Two Corinthians (4 page)

His mount was tiring when at last he trotted past St. Cuthbert’s Well. The crumbling ruins of Bellingham Castle were silhouetted on the skyline. Below it on the hillside, facing south with its two wings spread like open arms, the long, low house sprawled across the slope.

Lord Winterborne rode straight up the long drive and drew rein in the rose garden in front of the house, sheltered by the wings to east and west. At this season nothing was visible but carefully pruned stumps, half buried in muddy straw, but this had been his mother’s favourite place. When he thought of her, he could almost smell the heavy perfume of the dark red blooms she had loved best, the lighter fragrance of pink and yellow and white.

She had told him when he was six years old, when his brother was nothing but a squirming scrap of newborn humanity, that he must always take care of Danny. He had tried, and he had failed, and she had died not knowing that in the end he had succeeded after all.

“Mother,” he said aloud, “it’s all right now. Danny’s happy now, I helped him win the woman he loves. I took care of him, Mother.”

Feeling like a sentimental fool, he turned Orpheus towards the stables.

Lord Bellingham, seated at his desk, looked up as his tall son entered the library unannounced. For a moment he simply enjoyed the unexpected sight of his firstborn, the broad-shouldered, well-muscled figure, the arrogant nose so like his own, the dark hair and eyes that reminded him of his beloved wife. At thirty-six, George had lost the slimness of youth and gained a few grey streaks at his temples. The marquis ran his hand through his own thick white hair, put down his pen, and rose to clasp his son’s hand in both his.

“Forgive my dirt, sir. I have ridden from Newcastle this day, but I could not wait to give you my news. Father, Danny is to marry again!”

His face pale, the marquis sank back into his chair, looking suddenly old. George cursed himself for his abruptness. Daniel’s first marriage had been disastrous, ending in the scandal of divorce; he ought to have made it plain that his news was good before blurting it out like any rattle-tongued windbag.

“You will approve his choice, sir,” he assured his father over his shoulder as he hurried to pour a glass of brandy from the decanter on a side-table. “Here, take this. True, she has no portion, but her breeding is impeccable, and I can vouch for her being a delightful young lady.”

A little colour was creeping back into Lord Bellingham’s cheeks as he sipped at the brandy. “Who is this paragon?” he asked drily.

“The Honourable Amaryllis Hartwell. I daresay you knew her father?”

The marquis threw back his head and guffawed. “Hartwell’s daughter! Well matched, a scandal for a scandal! What has Miss Hartwell been doing since the viscount ran off with the Spanish ambassador’s daughter?”

“Running a school, and most competently,” George answered with some indignation. “And I wish you will not laugh, sir. Daniel is so changed, so happy, you would not know him. They are very much in love.”

“Creampot love! Marriage with even a younger son must be preferable to the life of a schoolmistress.”

“She might have had the heir to an earldom. Tatenhill’s heir, young Pomeroy, offered for her and was refused.”

“So she says!”

“You are too sceptical, sir. I had it from his own lips not a fortnight since.”

At last the marquis began to allow himself to believe. “Danny is happy?” he asked softly.

“Happy?” George laughed aloud, joyous, triumphant. “That is too poor a word. He is like a man released from a dungeon after ten years without a glimpse of the sky. She has given him back his youth. I tell you, Father, almost I think to look for a wife myself!”

“Then she has my blessing! You should have married and produced an heir long since!”

“Danny’s example was scarce encouraging, sir. I’d no mind to suffer the horns as he did, and I never met a woman worth the risk.”

“What of the child?”

“Amaryllis knows Isabel is not Danny’s daughter, yet she loves her as dearly as he does.” Suddenly alert, George studied his father’s face. “If you could bring yourself to acknowledge Isabel as your granddaughter...He wants a reconciliation. He wants your blessing, your presence at his wedding.”

“The estrangement was not all on my side,” said the marquis harshly.

“I know. He felt he had let you down. In his humiliation, he could not face you. But now…”

“I wish your mother were alive.” Lord Bellingham leaned his forehead on his hand, hiding his face.

George knew he had won and did not press his point. “No more than I wish it, no more than Danny does,” he said in a gentle voice. “Would that I might hope to find her equal!”

“I shall write to him. George, thank you.”

With a light heart, George went up to his chamber to change out of his riding clothes. It would be at least two days before his carriage arrived with his luggage and Slade, but the closets in his dressing-room held an assortment of cast-off clothing. He did not suppose that either his father or the widowed cousin who ran his household would object if his dress this evening was not in the first stare of fashion.

To his utter disgust he was quite unable to fasten the pantaloons made for him by the best tailors in London not five years since.

Turning to a rack of coats, he chose one that he remembered as being fairly loose fitting, not that he had ever cared for coats so tight he needed help in donning them. With a struggle he pulled it on, then leaned forward to adjust the cheval glass. There was a ripping sound as the coat split down the back.

George groaned. He stripped to the buff and pondered his reflexion in the mirror, turning and twisting like a debutante before her first ball.

It was no use pretending he was still a slender Adonis, but he was not yet ready for a Cumberland corset! There was no flabbiness, he decided with relief, poking and prodding at himself. He had always led an active life, riding and walking in the country, sparring with Gentleman Jackson and dancing till dawn in Town.

There were other activities that had helped, no doubt, to keep him fit. None of his many mistresses, high-born or low, had ever complained of a lack of ardour on his part.

He heard the door of his dressing-room open, followed by a ladylike shriek. The door slammed shut.

“George!” came an indignant voice from without.

He seized a crimson brocade dressing gown, wrapped it around himself, and went to the door. Outside stood a tiny, wispy lady of late middle years, wearing a quilted sacque of plum-coloured satin which would have been the height of alamodality some thirty years ago. Mrs Tilliot, once companion to the marchioness and now mistress of the house in all but name, did not believe in new-fangled fashions; somewhere in the wilds of Northumberland she had found a dressmaker to cater to her whims.

Grinning, George swept her into his arms and kissed her cheek soundly, eliciting another shriek.

“Put me down at once, you great bear!” she scolded, twinkling at him. “Indeed, I beg your pardon for walking in on you. I meant to check that all was set to rights, and I thought you were still with Bellingham in the library.”

“You are welcome at any time, dear Tilly. Since you are here, perhaps you can advise me.” He explained his predicament.

Mrs Tilliot tutted and clucked and gave it as her considered opinion that neither coats nor inexpressibles might be successfully let out to accommodate his expanded figure. She bore off the wrinkled clothes from his saddlebag, promising that his father’s valet would quickly produce something presentable from the heap.

“We must hope your carriage will arrive tomorrow,” she said as she left. “These will do for tonight. Our only guests will be the vicar and Mrs Gates and their daughter, and Mr Bowe, the lawyer from Hexham. Miss Gates and Mr Bowe are betrothed.”

George remembered Miss Gates as a pretty young woman with whom he had enjoyed a mild flirtation on his last visit. Doubtless her engagement ruled out that harmless pastime. He anticipated a dull evening.

Neither Miss Gate’s discretion nor her presumed affection for her future husband were proof against the attractions of the handsome, dashing, rich and titled Lord Winterborne. She brought to bear on him her full battery of coy glances, fluttered eyelashes, rippling laugh, and flirted fan.

George encouraged her. Better the man should know the worst before the knot was tied, he thought cynically.

Before he left Bellingham a week later, a letter arrived from Lord Daniel in response to his father’s overture. Jubilant, the marquis announced that he would follow George south in a month or so. Besides Danny’s wedding there was Print’s coronation to be attended, and he expected to enjoy the Season with a lighter heart than any time these ten years. Mrs Tilliot, too, looked forward to renewing her acquaintance with old friends she had not seen this age.

Even the constant rain which began when he reached York and continued throughout his journey could not dampen George’s high spirits.

He received a royal welcome from the Suttons. Sir James was delighted with the price he offered for Orpheus. When Lady Sutton pressed him to stay indefinitely, until the roads were fit to travel, he was confirmed in his belief that she was yet another matchmaking mama. After the caustic way she had spoken of Miss Sutton in his presence, it was clear that she intended him for Miss Elizabeth.

Nothing loath, he prepared to indulge that young lady in a flirtation, without any intention of letting it lead him to parson’s mousetrap.

He found it extraordinarily difficult. They met in the drawing room before dinner, taken early in the country fashion, and Lady Sutton took care to leave them alone together at one end of the room. His opening salvo, an admittedly commonplace remark that she was even prettier than he remembered, was met with a merry laugh.

“This is a new dress, and there is something about a new dress that makes one feel pretty,” Lizzie said dismissively. “I have you to thank for it, my lord. Mama only bought it because she wants me to impress you. She hopes that you will decide to marry me so that she does not have to bother with giving me a Season.”

Nonplussed by her frankness, his lordship made a quick recover. “And dare I hope that you, too, wish to impress me, Miss Elizabeth?”

Lizzie considered the question with a serious face. “It cannot be denied that you are the most eligible gentleman I have ever met,” she admitted. “And I like you, because you were so kind to Claire. But as for setting out to impress you, Claire says it is shockingly vulgar to set one’s cap at a gentleman, whatever Mama says. I do not know you well enough to have fallen in love with you yet,” she added apologetically.

George fell back on an enquiry as to Miss Sutton’s health.

“She is perfectly recovered, thank you. She will be down to dinner, but she always comes late because it gives Mama less time to snipe at her. Oh, I know why I am prettier now than last time we met. I expect I was quite haggard with worry over Claire’s ankle.”

“Of course, that must be it.” Grinning, Lord Winterborne gave up the attempted flirtation and decided to enjoy her artlessly enchanting conversation.

He was rewarded by her delight at learning that he meant to spend the coming Season in London.

“I hope we will see you there,” she exclaimed. “It will be much more comfortable if we have at least one acquaintance.”

“Surely Sir James and Lady Sutton have a wide acquaintance among the ton.”

“Papa knows any number of sporting gentlemen, of course, but he never bothers to introduce us to them, and when he goes to London he only goes to buy and sell horses at Tattersall’s. And I do not think Mama will go with us. She thinks it a waste of money for me to have a Season.” Lizzie explained about the several postponements, and how Claire had promised to take her to Town this year regardless of their mother’s opposition.

“I am glad to hear it,” said George, “for the ton would be the loser by your absence.”

Again the compliment was wasted on infertile ground. Lizzie ignored it completely. She was looking at him as if she had never seen him properly before.

“I don’t know how it is,” she said in a puzzled voice, “but I feel I can tell you anything. I promise you I do not usually bore strangers with tales of family quarrels. I beg your pardon, my lord.”

Touched, he took her hand and pressed it. “I am honoured by your confidence, Miss Elizabeth,” he said gravely. “You may be sure I shall not repeat to Lady Sutton anything you choose to tell me.”

“I am glad of it,” she responded, her sunny temper restored, “for though I do not care a groat for Mama’s scolding, I know it distresses Claire, however hard she pretends it does not.”

At that moment, Claire drifted into the room, a faraway look on her face. “Good evening, Mama, Papa,” she said in a soft voice, sketching a curtsy to her parents.

Sir James went on talking to his two older sons as if his daughter did not exist.

“You are late as usual,” said Lady Sutton automatically.

Claire turned towards George and Lizzie, and he thought he saw a spark of recognition and even welcome in her grey eyes. Then her gaze was unfocused again, as if she was looking through him to some unimaginable vision beyond. Again she curtsied, with a murmured, “How do you do, my lord,” then turned as if to seek a seat far from everyone.

He stepped towards her and she hesitated.

“I am glad to hear you are quite recovered from your fall, Miss Sutton,” he said, smiling down at her, wondering why she looked like a doe at bay.

Despite her obvious unease, her low voice was composed. “I must thank you for rescuing me from the effects of my clumsiness, my lord.”

“I fear I startled you, coming round the bend at such a speed. While I hesitate to boast, I am accounted something of a top sawyer and I have a deplorable tendency to show my paces whether I have an audience or not. Something like one of your father’s horses galloping round an empty field, I suppose.”

She smiled, her eyes lit with amusement. For a startled moment he recognised the delicate beauty animation brought to her fine features, then her face was blank again as her mother took her arm.