A Country Wooing (11 page)

“Only when I exert it. It will be a few weeks yet before I can ride. I’m looking forward to riding with you.”

He was willing to discuss the present and the future as agreeably as anyone could wish, but any slight reference to the past, and especially Charlie, closed him up like a clam.

Anne and her mother left before dark settled in. Alex said he would send word over to them when Rosalie arrived. When Anne lay in her bed, she reviewed her conversation with Robin—all those startling revelations about Charles and Alex. She regretted all the unkind things she had said. She no longer wondered that Alex occasionally let fall a gibe against Charles; she only wondered that he didn’t shout from the rooftops what he had had to put up with.

Charles had used her badly, too, leading her on just enough to keep her interest alive, when he had no intention of marrying her. If it weren’t for that, she might have fallen in love with Alex ages ago. But he was home now, and Charles was gone. It wasn’t too late. It was time for them both to let go of old passions, old loves, and old enmities and get on with the future.

Chapter Nine

It was Mollie Prawne and not a footboy who brought news of Rosalie and Exmore’s arrival the next day. She was sent down in a gig from Penholme just after lunch and delivered her precious news while she bobbed a curtsy to her new mistress. The Wickfields were requested to go up to the Hall as soon as it was convenient, but with a new servant to be shown her duties and her way around the house, “convenient” was not very soon.

Once Mollie was settled in, Anne and Mrs. Wickfield made their grandest toilette, knowing that even their grandest was inadequate to impress a fashionable young duchess with an eye that could spot a remodeled gown at sixty paces. Both ladies admitted to feeling foolish setting forth in a gig in broad daylight, rigged out in their evening dresses, but the invitation included dinner, so it was either that or darting home to change in a few hours.

The duchess sat alone with Aunt Tannie when the Wickfields arrived. Rosalie was as beautiful and trim as when she had been a maiden, in spite of her having borne two children. Her black hair was twisted in a Grecian knot, an elegant topping for her splendid rose gown. She was of the same strain as Charles and Robin, with the same large and lustrous blue eyes, heavily fringed with black lashes.

She made her cousins welcome and even granted Mrs. Wickfield the honor of rising upon her entrance. As she did so, her knowledgeable eyes ran over Anne’s well-worn yellow gown. Really, the girl was hopeless!

“Dear Anne!” She smiled as she enclosed her cousin in a perfumed embrace. “How good to see you again. Isn’t it wonderful to have Alex back home, safe and sound? Hasn’t he grown thin, though? I’ve been teasing him this past hour for not eating properly in Spain. But you know Alex—he was always so fussy about his beefsteak being done just right. I scarcely recognized him.”

Seats were taken, and conversation became general but mostly monopolized by the verbose duchess. “I could strangle Alex for not stopping off to see us on his way through London. I would love to have shown him off. However, he says he didn’t know we were there. Imagine not knowing we were in London at the height of the Season! Where did he
think
we’d be?”

“We hadn’t heard from you in a while, Rose,” Aunt Tannie apologized. “We sent notes off to your London address and your country place, to make sure you got word immediately.”

“It was a miracle I got your note. I was half packed to dart to Brighton for the weekend, for Exmore’s uncle has a home there, you must know, right on Marine Parade. He begs us to spend time with him. We are missing a very fine ball in London tonight—the Castlereaghs—and the assembly at Almack’s, not that
it
is worth worrying about. It is only good for finding a parti. I shall make sure to take Alex when he comes to town.”

“How is Exmore?” Mrs. Wickfield asked when the duchess stopped to draw breath.

“In sterling health. He’s out walking with Alex this minute. Nothing ever bothers him. I have had shortness of breath often the past month, but Exmore has the constitution of a horse. And the children take after their papa.” She expatiated for several minutes on the precocity of her offspring, till her roving eye chanced to fall on Babe, which gave her chatter a new turn.

“What a little lady you are become, eh? You’ll be coming to Rosalie to be presented one of these days.”

“Loo will be there a good while before her,” Aunt Tannie mentioned.

Loo was reaching the awkward age. She did not look nearly so appealing as Babe, which was held to account for her being ignored. Babe was allowed to sit at Rosalie’s daintily shod foot and play with the flounce of her gown. There was, in fact, a better reason, but it was not generally known that Aunt Lucretia was on the point of dying and had mentioned Babe as being one of the recipients of her estate.

The country ladies had been put in touch with all the latest fashions at court and much of the gossip concerning people totally unknown to them before the gentlemen came in. They were dusty from their walk and had to change before joining the ladies. Exmore, the visitor, received the first attention of them all. He was not handsome and not particularly interesting, certainly not at all amusing, but he was Rosalie’s ducal husband, and so all the ladies except his wife made a fuss over him.

Rosalie turned her flashing eye on Alex. “When are you coming to London to visit us? I’ve been bragging to the whole world that the hero of the Peninsular Campaign is my brother.”

“I’m no hero,” Alex objected.

“You are a slow top, Alex. I never saw your name in the list of honors. And came home only a major, after a year and a half. I swear if it had been Charlie, he’d be a general.”

“I’m not Charlie. And I shan’t be visiting you, I’m afraid. I am very busy about the estate. I must make a short visit to the city, but I don’t plan to make a social occasion of it.”

“But you’ll come to dinner!” Rosalie exclaimed.

“Certainly, but don’t turn it into a party on my account.”

“You won’t want to be seen till you get some decent jackets,” Rosalie agreed mindlessly. Then her eye chanced to fall on Robin, and she went into ecstasies of delight. “Now, there is a lad I should be proud to have at my table. My, what a menace to civilization. Look at that jacket, Exmore. Why can’t you look like that?”

How a stubby gentleman pushing forty with narrow shoulders and sandy hair was expected to accomplish this miracle did not occur to her.

“Heh-heh, a dashed handsome young fellow he has grown into.” Exmore smiled.

“I can’t afford Robin’s tailor,” Alex said.

“Not in the suds, I hope,” Rosalie said swiftly.

“We’re having tough sledding,” he admitted. Rosalie and Exmore exchanged a quick glance, but nothing more was said.

Rosalie embarked on another round of gossip. “Exmore—dear Bertie—has bought me a new phaeton, if you please. He says I am a shocking poor whip and insists on accompanying me in the park. What a quiz we look, man and wife tooling through Hyde Park together. We go in the morning, when no one is there.”

“You’d look stranger with some other man by your side,” Alex said. His sister stared at his antiquated notions.

“We’ve had gas put in the London house,” Exmore offered. “It’s the coming thing. Gives a very good light, much brighter than candles. Bright as daylight.”

“It sounds dangerous,” Mrs. Tannie said with a shiver.

“We are very worried about poor Aunt Lucretia. She is not at all well” was Rosalie’s next remark, uttered with a bright eye that belied her concern. “Seventy-five, of course, it is only to be expected. Shall I tell them, Bertie?”

“It ain’t a secret, so far as I know.”

“I’ll tell you, then, but don’t dare ask me how I know. Our solicitor, McDougall, is her man as well, and he let it slip. She is leaving some money to Babe.” Babe’s curls were rumpled affectionately at this news.

“How much?” Babe asked. “I hope it’s a guinea. I want a new bridle.”

Rosalie laughed gaily at such unimaginative desires. “More than that, Goosie.”

Alex made no effort to conceal his interest. “How much is it?” he asked hopefully.

“Ten thousand pounds!” Rosalie announced, and laughed in pure joy at the sound of the words.

Loo took instant offense. “Why isn’t she leaving
me
any?”

“Because she was the youngest daughter herself, and feels they are slighted. She’s leaving the same to all her youngest great-nieces. How I wish I were the youngest.” Rosalie sighed.

There was general rejoicing at this news, and Babe was heartily congratulated. “Very wise,” Alex approved. “The youngest, and especially the girls, fare badly. Leave it to Lucretia—she was always a sound and sensible old lady. I daresay it would be a bit previous of me to write and thank her, as we haven’t heard officially yet.”

“It would be utterly farouche!” Rosalie objected. “But as you and the old lady always got on well, you must call on her when you’re in London. Wear your regimentals. She has a soft spot for a uniform. It might put a new heir in her head.”

“That would be because her husband was a soldier,” Mrs. Wickfield mentioned.

“Was he?” Rosalie asked. “Fancy that. I often wondered who the ugly old fellow in the painting by her bed was. I hope I didn’t twit her about him.”

“My uniforms are put away in camphor,” Alex said.

“Then get them out and air them!” Rosalie said, laughing.

“I’m no longer in the army. I’ve sold out.”

“Lud, what does that matter? She’ll never know the difference. What a simpleton you are, Alex. I swear none of you knows how to manage here since I left.”

“I approve of Aunt Lucretia’s manner of leaving her fortune. I won’t try to turn her up sweet by playing on her sympathy.”

“I begin to understand why you remained a major,” Rosalie snipped. “You just said you were having tough times here.”

“We are, but I’ll take care of it.”

“I hope you do it in a hurry, for I might as well get to the point at once, Alex....”

He mistrusted that pious look on Rosalie’s face. “What point?”

“Exmore wants to speak to you about that three thousand pounds you owe him.” She leveled a commanding stare at Exmore.

Alex’s face went perfectly blank. “I don’t understand. I borrowed nothing from Exmore.” He looked a question at his brother-in-law.

“No, no, it wasn’t Alex, Rosie. We’ll discuss it later.”

“No, tell me now,” Alex demanded.

It was typical of the Penholmes that a matter of this nature be discussed in front of everyone—guests, children, and all.

“The thing is,” Exmore began reluctantly, “Charles borrowed three thousand from me six months before he died. He’d joined the Jockey Club, you recall—”

“I heard nothing about it. He didn’t write to me at all.”

“He never even told
me, “
Robin said, offended at having been left out of this secret, which would have been of consuming interest to him.

“Well, he did it anyhow,” Exmore continued. “He was planning to train a filly for the Derby—bought a flashy piece of horseflesh from Alvanley and gave it to the Croker brothers to train, but then he died before it ever ran, and the Crokers kept it as payment for stabling fees and training fees and so on.”

“Oh, lord,” Alex said. It was only a sigh, but his feelings were easy to read from his dejected face and sagging shoulders.

“And he never even paid the interest,” Rosalie added.

“He was dead, Rose,” her husband reminded her.

“It comes to close to four thousand now,” Rose continued. “He gave Bertie a note at ten percent two years ago, and with the high cost of everything nowadays, we could use the money.”

“Rosie, I can’t pay it right away,” Alex said with a worried frown. “I’ve been selling everything that isn’t nailed down to pay back wages and pay off the local merchants. Ten percent! Isn’t that a bit steep? I mean, within the family.”

“I don’t suppose you wanted your own brother running to the cent percenters!” she riposted. “It’s your duty, Alex. Your income is ten thousand a year.”

“No, it isn’t! It’s down to six with the way things have been mismanaged, and everything mortgaged to the roof. Penholme, Sawburne ...”

“And Charlie sold the Leicester place, of course,” Rosalie added. “Well, you can always sell the London house. You won’t use it much anyway, if I know you.”

“It begins to look as though I’ll have to sell it,” he said reluctantly. As they all watched, his reluctance stiffened to opposition. “I won’t, though.”

“If you can pay everyone else, you can pay the family,” Rosalie said, a martial fire burning in her eyes.

“You can have my money, Alex,” Babe said trustingly.

Rosalie nodded in approval.

“Don’t be foolish,” Alex said. “That’s yours. It begins to look as though it’s all you can ever depend on, so you’d best hang on to it.”

“You will be her guardian,” Rosalie pointed out.

“Rosalie! You surely don’t expect me to steal Babe’s inheritance to pay Exmore!”

Exmore sat embarrassed, for he was not yet accustomed to the Penholmes’ blunt way of dragging all the dirty linen into the middle of the saloon.

“I didn’t say steal,” Rosalie countered. “Borrow it. Pay her interest.”

“With what money do I repay her? We’re holding on here by our fingernails. And anyway, Lucretia isn’t dead yet. Whatever possessed you to lend Charles such a sum? You might have known he’d squander it.”

“He was making up to Sylvia Mapleton at the time. She has a huge dowry and is very horsey. It seemed like a good idea.”

“He only said that to get the money out of you,” Alex said bitterly.

“That’s not true. They were always together.”

“I don’t see why Alex should be hobbled with Charlie’s debts,” Robin said.

Rosalie gave him a vastly superior look. “It is a matter of honor, Robin dear. When you’re older, you’ll understand.”

“I understand well enough you’re dunning Alex for his brother’s debts. Charlie was
your
brother, too.
You
take the loss.”