The Art of Love (17 page)

A cluster of whitewashed cottages caught her eye and the carriage slowed as they entered a village and came to a halt by the well. Tara heard Leo spring from the driving box and the next minute her door was opened. ‘We’ll water the horses here,’ he said, and she could see that Jed was already hauling water from the well to fill the trough. ‘How are you?’ he asked.

Suddenly Tara felt her eyes fill with tears. Leo’s gallantry in escorting her home and his efficiency in organizing the journey she could accept with gratitude, but she felt completely undone by his kindness. ‘Oh, my poor darling,’ Leo said. He stepped into the carriage, shooed Betty out and took her in his arms. He did not say anything more, just held her and gradually Tara felt her fortitude returning.

‘It’s a lovely day,’ Leo said, when she raised her eyes to look at him. ‘Come and sit with me when we set off, the fresh air will do you good. The boy can keep your maid company, I’m sure they’d both appreciate that.’

Up high with Leo on the driving box, the sun shining down as if yesterday’s rainstorm had cleaned the sky, and with the wind in her hair, Tara found her spirits returning. True, her mother was ill, but summer was the best time to take a fever, the balmy weather should soon restore a patient to health unlike the cold of winter which stole heat and life from the sick. Furthermore, Leo was beside her, and with him there she felt she could face anything.

As Leo had promised they arrived at Penge just before noon. Tara climbed down from the carriage and rushed inside the yellow stone house which stood warm and inviting in the midday sun. She knew she should have waited for Leo, but she was sure he would have no difficulty finding his way about and that he would not resent her inconsideration for a second.

Tara stopped at the threshold of her mother’s bedroom, wondering if her mother would be awake or asleep, or if she would find something far, far worse. Then she heard a restless sigh from within the room and she pushed the door open with relief.

‘Mama, I’m here!’ she flew to her mother’s bedside and took her mother’s hand in her own. It was warm and clammy, but to Tara it did not feel dangerously hot.

Her mother opened her eyes. ‘Thank goodness,’ she said, and smiled at her only daughter. ‘I am sorry to have had to drag you away from the Hulmes, but I…I need you here.’ Lady Penge’s eyes filled with tears and Tara was shaken. Her mother was not given to tears, she had cried, of course, when Lord Penge had killed himself, but in all the years after, despite the exhausting demands of running the estate, Tara had never seen her give in to tears. She wrapped her arms around her mother.

‘It’s all right,’ she said. ‘I’m back now. I’ll look after you.’

‘Jennings said he thought one of the cows might have milk fever…’ Lady Penge began but Tara hushed her.

‘I’ll talk to him. Don’t you worry about it. I’ll take care of everything.’ As she said it she saw the worry lines smooth from her mother’s brow and the next moment Lady Penge was asleep, breathing lightly. So it hadn’t been a deathbed summons. Tara offered up a silent prayer of thanks that she had found her mother still fit enough to recover. Then the weight of Penge seemed to settle round her heart. It was obvious that her mother needed her to take over full management of the estate, but it was a heavy and time-consuming burden. Briefly Tara considered ordering lunch, but she was still dressed in her outdoor clothes and she had a dairyman to speak to. Now was probably the best time to do that.

‘The problem is it might be milk-fever and it might not,’ Jennings said.

‘What does the vetinary surgeon say?’ Tara asked, trying to conceal her impatience. If Jennings thought the cow had something contagious he should have sent for the vet immediately, rather than risking the disease spreading though the whole herd.

Jennings took a long time in answering. He looked up at the clouds as if reading them might tell him what to say, and twisted a piece of straw with one hand. ‘Thing is, I haven’t sent for him,’ he said at last.

‘Why not?’ Tara demanded in astonishment. Jennings had been their dairyman for a long time, but she hadn’t thought him old enough to start going senile yet. Then when Jennings met her eyes she saw that he still just as astute as she remembered.

‘Since your mother’s been sick, there’s been a bit of trouble with the money,’ he said. ‘The lads haven’t had their proper wages and I don’t want to embarrass the family by sending for a vet that can’t be paid.’

‘I see!’ Tara said, shocked. She did a brief reckoning of what cash she had in her reticule. ‘Send for the vet, I shall pay him personally, and I shall look into the other matter at once. Men can’t work for short pay. I will take care of it.’

‘Thank you, my lady,’ Jennings said. ‘I know young Edgar wants a word with you too. You’ll find him fixing the hen coops.’

Edgar wanted to know how she wanted to settle the problem of foxes and after that Tara found herself discussing the need for repairs to dry stone walls with another farmhand. The hay, she thought, as she strode past a field of golden blades of grass swishing in the sun, looked more than ready to cut. She wondered if that were waiting on a decision from her as well.

Edgar had mentioned something about the apple trees in the small orchard. Tara thought she’d better take a look right away, she cut across the back lawn of the house, noting absently that the lawn needed mowing and the roses were in dire need of dead-heading.

‘Stop!’ The French door she was passing flew open and the next moment Leo was on the path in front of her. Unbelievably she had almost forgotten he was there, she had been so taken up with the concerns of running Penge.

‘I can’t stop,’ she said, ‘I have to look at some apple trees.’

He laid a hand lightly on her arm, not restraining her, simply asking her to pause. ‘You need some food,’ he said. ‘You don’t want to collapse from overwork like your mother. I gather that is the main thing she is suffering from. I have taken the liberty of ordering some lunch. Come with me, the apple trees will still be there after you have eaten.’

‘I can’t,’ Tara said. ‘After I have been to the orchard I must look at the books. Urgently.’ She dropped her eyes, reluctant to confess the reason. ‘The farm workers have not been paid properly, I must rectify that at once.’

To her surprise Leo did not try to argue with her. ‘I shall have the lunch sent to your mother’s study, or wherever she does her accounting,’ he said. ‘You can eat and work at the same time.’ He was right, she realized, and the orchard could wait, she didn’t know anything about apple trees anyway. Meekly she followed Leo inside.

The accounts, Tara saw at once as she simultaneously bit into a piece of cold chicken pie and leafed her way through this year’s half-filled ledger, were as much neglected as the estate. Her mother had made some attempt to record bills and sales, but most of the payments to staff, both house and otherwise, were scrawled on bits of paper floating among the pages of the book. As far as she could tell it had all started getting too much for her mother about six weeks ago, clearly she had intended to transfer the information into her accounts book properly, but had run out of time or energy. It was going to take a lot of careful work to sort out, and she would have to be painstakingly accurate in finding out what each employee was owed. Then there was the actual work of overseeing the estate. As well as not knowing how she would make time to do everything she had to do, Tara also had to admit that she was not qualified to make many of the decisions about the farm. She thought it was time the hay was made, but it was an assumption, not a certainty. But if she didn’t make these decisions, who would?

She sighed and leaned her head on her hands, her eyes already weary from trying to decipher the crabbed, disorganized notes in the ledger.

‘Can I help?’ Leo asked.

Tara stared at him, the seed of an idea germinating in her mind. ‘I couldn’t possibly ask you,’ she said, trying to push the idea firmly away. It was inappropriate for more reasons than one. ‘You have already done so much, organizing the journey and bringing me here. I can’t ask you to do any more.’

Leo gave her a long look as if he were looking right into her very heart. ‘My time is at your disposal,’ he said. ‘I have no pressing engagements elsewhere. That is,’ he paused and for the first time since last night a slight note of uncertainty came into his voice, ‘unless you would rather not have me as a houseguest.’

‘Of course I want you here!’ Tara said impulsively. ‘But I couldn’t impose…’

But Leo interrupted her. He took both her hands in his and looked at her earnestly. ‘Are we not friends?’ he asked.

Friends. A simple label, but it warmed her more than it should. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Yes.’

‘Then impose,’ Leo said firmly. ‘That’s what friends are for. The way I see it you have two tasks. You need to unmuddle these finances and you need to oversee the day to day running of the estate. Would you let me act for you with the latter? I know something of farming. I could ride out each day and do what needs to be done while you spend your time with the figures. Then in the evening I can report to you and you will have the information you need to make the financial decisions.’

For a moment Tara stared at him, speechless. What he was proposing would solve all her problems, she need not scramble to be in two places at once if Leo were acting in her stead. ‘Yes!’ she said, flooded with relief. ‘Yes, I shouldn’t take such advantage of your generosity, but yes, please, it would be such a great help for you to do that.’

‘Then it’s settled,’ Leo looked curiously satisfied, Tara thought, but if he took satisfaction from taking on the burden of Penge, at least for a few days, she wasn’t going to argue. He rose from his chair. ‘Now, if you will excuse me, I have some apple trees to attend to.’

The next few days were a whirr of hectic activity for Tara. She rose early, breakfasted with Leo who told her his plans for the day, then she buried herself in her mother’s study where she pieced together a financial history of the estate over the last few months. Ironically, despite the neglect, Penge seemed to be doing very well. Tara was relieved to find that the costs of her latest season in London had not damaged the family finances in any way. Her secret fear was that she would find that her mother’s collapse had been brought about by a desperate attempt to make ends meet, but that had not been the case. At lunchtime Leo was usually still out in the fields. He seemed to have won over the cook’s heart, perhaps through his consideration towards her son Jed, and she furnished him each day with cold pie, freshly baked bread, fruit and ale so that he was able to eat without returning to the house. Tara took lunch with her mother, who seemed at her best in the middle of the day. She tried to keep the conversation off the running of the estate, but it was difficult. Penge had been her mother’s life for years and she wanted to know everything about it.

‘In Mr Fosse’s opinion the hay is ready for cutting, but it will take no harm if left for another week,’ Tara said, trying to project a note of finality into her voice. ‘I see Mrs Capshaw has sent you a note. I’m sure she would like to call on you. Do you feel up to visitors?’

‘A blatant attempt to change the subject,’ Lady Penge said, fixing Tara with a beady look. Tara looked back at her, unrepentant. The doctor had been and had said that her mother was no longer in danger, but he prescribed complete rest and said she was not to be troubled by concerns about the estate. ‘Does this Mr Fosse of yours know anything about farming?’

‘I believe so,’ said Tara, in fact she had got the impression from her evening conversations with Leo that he knew far more about farming than she did. ‘However in regard to the hay field Leo said that Jennings shares his opinion, and you can’t deny that Jennings knows the business.’

‘Yes,’ Lady Penge said, ‘Jennings is an excellent dairy man.’ She leaned back on her pillows and Tara thought her mother was preparing to go back to sleep when she suddenly gave Tara a wicked grin. ‘Leo, is it now? Not Mr Fosse?’

To her embarrassment Tara felt herself blushing. ‘I have known him for quite some time, Mama,’ she said, deciding not to elaborate on how they had met.

‘And does he address you by your Christian name?’

‘Yes,’ Tara said neutrally.

‘He seems like quite a personable young gentleman,’ Lady Penge said. ‘Tell me about his family.’

‘They are from Wiltshire,’ Tara said, trying to sound uninterested and casting frantically around in her mind for a change of topic, but all she could think about was the allegedly crumbling dry stone walls at the northern end of the farm. Leo was going to check on those today, but telling her mother that would only bring them back to Penge again and she was determined to follow the doctor’s orders and keep her mother’s mind off the minutiae of running the estate.

‘A Wiltshire family?’ her mother said. ‘I don’t believe I know them. Tell me more.’

‘I… I don’t know anything else.’ Tara said. There was a short silence.

‘You brought a complete stranger home with you?’ Lady Penge asked after a moment. Tara found herself cringing under her mother’s incredulity.

‘He’s not a complete stranger,’ she said. ‘Rodney Hulme introduced us.’

Her mother seemed to take a moment to digest this but Tara suspected she was not finished with the topic. ‘If you know nothing of the family, what do you know of the man himself?’ she asked. ‘How does he spend his time in town?’

‘Oh, er, the usual way, dinner parties, balls, you know the sort of thing,’ Tara said. Everyone else she knew would have accepted her answer, but her mother’s silence was interrogative and despite her reluctance Tara found herself continuing. ‘He paints,’ she said.

‘Paints what?’ her mother demanded.

‘Portraits,’ Tara mumbled, ‘but he’s moving into landscapes.’

Lady Penge fell silent and Tara looked out of the window. It was another beautiful day and she wondered if Leo was enjoying the life of a gentleman farmer. ‘He’s a painter,’ Lady Penge said, almost to herself. ‘He paints for a living, so he is not a gentleman.’