The Reckoning (77 page)

‘
The Duke of York married respectably,' Rosamund said
provokingly, for the Duke had been a close friend of Lady
Barbara's late husband, and she revelled in the high connec
tion, 'and that didn't do any good. Look at that dreadful
scandal about his mistress selling commissions. And then
there was that business over his valet –’

Lady Barbara put her knife and fork down with a rap that
almost broke the plate. 'I don't think we want that sort of talk at breakfast,' she said coldly, trying to stare Rosamund into a
sense of shame. But Rosamund was close to breaking point,
and she stared back with rising colour.

‘
I don't think I need you to tell me what I may and may not
discuss at my own breakfast-table,' she said.

Lady Barbara gasped at the insolence. 'Your table?
Your
table?' Then she recollected the presence of her daughter,
before whom some things ought not to be said. Polly was not
present – she took breakfast on a tray in her own chamber.
‘Barbarina, leave the room,' Lady Barbara snapped.

Barbarina was so used to her mother's ways that she rose
to obey without hesitation, without even displaying any
surprise. Rosamund glanced at her with rising annoyance.

‘
Don't go, Bab. You haven't finished your breakfast. Your
mother can have nothing to say to me that you can't hear.'

‘
Oh no, really, I'd sooner –' Barbarina murmured,
glancing anxiously at her mother.

‘
Leave us!' Lady Barbara snapped, and Bab scuttled away
gratefully. When the door had closed behind her, Rosamund turned on her mother-in-law.

‘
And now you have bullied her yet again, ma'am, it's time
for you to learn that you do not give the commands in this
house – I do. I shall say who sits at the table, and what is
discussed there.'

‘
Oh will you, indeed?' Lady Barbara flared. 'How dare you, you insolent sprite? Never in my life have I been spoken to in
such a manner!'

‘
That's the pity of it. It might have taught you something,'
Rosamund snapped.

‘
You would presume to teach me, would you? Let me tell
you it's you who have things to learn – a little conduct, to
begin with! And respect for your elders!'

‘Respect!'

‘
Something your mother evidently forgot to teach you –
one of the many things, I may say –'

‘
Before you insult my mother, you might remember that
we're living in her house – and at her expense, which no
doubt pleases you no end!'

‘
It doesn't please me at all. If it weren't for the complete
lack of morality and conduct of your cousin – who was
brought up by your mother, let's remember – we would not
be forced to rusticate in order to avoid public scandal!'

‘You're forgetting that Lord Penrith is
your
cousin!'

‘
Oh stop it, please!' Marcus cried at last, having watched
the stones fly backwards and forwards long enough. 'I can't
bear it. Mama, Ros, please don't quarrel like this!’

Lady Barbara turned an outraged face to him. 'Quarrel? It
is beneath my dignity to quarrel, and especially with my own daughter-in-law.'

‘
There will be no quarrelling,' Rosamund said, striving for
equal dignity, ‘if your mother learns that I intend to be
mistress in my own house.’

Lady Barbara's head snapped round to her. 'Let me
remind you whose son you have married! I am senior to you
in years, consequence and sense, and my son will not see me
slighted or insulted by a chit of a girl who vowed not so long
ago to
obey
him! Marcus, I think your wife needs a few words
from you on how to behave herself.’

Marcus looked from her to Rosamund, a picture of misery
and indecision. 'Oh Ros, darling, please –’

Rosamund stood up, trembling with all the things she
wanted to say, and dared not. 'You side with her, as always,'
was all she did say. 'I told you when you proposed to me that I
wouldn't marry your mother. I think you must have forgotten
what your answer was on that occasion.’

And with that she turned and went out, leaving Marcus to
answer his mother's inevitable next question as best he could.
That, she thought furiously as she closed the door on them,
could be his punishment for being so weak. Looking for
comfort, she headed automatically for the stables and the
large and soothing presence of the horses. Perhaps she would
take Magnus Apollo out for a gallop and let the thunder of his
hooves drive the restless rage out of her.

In the stables she found Parslow, just finishing grooming
Magnus.

‘
He'll be ready for you in a moment or two, my lady,'
Parslow said when he had returned her greeting. 'I just have
to do his hooves.'

‘
Don't hurry,' Rosamund said, though Parslow shewed no sign of doing any such thing. She leaned on the pillar at the
end of the stall and rested her chin on her hand. 'I don't mind
waiting.’

Parslow drew up Magnus's near hind hoof between his legs
and settled it comfortably against his thigh. He glanced up at Rosamund quickly, gauging her mood, and then said quietly,
‘Adjustments always take time, my lady. And while they're
going on, it always feels as if things will never be right again.'

‘
I don't know that they will,' she sighed. 'How can there be an adjustment? She won't ever change her ways. For things to be right again, it would mean my giving in to her all the time,
and I don't call that an adjustment.'

‘
No point in riding through a bog if you can ride round it,'
Parslow said, scraping the sole of the hoof clean and delicately
probing the frog with his hoof-pick. 'You know the Duke
always said you should get over heavy ground as lightly as
possible.'

‘
The Duke didn't have Lady Barbara for a mother-in-law.
If only she'd leave and set up home on her own! But she'll
never do that while she's comfortable with us.’

Parslow set down Magnus's near hind and straightened up,
looked at his young mistress thoughtfully, and then, leaning
on the shiny bay rump beside him, said, 'Have you ever seen a
fox get rid of its fleas, my lady?’

Rosamund burst out laughing, making Magnus turn his
head to look at her in surprise. 'Better not let anyone hear
you liken her ladyship to fleas! Tell me, then, what a fox
does.'

‘
It finds a scrap of sheep's wool, my lady. It holds it in its
teeth, goes to the river, and starts to walk into the water
backwards.'

‘
Backwards?'

‘
And very slowly. Of course, feeling the cold water come
through the pelt, the fleas move away from it. They scurry
ahead of the water up the fox's body, over its head, and
finally, when there's nowhere else to go, they climb onto the
sheep's wool. And when the fox is completely submerged, all but the tip of its muzzle, it lets go the fleece, and the fleas go
sailing off down the river.'

‘
Parslow, that's the biggest horse-story I've ever heard!
How do you expect to get to heaven if you tell such terrible
whiskers?’

Parslow smiled enigmatically. 'They say the fox is a wily
beast.’

Rosamund pondered. 'But look here, I've already moved
down here to Wolvercote, and she's still with us.'

‘
Perhaps you have to get further into the water, my lady.’

‘
Move again? But where? Deeper into the country, I
suppose, and further from London.'

‘
Race week is not so long away, my lady. Your predecessor
often used to have parties at Shawes for race week.’

Rosamund's face lit up. 'Yorkshire! Of course! I was
forgetting we owned Shawes too! Parslow, you wily old fox, I
do believe you've hit on it! Lady Barbara hates Yorkshire.'

‘
Yes, my lady – and if you make sure she knows you're
taking Miss Haworth with you, it will give her ladyship a very
good excuse not to accompany you.'

‘
Lord yes, Polly! I'd forgotten. It would do Polly good to go
to Yorkshire, and especially to Morland Place. She'd have the
chance to see that the rest of the world has other things to
think about than her disgrace. Parslow, you're a wonder.
Why didn't I think of it myself?'

‘
You've had a great deal on your mind, my lady,' Parslow
said kindly. She met his eyes and saw the real sympathy there, which brought a few foolish tears to her own. She
blinked them away determinedly.

‘
Don't encourage me to be weak. Poor Minnie! I was no comfort to her when she was alive, and I forget her just as
easily as everyone else now she's dead.’

Not quite as easily, my lady. Would you like to take
Magnus out now? He needs a good gallop to settle him down.'

‘
You mean /do. Yes, I'll take him out — and you had better
come with me on Hotspur, for I shan't have time to exercise
him today, with all the plans I have to make.'

‘Very good, my lady.'

‘And Parslow — thank you for suggesting the plan.’

He permitted himself a small smile. 'I love Yorkshire as
much as her ladyship hates it, my lady.’

*

So it was that Rosamund was present at Morland Place for
the unveiling ceremony of the new kitchen chimney.

‘
And really, you know,' said Mathilde proudly, 'John has
done wonderfully well to finish it in only eighteen months. It
was a dreadful mess. You simply can't imagine.'

‘The upper floors aren't finished yet,' Héloïse explained to
Rosamund. 'The north bedroom hasn't either a floor or a
ceiling, but that will be attended to in time. The most important thing was to get poor Barnard back into his
kitchen.'

‘
He and John have been poring over plans for weeks now,'
Mathilde said. 'At least there won't be any doubt that it will
be exactly the way he wants it.'

‘
Complete with open fire and roasting-spit,' Héloïse said
with a smile. 'Barnard is no reformist in the kitchen. Ah, here
they come now. Have you your tinder-box, James?'

‘
Here, my love, and ready,' James said appearing in the
hall with John Skelwith, Marcus, Father Moineau and the
boys, and the cook. There was Miss Rosedale, too, with Polly
— they had been having long conversations together ever since
the Chelmsford party's arrival at Shawes — and between
them, holding a hand each, was Mathilde's daughter Mary. She was eighteen months old, an enterprising young scamp
with round, brown eyes and fox-brown hair and a smile that
was uncannily like James's when she wanted to please.