A Woman's Estate (20 page)

Abigail stared at him, thinking his instincts as a landlord
had made him miss the significance of what she had said. She wondered if it
would be necessary to state what she meant in cruder terms as she explained,
“Because the subject came up before Lord Lydden died but when he was too weak
to be troubled, and Eustace refused to agree to the changes. Jameson felt
Eustace might have already told Deedes to stick to the letter of lease. That
was why I felt I should go to London myself rather than write.”

“It will be hot as the hinges of hell in London,” Arthur
remarked.

“Good,” Abigail retorted, quite annoyed with the lack of
understanding Arthur was showing. “Then perhaps I will thaw out. You do not
seem to realize that it is much warmer in America than it is in England.”

“And what am
I
to do while you are gone?” Arthur
asked. “Visit friends?”

Abigail was torn between the desire to flounce out of the
room in disgust and tell him in the lowest language she knew what the real
intention of her trip to London was, until she realized she had also
misunderstood him. “If you think that would be best,” she agreed, with a half
smile, “but is there no political business that would take you to London? I
prefer to tell as few lies as possible.”

“It would not be difficult to arrange,” Arthur said
thoughtfully.

His voice was flat because his mind was working on several
different levels at once. Most directly, he was thinking that he would ride
over to Stour and speak to Roger, who could easily arrange to have one of his
friends in the government ask Arthur to come to Town for a day to discuss
something or other. At the same time, he was wondering whether that would be
enough to deceive Bertram. Arthur was still worried about Bertram being in love
with Abigail and did not want him to be tormented by thinking about them
together. And he was also wondering if the separation would make his mother
less perceptive about the change in his relationship with Abigail.

Over all these practical considerations hung a delicate veil
of joy and expectation. Often, hearing those friends who had married for love
speak about their brides, he had wondered why they did not immediately take
what they seemed so much to desire. Now he knew. If the best chance in the
world to make love to Abigail had presented itself at that very moment, he
would have resisted the temptation in order to retain the vision he had of a
perfect time and place with leisure to sit and talk, to laugh and love, and no
need to part and pretend in their separate homes that no momentous event had
occurred.

“You do not seem very happy,” Abigail said, a tremor of
uncertainty in her voice.

He moved closer and drew her into his arms. “You are wrong,”
he murmured, and kissed her nose and then her chin. “If I expressed what was
within, we would have the entire household in here wondering at my cries of
joy.” He saw that doubt still troubled her, and smiled. “Truly, sweetheart, I
am delighted with your clever scheme, but you have not thought it through, and
I was doing that.”

“I don’t understand.”

Arthur laughed. “It is easy to see that you are quite
unaccustomed to deception. Did you intend to live at my house? Or think I could
live at yours? Or were you intending that we stay at the same hotel? Perhaps
you have heard that there is much freedom with regard to affairs of the heart
in the British upper classes? That is not untrue, but discretion is necessary.
One may not flaunt one’s love with impunity.”

“But I—”

He silenced her with another brief kiss. “Abigail, it does
not matter whether you were about to say ‘I don’t care’ or ‘I will not be
hurting anyone’. The second, oddly enough, is not considered an excuse and is a
cause for even closer scrutiny by the tattling old cats. And even if you were
willing to endure ostracism, it would hurt me to see you left out and ignored.
More important, you must think of Victor and Daphne. How do you think Victor
would like hearing his mother called ‘whore’ at school? And although Daphne is
only nine, memories are long in our ingrown society. Are you willing to take
the chance that she will be tainted by your reputation?”

She was staring at him with horror, and he shook his head.
“I did not mean to frighten you to death, love, nor certainly to frighten you
enough to back away from me. As long as you maintain a decent decorum, I swear
to you there will be no consequences. In fact, the hint of a romantic intrigue
will make you even more desirable as a guest. Abigail, I love you. I want you.
But I would not take you if I thought it would hurt you, or your children.
Trust me, my love.”

Abigail let out her breath in a long sigh and allowed her
head to fall onto his shoulder, listening with only half an ear to his plans.
They betrayed again what she already knew, that Arthur was an old hand at such
arrangements. She could, indeed, trust him to cover their tracks, but she had
her first quiver of doubt regarding the absolute wisdom of clinging to her
independence. She pushed it away. If necessary she could live without any man,
but she could not allow herself to become less than a slave to one again.

Whatever uneasiness Abigail continued to feel throughout the
following week was buried under new impressions and occupations. The first
thing Abigail discovered was that the flood of welcome now descending on her
was not spontaneous but the direct result of Violet’s formal dinner. Many more
people came than had been invited, of course, because those who had received
invitations told others, and everyone was curious about Francis’ American-born
bride now that Violet St. Eyre’s approval had guaranteed her respectability.

Abigail was grateful for Violet’s list. Some of the
visitors, often those whom Hilda approved with nods and smiles of satisfaction,
were very tedious but their names were never on the list. Those who were listed
sometimes caused Hilda to rise and leave the room, but they were the ones
Abigail found most interesting.

She did not see Arthur again until the night of Violet’s
party. Returning the visits had taken all her free time. She could have spread
out the chore, but she wanted to complete these obligatory calls as soon as
possible, partly because she was aware that she would be leaving for London
soon after the dinner and partly because she had been successful in discovering
who among those who had come to make her acquaintance had children of ages
suitable to be playmates for Daphne and Victor. It was these families with whom
Abigail was eager to become friendly, although she knew she must return visits
in strict order of precedence. Violet’s advice was again invaluable, and she
managed to accomplish both purposes so that, to their intense joy, Daphne and
Victor now had acquaintances of their own ages.

On Thursday evening as she was dressing to go to Stonar,
Abigail had another qualm of uncertainty about refusing Arthur’s proposals and
becoming his mistress. She realized it was only owing to Violet’s kindness that
she was able to look forward not only to this enjoyable evening but to many
others, for notes of invitation to similar dinners and entertainments were now
delivered each day. Violet’s kindness also extended through every aspect of
Abigail’s life. It did not seem fair to repay that kindness by frustrating
Violet’s dearest desire, which was not to keep her son for herself, as Abigail
had once suspected, but to see him married and with an heir. Abigail had
discovered that it was not moral indignation that fueled Violet’s disapproval
of her son’s love affairs but the fact that they diverted him from the need for
a wife.

The discovery came quite naturally during a discussion
Abigail had initiated by commenting about how easily Victor seemed to have
absorbed not only the idea of being an earl but a semblance of the correct
behavior, adding that he might be imitating Arthur.

“I wish Arthur
did
have a son to imitate him,” Violet
said, her face suddenly looking older and very worried. “Oh, it isn’t because I
have any silly fancies like Hilda about inheritance in the direct line. It’s
just that my poor darling Joseph will hate being the head of the family so
much. The St. Eyres have always been political, and Joseph isn’t. He is quite a
brilliant farmer. He is actually growing very rich out of farming and pig
breeding. Arthur laughs, but it is quite as important as politics.”

Although Abigail did not agree and did not really think
Violet believed her own words, she realized they had been spoken out of
Violet’s love for her younger son. She had murmured something soothing about it
not mattering if Joseph did not take the usual seat in the House of Commons and
play his part in the political scene.

“No,” Violet had replied, “he will do it, because he has
such a very strong sense of duty, but he will be miserable. And the worst of it
is that the misery is likely to spread down to another generation because
little Joseph is not being brought up right—at least not right insofar as being
Sir Joseph of Stonar Magna. Oh, my dear, I am so worried about that boy.
Naturally, Joseph encourages his son to be interested in his own estate; he
must
do so, but if Arthur lives to a good age, it is little Joseph who may inherit,
and
his
son may prefer farming and breeding pigs to politics by that
time.”

Abigail had laughed aloud, and after a moment’s surprise,
Violet had joined her. It was a funny perspective, generations of pig breeders
struggling with their own disinclination to be members of Parliament. But as
she sat before her dressing table while her maid twitched a curl here and there
to touch her forehead and cheek and set a sparkling comb into the high knot of
hair from which three long curls fell over her right shoulder, Abigail did not
feel at all like laughing. Although she had told herself there could be no
permanence in her love affair with Arthur, Abigail had certainly envisioned the
period as being one of years rather than months—and the proposals of marriage
she had received indicated that Arthur did not take the affair lightly either.
But the longer Arthur was content with her, the more fixed would become his
disinclination for marriage.

Almost certainly he would find a moment tonight to tell her
what he had arranged. Should she refuse to go? How could she explain her
refusal? It was impossible to tell Arthur the true reason. He would be furious
with Violet because no matter what she said, Abigail was sure he would believe
Violet had told the story deliberately to interfere with their affair. And if
she said she was afraid of being compromised, he would just ask her to marry
him again and be furious with her if she refused.

“You
are
lovely, madam.”

The soft voice of the country-bred maid was full of
admiration, but Abigail smiled at her largely out of relief for having her
train of thought broken. She had felt her eyes prickling with tears at the
notion that Arthur would be hurt and angry. She would think of a way, she
promised herself, to allow them to part as friends, but that would be
impossible if she denied him completely. In any case, she thought, smiling
involuntarily as her eyes caught her image in the cheval glass, he would kill
her if she said no to him while wearing this dress.

There was something to be said for London modistes over
American ones, Abigail decided as she examined herself more carefully. The
blue-violet of her underslip not only matched her eyes and brought out the
color of her dark red hair, but was of a soft and clinging silk, cut barely to
cover the nipples of her breasts and mold itself to every lush curve of her
body. There were no sleeves or straps; the slip was prevented from leaving her
naked to the high waist, where it was tightened with gathers and ribbons just
under her breasts, by being attached to a silver gauze overdress so thin as to
be nearly transparent. It was that “nearly” that made the gown enchanting
rather than vulgar, for the sparkling overdress swirled about her like smoke,
blurring the outlines of her bare shoulders, arms and breasts, masking what the
underslip revealed.

Berating herself for being so disgustingly vain, but
nonetheless feeling more cheerful, Abigail went down to the drawing room where
Hilda was waiting, and Griselda, who had probably been waiting until Abigail
came down, entered the room nearly on Abigail’s heels. At the sight of
Griselda, Abigail’s spirit took another upward leap. Probably for the first
time in her life, Griselda was becomingly dressed. Abigail had never ceased to
be irritated by the inappropriateness of Griselda’s clothes. What was more, she
guessed that Griselda was aware that the gowns she wore made the worst rather
than the best of her, and consequently was even shyer and more awkward.

There had previously been no opportunity to interfere, but
the dinner party provided one and, having lain in wait for Griselda and forced
her to acknowledge that her mother ordered all her dresses for her, Abigail had
ruthlessly dragged her faintly protesting sister-in-law into Sandwich and
ordered an evening dress made for her. Most of the trouble seemed to be caused
by Hilda’s delusion that she was—or at least could appear to be—a young matron.
This she carried over onto Griselda, dressing her daughter in the pallid pastel
shades, ruffles and flounces suitable to a very young girl.

At any age such styles must have looked silly on so tall and
gawky a girl as Griselda. Now, in her mid-twenties, they made her pathetic and
ridiculous. That she knew it was proved by the gown she chose for herself—after
considerable urging from Abigail. The color was a soft, dusty rose, the fabric
a dull, flowing silk crepe, and the style plain, the low bodice tucked into
narrow pleats over the breast, which continued over the shoulder to the back,
the pleats being held in place by a thin band of gold ribbon. The skirt, like
the bodice, was edged in gold and had some simple but attractive gold
embroidery around the hem. It was almost straight, with just enough fullness so
it would not impede walking, and fell into a demi-train. The color of the gown
warmed Griselda’s pale complexion, the pleats filled in her rather flat bosom,
and the straight fall of the skirt made her statuesque rather than too tall and
awkward. Moreover, as she walked, the trained pulled the dress back just a
little, outlining provocatively the long line of her thighs.