“He shall have the four-poster in the room that was Amelia’s. Had she not gone I should have had to refuse you. Every room is booked. It seems as if one gentleman promptly told another after receiving your recommendation, because several mentioned in their letters that my name had been passed to them.”
“I’m glad to hear it. Naturally not all those will be known to me, but is there any way I may be of assistance to you, seeing that you have obliged me by letting a number of my acquaintances have first chance to come here?”
“I should like some advice on the matter of wine to purchase,” she said. “I learned something about wines and spirits from my father during his affluent times, but maybe you could advise me as to what all these gentlemen might prefer.”
He was pleased enough to advise her, being something of an expert in the matter of wines, and she fetched writing materials and returned to sit by him in the fire glow, putting down all he said.
Less than a quarter of a mile away, in the glow of another fire, Nina, still in her cloak, stood looking Adam, who had his back to her, hands deep in his jacket pockets, one booted foot resting on the fender as he stared into the leaping flames, listening to all she had to say.
“So you see,” she concluded, “with Amelia gone I’m no longer subject to threats. Should you be thinking of going to Edward with your tales at any time I shall forestall you. I intend to confess to him that I lied about my relationship to Oliver Marlow, but it was to save my sisters suffering the social stigma that living under the same roof as Amelia would have brought upon us. With that woman gone and no danger whatever left of a scandal breaking, Edward will look upon matters in a very different light. He will even be distraught at what I must have bravely suffered in silence when her very presence was abhorrent to me.”
He went on gazing into the fire. “You’re bluffing, Nina.”
“What do you mean?” she retorted.
“You wouldn’t dare confess to that mealy-minded future husband of yours. It’s too great a risk. You cannot be sure that he wouldn’t turn against you. A man’s pride is an incalculable force, being a powerful, primeval part of him, linked as it is with his very masculinity and his deepest desires. He would hate you for making a fool of him.”
“No, he wouldn’t! I know he wouldn’t!” she protested, but her voice held a quaver of doubt. Then it changed, becoming fierce and taunting, as suddenly the significance of what he had said struck home. “So that’s it, is it? I hurt your pride that night I told you I never wanted to see you again. You, the irresistible Adam Webster, the local Don Juan and captor of village girls’ hearts, turned down by someone who could no longer stand the sight of him.”
He did not turn and answered her without anger. “You’d better go.
She thought she had not heard aright. “What did you say?”
He did turn now and stood with his back to the fire, feet apart, arms folded. “I said get out. Go. Do as you please. You need never come here again.”
She put a hand to her throat and she backed uncertainly. “Yes. That’s what I’ve wanted all along — just to hear you say that.”
“That’s all right then, isn’t it? I’ve said it. There’s the door. You know the way out.”
“I’ve risked everything to keep these assignations with you.”
“I know that.”
“So you accept I wasn’t bluffing about telling Edward?”
“Not at all. You were bluffing.”
“Then why are you sending me away?”
Something flickered in the depths of his eyes. Triumph? Satisfaction? She could not tell and his reply was enigmatic. “Go home and think about it.”
She moved toward the door and stayed with her hand on the latch, retaliating with a white-hot flash of anger. “I’ll never think of you again!”
“You won’t be able to forget me.”
Her mouth trembled. He had taken her virginity from her, taught her body responses that she had never dreamed existed, abused her, used her, and finally taken from her that sweet moment of her own revenge by dismissing her with complete in-difference.
“You’ve cared nothing for me!” she accused self-pityingly.
He shrugged, not answering her. With a stifled sob she jerked open the door and went out on the dark landing, the door slamming shut behind her. He did not come out after her. She took the first few stairs down the flight at a rush, but then she stopped and looked back over her shoulder, closing her eyes tightly as if to shut out the host of other memories that flooded in on her. The tenderness of touch. His mouth that could kiss her in a thousand ways. The silkiness of flesh against flesh. Whispers and soft moaning and loving caresses.
She took another stair and paused again, leaning her weight on the banisters, her head bowed, taking stock of herself and her feelings. She wanted to marry Edward more than ever before, exulting in the life-style that had already begun to encompass her. She wanted everything he represented and all he could give her. She wanted her children to be cocooned in the family cradle in the grand nursery and grow up by the way of the best education that money and social status could obtain for them. Why then did her feet drag? What prevented her at this final hour from running from Adam with all the speed she could muster? She loathed him, didn’t she?
She reached the door and pulled it open, going out into the starry night. Normally she took the utmost care not to be seen, for although the lane was little used except by day, she always watched and waited before emerging from the house, but tonight she walked out as though in a trance, releasing the gate without thought to let it slam closed behind her. It was only luck that none saw her before she entered the dark shadows of the wood and came out near her home on the other side.
Tansy, who was showing Dominic the four-poster bed where Selwyn Hedley was to sleep, heard the back door open downstairs and guessed Nina had returned. She half-expected her to come upstairs, which she usually did after her walks, never wanting to speak to anyone and going straight to bed, but when she did not appear Tansy supposed she must have heard the sound of Dominic’s voice and decided to stay out of sight.
“The work on this bed was also done by a master craftsman,” he said, holding a lamp to the bedhead in order to see better the quaint figures in Elizabethan clothes that. danced and skipped amid the intricate carving that covered every inch of the bed from the enormous posts to the canopy, “and these small recesses were for candles.” He tapped one with his finger, and then stood back, viewing the bare boards of the bed. “What about a mattress? Have you one to fit a bed as wide as this?”
“It does present a problem, but —”
“A problem no more. I’ll tell my housekeeper to have one sent to you from the Hall.”
“I couldn’t possibly —”
“Nonsense! There’s everything in the linen store. If you’re short of bedding or anything else Mrs. Burton can supply whatever you need.” When she opened her mouth to protest again he forestalled her with a cynical edge to his voice. “The articles would not be gifts, but only on loan. It’s in my own interests to assist this venture of yours in any small way I can. After all, it is to result in financial remuneration for me, is it not?”
“It is indeed,” she replied edgily. Somehow he had inveigled her into a position where it would appear she was careless of his acquaintances and their comfort if she was churlish enough to refuse his generous offer. Everything that passed between them was like a duel, each trying to score a point off the other. She made a move to return downstairs and he went with her. “I was sorry that Young Oberon did not win his race,” she said as they descended the stairs. “I had hoped that whatever prize money he might have won would have gone toward his upkeep.”
“Perhaps he’ll do better next time. There is another race lined up for him shortly at Doncaster, and he’ll run at Goodwood. The subject brings me to the second and most important reason for my calling on you this evening. As you know, I have high hopes for my filly, Merry Day, in th
e Derby. Will you come with me on the great day and see her run?”
The Derby! For a moment she was sorely tempted, but she had to refuse. It was not out of pique or animosity or a self-righteous desire to disassociate herself from his racing activities, but the knowledge that with a houseful of guests to sit down to breakfast in the morning and their ravenous return to a dinner of several courses in the evening she could not go flitting off to the Derby, for she would only have Judith to help her and Nina would not be in the house at all, but would be staying at the Manor to star once again at Edward’s house party for race week.
“I cannot,” she replied. “I’ll be kept far too busy here. It’s quite impossible.” Then on impulse she added: “But somehow or other, should you ask me again next year, I’ll find a way to come with you to see Young Oberon try for the Derby stakes.”
He gave a regretful shrug. “You soften my disappointment with a promise I only hope is possible to see fulfilled. My trainer was far from pleased with Young Oberon’s performance in his first race and talked bluntly of his having to be withdrawn from next year’s Derby at one of the remaining forfeit stages if his performance doesn’t improve. I happen to share your faith in the colt, but in the end the facts will have to speak for themselves.”
“Why not let Roger ride him at Doncaster. You said yourself you had never seen such affinity between a lad and his horse.”
He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “I’ll tell you what I’ll do. The Doncaster arrangements shall stand, but in the meantime Roger is to be tried out at a number of smaller race meetings, not on Young Oberon, but on other runners that are being put through their paces. He needs experience — there’s always a crush for the best places at the line-up, older jockeys will see that he’s pressed into the least advantageous place, and then he has to learn to look for a gap in the field and how to get through without other jockeys crowding him, and a hundred other such points. If he’s as sharp as I think he is he’ll soon be able to stand up for himself and if he makes sufficient progress I’ll let him ride Young Oberon at Goodwood — if you’ll agree to come with me and see how he gets on.”
He had the most extraordinary talent for getting his own way, she thought. “I’ll accept your invitation to Goodwood,” she said. “I went there once with my father and I’ve never forgotten the wonderful time we had.”
He took up his hat and cane and gave her a slow smile. “I trust you will enjoy everything twice as much with me.”
“That remains to be seen,” she said cautiously, but she was more than happy that she had secured for Roger the opportunity for which he had longed.
Dominic laughed, giving her a sidelong glance as he clapped his tall hat on his head and went out of the door. She closed it after him and ran into the kitchen to tell Nina what she had achieved before seeking out Judith, but of her sister there was no sign and the back door was swinging on its hinges.
At that precise moment Nina was running back through the woods to Adam’s house. She saw from the light in the window that he was still in the bedroom where she had left him. Through the gate she charged and into the house. Up the stairs she went and threw open the bedroom door, her cloak swinging about her. He lay in the bed, his fingers linked under his head on the pillow, a sheet covering his nakedness. Their eyes held across the room.
“I’ve been watching the clock,” he said without mockery or scorn, his voice low and curiously tender. “You’ve taken three minutes longer to come back than I anticipated.”
With a cry she ran to him and he sat up to catch her as she hurled herself into his arms. “I love you! I love you!” she cried. Then their mouths met in a frantic fury of kissing.
She returned home in the early hours of the morning, Adam going with her for the first time through the woods to see her into the lane near the gates of Rushmere, more than reluctant to let her go. They clung together in yet another parting kiss before she went from him and slipped silently into the sleeping house. When she got into her own narrow bed and had pulled the covers over her shoulders she hugged the pillow to her face with one arm. She loved Adam, but she was still going to marry Edward, who would one day inherit a title of his own and make her Lady of the Manor in every sense of the word. That was her plan and she would not swerve from it. But, oh! could Edward ever love her as she had been loved this night? Thankful that her marriage was still many months distant she drifted into sleep on a cloud of especially erotic memories which had been created in those few past hours.
11
The day before the Epsom races the traffic began converging on the town, much of it passing through Cudlingham. Gypsy caravans, tent show wagons, horse boxes, coaches, and every kind of vehicle rolled past Rushmere. Tansy, busy with her preparations, scarcely had time to look out of the window, but the butcher boy, delivering the meat, told her the stream of traffic was nothing compared with what it would be like the next day, and he spoke with authority when he stated that on Derby Day itself complete chaos would reign. Nina, who had not lifted a finger to help, departed at noon to stay at the Manor. In the afternoon Judith took to her bed for a much-needed rest and the house stood ready and waiting. Tansy, wearing a freshly laundered striped blue and white cotton dress, was wandering about restlessly when she saw a spanking four-in-hand come bowling up the drive. She flew to receive her first racing guest. Selwyn Hedley had arrived.
“Good day to you, ma’am. Miss Tansy Marlow, I presume? Pretty name, pretty face to go with it. No impertinence intended, I assure you. Delighted to make your acquaintance. Hedley is the name, don’t you know. Selwyn Hedley. If you a fancy a flutter on the Derby or any of the other races, just you have a word with me. There ain’t a gee-gee running that I don’t know its chances.” He laid a yellow chamois-gloved finger in a roguish, knowing way against his bulbous red nose.
He was, she thought, the most vulgar-looking man she had ever seen, black-browed, huge-faced, and coarse-featured and heavy-bellied, his hands of a size that a blacksmith might have envied. His voice matched his physique, loud and deep and throaty with rich living. His clothes were of finest cloth and well cut, but the check of his frockcoat rivalled the brilliance of his waistcoat, across which was looped a thick gold watch-chain with a jewelled sovereign case dangling from it. His servant, a wiry, ferret-faced man, as thin and short as his master was large and broad, was unloading a portmanteau and some other baggage. Hedley jerked a thumb in his direction. “My man, Silas. You’ve a place for him to bed down, I suppose. The stable loft will do. He has his own bedding.”
Tansy had known a second of panic, no mention having been made of accommodation for a servant when the booking was made. “The stable loft is new-swept and clean,” she said, sending silent thanks toward the saddler’s sons who had even carried out that chore for her. “I’ll show you to your room.”
Hedley trod heavily but agilely, the stairs creaking under his weight, and the floorboards of the wide landing groaned. He looked about his room approvingly. “You have good taste, ma’am. They don’t make furniture of quality like these pieces nowadays. Oak, ain’t it?” He slapped a great hand round one of the bedposts, giving it an experimental shake. “I declare this great bed could have been designed specially for my bulk. I’ll sleep right comfy in it and still have plenty of room to spare for a companion, what say you? Eh? Eh?”
She ignored the leering innuendo with a stony face. “I’m sure you would like some tea. I’ll take it into the small drawing room when I hear you come downstairs. Dinner will be at eight o’clock when the other guests will have arrived.”
She was fuming as she stamped down the rear staircase into the kitchen to put the kettle on the hob. What a fat, detestable toad! How dare he! And how dare Dominic ask her to take such a man into her house! She wouldn’t trust Hedley in any way. He looked thoroughly dishonest, for all his expensive clothing and fine carriage, which Silas had taken under cover, unharnessing the horses. Dishonest? She pressed her fingertips to her cheeks. Could he be one of Do
minic’s confederates? Dominic had certainly been most anxious that she should take the man in. If
Hedley was one of the racecourse villains, she was glad to have him under her roof, for there was always the chance that she might get a lead into something of importance. She looked over her shoulder and gave a start, seeing Silas standing by her. She had not heard him in his soft-soled boots. He gave a gap-toothed grin.
“Will there be a cuppa goin’ fer me? I’m real parched. Like I allus was afore a race. Still get it when there’s racin’ in the air. Excitement, y’know.”
“You may have a cup, of course,” she said, taking a kitchen cup down from the cupboard. She had set one of the best left by Amelia on a tray ready for Hedley. “I’m about to toast some muffins as well. Were you a jockey in your day?”
“I was that. Rode in all the Classics and on every racecourse in the land. Mr. Hedley’s a big-hearted gent. Took me on as his personal valet, coachman, and bodyguard when I was unjustly accused of a crime what I never committed and banned from ridin’ the course for life.”
“Whatever crime was that?” she exclaimed.
He showed more gaps in his dirty teeth as his grin broadened. “They said I savagely whipped and spurred a runner to the bone to bring him in a winner. As if I would do a thing like that. Me, what loves horses! I told ‘em all the blood was due to the colt gashing himself on the rails, but they didn’t believe me.” He gave her a nudge with his bony elbow. “Know what I’ve been called ever since? Bloody Silas. But none can deny I’ve ridden more winners than most other jockeys alive today. Mr. Hedley is using his influence to get my ban lifted. Talents like mine shouldn’t be lost to the Turf.”
The Marlows Page 23
