Heir to Rowanlea (14 page)

“My mistress asks if she can help,” the man said as he came up to them. “Why, Mr Norville, sir!”

“It’s Lady Fotherley, is it not?” Harry asked, and when the man nodded, briskly bade him ask his mistress if she would be so good as to convey Miss Maine, who was bruised but otherwise unhurt, home to Bruton Street.

Elizabeth was soon taken to the carriage, permitting a solicitous Claude to carry her there, although she protested she was well able to walk. While she was being comfortably settled, and Claude was promising to follow her home, leading her horse, the rest of the party had come up, James hanging shame-faced behind, Wolf firmly tethered on a length of rope. Claude turned grimly to James as the landaulet moved off.

“How dare you bring that hell hound here and set it on Miss Maine?” he demanded furiously. “You should know better than to permit any dog to frighten horses. You are not fit to have charge of a lap dog, let alone a great wild animal like that, which is totally unsuitable for town, and utterly untrained. I intend to have the brute shot!”

“No, you shall not! He’s mine, and mama said I might keep him,” James ejaculated, clutching the threatened animal closely to him.

“He could not know Elizabeth would be so feeble as to let her horse bolt with her,” Charlotte exclaimed, firing up in defense of her brother.

“It happened too suddenly,” Claude said stiffly, “and I’ll thank you to keep out of this. It’s none of your business.”

“Amanda got her horse under control, and she’s riding a much more spirited animal than that knock-kneed slug Elizabeth has!” Charlotte retorted, unabashed. “As for the dog, James has already taught him to do several tricks, and it is unfair of you to say he is untrained. And you shall not have him shot. What our mama permits is none of your business.”

“You are impertinent, and as you are all living in my house, and the animal is accommodated in my stables, what I say goes. He will be shot, and that’s the end of the matter.”

“You would not!” James cried in anguish. “You are a cruel beast! Mama will not permit it!”

He turned, and dragging Wolf after him, plunged off across the Park while Claude, ignoring Charlotte’s strictures, gathered up the reins and mounted, taking Elizabeth’s horse and leaving the party with a brief word of farewell. The rest of them rode home in unusually subdued moods.

* * * *

Harry’s fears about Claude’s gambling were brought forcibly to Charlotte’s mind again on the following morning, when Lady Norville, somewhat unexpectedly, for she was normally the most indulgent of parents, commented acidly to Claude on his belated appearance at the breakfast table.

“Since I do not myself adopt the somewhat lazy habit of breakfasting in bed, and am here to pour your coffee, you might have the courtesy to appear on time,” she said coldly when he entered and, barely glancing at her, took his place.

“I apologize, Maman,” he said coldly, glancing at her almost with dislike. “I was late home last night, having been with some new friends. Really I cannot think why you do bother to get up so early. It might be better if you did breakfast in bed like Aunt Sophia.”

Lady Norville pursed her lips angrily.

“No doubt you were at some gambling hell,” she said with distaste in her voice. “You must take care, Claude, for you do not wish to bring yourself, and us all, to ruin that way!”

“Be easy, ma’am! I have no intention of doing so foolish a thing,” he responded, and turned with unusual affability to ask Charlotte if she would care to drive with him to see how Elizabeth was.

He seemed to be in a better mood this morning, and thinking she might be able to put in a word of her own regarding his proposed activities, and in defense of Wolf, she agreed, and went to fetch her pelisse while he sent for his curricle. As they started off Charlotte, as ingenuously as she could contrive, asked if he had really been at some gambling hell the previous night.

“What do you know of gambling hells?” he demanded, giving a surprised laugh.

“Oh, nothing. How should I?” she returned. “But I am for ever hearing how wicked they are, and how young men are lured into them and cheated of their fortunes, that I wondered if it could possibly be so?”

“Are you as concerned as our dear Harry I shall gamble my fortune away?” he said angrily.

“I am convinced you would do naught so foolish,” she responded with spirit, “and so I wondered why you went there?”

“For those who lose there must be others that win, and you may be sure I won’t permit anyone to cheat me,” Claude said with a contemptuous laugh. “All this pother because I have decided to sell property I am never likely to visit, which is mine to dispose of as I wish, and actually nothing at all to do with your family or your dear cousin Harry. Enough, dear coz, of this tedious subject! Tell me instead, for you seem friendly enough with Richard Davies, how important his father is at the Foreign Office.”

Charlotte, furious he should speak to her in such a fashion, turned away to hide the angry color in her cheeks.

“Quite important, I believe,” she answered shortly, determined to keep her temper at all costs. “I really know very little about Mr Davies though. Why are you interested?”

“I have found him a knowledgeable man on the few occasions we have met, and it occurred to me he and my uncle would have a great deal in common. I must arrange for them to meet. I dare say you would not object if Richard were invited to dine? I have the impression you know him very well indeed.”

“I have known him—oh, since Harry went to Eton,” Charlotte replied self-consciously, and Claude laughed in a way that made her long to box his ears. Seeing he had offended her Claude tried to make amends by telling her something of his life in France, and she was so interested she forgot both her anger and her discomfort at his insinuations about Richard.

“I do not suppose you recall Bagshot, who was my father’s servant,” he said at last.

Charlotte frowned in concentration.

“Was he the small wiry man with sandy hair? I think I recall him chasing you and Harry out of the stables once for some prank you had played. He went with you to France, didn’t he?”

“Aye, that is he. Well, he married a French girl, and after my father’s death went to work on her father’s farm until she inherited it. Now she is dead, and his sons run the farm, and he wrote to me to ask if there was a cottage he could have. He is homesick for England, and from what he says I suspect he does not deal any too kindly with his sons. Is there an empty cottage at Rowanlea that would do for him, do you think?”

Charlotte considered, and then nodded.

“Indeed, I am sure there is, unless Uncle Henry had promised it to anyone before you came home. It is next to the Turners’ farm.”

“The Turners? Where do they live? Is it near to the house?”

“You cannot have forgotten Mrs Turner!” Charlotte exclaimed in disbelief. “You could not, Claude!”

“But I have, my dear Charlotte,” he replied, shrugging and laughing quizzically at her. “I have the most shocking memory. Why ought I not to have forgotten this good lady?”

“Do you not recall her delicious gingerbread?” she demanded.

Claude frowned, then nodded.

“Of course! I remember now, the gingerbread, but did not recall the name of the cook who supplied it.”

“Oh, it used to be a high treat to be permitted to visit Mrs Turner, and she always had a great supply of gingerbread ready for us. I believe Harry goes to see her now mainly for that, and she still offers it to us,” Charlotte told him.

“Harry is yet a boy in many ways,” Claude remarked, and laughed as Charlotte turned indignant eyes towards him. “Oh, do not fire up so in his defense, cousin! Tell me instead more about these Turners. I cannot recall seeing their name on the rent roll.”

“No, for they bought their farm long ago, before grandfather died, I think. Mrs Turner inherited a great sum, great that is for a farmer, from her own father. She was the only child, and I believe he was a merchant who retired to a farm in Kent to grow fruit. I remember Mr Turner saying once he preferred to keep the farm and crops he was used to, and so they sold up the other one.”

“Do you think many of the tenant farmers at Rowanlea would wish to buy their land if they were offered the chance?” Claude asked. “After all, with the wars, agriculture has been a profitable concern of late. Some of them ought to be able to afford it.”

“Why, you do not plan to sell the farms at Rowanlea as well, do you?” asked Charlotte in dismay.

“Why not? It would be less to manage, and that could be no bad thing. I have already decided to rid myself of the trouble of the Yorkshire estate. It is too far away.”

“You cannot! You must not!”

He raised his eyebrows haughtily.

“Must not? Pray, cousin Charlotte, do you presume to give me orders, like Harry and his father do?”

Charlotte fumed inwardly. She did not appreciate being treated like a child, by a cousin who had once romped with her and teased her.

“I am sorry, I do not mean to be impertinent, but it would damage the estate if you did.”

“Apparently it did not when the Turners bought.”

“That was different, an isolated case when no other farmer could have dreamed of buying. But if you offer it to all, they might now be able to!”

“Why not? Why not encourage them to own their land instead of working just to pay rent?”

“You have revolutionary ideas!” Charlotte snapped. “Where would you be without the rents?”

“I would have the purchase price, and be able to invest it.”

“Or send it to France. Is that your idea?”

“What I plan is no business of yours,” Claude said angrily. “If I have a mind to sell anything that belongs to me, farms, or hunting-box, or even the town house, I shall do so, and none shall gainsay me! I have suffered enough impertinence from Harry and his father, and do not mean to tolerate it anymore from either of them, or from you!”

“You are far more impertinent yourself!” Charlotte blazed. “How dare you chide Uncle Henry when he offers advice? If he had not spent a vast amount of time and his own money on looking after Rowanlea there would be no prosperous estate for you to come home to, and milk off the profits he has worked for. He is entitled to look to you for some gratitude!”

Fortunately they had just arrived in Bruton Street, and she was forced to hide her fury as they were admitted to the house and asked how Elizabeth did. She was found reclining on a sofa in her mama’s drawing-room, and when Claude was shown in she smiled winningly at him. Mrs Maine greeted him warmly, thanking him for his care of Elizabeth as though it had been he and not Lady Fotherley who had conveyed her home.

“She is fully recovered, and after a short, gentle airing we have planned will spend most of the day resting,” Mrs Maine declared. “How fortunate she did not hurt her ankle and be unable to dance.”

Claude apologized on behalf of James, and assured them, to Charlotte’s renewed fury, that Wolf would be shot for frightening Elizabeth so. Mrs Maine shook her head at him and protested he was not to be blamed for the thoughtlessness of his young cousin.

“And I really must endeavor to overcome my stupid dislike of big dogs,” Elizabeth said with a tinkling laugh. “Pray, Claude, do not destroy James’ dog on my account.”

He did not answer, and soon took his leave, with a coldly unresponsive Charlotte beside him. He chatted to her, despite her refusal to utter more than monosyllabic replies, but as soon as they reached home Charlotte swept up the stairs to her room, there to fling herself into a chair and try to consider the implications of what he had said. One thing she could do immediately, she decided, and that was to warn James he must take Wolf to where Claude could not find him. She went to James’ room, but he was out, and so she sat down and scribbled a note to him, then pondered on the problem of speaking with Harry.

* * * *

She was determined he must know as soon as possible of this further threat to Rowanlea and the other lands, and the only way to contrive it was to go to see him, but the doing of this presented difficulties. Jenny, her maid, had been sent out to make some small purchases, and was not yet back. It would be impossible to escape through the hall, for Rivers or one of the footmen was almost always on duty there, and would not permit her to leave the house alone. She went down to the stables on the excuse of looking at her mare, and managed to slip out of the yard when none of the grooms was looking.

Hastily she made her way to South Audley Street, thankful Harry’s rooms were so close, and not in St. James’s, where even she would not have dared to walk alone. As it was she walked as quickly as she could, with difficulty restraining herself from breaking into a run, and arrived breathless at the door of the house where Harry had rooms on the first floor. She knocked vigorously, and as soon as the door was opened demanded to see Mr Norville at once.

The man had never seen her before, and stared at her in surprise, then looked beyond her to see where her maid could be. Seeing she had none, he became truculent.

“Ho, and what would the likes of you be wanting of with Mr Norville?” he said slowly.

Charlotte stamped her foot in fury.

“That is no concern of yours, and I must see my cousin immediately!” she declared.

“Cousin? A likely tale. Where’s your maid then? The cousins of Mr Norville wouldn’t come visitin’ wivout a maid, no’ow. Well, stands to reason. They wouldn’t come ‘ere at all, come to think of it!”

“Well, I have, and if you don’t go and tell him at once that Miss—that his cousin is waiting for him, and needs to speak with him urgently, you will regret it!” Charlotte said angrily, though something in his manner made her cautious enough to avoid giving her name.

He refused, and she was raising her voice in argument when Willis, Harry’s valet, appeared at the top of the stairs.

“That is enough, Cooper,” he said firmly. “I know Mr Norville’s cousin and will announce her myself. This way, if you please, Miss.”

Cooper retired, muttering imprecations, to the lower regions, and Charlotte thankfully followed Willis up the stairs and into a room furnished in comfortable rather than elegant style. It was reassuringly untidy. A greatcoat was flung across one of the chairs, a pair of pistols Harry appeared to have been cleaning were on a table in the middle of the room, together with a decanter and some glasses, and several whips and fishing rods were propped in a corner. She looked round with interest, recognizing some of the pictures Harry had previously had at Grosvenor Square, until she was made aware Harry was in the room by an angry exclamation, and turned to see him starting out of a deep armchair, tossing aside a book, and gazing at her in disbelief.