The Accidental Marriage (19 page)

‘His lordship said to tell you he’s gone to visit more farms today, my lady. He won’t be back till dinner time. He hopes you will rest.’

‘And not go exploring more ruined castles,’ Julia interpreted, and laughed. ‘Do the girls have lessons today?’

‘Yes, Miss Trant gave them a holiday to greet you, but they’ll be free this afternoon, and may want to go for a gentle walk, to show you the gardens.’

‘That sounds safe enough,’ Julia said, wondering whether Sir Carey had issued these instructions for her entertainment.

She spent a quiet morning strolling round the house, noting things she wanted to change. The curtains here were in even worse condition than at the London house, and she determined to measure how much fabric was wanted and visit one of the warehouses when she was next in London. She fetched her water colours and crayons, and tried to match the shades of the wallpapers in the different rooms. Some of these were old, but particularly beautiful. The one in the dining room was Chinese, she was certain, and probably valuable. That could be cleaned, if done carefully.

The girls and Miss Trant appeared and joined her for a meal of ham and fruit. Then Miss Trant asked if she was wanted, for if not she would retire and write some letters.

Julia and the girls fetched wraps, for the wind was cold, and went out into the garden.

‘Sir Carey tells me you write many letters, Caroline.’

‘Oh yes, I do, to all my school friends.’

‘And relatives?’

‘My mother’s sisters, and some cousins, but there are no other Eveleghs, or relatives on Papa’s side apart from Cousin Daniel. He’s an unpleasant person, who would not reply in any case. So I never write to him. I’m so glad Carey married you after Angelica jilted him. I was afraid Cousin Daniel would get Carey’s grandfather’s money, and that would have been a great shame. Did you know he was at the same house party in Yorkshire as Angelica at Christmas? She wrote to say he was there.’

‘You correspond with Angelica?’ Julia said, surprised.

‘Yes. She was at school with us, though she was two years older than me. She was the same age as Penelope. She’s the Rector’s daughter, and she was there too. She doesn’t write many letters, though. She didn’t write to say she was going to marry someone else instead of Carey. It was Phoebe Norton, who was also there, who told me, but I haven’t heard any more from her either. Julia, will you ask Carey if I can have my come out next year? I’ll be sixteen, and Angelica was only a little older when she came out, and became engaged to Carey.’

‘That will be for your brother to decide. But you don’t have to hurry into a Season and a betrothal yet. You have plenty of time. Girls your age don’t usually know what they want. Angelica didn’t, did she?’

Two days later Julia again accompanied Sir Carey on farm visits. This time they went in the opposite direction, to an outlying farm at the end of the valley where Courtlands lay. This was more rugged country, the beginning of the Cotswold hills, and Julia saw several flocks of sheep. Because of this, they had again left the dogs at home.

‘I cannot trust them not to chase the silly things,’ Sir Carey explained, laughing. ‘If the sheep turned and faced them the dogs would run away, as they do when they encounter the stable cat.’

Julia’s leg had been stiff, and he must have noticed her slight wince when she mounted Daisy, for he did not take the direct route over hedges and walls which had been their previous mode of riding, but led the way decorously through gaps in the walls or gateways in the hedges. Julia had to blink away a sudden wetness in her eyes when she realized his silent consideration for her. She had been attracted to him in Vienna, incredulous and barely able to credit her good fortune when they were married, but she wondered whether she could endure spending the rest of her life with him in this polite friendship. Feeling guilty for even admitting such thoughts to herself, she knew she wanted more, to be a true wife, and to bear his children.

Would he ever turn to her? Once, long ago, when she had been a child and had not understood, her mother had spoken disparagingly about one of the local gentry, saying that some men had uncontrollable carnal appetites, but she wished he would indulge them away from home, rather than inflict them on helpless maidservants. Their own dairy maid had suddenly left the village, and later Julia had overheard another village girl saying what a shame it was she couldn’t keep her baby.

Years later these events had come together and made sense to the older Julia. Now she wondered, rather desolately, whether Sir Carey would satisfy his sexual appetites elsewhere. He was young and vigorous, surely he had normal desires. He’d married her in haste, perhaps without thought, promising her he would not ask from her the normal married duties. He was honourable, she knew, and would keep that promise, but she was beginning to wish he had not made it, and consider ways in which she might encourage him to forget it.

As they reached the farm Julia’s mood of despondency had lifted, and she was smiling to herself as she envisaged scenes of seduction in which she enticed Sir Carey into her bed. Should she, when they returned to London, equip herself with some of the outrageously indelicate nightgowns she had seen? Shocked though she had been at the time, she had later admitted to herself she would like to wear them, for her own satisfaction as well as their apparent power over susceptible husbands.

‘You look happy,’ Sir Carey commented as he swung down from his horse and came across to lift her from the mare.

‘It’s a lovely day,’ Julia said, feeling herself go hot with embarrassment at her lascivious thoughts. She trembled as his hands gripped her waist and she swung her leg over the pommel. As he lowered her to the ground she held onto the pommel to steady herself, and then exclaimed in dismay as the whole saddle slid towards her. They both stepped backwards and the saddle fell to the ground.

* * * *

As they stared at it one of the farmer’s sons, a brawny lad of sixteen, ran out of the cowshed and took the reins from Sir Carey, who bent down to examine the saddle.

‘The devil!’ Sir Carey exploded.

‘The girths be broke,’ the lad said.

‘Sir Carey, what’s amiss?’

The farmer’s wife had appeared from the kitchen, looking anxious. ‘Ben, what have ‘ee done?’

‘He’s done nothing,’ Sir Carey said, his voice grim. ‘Mrs Smith, may I bring this into your kitchen to have a closer look at it?’

‘To be sure, sir. And this must be Lady Evelegh. Welcome, ma’am. to Hill Farm. Come in, both of ye, and I’ll find some bread and cheese. Ben, when ye’ve tethered the horses, go and fetch me some cider.’

Sir Carey took Julia’s arm and led her inside the low-beamed kitchen. It was similar to the others she had seen, bright and cheerful with a warm range on which stood various pots, and on the huge scrubbed pine table plenty of evidence of baking in progress.

They sat down, and Sir Carey turned up the saddle. ‘See here,’ he said, holding up the end of the girth strap. ‘This has been cut through, almost to the end.’

‘It hasn’t just frayed?’ Julia asked, leaning across and fingering the webbing strap.

‘No, the cut’s clean, done with a knife. And it was hidden by the saddle flap. This was deliberate. My God, if we’d been taking jumps as normal, and it had broken, you’d have taken a nasty fall!’

‘Wicked,’ Mrs Smith said, peering over Sir Carey’s shoulder. ‘Ye could have broken your neck, me lady, if ye’d fallen on they walls.’

Sir Carey took a deep breath. ‘That new groom! I’ll see to it he never works in a stables again!’

As Mrs Smith pressed food and cider on them, he frowned in thought. It hadn’t been carelessness. Who could have wanted to injure, perhaps kill Julia? He glanced up at her, and wondered at her apparent calm. She was pale, and there was an anxious look in her eyes. She must have reached the same conclusion as he had, that someone wanted to hurt her, but she was smiling at Mrs Smith and asking about her family, nodding as the farmer’s wife went into copious detail about all the childish ills the younger ones had suffered this past winter.

‘Can we borrow a girth strap?’ he asked when Mrs Smith paused for breath. ‘Julia can’t ride home on this saddle as it is.’

‘To be sure ye may. Ben’ll find ye one.’

‘Or would you prefer to wait here while I fetch a carriage?’ he asked Julia, suddenly aware she might not wish to ride so soon after such a shock.

She shook her head. ‘I will ride, and in future I’ll check everything first,’ she said, but her smile was tremulous.

‘And so will I. Which tells me I ought to go and check the bridles and my own saddle,’ he said. ‘Will you excuse me?’

In the barn where Ben had tethered the horses and given them nets of hay to munch on, he found the boy already looking over the bridles.

‘Your saddle’s not been touched,’ Ben said, ‘but look-ee at this.’

He proffered the small bridle, and showed how the stitching on one rein near one of the rings had been broken, so that only a couple of threads held the leather together.

Sir Carey went cold. Whoever had done this had intended to make sure. It was only thanks to the careful, gentle way they had made this ride that both rein and girth strap had held as long as they had.

Ben assured him the rest of the gear was in good shape, but he went over everything himself, while Ben went off to find a needle and some strong thread, saying he was used to mending the harnesses of their own horses.

Ben also found a girth strap, and Sir Carey made sure it was fixed properly. They would ride back at a walk, and he would be alongside Julia all the way, ready to catch her should anything more happen, or should she faint. She had shown remarkable fortitude so far, but in his experience females often succumbed to the vapours once the initial shock had lessened. They put it down to greater sensibility than men possessed.

Angelica, he thought suddenly, would probably have swooned. It was the first time he had permitted himself to think of Angelica since the initial hurt and anger at her defection had cooled, and he swiftly banished the image of her from his mind. It was done, she was lost for him, and there was no profit in even thinking about what might have been. She was out of his reach, and he was married to Julia

Then he grinned. Somehow he didn’t think Julia was quite so feeble as to let herself react to shocks in such a manner. She had considered his outrageous proposal of marriage calmly, had judged his arguments in favour, and as calmly accepted. He wondered at himself. Had he been mad? Had the knock on the head which had felled him the night before addled his wits? He’d behaved in a manner quite alien to his normal common sense, but it had seemed sensible at the time. She was making his homes more comfortable and attractive, his sisters and the servants all seemed to like her, and his tenants showed their approval. The bargain they had made was proving to be satisfactory, and in addition he had thwarted his cousin’s ambitions, which might be an ignoble thought but was a satisfying one.

* * * *

When they reached Courtlands the head groom came to take the horses.

‘Where is Samuel?’ Sir Carey asked, and Julia thought she had never before heard him quite so furiously and coldly angry.

‘I don’t know, sir. He left soon after you rode away yourself. He slipped off, no one saw him go, but he’s taken his belongings. Didn’t even wait for the wages he was due.’

‘I’ll warrant he didn’t!’

Sir Carey turned away and lifted Julia down from the mare. ‘Go inside and rest, my dear, I’ll explain.’

Julia nodded without speaking and went up to her room. Thankfully, she saw no one, and didn’t bother to ring for Molly to help her out of her riding habit. When she had replaced it with a simple morning dress she sat down on the window seat and tried to order her thoughts. The accident of the falling stone might, now, be considered no accident. It could have been a deliberate attempt to kill her. This latest discovery could not have been anything other than deliberate. She could merely have suffered a bad fall, but it was equally possible she could have broken her neck. Samuel, by his disappearance, seemed to have admitted his guilt. Had he also been responsible for the falling stone?

Who might want her dead? Her marriage had directly affected Sir Carey’s cousin by depriving him of their grandfather’s legacy, but she and Sir Carey were legally wed. Surely, even if she died, this would not invalidate the inheritance? Her knowledge of the law was hazy, but logic would suggest that once the conditions for inheriting had been in place, they could not be overturned. She recalled Sir Carey telling her cousin Daniel’s own wife had deserted him soon after their marriage, so he would have been in the same position as Sir Carey, wifeless. Yet she presumed he was still married, so that might make a difference. It didn’t make sense. What could Daniel achieve by harming her? It could only be revenge.

Had Daniel employed Samuel for that? The man had come, he said, from Yorkshire. Daniel lived in nearby Lincolnshire, so the man might have been his own servant. How long had Samuel been employed at Courtlands? She didn’t know, but for her own peace of mind she would find out. If he had arrived after their marriage had been announced, it would prove her suspicions.

She consoled herself with the thought that he had gone now. He was in no position to try to harm her again. The thought brought some comfort, and when Sir Carey knocked softly at the door she welcomed him with a bright smile.

‘Sir Carey, come in. I’ve been trying to make sense of it all.’

‘As I have. How do you feel? Should you not be in bed, resting?’

Julia laughed. ‘I’m not a delicate flower. Yes, it was a shock, but no more. I cannot stop wondering what it’s all for.’

‘And your conclusions?’

‘I don’t want to accuse your cousin,’ she said slowly, ‘but he is the only explanation I can think of.’

She explained her reasoning, and he, it appeared, had been thinking along the same lines.

‘The man Samuel came here a few days after the announcement of our wedding. One of the young grooms had left rather suddenly, with some incoherent story of a sick relative in Devon, and Samuel providentially appeared the following morning. As they were concerned not to be short handed when I came home, they accepted him on a month’s trial. I presume the other groom had been paid well to leave.’