Reluctant Bride (12 page)

Chapter 9

It was
a short trip to Rusholme, about sixteen miles. The team of grays borrowed from Edmund’s friend made it without baiting. We arrived just in time for dinner, at six. Uncle Weston had about given up on seeing us. I had mentioned we would arrive around noon. Weston Braden, I happen to know, is sixty-five, but he looks older. He is a rumpled anachronism of a man that no valet can keep presentable. His hair is white, worn in the old style—longish, pulled into a tail behind. He has no pretensions to fashion. As often as not he wears an old fustian coat about his place, but in honor of our visit he was rigged out in a blue one. He is somewhat stout, ruddy-complexioned, with bright hazel eyes. Gout necessitates his hobbling along with a walking stick. He is out of style with the world at large, but in the doorway of his half-timbered Elizabethan home, he looks just right—a portly, sixteenth-century English squire. One expects to hear a “forsooth” or “sirrah” when he opens his mouth.

I introduced Sir Edmund as my fiancé, never thinking I would have to do more than make the statement. I was in grave error. Weston took an inordinate interest in the matter.

“Why you never mentioned a word of being engaged, Lizzie!” he exclaimed, greatly surprised.

“It happened only recently, Uncle.”

“Isn’t that nice. I had despaired of ever seeing you settled. So you are Lizzie’s young man,” he continued, shaking Blount’s hand.

“I have that honor,” Edmund confessed, unblushing.

“Blount. Blount—the name sounds familiar,” Uncle said next. “You wouldn’t be the Blount who owns Woldwood, where the fine cattle are bred?”

“I have that honor, too,” Blount answered modestly.

“Well, now, isn’t that fine.” Weston smiled fondly at first me, then my catch. “You have done well for yourself, missie. Very well indeed. She is sly as a fox, Sir Edmund. She has kept mum as a mole about the whole thing.”

“Very likely she is ashamed of me,” Edmund replied, with a disparaging smile.

This was treated as humor of a high order. After he had finished laughing, Weston asked, “How do things go on at Westgate? Not too prosperously I fear, as you are ready to sell me the necklace.”

“Not prosperously at all, Uncle. That Berrigan fellow you saddled us with is a disaster.”

“Is he indeed? I am surprised to hear it. He came highly recommended. I’ll look about and find someone else for you. Or perhaps Sir Edmund would be interested . . .” His relief at being rid of us was genuine.

Once I was there, actually facing my uncle, I knew perfectly well it was nonsense to think he had anything to do with Greenie or the stolen jewelry. I believe Sir Edmund was thinking the same thing. He observed Weston closely, then a sort of puzzled frown settled on his harsh features as he glanced to me.

Maisie came forward to make her greeting and be welcomed. When she was seen to be carrying a walking stick, Weston thought he had a fellow-sufferer in gout. “No, I had an accident,” she told him. “Our carriage was overturned just outside of Devizes. Lizzie is wearing a patch, you must have noticed.”

“How did it happen?” he inquired.

“One of those demmed Corinthians was hunting the squirrel, and capsized us,” Edmund explained, in well-feigned vexation.

“They ought to be whipped at the cart’s tail, every one of them,” Weston said in a supporting way. “Well, come in, folks, and let us have some refreshment. You ladies will want to change for dinner.”

The difficulty in this scheme was explained. “Our trunks ought to be here by tomorrow,” Edmund said. “I sent word to Devizes to forward them here. I forgot to mention it to you, Lizzie. I did it this morning, when I was up early with Mitzi.”

“Good, I am happy to hear it.” I hoped it was true, and not more invention from my fellow actor.

“No matter. We are not at all grand here, in the country,” Uncle told us, relieved to be spared the bother of dressing himself.

We had a glass of wine while dinner was given its final preparation. “I am most eager to see the necklace,” Uncle said. “Do you have it in your reticule, Lizzie, that I might have a look now, while we await dinner?”

“Edmund is carrying it,” I told him.

I knew it was in Edmund’s pocket, but he did not produce it. Perhaps he was afraid my uncle would get to compare it to the other while we were washing up for dinner. “I’ll get it later,” he said.

There was nothing amiss in the meal. Uncle sets a good table, but the conversation was uneasy. The matter of my wedding arose again. Weston expressed a natural interest in its date. “When do you plan to tie the knot?” he asked.

“Pretty soon,” Edmund answered, while I simultaneously said, “Not for a while yet.” Our eyes flew to each other to exchange a guilty look at this blunder.

“The date is not settled,” Maisie explained, easing us out of the touchy situation.

We spoke of my brother, of Weston’s stepson Glandower. “Who will run Westgate after the wedding?” Weston asked. “Jeremy never took any interest in it. You will want a good steward.”

“I will be taking care of those details,” Edmund replied. “It is the problem of leaving Westgate untenanted that causes the delay in our wedding.”

“Will you go to Woldwood with them, Maisie?” he asked next.

Again we came a cropper. Her “no” collided solidly with my “oh, yes” and Edmund’s “certainly she will.”

Uncle looked at us, bewildered. “That is not quite settled either,” Maisie told him. “They want me to go, but I feel I ought to stay home to look after Jeremy when he comes home, you know.”

“You will be much better off with us,” Edmund scolded in a proprietary way. “Lizzie agrees with me.”

“Yes, for Jeremy is so seldom home you would be lonesome, Auntie,” I added, doing my bit to bolster the illusion of an approaching wedding. I realized the farce was becoming more complicated than I had ever anticipated.

Edmund diverted the conversation to farming, which got us through dessert without utter disaster. Uncle was eager enough to see the diamonds that he kept Edmund behind for only one small glass of port. Ten minutes after we left the gentlemen, they joined us in the saloon.

“Shall we have a look at it now?” Uncle asked, rubbing his hands together in delighted anticipation.

“Why not? Here it is,” Edmund said, sliding his hand into his inner jacket pocket to extract the green case.

We three visitors risked one curious, swift exchange of a look while Uncle took the box, then we all stared hard at him, ready to discover any flaw in his expression, any sign indicating guilt. He opened the lid, nodding and smiling innocently at the plaque inside. Then his gaze went to the necklace, still smiling, still innocent. Within two seconds, some little frown formed between his white brows. He picked the jewelry up, looked closely at it for a while longer, then looked at me.

“It looks different somehow,” he said. “These matching stones here, third from the center, are oval—I made sure they were done in the rounder style.”

“You must be mistaken,” I answered, trying for a nonchalant air.

“I must be,” he agreed reluctantly. “This is very strange. The center stone is larger than I recall, and some of the others smaller.”

“You have not seen it for a long while,” I mentioned.

“True, but I have the replica, you recall, that I often take a look at. I had it out after I received your letter, Lizzie. I had thought it was a perfect copy, but I was mistaken.”

We three conspirators risked another quick glance, noting he had voluntarily mentioned the replica. “Why do you not get the copy, and compare them?” Edmund asked. His speech sounded so extremely significant to me I was sure Uncle would demand at once what chicanery we were up to.

“Yes, I’ll do that,” was all he said.

When he turned to leave the room, still carrying the necklace, Edmund followed at his heels. They went no farther than a few yards down the hall to the study. When they returned, Uncle carried his copy in the other hand.

He laid the pair on the table under a lamp, while the four of us gathered round to stare at them. Uncle’s copy looked better than ours; despite the paste stones. The design was more pleasing, the size and shape of the “stones” better matched.

“Lizzie, you wretch, confess!” Uncle said, lifting his blue eyes to examine me critically.

“Wh-what do you mean?” I asked, my voice trembling.

“I don’t understand your remark, Mr. Braden,” Edmund said quickly, hotly, like any lover defending his fiancée.

Uncle shook his head sadly. “You have
tampered
with this, Liz. Had some of the stones pried out and sold, then replaced them with others that do not suit so well. It is no longer a genuine antique. Oh, I can see the stones are old, the style of the faceting is certainly correct, but the actual stones are not the originals. Unless you can tell me where I might find the ones that ought to be in it, I am not sure I want to buy it.”

“Bartlett, in Winchester, took a look at this on our way through, Mr. Braden. He certainly said nothing about any of the stones not being genuine,” Edmund told him, still feigning offense on my behalf.

“They are genuine diamonds; they are genuinely
old
diamonds, but they are not the diamonds Queen Elizabeth gave to Sir Eldridge. Well, some of them undoubtedly are. Those at the back on either side look very much as they ought.” As he spoke, he pulled a jeweler’s loupe from his trousers pocket and put it to his eye, lifting up the necklace to scrutinize it.

“They have not been put in any too carefully either,” he added, picking at some of the mountings. “Pity,” he said, shaking his head at our botched piece. His interest in the stones was strong enough that he did not take a close look at the metal, which would have told him, perhaps, exactly what he held.

“Why did you do it?” Weston asked me.

“Let us first confirm that she
did
do it,” Edmund objected.

The ball was in my hands. Was I to confess, or not? I looked to Edmund for a clue. “I daresay it happened after that spot of trouble about your infected cattle, when you were short of funds,” he prompted, giving me the clue I was to confess.

“Yes, that is when I did it.”

“Now, Lizzie, that was very wrong of you, to try to sell me the thing in such a condition,” Weston said. “Unethical, I believe is not too strong a word. I am disappointed in you.”

“She hadn’t much choice, with Berrigan decimating the herd on her!” Edmund shot back angrily, with an accusing stare at Braden, the supplier of poor stewards, and a protective hand on my arm. “He is
right,
however. It was wrong of you to do it, Lizzie. You should have told me.”

“Ladies don’t understand these matters,” Braden said, taking his turn at exculpating and forgiving me. “I will oftimes come across a wonderful, rare old piece of furniture, where some well-meaning housewife has had good Elizabethan brocade ripped off a chair, to be replaced with new. Authenticity means nothing to them.”

“Nine-tenths of them prefer gaudy junk, given a choice,” Blount agreed, giving my tin ring a little twirl on my finger.

“Where did you sell them?” Weston asked. His next speech would be to inquire whether they were retrievable. I was sinking, sinking into a morass from which I saw no extrication.

“Different times, at different places,” I replied vaguely.

“Local merchants, I daresay? There will be no tracing them,” Weston said sadly. I encouraged him to continue in this illusion, to muddy the waters as much as possible. The whole trip was futile. Uncle knew nothing about the theft.

After a few moments regretting and repining, the subject was dropped. “Are you interested in antiques at all, Sir Edmund?” Uncle asked hopefully.

Edmund was willing to divert the talk to harmless matters till we had got together to discuss our next step. He confessed, or pretended, to some interest in archaic things to pass the next hour. Maisie and I had already admired his walls, feet thick, his mottled glass window panes, his badly carved furnishings and misshapen dishes and flatware. It was Edmund’s turn. He was led from room to room, inventing praise, while my aunt and I passed a more comfortable evening resting, drinking tea and making plans.

“We’ll have to meet with Edmund tonight after Uncle retires,” I said. “We shall get away from here as soon as possible tomorrow.”

“Right after our trunks arrive,” Maisie added. “My gown got up on its own and closed the window at the inn last night, it is so soiled.”

Later the gentlemen returned, had tea, and then it was time for bed, though the hour was not at all advanced. “Sleep in if you like in the morning,” Uncle offered. “I breakfast at seven, but I am old-fashioned. Goodnight to you all. I’ll take you along to your rooms, to save disturbing Mrs. Welter.”

No lights were left burning below. We went perforce with Uncle upstairs, with nothing settled as to when we might meet again for a private chat. Maisie was shown to her room first, myself next. “I’ve put you in the west wing, next to myself,” I heard Uncle tell Edmund as they retreated down the hall.

As their doors closed behind them, Maisie’s opened. “What are we to do now?” she asked.

“I shall leave my door open a while. I expect to see Edmund peep his head out any moment.”

“Excellent. I’ll let you two decide what is to be done. You had better meet with him
downstairs,
Lizzie,” she added, with a nod of her head.

“Let us all meet in
your
room, if it is only the proprieties that trouble you.”

“Oh, I think it would be better if the two of you met alone,” she said, with a little laugh.

“Setting up your shingle as a matchmaker, Maisie?”

“I just want to get you out of Westgate, so I can have a clear field with old Beattie,” she answered.

Of course she joked, but that
old
look had left her since our trip’s beginning. The excitement was good for her. Even with her ankle bothering her, she was looking younger, happier. She closed the door softly. I stood alone, waiting.

Chapter 10

I had a long wait. For close to ten minutes I stood, wondering whether I ought to slip down the hallway and tap gently on Edmund’s door. Just as I took the decision to do it, his door opened and he came out. He had left his boots behind to tread more softly. He had also sprinkled himself with scent. He carried no candle or lamp. I had an inkling he might suggest we two meet without Maisie’s chaperonage, and waited with some amusement to see if I was correct.