Elisabeth Kidd (21 page)

But the loving expression on Georgina’s pretty face as she looked at Lewis tore at her heart. It was all she could do not to weep.

“You are looking very lovely this evening,” Randolph, seated next to her, observed
sotto voce
.

Sabina blinked her eyes and glanced at him. “Thank you. I could
not
bring myself to wear black tonight.”

“I should think not. Even Alicia, you notice, has covered her weeds with a flowered shawl.”

“It is called paisley, Randolph, as well you know.”

He grinned. “I was only testing you, darling, to be sure you are truly with us again.”

“Have I seemed so very far away?”

“Preoccupied, I would have called it. Not to be wondered at, I’m sure.”

“But it might have become tiresome before much longer.”

Under the table, Randolph squeezed her hand. “I hope you would have confided in us before coming to that state, Sabina. You know you can trust any of us, however much we tease over less important matters.”

Sabina felt her eyes watering up again. “I know, Randolph dear. I’m sorry if I have behaved as if I thought otherwise. I shan’t forget again, I promise.”

“We only want to see you happy, darling.”

It seemed, Sabina thought, that everyone wanted her to be happy but herself. Rose was right. It was up to her to decide what she really wanted and to act on it. She must seize the happiness that had eluded her because she had let it.

At that moment, Henshaw came into the room bearing another tray of champagne glasses, followed by a footman with a bucket of ice shavings and two bottles. Henry rose to propose a toast.

“Will everyone please join me in toasting the happy couple—although I personally believe that Lewis ought to be the happier of the two for finally accepting his good fortune.”

“Hear, hear!” said Fletcher and Randolph in unison.

Lewis grinned from ear to ear, and Georgina blushed as more toasts followed. Much against Lewis’s objections, his brothers then proceeded to reveal all his childhood peccadilloes and to warn Georgina what to expect of a husband who was invariably grumpy in the morning and insisted on lemon instead of milk in his tea.

Alicia observed that it had been a long time since there was a wedding in the family, and Sabina had to be grateful for her tact. There had not been a wedding because Peter Ogilvey had not lived to come back to her. But there had been a betrothal much like this one, different in only one circumstance—she had not loved Peter as Georgina did Lewis. She had always known that, but they had been friends and she had loved him as a friend and thought they could build a marriage on that. It was only now that she knew she had been relieved not to have to put that friendship to such a test and to face her fear that she could not be the wife Peter expected.

Her mind eased of at least that lingering burden, Sabina was able to take part in the general good will and felicitations being given all around her. She knew all this ought to be directed at her, and although she had never up to this moment pictured herself as the center of attention in the way Georgina now was, it was borne in on her that she was sorry she was not.

Chapter 14

“Oh, by the bye, Sabina, we are having a few neighbors to join us for dinner tonight—just a small party. You will know everyone, but I thought I would just drop a word in your ear so that you may plan your wardrobe accordingly.”

Alicia murmured this piece of news to her sister-in-law as she passed her in the hall in front of the breakfast room and was out the door to the garden, flower basket over her arm, before Sabina could reply.

She found it mildly irritating that Alicia would invite guests without asking if she felt up to receiving them, but then dismissed the matter from her mind. This was Alicia’s home, after all, and she could invite whom she chose. And since Sabina had been coming down to dinner in the normal way for weeks now, she could scarcely refuse to do so tonight.

“What did she mean by that?” she asked Dulcie, who came out of the library just at that moment.

“Why, what could she mean, except to forewarn you to expect outsiders tonight. I daresay she wished to be certain you do not wear red or something equally unsuitable.”

Dulcie looked at her now, surveying her dark blue riding habit. “Are you going to Carling today? Would you care for my company?”

“Thank you, but I daresay you have enough to occupy you here,” Sabina returned, adding wryly, “Preparing for this mysterious dinner party, that is. Perhaps I will ask Randolph to come.”

“Try Henry,” Dulcie advised. “He does get under foot when there is housekeeping to be done.”

“I will,” Sabina replied, putting on her hat in front of the hall mirror and studying her reflection. She thought she had regained some of the usual color in her cheeks, and her eyes were no longer red-rimmed. She must be recovering. Indeed, she had been feeling much more herself since her discussion with Fletcher and had even begun to view the future with some optimism. She now had a goal and defined steps to follow to achieve it—even if it meant compromise in the matter of a companion.

She carried in her pocket the latest of several letters she had received from her cousin Edina, all of which she had politely, if abbreviately, answered. Today’s letter, however, which she had already taken out several times to brood over in the course of the morning, had done little to maintain her cheerful outlook.

She sighed and turned toward the back of the house to make her way to the stables. As it happened, however, Henry was nowhere to be found and Randolph, one of the grooms informed her, had just driven off to the village.

Accepting the same groom’s offer to accompany her only because she had decided to take some swatches of drapery fabric and wallpaper samples with her to see how they would look in her bedroom at Carling, Sabina set off, her mind vaguely troubled by the notion that something was going on that she was not a party to and that her family were avoiding her. She told herself that they were merely leaving her to sort out her feelings about moving in her own mind; they were, after all, still within reach if she wished to discuss anything with anyone.

She had begun organizing her move to Carling the very day of her talk with Fletcher and had already spent several afternoons at the house to see to any changes that might be made before she moved in and to set the servants to cleaning and otherwise readying the house, which had not been occupied since her Great-Aunt Mary had lived in it until her death three years earlier, and it was disagreeably dusty and faded-looking in some quarters.

Carling Manor was located only a few miles from Bromleigh Hall, on the other side of the Avon. It had been purchased by the late earl only twenty years before, mainly for its excellent coverts, and it was not therefore a traditional family property. Despite this lack of pedigree, however, Sabina found the manor house small enough to be cosy and well built enough to be dry and snug in all weathers.

The three farms situated on the estate were prosperous, and the income from them would have kept Sabina in comfortable circumstances. Unmarried, of course, the income was not hers to command, but Fletcher had kept his word to consult immediately with Mr. Quigley and an arrangement was being worked out by which she could at least pretend to enjoy independent means and live as she wished.

She refused to let her mind dwell on the inevitable farewell to her family that the move to Carling entailed, or on her happy past at Bromleigh Hall, telling herself that the move was much the same as moving to a room a far wing of the Hall; it was not so far away that she could not still visit whenever she liked.

She threw herself into every detail of the management of her new home, determined to arrange everything to her liking. Today, however, she found herself unable even to decide between two shades of blue curtains for her dressing room and temporarily gave up the effort. She sat on a Holland-covered chair and took out Edina’s letter. It was already folded to the page that had captured her attention when the letter arrived that morning:

…quite the sensation when he arrived (Edina wrote in a hurried but legible scrawl), particularly since so few such handsome young men had been spotted on the streets so early in the year, but none of the liveliest young ladies seemed to interest him, until—and here is the astonishing part, dear Sabina—he was seen yesterday driving Lady Jane Portman in the park, not for the first time, and last night they were seen—
unchaperoned
—at the Theatre Royal. Now I have no objection to Jane, who is a charming girl, but she is hardly in the first blush of youth, and not at all fashionable in her looks and dress, despite her recent sojourn in Paris. Well, I daresay it is not serious….

Sabina was less sanguine. She might have dismissed, although with some difficulty, the news that Robert Ashton was squiring one of the season’s accredited beauties, but a girl not in her first youth—and she was conscious of her own situation in that regard—and not “fashionable” struck her as ominous. It would be precisely such a female who would be most likely to attract Robert Ashton. If he were in a humor to be attracted.

She could not be sure that he was not. She had certainly given him no reason to return to Leicestershire if he were not.

She glanced at the date on the letter and saw that it had been written three days before, although not posted until yesterday. She wondered what had happened in the intervening days and looked forward to the next morning’s post with a mixture of dread and curiosity.

It was in this abstracted mood that she came down to dinner that evening. She had dressed in grey silk with a discreet silver broach at the collar and had allowed Emily to experiment with her hair, which effort had produced a flattering, high-swept style which was nonetheless simple enough to pass Alicia’s stern inspection. Despite the simplicity of her costume, however, she knew the gown flattered her figure, and she had studied herself with some satisfaction in her looking glass before descending to the front hall.

She had reached the hall before becoming aware of voices and the bustle of someone’s arrival. She glanced toward the door and stopped abruptly at the foot of the stairs, not certain whether to believe her eyes.

“You!”

Robert Ashton bowed. “I am pleased to see you again, Lady Sabina.”

Despite his neutral tone of voice, she could see by the warmth in his blue eyes that he really was glad to see her, as if nothing had happened between them since they set foot on the wharf at Market Harborough, as if he had not been amusing himself in London with—but she would not think of that. Obviously Edina had been mistaken.

She found his warmth more disconcerting than if he had been cold or angry. He was dressed formally but soberly in pale knee-breeches that made his legs look even longer, a grey coat, and a white silk waistcoat. It was even more distressing that Sabina found his tall figure and handsome face no less attractive than ever. She felt the color rise to her cheeks and put up her chin belligerently.

“Good evening, Captain Ashton. This
is
a surprise.”

He raised his brows questioningly at that, but before he could say more, Alicia took Sabina by the arm and led her firmly, if not quite forcibly, to meet their other guests.

“Lady Kimborough, I believe you are not acquainted with my sister, Sabina. Lord Kimborough, my sister. My dear, these are our neighbors.”

“The rival earl,” Richard said sardonically, but genially enough, and held out his hand to shake hers. “I am happy to meet you at last, Lady Sabina.”

He studied her with ill-concealed interest but not unapprovingly. Sabina shook his hand lightly, wondering how much he knew about her relationship with his brother.

When she turned to his wife, however, Lady Kimborough merely nodded her head slightly in her direction, not accepting her hand or even meeting her eyes.

“Welcome to Bromleigh Hall,” Sabina said deliberately in her direction, stressing the first word.

“Thank you,” Lavinia replied stiffly.

Alicia, perhaps sensing that Sabina was likely, at the least encouragement, to jump on her high horse, ushered their guests into the green drawing room under cover of uncharacteristic garrulousness. There was, however, enough skill in her conversation to draw Lady Kimborough into responding politely, if not warmly, and when Fletcher joined in, the small talk nearly approached a normal, sociable level.

Fletcher did take her aside briefly when they entered the drawing room and said, in a low voice, “Sabina, I must apologize for all this. I assure you, it was done without my knowledge. I have explained to Alicia that we had come to an arrangement, but you know what she is—nothing must interfere with her social plans once she has set them in motion.”

“I’m not certain I understand you, Fletcher.”

“I only mean, I would have prevented your being obliged to meet Captain Ashton again, if I could—particularly in your own home.”

“Thank you, Fletcher, but you need not have interfered, I assure you.”

He glanced at her as if uncertain whether to believe her, but Alicia signaled to him just at that moment and he said nothing more, only squeezing Sabina’s hand briefly before resuming his host’s duties.

Georgina was already seated in the drawing room, looking like a fashion plate in a simple white frock with a high neck edged in lace and demure blue flowers around the hem. Even Lady Kimborough, herself arrayed in dark blue silk and a profusion of diamonds which she must have been confident no one else could approach, appeared to approve of Miss Campion and condescended to be gracious on being introduced to her.

Each of the Bromleys joined this initial grouping in turn, until each had been suitably presented. Sabina had no doubt that Alicia had carefully choreographed the parade in order not to overwhelm the Ashtons with superior waves of Bromleys. Dulcie and Henry, the most likely to cause an eruption of competitive spirit, arrived last, bare seconds before dinner was announced and they all trouped into the dining room.