Lady of Spirit, A (16 page)

Gwynn Place had first been constructed during the reign of George I, but it had not reached its current size and beauty until the Regency of that witty inventor who subsequently became George IV. The previous evening at dinner, Lady Flora, the second wife of Sir Richard Jermyn, and mother of Lady Claire and the current Viscount St. Ives, had told them the tale.

Since anything connected with Claire was of interest to him, Andrew Malvern had paid more attention than such stories usually warranted.

“My late husband was not terribly clear on the details—but it seems that in her youth, his grandmother was quite the bluestocking, always closeted away tinkering with bits of machinery. Claire, I am quite sure these tendencies must be inherited, for I cannot account for them otherwise. There are certainly no such tendencies on my side of the family.”

“I am sure that is true, Mama.”

“What was Claire’s great-grandmother’s name, Lady Flora?” Andrew asked.

“She was called Loveday Trevithick.”

“Ah, that explains it,” Andrew said with the satisfaction of feeling a puzzle piece slip into place. “That family is known for their genius with mechanics. Richard Trevithick invented the steam engine and put the nation on the path to greatness that it enjoys today.”

“Yes, well, at the time, greatness was a long way off, to hear Vivyan tell it,” Lady Flora said. He suspected she might have sniffed, but deferred because of his obvious admiration for the Trevithick name. “While she was a gentleman’s daughter, and Gavin Trevelyan a gentleman, she had nothing to bring to the match save her talents—and sadly, they did not extend to kitchen and home.”

“Unless one needed something fixed, presumably,” Claire said into her soup.

Sir Richard and Andrew laughed, and then sobered when Lady Flora did not. “In any case, love seems to have won out, and they had three children—a boy who inherited the estate, and two girls.”

“My great-aunts Jenna and Elowen,” Claire explained to Andrew. “They married brothers—you will have heard of Admiral Wingate? It was he who first circumnavigated the globe by airship, in eighteen fifty-two.”

“I have indeed,” Andrew said. “I declare, you have quite the illustrious family.”

“We do our part,” Lady Flora said, and turned the conversation to other things.

Andrew found it difficult to listen politely to a discussion of local families, and afterward, when Claire and her mother and Sir Richard’s unmarried sister passed through into the drawing room, he found himself equally distracted, glancing at the clock and wondering how a man such as his host, who was possessed of both intellect and means, could have so little conversation.

“Sir Richard,” he said, interrupting a soliloquy on the merits of two different kinds of grain, “might I ask your advice on a subject requiring some delicacy?”

“Hm? What? Delicacy? What do you mean?”

“I mean Lady Flora’s daughter Claire.”

“Claire? What about her? Hardly see the girl. About time she left gadding about the world and came to see her family. It’s not because she needs money, is it?”

Andrew recovered quickly from his surprise. “No, sir, it is not. I believe her to be quite sound in her management of money, and she would not importune her mother in any case, even if she were not.”

Sir Richard harrumphed. “Damned good thing. Gwynn Place is only just getting back on its feet again after that Arabian Bubble business. But what did you want to ask me about?”

Andrew gathered his courage. It was not in his nature to confide in someone he had only just met, but needs must where the devil drives, as his mother used to say. “Some years ago, when she was only eighteen, I asked Claire to marry me.” Sir Richard choked on his port, and Andrew handed him a linen napkin. “Are you quite all right, sir?”

“Yes, yes, quite all right. And what was her answer?”

“She—to be honest—she gave none. But her conduct toward me since has given me reason to believe that any indecision was the result of her age and not her inclination. And I have been advised by persons in a position to know that I ought to try again.”

“Eighteen. And she’s what now? Twenty-five?”

“She will be twenty-four in October, sir.”

“Girl’s practically on the shelf. No wonder her mother has given up on her. Well, if you’re looking for permission to ask for her hand, I’m not the man to give it. Technically you ought to apply to her brother, but since he’s only six, Flora is the one. Joy and jubilation in that department, I’ll wager.” His sandy eyebrows rose as he took Andrew in from head to foot. “Set up well enough to support her, are you?”

“Claire is possessed of an independent competency, but even if she were not, the answer would be yes. I have been quite successful in my field, and with my doctorate in hand, I expect that to continue. I have a standing invitation to take up a professorship at the University of Edinburgh, should I choose, as well as invitations of a similar kind from the University of Bavaria in Prussia.”

“Damned cold place to live, Scotland. Never travel north of the Cotswolds if I can help it.”

And that had been that. Andrew had risked his sense of propriety and had nothing to show for it, and earlier, when he had applied to Lady Flora in the privacy of the morning room as she wrote out the day’s menu for the cook, he had come out not much further ahead.

“Marry Claire?” She had laid down her pen and gazed at him in astonishment. “But I thought you were her—her employer?”

“I was. But on a more personal level, there has been no one for me but your daughter since the moment she turned up at my laboratory five years ago, looking for a job.”

Lady Flora passed a hand over her forehead. “Pray do not remind me. But are you certain? I am her mother and I love her dearly, but let us be honest—she does not exactly have the temperament for wifehood.”

That depends on the sort of wife one is looking for.
“I believe her temperament will suit me exactly. Do I have your permission to ask for her hand, then, Lady Flora?”

She had waved her fingers, as if this idea must be dissuaded from landing in anyone’s head. “She has been independent of me for so many years that I am not deluded that my opinion counts for anything … but yes, Mr. Malvern, if you are willing to take her on, you have my blessing. And … I wish you good luck.”

Andrew had not been through these proceedings before, but even he suspected that most mothers would not have added that last.

So now all that was left to do was to find the lady herself, and pose the question. But this proved to be more difficult than he might have expected, and the house larger and more confusing than it looked from its serene and Georgian southern prospect, gazing out over Carrick Roads to the sea.

After a series of gabbled directions from a housemaid, he somehow found himself out in the herb garden, and upon blundering through a door, ended up in a neat enclosed yard full of raised beds of vegetables, with a tidy row of small sheds along one wall, where the sun was guaranteed to warm them.
Sheds
was an unkind term; as he approached, he saw they were more like small houses, snugly built and weather-tight.

Houses for the hens.

Ah. He was in the presence of the famous Gwynn Place hens, outside enjoying the day in all their golden splendor, and there, digging joyfully in the grass, were two small red specimens he recognized. “Holly? Ivy? Where is your mistress, ladies?”

Hearing their names and recognizing him as someone who might have cracked corn about his person, they raced across the grass to dance about his feet, looking up in expectation. He knelt to stroke their feathers. “Sorry, girls, I forgot to stock up. Have you seen Claire hereabouts?”

Holly and Ivy did not reply except to express their disappointment in his unreliability, but a voice came across the grass instead.

“If you’re looking for the young lady, she was here.” A man stepped out from between two of the houses, his hair shining white in the sun, his keen eyes the color of strong tea, wrinkles fanning out from their corners as though he laughed often and made a habit of looking to the horizon.

“But she is not now?”

“No. But she’ll be back. I believe she went to that airship of hers that’s moored in our paddock.”

“Ah. Checking for pigeons, most likely. Do I have the pleasure of addressing Mr. Polgarth?”

“Aye, you do.”

“I am Andrew Malvern. I accompanied Claire and the Mop—and her wards down to Cornwall. They were to stay with their grandparents in Penzance, so we left the girls and their cousin in their care and came up here yesterday.”

Mr. Polgarth shook his hand with a strength and vigor that belied the white hair and wrinkles. “And did our Mopsies find their grandparents well?”

Andrew dropped the man’s hand in surprise, and Polgarth smiled. “Young Maggie has been corresponding with me off and on since she first came down here as a little ’un. She’s told me what you call her and her cousin. She has quite an interest in the Gwynn Place hens.”

“So I’ve heard,” Andrew agreed. “I believe she plans to study genetics in the future, thanks to your conversations with her during their summer holidays here.”

“Does she, now?” Polgarth pushed his tweed cap back with a finger as satisfaction wreathed his face. “That makes me happy. My feathered ladies have much to teach us.”

“In answer to your question, though … yes, they found their grandparents well, though I am afraid a period of adjustment might be necessary when it comes to personalities and customs.”

“The Seacombes are set in their ways, are they?”

“You could say so.”

“Did they treat our girls well?”

Andrew hesitated a moment too long.

“I see you’re a gentleman, unwilling to criticize your acquaintance to a stranger. My grandson Michael has told me of the goings-on in that house, and why he lost his position at the Seacombe Steamship Company. Shameful business.”

“I quite agree,” was all that Andrew would allow himself to say.

“I wish they had come here instead.”

“I do, too, but Claire believes them old enough to make their own decisions. And to be fair, it is right that the girls acquaint themselves with their grandparents—the Seacombes are their only family now.”

The moment the words were out of his mouth, Andrew realized he had said the wrong thing.

“That is not true, sir.” Polgarth’s face darkened and Andrew remembered the strength of that grip.

Andrew was not the kind of man who would take a step back in retreat or take one forward in challenge. Instead, he sensed a puzzle and committed himself to ferreting out the truth. “I’m dreadfully sorry. I meant no offense. I am not familiar enough with the girls’ parentage to make that kind of pronouncement. I see that you have information that I do not.”

“I do, sir. Maggie is my granddaughter, too. My own son Kevern’s child. Everyone hereabouts knows it—except them Seacombes, who will deny it to their last breath. They’d rather throw mud upon his good name and call him traitor than admit their girl could fall in love with a poultryman’s son.”

Andrew’s knowledge of the situation at Seacombe House underwent a rapid reassessment. Claire had told him nothing of this—but then, she was protective of the girls and the less said on some subjects, the better. “Then Mr. Michael Polgarth—how does he fit into this?”

“He is Maggie’s cousin. My son Myghal’s boy, and a more honest, hard-working young man you won’t find. But that don’t hold water with Seacombe. After turning him out of the house, he found out he was telling our Maggie about her
other
family and gave him the sack as well.”

“So he did not know the young man was in his employ—it must be a larger concern than I thought. Well, I understand the situation now, where I did not before,” Andrew said slowly. “Where is young Mr. Polgarth?”

“He’s hereabouts.” Polgarth looked around the enclosed garden, as though Michael might step out of one of the hen houses at any moment. “Spending a few days with his family to get his feet back under him. But tell me this, sir—will the young maids come here after their visit in Penzance is concluded?”

In Polgarth’s eyes Andrew could see so much longing that it almost hurt to look. It was with a sense of relief that he was able to say, “Yes, I believe so. We are all flying back to London together in
Athena—
that ship out in your paddock.”

“I am glad,” Polgarth said on a long breath. “It will be the first Maggie and I will have seen one another since we learned of our connection. I am anxious to know her as my own flesh and blood, not merely the visiting wards of my young lady.” His keen eyes flashed as his gaze met Andrew’s. “You’re the second young man who has come down here with Lady Claire. She’s told me much more of you than she ever did of the other one. I understand you’re good friends as well as being her employer at one time.”

Andrew heard the question under the polite observation. “We are good friends. But with Claire, it’s dashed hard to get her attention long enough to become anything more.”

Polgarth regarded him for a few seconds, as if making up his mind. “You won’t think I’m stepping out of my place if I say a thing or two?”

“I wish you would.” The chance for honesty felt like a cup of fresh water to Andrew’s spirits. “When I applied to Sir Richard for her hand, he referred me to her mother. Lady Flora essentially wished me luck, by which I inferred I was on my own. To be quite honest, Mr. Polgarth, I never would have suspected proposing to a woman would be this difficult.”

Polgarth smiled, his eyes warming with humor. “Is it so difficult to tell a woman you love her?”

“I haven’t had much experience along that line, but one would think not. However, Claire is noticeably unlike any other woman I have ever met.”

“She is,” Polgarth agreed. “But then, perhaps you’re unlike any man she has ever met.”

“She turned down a baronet’s offer a few weeks ago—a fine man, and an excellent match. I hope her mother never hears of it.”

“And this doesn’t give you hope?”

“It might, if I didn’t know about her ambition and her prospects, both of which fly as high as the airships she loves.”