Lifting her perfume, Alicia lavishly applied it to her neck and wrists and pouted.
‘Why shouldn’t I sulk?’ She patted the ringlets that cascaded over her slim shoulders as her eyes met his in the mirror. ‘I can’t forget how you held that girl at the ball at Peter’s house last week. And did you really have to dance with her three times?’
Matthew grinned and raised an eyebrow. ‘Hold on, darling. I don’t recall you sitting any of the dances out. In fact, you were in such great demand that I barely got a chance to claim you for a dance myself.’
She shrugged. ‘I can’t help it if I’m pretty,’ she said coyly.
Matthew sighed as she handed him a strand of pearls to fasten about her neck. He had to admit she looked ravishing. Tonight she had chosen to wear yet another of her new gowns in a deep sky-blue colour, heavily adorned with sequins and pearls that set off her fair beauty to perfection – but as he had discovered, in some ways, Alicia’s beauty was only skin deep. She was incredibly vain, thanks to her parents, who had spoiled her shamelessly, and she tended not to think of much at all apart from her jewels and what she would wear.
It had been she who had wanted to adopt a child and, although Matthew had had grave misgivings about the idea, he had finally given way to her wishes, just as he always did. Unfortunately, the novelty of having a daughter had worn off very quickly for her and strangely it was he who had become fond of the child, to the point that it hurt him to know that poor Suzanne was left in the care of the dreadful nanny in the nursery upstairs for most of the time now. Had it been up to him, he would have given the woman her marching orders in seconds, but Alicia had insisted that she knew what she was doing, so he had reluctantly kept his own counsel – for now at least.
Once the necklace was fastened, he stood back, and as he watched her, admiring the pearls – a gift from him for Christmas – he suddenly found himself thinking of the girl he had danced with who Alicia had taken such a dislike to. In fact, it was clear that she had more than disliked her and was insanely jealous of the girl. He could picture her shining jet-black hair and gentle face, but it was her eyes that he most remembered. They had been quite striking: an unusual nut-brown colour with long dark lashes. In fact, now he thought about it, they were remarkably similar to Suzanne’s, and they even had the same haunted look about them. Opal, she had said her name was, he recalled, and he wondered why Alicia was so jealous of her. She normally didn’t mind who he danced with when they were at such events, so long as she herself was surrounded by admirers.
‘You’re thinking of her now, aren’t you?’ she suddenly accused crossly.
Bringing his thoughts back to the present, Matthew flushed guiltily. ‘Of course I’m not. Now, are you quite ready? If so, I shall just pop up and say goodnight to Suzanne before we leave.’
‘Oh Matthew, must you?’ Alicia pouted again as she picked up a tiny satin evening bag that matched her dress. ‘You do know how disgruntled William and Fiona get if their guests are late. And I do so want to show off my new gown before we go in to dinner.’ She had started to resent the fact that Suzanne seemed to prefer Matthew to her, even though she never called him ‘Father’. Instead she called him by his first name, and Matthew didn’t seem to mind at all. She found it most improper. When she was Suzanne’s age, she would never have dreamed of addressing a grown-up man by his first name!
‘Then you go down and I’ll join you in a moment.’ He bent to kiss the soft skin on her shoulder and hastily left the room, taking the stairs that led to the nursery two at a time.
He found Suzanne sitting in a chair with a book in her lap and the nanny with her feet up on a stool as she sat in the chair next to the fire.
Agatha rose hastily, but barely giving her a glance, Matthew strode past her towards Suzanne, who was sitting as still as a statue.
He hunkered down next to the child and asked with concern, ‘Are you all right, Suzanne? You look as if you’ve been crying?’
Before Susie could say a word, Agatha said silkily, ‘No, she hasn’t, sir. She has a bit of a cold that’s making her eyes run.’
Matthew didn’t believe a word of it as he rose and stared at her stonily. ‘In that case, I suggest you summon the doctor to look at her first thing in the morning.’
‘Oh, there’ll be no need for that, sir,’ Agatha smarmed. ‘She just needs to be kept in for a few days.’
‘But surely fresh air is good for a child if they are well wrapped up?’
‘Not when it’s as cold as this, sir.’ Agatha just wished he would clear off and stop interfering. He was becoming a nuisance lately, popping in and out of the nursery when he wasn’t expected.
‘I see.’ Matthew hovered uncertainly. He couldn’t abide the woman. There was something about her that he hadn’t taken to, but then he knew very little about raising children, so he supposed in this instance he would just have to trust her judgement. When he turned his attention back to the child, she gave him a faltering smile. ‘Be a good girl for Nanny then, my dear, and I’ll pop in and see how you are when I get back.’
‘I’d rather you didn’t, sir.’ Agatha stared at him boldly. ‘Suzanne will be fast asleep by then and I wouldn’t wish her to be disturbed.’
He supposed she was right on that count, so he nodded. ‘Very well, but I shall come up here first thing in the morning and if she isn’t any better I shall have to insist that she sees the doctor.’
Agatha’s lips set in a grim line, but she nodded, knowing she had no alternative. Thankfully the interfering busybody turned and left, leaving Susie to the nanny’s mercy again.
Still, Susie thought miserably, at least she had some respite from her now that she had a tutor come in for a few hours each day.
Thankfully Matthew had had the final say on who they should employ, which was just as well, for Alicia didn’t seem to have a clue when it came to interviewing the applicants. He had finally decided on a younger woman called Elizabeth Collins who had come with an excellent reference from her former employers who no longer needed her because their two boys were now attending a boarding school. Elizabeth was in her early thirties, slim to the point of being thin and not at all pretty in the traditional sense; her hair was light brown and unfashionably straight and her nose slightly too big for her face, but she had a wonderful sense of humour and twinkling brown eyes.
‘I think learning should be fun,’ she had told Matthew enthusiastically during the interview, much as his mother-in-law had said, and he had taken to her immediately. She soon proved that she wasn’t afraid to stand up to the strict nanny either, which Matthew took as a point in her favour when Agatha tried to interfere.
‘I see no need for you and Suzanne to closet yourselves away in the school room,’ Agatha had told her bossily the first time she arrived to give lessons. ‘She can work just as well in here with me to make sure she behaves herself.’
Miss Collins had drawn herself up to her full height and glared at her coldly. ‘Thank you for your concern, Nanny, but I’m quite sure we shall do very well on our own.’
And from that moment on they had barely spoken, apart from when they had to, which suited Miss Collins right down to the ground.
Susie loved the time she spent with her new tutor. Miss Collins would take her out to the park on nice days, much to Nanny’s disgust.
‘I thought you were supposed to be teaching her not gallivanting about,’ Agatha had said stroppily.
Miss Collins had merely stared her out. ‘There is a lot more to learn than English and mathematics,’ she had informed her coolly. ‘It is important that a young lady learns about birds and flowers and wildlife, so I suggest you leave her teaching to me.’
From that moment on the two women were at war, and could the gentle Miss Collins have known it, it was no good for Susie whatsoever, for when she returned to the nursery Agatha would vent her wrath on her with vicious pinches or slaps where the bruises would not be seen.
Sometimes Susie wondered if she s
hould tell the woman who professed to be her new mother about it, but her fear of the bullying nanny kept her silent, and anyway she doubted that Alicia would believe her. Her visits to the nursery floor had waned somewhat over the time Susie had lived there, although she was still taken downstairs from time to time and paraded in front of Alicia’s friends.
Susie hated such times. The tiny teacups and saucers she was handed were so fine that she was terrified of breaking them or spilling tea everywhere, and she was too afraid to take any of the tiny cakes or pastries she was offered for fear of spraying crumbs, although the sight of them made her mouth water. That was another thing she hated. Nanny was very strict about Susie’s diet and insisted that anything sugary was no good for a growing girl, although she never seemed to mind stuffing her own face with cakes and sweets.
Every night when she went to bed she thought of Opal, Charlie and Jack, and wondered where they were and what they were doing. For some long time, she had lived in hope that they would come and find her, but as time passed the hope died, and now it felt as if there was nothing to look forward to other than living under Agatha’s strict reign.
Downstairs Matthew was helping Alicia on with the new mink cloak he had bought her, another present for Christmas, and soon after they left in their fine carriage, unaware that Susie was watching them enviously from the nursery window.
‘Come away from there and get yourself into bed,’ Agatha barked, making Susie almost jump out of her skin. ‘You can have an early night tonight because I want to go down and have a game of cards with Cook.’
‘But isn’t it a little early to be going to bed?’ Susie plucked up the courage to ask – and instantly wished she hadn’t when she saw angry colour flood into Agatha’s cheeks.
‘You are questioning me?’ Agatha’s words came out more as a threat than a question and before Susie could answer she was across the room and gripping her arm so tightly that Susie winced with pain. She had no doubt that tomorrow there would be another bruise to add to the others that had not yet faded. There were so many of them now that Agatha had taken to locking the door when Susie bathed or got undressed in case anyone should come in and see them. Agatha shook her viciously, making her teeth rattle as she dragged her towards the bed where she flung her onto the bedspread.
‘Now, you just stay there an’ make sure I don’t hear a peep out of you, else you’ll regret it,’ she warned, waggling a plump finger in the terrified girl’s face.
Susie dragged the blankets back and crawled beneath them as the nanny headed for the door, then she lay there listening to the sound of the woman’s footsteps receding as hot tears spilled down her pale cheeks.
And it was then that she made her decision. She was going to run away and find her family.
Without waiting to think about it, she crept out of bed again and, after throwing her nightgown over the back of a chair, she hastily dressed in the clothes that Agatha had laid out ready for her to wear the next day. Her heart was hammering as her ears strained for the sound of Agatha returning, but all was quiet, so she grabbed a bag from the bottom of her small wardrobe and began to ram some clothes into it. Next, she slid her arms into the sleeves of the fancy little red coat Alicia had bought her for Christmas and pushed her feet into tiny black leather lace-up boots.
It was only then that the enormity of what she was about to do hit her and she chewed nervously on her lip. She didn’t think that her new mother would much care if she was gone, but she thought that perhaps Matthew would – so, snatching up a book that she had been using to practise her alphabet she licked the end of a pencil and hesitantly began.
Dear Matew,
I’m sorry but im runnin away cos nanny is crewl to me an I don’t want to live ere any moor. Yu ave bin very kind to me but I want to find my reel family so I’m goin to luk for them, luv Susie
After reading the note through, she propped it up against the inkwell on the table – but then, thinking better of it, she decided she would leave it somewhere else, for she was sure that if Agatha found it, it would end up on the fire.
She pulled the bonnet that matched her coat on to her springy curls. Then, grabbing the note, her bag and the beautiful china-faced doll that had been a gift from Matthew for Christmas, she left the room and crept along the landing. Because Alicia and Matthew were out for the evening, the house was quiet as the staff made the most of their absence. Most of them were in the kitchen drinking tea and gossiping, and the hall was deserted.
Susie quickly propped her note up against a crystal vase full of flowers standing on the gilt console table in the hall – then, with her heart in her mouth, she crept towards the door, praying she would be able to open it.
After what seemed like a lifetime, she finally managed to turn the key in the lock and as the door opened an icy blast of air hit her full in the face, making her gasp. But she didn’t hesitate and, stepping out on to the step, she closed the door as quietly as she could behind her.
She glanced up and down the rows of fine terraced town houses, realising that she had no idea where she was going. But there was no time to lose; if anyone was to discover her note and find her out there on the step, she had no doubt that Agatha would relish punishing her severely. The thought added wings to her feet as she fled down the street, a tiny figure flitting beneath the pools of yellow light spread by the gas lamps.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Early in January Mrs King came down with a bad cold that confined her to bed and when she told Opal that Henry would be dining there that evening Opal flew into a panic.
‘But does that mean that he and I will have to dine alone?’ she asked in alarm.
Mrs King chuckled as she pulled the blankets up around her neck. She found that she was either freezing cold or roasting hot and couldn’t seem to get comfortable. ‘Don’t worry, my dear,’ she croaked. ‘There will be plenty of food as always, so I’m sure he won’t eat you.’
Opal bit her lip as she filled the old lady’s water glass from the jug at the side of the bed. Henry had not as yet broached the subject of his proposal nor asked her for an answer, but Opal had no doubt that he would that very evening if they were to dine alone.
‘B-but what shall I talk to him about?’
The old woman sighed. ‘Haven’t I taught you how to hold polite conversation? This will be your chance to put it to the test.’
Seeing that she had made up her mind about Henry coming to dinner, Opal said no more – but as the afternoon wore on, she became more nervous by the hour. The old lady was living on a diet of soup at present, insisting that she could stomach nothing more, and when Opal carried her tray up to her Mrs King said, ‘Thank you. Now I suggest you go and make yourself presentable for Henry. Perhaps you could wear that nice yellow gown I bought you at the end of last year? Oh, and do something with your hair. It looks very stern tied back in a bun like that. When you’re ready, you can come in and let me have a look at you.’
With a sigh of resignation, Opal placed the tray on the old woman’s lap, and when she had ensured she had done all she could to make her comfortable, she went to her room to change for dinner.
The dress Mrs King had suggested she should wear was in a pretty shade of lemon yellow. It was fashioned in a very fine, silky wool and Mrs King had bought her hooped underskirts to wear beneath it. It was high-necked, with tiny little navy buttons running all up the bodice and the hems of the sleeve and the neckline were trimmed with navy braid that made it look quite elegant. Opal had been looking forward to wearing it, but tonight, after thoroughly washing every inch of herself, she felt no pleasure at all as she slipped it over her head.
Once she was dressed, she released her hair from its pins and, after brushing it until it gleamed, she fastened it into a loose chignon on the back of her head, leaving a few strands to curl about her face.
When she was ready, she stared at herself in the mirror. She was barely recognisable now compared to what she had looked like when she arrived, ye
t she would have given up her new easy life and the fashionable clothes she now wore in a sigh if only she could have had her family back. As they often did, her thoughts turned to Charlie. She had been reading everything she could get her hands on about Australia and as she gazed at the hoar frost on the lawn beyond her bedroom window it was hard to imagine that where he was, they would now be at the height of their summer.
The sound of Mrs King ringing her bell yanked her thoughts sharply back to the present and after a final glance in the mirror she hurried away to see what the old lady wanted.
‘Ah, very elegant!’ Mrs King studied her approvingly. ‘I thought that colour would suit you. Now, pass me my book, my dear, and get yourself downstairs. Henry should be arriving any minute.’
Even as she spoke they both heard the sound of his carriage wheels and the horses clip-clopping down the drive; so, reluctantly Opal turned to make her way downstairs.
Henry was in the hall handing his hat and coat to Belle as she reached the bottom of the stairs and he smiled at her, his eyes openly approving. ‘May I say how very charming you look this evening, my dear?’ To her huge embarrassment, he took her hand and kissed it, much to the amusement of Belle, who was struggling not to grin. He held his arm out and, feeling that she had no choice, she slipped hers through it and allowed him to lead her to the drawing room, where he instantly headed for the cut-glass decanters that the old lady insisted were filled daily.
‘A little sherry perhaps?’
Opal shook her head and sat down on one of the fireside chairs, spreading her skirts neatly about her. Suddenly she felt tongue-tied, but she needn’t have worried as Henry asked, ‘So, how is my mother today? Did the doctor call in again?’
‘She is no worse, and yes he did. He has left her a tonic; but other than ensure that she drinks plenty of fluids, there is little else I can do for her.’
He nodded. ‘Quite right. She’s lucky to have you looking after her.’ He flashed her a smile. ‘How are you, my dear? This is the first time I have had a chance to speak to you alone for some time.’
The Winter Promise Page 19
