The Emperor (78 page)

Edward, his brow creased with concern, felt the first cold
breath of a very human fear. Chetwyn was five years his
senior, and the time marched for all of them. He had
thought his mother immortal, until she had gone away and
left him. 'I won't hunt either,' he said. 'We'll coze together,
like old times, and roast chestnuts, and tell stories. We'll get you well and strong again. Morland Place will cure you.’

Fanny was delighted with the advent of so many cousins
over whom to queen it, and as first lady of the nursery, with
a pony and a dog of her own, she felt she had every right to
superiority. Hippolyta, however, was a very difficult person
to impress. She was a year older than Fanny, and of an
imperturbable disposition, and the fact that she, too, had
been learning to ride proved the deciding factor.

To Fanny's surprise, the pleasure of displaying her
prowess on Tempest to a silently admiring audience, paled before the prospect of actually going out for a ride with her
cousin Polly. Aunt Lucy and Papa arranged it all. Papa
found a suitable mount for Polly, and Aunt Lucy instructed
the formidable Parslow to be their guide and guard, with a Morland Place groom to help him.

Fanny's chagrin when she discovered that Hippolyta was allowed to handle her own mount, while Tempest must stay
on the leading-rein, almost put an end to the outing. But
Papa promised that if she behaved herself very well, she might be let off next time, and Polly herself pointed out that
she was a year older, and that her mount was old and steady
and only called Robin, so Fanny allowed her ruffled feelings to be soothed, and even agreed without fuss to leave Puppy behind.

‘
Hippolyta has a good influence on Fanny,' Edward
remarked as the little girls set off demurely through the
barbican.

‘
Early days yet,' Lucy replied. 'Let's see if they come back in one piece. Fanny might corrupt Polly, for all we
know.’

It was not a comment to please Mary Ann, who forgave
it, however, in view of Lucy's gratifying interest in the
changes she had made about the house. At Lucy's request,
she took her on a tour of the principal sites. The kitchen was
their first port of call, where she had had a Rumford
installed, and introduced various improvements of which
she was intensely proud. Danvers, the new cook, spoke of
the advantages of a stove over an open fire, and Mrs Scaggs,
the new housekeeper, praised Madam's arrangement of the
pantries as most felicitous, but Lucy watched their eyes and
felt that they would have said anything to turn Madam up
sweet.

‘
Oh, the swan window's still there,' she exclaimed with
pleasure as her roving eye found a familiar landmark.

‘
Oh yes, we couldn't break with tradition, you know,
however inconvenient it is,' Mary Ann said quickly. Lucy
learned afterwards from James that Mary Ann had got as far
as having a man in to block it up, before Edward heard
about it and intervened.

The chapel was their next stop. It had been newly decor
ated, with a great deal of gold-leaf, and a new chandelier,
whose central globe of bright ormolu sprouted graceful
swan-necked stems, each bearing a crystal lustre as well as
the candle-rose. There were new gold and crystal vases on
the high altar, and in the Lady-chapel the wooden statue
once more wore its blue robes and its crown of pearls. It all
looked very beautiful, and Lucy said so, glad to be able to
praise something sincerely.

She could say nothing pleasant about the drawing-room,
which seemed crowded with over-elaborate furniture and
ornaments. She was amused to note that the pianoforte
again occupied the corner where Mary's harpsichord used to
stand. She asked what had happened to the harpsichord,
and Mary Ann told her briefly that it had been sent as a gift
to the girls' school in York.

But the changes Lucy most disliked were to the red
room, where she slept, since Mary Ann still used the blue room, and Lucy had never cared for the great bed chamber.

‘
It hadn't been redecorated for eighty years or more,'
Mary Ann said. 'It looks very different now don't you
think?'

‘
Very different,' Lucy agreed. The old four-poster,
Eleanor's bed as it was known, had been stripped of its
hangings and tester of red damask. A new canopy had been
made, of pleated yellow silk drawn up to a pinnacle
crowned with a gold knob. There was a fringed frieze, gold
knobs atop the posts themselves, and the bed curtains were of the same dark-yellow silk, while the counterpane was of
quilted satin. The walls were covered in a modern yellow
and green wall-paper, and there were mustard-coloured
moreen curtains at the window. Modern furniture had
replaced the old dark oak, and there were two large mirrors.

‘It was Mother's room,' was all Lucy said.

‘
Only after your father died,' Mary Ann said, a little
puzzled. 'Before that she slept in the great bed chamber.’

Useless to tell Mary Ann what she had told Weston, that
she wanted her childhood home to stay always the same.
Useless and selfish — it was not her home now. It was borne
upon her forcibly that her mother's death had changed
everything. She was no-one's child any longer, and it
seemed to her suddenly a lonely thing, to be grown-up.

*

On the thirteenth of January, an express arrived for Harry,
to say that the
Semele
had been sighted off Portland.
Harry's indolence fell from him like a discarded cloak.

‘
I must pack my bag at once,' he said. 'Ned, do you think
one of the men could be sent out to hire a po'chaise? If I
sleep on the road, I could be at Portsmouth almost as soon
as she is.'

‘
Of course,' said Ned obligingly. 'What men of action
you sailors are!' Everything was action and bustle, but it had
not escaped Chetwyn's eye that Lucy turned very pale when
Harry read out his letter, nor that she took the opportunity
to slip out of the room when Ottershaw answered the bell.
He found her, as he expected, with Docwra in her room,
packing. She straightened up guiltily as he appeared in the
doorway, and then, with a glance at Docwra, she came out
into the passage and closed the door.

‘
You're leaving, then?' he said, Lucy bit her lip, searching for a reply. 'Harry will be glad, I imagine, to share the
cost of the chaise,' he went on mildly.

‘Chetwyn — ' she began helplessly.

‘
I suppose,' he interrupted her, 'it's no use asking you not
to go?’

She looked down at her hands, and up again, and shook
her cropped head.

‘
No use,' she said. He regarded her a moment longer,
and then nodded, and turned away.

‘I see,' he said, 'I may perhaps see you in London.'

‘
Why don't you stay here?' Lucy said anxiously. 'It's
early for London. There'll be no-one there. You'll be much
more comfortable here than at Grosvenor Street.'

‘
Thank you for your concern, but I shan't be going back
to Grosvenor Street,' he said. 'When I leave here, I shall go
to my lodgings.' He met her eyes with a hard look. ‘I should
not like to be in your way. That, I imagine, would embarrass
both of us equally.’

Lucy reached out a hand to him. 'Oh Chetwyn, please —can't we be friends? I thought that things were better since
your illness.'

‘
Ah yes, how wise of you to remind me of what I owe
you,' he said, looking away.

‘
Oh, don't,' she said exasperated, letting her hand drop
again. 'You know I didn't mean that.'

‘
No,' he admitted. ‘That was ungenerous of me. I'm
sorry. But in answer to your question, no, I don't think we
can be friends.’

Lucy felt tears prickling her eyes, of frustration, or of pity
for his pain, she didn't know which. She swallowed them
back determinedly, and said in a steady voice, ‘But at least —
not enemies?’

He didn't answer for a long time, and then she thought
he sighed before lifting his eyes for a moment to hers. 'Not
enemies. I think we can manage that.'

*

 
On Lucy's offering to pay all the expenses of the journey,
Harry was quite willing to allow her and her maid to take up
two thirds of the room in the chaise. Parslow was left to take
Minstrel back to Wolvercote, forming an escort for Miss
Trotton and the children at the same time.

‘
I don't know where I will be going from Portsmouth, so
you had better go on to Grosvenor Street and wait for me
there. I'll send for you if I want you,' Lucy said.

Brother and sister were equally anxious to make all
possible haste, and did their part by hiring four horses and sleeping in the chaise. Encouraged by Harry's exhortations
to ‘put 'em along' and Lucy's judicious distribution of coin,
the postboys entered into the spirit of the thing, and the
journey was made most expeditiously. On reaching Ports
mouth they drove straight to the dockyard, where Harry's
enquiries established that the
Semele
was already in, and
lying at Spithead.

‘
We had better find an inn and bespeak rooms,' Lucy
said. Harry stared.

‘
What for? I want to take a shore-boat out to my ship. I
don't need a room. Once I've read myself in, I'll be sleeping
on board.'

‘
But we need rooms,' Lucy said firmly. 'You need to
change into your uniform, and we all need dinner. It's after
four o'clock.'

‘
Aye, and it'll be dark any moment,' said Harry agitat
edly. 'I'll come with you while you bespeak a room, and
change my clothes, but I can't wait for dinner. I'll get mine
on board.’

Lucy agreed to the compromise, and told the post-boys
to drive to the Golden Lion. It was thrilling to be in
Portsmouth again, almost eight years since the day she had
arrived here by the stage, dressed in boy's clothing and
looking for adventure. She craned eagerly out of the
window as they drove along the Hard, past the Keppel's
Head, where she had first met Weston. How little she had
guessed then what would come of it all! The horses turned, slipping a little on the cobbles, into the High Street and up
towards the smart new square behind the Garrison Chapel
where the Golden Lion was situated. It was beginning to
drizzle, and everything was dull and grey, but nothing could
dampen the joy in two of the three hearts that beat inside
the hired chaise.

My Lady Aylesbury, with the dignity of four horses and a stern-faced maid, had no difficulty in acquiring the best bed
chamber, with a private sitting room, and an adjoining
dressing-room for her maid.

‘
And how long will you be staying, my lady?' asked the
landlord.

‘
I don't know. A few days, perhaps. My brother has
come to take command of his ship, and 1 shall probably stay
until he sails.’

The landlord regarded Harry with an experienced eye. ‘Your first command, sir? My felicitations, sir. May you
confound the French and take a hundred prizes,' he offered
with more courtesy than conviction.

Harry had no fault to find with the sentiment. 'You may
depend upon it!' he said with an irrepressible grin.

He used Lucy's dressing-room in which to put on his
uniform and shave himself in the hot water sent up, and
emerged to find Lucy had changed into a very sober round
gown of grey twilled stuff, and was putting on a small
bonnet with long, broad ribbons, calculated to resist the
wind.

‘
I'm coming with you,' she said firmly. Out of the corner
of his eye, Harry saw Docwra looking disapproving, and
took courage to protest.

‘
But I thought you wanted your dinner? Besides, a shore-
boat will be very uncomfortable. It's choppy today, and the
wind is very sharp.'