A Little Folly (7 page)

Louisa was very ready to agree that it was. There was for her a keen interest in this tale of a father, very different from her own in his habit of neglect rather than control but no less capricious and arbitrary in his dispensation of his children’s lives. She was thankful at least that their treatment had thrust her and Valentine closer together; the young earl’s unbrotherly conduct seeming an inevitable result – shocking, but not surprising – in a family where natural feeling was so little promoted or valued.

‘For my part I cannot conceive of anything so inhuman,’ Sophie went on, ‘but then Papa was always so fond and indulgent with us – too much so, I dare say. I surmise – can we be confidential? – that your own experience was different. Mama always said that Sir Clement tended to strictness – oh, but she said so only in terms of respect—’

‘My father was strict and severe in everything,’ Louisa said simply.

‘Yet you are so good-tempered! But there, I’ll say no more of that. – I was telling you of Harriet. Well, her marriage stirred a good deal of talk in society: ordinarily it would soon have died down. But they remained very conspicuous: Colonel Eversholt, I fear, was quite as addicted to high living as the old earl had been; and she, as she has readily confessed to me, was dazzled at being his bride. Being, as you see, a considerable beauty – though her late trials have sadly darkened her looks – she was glad to dress, and go about, and shine, and feel herself the object of regard and attention. Alas, the spirited temperament that had so captivated her in Colonel Eversholt began to reveal itself in less pleasing ways. – He had threatened to horsewhip the young earl when he slighted Harriet – gallant enough, if hot-headed; but such violent outbursts became more frequent, especially as his income began to prove unequal to his style of living. He soon acquired a name for being unapproachable, particularly when he had lost heavily at the tables; and I regret to say that the wife he had won with such ardour at last became the frequent victim of the worst excesses of his ill-temper.’

‘This is terrible,’ breathed Louisa, though it was not so terrible that she was not eager to hear more.

‘Mind, Harriet has never been forthcoming on that last part; but I know how to read a painful silence as well as the next woman, I hope. It was at this time that I became acquainted with her, having often seen her in town, from a distance; and observed the swift change from a brilliant bride to a woman reserved – sorrowful – and, as I found, sorely in need of a friend, who could listen without leaping to judgement. For there was no lack of voices to say that she had reaped what she had sown, and had no one to blame but herself.’

‘Yes. I can just hear them,’ Louisa said, with warmth. She could hear
one
, certainly. ‘But no woman can be held to deserve that, surely – not for any reason; and certainly not for acting on the heart’s impulse.’

‘I knew you would be of my mind. Yet it was from other women that I heard the harshest reflections on Harriet’s character – which I confess endeared her to me all the more. If I wished to be part of a herd,’ Sophie said, drawing herself up with elfin solemnity, ‘I should have been born a cow. I have often told people that, and they never know how to answer it. Harriet is a delightful creature – tender-hearted – and no one more amusing when she is in spirits. Those, however, are now quite sunk, as you may have divined. My dear cousin, here is where I must test your liberality of spirit. – Harriet is living apart from her husband.’

‘So I should hope,’ cried Louisa, who was growing bolder by the moment. ‘That is, if his conduct has been as you describe.’

‘All of that and worse,’ said Sophie, opening her eyes even wider, if that were possible. ‘Still, some might say it was her duty to endure it. But she could not sacrifice self-respect on the altar of convention. That’s rather a good phrase, isn’t it? I must have read it somewhere. – Yes, she left his house when she could bear no more, making no complaint of his cruel treatment – common report had sufficiently established that – but only to secure herself from further outrages. Her brother persisted in his opinion that she had made her bed; and Colonel Eversholt has been as furious against her as may be expected, abusing her as an undutiful wife and, what is worse, denying her any decent maintenance.’

‘But he is not obliged to do so?’

‘If the separation were to be placed on a legal footing, then he might be brought to it. But Harriet is reluctant to subject herself to the further publicity and scandal of the courts; and besides, though she is the last woman to prate of her feelings, I suspect that though she cannot bear to be any longer under Colonel Eversholt’s roof, her heart is not entirely closed against him; and that love can sustain the greatest injury, and still not die. I suspect she nurtures a secret hope that he may change, that her situation may resolve itself as happily as it seemed to begin. But in the meantime she must support herself as best she can; and, as she candidly admits, her education fitted her for nothing. So, Louisa, she is obliged to keep a faro-bank.’

‘Really?’ said Louisa. Not knowing what a faro-bank was, but hating to admit it, she tried to include in her tone everything from outright shock to easy acceptance, with a result almost operatic in effect.

‘Yes: she took a lease on a house in Jermyn Street, and there presided – at a cost to her reputation, you may be sure; though she has friends, among whom I hope I am numbered, who are compassionate rather than condemn her. And, in any case, no one can despise her more than she does herself; and it was a crisis of the nerves, brought on by her wretched consciousness of her situation, that resulted in her physician ordering her to the sea for her health. – And so I came upon her again at Lyme. I was shocked to see her so low – so changed; but in truth it was a happy circumstance, for at Lyme solitude was beginning to undo what sea air had repaired. Our intimacy rapidly increased: much that I have told you I learned fully only while we were so much together at Lyme. I dare say any sympathetic presence would have had the same effect on her, poor thing – it happened to be me. But such was the attachment that I could not bear to think of her left alone again. Though neither could I bear to abandon the opportunity of meeting my cousins at last: hence the result: hence my presumption, my dear Louisa, in bringing her here.’

‘It is an unhappy story indeed. I hope we should have welcomed any friend of yours, even without it; so you may believe I am very far from seeing anything like presumption – and I can answer for Valentine’s being of the same mind, for we always feel alike. But I do have one anxiety. – From what you have told me of Lady Harriet, I am afraid she will find life at Pennacombe very dull.’

‘My dear, have no fear on that score. It was with difficulty that I overcame Harriet’s own scruples about coming here unintroduced – but it was the very thought of a healthful, kindly, retired spot, and the balm it might offer to her nerves, that seemed at last to overcome them.’

There was so much in the story of Lady Harriet to appeal to Louisa’s strong sense of fancy – not unmixed, perhaps, with a guilty thrill in imagining her father’s reaction at having her under his roof – that it might almost have displaced her fascination in meeting her cousins. On their going down to dinner, however, the Lady Harriet of Sophie’s narrative gave way again to the quiet, undemonstrative woman, elegantly but soberly dressed, who seemed to wish only to be noticed as little as possible; and attention fastened again on the Speddings, who revealed themselves to be excellent company, and who made the dining-room so talkative, animated and cheerful, that it was hard to remember that it had once been the most oppressive place in the house, the scene of freezing silences, needling interrogations, and servants in such stiff terror of clattering the crockery as made clumsiness inevitable.

‘Capital – couldn’t be better,’ was Tom Spedding’s reply, on Louisa’s asking if he found his room comfortable. ‘Only I hope you haven’t gone to the trouble of giving Sophie a bed: for she doesn’t sleep, you know: not she – never a wink!’

‘Oh, Tom, you shocking fibster – pay no heed to him, I beg you. I certainly do sleep, though it’s true I have never much cared for it, and see it as a thing to be got over. Besides, Tom,
you
go to the opposite extreme:
you
once fell asleep sitting on a stile, which in anyone else but you would be a physical impossibility – now don’t deny it.’

Tom, laughing, did not. – His good humour seemed unassailable. Everything met with his hearty approbation: not only was his room capital, but the house, the dining-table, the fire in the grate, the entrance of the roast mutton, all received from him the tribute of being splendid, famous, or just the thing. The minute attention he had given to his hair and clothes before coming into dinner, and his surreptitious and doomed attempts to see the back of his head in the pier-glass, suggested perhaps that his mind was not as developed as his figure; and he had an occasional tendency, when narrating an anecdote, to presuppose that everything familiar to him was familiar to his hearer; as, when describing a favourite dog, he added to Louisa: ‘Got him as a pup from old Southwood. Not his brother, the other one. Queer old cove. Had half a finger missing. Gave me a whipping once for stealing greengages. No?’ But on discovering that Louisa did not share these entirely personal memories, he laughed at himself with the same good humour.

It was only after dinner that Lady Harriet came a little out of her shell, seating herself beside Louisa, and saying, in her cool shaded voice: ‘Miss Carnell, I will not embarrass you with thanks for the welcome you and Mr Carnell have given me. It is more than I could wish. But if any misconceptions concern my presence here, I must correct them. Sophie, I am sure, has told you all about me.’

Louisa, in some discomfort, hesitated over her answer; but Lady Harriet surprised her by quickly squeezing her hand.

‘I see from your look that she has. Good, because I wished it so: nothing less than a full account of my situation is owing to you. But what I wish to make plain is that it was my importunity that brought me here. Knowing Sophie, she will have taken the blame to herself, and said she could not part with me. But I fear I have lately been so very dependent on her – clinging, call it – that she was left with little choice.’ Lady Harriet gave a brief, bare smile, in which the beauty for which she had been celebrated was startlingly renewed. ‘There, that is all I have to say. You need not fear that I will be always remarking on these circumstances.’

Nor did she, at least for the rest of the evening. Evidently Lady Harriet was so dead to pleasures that even the one most universally enjoyed – talking at great length about oneself – was denied to her.

After their guests had gone to bed, Louisa and Valentine stayed some time in the drawing-room that had seen the removal of the fire-screen, reflecting on the swift changes that had followed it, and expressing their equal pleasure in the society of their cousins: Valentine finding Tom extremely well-bred, agreeable, and refreshing in the ease and openness of his manners. Louisa had had a hint from Sophie after dinner that it would be only proper if Valentine also knew the history of her friend; and so she told it, as nearly as possible in Sophie’s words – not feeling equipped by experience or understanding to put any of her own gloss on them and, besides, rather liking her cousin’s light, rapid way of speaking, and wishing it were her own.

Valentine heard Lady Harriet’s story as attentively as he had looked all evening at the lady herself. ‘No,’ he concluded, with a sigh, shaking his head, ‘none of this surprises me. Her sorrows are there to be read in her face.’

‘Even her being obliged to keep a faro-bank?’

‘Oh, I do not think that the worst of it: do you?’

‘Well, it depends on what
sort
of faro-bank it is, to be sure. If it is a – oh, Valentine, I am trying to convey to you that I don’t know what a faro-bank is, and you are supposed to help me to an understanding without my having to ask you.’

‘Ah, forgive me. That was too subtle for me. A faro-bank – well, faro is a game at cards—’

‘I
thought
it was. But the keeping of a bank confused me.’

‘Faro is a banker’s game: that is, when you bet on the turn of the cards you bet against the banker, or dealer. If you lose, the banker keeps the stake. So it can be profitable, if someone sets up a house at which faro-games are regularly conducted, and they can attract a good number of players to it.’

‘So you mean Lady Harriet keeps a gaming-house? Is that not against the law?’

‘Oh, it depends on the zeal of the magistrates, I think. It can plausibly be presented as the holding of a private party, after all, at which the guests happen to be gaming at cards. I have often heard of ladies of quality doing this, when they – well, when they are in an unfortunate position, as Lady Harriet is. I for one would certainly not condemn her for it.’

‘Oh, neither would I,’ said Louisa, quickly.

‘You know, I grow more and more disgusted at the illiberal thinking of the world,’ Valentine said, frowning and raking the fire. ‘The haste to leap on the moral high horse – the disregard for the honest impulses of the human heart. Well, we shall set a different example at Pennacombe, I hope. – Louisa, we must have a dinner. I should not want Lady Harriet to feel in the least that we are constrained by her presence: no, she shall be treated as an honoured guest. We shall invite our friends – aye, and let that old humbug Dr Sayles come too. And then Pearce Lynley – an invitation is surely owing there.’

‘I do not consider anything as particularly
owing
in that quarter.’

‘Perhaps not. – Still, he is a notable man after all, and we surely don’t want our cousins thinking we know no one of consequence.’ He shrugged away from her look of mild surprise at this, coughed, and recovered himself by adding, with a teasing smile: ‘And besides, Louisa, you must know you cannot avoid him for ever.’

T
he Carnells and the Speddings were very soon on terms not merely of cordiality but of intimacy. At least in the case of Valentine and Tom, they were much together; shooting was over, but they rode every morning; before and after dinner they often talked together for minutes at a time; and each referred to the other as an excellent fellow. Even Louisa’s limited experience recognised in this the ultimate expression of masculine sentiment; and when Tom began to teach Valentine the newest and most fashionable methods of tying the cravat, their friendship was plainly placed on unshakeable foundations.

As for Sophie, she was so forthcoming, so free of reserve, and so gratifyingly inclined to like her, that it was impossible for Louisa to imagine being anything less than confidential with her. Whether Tom’s assertion that she did not sleep were true or not, she certainly possessed great vivacity: but it was not of the relentless sort that leaves one longing for a little lifeless silence. She was as eager to listen as to tell – a fact that occasioned in Louisa, at first, some constraint; for Sophie had been accustomed to going about with her brother since he was at Oxford, and clearly knew so much of London, of Bath and all the watering-places, of country-house parties and town crushes, that Louisa feared she had little of interest to offer in return. – But Sophie, in her affectionate way, would have none of this. She was hungry for everything Louisa had to say, and found equal fascination in all of it. It was a stimulating thought, that even having a great deal of experience did not diminish the appetite for more.

Instructive, too, was the manifest ease between Tom and Sophie, which must be a reflection of their very different upbringing. They could abuse each other with the greatest good humour, rising to such epithets as
great starched booby
and
prattling featherhead
; and their true affection was unimpaired. Between Louisa and Valentine, the very tightness of the bond precluded such freedom. They had both received too many insults in earnest. If Louisa could speak with anyone in that way it was, curiously, Mr Tresilian; but with her brother, it would have been like playing with knives.

The presence of Lady Harriet might have acted as a check on the rapid familiarity of the cousins, but she conducted herself much as she had hinted on that first evening – seeming only to seek quiet and retirement. She did not monopolise Sophie’s attention: spent a lot of time writing letters, but did not receive any; and would sometimes smile distantly but tenderly at the high spirits of the others, as if a great number of years separated her from them. – Her situation brought out all the warm chivalry of Valentine’s nature. His brow would cloud if ever Sophie, in whom volubility occasionally overleaped tact, happened to mention the name of Colonel Eversholt; and he exerted himself constantly in attention to Lady Harriet’s comfort – though always with a delicacy that would not render her conspicuous.

Her presence must excite remark, of course, at the dinner Valentine insisted on, but this would be lost in the general novelty of their being company at Pennacombe House. Curiosity brought a ready attendance from their guests, except the rector, Dr Sayles, who came only to be offended and disapproving, and remained throughout as much on his dignity as was possible to a man with horse’s teeth and large bunches of hair growing out of his ears. The occasion went well; Louisa felt that with the Speddings there, it could hardly go otherwise. Before the first course was over, Tom was confiding to her that he had never met such a thoroughly agreeable set of people in his life. This was in spite of his having on his other side the doleful shawled figure of Miss Rose, emanating murmurs about preventively throwing herself off ledges and into lakes before she would be a nuisance to anyone. But in her determination to be disregarded she had met a stiff enemy in Tom, who persisted in helping her to the choicest slices of meat, and in finding everything she said interesting, to her almost complete bafflement. There seemed in the end no recourse for her except to be civil, pleasant and cheerful in return. Miss Rose managed to avoid
that
, naturally, but it was a close-run thing.

‘Well, my dear, I was never more delighted,’ Mrs Lappage cried, seizing on Louisa when the ladies withdrew. ‘Such very charming young people! Such elegance, without the least affectation! I heartily congratulate you for improving the acquaintance; and indeed there is such a degree of amiability and good manners that one can only wonder why the acquaintance was rejected before, in a certain quarter. But then one does
not
wonder, on recollection – amiability and good manners being not at all esteemed in that certain quarter: but I will not allude to that. And as for their companion –’ lowering her voice ‘– I feel sure I have seen her portrait engraved in a London paper, illustrating notable beauties. There is certainly a good deal more reserve in her manner; and if I thought that was in any way to do with her finding some of her company beneath her, I should be a little dismayed – but your look tells me it is nothing of the sort, my dear, so I say no more of it.’

Certainly Lady Harriet had said little at dinner but, then, she had not had the most engaging of companions. – Mr Lynley, at Louisa’s instigation, had been at her side. She was sure that his pride, at least, would be gratified in taking in to dinner the lady of the highest rank there: rank was always a first consideration with him; but Louisa had not acted to oblige him, only to deliver herself from his society. It was true, as Valentine had hinted, that she could not for ever evade him or, rather, that formal avowal of his intentions which he had given her notice to expect; but he was unlikely to make it in the course of a dinner-party, and she could at least secure the temporary comfort of not having to talk to him. He had appeared, however, not at all put out, as far as his immovable expression could be judged; and seemed chiefly occupied with a minute observation of the newcomers, and the storing up of his gathered intelligence against a conclusion.

‘And I fancy I am not the only one favourably impressed,’ Mrs Lappage went on. ‘Mr Tresilian, I could not help but observe at dinner, was most forcibly struck by Miss Spedding.’

‘Was he?’ cried Louisa, in surprise. ‘I did not remark it.’

‘Oh, nothing
demonstrative
– that is not his way; but I saw him several times absolutely gazing at her – I would almost say, as if he were lost in admiration.’

‘Mr Tresilian? Well, perhaps you are right, ma’am.’ It was quite a new idea – but, Louisa thought after a moment’s reflection, a mistaken one. When Mr Tresilian gazed in that abstracted way, it usually meant he was thinking about the new excise duty.

No, she strongly doubted that Mrs Lappage had read Mr Tresilian aright; still, with a sharpness of curiosity she could hardly account for, she resolved to be watchful when the gentlemen rejoined them. – Alas, when they walked into the drawing-room her attention was promptly claimed, or appropriated, by Mr Lynley, who took his seat by her as if by right; and receiving from her hands his tea, which by unhappy lack of foresight she had neglected to fortify with poison, declared: ‘Well, your cousins seem tolerably well-bred people on the whole. They are rather inclined to fashion, I think; but I have had some conversation with Mr Spedding, and it appears their fortune is at least equal to it.’

‘I dare say: I have not thought of it. I have been chiefly occupied with the simple pleasure of getting to know them, as they are our nearest family.’

‘Very proper. That is not, of course, a consideration that can be extended to their companion. I am curious to know how Lady Harriet comes to be travelling with them. I have been thinking on her name. Eversholt is not, as I recall, a family name occurring in the peerage, which suggests she must be married, or widowed.’

‘I congratulate you on your detective skills, Mr Lynley: I’m sure you may become a Bow Street Runner whenever you choose to apply.’

‘Naturally,’ he said, ignoring this, ‘neither you nor Mr Carnell would have welcomed her to Pennacombe without some previous assurance as to her character and situation in life.’

‘She is a guest, Mr Lynley, not a governess.’

He made no answer to this, but sat regarding her with a look more quizzical than his usual coolness admitted. Perhaps it was the dressing of her hair, which she had done rather after Sophie’s fashion; whatever the reason, it made her sufficiently uncomfortable.

‘So, have you any more news of your brother, Mr Lynley?’

‘I hear, through an Admiralty connection, that he has taken ship: he will be in England as soon as the winds permit.’

‘No doubt it will be a great comfort to you to have him restored.’

‘I am happy that he is safe, certainly. Comfort is not a term I would apply in this instance, nor in anything connected with Francis,’ he said, with his severest composure.

‘I’m sure I should be greatly agitated if my brother were to be returning wounded from overseas.’

‘Your familial feeling does you credit. – Allow me to remark, however, that the situation is quite different.’

That
allow me to remark
was a characteristic phrase of Mr Lynley’s that in Louisa’s view contained, in little, all that was detestable about him. There was, after all, not the slightest possibility of his
not
being allowed to remark, ever – as he well knew; but the phrase established his superiority, put you in your place, and cast over the conversation the deep chill that he appeared to consider the median temperature for human relations. – Fortunately she had not long to remain at this pitch of vexation with him. Mr Tresilian came to entreat her to play, and conduct her to the pianoforte.

‘The fact is,’ he confided, ‘they’re talking of Kate playing; but the newcomers have made her shy so I thought if we had you, it would cover it over for now.’

‘There is no resisting such a gracious invitation. What do you like best about my playing, Mr Tresilian? The wrong notes, or the splendid force with which I hit them?’

He thought. ‘No: the way you look at the music, as if it were a threatening letter written in blood.’

She was not so diverted by this as to forget to watch him when he returned to his seat by Sophie; and having got creditably to the end of her first piece without taking too many musical wrong turnings, she observed them further. There was certainly a marked attention in his manner; but the gaze he fixed on Sophie struck Louisa chiefly by its wistfulness. – It seemed the look of a man remembering, rather than admiring. As a girl she had only glimpsed the late Mrs Tresilian once or twice, Sir Clement not in the least inclining to bridal visits; but putting that together with all she had heard of her, she wondered if Sophie, with her dainty vitality, was reminding Mr Tresilian of his unfortunate choice, and with what emotions he contemplated the likeness.

Presently Kate was prevailed upon to play – it was Lady Harriet, with a few discreet and skilful words, who achieved it; and as Mr Tresilian’s attention was now claimed by Miss Rose, who was looking unhappy so that she could deny looking unhappy, Louisa took the opportunity of asking Sophie how she liked her dinner companion.

‘Oh, excessively! I thought at first I should get nothing from him – but he is quite a delightfully whimsical creature; and when I asked him about his name, and whether it is Cornish, he said yes, but I must be quiet about it, because the men of Devonshire and the men of Cornwall have disliked each other since time immemorial, and he was liable to be put in a sack by night and dropped in the Tamar. His face was so dreadfully solemn that for a moment I thought he was serious.’

‘Mr Tresilian does not often say serious things.’

‘No – and yet there is the most interesting melancholy about his face; and then something boyish too, when he smiles – though at first I supposed him past thirty.’

‘He is, I think, eight-and-twenty.’ Louisa doubted that it was appropriate for her to give Sophie his history; and indeed found herself feeling a little proprietorial about it, and faintly resentful of such speculations from a newcomer, when she knew him so well. But she was doubtful also whether it was something her cousin actively sought. If anyone else had spoken so, she might have suspected a partiality; but in Sophie’s words and expression, she discerned nothing more than the Spedding tendency to find everybody likeable.

The party broke up early – much earlier than suited Valentine, who wished parties to go on for ever – at the instigation of Mr Lynley, who asked for his carriage to be brought round. The Tresilians, who only used theirs when there was Miss Rose to be conveyed, thought they had better go too, to save troubling the servants twice over; and so started a general leave-taking. Mr Lynley, who still wore an air of privately drawing conclusions, chose a moment in the hall to speak to Louisa alone.

‘I hope, Miss Carnell, that the demands of your company will not prevent me from calling at Pennacombe in my accustomed manner, and having some talk with you alone,’ he said, in a tone very little like that of a man asking a favour, and much like one asserting a right.

‘Certainly: though as you remark, Mr Lynley, the entertainment of our guests must have the first claim.’

She thought she had done rather well in answering him with his own cold propriety of expression; but she could not be comfortable under his steadfast regard; and she hardly knew how to answer when he went on: ‘As to
claims
, there are those which are incidental and temporary – and those which are of long standing, and reinforced by the strongest authority. The balance between them, my dear Miss Carnell, I leave to your good sense to judge; but as this touches on the matter I wish to discuss, I shall not anticipate.’

For some time afterwards she felt as drearily crushed and helpless as she had after her father’s worst rebukes – a sensation very unwelcome in its return; and it took all the liveliness of her cousins to restore her spirits, before the hour of retiring. Here, indeed, lay her best remedy: for she was reminded that this was an acquaintance begun and maintained by happy choice, not by compulsion. The question of choice was still in her mind when at last, being alone, she told Valentine of Mrs Lappage’s conjectures about Mr Tresilian.