”
“No one can get up the stairs,” Major Hartley answered.
Carina gave a little cry.
“You must bring ladders!” But even as she spoke she knew that no ladder could reach the nurseries.
“Do something,” she pleaded, “do something to save them!”
Then she saw Lord Lynche come round the side of The Castle, with Dipa in his arms covered by a blanket.
She ran towards them and her feet seemed to have wings.
Lord Lynche’s hand was burned. His hair and eyebrows were scorched and there was a wound on one cheek. But his lips were smiling.
“You are safe! You are safe!”
The tears were pouring down Carina’s face, but her voice was lilting with joy and her eyes were like stars.
“We are safe,” Lord Lynche repeated.
Dipa threw back the blanket.
“Fire! Pretty, pretty fire!” he cried excitedly.
But Carina did not hear him.
Lord Lynche’s arms were around her and she hid her eyes, blind with tears, against his shoulder.
Chapter 12
“Lady Lynche by Sir Thomas Lawrence,” Carina said aloud and inscribed the words in her neat upright handwriting on the notepad that she held on her lap.
Then she looked up and smiled at the footman holding the picture.
“It’s less damaged than some of the others,” she said.
“Oh, it’ll be all right, miss,” he answered. “It’s mostly smoke, but those firemen did a power of damage to the tapestries with their hoses.”
“His Lordship must get someone down from London to advise what is the best way to restore them,” Carina said, speaking more to herself than to the footman.
Then, as he waited, she added,
“Put it with the others, will you?”
“It’s the last one, miss,” the footman told her. “His Lordship says the men have had a long day and they can leave everythin’ else till tomorrow.”
“I expect everyone is tired,” Carina said sympathetically.
She rose to her feet, realising that she had been sitting for a long time and her legs felt cramped.
She looked down the long beautifully proportioned ballroom where everything that was being salvaged from the fire had been stacked and thought with a sense of satisfaction that a great deal had been saved.
The ballroom was exquisite, with its white and gold walls and glittering crystal chandeliers.
Carina wondered a little wistfully if she would ever see a ball here with the ladies’ skirts billowing out over the parquet floor and the gentlemen twirling th
em around in that much criticised dance, the waltz.
She walked back through the house and, glancing at a big grandfather clock, saw that it was nearly five o’clock.
‘Another hour before I put Dipa to bed,’ she thought.
There was no need to worry about him. He had seemed not in the least upset by the dangers he had encountered the night before.
He had awoken well and cheerful and could talk of nothing but the kittens downstairs, asking incessantly how soon he could see them. Because Carina was sure that there were things she could do to help, she had taken Dipa down to the kitchen where the fat old cook had welcomed them both.
“Leave him with me, miss,” she said to Carina. “I’m used to children, havin’ had five of my own. And the little Prince will come to no harm playin’ with the kittens for their mother is one of the gentlest creatures I’ve ever known.”
Telling Dipa to be a good boy, Carina had gone in search of Lord Lynche, only to find that he had left at dawn for The Castle to try to salvage all that had not been completely destroyed by the fire.
Very soon the estate carts were coming down the long drive piled high with pictures and furniture, some badly burned, some only superficially spoiled by smoke and water.
Carina had them all put in the ballroom, as it was the one room in the house large enough to store everything. Then she had started to make a catalogue, feeling that by doing so she would assist Lord Lynche and at the same time soothe her own feelings of restlessness and apprehension.
Now after a long day she felt the emotions that she had been keeping at bay flood over her and she drew in her breath quickly when she reached the hall and saw a man come hurrying through the open door.
It was not, however, Lord Lynche, but his agent, Captain Andrews.
“Good afternoon, Miss Warner,” the agent said. “Has Lord Lynche returned yet?”
“No, not yet,” Carina replied.
“Then I will find him at The Castle,” Captain Andrews said. “I have just come from the hospital.”
“Is everyone all right?” Carina asked.
“Mrs. Barnstaple and old Newman are splendid,” Captain Andrews replied. “They are suffering from shock and the doctor thinks it wise for them to stay there for another twenty-four hours. But naturally they are agitating to come home, feeling that when there is a crisis they are indispensable.”
There was a pause before Carina asked in a low voice,
“And Sir Percy Rockley?”
“He is alive all right,” the agent answered. “His arm has been amputated. But the doctors say he should be well enough to go back to London in a week or so.”
Carina closed her eyes for a moment. She was uncertain whether she was glad or sorry at the news.
“And what about Robert?”
She had gone to sleep thinking of that ghastly moment when Lord Lynche was being held back from entering the blazing Castle door.
As he fought with those who restrained him, through the smoke and flames had staggered the terrible figure of a man. His clothes were on fire, his hair was scorched and his face burned and blackened almost out of recognition.
For a moment everyone had stared, almost it seemed unable to move because it did not seem possible that anyone could come through that inferno and live.
Then, as the burning figure flung himself, weeping bitterly, at Lord Lynche’s feet, Carina recognised the valet who had been in attendance on the white-haired man.
“I couldn’t move him, my Lord,” he sobbed. “I tried everythin’ – but I couldn’t move him – ”
The tears were pouring from his swollen eyes with their burnt lashes. His raw hands were held up beseechingly. Carina gave a little groan of horror at the sight of his blackened lips.
Lord Lynche beat out the flames, put his arm around the man and raised him to his feet.
“It’s all right, Robert,” she heard him say gently. “Mr. Giles was in a coma, he will have felt nothing. Now we must look after you.”
With the help of an ambulance man he half carried the weeping Robert to an ambulance and then came back to give orders that Carina and Dipa should be taken at once in a carriage to the house they had visited the morning they rode with him.
With a little start Carina forced her thoughts away from what had happened last night to hear the agent answering her question.
“I think Robert will be all right,” he said a little doubtfully. “I saw him, but he could not speak to me. They have given him something to make him sleep. His burns are bad, but the doctor said that he had seen worse cases.”
“Poor man!” Carina said and wondered if the agony in Robert’s voice would always haunt her.
“Well, I will go and see if I can find Lord Lynche,” Captain Andrews said in a more cheerful tone.
He bowed politely and hurried out through the front door.
Carina crossed the hall and went into the drawing room, feeling as she entered that it was one of the loveliest rooms she had ever seen.
Someone, she supposed it was one of the gardeners, had filled it with flowers from the hothouses at The Castle. There was a fire burning in the grate and the windows looking out over the gardens seemed to be full of sunshine.
It looked very different from when she had seen it first. Then there had been an unlived-in and sad atmosphere about it, as if it was lonely and without anyone to care for it. Now it had a welcome that Carina not only saw with her eyes but felt in her heart.
She walked to the mantelpiece and stood touching the exquisite Dresden ornaments with her soft fingertips.
She thought that she heard a horse’s hoofs in the distance and held her breath to listen.
She was waiting – waiting tremulously and a little afraid – for the man she loved.
She had never imagined that love could be like this. She had thought that it would be something quiet, peaceful and comforting, instead of which it was a burning fire that consumed her whole being even as the fire last night had consumed The Castle.
She was no longer sure of herself. She only knew that every breath she drew was like a sharp sword searing its way into her heart and every thought of him was an ecstasy beyond expression.
“I love you.”
She whispered the words beneath her breath and wanted to shout them aloud so that the whole room echoed with them. She loved him and she could think of nothing but her love and the feelings he aroused in her.
She wanted to consider everything dispassionately and logically but she could only feel and go on feeling, so that her whole being became an instrument of pulsating emotion that she had no control over.
He was coming! She heard his footsteps cross the hall and she turned her face towards the door. Her eyes were like lighted candles as he came into the room.
‘He is looking tired,’ she thought at her first glimpse of him. But then, as he saw her standing there, his face was transfigured.
In a few quick strides he was at her side.
“Carina,” he said, “you are all right?”
“But of course,” she answered.
And her eyes looking up into his said so much more than the mere conventional words.
“I have thought about you all day,” he said, “but I could not come until now.”
“Of course not,” she answered, “there was so much to do.”
His eyes held hers.
“You are so lovely,” he murmured, “lovelier than I remembered.”
She felt herself begin to tremble.
She knew that his eyes were on her lips and thought that he was about to kiss her, drawing in her breath in anticipation of the rapture that in one second would be hers.
But to her surprise he turned away from her.
“Carina,” he said. “I have something to ask you.”
“What is it?” she whispered.
She had to force herself to speak because the sudden constriction in her throat nearly suffocated her.
“I want to ask you to ma
rry me – ”
Then, as she felt as if the room swam round her, he went on,
“ – but before I tell you what you mean to me and what I know my life would be without you, I must tell you something else.”
Carina pressed her fingers against her breasts. Somehow she could not trust herself to speak.
“It is this,” Lord Lynche said and unexpectedly his voice was hard, “that if you marry me, if you take me as I am, then you are accepting a man who loves you with the whole of his being, but who has nothing else to give you.”
“What do you mean?” Carina asked, bewildered.
“I mean this – and therefore take your time before you give me your answer,” Lord Lynche replied. “I have nothing to lay at your feet except my heart. I am penniless, absolutely penniless.”
“But – I don’t understand,” Carina faltered.
For just one moment his lips twisted in a grim smile.
“Why should you?” he asked. “But what I am telling you is the truth. Come here.”
Carina moved slowly across the floor towards him almost as if she was mesmerised.
When she reached his side, he drew her to the window and they stood looking out over the Vale of Evesham towards the blue silhouette of the Malvern Hills against the evening sky.
“You see that?” he asked.
“Yes,” Carina answered, wonderingly.
“Once I believed that the land as far as the eye can see would belong to me, would be mine to administer, to love and to care for as my ancestors have done since the time of the Norman Conquest,” Lord Lynche went on. “But now it is no longer mine. And, although this house belongs to me, as I told you yesterday, now that The Castle has gone, it must be the family seat, the focal point from which the Lynche family carries on its name.”
“But what are you saying?” Carina cried. “I thought Sir Percy – ”
Lord Lynche shook his head and interrupted her.
“It has nothing to do with Percy Rockley,” he said. “He is finished and forgotten. No, all this, Carina darling, must belong to the Head of the Family and there is nothing I can do except to give my house to him for his children in the future.”
“But you are Lord Lynche,” Carina said insistently.
He shook his head.
The Fire of Love Page 21