Fragile Mask (26 page)

‘
Because she was agitated by his presence at Christmas. It
was the first time I saw her control waver in company. There is
something in the wind, I am sure of it.’

This certainty grew upon him when Verena failed to put in
an appearance anywhere in company either that evening, or at Sunday
service in The King Charles Chapel, even though both her brother
and mother were present. When she was again absent on Monday, while
the company walked on the Pantiles in the morning, Unice, urged
thereto by her house guest, paid her respects to Mrs Peverill and
enquired after her daughter.

‘
The story is,’ she reported to Denzell, ‘that Verena is
feeling a trifle down pin with the gaiety of the
season.’

‘
Fiddle!’

‘
Why, so I think,’ agreed Unice. ‘And Mrs Peverill herself
is displaying a degree of nervousness.’

‘
What about the brother?’ Denzell asked,
frowning.

‘
Are you at that again?’ demanded Osmond. ‘Why don’t you go
and talk to the fellow then?’

‘
I might just do that.’

‘
I know,’ exclaimed Unice. ‘You can find out from him
whether Verena intends to go on this expedition to the High Rocks
tomorrow.’

The Master of Ceremonies, Mr Tyson, with his usual
enthusiasm, had arranged a picnic to the High Rocks which the
majority of Wellsians were anticipating with eagerness.

‘
Is that tomorrow?’

‘
According to Mrs Felpham,’ put in Osmond. ‘Dashed female
has never ceased running around asking everyone if they intend to
go. You can ask her if Verena is going.’

‘
I thank you, I had rather Adam Peverill was my informant.
And if Verena is going, how will that serve me?’

‘
It will serve you if she is not,’ Unice pointed out. ‘You
may go and see her and make what peace you can.’

Denzell brightened. ‘That is the first sensible suggestion
anyone has made to me.’

It was not, however, until very late in the evening that he
was able to beard Adam Peverill, and then by accident. In the
expectation of the High Rocks expedition, there had been no
entertainment arranged beyond the usual gathering for cards or chat
in the Upper Rooms, and even that broke up early.

Feeling restless at Verena’s continued absence, Denzell did
not accompany his hosts when they left for home, but went instead
to the Gentlemen’s Rooms a few doors down where a number of
die-hards were engaged in dicing and wining, or smoking a
pipe.

He discovered Adam Peverill slumped over a bottle in a
corner. The boy was somewhat the worse for drink, he realised, as
he came up to the small table. Adam looked up blearily at his
approach. Denzell smiled.

‘
May I join you?’

A frown descended upon Adam’s brow, but he grudgingly moved
a little to make room. Denzell pulled up a chair from close by and
signed to one of the waiters.

‘
Bring me burgundy, if you please.’ He looked at Adam again.
‘I thought you had gone home.’

Adam made an effort. ‘Took my mother, thass all. Didn’t
feel like g-going back to the New Inn.’

‘
I know what you mean,’ Denzell agreed. ‘There is little
enjoyment in drinking alone.’

‘
Want to be alone,’ said Adam, and then his colour deepened.
‘I don’t mean—I mean, don’t mind you.’

‘
Thank you,’ Denzell said, handing the waiter a coin and
pouring himself a glass from the bottle that had been
brought.

He looked the lad over. He was only a lad, for all the
serious look of his face—dissipated just now, though, which told
its own tale, along with the slurring of his words. He must have
suffered, too, under such a brutal reign. Was this his way of
dealing with it, through a too liberal use of the
bottle?

He leaned confidentially towards the boy. ‘Adam—may I call
you that?’

A scornful laugh came. ‘Call me anything you like. Harsh as
you like. I deserve it all!’

By George, what an opening! ‘Why, Adam, what have you
done?’

He shook his head. ‘She hasn’t blamed me for it. Should’ve,
though. All my fault.’

Verena? Had he not known it? But what was it? Really, it
was almost as difficult to extract information from the boy in his
cups as it was from Verena herself.

‘
Come, Adam. Your sister must know you meant no
harm.’

‘
Harm? ’Course I meant no harm. She’s my mother. Think I
want that devil to hurt her again? Swears he won’t. V’rena don’t
believe him. Not sure I do either.’

Now they were getting somewhere. Denzell tossed off his
glass and poured himself another. The boy had a loose tongue all
right. It was not difficult to guess the rest.

‘
You told him where to find them, is that it?’

Adam dropped his head in his hands with a groan. Yes, that
must have been it, Denzell decided, nursing his glass in his cupped
hands. So that explained the mystery. Verena and her mother were in
hiding here, and the boy had given them away. Obviously he had not
meant to. But if he was in the habit of drinking, and drink made
him garrulous, what price loyalty then?

A thought struck him with stunning force. Was the man
Peverill coming here? Oh, chaste stars!

‘
Adam!’ he said imperatively, putting down his glass without
sipping at it again. ‘Tell me this. Is Verena in any danger?
Peverill—your father—will he hurt her?’

The boy dragged himself upright, and tried to shake his
head. ‘Not V’rena. Too clever.’ He threw up a finger and tapped his
own nose. ‘Used her head. Not like me. Alwaysh flared, me. Got beat
for’t. Not V’rena. Quiet as a mouse, she was. Docile and
ob-obedient, never say boo to a goose. Thass what he thought. He’d
look at her, never see anything in her face, never. Give him no
reason, she said, no excuse.’

Denzell’s heart contracted. Oh, poor darling girl. Was it
thus her mask was built? All her warmth, the natural joy of her,
pushed under for fear of what this man might do. And he himself,
who had fallen in love with what he glimpsed beneath the mask, to
be tarred with a like brush? No, Verena. Oh no, sweet
princess.

There and then a new determination was bora. If it took him
his life long, she would learn to discover him for what he was—not
for what she imagined he might be. And he would, whatever it took,
release her from that darkness she inhabited, into a world of light
and laughter.

‘
Adam,’ he said, on a note of strength brought about by the
change in him the boy’s revelations had wrought, ‘tell me only
this. Is Verena intending to go to High Rocks tomorrow?’

The boy shook his head. ‘Waiting. Won’t come out. Wants me
to keep Mama out of the way, much as possible. Thass why we’ve been
gadding about—without V’rena. Hopes to send him
packing.’

‘
Then are you going to High Rocks?’

‘
Shouldn’t think Mama will go. Wants to see him.’

‘
What? Your mother
wishes
to see your
father?’

Adam nodded. ‘See if he’s changed. Thinks she might go back
then. Doesn’t want to ruin V’rena’s life. But ish no good, ’cos
V’rena won’t let her go back. Nothing to be done about
it.’

Oh, was there not? They would see about that, Denzell
promised mentally. He did not know what might be done about it, not
yet. But something had to be done. For there was another now who
was not prepared to tolerate the ruin of Verena’s life.

Chapter Nine

Verena had slept a little better than she had these last
few nights. More from exhaustion than anything else. She had felt
dreadful on waking, her head thick and heavy, her bones weary. But
remembrance of what she was waiting for had soon driven all that
away—just as it had every morning since Adam had come with his
hideous news.

She had calculated the probabilities, counting days.
Nathaniel would come by coach, and he would not have travelled on
Sunday. He must have started out a day or two after Adam, and the
coach would necessarily make slower progress, for Adam, dependent
on speed, had left the gig at home and ridden post. She had waited
at home none the less, although she thought she could reckon on two
to three days, four at the most.

But time was up. He must arrive today.

She was riding on nervous energy, but she was aware only of
the necessity to remain alert, to be ready for the moment that must
tax every ounce of her strength.

Mama had gone out with Adam, although neither he nor Verena
had been able to persuade her to join the expedition to High Rocks.
Verena know not whether to be glad of the new determination that
showed how Mama had altered, or sorry for it, since she now wished
to face Nathaniel herself.

‘
When all is said and done, Verena, he is still my husband,
to whom I am vowed before God,’ she had stated with a dignity that
became her. ‘If you wonder that I am not afraid of him, then I
reply that I am afraid. But this respite has given me courage,
Verena, and that I owe to you. I am persuaded he will not attempt
to do me harm in this place, and therefore I will see
him.’

Nothing Verena could do or say served to move her from this
standpoint, and it had filled Verena with a dread that swept from
her mind everything but this. She had succeeded in extracting a
promise from Adam to keep Mama away from the lodging for as long as
possible, to give her opportunity to make her own warnings to
Nathaniel before he could get to Mama.

Pacing the little parlour, attired against the expected
visit in a round gown of pale yellow muslin demurely buttoned high
over the bosom, with a standing ruff edged with lace and sleeves to
the wrist, her hair partly covered by a small mob-cap, she waited,
rehearsing in her head all the things she meant to say to
Nathaniel.

Yet when the door knocker sounded downstairs, her mind
froze as still as her body. She stood like a statue, facing the
door, in a listening attitude, hearing the clump of Betsey’s
footsteps going down the stairs.

Her heartbeat began to thud in her own ears as the sound of
a male voice smote them, along with Betsey’s murmurs. Double thumps
now, two sets of feet ascending the stairs.

A plea sang in her head.
Heaven give me strength!

Her pulse quickened even more painfully, and she braced
herself as the door swung open.

‘
A visitor, Miss Verena,’ said Betsey, and Denzell
Hawkeridge walked into the room, easy in buckskins and top-boots,
and a frock-coat of olive green, a toning waistcoat beneath in a
lighter hue.

For an instant, Verena stared at him, bewilderment in her
brain. Then a wash of relief hit her, dizzyingly, and she took
several steps backwards towards the bureau, grasping swiftly at the
back of the chair before it.

‘
Miss Chaceley, are you ill?’ came Denzell’s concerned
tones, as he moved quickly forward.

But Betsey was before him, one hand about her charge’s
waist in an instant, supporting her drooping form, and clucking her
concern.

‘
There, my dove, now don’t you go swooning on me. Here,
quick, sit in the chair.’

But Verena was already recovering. She pushed the
maid away. ‘No, no, Betsey, I am all right. It was only—I thought
it was
he.’

‘
So did I,’ agreed the maid, adding in an under-voice, ‘I
thought you might as well see the gentleman, Miss Verena. It’ll
take your mind off it for a little.’

Verena looked across at Denzell, standing in the middle of
the room and regarding her with a good deal of concern. Without
thinking, she smiled at him.

‘
I beg your pardon, Mr Hawkeridge. I was
expecting...’

She petered out as the memory of their last meeting came
back to her, the things she had said to him, and subsequently
restated to Unice—and given herself away into the bargain. Had he
discovered it all from his hostess?

There was no telling any of this from his face. He was
returning the smile, a twinkle coming into his eye.

‘
I am glad to discover it is not I who had such an effect
upon you. I should be afraid to walk into any room in which you
might be present had that been the case.’

That drew a spurt of laughter from her, and some of her
consciousness eased. Betsey, a somewhat grim smile curling her
lips, released the hold she still had on Verena’s arm, and moved to
the door.

‘
I’ll warn you, Miss Verena, when it’s the
master.’

Verena nodded, watching as Betsey left the room, very
properly leaving the door partially ajar behind her.

Denzell took a step or two towards her. ‘Don’t you think
you should sit down for a moment?’

‘
To tell the truth, I am still a trifle shaky,’ she agreed,
moving to seat herself in the chair.

Denzell came up and perched on the corner of the day-bed,
his eyes never leaving her face. He could not doubt but that she
was waiting to receive this man Peverill, but he was reluctant to
make any further reference to that. He dared not show his own new
knowledge. For one thing, it would mean betraying Adam’s
inadvertent confidences, which could not please his sister. For
another, he did not wish to embarrass her by making it obvious
Unice had told him all that had been spoken between them in this
very room.