Place of Confinement (38 page)

She watched the sandy track and the grass and the gorse bushes blur with the speed of their motion. And she thought:

If Mr George Fenstanton swam
every
day, then he had done so on the day that Letitia Verney left Charcombe Manor. In order to keep his appointment on the beach at New Charcombe at three, he must have left the manor almost immediately after the walking party quitted it at half after two …

And that meant that Mr George Fenstanton could not have been the person who detected an eavesdropper and wrote the threatening note to Miss Gibbs. He had had no time in which to do so much.

Dido turned her head fearfully towards the gentleman beside her.

It was only Mr Lancelot Fenstanton who had remained behind in the hall that day …

Chapter Thirty-Nine

‘Have you considered my proposal, Miss Kent?’ Mr Fenstanton asked as they left the town behind and started along the sandy road.

Dido looked at her companion, almost as if she had never seen him before.

The hair was blowing back from his face, his square jaw was set in a look of determination, one powerful hand controlled the reins, the other idled on the whip. Outdoors, with his boots and his greatcoat and his horses, Lancelot Fenstanton was in his natural element, at ease with himself – much more the man of property and lord of the manor, less the eager little boy.

She wondered again whether she quite understood this man. Was it possible that he was involved in his uncle’s dark schemes? Because Lancelot Fenstanton
must
be the person who had heard a sound in the library and issued the horrible threat against Miss Gibbs. There had been no one else in the house to do it …

Her companion had turned now and was looking for an answer. And the question of just
why
he wished to marry her took on a new urgency.

‘I am very sorry to keep you in suspense,’ she began cautiously, trying with all her might to sound as if a proposal was all that she had on her mind. ‘But any offer of marriage is a very serious matter. And this one, I think, is particularly difficult to decide upon.’

He smiled sidelong at her. ‘Am I such a very difficult prospect to consider?’

‘Perhaps you are.’ She cast down her eyes, for, after all, a lady is allowed to be bashful when an offer of marriage is under discussion. ‘I confess it is the letter – Mr Bailey’s letter – which makes me hesitate.’

‘No need for you to worry about that, my dear,’ he said promptly. ‘I’ll put it into your hands the moment you consent to marry me.’

She fixed her gaze upon her own small feet which were swinging an inch or two above the floor of the carriage; but out of the corner of her eye she could see his booted feet and the tip of his riding whip, which was just beginning to twitch and tap against one foot.

‘But,’ she pursued, ‘it is that which makes me uneasy, Mr Fenstanton – your promise to give me the letter
after I have agreed to be your wife.
’

‘Ha!’ he threw her a quick, assessing look.

‘You see, I cannot help but feel that I am being … manoeuvred into marriage. That my consent is being enforced.’

He frowned and seemed for a moment as if he would not answer. But she waited in silence.

‘Don’t they say,’ he remarked at last, ‘that everything is fair in love as it is in war?’

Dido continued to look down. His whip was still tapping on the high leather boot. ‘But I would wish to know,’ she said, ‘whether this is a case of love or of war. In short, are you making love to me or threatening me?’

‘Why, I’m making love, ain’t I?’ he cried. She looked up and saw that he was trying for a smile. ‘I have told you that I admire you – and, by way of proof I’m offering to do you a service.’

‘But the service is conditional upon my acceptance of your offer?’

He threw her another troubled, sideways look, then turned his attention back to his horses. Clearly he had expected only a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’, not this lively interrogation.

‘I cannot allow myself to be threatened and tricked into marriage, Mr Fenstanton.’

‘Threatened? Why, what nonsense!’ He laughed and urged on the horses. ‘I only mean to
persuade.
Marriage is a manoeuvring business. It is the way of the world.’

Whether Mr Fenstanton was embarrassed, or only anxious to reach his destination, he was driving the horses harder and harder and they were now travelling at a speed which was not entirely comfortable. Dido held to her seat with both hands and studied the profile of her companion. His jaw was set, he had a look of determination. But what, exactly was he determined upon?

And was his pursuit of her some part of the other mysteries?

The motion of the carriage whipped blood into her cheeks, made her heart beat fast – and emboldened her to ask: ‘And what do you hope to gain from the manoeuvring, Mr Fenstanton?’

‘Why, I hope to gain you, of course,’ he answered, and tried to laugh.

‘I am a bad bargain!’

‘You are a great deal too modest!’

‘No, an excess of modesty has never been a part of my character,’ said Dido. She put up one hand, attempting to catch her bonnet which was being blown from her head. But she found that both hands were required to prevent her being shaken from her seat. She gave up the attempt, allowed the bonnet to be carried back onto her shoulders and held hard to the seat. ‘My failings lie elsewhere,’ she said.

‘I am sure you have no failings,’ insisted the gentleman – but impatience was beginning to break through his gallantry.

‘Oh, but I have! I am poor and I am not young. Those, I think, would generally be considered my greatest weaknesses of character.’

He shook his head in exasperation. ‘This is an extraordinary way to talk to a fellow that’s made you an offer of marriage.’

‘It is an extraordinary offer.’

‘Damn it!’ he cried suddenly and urged the horses to greater effort. ‘Why must you argue?’

‘Arguing,’ said Dido – speaking loud to be heard above the noise of the wheels, ‘is generally considered to be my third great fault. And, all in all, I cannot help but conclude that I am a bad choice for a wife.’

In reply he pulled the horses to a sudden, slithering halt and turned towards her – his brown eyes were earnest, a little frown of puzzlement was gathering on his brow. All at once he was the bewildered boy again. ‘But what if a fellow has fallen in love with you?’

‘Ah!’ she said as the quiet afternoon settled about them and the sounds of the sea and the circling seabirds reasserted themselves. ‘If that were the case, it would, of course, change everything.’

‘But, I tell you, it
is
the case! Why must you doubt me?’

She turned her eyes directly upon him, ‘Because of the means by which you have sought to win my consent. I grant that marriage may often be a manoeuvring business, Mr Fenstanton. But,’ she said with great firmness, ‘there is no manoeuvring when there is genuine affection in the case. Love is open and honest, and it seeks to promote the welfare of its object without cavil or condition.’

He frowned, drew the reins thoughtfully through his fingers for a moment or two and looked down at his boots on the splashboard. ‘You speak very decidedly about love,’ he said quietly. ‘You seem to know a lot about it.’

She blushed at that. ‘I know,’ she said, as composedly as she could, ‘that there has been very little of love in your behaviour towards me. If you had burnt the letter as proof of your esteem and
then
sought my hand, I might have believed that you cared for me. But to make conditions – to inflict the pain of decision – that is not the behaviour of a man in love.’

‘Good God!’ Fenstanton closed his eyes a moment and seemed to struggle for control of himself. ‘If you argue so, it is no wonder you have never married.’

‘You are not the first to express that opinion,’ Dido assured him. ‘But I cannot consider a proposal unless I understand
why
it is being made. I am not rich, I am not well connected. I am neither young nor beautiful. And you certainly do not love me; I am quite sure that you do not, for, quite apart from your behaviour over Mr Bailey’s letter, there is the little matter of when your passion for me began.’

‘When it began?’

‘Yes. You have told me yourself that your affection for me was the cause of your not pursuing Miss Verney. But your reluctance to ride after the fugitive was apparent to her friend on the very day of the disappearance. And that was
the day before
my aunt and I arrived at your house. No, Mr Fenstanton; the vainest woman in the world could not believe that you conceived an overwhelming passion for her a full four and twenty hours before any meeting took place.’

He said nothing.

‘I repeat: why do you wish to marry me?’

But he remained sunk in his own thoughts. Dido pulled the bonnet back onto her head, secured the ribbons and waited for a reply in determined silence. From the cliffs above them came the voices of their companions and the faint rattle of teacups being set out on the board. After a moment or two Mr Fenstanton set the horses in motion and they started slowly up the hill. His eyes were fixed upon the road ahead. But one hand still tapped the whip against his boot.

‘I’m damned if I know what to say,’ he admitted at last. ‘You see, I’m not supposed to tell it all, unless I have to.’

Dido was becoming more uneasy every minute. She was sure now that this proposal went deeper than she had thought. She studied the easy laughing lines of his face. She had always supposed that there were no ugly lines there because there were no ugly thoughts. But it occurred to her now that a smooth brow might indicate a lack of proper care and concern for others.

‘My brother Edward,’ she began slowly, ‘won a medal for debating at Cambridge; and he told me once about logic – how, by putting together two propositions, one might come at an unassailable conclusion.’

Fenstanton shook his head in bafflement.

‘In this case,’ pursued Dido, ‘the two propositions might be: first, Mr Lancelot Fenstanton is so troubled by debt that he
must
marry for money; second, Mr Lancelot Fenstanton is seeking to marry Miss Dido Kent.’

‘Ha! And the conclusion?’

‘The conclusion,’ said Dido – a little shocked by it herself, ‘the conclusion must be that Mr Lancelot Fenstanton expects to enrich himself by marrying Miss Dido Kent. It is a matter of pure logic; it cannot be escaped.’

But still she looked at him – expecting him to offer an argument against such a nonsensical conclusion.

‘Your brother is a very clever fellow. Though I ain’t sure he was so clever to put logic like that in the hands of a woman.’

‘My conclusion is correct?’

‘Yes.’

They rattled on a little way, turning at the zigzag which rendered the assent easier on the horses. The picnic in all its glory came into view. White cloths and sparkling glasses and steaming urns, surrounded by bracken and gorse bushes and the black, staring faces of a dozen or so bemused sheep. The manor party was elegantly disposed about it: Miss Fenstanton and Miss Gibbs in new white muslins and Mrs Bailey in unbecoming puce; and Mrs Manners in uncompromising black, seated regally upon a chair beneath a gay parasol, hands clasped upon the head of her walking stick – looking with marked approval towards the approaching carriage.

‘It is my aunt!’ cried Dido.

He only shrugged up his shoulders under the many capes of his riding coat and slapped the reins needlessly along the backs of the straining horses.

‘My aunt,’ she repeated more quietly, for they were now almost within earshot of that lady, ‘my aunt has promised to settle money on me!’

The words were shrill and frail in the warm salty breeze and they sounded so foolish when spoken aloud that she was ashamed of having uttered them. Her companion began to laugh. He pulled the horses to a standstill on the grass beside Mrs Manners’ chaise.

‘Ha! Your logic gets you but halfway there,’ he said. ‘She ain’t promised to settle money.’

‘No, I did not think it possible…’

‘You see,’ he explained hurriedly, ‘dear Mrs Manners don’t like the way her whole family is after her fortune. We don’t give her any peace, she says. And she don’t see how she can satisfy us all. So she wants an alliance between the families of Manners and Fenstanton. She has promised that if you marry me, she will keep only the money settled on her at her marriage – and make you heiress to your uncle’s entire fortune.’

Chapter Forty

As she stepped down from the curricle, the picnic closed about Dido with all its noise and business – and there is a great deal of noise and business when ladies and gentlemen have determined upon taking refreshment without the walls of a dining parlour. Every cup of tea is drunk with a sense of something achieved; the eating of every slice of cold meat, every spoonful of jelly, in a safe and elegant manner is an accomplishment.

With a mind so burdened, Dido would have been very glad indeed to have been excused eating entirely. She would have liked nothing better than to be left alone to consider just
why
her aunt should make such an extraordinary offer. Mr Lancelot’s explanation had shaken her badly and she longed for an hour or so of quiet reflection … But that, of course, was not permitted. The purpose of the party gathered on the cliff top was to eat – and eat with elegance. She immediately found herself attacked with pigeon pie and a dressed cucumber and a wine glass – which she could find nowhere to stand.

But she was at least able to escape from Mr Lancelot, thanks to the kind offices of Mrs Bailey who laid claim to that gentleman’s attention as soon as he set foot from his carriage. She was fortunate too in finding a seat at a little distance from the main party, on a rug beside Martha Gibbs – who proved a very kind and sympathetic listener.

‘Lord!’ cried Miss Gibbs when the startling cause of Mr Lancelot’s proposal had poured from Dido’s lips. ‘Fancy you being an heiress and not knowing it! And do you mean to have him?’

Martha was smiling in that manner peculiar to discussions of matrimony, and her look made Dido cautious. The immediate need to communicate her news had been overwhelming, but now she exerted herself to think rationally – and remembered that the proof they needed was still not found; that an acceptance of the proposal might yet be necessary. ‘Mr Fenstanton,’ she said – seeking for a place on the grass which might accommodate the troublesome glass – ‘appears to be a very agreeable, respectable gentleman…’