Call of the Heart (9 page)

“You are very modest!” he said. “Do you resemble your father?”

“No, I am like my mother,” Lalitha answered, “but only a poor reflection of her, just a few characteristics. She was very beautiful!”

She spoke without thinking and once again Lord Rothwyn saw the fear in her eyes and a sudden tremor go through her.

“Of . . . course,” she said, not looking at him, “she has... altered a great deal as she has grown ... older!” “I thought we agreed,” Lord Rothwyn answered, “that we would not lie to each other.”

“I gave my... word,” Lalitha answered, “and ...”

She paused.

“What were the threats if you broke it?” he asked. “S-She .. . really . . . will ... kill me!” Lalitha murmured almost beneath her breath.

“That is something that will never happen,” he said, “but because I do not wish you to be worried by anything you might say to me, because I want you to forget all the horrors of the past, I will not press you.” He saw a little light of gratitude in Lalitha’s expression.

“I want you to think of nothing but getting well,” he said, “and then you can walk in the garden with me, and when you are strong enough I want to drive you to see the Spa near St. Albans and the Elizabethan house before I find a tenant for it.” He rose to his feet.

“Promise me you will not worry about the future?”

“I will... try!” Lalitha answered.

“We will discuss it again when you are strong enough, but think now only that I shall be very disappointed by a restoration of a building called ‘Lalitha’ if it does not come up to my expectations!”

Lalitha gave him a little smile.

“Please do not expect too much.”

“I am afraid I am a perfectionist,” he answered.

He took her hand in his and raised it to his lips.

“Sleep well, Lalitha. I will come and see you again tomorrow.”

He turned towards the door, then stopped as she said:

“Why are you here in the country? You should be in London. It is still the Season.”

“Very nearly the end of it,” he replied, “and I really cannot trust anyone but myself where my buildings are concerned.” He smiled at her and then he was gone from the room.

Lalitha leant back against the pillows.

Her heart was beating fast and yet she was no longer frightened, as she had been when he’d first entered.

‘How kind he has been,’ she thought, and yet she felt that she should have pressed him further to be rid of her.

He was obviously being gallant, but she was well aware what sort of impression she would make on his friends.

They had expected his wife to be Sophie, the beautiful, incomparable Sophie, with her golden hair, blue eyes, and perfect skin.

Lalitha knew without being told that while there must have been many women in Lord Rothwyn’s life he had probably never before offered marriage to any of them.

Sophie had said that he was one of the richest men in England, in which case every ambitious mother would have wanted him as a son-in-law.

Any girl would fancy living at Rothwyn House in Park Lane or being the Chatelaine of Roth Park.

Wearing the family jewels in which Lord Rothwyn’s wife would bedeck herself, she could be Hostess to all the great personalities in the land from the Regent downwards.

Sophie had one qualification essential to such a position—a beauty that would strike anyone as soon as they saw her.

There might be others with blue-blood, a great dowry, or perhaps an engaging personality.

‘I have none of those things!’ Lalitha thought.

She turned her head against the pillows and shut her eyes.

She had to be practical, she thought. She had to be sensible.

For a little while until she was well she could stay here in the midst of a beauty which moved her in a manner that was inexpressible in words.

She had always loathed ugliness, just as she had always loathed dirt, cruelty, lies, and deceit, all of which had been part of the life she had been forced to live.

Now she had escaped!

Yet she must not deceive herself into thinking it could last forever.

Lord Rothwyn had been kind to her, but only because she was ill and because in his anger he had forced her to do as he wished.

‘At the same time,’ Lalitha thought, “he must despise me for being so feeble! If I had protested loudly enough, if I had refused to take the marriage vows, he would not be in the position he is in now. ’

She gave a little sigh.

‘I must save him from himself! ’ she thought, ‘and from me! ’

It was two days later that Lalitha was well enough to go

downstairs, and before that she had met the Herb-Woman.

She was not quite certain what she had expected.

Not a strange old crone who looked as though she had been baked in the sun until her skin was like brass and her eyes were blue as forget-me-nots.

She had been brought to Roth Park in one of His Lordship’s carriages and had been delighted to see how Lalitha’s health had improved and how there seemed to be a little more fat covering her thin bones.

“You got a long way to go, my dear,” she said with a broad Hertfordshire accent, “but you be on the right road and all you have to do now is to follow my instructions!”

She wagged her finger at Lalitha.

“No cheating now!”

There were herbs for Lalitha to take which intrigued her. She was to continue with the Bay-oil, which had healed her back and which was still necessary where there were scars.

There were soft creams that she was to rub over herself after she had bathed and which, she learnt, contained cowslips.

There was calamint to take, which Lalitha learnt was the herb of Mercury and was not only good for the skin but for all afflictions of the brain.

“You sound as if you thought I was mad!” she expostulated.

“You starved your brain as you starved your body!” the Herb-Woman answered. “It needs feeding for it to be as strong as it should be. Calamint will help you. I will leave you a bottle. Let me know when it is finished.”

There were so many other things that Lalitha, afraid that she would forget her instructions when the old woman had gone, wrote them all down.

One thing which was easy for her to remember was that she was now to change the lotion for her hair to one made of peach-kernels.

“Boil them in vinegar,” the Herb-Woman ordered Nattie. “Fortunately peaches are easy to come by at this time of the year. They make the hair grow even upon bald patches and give it a lustre and a shine as beautiful as the peach itself!”

She also brought Lalitha some of her special honey and told her that she must eat the comb because that was as important as the honey itself.

“How did you learn all these things?” Lalitha asked. “My father was a Herbalist and his father before him. My ancestor was Nicholas Culpeper.”

“Who was he?”

“A very famous Astrologer-Physician,” the Herb-Woman answered. “He was the first man in this country to set down his findings where herbs were concerned.”

She smiled at Lalitha and added:

“A study which goes back into the very annals of time.”

“Yes, I knew that,” Lalitha said, “but I did not know there were books about herbs.”

“Nicholas Culpeper,” the Herb-Woman said, “devoted his life to the study of Astrology and Medicine.” “How fortunate that he wrote it down!” Lalitha exclaimed.

“During the Civil War he fought on the Parliamentary side and was wounded in the chest,” the Herb-Woman explained. “He cured himself and he thought if he had died his secrets would have died with him.” “That would have been a terrible loss!”

“It would indeed! So while he treated innumerable patients in Spitalfields he still found time to describe the medicinal properties of herbs and the directions for his compounds in what he called his ‘Complete Herbal.’ ” “Please, one day could you let me see it?” Lalitha begged.

“Certainly,” the Herb-Woman replied. “I will let you see it when you come to visit me, and as you are interested you can see the herbs growing, inspect those I have dried ready for Winter, and speak to my bees!” “Speak to your bees?” Lalitha exclaimed in astonishment.

“They like those they heal to speak to them,” the Herb-Woman said. “I talk to them, tell them what is happening, and explain to them what their magical honey has to do.”

She added simply:

“They never fail me!”

It seemed to Lalitha as if every moment she was at Roth Park there were new things to see and to learn about.

When she dressed, with Nattie’s help, the Nurse brought from the wardrobe a gown she had never seen before.

She had worried as to what she would wear when she went downstairs, aware that the dress she had worn to go to the Church would seem very out of place in the beauty and luxury of Roth Park.

The gown Nattie held out for her to see was very lovely.

It had the boat-shaped neckline which was so fashionable, and

the huge sleeves which ended tightly at the wrist would hide the thinness of her arms.

The skirt was full and ornamented round the hem with soft ribbons which somehow bespoke the magic word “Paris.”

“Is that for... me?” Lalitha asked, wide-eyed.

“His Lordship has had a number of gowns sent down from London,” Nattie answered. “I burnt those rags you were wearing the night I first saw you.”

Lalitha blushed.

“They were all I had,” she murmured.

“Well, you have a great deal more now,” Nattie said. “But I do not wish you to tire yourself by looking at them.”

“Can I have just one look?” Lalitha begged.

Humouring her as if she were a child, Nattie opened the doors of the wardrobe and Lalitha saw that there were more than a dozen gowns of soft, muted colours very unlike the striking hues that had become Sophie’s brilliant pink, white, and gold beauty.

“How did he know I would look best in the very soft shades like Mama?” Lalitha asked herself.

She thought that he must have a fantastic instinct for such things.

Certainly her dress of a soft shade of blue which reminded her of “love in a mist” flattered her slight body and seemed to accentuate the faint colour that had come into her face since she had taken the Herb-Woman’s mixtures.

Nevertheless as she went down the stairs she felt apprehensive.

Supposing after all he had done for her Lord Rothwyn was disappointed?

A liveried footman led her across the Hall and opened the door to what Lalitha saw at a glance was not the Grand Salon she had rather dreaded but a much cosier, smaller room.

It was filled with flowers and decorated with brocade-panelled walls and pictures of children.

Standing in the window which opened into the garden was Lord Rothwyn.

He turned, stood for a second looking at her, and then smiled.

For the moment she was no longer frightened and she moved confidently towards him.

Lalitha came down the stairs with a lilt in her step followed by a small black-and-white dog.

Every day she had been at Roth Park had been full of discovery and delight!

First she had been shown over the house that had been built in the reign of Charles II and added to by every succeeding generation of Rothwyns.

She could not imagine that anything so large and imposing could still have the warmth, atmosphere, and intimacy of a home.

There were treasures wherever she looked, fabulous pictures and tapestrys on the walls; furniture which successive owners had brought from France and Italy, all pieces which complemented each other in their fine craftmanship and made as a whole a pattern of beauty which enthralled her.

In fact she found herself thrilled by everything she

saw, and to have the history of such treasures explained to her

by Lord Rothwyn was a delight she had never known.

Engraved in stone over the front door were the words:

This house has been built by Inigo the first Lord Rothwyn not only with bricks and timbers but with his mind, imagination, and heart Erected in the year of Our Lord, a.d. 1678.

“I can understand him saying that,” Lalitha cried.

“So can I!” Lord Rothwyn agreed.

“Is that how ... you build?”

“Yes.”

There was a pause and Lalitha longed to ask if in restoring her, as he had said he was doing, he gave her his mind, imagination, and heart.

But she was too shy!

In any case the last was impossible where she was concerned. Then Lord Rothwyn took her into his enormous Library.

When she saw its beautiful painted ceiling and thousands of books giving the walls a patch-work effect of colour she had felt breathless with excitement.

“Would I . . . would I ... be allowed to . . . read some of these?” she asked, eagerly looking up at him.

With his hand he made a gesture which embraced the room. “They are all yours!”

“I can hardly believe it!” she said beneath her breath. “I have felt these last years . . . starved because I was not allowed to read.”

“Books are not the only thing of which you were starved,” he said.

She blushed and then said anxiously:

“I am better! I am not as ugly as I was.”

“You were never ugly,” he answered in his deep voice, “but you did look somewhat neglected.”

“I am trying very hard to eat everything I should. I drink literally gallons of milk!”

She wrinkled her nose.

“It is an effort, because I do not like milk.”

“Neither do I,” Lord Rothwyn confessed. “But Nattie always insisted on my finishing my mug, so you must do as she tells you.”

Lalitha laughed.

“She is so kind and yet she is very firm.”

“That is why I was so well brought up!”

He was speaking jokingly but Lalitha answered seriously: “She is exceedingly proud of you. She thinks all the good qualities you have are due entirely to her.”

“And so they are,” Lord Rothwyn agreed loyally, “but what about the bad?”

He looked at Lalitha with a cynical smile on his lips as he spoke, and she knew that he was referring to his bad temper the night he had forced her to marry him. “I think,” she said slowly, “that perhaps you are rather too . . . proud of being like your famous ancestor.”