The Importance of Love (3 page)

“
Stop this
,” cried the Marquis, quite clearly upset. “I will not have such words spoken in my house.”

However, the Earl continued to rail against his son, becoming more and more agitated. He thrust his finger into the young man's chest repeatedly and ugly words spilled forth from his lips.

“
Stop
!” called the Marquis again weakly.

Bates noticed that his Master was turning a peculiar colour and appeared to be having difficulty in breathing. His face turned blue and he slowly sank to his knees.

As the Earl had his back to him, the first he realised that something was amiss was when the Viscount rushed to help Bates haul the old man to a nearby chair.

“Send someone for the doctor,” yelled the Viscount, loosening his grandfather's necktie. “And make haste.”

The Earl stood horrified in the hall. He could neither move nor speak.

“Grandfather! Can you hear me?”

The Viscount was kneeling down by the old man and patting his hand. The Marquis let out a long sigh and then expired.

“Grandfather. No! No!
No
!”

“You – have – killed him,” muttered the Earl, falling back against the wall.

The Viscount laid his head on his dead grandfather's knee and stifled a sob.

He had been brought up to believe it was not manly to cry, but how could he not shed a tear when the man he loved and respected more than any other had just died?

“Get up, you fool!” shouted his father hoarsely. “You are making a spectacle of yourself crying like a weak girl.”

The Viscount remained with the Marquis until the doctor arrived.

“I am so sorry, my Lord,” he said, shaking his head. “I would suggest that you have the servants remove his body to his bedroom. I will drop in on the undertaker on the way back to my house and ask him to come at once.”

“Thank you,” replied the Viscount, choking back his emotions. “That is very kind of you.”

“I shall have to go home and write out the death certificate and will have it delivered as soon as possible. The undertakers will need it.”

“Of course, thank you, doctor.”

The Viscount walked with him to the door and past his still-stunned father. As he closed the door behind him, he turned to face the Earl.

“Father – ”

“Don't speak to me and don't look at me,” snarled the Earl in a tone of voice that sounded as hollow as it was dangerous. “You are no longer my son!”

“Father, you are upset – you do not know what you are saying.”

The Earl's eyes glittered as he regarded the Viscount with a cold stare.

“You killed him. You and your selfishness,” he screamed. “Get away from me!”

He pushed past his son and pulled open the front door with such force that it rebounded off the wall and almost hit him as he stood in the doorway.

“You have your grandfather's death on your conscience. I will never forgive you!
Never
, do you hear?”

With that he ran down the steps of the house and out on to the street.

It had begun to rain and he pulled his hat down over his eyes as he rushed off, leaving the distraught Viscount feeling empty and numb as he stared after him.

The passage from Calais to Dover was not a smooth one for Luella and her aunt. The sea pitched their ship mercilessly and as a result they were both seasick.

By the time that they had docked at Dover, Luella was very worried about the Countess – she was almost delirious.

“I think we had better stay in Dover tonight and forget about trying to make for Hastings,” she said, as two sailors helped her aunt down the gangplank.

“No, we must press on. I am well enough to withstand a carriage ride.”

Luella regarded her ashen face with concern. Although her aunt was hardly in her dotage, she had never seen her look so frail. It was as if she had aged overnight.

The sailors quickly found them a carriage that sported a team of fast horses and made certain that she was comfortable before they bade farewell.

“What kind gentlemen,” murmured the Countess, as Luella tucked blankets around her knees. Outside it promised to be another fine July day, but the Countess was shivering and needed the extra warmth.

Luella sipped at the cup of water the sailors had brought for her and clutched at her stomach. She was slowly feeling a little better, unlike her aunt who groaned as the carriage bumped its way along the road to Hastings.

It was late afternoon by the time they arrived at their destination and the Countess had been asleep for much of the journey.

Luella had tried to make her as comfortable as possible and the coachmen had been most considerate, bringing them a water bottle and some plain bread and butter. The Countess had not touched anything apart from a few sips of water. It was left to Luella to advise the coachmen of their final destination – the
George Hotel
in Battle, just outside Hastings.

It was an old coaching inn and at first Luella was concerned that it would not be to their liking. However, once inside, they were shown to a comfortable suite of rooms that overlooked Battle Abbey.

‘Surely Frank Connolly will not find us here?' she said to herself, as she waited for the landlord to bring them something to eat. ‘He would not think of looking somewhere so modest.'

The thought did occur to her that perhaps he may pass through, as most of the London-bound coaches stopped at the inn.

‘But he would never dream of finding us here,' she mumbled, gazing out of the window at the Abbey. ‘Even so, I feel in my bones that he has discovered we have left Paris and is even now in hot pursuit. I hope we can outwit him as I do not know what I would do if he was to find us.'

*

The days after the Marquis's undignified death were highly fraught for the Viscount. He attempted to visit his father to clear the air, only to be told by his butler that he was not at home, when the Viscount knew quite clearly that he was.

‘He will have to face me at the funeral,' he told himself as he walked back to South Audley Street.

Halfway there, he changed his mind and made for Belgrave Square instead. His grandmother had returned from her visit to Brighton to the terrible news and had been inconsolable ever since.

It did not help that no one seemed to be able to tell her the precise circumstances that led her husband to collapse.

The servants maintained a wall of silence, having been drilled by the Earl to keep their mouths shut on the subject and the poor Marchioness was beside herself.

The Viscount knocked on the black-wreathed front door and waited for Bates.

“Good afternoon, my Lord,” intoned the butler, as his sombre face appeared in the hall. The Viscount noticed that he was wearing a black armband.

“Good afternoon, Bates. Is Grandmama at home?”

“Yes, my Lord. She is in the library, please come this way.”

The Marchioness was sitting in an armchair with a pile of papers on her knee. As soon as she saw her grandson, she set them down and rose to kiss him.

“David,” she exclaimed, her red-rimmed eyes staring balefully up at him. “How nice of you to come.”

“I hope you did not think I was deserting you, Grandmama, it is just that Father – ”

“Yes, I know. You two are still at loggerheads.”

“I am sorry, I have tried to see him to smooth the way, but he has instructed his servants not to let me past the front door. It is very hurtful to be kept on the step like an unwelcome visitor.”

“Your father always was a stubborn child and he grew up to become a stubborn man. He would rather die than admit he was in the wrong and as for apologising – ”

“I came to see how you are.”

The old lady sighed heavily and waved her hand at the piles of papers everywhere.

“As you can see, your grandfather left a great deal of unfinished business. His Solicitor has promised to call and help me attend to things, but I do not know what I shall do.”

Her lip trembled and she dabbed at her eyes with a black-edged handkerchief. After a few moments she composed herself and looked up at him.

“David, you were here – will you tell me what happened?”

“I am not certain I should,” replied the Viscount wearily. “If I did, then Father would use it against me and make me suffer even more.”

“I am asking you, dearest, if there is something I should know.”

“Very well. There was an argument between Father and me and Grandpapa became upset. The next thing we knew, he had slumped to the floor, clutching his chest.”

The Marchioness contemplated his words for a while and then spoke,

“Thank you, David. I had suspected as much. You do know that your grandfather always had a weak heart? It was a miracle that he survived as long as he did. His doctors told us years ago that the end was in sight.”

“You do not blame me?”

“For your grandfather's death?
No
,” she shook her head. “The slightest amount of strain could have brought on a heart attack – one of his horses not winning the Derby, news that his investments had hit rock bottom.”

He seized his grandmother's hand and kissed it.

“Thank you, Grandmama. Father blames me, of course. That is why he will not see me.”

“He is a very stupid man, even if he is my son. You are his only child and should be comforting him at this dreadful time.”

“As long as you do not bear me any ill will, Grandmama, I believe I can bear his ostracising me.”

“He will come round, just give him time. He always has to have someone to lash out at and this time it is you. Stay strong, David. We shall all need you very much at the funeral tomorrow.”

“The Solicitor says it will be held at Kensal Green and not at the family Church in Hertfordshire. That is strange, is it not?”

The Marchioness took a deep breath and he could see that something else was troubling her.

“They were his last wishes and being a loyal wife, I do not wish to disobey my husband, even in death. Now, if you will excuse me, David.”

Tears were flowing freely down her face much to the Viscount's discomfort.

‘There is something she is not telling me,' he thought, as he took his hat from Bates and left the house with its shuttered front windows.

*

Even before he left his home the next day for the funeral, the Viscount had a distinct sense of unease.

The cortege was to leave from Belgrave Square at eleven o'clock and the funeral was to be followed by the reading of the will at the Solicitor's office.

Arriving at his grandfather's house, the Viscount went to take his place with the chief mourners and was told that he should travel in one of the many carriages arranged for the journey to Kensal Green. Stung, he tried not to show how upset he was by this slight.

He could see his father from a distance, but he was making a point of ignoring him.

At last, the undertaker announced that it was time to leave.

The Viscount looked at the velvet-draped coffin in the enormous, glass-bodied hearse festooned with a forest of black plumes and wanted to weep.

It took all of his inner strength not to sob aloud in front of the assembled throng.

Slowly, the undertaker took up his position in front of the team of six black horses. The procession began to move forward with the Marchioness and the Earl travelling in a black landau immediately behind the hearse.

Two outriders on liveried horses, a pair of feathermen and numerous pages all dressed in black with black streamers flying from their hats began the solemn journey around Belgrave Square.

On the side of the hearse were shields bearing the Marquis's coat of arms, topped with coronets, while the lavish fittings would have been considered eye-popping had they not graced a funeral vehicle.

The Viscount's carriage followed the parade. People from streets around lined the pavements to gawp at the spectacle.

At Hyde Park Corner, the undertaker jumped up onto the box of the hearse and the whole procession picked up speed as it made its way towards North Kensington.

Along the way, people stopped to doff their caps and bow their heads as a mark of respect. It had been a while since London had seen a funeral on such a grand scale.

Some time later they arrived at Kensal Green. After a short service in the Chapel, where many mourners were forced to stand outside, the coffin made its way to its last resting place.

The Viscount barely noticed the architecture of the solid mausoleum that rose up in front of them. It stood not two hundred yards from the famous tomb of Princess Sophia and, apart from the solid columns that flanked the four corners of the structure, it struck him as a rather modest affair.

In fact, he almost felt proud of the fact that his grandfather had chosen such a restrained monument.

For the older generation building an ostentatious and expensive final resting place had been all the rage during the early days of the
Belgravia of Death
as Kensal Green had been named.

Yet here was one of the most important and aristocratic men in the Kingdom about to be interred in a building that would have been self-effacing for a merchant, let alone a Marquis.

‘Oh, Father. Do not ignore me,' thought the Viscount, as the pain in his heart increased. Each time he attempted to catch his father's eye, the Earl simply looked away. ‘Why must you make everything so difficult?'

The Minister began to intone the final rites as the pallbearers halted by the open door.

With tears in his eyes, the Viscount's gaze rested upon the lintel over the door that bore a name. Squinting he began to make out the letters of the name.

“
Le Fevre
,” it read.

‘Le Fevre?' thought the Viscount.

Moving swiftly to the side of the mausoleum, he pushed through the crowds to read the simple inscription.

“My well-beloved, Marie-Annette Le Fevre, taken from this world 26th January 1891.”