Читать книгу Regency Collection 2013 Part 1 - Хелен Диксон, Louise Allen, Хелен Диксон - Страница 52

‘You have managed to tear yourselves away from your purchases, I see.’ Jack uncoiled himself from the depths of a wing chair in front of the fireplace in the drawing room as Lily and Caroline came in. ‘I was resigned to dining alone this evening.’

‘Well, I think we have done very well,’ Caroline congratulated herself. ‘Both Lily and I resisted the temptation to put on anything new tonight, but Mama purchased a very dashing turban and is trying it out on us before she risks it in company and Susan and Penny are bickering over who is going to wear the gauze shawl they bought jointly.’

‘Do turbans take a long time?’ Jack enquired with a reasonable pretence of interest.

‘This one does,’ Caroline chuckled. ‘Mama is having doubts about it and Maria must have done her hair about three times already in an attempt to please her. For goodness’ sake, admire it lavishly when she finally appears.’

‘Very well, I will do my best.’ Lily felt Jack’s eyes on her and struggled to find a topic for small talk. She had never had the slightest problem in talking to him before. Now, when they were supposedly behaving in a manner that should have put all embarrassments behind them, she felt more awkward than she had ever done.

‘Did your business prosper this afternoon?’ she enquired, sounding to her own ears just like her prosiest cousin, Frederica.

‘Thank you, yes. And I called at your agent’s office to return that item you had forgotten.’

‘I am grateful, I hope it was not out of your way.’ What was the matter with her? After the silliness of trying to make themselves respectable in the hackney carriage had subsided, a pall of stultifying shyness seemed to have fallen on her. Lily kept her gaze on her clasped hands, and after a moment picked up a journal and began to flick through it.

No such constraint had fallen on Caroline. ‘Lily and I think we should be finding you a wife, Jack,’ she remarked chattily. Lily dropped the journal and scrabbled for it on the floor while she tried to cover her confusion.

‘Do you, indeed? How very kind of you both.’ Lily did not have to raise her eyes from desperately smoothing out crumpled pages to know exactly what Jack’s reaction was. One dark eyebrow would be raised and he would be managing to do that while looking down his nose at the same time.

‘Yes,’ Caroline said complacently.

‘No!’ Lily interjected, looking up at last to meet a very sardonic gaze.

‘Yes, you did, Lily, you said that Jack would make an excellent father and we both agreed that we should find him a charming bride. Don’t you remember? When we were getting out of the carriage when we arrived home?’

In the face of this convincing detail Lily could hardly deny that she had said some of this. ‘I might have said something like that,’ she agreed feebly, waiting for the explosion.

But Jack was unnaturally calm about it. ‘Do tell me, Caro—have you anyone particular in mind? A shortlist, perhaps?’

‘Of course,’ his sister said, with an expression of smug complacency. ‘Miss Willoughby—George’s elder sister, if you recall.’

‘Dull.’

‘But very worthy and industrious, which I am sure is what is needed. Or there is Louisa Carfax.’

‘Is that the one with the giggle? Certainly not.’

‘Lady Georgiana Foster? Now she does not giggle and she is a most handsome girl.’

‘She has the brains of a peahen.’

‘But, Jack, we are all agreed you need a wife, and here I am doing my best and you are not being at all helpful! If you are going to be so fussy about our local ladies, then you had better do as we suggested the other evening and go back to London to find a rich wife.’

‘Caroline!’ Jack’s snapped warning came too late to stop the tide of colour flooding into Lily’s face. How could Caroline be so tactless? But perhaps she had no idea how wealthy Lily was. She felt ready to sink, and had to force herself to speak.

‘Perhaps Lord Allerton has scruples about marrying someone simply because of their wealth,’ she managed between stiff lips. ‘No doubt he is waiting to find someone for whom he can feel regard and affection.’

‘I do not see how being wealthy excludes a woman from being those things to him,’ Caroline persisted, apparently completely insensitive to her friend writhing miserably beside her and her glowering brother. ‘Jack could very well find a rich lady to fall in love with and in that case he would have to be a complete blockhead to let her money stand in his way.’

‘Caroline—’ It was a warning growl this time. Then Jack was getting to his feet as his mother and younger sisters came in, and Lily found she was dragging air into her lungs as though she had been holding her breath for an hour. ‘Mama, what a very dashing confection on your head! You are going to reduce all the local ladies to blatant envy when we next entertain.’

‘I think it is not so bad,’ Lady Allerton agreed, patting her curls with a touch of complacency. Jack sat again, not in his previous chair, but beside Lily, who found her fingers were clenched on the journal.

‘I shall strangle my sister,’ he remarked, low-voiced.

‘She can have no idea … Please, do not make anything of it.’ Lily forced herself to a semblance of composure. ‘I do not regard it, I promise you.’

‘Do you truly think I would make a good father?’ Lily risked a sideways glance and found Jack was frowning over the question.

‘I beg your pardon—it was perhaps an impertinent observation. I merely thought that the way you are with Penelope shows a charming affection.’

‘Lily, are you all right? You sound so unlike yourself.’ She sounded strange to herself—Cousin Frederica appeared to be taking over.

‘I am fine.’ Lily forced a smile, ‘I am trying, for once, to heed my chaperon’s strictures and to sound more ladylike.’

‘Well, please do not! You do not sound like my Lily at all.’

His Lily? Lily turned abruptly, but Grimwade had just announced dinner and Jack was already getting to his feet. His friend Lily, with whom he had shared some highly improper adventures, that is all he means by it. It is all he can mean.

‘Peter Coachman tells me it will be a fine day tomorrow,’ Lady Allerton remarked. ‘He is considered quite a weather prophet,’ she added for Lily’s benefit.

‘How useful. Presumably you consult him before undertaking all kinds of agricultural procedures, such as ploughing?’ Lily asked with an innocent smile at Caroline and Jack. Caroline, already caught out in her deceit, merely smiled back, but Jack’s cheekbones were just touched with betraying colour. So, he did know that Caroline was fibbing and yet he said nothing and so I stayed here. Why?

‘Shall we go riding tomorrow?’ Susan suggested, happily oblivious to undercurrents. ‘Do you have a riding habit, Lily? I expect Caro can lend you one.’

‘I would enjoy that, thank you. And I have packed a habit.’

‘The sea-green one?’ Jack enquired. He had regained his composure and was watching her with an air of innocence she deeply mistrusted.

‘No,’ Lily replied repressively. ‘A black one.’

‘No frogging?’

‘None. And a very sensible hat,’ she added for good measure.

‘Miss France might care to borrow Chaffinch,’ Lady Allerton offered graciously. ‘My own mare, Miss France; I think you will be pleased with her.’

Lily thanked her hostess and the remainder of the meal was taken up in a prolonged, and apparently familiar, argument amongst the Lovell siblings about their destination and route.

‘Along the Aller Valley,’ Jack said firmly as the dessert plates were removed. ‘Lily will not want to look at miles of moorland, however starkly romantic you find it, Susan.’ Penelope tried to interject and he added, ‘And definitely not to the pit head, Penny. That is no place for ladies.’

‘Don’t worry, I will take you,’ Caroline whispered as the ladies rose to leave Jack to his solitary consideration of the decanter. ‘Jack is being very stuffy this evening—look how unreasonable he was about finding a wife. I mean, I am his sister and you are a good friend—why should he object to our efforts?’

‘Perhaps he feels pressured? Or embarrassed?’ Lily hazarded. ‘I do not think we should tease him about it any more, do you?’

‘Mmm.’ There was a steely glint in Caroline’s eyes which Lily recognised with a sinking feeling. ‘I think he needs throwing together with some young ladies. I shall organise a dance.’

‘Oh. How nice.’ And I will be long gone, thank goodness.

‘By next week will be time enough to get our new dresses finished,’ Caroline said confidently. ‘Mama! Shall we hold an informal dance for Lily? We all do that around here,’ she explained cheerfully. ‘It is a small society and we know each other far too well to stand on ceremony. Everyone is always ready for a party. And there’s a full moon, so people will not mind the travelling.’

‘What a lovely idea, Caroline,’ her mother approved. ‘And how pleased everyone will be to meet a new acquaintance. Tuesday, I think. I will write invitations tomorrow while you are out riding.’

Lily could only smile and agree with every appearance of delight while her heart sank into her satin slippers.

Jack strolled back into the drawing room and found its occupants deep in plans for a dance. After being comprehensively ignored for five minutes, he enquired mildly when it was to be. ‘Next Tuesday. Jack—you won’t be tiresome and say you have some prior engagement, now will you?’ his eldest sister demanded. Denying any such intention, he beat a strategic retreat to the study.

Why Caro was assuming he would want to avoid the dance was a mystery, as was why she was nagging him about finding a wife. Had Lily said something? But that would presuppose Lily had confided their entire story to Caro—she would hardly tell her that she and Jack had decided to behave with circumspection. That would only make sense if she knew Caroline would understand the background. And if Caroline knew that Lily knew that she knew about … He stopped trying to puzzle it out, it was making his head spin.

He could avoid Caro’s clumsy matchmaking schemes easily enough. The real mystery was what had happened to Lily. She had become stiff, subdued and formal ever since his suggestion in the warehouse. He had expected her to relax; it seemed it had had the opposite effect and she had become a conformable unmarried young lady.

And he did not want a prim and proper young lady—he wanted his Lily back. Jack pulled a face at his distorted reflection in the battered pewter inkpot on his desk. ‘You want to have your cake and eat it too,’ he informed himself wryly. He wanted to ride with Lily over the estate and hear her views on the landscape. Was she as much of a town mouse as he suspected, or would she find the wide open spaces irresistible? He was looking forward to her observations on sheep; he suspected they would be forthright. He had plans to tease her with extravagant schemes for redecorating the Great Hall in full baronial splendour and he wanted her to rivet the assembled guests at the dance by appearing in one of her completely outrageous evening ensembles.

But she had made all her gowns simple and elegant. And now it seemed he had made her so self-conscious that not just her gowns had become conventional, but she had submerged her entire personality. Oh, Lily, my love, where have you gone?

Lily appeared next day for their ride in a rigorously tailored black riding habit that drew a covetous gasp from Jack’s two elder sisters and a long, unreadable look from under his lashes from Jack.

Lily made friends with Chaffinch, a pretty strawberry-roan mare, and was boosted into the saddle by one of the grooms while Jack was helping his sisters. He strode over, with a curt nod of thanks to the man, and took over checking Chaffinch’s girth. ‘Are you comfortable? She is not such a spirited ride as you are used to, I am afraid.’

He stood looking up at her, his hand resting on the mare’s neck, so close to hers that she could have extended her little finger and touched his. Why did she want to? Wasn’t this all supposed to be simple now they were merely acquaintances? Why could she not just stop loving him?

Instead she found herself studying the way his hair was beginning to curl as the crop grew out, the way the laughter lines at the corners of his eyes crinkled as he narrowed them to look up at her. ‘Jack, this—’

Whatever it was she was about to say was swallowed up by an exclamation of pleasure from Caroline. ‘George! What a nice surprise!’

A tall, sober-looking gentleman on a rangy hack rode into the yard, his austere face breaking into a smile as his eyes found Caroline.

‘Willoughby.’ Jack turned to greet his neighbour. Caroline’s beau, Lily realised, gathering her scattered wits. ‘We were just on our way out for a ride to introduce our guest, Miss France, to the countryside. Will you join us?’

The sober gentleman was easily persuaded, despite a mild protest that he had only ridden over with a book of sermons he had promised to lend Caroline. Lily bit her lip as Penelope rolled her eyes behind his back: he certainly seemed a strange choice for vivacious Miss Lovell, but then, who chose who they fell in love with? Certainly not her.

As the party rode out over the moat, Lily began to suspect that Caroline had known only too well that George Willoughby was going to call at this time. She manoeuvred her own gelding so that Lily had no choice but to ride beside Jack, while she fell in beside George, and Susan and Penelope were left to bring up the rear. Even more suspiciously, the two younger girls immediately began to dawdle.

Jack grinned. ‘Trust Caro to have a plan,’ he remarked softly. ‘I believe it is our role to draw on ahead a little while the hapless George hands over his heart along with his sermons.’

‘Hapless?’ Lily queried. ‘Does he not love Caroline?’

‘I am sure he does, but if she does not take a hand he is going to hesitate in a damnably respectful manner until she goes into a decline.’ He turned his big grey hunter down towards the river. ‘Shall we canter?’

Lily realised she had not seen Jack on a horse before. The sight did nothing to subdue any of her feelings about him. He rode as though he was part of the animal, with a relaxed natural balance she could only envy, yet she was not deceived that he was astride an easy ride. The big horse curved its neck, fretting at the bit, and she could see Jack’s thigh muscles working as he controlled the animal, as much by his balance as by any pressure on its mouth.

He relaxed the rein and it was away, hitting a controlled canter direct from the walk. Lily found she had to give her borrowed mount clear instructions to follow suit. The mare was far too well mannered to take liberties. But once Chaffinch had hit her stride she proved to have a long, easy action and Lily was soon itching to gallop. But, of course, to race a borrowed horse over unknown ground was just not possible.

‘Race?’ Jack called back over his shoulder. The big grey was working itself up into a lather of sweat where the reins touched its neck.

‘I should not, not riding your mother’s horse,’ Lily called back.

In answer, Jack circled round, came up alongside her and leaned over to slap Chaffinch on the rump. ‘Get up!’

‘Jack, for goodness’ sake!’ Lily tightened her grip and pushed her heel down in the stirrup as she urged an already excited mare after the hunter. I’ll give him get up!

But, despite her best endeavours, the little mare could not catch the grey. Jack had reined in beside the river where it widened into a shallow ford before Lily was close enough to carry on berating him.

‘What would I have told your mama if Chaffinch had put her foot in a rabbit hole?’ she demanded, jamming her hat down.

‘That her undutiful son had led you astray?’ He already has … ‘Anyway, I know there are no hidden dangers along that stretch. If we cross here, I can take you up to the edge of the moors.’

‘This is very lovely.’ Lily twisted in the saddle to look around her as the horses picked their way across the river. ‘We have left Caroline and Mr Willoughby behind.’

‘The girls can chaperon her—at a safe distance.’ Jack chuckled. ‘I’d bet ten corves of coal that I’ll be greeting a future brother-in-law by lunch time.’

‘What is a corve?’

‘Corves are the containers coal is moved in underground,’ Jack explained. Lily nodded encouragingly; she was actually getting him to talk about mining at long last. ‘A miner has his own, moved by members of his own family, so we can keep tally on who has mined what.’

‘And how much would that be in a day?’ She should have known better. Jack shrugged.

‘All depends. There, what do you make of the moors?’

The sharp slope of sheep-nibbled grassland flattened out into rolling, open moors, patched green and brown and punctuated by occasional clumps of trees or thickets of scrub. Dotted across the vastness were flocks of sheep, like so many clouds on a green sky.

‘Um.’ Lily stared. ‘There is an awful lot of it. I was expecting fields—how do you keep the sheep in?’

‘We do not have to; they know where they live.’ It all seemed very odd to Lily. Jack grinned at her. ‘You really are a town creature, aren’t you, Lily?’

‘I suppose I am … I never thought about it. We have never owned land, you see, so countryside is just something one drives through. How do you know where your land stops? I cannot see any fences.’

‘There are none, and everything you can see is mine.’

‘All this?’ Lily turned in the saddle, looking back over the wide valley and the rising land on the other side. ‘And that way?’

‘Yes, as far as you can see.’

‘But that must be thousands of acres!’ Jack nodded and pressed his heels into the hunter’s sides so that they began to approach a flock of sheep. Lily eyed them nervously as they came closer. ‘Then why do you not sell some land to raise money for the mine?’ It seemed so obvious.

‘Sell? Sell Allerton land?’ Now what had she said wrong? Jack was staring at her as though she had suggested he walk naked down Piccadilly. It was obviously not just a bad idea, but an impossible concept.

‘Well, yes. Or is it all entailed?’ Lily was not quite certain what a entail was, but she knew it was some sort of legal device to prevent one generation from selling their descendents’ inheritance.

‘Some of it is.’ He was still treating the suggestion as ludicrous. ‘But I could not sell land.’

‘Why not? Is it not worth much?’ Lily had gone beyond any attempt at tactfulness in her need to understand.

‘An acre here is not worth as much as an acre of, say, Suffolk, grazing, but it has a reasonable monetary value all the same. But this is not about money. You do not understand, Lily.’

‘No. I do not. Explain it to me.’

‘I do not know if I can. The land is what we are, where we came from. Blood and bone. I sell this land over my dead body.’ That was plain enough, if still incomprehensible. Was land not just another asset? If she wanted to sell parts of the business to improve another section, then she would do it happily, even if it was something her father had bought and built up; that was how it worked.

Lily caught her lower lip between her teeth to stop herself saying as much. To do so would be to blunder, she could tell that. She had come up hard against the heart-deep source of that pride that was so blatantly displayed by Adrian and which ran, like a seam of coal, through Jack. He had all this land, but the mine had his intense interest, took most of his time and energy. Yet he would not sacrifice an acre to save the mine. She shook her head. This, then, was the gulf between the landed classes and the new rich: no amount of money could purchase the elusive cachet of ancestral lands.

‘Given up trying to understand me, Lily?’ Jack was smiling at her; at least she had not blundered too much.

‘I did that almost as soon as I met you,’ she retorted with an attempt at lightness. ‘My goodness—Lady Philpott!’

‘Where?’ Jack stood in his stirrups and stared round. ‘And who the devil is Lady Philpott?’

Lily pointed with her whip at the Roman-nosed sheep that was regarding her stolidly. ‘The nose, and that ridiculous clump of curls on top of its head! Lady Philpott is very much given to turbans.’

Jack snorted with laughter and urged his mount closer, scattering the sheep. ‘One hopes she is not as dim-witted as a sheep, or one must be deeply sorry for her husband.’ Despite his words, Lily could see he was checking the animals, running a knowledgeable eye over them. ‘They’re in good fettle this year.’

‘What is that?’ Lily pointed to a plume of grey smoke rising over the edge of the moor.

‘The smoke from the engine house at the pit head.’ Jack wheeled round and began to head back towards the valley. ‘And, no, Lily, before you ask, we are not going to look at it.’

‘Why not?’ Because you do not want me interfering in your precious mine. Because I blundered once and I have not been forgiven.

‘Because it is dirty, rough and dangerous and no place for a lady.’

Lily urged Chaffinch up beside the grey. ‘I have ridden through Indian hill country and camped out in dacoit territory. I have sailed halfway round the world. I have been in more factories than I can count. I am not one of your conventional ladies, Jack!’

‘No?’ He twisted in the saddle to look at her, his expression bleak. ‘Then I think it will be safer all round if you become one.’