Elisabeth Kidd (15 page)

Then she glanced back. There was no sign that he had ever been there.

Chapter 10

Following his encounter with Sabina, Captain Ashton found himself missing his comrades in arms. He could have used Nicky’s carelessly given but always sage advice—particularly when the matter concerned the ladies. Richard was equally discreet, but his brother had counseled patience, and Robert did not think he could remain patient very much longer. And it was certainly no use to apply to Lavinia, on the grounds of her being female, for she would only cast aspersions on Sabina’s character and say there was nothing else to be expected from a Bromley.

He could only search his own soul for an answer. Taking Salamanca out for his early morning ride the day after Viscount Markham and his other friends had left for Derby, Robert pulled up on a rise overlooking the Laughton Hills, the direction in which he knew Carling lay, and stared at the dawn landscape contemplatively.

Should he have accepted Sabina’s proposal, hoping that love would win out in the end? No, he had his pride, too. And he had done enough damage already in the name of love; he could not be sure that Sabina would not come to hate him even more if she were forced to endure his presence, if in name only, every day of her life.

Gazing down into the nearer distance, he caught the glint of sunlight on the canal. He smiled. He had not seen Rose and Bill for nearly a week. He would go there and refresh his mind and spirit; perhaps then he might come up with an answer before it was too late to sway Sabina in any direction at all.

On his way down the hill, however, he had a sudden thought and turned back toward the Abbey. His nephews had been begging him to take them on a picnic; now was as good a time as any. Besides, he had been intending to introduce the boys to the Theaks.

As he rode up the drive, two small bundles of energy burst out of the woods to run beside Salamanca to the house. Geoffrey, the elder and already tall for his age, won the race as usual, with his younger brother, his blond curls in disarray, gamely catching up at the end.

“Halloo, Uncle Robert. Can we have a ride?”

“Gosh, sir, he’s a big fellow, isn’t he?”

Only Robert’s battle-trained horse kept him from being thrown or the boys from being trampled. When he had dismounted and handed the reins to a grinning groom, however, he scolded them just the same.

“No, you cannot ride Salamanca until you learn how to behave around horses. Do you remember nothing I have told you?”

Lord Ashton, aged seven, protested, “We were just glad to see you, sir. We forgot that we should not make sudden noises near horses. But Salamanca must have heard all sorts of loud noises in battle, didn’t he?”

“He did, but he is an exception. And flattery will avail you nothing, young sir.”

“Please, please, sir,” pleaded Davey Ashton, aged five, apparently believing that begging was more acceptable than flattery, particularly when accompanied by little jumps as he tried to reach Robert’s hand. “Can’t we just sit on the saddle with you for a little while?”

“Perhaps.”

“When, sir? Today, sir?”

“Very well, sir. Today, sir. Geoffrey, go down to the stables and tell Foster to saddle Salamanca again after he has had a little rest. He should also make the donkey cart ready, since I cannot take both of you up at the same time—that
would
be asking a great deal even of a battle-hardened cavalry horse. We will go out as soon as I have had some breakfast.”

With a whoop, Geoffrey ran off to the stables, while young Davey hurried to keep up with his uncle’s long strides. “May I have some breakfast with you, Uncle Robert?”

“I suppose you may, toad-eater. But haven’t you eaten already? I believe your mama likes your company at breakfast, doesn’t she?”

“Not really,” Davey said wisely. “She just wants to be sure we’re up and properly dressed. Anyway, that was
hours
ago. I’m hungry again!”

Robert grinned. “You may make a soldier yet, young ‘un.”

He picked Davey up and set him on his shoulders for the walk to the house. Davey squealed with delight and pulled on his hair, but Robert no longer minded. When he had first returned home, both boys had been in awe of him, having heard exaggerated tales of his heroism in the field from the servants. It was some weeks before they dared even speak to their legendary uncle, but Robert was patient and wooed them by speaking to them as if they were intelligent enough to answer for themselves, even if Lavinia often did first or the boys were too timid to speak up.

Gradually, however, Geoffrey’s admiration turned to adoration, and the younger Davey followed his lead in this as in most things. It was all Robert could do then to stay off the pedestal they erected for his use without giving his nephews a distaste for him. This he contrived by offering them advice and lessons in all the things their mother thought too dangerous or too vulgar for young boys—particularly the sons of an earl—to know or hear.

But Robert had not entirely forgotten his own boyhood, and he knew what an adventure it was to brave the woods at night, or learn to shoot a gun, or ride on a horse bigger than one’s own docile little pony. He was invariably careful also to teach the boys to be cautious in strange places, to handle weapons with respect, and to be both kind and firm towards animals. Lavinia would have to be content with that.

Now that he had won their loyalty, Robert had another goal in mind. Their parents might be content, if not determined, to continue the rivalry between the Ashtons and the Bromleighs, but Robert was equally determined not to let it continue into the next generation.

Thus far, he had merely mentioned the other family casually in conversation, when pointing out where their land began and—just as important—where the Ashton estates left off. Careful probing elicited the information that the boys had not yet been made aware of The Quarrel, and Robert was grateful for the first time for their father’s indifference and their mother’s disinclination to raise distasteful subjects within the hearing of innocents.

Indeed, Lavinia confirmed this by confronting him in the breakfast parlor, while the boys were in the stables, with her impressions of Earl Bromleigh’s will.

“I assure you, you are well out of it, Robin dear,” she said as confidently as if he shared her opinion. “Why you should have been involved in the first place, I fail to understand.”

“I would have thought that to be obvious,” Robert replied, offering to pour Lavinia a cup of cocoa. She shook her head, and he put the pot down. “There is no other eligible Montagu for Miss Capulet to marry.”

She frowned. “I do wish you would not use literary allusions, Robin. I am never certain what you mean by them.”

“I use them hoping to make my meaning clearer,” he said, “but forgive me if I have failed. I meant, in plainer English, that Earl Bromleigh hoped to resolve the differences between our families by joining our houses through my marriage to Lady Sabina.”

“Nonsense. It cannot be done so simply. Anyway, what if you refused?”

“I have not refused. She has.”

Lavinia stared at him in amazement. Robert noticed for the first time that her eyes bulged slightly, making her look remarkably like a distant relation of the Prince Regent. He wondered why she had not claimed such a kinship; perhaps she considered the disreputable prince a connection she would not care to make.

“I cannot credit it,” she said finally. “Richard told me only that that particular clause in the will would likely be legally overturned.”

Robert inwardly applauded his brother’s ingenuity, but he preferred that Lavinia not labor under any illusions about him.

“I do not wish it overturned, Lavinia. At least, not until I have exhausted all other means of persuading Lady Sabina to marry me.”

“I do not know how you can lower yourself so. The Bromleys will hold this over our heads forever.”

“What if they do?” Robert asked, becoming irritated.

“I daresay we can rise above it,” Lavinia conceded, “but one would not wish to offer even the smallest reason for the Bromleys to feel superior to the Ashtons.”

“Why should they?” Robert retorted. “They are not dukes or even marquesses. Nor are we, for that matter. It seems to me that we are far more alike than not.”

“Nonsense. There is no question. Why, Earl Bromleigh—indeed, there is another odd thing about them. Why do they not call themselves earls
of
Bromleigh? I’m sure their style is outmoded and ridiculous.”

Robert had to laugh at that, which did nothing to appease his sister-in-law. “It
is
ridiculous, Lavinia, can’t you see? These petty differences cannot justify this continued estrangement, and any others are far in the past. Even Richard, who has more right than any of us to hold a grudge, does not.”

“I do not wish to discuss this further,” Lavinia said, rising from her chair. “In any case, I see the boys coming back from the stables, and I refuse to sully their innocent ears with such sordid gossip.”

“Gossip, indeed. What a whisker.”

“Good day, Robert.”

With that, the countess departed, her head held high, as if to impress an invisible audience of Bromleys with her personal superiority, if not that of certain black sheep regrettably still cluttering the family escutcheon. Robert smiled to himself, but then, when his nephews came racing into the room and jumped onto his knees, he put out of his mind Lavinia and her dogged determination never to see any side of an argument but her own. He would not “sully their ears” with anything sordid, but he would teach them about The Quarrel in his own way.

Indeed, he had already added some information about the Ashtons’ differences with the Bromleys to his other lessons to the boys about the world beyond the Abbey, dismissing it as a tradition not much different, or more real, than the ghost of a nun said to haunt the east wing, the only part of the house that still contained the stones of the original abbey.

Robert was now attempting to work out a way for Geoffrey and David to meet Edward and Diana, Earl Bromleigh’s children, and Dulcie’s twins without making an occasion of the meeting. But since neither set of siblings ventured into the village or anywhere else except under heavy escort, this seemed unlikely to come about soon. In the meanwhile, Robert’s excursions with his nephews were describing an ever-widening circle around Ashtonbury Abbey. Sooner or later, he hoped, it would encompass Bromleigh Hall.

* * * *

An hour later, the little expedition of one horse, two boys, and a donkey cart driven by Foster, Robert’s groom, set off for the canal, a coin toss having settled which of the boys should have the pleasure of riding before their uncle first. Davey, not very sorry to have to wait, for he liked to “help” steer the donkey cart, sat beside Foster on this conveyance as the quartet made their leisurely way along the canal.

“Where are we going, Uncle Robert?” it finally occurred to Geoffrey to ask.

“I want you to meet some very pleasant people who own a boat.”

“Oh, sir, what kind of boat?” Davey asked eagerly, nearly letting the reins drop.

“Ah, a future Navy man, I see. It is a narrowboat.”

“What sort of boat is that?”

“Dear me, Admiral, you do have a great deal to learn before you take up your sailing career.”

“I know!” Geoffrey crowed. “It is the kind of boat they sail on the canal.”

“Right you are, my boy. But one does not
sail
a narrowboat. It is pulled by horses.”

“A boat pulled by horses?” Davey’s imagination balked. “How can that be?”

“You shall see,” was all his uncle would tell them.

What they saw when the lock came into sight was George Theak whittling in a chair on deck, Bill lying on his stomach with his head in the hatch and a hammer in his hand, and Rose seated beside George, painting a tin washbasin with a bright floral design. Rose and George stood up and waved when they saw Robert and the boys coming toward them. When Robert dismounted from Salamanca, tied him to a tree, and called out, “Permission to come aboard, sir!”, Bill scrambled to an upright position and ceremoniously bowed them over the gangplank, raising his hat politely to Geoffrey and David in turn.

Introductions were made all around, and for a moment the boys stood politely, trying not to look too eager to run off and explore the boat.

“What is that you are whittling, please, sir?” Davey asked George, who still held his knife and a block of wood which as yet had no defined shape.

George leaned down towards Davey. “This will be a boat like the Rose Franklin,” he said, then held up the elongated piece of light wood. “This be the bow, see, and that the stern, and here in the middle is the cabin.”

Davey stared at the wood, trying to see a boat in it. “May I watch you, sir?”

Bill interrupted. “That sounds to me like a pretty tame entertainment for two lively young fellows like you. Why don’t we show you around the boat first. Then when you’re tired, you can sit with us for a while and watch George work.”

Those were magic words, upon which the boys eagerly turned to their uncle for permission, which was readily given. After consultation among the Theaks, Rose was delegated to show the boys the most interesting features of the boat. Bill would then give them a tour of the lock, and George would later direct a voyage of the narrowboat as far as the Welford arm and back. Foster declined an invitation to join in these activities, saying he would take the donkey cart back to the Abbey and return for the young gentlemen in time to get them home for dinner.

Robert sat down with Bill and George for a smoke, during which they could hear delighted shouts from below when the boys discovered the beds which folded down from the wall and the myriad of tiny cabinets lining the cabin, all of which they had to open and explore and close again with a bang.

“I trust they won’t do any damage, Bill,” Robert said. “I think they are small enough not to be able to actually sink the boat by putting a foot through the floor.”

George laughed. “You should have seen Bill when he was a boy. He ran around boats as if they were dry land and was even more active than your nephews.”