Rebel Heiress (17 page)

‘What a delightful surprise,' chimed in the second, reaching even higher to kiss Henrietta.

‘To find you still here in August.' The third had been patiently waiting her turn at Lady Marchmont's cheek.

‘We did not think Lady Marchmont could have left town without saying good-bye to her devoted friends,' said Miss Giddy.

‘And yet it seemed strange enough that you should be still lingering here,' added Miss Letitia.

‘But of course there is poor dear Lord Marchmont and his politics to be considered.' Miss Patricia made them sound like an infectious disease.

‘So altogether,' summed up Miss Giddy, ‘we hoped we might not be too late to come as petitioners to you.'

By this time they had all been swept, in a wave of muslin and orrisroot, into the morning room, where two chairs, close together by the window, spoke to Henrietta of the interview that had just taken place. And, still, Rivers was seeking her in the garden. But how could she escape?

Miss Patricia had her by the arm. ‘So you see,' she was explaining earnestly, ‘we feel ourselves compelled to ask it for poor dear Fanny's sake. And dear Lady Marchmont is so kind … so good; we knew we should not ask in vain.'

Henrietta, who knew all too well that Miss Fanny was the fourth and invalid Miss Giddy, in whose name her sisters would ask anything, turned to listen to the request the eldest sister was making. It was prefaced by an alarming list of Miss Fanny's new symptoms.

‘And Sir Henry Halford says,' Miss Giddy concluded triumphantly, ‘that she must have country air to build up her strength for next winter. Poor dear Fanny; if you could but see her, dear Lady Marchmont, you must pity her; so thin, so wan, so languid. “Do not trouble yourselves for me,” she said this morning. “I am nothing but a burden to you; let me pine away and die as the good Lord intended.”'

‘But
we
said' — Miss Letitia took up the tale —'we said: “Lady Marchmont would never forgive us if we did not tell her Sir Henry's verdict.”'

‘So often as she has urged us to consider Marchmont Hall as our own,” that is what we told Fanny,' explained Miss Patricia.

‘So here we are, humble petitioners,' concluded Miss Giddy. ‘Not for ourselves, of course, but for our poor dear Fanny who must have country air or die. And to think that you have not yet left for Marchmont! Why, it seems like the hand of Providence.'

‘Yes, indeed,' said Miss Patricia.

‘Perhaps there will even be some corner in one of the carriages where we could put our poor dear Fanny,' said Miss Letitia.

‘Of course, as for
us
' said Miss Giddy, ‘you know us, Lady Marchmont. We are old campaigners; the public coach is good enough for us.'

‘Though perhaps,' suggested Miss Patricia. '
One
of us should go with poor dear Fanny in case she has one of her seizures.'

‘Just the tiniest corner of a carriage,' said Miss Giddy. ‘You know how slender poor Fanny is.'

At last they all paused and three pairs of large brown eyes, in three thin brown faces, were directed eagerly at Lady Marchmont.

‘I collect,' she said, ‘that you wish to accompany us when we go to Marchmont.'

‘Dear Lady Marchmont,' said Miss Giddy.

‘Always so quick,' said Miss Letitia.

‘Always so
generous,
' said Miss Patricia.

The door of the room swung open. ‘I have looked everywhere,' began Charles Rivers. ‘Oh. I beg your pardon.'

They were upon him. ‘Dear Mr. Rivers,' said Miss Giddy.

‘We have not seen you this age,' said Miss Patricia.

‘But “Here's metal more attractive,”' sighed Miss Letitia.

‘Yes, indeed,' said Miss Giddy. ‘Who are we to complain that we have not seen you this month or more? What are our poor evenings compared with dear Lady Marchmont's soirees?'

‘But perhaps,' said Miss Patricia, ‘we shall be so fortunate as to have your company in the country.'

‘Yes,' said Miss Letitia. ‘Only think, Mr. Rivers. Dear, dear Lady Marchmont has invited us all — yes, four miserable spinsters that we are —'

‘To bear her company to Marchmont,' said Miss Giddy. ‘Of course, Lady Marchmont knows that any attic will do for us.'

‘Any garret,' said Miss Patricia.

‘Some nook under the tiles,' said Miss Letitia.
‘Though of course,' said Miss Giddy. ‘We must not forget poor dear Fanny's palpitations.'

‘No,' agreed Miss Letitia, ‘stairs are death to poor Fanny.'

‘And if she
were
to have one of her spasms,' added Miss Patricia.

‘It would be best if one of us were within call,' concluded Miss Giddy.

Lady Marchmont rose to her feet. ‘Well, that is settled then. We leave for Marchmont on Friday. It is but this morning decided, so you are arrived most happily.' Her voice was dry. ‘And naturally you will have your usual rooms. As for the journey, we must see what can be managed. Charles, you bring your carriage, do you not? But in the meantime, Henrietta and I must beg you to excuse us; we are expected this moment in the park. Henrietta, my love, you must make your best haste to change into your habit. Charles, you will accompany us, of course.'

He bowed a silent acquiesence while Henrietta said the quickest farewells she could to the voluble Miss Giddys and retired, with somewhat mixed emotions, to change. A ride in the park with Rivers was hardly a substitute for the private interview she had hoped for. But her immediate disappointment was lost in her pleasure at the news that Rivers was to accompany them to Marchmont. In the country, surely, there would be time to talk.

Henrietta's dream of country solitude with Rivers at her side was doomed to disappointment. She arrived to find Marchmont Hall full of the bustle preliminary to a week-end party. The house, her stepmother told her, was to be full to capacity. Lord Liverpool was coming down with several other members of the Ministry. Doubtless they wished to discuss the news of Bonaparte's invasion of Russia, which had set all political London in a whirl. And indeed, all week-end, the house was full of currents and crosscurrents, of interrupted conversations
and suspended sentences. Some new arrangement or combination seemed to be afoot, though Henrietta had no idea what it could be. Questioned, her father laughed and put her off.

‘No, no, child. You attend to your romantic affairs and leave my politics to me. This is too secret even for your ears.'

She could tell, however, that it was something that very much interested him, and the atmosphere of the house, all weekend, was full of a greater excitement than could be accounted for simply by the news of her engagement, about which, of course, each guest, as he arrived, had said all that was proper to her. Smiling and thanking them in turn, she wondered why she was not happier. True, she had still to await a proposal in form from Rivers. It was odd enough to have been officially engaged for several days and still not to have had the opportunity of accepting her lover's hand. And yet, she told herself, it was not so surprising after all. They had never been alone together for longer than a few minutes at a time. With the four Miss Giddys in the house, their chances of more seemed slight indeed.

But — and here was the rub — she was beginning to wonder whether Rivers really wanted such an opportunity. He behaved to her with all the attentions of an accepted lover: there was nothing to trouble her there. But on one or two occasions, when chance had seemed to be on their side — when she had really begun to hope that they might be alone for a while, whether in conservatory, library or shrubbery — it seemed that he himself, as if by accident, threw away the opportunity. She was shivering, he must fetch her shawl; the sun was too hot, he would get her hat … It was absurd; she must be imagining this; and yet the week-end passed and still there had been no
éclaircissement
between them.

And on Monday her father made his announcement. Lord Liverpool had done him the honour of asking him to go on a mission to the Czar, who had now become an ally, willy-nilly, on being attacked by the French. He was to leave at once. For a while all was forgotten in the bustle of his departure. It might be months before he returned, and he was to travel through the very heart of Europe at a time when Bonaparte seemed all-powerful there. All thoughts of her own affairs forgotten, Henrietta hung constantly about him, insisting on helping with his packing, and getting, as he laughingly told her, very seriously in his way.

He left with Lord Liverpool next day. Henrietta had begged to be allowed to accompany him back to town, but he would not let her. He was to drive with Lord Liverpool and they would be discussing the line he was to take in St. Petersburg. Henrietta would not be able to go with them. And besides, she had Rivers to consider. For the first time there was a faint suggestion of warmth in her father's voice when he referred to her engagement.

‘I confess, my dear,' he said, ‘it is something of a relief to me that I leave you an engaged young lady. If anything should happen to me — which I do not in the least expect — I have no doubt that Charles Rivers will take good care of you.' As so often, the criticism of Lady Marchmont remained unspoken between them. Both were aware that as a guardian she would leave a good deal to be desired. ‘I shall not have time to change my will again.' Lord Marchmont went on. ‘Nor, indeed, do I think it necessary. After proper provision for Lady Marchmont, I have left you my heiress unconditionally.'

But Henrietta did not want to talk of wills, nor even, for once, of Charles Rivers. It was her father's journey that exercised her mind. It seemed so soon, after finding him, to lose him again. She cried, unashamedly, when he actually left, and, shamed at last more by Lady Marchmont's crystal calm than by her own emotion, hurried into the garden to recover herself. Charles Rivers had ridden a little way with the London party and when she heard a horse coming up the drive, she thought with pleasure that he must have returned, so soon, to comfort her.

But the horseman, when he appeared, was not Rivers but Beaufrage, who came up the drive with a face of thunder. When he saw her, he reined in his horse.

‘The very person I wished to see.' He did not sound pleased. ‘Henrietta, what madness is this of yours?'

‘Madness? I do not understand you, Cedric.'

He jumped from his horse, looped the reins over his arm and turned to walk beside her, back the way he had come. ‘I have but this morning seen Friday's gazette with the announcement of your engagement. Need I say more?'

‘You could congratulate me, I collect.'

‘Congratulate you: I'll see you damned first. I beg your pardon' — he recovered himself — ‘but this news has near maddened me. What can you have been thinking of? And as for my
mother: I knew she was shatterbrained enough, but this is more than folly.'

Henrietta was growing angry. ‘I do not understand,' she said, ‘what affair my engagement is of Lady Marchmont's.'

He laughed harshly. ‘You do not understand! Truly, Henrietta, you are even more of a ninny than I had thought. You do not think my mother needs concern herself with your engagement to Rivers! I always took you for a green girl, but this passes everything. Is it possible you do not know?'

‘Do not know what? You are talking in riddles, which I neither like nor comprehend.'

He laughed again. ‘I am sorry to seem so mysterious, but it is hard to believe you ignorant of what all the world knows. I had thought at least the Miss Giddys, or even your own common sense would have enlightened you.'

‘About what?' She was nearly at the end of her patience.

‘Why, that Rivers and my mother have been lovers this age. Why did you think that your father looked so sourly on him? And that he haunted the house so? Not for the sake of your
beaux yeux,
I can tell you, though it may have suited my mother to let it seem so. But to carry it to the point of engagement: that is really the outside of enough, and so I shall tell her. Why do you think she gave in so gracefully on your arrival, but that she saw your presence would provide an admirable screen when Rivers returned, as, you will note, he soon did, with his convenient bout of “Walcheren fever”? Did you not think it odd that he should arrive so pat when we were down at Marchmont the last time? Did you not wonder how he knew where to find us? Have you never noticed, though he does his best to conceal it, how much he knows of our affairs, and how much, equally, my mother knows of his? They have been in constant correspondence for years, ever since she left my father for his sake. You did not know that, did you? Nor that when my father died my mother would have married Rivers if either of them had had but a feather to fly with? But my father had run through everything. The only kindness he ever did my mother was to die when he did and so save her the disgrace of a separation. And then my Lord Marchmont comes along, with his nabob's fortune, fresh home from India, and almost as innocent as you, and, hey presto, they are married, and the world's mouth is stopped. But it was touch and go, for a while there, with my mother's reputation, I can tell you. She
saved her bacon well enough then, but this, this using you as her screen — well, I tell you, it is too much, and so I shall tell her too.'

Henrietta had listened to this tirade in shocked silence. At first she had striven to disbelieve him, but it was impossible. The whole thing, appallingly, made sense, and she even realised that she could, if she had wished, have added to Cedric's indictment of his mother. Now, at last, she understood the scene that had led to her engagement. How could she have been so blind? But how, on the other hand, could she have suspected anything so sordid? Now it was all agonisingly clear. Lady Marchmont, thinking her husband safe at Chiswick that night, had sent for her lover. And then suddenly she had heard belowstairs the bustle that heralded Lord Marchmont's return — or, Henrietta wondered, did the ubiquitous Fenner act as look out on these occasions? At any rate, Fenner had been despatched, posthaste, to fetch her and thus give the assignation an appearance of innocence. Had Lady Marchmont planned all along to play the trump card of the engagement? Henrietta doubted it. She remembered her father's stony face as he entered. His wife had been frightened, as well she might, and had decided to risk all on a bluff. As for Rivers, no wonder if he had seemed silent and embarrassed. It must have been the first he had heard of it. At this point, Henrietta's thoughts became too painful to be borne.