06.The Penniless Peer (The Eternal Collection) (12 page)

At the sight of him, Madame D’Arbley sprang to her feet and moving swiftly towards him placed both her hands in his.

“Periquine,
Mon Cher,
what is this I hear?
C’est incroyable!
How could you do this to me when we have meant so —much to each other?”

Lord Corbury raised one of her hands to his lips.

“It is delightful to see you, Amaline,” he said, “and looking more attractive than ever.”

“Je ne comprends pas!”
Madame D’Arbley said in a voice low and vibrant with emotion. “You promised me marriage, you asked me to share my life with you!”

“I know, my dear,” Lord Corbury answered, “but you were not free. I had no idea that your husband would die so soon.”

“I told you! I told you that the doctors had not given him long to live!”

“He might however have lingered on for years.”

“Mais il est mort.
How could you be so cruel, so heartless as to forget me so quickly?”

Her voice broke dramatically, and Madame D’Arbley bent her head over Lord Corbury’s hand which she now held clasped to her heart.

Lord Corbury gave Fenella a glance which was a wild plea for help.

“I think, Periquine, that you should fetch Madame some refreshment,” Fenella said gently. “A glass of Madeira, perhaps? She has been travelling for a long time.”

“Yes, yes of course!” Lord Corbury said, disentangling himself from the clinging hands of the French woman.

“Sit down, Amaline, and I will bring you something to drink. That will make you feel better, I am sure of it.”

He hurried from the room with the eagerness of a man who was longing to escape from an unpleasant situation.

Madame D’Arbley sat down in an armchair, and drawing a black-edged handkerchief from her satin reticule, applied it to her eyes.

“I cannot believe it is happening to me!” she said. “How I have adored that man! I have been everything to him, his - how do you say? - his slave!”

“I can understand that, Madame,” Fenella said sympathetically, “but all men are the same. They feel lonely without a woman to look after them. Perhaps you were too kind and spoilt him so much when he was at your Chateau, that he found life insupportable when you were not beside him.”

Fenella hoped such an explanation would salve the pride of the widow. Although Lord Corbury suspected she was interested mainly in his title, Fenella was sure she was also genuinely enamoured of him.

Madame D’Arbley dabbed her eyes and Fenella could not help thinking how attractive she was and how it might even be advantageous for Periquine to marry someone so wealthy.

She could understand his being fascinated by her. It would, she thought, have been impossible for him to avoid having a passionate love affair with such a woman when they were together in France and he had little else to do.

‘Do all men,’ she wondered, ‘tire so quickly of their loves?’

At one moment they could find some woman irresistible and the next moment wish only to be rid of her. It was a depressing thought, and because Fenella was sorry for Madame D’Arbley, her voice was soft as she said,

 “I am sure,
Madame,
you will find real happiness elsewhere. You are young and because you are no longer
une jeune fille,
you are free to do what you like, and you have the money to be able to go anywhere in the world.”

“Nom de Dieu!”
Madame D’Arbley exclaimed, “but I wished to live here - here in this magnificent Chateau, of which Periquine had talked so often. I saw myself as the Chatelaine, entertaining, being the noble lady of my very handsome, noble husband.”

“I think perhaps you would find it very dull living in the country,” Fenella answered. “It is different from London, where there are parties, Balls and Assemblies, but here we are very quiet. Sometimes we go for days without even seeing a neighbour.”

“My Lord would be there!” Madame D’Arbley murmured, and that, thought Fenella, was unanswerable as an argument.

Lord Corbury returned, followed by old Barnes carrying a silver salver on which reposed a decanter of Madeira and some wine glasses.

He set it down on a small table and Lord Corbury poured some Madeira into a glass and carried it to Madame D’Arbley.

“I thought it best,” he said as he handed her the glass, “to keep your Post-Chaise as I know my - er - w — Fenella has told you that we have an infectious complaint in the house and I would not wish you, Amaline, to run the risk of catching it.”

Fenella noticed how he stumbled and was unable to utter the words, ‘my wife’, and suddenly she felt a little disgusted at the trick they were playing on the French woman, who after all had every reason to believe that Periquine had spoken the truth when he said he loved her.

Aware it would annoy him, at the same time feeling that he deserved to suffer a little for his past behaviour, she rose to her feet.

“I must enquire,” she said, “whether the driver of the Post-Chaise has been offered a glass of ale.”

And before Lord Corbury could think of an excuse to stop her she went from the room.

Outside in the hall she put her hands to her temples. She felt a little ashamed, but at the same time relieved. She might censure him, but at the same time she knew that Periquine would not have been really happy with a French wife who had nothing in common with his interests, his background or the life he enjoyed.

What would Madame D’Arbley know of English sport? Of the demands of a country house and the responsibility of a British nobleman to those who had lived on his estate for generations and whose well-being was as important as his own.

‘It would have been an impossible match,’ Fenella told herself, and yet she could not help feeling sorry for Madame D’Arbley if her heart ached as much as hers did.

How long she stood waiting in the hall she had no idea but it must have been over a quarter of an hour before the door of the Salon opened and Lord Corbury came out with Madame D’Arbley clinging to his arm.

There were tears on her cheeks and he was looking cross and uncomfortable which told Fenella only too clearly what had occurred.

“Oh, there you are, Fenella!” Lord Corbury said in relief. “I have persuaded
Madame
that it is wisest for her to leave at once. Scarlet fever is a most unpleasant disease, and I would never forgive myself if she were stricken down with it after travelling so many miles to see us.”

“Perhaps
Madame
, you will be able to visit us another time,” Fenella said.

The French woman did not answer, but still clinging to Lord Corbury’s arm proceeded slowly towards the front door.

Only when she looked out and saw the Post-Chaise waiting for her outside, did she seem to shiver as if she realised that the happiness with which she had set out on her long journey was finally and completely extinguished.

It was then she turned her face up to Lord Corbury’s.

“Adieu, mon cher,”
she said in a voice that trembled, “I shall never forget you.”

She put out her arms as she spoke and putting them round his neck, drew his head down to her.

She kissed him passionately on the lips and Fenella watching, felt once again the same stabbing pain that she had known when she had watched Periquine kissing the pretty lady in the coach.

This embrace however, did not take so long. Abruptly Madame D’Arbley drew herself free of Lord Corbury and walked down the steps ahead of him.

He helped her into the Post-Chaise. Once she was settled she put out her hand and he raised it to his lips.

“I am sorry, Amaline,” Fenella heard him say.

Then in a hard sharp tone which seemed almost to ring out, Madame D’Arbley replied,

 “Sorry!
Mère de Dieu! I
will never forgive you! Never!”

Lord Corbury stepped back, the driver whipped up his horses and the Post-Chaise moved away.

Lord Corbury stood politely on the steps until it was some way down the drive. Then he came back into the hall. He had taken a handkerchief from his pocket and was mopping his forehead.

“My God!” he ejaculated, “I hope never to go through anything like that again.”

He had spoken to Fenella, but when he looked the hall was empty, she was no longer there.

The dinner-party was an undoubted success. Hetty arrived looking exquisite and completely ravishing, in a gown which only another woman would have known was too elaborate for a quiet evening in the country.

She was also wearing a diamond necklace round her neck and there were diamonds sparkling in the ribbons which were entwined in her fair hair.

She evidently intended to dazzle both Lord Corbury and Sir Nicolas, and Fenella watching her realised she had never known Hetty take so much trouble, or deliberately set out to fascinate.

She was not jealous, what was the use? How could anyone compete with a creature so beautiful, so exquisitely dressed, so sparkling as Hetty?

Fenella had nothing to put on except a plain white muslin she had made herself some months previously to wear in the evening at home.

It was very simple with a fichu veiling her shoulders, her waist encircled with a sash she had worn since she was a child in the Nursery.

Nevertheless, Augustus Baldwyn condescended to ogle her quite outrageously and to be so over-impressive in his compliments that Fenella had the greatest difficulty in not laughing in his face.

More than once she exchanged a glance with Sir Nicolas and remembering their conversation about Augustus saw a twinkle of amusement in his eyes.

The food was unbelievably delicious. Sir Nicolas had certainly spoken the truth when he said that his valet was an experienced Chef, and even Lord Corbury seemed surprised when course after course was presented to him, each more succulent and exotic than the one before.

“I had no idea that Mrs. Buckle was such a good Cook,” Hetty said as she helped herself to a quail in aspic, from a dish skilfully decorated in a manner which would have done credit to Careme -
le Chef “par excellence”,
to the Prince Regent.

“She has made a special effort as you are here,” Lord Corbury replied, and catching Sir Nicolas’s eye, Fenella gave a hastily repressed laugh.

“Why do I see so little of you, Fenella, these days?”

Augustus Baldwyn asked ingratiatingly.

Fenella wondered if it was the excellent Claret which was making him so mellow.

“I expect because you do not bother to look for me,” she answered. “I am either here, or at home, while you, Augustus, I am sure are making your mark amongst the Bucks and Dandies of St. James’s.”

“You are right, my dear Fenella,” he replied conceitedly. “I play my part in the
Beau Monde,
but I would still like to see more of you. I will take you driving in my phaeton one afternoon.”

This, Fenella knew, was a gesture of high condescension from someone as puffed up with his own importance as Augustus Baldwyn.

“How very kind of you,” she replied, “but of course I would have to ask Mama if I can drive with a gentleman unchaperoned.”

“Good heavens, we do not have to be chaperoned!” Augustus Baldwyn exclaimed. “We have known each other since you were in your cradle, and I am sure your Mother makes no restrictions about your driving with Periquine.”

“Periquine is a cousin,” Fenella said demurely.

“A distant one,” Augustus remarked.

“Periquine’s grandmother was my grandmother’s first cousin,” Fenella said, and glanced at Sir Nicolas as she spoke.

“Of course!” he said quietly, “I realised that was where the Farquhars were linked with the Corbury family.”

“Corbury, or no Corbury,” Augustus said in an aggressive voice which showed that he was annoyed at Sir Nicolas joining in the conversation, “I will take you driving, Fenella. You will enjoy it.”

There was obviously nothing further to say to this, except to thank him. But Fenella made up her mind that nothing would induce her to go driving with Augustus, if she could possibly avoid it.

Two years ago, when she was only sixteen, Augustus had called at her home unexpectedly one afternoon with a box of plants for her mother from Lady Baldwyn.

Fenella had been alone when he was announced. She was sitting in front of the fire drying her hair which she had just washed.

It rioted like a wave, rich and red over her shoulders, framing her small face.

“Oh Augustus ! “ she exclaimed rising to her feet. “‘The servants should not have shown you in here! “

“Why not?” he questioned. “You look pretty like that.” He stood looking down at her, very grown up - the rich Beau patronising the village maiden! But there was something about him which made her feel nervous.

“I will fetch Mama.”

“Not so fast,” Augustus replied and she saw a glint of fire in his protruding eyes.

He caught hold of her arm as she would have passed him to reach the door and Fenella was suddenly afraid.

“Let me go!” she cried.

“When you have given me a kiss!” Augustus replied thickly in a voice which she felt was slimy and unpleasant.

 “I will do nothing of the sort!” Fenella retorted trying to pull her arm free of his fat hands.

But he was too strong for her. Inexorably, amused by her struggle to resist him, he drew her into his arms.

“Let me go! How dare you!”

Fenella was now really frightened, no man had ever touched her in such a manner. No man had ever kissed her.

“No! No ! I hate you! “ she screamed, twisting and turning but despairingly aware that she could not escape, could not be free of him.

Then just as with a kind of sick horror she realised his thick lips were only a few inches from her own and her voice seemed lost in her throat, the door opened and her mother entered the room.

Augustus released her and she had collapsed onto the floor, hiding her frightened face beneath her hair and feeling somehow defiled because he had touched her.

‘I hate him! I hate him!’ she told herself and was humiliated at her own weakness.

Her feeling had not changed with the passing of time. She disliked Augustus and everything he did.