Deception (Daughters of Mannerling 3) (4 page)

He was sitting taking tea with his hostess in her drawing room at Hursley Park a week before the ball when he said to her, half-jokingly, that he had a mind to marry.

‘And who is the lucky girl?’ asked Lady Evans, her great starched cap casting a shadow over her face as she leaned forward to pour more tea.

‘There isn’t one,’ he said. ‘But there should be plenty of young misses at this ball of yours. One has only to drop the handkerchief.’

‘For one of them to snatch it up? How arrogant you sound!’

‘I suppose I do.’

‘I trust you are contemplating courting some lady and getting to know her and her family first?’

‘I find the idea of a courtship boring. I cannot talk of serious matters. I must compliment and flirt, she must simper and sigh, her parents will assess the amount of my fortune and give their blessing.’

‘What if you should fall in love with a lady who has no fortune?’

‘I doubt if that will ever happen. I would assume any penniless miss who wanted me would have her eye on my moneybags. And talking of mercenary misses, what is all this fascinating gossip about the beautiful Beverley sisters?’

‘What have you heard?’

He stretched out his long legs and watched the reflection of the flames burning among the apple logs in the hearth shining on his Hessian boots. ‘It was at dinner the other night. Young Mr Harris said they would never find husbands with their reputations. I was fascinated by the vision of sinful young girls. But evidently their sin is only in their lust for their old home and in their plotting and scheming to get it back.

‘It all sounded such a Gothic tale. One owner committed suicide, the Beverley father ruined and dying of typhoid, and yet when I asked about the two elder girls who are married, I learned to my surprise that they married exceptionally well, and all for unfashionable love, too. Is this Mannerling such an enchanted house?’

‘I have not called there yet, so I do not know. If you heard all that gossip, you no doubt heard about the Deverses’ son, Harry, a rake and libertine and half mad?’

He nodded.

‘That is the reason I decided not to call. There certainly seems to be something weird about Mannerling, for the hedonistic Harry is said to be obsessed with the place.’

‘In any case, you will have a chance to meet the Beverly girls, the four remaining ones, that is. I have invited them all to my ball.’

‘Indeed! And you such a high stickler.’

‘I have my reasons, which are private.’

‘I become more intrigued by the moment. Perhaps if the weather holds fine, I will ride over tomorrow and have a look at this Mannerling.’

‘Do not call!’ exclaimed Lady Evans. ‘ ’Twould be most awkward, considering the Deverses are not invited here.’

‘Be reassured. I shall simply look.’

Rachel had a bad cold and lay in bed with a handkerchief to her little red nose, moaning that if she did not get better soon, she would not be able to go to the ball. Miss Trumble was nursing her and chiding her in a rallying voice to concentrate on getting well and to forget about the ball. Abigail left her twin’s bedroom and put a warm cloak over her gown and a sturdy pair of half-boots on her feet, a felt hat on her fair curls, and set out for a walk. She had not told anyone she was going, only meaning to walk a little way along the road. But the day was crisp and clear and somehow she found she was taking the road to Mannerling. A cow leaned over a fence, its breath steaming in the cold air. She patted its nose absentmindedly. Now that all the excitement of having a brand-new ball gown in the very latest fashion had begun to ebb, she felt slightly lost, as one does when a burning ambition has fled. Mannerling was gone. Despite Mrs Devers’s remarks about her son being a reformed character, Abigail did not believe it. In romantic novels, the hero was always being reformed by the ‘love of a good woman.’ But the sensible Miss Trumble had forcibly pointed out that this did not happen in real life. Abigail gave a little sigh. Perhaps she should concentrate her mind on looking as pretty as possible at the ball, and try to find a husband. What would it be like to be in love? she mused as she walked steadily along the rutted road. All her young thoughts had been so taken up with Mannerling that she had never had any space in her head for other dreams. A house of her own would be fine, and perhaps children. She tried to conjure up a vision of a husband, but he remained shadowy.

She came to the gates of Mannerling and put her gloved hands on the iron bars, like someone in prison, and stared hungrily down the drive.

And that is how Lord Burfield first saw her. So intent was Abigail in staring at her old home that she did not hear the approach of the horseman.

Lord Burfield reined in his horse and swung down from the saddle and stood looking at the slim figure of Abigail, her hands clutching the gates of Mannerling.

He took her for an upper servant, for he knew no lady went out walking unaccompanied. Or perhaps, he thought, she was the lodge-keeper’s daughter. Suddenly, as if aware of his gaze, she swung round and gazed full up into his face. He caught his breath. It was an enchanting little face with thick lashes framing eyes as blue as his own. He swept off his hat and made a low bow.

Abigail gave a tentative smile and began to back away down the road.

‘It is a fine day, miss,’ ventured Lord Burfield.

She nodded, turned, and began to walk hurriedly away. It was then he noticed the richness of her fur-lined cloak.

‘Are you by any chance,’ he called after her, ‘one of the Misses Beverley?’

She turned round again and walked back towards him, her eyes wary. ‘Yes, sir.’

‘Then we will meet at the ball. I am a guest of Lady Evans. My name is Burfield.’

‘Lord Burfield?’ asked Abigail, assuming that if he were a plain mister he would have said so. She dropped a curtsy. ‘I am Miss Abigail Beverley.’

‘I am delighted to make your acquaintance. May I ask why it is that you are out walking without a maid or footman to accompany you?’

Her face flamed and she began to stammer, ‘I-I k-know it is wrong of m-me. You will not tell? I often go walking on my own. My twin is ill with the cold. Sometimes I feel so “cabin’d cribb’d, confin’d.” ’

He raised his eyebrows. It was unusual to come across any young miss who quoted Shakespeare. He smiled. ‘And how is it you come to be “bound in to saucy doubts and fears”?’

She sighed. ‘I was restless.’

‘So, Miss Abigail, you stand outside the gates of your old home like a peri outside the gates of Paradise.’

She blushed again. ‘You know of us?’

‘Gossip moves freely in the country. Come, I will accompany you a little way.’ He glanced through the gates. ‘A fine house, but only a house. I came to view the haunted mansion.’

‘Haunted?’

‘It seems to exercise a powerful influence on all who have anything to do with the place.’ Leading his horse, he fell into step beside her.

‘You must not walk all the way home with me,’ said Abigail anxiously. ‘For I am not supposed to be out on my own and must enter quietly from the back.’

‘I promise to disappear as soon as your home comes in sight.’

They walked on. He gave a little shiver. ‘I am always glad when summer is with us again. Ever since my days in India, I feel the cold more than any Englishman should.’

Abigail looked up at the tall figure shyly. ‘You were in India?’

‘Yes, under the command of Colonel Wesley, although, now I remember, the family name was changed to Wellesley while our Iron Duke was still in India.’

Abigail forgot her shyness. ‘Were you at the siege of Seringapatam?’ she asked eagerly.

‘Yes, Miss Abigail.’

‘Oh, do tell me about it. It must have been monstrous exciting to fight the Tiger of Mysore.’

Tippu Sultan, the Tiger of Mysore, had been in league with the French. Lord Burfield was surprised this young miss had even heard of the siege. ‘I believe the ladies do not like stories of war.’

‘But I do. For you were actually there!’

And so he began to tell her while his mind wandered back to the Indian days. He remembered the ferocious heat and the careful preparation of the siegeworks, following in precision according to the hallowed ritual of the master, Sebastien de Vauban, who in the seventeenth century had made his name as the most celebrated of military engineers. The men worked on the batteries, the trenches, the connecting lines to more trenches and batteries, all working towards making a breach in the enemy’s defences.

‘On a May morning the siege began. There was a shattering roar. A shell had fallen on a rocket magazine inside Tippu’s fort. Black smoke belched up in a huge plume, laced with fiery stars, plunging into shade the fort’s long, low white walls, the shining roofs of Tippu’s palace, the sugar-white minaret of his elegant mosque, the flat boulders of the river Cauvery which encircled the island of Seringapatam, and the shell-shattered trees, banks, and aloe hedges which concealed the British siege-works.

‘By noon the next day, the breach was “practicable,” and bamboo scaling-ladders were silently carried into the trenches at dusk.

‘On the morning of fourth May, seventeen ninety-nine, the order went out for the assault.’

‘That came from General Sir David Baird,’ said Abigail, her eyes shining.

‘You are remarkably well-informed,’ he commented.

‘Go on,’ commanded Abigail.

He looked down at her doubtfully. ‘I am beginning to form an impression that you know as much as I do. But, very well.

‘General Baird was in charge of the four thousand storming troops, and Wellesley was in charge of the reserve in the trenches. Baird shouted—’

‘ “Now, my brave fellows, follow
me,
and prove yourselves worthy of the name of British soldiers!” ’ cried Abigail, doing a little dance of excitement.

He burst out laughing. ‘Now I
am
intrigued. How did you come by such a fund of masculine knowledge?’

‘We have an unusual governess. We are too old, don’t you know, to have a governess, and recently we have had few lessons, but our education has served to enliven the tedium of our country days.’

‘I find life in the country very busy.’

‘But you are a man! Men can ride and shoot and have jolly parties and go when and where they like. Ladies sit and sew and learn to prattle and flirt so that they may secure husbands.’

Her shyness had gone. Her face, turned up to his, was animated. He realized with a little start that she was unaware of him as a man, only as a sort of companionable intelligence. And somehow that realization made him sharply aware of her as a desirable young woman. He had at first thought her a shy little thing, but now she was striding out beside him, quite unselfconsciously, and he realized her maidenly blushes had been because she had been caught out staring at her old home.

‘Oh, we are nearly there,’ said Abigail. ‘You must leave me!’

‘Will you save me a dance?’ he called after her flying figure but she did not appear to hear him. He mounted his horse and rode back to Hursley Park.

Lady Evans greeted him on his arrival with, ‘Well, did you see the famous Mannerling?’

‘Fine in its way, but it did not appear anything extraordinary. On the other hand, I did have an extraordinary meeting.’

‘Not with the Deverses!’

‘No, with one of the Beverley girls. Miss Abigail.’

‘Ah, yes, she has a twin. They are both nineteen. Was she making a call?’

‘No, she was standing hanging on to the gates and gazing hungrily down the drive.’

‘Oh, dear.’

‘I spoke to her.’

Lady Evans frowned her disapproval. ‘You had not been introduced.’

‘Miss Abigail was on her own, without maid or footman. I considered it my gentlemanly duty to walk her home.’

‘I hope you behaved yourself.’

‘Miss Abigail is the first young female I have ever come across who has not tried to flirt with me. On the other hand, she does seem to have a surprising knowledge of military history.’

‘Letitia,’ murmured Lady Evans with a reminiscent smile.

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘I am sorry, I was remembering someone like Miss Abigail I knew in the old days. I often thought she ruined her chances of marriage by being over-educated in masculine matters. She made every man who took an interest in her feel like a fool. The gentlemen do like to be petted and cajoled.’

‘I found Miss Abigail very refreshing.’

‘Not in danger of losing your heart?’

‘Not I. The lady is nineteen and I am middle-aged.’

‘True, very true,’ said Lady Evans placidly. ‘I have the very lady in mind for you.’

‘Matchmaking? Who is this charmer?’

‘Prudence Makepeace, twenty-five years of age and possessed of a great fortune, along with a great deal of common sense.’

‘And why is this great heiress unwed?’

‘Her parents betrothed her to Charlie Tuffnel. He was killed in the Peninsular Wars.’

‘And she still mourns him?’

‘That is the story her parents put about, but I find it hard to believe. She barely knew young Tuffnel. They were betrothed when they were children. One of those family arrangements. In any case, she arrives this very evening with her parents, so you may judge for yourself. They will stay with me until after the ball.’

‘Is she very ugly?’

Lady Evans laughed. ‘She is good and beautiful and wise.’

‘I cannot wait to meet this paragon. But with looks and money, if she has not yet been snapped up, there is something wrong.’

‘The same might be said of you,’ said Lady Evans tartly.

At that moment, while Lady Evans and Lord Burfield were talking, Harry Devers arrived home. He gazed about him lovingly as the peace of Mannerling enfolded him. He felt like a child being welcomed back into the loving embrace of a parent, for the house meant more to him now than his mother and father, who were seated in the drawing room, nervously waiting to see if their son was as changed as he had claimed to be.

When he marched in and bowed formally to both of them, they studied his face for marks of dissipation, but Harry was looking fit and well.

Harry had gained in cunning. He never meant to be humiliated ever again the way he had been humiliated by Jessica Beverley’s rejection of his suit. He also did not plan to annoy his father any further in case he found himself disinherited. He longed to resign from the army and planned to spend the whole of his leave working towards that end. If he took an interest in the estates, then surely they would let him stay.