Twixt Two Equal Armies (42 page)

Chapter 19

His Lordship’s Library Finally gets the Attention it Deserves and a New Avid Reader is Introduced

Baugham was suffering from acute embarrassment. He sat in his chair in the small parlour where two women on the opposite sofa were beaming at him and sending him grateful and happy looks, all because of a strange impulse he was now having doubts about, if not outright regrets. He really did not like to be reminded he had that kind of power over persons he hardly knew, and the fact that a mere whim and indiscernible fancy of his could make such a difference to someone was disquieting to say the least. These women were now obviously depending on him and, more to the point, they were to be a feature of his daily life here that he could not control and that he had never intended or particularly wanted. It smelled of exactly the kind of thing Darcy was always going on about — duty and obligation — and he thought he had guarded himself well from that sort of involvement while at Clyne.

“Well, I really cannot stay,” he said as he got out of his seat. “I’m happy my suggestion meets with your approval, Mrs Tournier. If it is at all convenient I would suggest Miss Tournier could perhaps pay Clyne a visit tomorrow and make an initial assessment of the work and then we could proceed.”

Holly stood up, still smiling but a looking a little surprised at the abruptness of his speech.

“Oh! But can’t we offer you — ”

“No, no!” his lordship said and took a step closer to the door. “It is late; I would not wish to inconvenience you any longer. We will meet tomorrow and then we will see where we are.”

He took his leave and left the women looking after him. Just as he closed the door behind him he heard a female shriek from the parlour window and he hesitated. Rolling laughter followed it, however, so he briskly went on his way again, not looking back.

O
NCE HIS LORDSHIP LEFT,
H
OLLY
at last could give in to her long suppressed urge to jump up and down in excitement. She then ran to her mother and nearly smothered her in an excited embrace.

“Maman, is this not the finest thing in the world? I have found work, right here in Clanough! And I’ll have time enough to look for more before — ” she broke off suddenly.

“Before what, Lie-lie?” Mrs Tournier asked.

“Oh, I really wish I didn’t have to talk about it right now,” Holly began, “but as unpleasant as it was, I think it was a good thing I took that ride with Mr Pembroke after all.”

Her mother looked at her tartly, but held onto her hand. “Well, that is the one thing you will never manage to convince me of.”

For a moment Holly’s exuberance and joy gave way to a more serious expression. “Maman, during that trip I was able to learn something, something that it is better to know as early as possible. Mr Pembroke is taking over his father’s business affairs, together with the management of his properties, Rosefarm included.”

Her mother’s face progressively grew more severe as she waited for her daughter to finish her sentence. “Is he letting us go?” she asked tightly.

Holly sighed, sorry that this discussion was taking the joy out of the moment, but it was best to get the truth out quickly.

“He is raising the rent — significantly — and it will come due this Christmas. But Maman, we are well provided for now, because I have the money from Sir John we can use for that, and now with my work for Lord Baugham, we will have something to live on as well. That gives us the next three months to solicit work enough to prepare for when it comes around again.”

Her mother looked at her with narrowed eyes. “And this is why his lordship offered you employment?”

“Heavens no!” Holly was shocked. “I wouldn’t share our private matters with anyone, Maman. Certainly not with him. What a thing to suggest!”

“Hm,” Mrs Tournier said.

“It really needs work,” Holly said seriously. “That library is a disgrace.”

“Oh, I’m certain it is,” her mother said, “and time consuming as well. Have you agreed upon a suitable salary for such an extensive renovation?”

“Well, no,” Holly admitted. “Not as of yet. It was a spur of the moment decision, you see. But I’m sure everything will work out easily.”

Mrs Tournier looked at her and simply said, “Yes. As easily as everything works out between the two of you. But in any case I would suggest you agree to terms soon, and also that you should arrange for some additional help.”

She got up and her daughter stayed where she was looking thoughtful.

“Yes, his lordship did mention something about more help.”

“As he should,” Mrs Tournier nodded. “You’ll need a suitable young man to help you with the heavy or dirty tasks who could also benefit from escaping from his daily grind and perhaps get more out of assisting you than wages for his work. I think his lordship’s sense of charity can well stand it.”

“You already have someone in mind, don’t you?” Holly said suspiciously.

“Certainly I do,” Mrs Tournier answered calmly. “Hamish Nethery.”

I
N SPITE OF TAKING THE
shortest way home, Baugham found himself surprised at just how soon he could see the lights of his windows showing through the trees. He had spun round in the same thoughts all the way without being able to reconcile them or make sense of their relation to one another. When he left the laughing women he had been overwhelmed by a sense of wryness. Well, he had done a good thing, even if it was from complete ignorance and lack of moral deliberation. It had just popped out of him! It had, however, been for the best and he felt pleased he could help a friend like Mrs Tournier keep her daughter beside her for a few more months.

Apart from that, however, he tried hard not to think of what he had done to his well-established routine and purpose at Clyne. He had invited a woman into his house — a quarrelsome, bothersome, opinionated woman — one with whom it took all his efforts to remain on civil terms and who really had the most unfortunate habit of making him feel ill at ease and doubtful of his own resolutions. A woman who gave him inviting glimpses of a laughing temperament and a spirited and mischievous nature, but who could show a general resentment toward him and who he was, just as easily as she could fall into friendly banter. A woman who had looked so troubled when she came to see him at Clyne with her still unknown appeal, that he had impulsively given in to charity to save her from the shame of making a request of him or to see her suffer.

He did not like that last thought at all. And so he returned to the first thoughts on his surrender to keep his privacy absolute and every local dignitary, personality, denizen or neighbour out of his house and life. Mrs Tournier was happy, and he had been glad to do his friend a service. But
she
would be there, perhaps
every day . . .
He sighed as his thoughts continued around the same track once more.

M
RS
M
C
L
AUGHLIN WAS JUST THROWING
the last soiled cloth in her laundry basket for tomorrow and giving one last proud glance at the shining copper pans and silver laid out all over the table, when there came a discreet knock at the kitchen door. Proud with her work that morning, she opened the door and let Miss Tournier in.

“Ye’ll be here to look at the library then, Miss Tournier? His lairdship told me ye’d be comin’. He’s in there now, if ye can show yerself the way.” Mrs McLaughlin said, beginning the task of returning the metalware to its proper place. She gave the young woman a glance as she gathered her cloak and bonnet to stow away and shook her head grimly to herself as Miss Tournier gingerly made her way down the hall.

Feeling a bit out of place, walking through the rooms and down the halls of Clyne Cottage unaccompanied, Holly found the door that she thought must be the library and softly tapped on it. To her relief she heard a muffled voice on the other side and brisk footsteps. Before she was quite ready, the door opened and she was face to face with Lord Baugham.

“Good morning,” she said hesitatingly. “I hope . . . that is, we never settled on a time yesterday so I wasn’t sure . . . Is this inconvenient? Me coming now, I mean?”

“Now is as good as ever!” Baugham said in what he hoped was a cheerful tone that did not give away his own hesitation. “Come in! Come in! I’ll send for tea, shall I?”

Although she had taken a good strong cup before she left home to sustain herself and not be forced to take anything in the form of food or drink while working, she quickly nodded. It was something to keep busy with, a prop to help them through what must be the initial awkwardness of a new relationship. And anyway, the tea served at Clyne was nothing like the tea she drank alone at the kitchen table at Rosefarm, so this was an entirely different meal, she rationalised to herself.

She slowly moved around while Lord Baugham busied himself with finding Mrs McLaughlin. It was a beautiful room, richly furnished with dark woods and leather, well lit by large windows and warmed with a lively blaze in a great brick fireplace. She walked about, admiring the floor to ceiling bookcases along two full walls — deeply breathing in the beloved smell of paper, ink, wood smoke, and what might have been the smell of old tobacco — she examined the jumble of titles within her reach.

She looked up and down the shelves. It was a fair sized room and obviously one in which a large amount of time was spent. Leisure time, she concluded, for it was strewn with newspapers, books opened and left to wait for their reader’s pleasure, little knick knacks obviously picked up from other parts of the house or outdoors and left as keepsakes or for convenience. The furniture was worn, but of good and comfortable quality, emphasising that the owner of the room rather spent his time reading and lounging than studying or working. There was a working desk but it was cluttered with things — the chair included — and it was quite obvious it was not used for its original industrious purposes.

But the bookshelves did betray neglect. Many of them gapingly empty, some of them filled with anything but books; some of the books that
were
there were in terrible condition and little more than loose stacks of pages, some of them were new and bunched together in one area as a little isle of order and pride in a vast sea of chaos and abandon.

She pulled out a few volumes carefully: Catullus, the Iliad, Burns, Shakespeare’s ‘As You Like It’ with commentary, and three volumes on the Caucasian peoples and the old Silk Road.

“Oh, so you found my fancies?” Baugham came back through the door, almost startling her. “That particular selection you must blame me for. I’m sure you can find another Burns — the second edition, I think — around here, too. In tatters though, I shouldn’t wonder.

“You see,” he continued, picking up a volume only to put it back again straight away, “you are now in what I like to call ‘my’ corner. That is, the things you see here are books I’ve mostly purchased here, or on my way here, or had sent up from Hatchard’s. Nothing remarkable, I believe, although I did lay my hands on that most curious treatise by John Craig through Mr Blackwood’s assistance. And perhaps the
Hortus Kewensis
might interest you — it’s somewhere on the lower shelf. But I have bought them myself without any intension of fitting them into anything besides a bookshelf or a travel satchel.

“And so here, on the other side,” he said and walked over to the darker corner of the room, “is the Cumbermere side.” He shrugged and pulled a face. “I have no idea why they are still here or what is their use or value. I just hauled them with me at one point in some fit of optimism they could actually be used to make a library out of this room. No treasures though, I suppose, since those would have long been sold off. Although I know my Uncle was regarded as quite a quirky old Astronomy enthusiast. I dare say I remember there being some curious, old Italian works no one quite knew what to make of. Very interesting engravings though, I seem to recall. Also, there are old botanical works — Jungius and Tournefourt certainly. The old man was fond of that sort of thing, but any Linnaeus I think must be gone.”

Holly was certain that her expression must be showing more than she intended about the condition of the library, a thought confirmed by his lordship’s next statement.

“Well,” he said in a soft voice, quizzing her with his blue eyes very much on the alert, “I think you will agree there is a great deal more work in this assignment than you might have thought, but tell me, is it as hopeless as your countenance leads me to think?”

She looked around her. “No,” she said. “Not hopeless . . . ”

“Yes, but maybe a bit more than you thought you were taking on?”

B
AUGHAM FELT A MEASURE OF
unspoken criticism in her attitude and looks and felt strangely obligated to apologise for proposing she do the job at all, “Now that you have looked it over in the cold light of day, you are perhaps feeling sorry that you agreed to do this yesterday? If so, I will completely understand. Only you can measure the value of your time . . . ”

To his great irritation, she appeared to take offence at his suggestion.

“Lord Baugham,” she replied, “please believe that I have no wish to go back on our agreement. I am perfectly willing to keep to my word, as I assume you are also?”