A Country Wooing (16 page)

“I was happy to learn you are safely returned to us, milord,” Mr. Naismith began, lending a social air to the occasion by a reference to matters in the Peninsula. This was not why Alex had come, and he reverted directly to business. Though the firm handled only London matters of finance, Naismith knew enough of the general situation that he inquired discreetly as to whether Penholme would be able to set the Hall to rights.

“I hope so. We’re heavily mortgaged,” Alex admitted. “There is the London house to fall back on, however. I may find it necessary to take out a small mortgage on it.”

Naismith’s pale eyes blinked. “Ah, another mortgage...”

Alex’s heart plunged. “Another mortgage?” he asked in a sepulchral tone.

“There is the mortgage for eight thousand the late earl took out some months before his death. The place is worth more—ten thousand, I should think—but eighty percent is already a heavy mortgage, the heaviest your brother could raise at the time.”

Once, at Badajos, Alex had found himself cut off from his army, caught behind the enemy line with only his batman, the two of them surrounded by enemies. He had thought he would die that night. He could hear not a dozen feet away from him French soldiers talking. He knew the taste of fear, of panic, and he tasted it now at the back of his throat. It was a sharp, dry sensation, accompanied by a heightened awareness of irrelevant details around him. In Spain that night, he had noticed how brightly the stars shone, had been minutely aware of a sharp stone digging into his leg as he sat cramped and silent.

Now he looked at a bad picture of Anne Hathaway’s cottage, and knew he would remember for the rest of his life the exact lineaments of it. The three chimneys, the left part of the house higher than the right, the thatched roof. At Badajos, he and Lehman had escaped by crawling on their bellies like snakes, inching forward an inch at a time, fearing every rustle of the grass, just waiting to be discovered and killed.

He saw no means of exit this time. He was surrounded by debts, and the money he had been counting on was gone. Another eight thousand pounds poured down the bottomless pit of Charles’s senseless spending. What had ailed him, that he could waste the family money so wantonly? Lowering his eyes from the picture on the wall, Alex saw Mr. Naismith regarding him with a commiserating eye.

“It cannot be impossible to raise a small sum,” Naismith suggested hopefully. “How much do you urgently require? You mentioned a small mortgage.”

Alex was reluctant to go into all the disagreeable, impossible details till he had time to think. “I’ll look over my accounts and let you know.”

“These bills waiting for payment,” Naismith went on, pulling out a great folder stuffed with unpaid bills, “can wait. Tradesmen, for the most part. I paid off your brother’s gambling debts from the bequest the estate came into from your uncle Cyrus Fender last year. I knew you would wish to have them taken care of as soon as possible. I also kept up payments on the London mortgage.”

Alex knew vaguely he had once had an uncle Cyrus Fender. He didn’t know the man had died, and he had not thought the family would inherit anything from him. With an apathy born of despair, he inquired how much it had amounted to.

“Ten thousand pounds,” Naismith said calmly.

Another fortune sown on the winds by his brother. His delightful, charming brother, whom all the world loved. Another ten thousand on top of the eight thousand mortgage on the house. There couldn’t be another creature in the country who spent such sums, unless it should be the Prince of Wales, and he, at least, had the whole country to support him.

“What is the total of this batch of bills?” Alex asked, hefting the folder.

“It is nothing to worry about. Tailors and bootmakers and hatmakers. Few gentlemen presented such a fine appearance as the late Lord Penholme. A few bills from jewelers. Your brother was popular with the ladies,” he ventured playfully.

“How much?” Alex repeated in a louder, harsher voice.

“I have it figured out here. Four thousand and five hundred, give or take a few guineas.”

Nothing to worry about! A mere drop in the bottomless bucket of Charles’s improvidence. “We’ll let the merchants wait a little longer,” Alex said, rising. He felt a hundred years old. His very joints protested at the effort of moving.

“Oh, they are not worried about getting their money. They were all happy for your brother’s patronage. His appearance did them credit.”

Not worried, but they should be. They weren’t aware that Penholme was mortgaged to the tune of forty thousand, Sawburne to three, the Leicester property sold outright, that Charles had gotten the family into such debt that they’d be lucky to get a shilling on the pound when he was forced to declare himself a bankrupt.

“There are a few assets, what?” Naismith asked archly, but more than “a few” were needed. “A few investments.” Alex gave a hopeful look. “The shipbuilding company was not profitable, alas. He lost a good sum on that, though it’s still worth something—a few hundred. The wiser course would be to hang on till after the war, but you could sell them now ...”

“A few hundred won’t make much difference.”

“Fortunately some of his other ventures did a little better. Would you like to take your brother’s papers home with you? Look them over at your leisure, and we’ll have a good meeting after you are in possession of the facts. Not much we can do till you have all the facts before you.”

Naismith began pulling out folders and had them stuffed into a large box for Penholme to take to his carriage. A clerk was called to save his lordship the indignity of carrying a box.

“These are the stocks here,” Naismith said, handing a slim folder to Alex. “A pity about the shipbuilding company. I thought it might prove profitable, but with the war disrupting shipping ...”

“Yes, a pity,” Alex said. He put the folder under his arm and left. He threw the material in a heap on one banquette of the carriage and directed the groom to take him to Hyde Park. He got out at Tyburn Turnpike House and walked along in a sort of daze. Tyburn, that old historical site of executions, suited his mood. He stopped at Tyburn tree, now replaced with an inscribed stone, and thought of Cromwell hanging there, and Jack Sheppard. He was at the end of a rope himself; he might as well be hanging there with all his troubles behind him. It hardly seemed worth surviving a war, to come home to this.

How bright the future had looked a few short weeks ago. In his eagerness to get home, he’d left with his wound still open, thinking it would heal during the voyage, only to have it become infected during the trip. But that was only a physical wound—one gritted one’s teeth and endured the short agony of cauterization.

How was this other hurt, this deep, creeping ache that must be despair, to be overcome? He thought of his family, the children raised with high expectations, who must be farmed out to obliging relatives, for it was beginning to look as though he might lose even Penholme. It wasn’t fair to his tenants to make them go on living in damp, unhealthy cottages, working farms that needed money put into them to be profitable.

Some smart, retired merchant like Anglin could afford to set Penholme back on its feet. He would lose it—the stain of failure would besmirch his name, not Charles’s. And Annie—was he to lose her now, after so much waiting, and when she was within his grasp?

Annie ... A sad smile settled on him as he remembered her mending her blue slippers and regretting the white crepe, but in good humor. “An officer and a gentleman should have more gumption!” she had told him. What good was gumption when unaccompanied by money? Sell the London house? He’d clear two thousand, a laughable sum, in the face of his debts.

All he had was his title. A title ought to be worth something.... Any number of sinecures might be open to a lord returned from the war in Spain. An ambassadorship or some government post would be provided. Prinny treated his officers with liberality.

He looked into the muddy waters of that misnamed lake the Serpentine, which was nearly a perfect parallelogram, and thought its creator, Queen Caroline, had been nearly as foolish as Charles to have spent a reputed twenty thousand pounds for the dirty, unappetizing little puddle. The world was full of fools and scoundrels—how did it come that they were invariably the ones who got their hands on money?

How much would a sinecure at court pay? Enough to hold on to Penholme, to meet the staggering mortgage? Perhaps, if one lived like a hermit for a couple of decades and could endure the guilt of making his tenants live in squalor. Was it fair to offer a lady a battle-torn body, scarred for life, and a crippling burden of debt? Possibly even a life of exile, if it turned out he was given an ambassadorship. Annie loved her roots and her home as much as he did himself.

Alive or dead, Charles was still between them. Dashing, daring, handsome, reckless Charles, who had infatuated Anne as he had all the other girls, and treated her as badly, too. Perhaps it was partly Alex’s fault. He had felt he had no chance to win her while Charles was alive, and nothing to offer her. He had seen her only when he could find an excuse—a brace of partridge or a rabbit, which he was obliged to say came from Charles, the lord of the manor. And, of course, the family parties, when he had had the excruciating pain of seeing her smile at Charles and hardly glancing in his own direction. But with Charles dead, it looked as though all that was changing. He had always known they’d be pinched for money at first, but Annie wouldn’t cavil at that.

His delight at learning she cared for him was short-lived. It had lasted exactly thirty-six hours; from eleven o’clock the night of the assembly till eleven this morning. The dream of having her at the Hall, a bride for himself and a mother for the children, had seemed possible for exactly thirty-six hours. At least he hadn’t offered for her; he would not have the shame of withdrawing his offer.

Yet he regretted that he had not. He could not honorably offer now, in his position, but had the wedding already been set, she wouldn’t back down. She would face with him what he must now face alone. He wouldn’t mind being exiled to Austria or some such place if only Annie could go with him.

He walked for two hours, not noticing when the carriages started to arrive, but the increased traffic began to annoy his solitude after a while, and he went to his carriage, to return to Exmore’s. It was his family’s custom to share all the news, however unpleasant, and talk it out thoroughly, but today he couldn’t face it. Rosalie’s eager face told him she expected to receive her money, possibly even that minute, and he had to make an excuse about that.

“I have some debts of Charles’s that must be taken care of immediately,” he explained. “Exmore said his need wasn’t urgent. I’ll pay him as soon as I can.”

“It seems a pity to me that Harriet Wilson must take precedence over us, but there will be a great scandal if her jewelry isn’t paid for. I suppose that is the debt you refer to.”

“Who is Harriet Wilson?” Alex asked.

“Oh, Alex, really! Have you been living in Spain or on the moon? I made sure even
you
would know about the Wilson sisters. Why, Wellington himself is one of Harriet’s beaux, you must know. Three prissy little whores who have every buck and beau in the city languishing after them. Charles was carrying on with Harriet before he died, and it was said he was the one who gave her that diamond necklace she wore to the opera. I think he might have paid Exmore instead! Of course, the Wilsons are very good ton,” she added forgivingly.

Alex stared at her condoning tone. “How could you let him do it, Rosie? He’s
ruined
this family. He hardly behaved like a rational man.”

“He didn’t seem very worried. In fact, after you left, he said you had read him a Bear Garden jaw, and he was going to make some solid investments.”

“Yes, in a shipping company that’s sunk.”

“Even when he was dying, he didn’t appear unduly concerned. I made a point to be with him at the end, you know,” she said in a saintly voice. “I mentioned to him that he still owed Exmore and wondered if he had any suggestion as to how we might get our money.”

Alex stared at this untimely dun, but Rosie was not disconcerted. “Well, I knew that once the will went into escrow, if that is the proper term, it would take eons to get our money, but Charles said not to worry.”

“I don’t believe he even knew what he owed. He’d run out of control completely. He hadn’t sold off the furnishings; that’s about all that remains. You are welcome to take your money in merchandise from the house if you like, before it is put up to auction.”

“Oh, Alex, you’re not going to have an auction! So vulgar. Why, you’re worse than Charles.”

“Yes, I have taken the cavalier notion to destroy the family’s dignity and fortune, after Charles’s careful guardianship, Rosalie. Better dip in and grab what is owed you, before the bailiffs move in.”

“There is no need to be satirical. I knew how it would be once you took over,” she snipped, and began assessing what value she could get away with putting on his possessions and what increase she might realize at a private sale later.

“Think about it. I’m returning to Penholme at once.”

“What, going back already? You haven’t seen Aunt Lucretia or ordered new jackets or anything.”

“I’ll write to Lucretia, and I won’t be going anywhere that I need new jackets.” His gait was dragging as he left the room. Rosalie shook her head sadly. Alex had never had the spirit of Charles. Charles would only laugh at this contretemps and begin making eyes at the richest heiress in London.

“You’d best get home and begin making eyes at Miss Anglin, then,” she said.

The duchess sent a footman to inquire as to whether her brother wanted the papers from his solicitor taken up, but as he was leaving so soon, he left them in the carriage. She did succeed in getting him to remain one night, as an early-morning start would prevent him from having to stay overnight at an inn. She urged him out to the theater with her and Exmore, but he elected to stay at home and spent his night tallying up long columns of figures, of which the assets always formed the smaller total. He left early the next morning, with Rosalie urging him to let her have her money as soon as possible. Anglin would not object to forwarding him a measly few thousand.