Never Doubt I Love (24 page)

“Don't. She's a diamond of the first water, surely, but too fiery for my tastes. Type that makes a fellow nervous. No, 'tis the glowing little lass with the auburn locks and the big green eyes I speak of. You had the extremes there, Perry. Bewitching midnight on one side, and a ray of sunshine on the other. I rely on you for an introduction. Don't fob me off, my lad, or you'll rue the day!”

Cranford had enjoyed a long sleep, and although his head still ached, he felt a good deal more himself this morning. He'd had not the least intention to accept Lady Eaglund's invitation, and no less than Crenshore was he surprised to have been so honoured.

Relaying their conversation to Owen Furlong after Crenshore had gone off to Tattersall's, he said slowly, “I'll wager that was why the invitation came my way. My uncle's cousin, or whatever she is, hoped I'd take little Miss Grainger to that confounded musicale.” He frowned, and muttered, “I fancy she'd like to go.”

Cranford was not fond of the opera and had been heard to remark that he'd as soon have a case of the plague as suffer through a musicale. Aware of this, Sir Owen winked at Florian who was gathering up yesterday's newspapers, and asked innocently, “How is your head this morning, Perry? I fully expected to find you cleaning your duelling pistols before going off after Michael Templeby.”

Puzzled, Cranford said, “What, because he painted my new foot?”

“No, you clunch. Because he sent you that ridiculous stolen letter.”

“I did accuse him of that, didn't I! I must beg his pardon. I realized afterwards, Owen, that the letter could not have come from Templeby. Not unless he's found some magician to waft him off to Russia, or some such place. I had to pay sixpence for the silly thing. Must've come a distance. I wonder I didn't think of that at the time.”

“I wonder you could think of anything at all, considering everything that was going on with your brainbox.”

Cranford grinned. “It may have been dented, perhaps, but my brains aren't addled if that's what you mean.”

“What I mean,” said Furlong, “is that I begin to suspect you're acquiring a fondness for Miss Grainger's company. Which is not surprising. Don't you agree, Florian?”

“I do, sir,” answered Florian. “And I think Mr. Crenshore was right. Miss Grainger is more than pretty, and when she smiles, she really is a ray of sunshine.”

‘By George, but she is!' thought Cranford.

Half an hour later, he was riding to Yerville Hall to ask if he might be allowed to escort Miss Zoe Grainger to the Eaglund musicale this afternoon.

His dashing appearance on horseback won many admiring glances from female eyes. His mood, however, was not quite as cheerful as it had been earlier. Owen Furlong, who was of course invited everywhere, had said thoughtfully that although as a rule he avoided such occasions, he just might attend this one. “If only to meet your little ray of sunshine.”

Such a good fellow, was Owen. The best of men. But Cranford found himself wishing he'd not mentioned the invitation. Owen had such a confoundedly unfailing ability to set the ladies' hearts a'flutter!

C
HAPTER
X

“When asked if you would sign a statement specificating as the gent was racing of his carriage,” said Mr. Young of Bow Street, consulting the papers he had brought to Yerville Hall, “your eggsack words was—‘I—most—certinly—will!'”

He was short and sturdy, with a deeply lined face and a truculent chin. He had refused to sit down, and stood in the centre of the morning room with the air of a gladiator prepared to take on all comers. His eyes, deep-set under great bushy eyebrows that stood straight out from his face like miniature chevaux-de-frise, lifted, to dart accusation at Zoe.

“Yes, I know I did,” she said apologetically. “But, you see, when I stopped to think about it—”

“You thought it best to change ‘will' to ‘will not'!” he growled.

Zoe frowned. “I can understand your feelings, Mr. Young, but kindly do not use that tone of voice to me. At the time of the accident I was upset and did not stop to think that—”

“You thought enough,” he interrupted again, consulting the statement. “You thought enough to say as this here Mr. Perry-green. Cranford was ‘a—bad—man.' And when asked, specific, if the victim had
walked
crost the street, your very own words was: ‘Of—course—what—would—you—think?'”

“Oh, dear. I did say that. But—”

“But now, you bin and changed your thoughts, ma'am. And what I would like to know is this: What brung about this sudden change? I bin round afore today, ma'am. And I were turned away every time. And now you tells me as this
good-looking
young
gentry
cove ain't a bad man after all, and that you was—”

“Be so kind as to tell me who this—person—is, Miss Grainger,” commanded Lady Buttershaw, coming into the room with a rustle of satin and an expression of abhorrence. “And why you saw fit to interview him alone.”

The Runner held up a short baton surmounted by a crown. “I am a orficer o' the law,” he announced. “Exercising of me right as such to—”

“I believe I asked you a question, Miss Grainger,” barked Lady Buttershaw, ignoring him.

The face of the officer of the law became a darker red, his eyebrows more bristly than ever, and his jaw even more pugnacious.

Zoe said, “This is Mr. Young, from Bow Street, my lady. He brought the statement that—”

“A fig for his statement! He was told yesterday,
and
the day before, that you had erred and had no clear recollection of the incident. I have no time to waste on silly nonsense. Arbour!” Her ladyship turned to the doorway where the butler hovered. “Show this person out!”

“If you please, ma'am,” said Zoe firmly. “I feel I owe Mr. Young an explanation of why—”

“Once again your feelings are misplaced! You owe him nothing! Any Bow Street officer worth his salt should know better than try to force statements from a gently bred-up young lady who is clearly in a swooning condition!”

The Runner snapped, “The
law,
me lady, is
the law!
And not
no one's
got the right to—”

“Be still, you insolent creature!” Lady Buttershaw's volume made Zoe wince, and rattled the prisms on a lamp shade. “You do not browbeat some poor unfortunate commoner! Let me warn you that my late husband was well acquaint with Chancellor Hardwicke. As am I! And if you do not take yourself off at once, 'twill be my duty to apprise him of your disgraceful manners! Remove yourself, my good man!” She waved her long arm regally. “You offend my sight! Begone!”

The mention of the mighty Lord Chancellor had caused Mr. Young to shrink. He lost all his ruddy colour and it seemed to Zoe that even the chevaux-de-frise wilted. With abject bows and murmurings of “most sincere apologies” and “deepest regrets” he beat an ignominious retreat.

“If ever I heard the like!” snorted Lady Buttershaw. “You will, I trust, have learned something of how a person of Quality must deal with such presumptuous mushrooms! The creature, one hopes, is thoroughly ashamed of himself!”

‘If
he
is not,' thought Zoe, mortified, ‘
I
most certainly am!'

When Gorton came into her bedchamber an hour later, she was writing a letter to advise Aunt Minerva of where she now resided, and to ask what that dear lady knew of the present family Yerville. She was still seething over the Turkish treatment that had been accorded Mr. Young who, although rather rude, had some excuse for being provoked and had simply been doing his duty. “Yes?” she asked, without her usual smile.

Gorton eyed her uncertainly. “Ay knew you would be cross, Miss Zoe. But as Ay told Chubb, he had only himself to blame.”

“What? Who is Chubb? And what has he done?”

“One of the lackeys, Miss. Leastwise, he was. Ay beg your pardon. I thought you knew, and being so kind-hearted as you are … But he shouldn't have let in that Runner. Got turned off.”

Dismayed, Zoe cried, “Oh, never say so! Whatever will become of him?”

“Says he'll take the King's shilling. Likely he will. Ay don't think he much enjoyed being a lackey. The Army will suit him better. Now never be upset, Miss. 'Tis not your fault. And only look! Ay have a letter for you! And Lady Buttershaw wants you to change into your prettiest gown. Mr. Cranford has asked permission to take you to Lord Eaglund's house this afternoon! Only think, Miss! A musicale at the home of a
viscount
!”

“And such a nice gentleman! How
lovely
!” Clapping her hands with excitement, Zoe jumped up and danced over to take the letter. “Oh, 'tis from my
Papa
!” She flew back to the desk and broke the thick seal with great care, but as she spread the closely written and crossed sheet another piece of sealing wax fell out.

Papa's news banished the joy from her eyes. Travis had been very ill and was coming home.

Gorton hummed merrily as she selected her personal favourite among Miss Zoe's new gowns, a
robe battante
of silvery blue damask, very décolleté, the neckline and stomacher trimmed with silver lace.

A shadow had fallen over Zoe's happiness, and she gazed in silence at Papa's ominous words. Absently, she took up the little fallen piece of wax and fitted it back into place. Or would have. But there was no splinter in the seal. She had opened the letter so carefully that the wax had broken cleanly. She saw then the broken piece seemed to have attached itself to the underside of the paper, and that it was a darker shade of red, almost as though … Stunned, she thought, ‘Oh! My heavens! Almost as though it has been opened and re-sealed!' Shock was succeeded by incredulous anger, and she had to struggle to appear calm and to remind herself that she must not again jump to conclusions. It could be a simple case of Papa having forgotten something and being obliged to break his initial seal so as to add a note. Only—there was no note; nothing had been added after his signature. And surely he would have written a little postscript to explain why he had opened the letter, rather than going to such lengths to disguise the broken seal? But if Papa had not opened the letter, who had? Her suspicion turned at once to the logical culprit, but she had to abandon that unkind thought. Papa had mentioned at the end that he was a lonely bachelor again, as his “dear wife” and the children were at Hampstead, visiting her parents. So Mrs. Mowbray had not been at Travisford to pry into his letter. In which case …

When she could command her voice, she asked quietly, “What becomes of the post when it is brought in, Elsie?”

Inspecting the blue damask for creases, Gorton answered, “'Tis all delivered to Lady Buttershaw, Miss, so her la'ship can sort it out. Then, she gives it to Mr. Arbour, or Chef, or the proper party.”

“I see. And when did my letter come?”

Gorton turned to look at her curiously. “Why, today, Miss. Lady Buttershaw gave it me just a few minutes ago. Is something wrong?”

Zoe brought herself up short. To discuss her suspicions with a servant was unthinkable. To even harbour such suspicions must be the height of ingratitude. “Oh, no,” she said lightly. “I just wondered. I had not heard the postman's horn.”

“Likely not, Miss. In the morning he comes at eight o'clock, and your room being at the back of the house, you'd not hear him.”

Zoe nodded and returned to her letter. But she could not write. Her anxiety for Travis distracted her, and her thoughts kept turning also to the several things that worried at the edges of her mind. Foolish little worries by comparison, she told herself. But they were beginning to mount up; to form a pattern she could not understand. And that was starting to make her uneasy.

*   *   *

The home of Rupert Shale, Viscount Eaglund, was one of the Bloomsbury palaces. “'Tis even bigger than Yerville Hall,” Zoe confided to Cranford as they moved across the marble floor of the extremely large entrance hall, “only more cheery. Take that pretty painting over there, for instance. So much livelier than all those dusty old tapestries.”

Since the “pretty painting” was of a voluptuous nude that the eyes of ladies usually avoided, Cranford was hard put to it not to laugh, and suggested piously that Miss Grainger might do better than to stare at it so obviously.

She glanced up at him and saw laughter glinting in the blue eyes. Her own bright beam dawned at once. “You are quizzing me again. But, do look, Mr. Cranford. Surely the artist has exaggerated. Even my step-mama does not have such enormous—”

“Very true, ma'am,” he over-rode loudly, and hissed, “quiet, you little wretch, or you will cause the dowager behind us to swoon dead away! Lord Eaglund's art collection,” he went on in his normal voice, “is believed to be one of the finest in Europe.”

“I think you are very prim, for an Army man,” she whispered mischievously. “My brother used to—” She stopped and her face clouded.

Cranford said, “What is it? I had no thought to hurt your feelings, Miss Zoe. 'Tis just that what can be said to one's brother in the country, is not always—er,
convenable
in London Town.”

She sighed. “I know. I am hopeless.”

He patted the small hand that rested on his arm. “You are a delight,” he said, and realized with something of a shock that he meant it.

Zoe halted abruptly, and searching his face, said an astonished, “No, am I? Nobody ever said that to me before.”

“Dare I ask what improprieties you have been voicing to this lovely creature?” enquired a deep, amused voice.

Cranford swung around. “You did come! Are you all about in your head, Owen? You know you should not be here!”

Far from endorsing these sentiments, Zoe said impulsively, “Oh! 'Tis my odiousity instructor! How nice to see you again, sir!”