Perceptions
A Sense of Misgiving
Wendy Soliman
Perceptions Series Book 3
A Sense of Misgiving
Copyright © Wendy Soliman 2019
Edited by Perry Iles
Cover Design by Jane Dixon-Smith
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Chapter One
Swindon: September 1880
‘The days are becoming cooler, my lady.’ Flora noticed her charge shiver. She threw another log onto the fire and resumed her seat on the stool at the dowager Countess of Swindon’s feet. ‘Autumn is my favourite season, and the early indications are that the colour of the leaves will be especially spectacular this year. There again, I am not in the middle of Salisbury. I have never had the pleasure of experiencing autumn in the countryside before.’
‘Cool, you say?’ The countess flapped a gnarled hand. ‘You young gels are too sensitive by half. I myself am never cold.’ Her ladyship didn’t appear to appreciate the irony as she adjusted the two thick shawls draped around her shoulders. ‘You need more meat on your bones, child. Then you would not feel the cold.’
‘I am not in the least cold, ma’am,’ Flora replied with perfect equanimity. ‘How could I be when this entire house is always so very warm?’
The countess sniffed. ‘I suppose the miserable hovel you were raised in didn’t run to decent fires.’
‘Certainly not as substantial as this one, and we were never allowed a fire in the bedchambers.’ Flora managed a wry smile. ‘Expenditure on creature comforts, in case you are not aware, is self-indulgent and therefore frowned upon in ecclesiastical circles.’
‘Bah! It seems to me that anything pleasurable don’t find favour with the clergy. Not that they ever practise what they preach. I’m willing to wager that your sainted father always had a roaring fire in his private rooms, leaving the rest of you to shiver in your shoes.’
Flora inclined her head. ‘How very astute of you.’
‘The clergy set impossible standards and then line their pockets with donations made by the guilty when they fail to live up to those standards. The fools fear hell and eternal damnation if they don’t make flamboyant gestures of contrition.’
Flora tilted her head in a considering fashion. ‘A little harsh, ma’am.’
The countess harrumphed. ‘You need to open your eyes to the real world around you.’
‘No need, my lady, since I have you to do it for me.’ Flora smiled. ‘Bear in mind that the clergy have a duty to concern themselves with our spiritual and moral wellbeing.’
‘Tosh!’ Her ladyship waved the suggestion aside. ‘They sit in their ivory towers and enjoy being judgemental, but they don’t feel disinclined to indulge in the pleasures of the flesh themselves. All that sackcloth and ashes behaviour makes my blood boil.’
‘My father does not. Indulge in unsuitable pursuits, I mean.’
The countess raised a brow. ‘Sure about that, are you?’
Flora hesitated. ‘As sure as I can be. Papa is very disciplined, so I simply assumed…’
‘He’s got you well and truly indoctrinated, girl.’
‘Hardly. If that were the case, I would not have found the courage to defy him and take up this position. He is furious with me still, and no longer acknowledges my existence.’
The old lady harrumphed ‘A cause for celebration, I should have thought.’
Flora nodded, wondering why she did not feel more relieved. Why she still had these niggling concerns about her family’s intentions. ‘I count by blessings in that regard,’ she said, sounding less than convincing even to her own ears.
‘The clergy excel at making us feel guilty, even when we have done nothing to feel guilty about. We allow them to get away with it by trooping to church Sunday after interminable Sunday on the misguided assumption that our sins will be forgiven, our consciences cleansed so that we can do it all over again.’ Her expression remained sceptical. ‘An exhausting nonsense of the blind following the blind, if you ask me.’
‘You do not attend church.’
‘Indeed I do not.’ The countess lifted her chin. ‘I was referring to the less enlightened. I have considerably more sense, and sufficient courage to question the clergy’s right to tell me what I ought or ought not to enjoy. Sin, and I speak from experience, is considerably more pleasurable than spending hours on one’s knees, praying to a deity one cannot see, and about whose existence one remains sceptical—’ Flora gasped. ‘Aha! I’ve finally managed to shock you, miss.’ The dowager looked smugly satisfied with that achievement. ‘You claim to be relieved to have got away from the restrictions that were placed upon you in your father’s tedious household, but deep down you are still very religious and cannot bear to hear even the slightest criticism of the church.’
‘Perhaps I am a dyed-in-the-wool Christian,’ Flora replied, ‘although I suspect that my father would give you an argument on that score. I have never been devout enough to satisfy him. Be that as it may, I’ve had the tenets of the Church of England drummed into me from the cradle and I have never questioned them, not really. Well, not until I enjoyed the privilege of making your acquaintance.’ It was Flora’s turn to wave a hand to emphasise her point. ‘I’m not blind to religion’s faults, but I do know that a lot of people take comfort from their faith, especially the bereaved.’ She tilted her head and smiled at her curmudgeonly charge, of whom she was inordinately fond. ‘Surely that’s not such a bad thing?’
‘I need tangible proof that God actually exists before I part with a single penny of my fortune to an institution that is already one of the wealthiest landowners in the country. Yet there are still thousands of empty bellies that they do absolutely nothing to fill. Where’s the Christian charity in that?’
‘Well, I don’t have all the answers, ma’am, and I agree with you that the church should be more generous when it comes to the needs of the destitute.’ Flora wondered how they had managed to get onto such a contentious subject. The countess enjoyed making mischief and constantly picked on Flora’s upbringing in the hope of goading her. Flora didn’t usually allow that to happen, but she was distracted today and the countess had caught her off guard. ‘They will probably tell you that they act in accordance with God’s will,’ she said, with the ghost of a smile.
‘Piffle! I’m baffled that people still believe all that codswallop in this day and age. It sounds like a massive confidence trick to me. One that has been perpetuated over the centuries. I question the power of a deity that no one’s ever actually seen, but I am the only member of this family who is supposedly out of her wits. No one knows quite what to do with me, so they have inflicted the daughter of a senior minister upon me just to test my patience. Or perhaps to try and curtail my irreverent ways.’ The dowager fo
lded her hands in her lap and gave a self-satisfied nod. ‘Well, my tiresome grandson will have to do a great deal better than that if he wants to keep me quiet. The day has yet to dawn when a wet-behind-the-ears slip of a girl will get the better of me. I mean, you haven’t even taken a lover yet, so what can you possibly know about the world?’
Flora smiled. ‘You seem determined to either quarrel or shock me this afternoon, ma’am, but it won’t serve. I fully intend to agree with every word you say, and we shall have a perfectly lovely time of it.’ She rested her elbow on her knee and her chin on her clenched fist. ‘Do you really think I should take a lover?’ she asked mischievously, calling the old lady’s bluff. ‘If so, perhaps you can advise me on a suitable choice, given your vast experience. I myself wouldn’t have the first idea what qualities to look for.’
Lady Berenger pouted, clearly disappointed that her tactics had failed to offend Flora. ‘No one listens to my advice anymore,’ she said with a hint of petulance.
‘On the contrary, ma’am. I hang on your every word.’
‘That’s because you’re a silly goose who is paid to humour me. I won’t cause you to blush by telling you precisely what I got up to in my younger days. Suffice it to say that when I enjoyed the protection of my maharajah, I saw and did things that would make your hair curl.’
‘Did you indeed?’ Flora leaned forward, her expression teasing. ‘What things? Do tell. I am inordinately interested, and promise not to blush if I can possibly help it.’
The countess huffed. ‘Never you mind. Despite your assurances, it would probably shock you into giving notice.’
‘And then you would finally be rid of me, which is what you desire anyway, so I have no idea what could be holding you back.’ Flora enjoyed her ladyship’s increasingly inventive efforts to behave outrageously. As far as Christianity was concerned, she had grown accustomed to the dowager’s forthright and radical views on the subject. At first totally astounded because she had never heard anyone speak quite so blasphemously before, the countess’s genuine doubts about God’s existence had actually caused Flora to take a fresh look at her own faith and the reasons why it was so deeply ingrained. Habit or true belief? A year ago, the question would not have crossed her mind. But now…
Flora’s crisis of faith had not arisen solely through the mischievous efforts of a wily old lady. Remus was responsible for the changes, too. Flora had always been able to sense when danger threatened. She had no idea how she knew, but when prescient visions flooded her mind she felt compelled to warn whomever they concerned. Her father had flown into such terrifying rages whenever she did so that she had quickly learned to keep her perceptions to herself.
Her paternal grandmother had enjoyed the gift of second sight and was often branded as a witch—the worst possible impediment to overcome for an overly religious son with fierce ambitions to take holy orders and rise up through the ecclesiastical ranks. Grandmamma had been kept out of sight of Papa’s fellow clergy for fear that she would disgrace him, but she knew that Flora had inherited her gift and encouraged her to make good use of it.
That had not been possible in the Canon Chancellor of Salisbury Cathedral’s strict household. But when Flora had defied her family and taken this position with the dowager countess six months previously, she also found herself with the spiritual freedom to think as she pleased. Which is when Remus, her spirit guide, had first appeared to her. Thanks to his warnings she had saved the current earl from a disastrous marriage and helped his brother Charlie to overcome various obstacles placed in the path of true love.
Remus had been quiet since then, and Flora had enjoyed a delightful summer at Beranger court in the heart of the Wiltshire countryside, where she was treated as a valued member of the earl’s family. Of the earl himself she had seen little. He had come and gone, dealing with the myriad duties that fell to his lot. There had been no occasion for her to spend more than a minute or two alone with him, and only then to discuss his grandmother’s state of health. He didn’t believe in her gift, even though he had been forced to acknowledge that it had helped his family on two occasions. He now seemed determined to treat her with polite distraction.
Flora told herself it was just as well.
‘I suppose my irresponsible grandson will return sooner or later and remember that I am alive,’ the dowager groused.
Flora could see that she was chilly, despite her earlier protests, and stood to drape a rug over her knees.
‘Don’t fuss so, child.’ But she didn’t push the rug off.
‘I understand he is due back from his shooting party in Scotland any day.’
‘Just so long as he hasn’t got himself engaged to be married without my first meeting his intended. The boy doesn’t have the sense he was born with when it comes to the fairer sex. Good looks are not everything, but Luke cannot always see past a pretty face. Ambitious fortune hunters abound, are often attractive, and are becoming wilier by the day.’
Flora felt an inappropriate acceleration of her heartbeat at the prospect of seeing Luke Beranger again. But her anticipation was tempered by the prospect of his finally having committed himself to matrimony. She enjoyed an unorthodox relationship with him, which a future wife would likely misunderstand and frown upon. Flora was a servant, and had no business having the earl’s ear, or offering him advice that he listened to and acted upon more often than not. She had always known this day would come. It was ridiculous to resent his happiness, and if he had found a suitable bride she would be the first to wish him joy.
She absolutely would.
‘His lordship has more sense than to be taken in by scheming females,’ Flora remarked, wondering whom she was attempting to convince.
‘Ha! Time will tell.’
‘You’re finding it hard to adjust, I expect. Emma is married and settled, and Mary has been staying with her for most of the summer,’ Flora said, referring to the countess’s two granddaughters.
‘It makes no difference to me. I never saw their faces from one week’s end to the next.’
‘They visited you every day and endured your bad temper with good grace, and well you know it.’
‘I am never bad tempered,’ the countess replied with another lofty toss of her head. ‘I simply cannot abide nincompoops despite being surrounded by them.’
‘I am sorry if I try your patience, ma’am.’
‘You are tolerable, I suppose, but far too opinionated.’
Flora bit her lip to prevent a smile from escaping. ‘Praise indeed,’ she muttered.
‘I keep telling my family that I don’t need a companion, but Luke will insist. You are by far the best of the bunch that they’ve inflicted upon me so far, which isn’t saying a great deal. I would send you back but for the fact that even I wouldn’t subject you to all that praying and repenting that you’ve managed to escape from.’
‘I am sure I’m much obliged to your ladyship.’ This time, despite her best efforts, a smile did slip past her guard.
‘You come of age next month and will be free of your family’s influence once and for all,’ the dowager said, in an abrupt change of subject.
‘Yes, I shall be one-and-twenty. Positively ancient.’
And that undeniable fact, Flora realised, was at the heart of the mild misgivings that had recently crept up on her. Her father had unexpectedly visited Beranger Court in the spring, demanding that Flora return to Salisbury and the bosom of her family. Someone had heard the dowager countess, in one of her more eccentric outbursts, expressing sacrilegious beliefs in a loud voice in the village. No daughter of the Canon Chancellor of Salisbury Cathedral could be associated with such a shockingly blasphemous female.
Flora had not the slightest intention of giving up a position within a family that had embraced her so generously, or turning her back on a charge who both challenged and entertained her. A lady who had shown her a great deal more attention than her own mother ever spared for her. The dowager herself prevented a terrible dis
pute between father and daughter by appearing in front of Papa with a bible in her hands, asking for Flora’s help to interpret a passage she didn’t understand. It was the first and only time that she had seen her father completely lost for words.
Since the countess had never once opened a bible in Flora’s presence, her little charade demonstrated how groundless her family’s concerns were regarding the old lady’s state of mind. She was not senile—merely lonely. She was, however, most definitely mischievous. Flora had grown to depend upon her sometimes quirky yet often sound common sense. She had been touched beyond words when the countess had used her wits to outmanoeuvre Papa and save Flora’s position, especially since she kept insisting that she had no need of her services.
Flora had heard nothing from her family since Papa had retreated in defeat. All her letters remained unanswered, but her father still wanted her back, she knew, even though she was his least favourite daughter. Her sixth sense told her that he had not given up on his plan to see her married to his curate, Mr Bolton. Flora thought the admittedly handsome cleric pompous, self-centred and dull. A mirror image of her father, in fact. She assumed Papa wanted the match to go ahead in order to somehow advance of his own career. If that was the case, she could expect to hear from him before she became legally independent.
There is nothing he can do to force me away from here.
She had seen Mr Bolton in the local village back in the spring, just before Charlie Beranger, the brother closest in age to the earl, had married Miranda Defoe. What the cleric was doing there she had been unable to fathom, but his presence had made her decidedly uneasy. He had no ecclesiastical duties that far from Salisbury, so he could only have been there in the hope of seeing her. She had pretended not to notice him. He hadn’t accosted her and she hadn’t come across him anywhere since then. But she still felt uneasy about the entire situation and would welcome some advice from the suspiciously absent Remus.
A Sense of Misgiving (Perceptions Book 3) Page 1