As a result, his apology was not as polished or sincere as he had intended, and the lady’s acknowledgment of it far from gracious.
“Why did you not tell us you were already acquainted with Lady Marguerite’s niece, my dear?” the dowager asked him, her tone tinged with reproach.
“His lordship did not make himself known to me,” Lady Sylvia offered in a flat voice. “At least not directly,” she added, and Nicholas did not miss the ironic inflection in her voice.
The dowager glared at her as though she had committed a social gaffe. “Who else could he have been?” she demanded impatiently, as though the earl’s very presence were sufficient to establish his identity.
Lady Sylvia laughed shortly at that pompous remark, and Nicholas did not like the sound of it at all. He braced himself for the set-down he guessed was coming.
“I rather thought his lordship was a madman.”
His mother gasped at this unflattering remark, but Mrs. Hargate broke the sudden tension with her easy laugh. “Nicholas did mention meeting an artist on the cliffs a day or two ago, Dorothea,” she remarked. “I should have guessed that it was you, my dear,” she
added, turning her smile to the slim figure in gray still standing beside the tea-table, “since he is well known to your aunt.”
“Indeed he is,” Lady Marguerite agreed, “as is my dear Dotty. I do not want to think how many years it has been since we attended Miss Harris’s Academy for Young Ladies in Bath together, dear. Do you remember that divine dancing master? What was his name? You were quite taken with him yourself, as I recall. It seems only yesterday that the old harridan caught us—”
“Oh, Marguerite!” the dowager interrupted in obvious agitation. “I forbid you to remind me of all the foolish things we did in those days. It is quite unkind of you to bring up our little peccadilloes at all.”
The earl watched his mother’s growing confusion with amusement. If his memory was correct, it was at that same Bath Academy that Lady Marguerite Sutherland first encountered the impecunious gentleman who later enticed her to throw discretion to the winds and run off to Italy with him.
The daughter of the Earl of Weston was reported to have cut off her glorious red hair, masqueraded as a boy, and ridden all the way to Dover on the open road. When the romantic swain—who by all accounts had hoped to be bought off by an enraged father-discovered that his lady had every intention of holding him to his promise of Italy, he cut his losses and bolted back to Bath to spread vastly exaggerated accounts of his exploits.
Lady Marguerite laughed, and Nicholas noticed that, unlike her niece, her eyes were more hazel than gray. The hair was the same vivid, blatant red, and escaped from her casual chignon with the same abandon as Lady Sylvia’s undisciplined curls.
“I would hardly call our peccadilloes little, Dotty,” Lady Marguerite remarked innocently, and the earl sensed his hostess was on the brink of making an outrageous confession. The dowager must have thought so, too, for she turned a bright pink and wrung her hands pathetically.
Unexpectedly, it was Lady Sylvia who came to the rescue.
“I am sure we all know that anything you undertake could never be little, Aunt. You have always lived as you have painted, in the Grand Style. But I cannot see her ladyship indulging in anything improper. After all, that appears to be the prerogative of the Sutherlands, does it not?”
The lady’s oblique but unmistakable reference to her own reputation startled Nicholas, who was accustomed to the dowager’s rigid suppression of anything vaguely associated with the scandal in his family’s past.
Nicholas preferred it that way.
Any reference to that summer evening when his life had crumbled around him had to be—indeed, had been—ruthlessly suppressed if he was to maintain his sanity. The recent encounter with Lady Sylvia on the site of that tragedy had jolted old memories that he had thought carefully buried years ago. The vision of that female figure, sitting as she had so often sat, dabbling at her wa- tercolors, had broken down that tenuous wall he had constructed for himself over the years.
There was no other place to hide. He wished he might have stayed away in India, but that had seemed cowardly and selfish, in view of his mother’s failing health. There were definite disadvantages to being the only surviving male in a family as ancient and tradition-bound as the Morleys of Longueville. There were certain responsibilities that must be placed above his own inclinations.
Nicholas thought with sudden regret of his brother Stephen, whose death at Talavera had left a chasm, both emotional and physical, in his life. With Stephen gone, the earl had been the only one left to carry on the line. They had long since ceased to look to his uncle, Colonel Lord Peter Morley, and his comfortable wife, Agnes, to contribute a presumptive heir to the title, and that left only Matthew.
The idea of Longueville going to his cousin Matthew by default had finally brought Nicholas back from India.
His mother had been right, he reminded himself as the Longueville party rose to take their leave. It was long past time for him to take a second wife and start his nursery.
Sylvia breathed a sigh of relief when the dowager countess rose to signal the end of the visit. It was not that she found the lady uncivil, although her manner often verged on the condescending. She seemed genuinely fond of Lady Marguerite, and Sylvia knew her aunt well enough to know that Marguerite was equally attached to the starched-up dowager.
Mrs. Hargate appeared less eager to leave, and Sylvia would have welcomed a chance to further her acquaintance with the lady. Upon Mrs. Hargate expressing similar inclinations, it was agreed that the earl would convey his aunt to Whitecliffs the following af- temoon to take a tour of the West Gallery, where many of the paintings hung.
“I never was any good with watercolors,” Mrs. Hargate admitted ruefully, “but I do so admire those artists who create beauty or tragedy that touches our souls.”
“Paintings should reflect only the beauty of the world,” cut in the dowager, turning to glare at her companion. “1 cannot imagine why you would wish to have ugliness staring at you from the walls, Lydia, when there is quite enough of it all around us.”
“Tragedy is an inescapable part of life, my lady,” Sylvia could not help remarking. Her thoughts flew to the ghostly figure said to roam the cliffs by the stone hut. There was undoubtedly some tragedy attached to the legend. Mere death alone—and the lady had reportedly died mysteriously on the cliff, that much was true—would hardly be sufficient to cause the villagers to sublimate the death of a young countess into a quasi-romantic legend of lost love.
“Tragedy is all around us,” Sylvia continued, intrigued at the sudden pallor that invaded the dowager’s smooth cheeks. “Who was it who said that we each carry our own death within us?”
The dowager flinched visibly. “Rubbish!” she exclaimed angrily. “One of your idle poets or philosophers, no doubt, who have nothing better to do than spout platitudes that they hope will pass as wit.”
Sylvia caught the earl’s eye and was startled to see a gleam of amusement there. Her first impression of the gentleman two days ago had been anything but pleasant, and this afternoon Lord Longueville had shown little evidence of enjoying the company at Whitecliffs.
“I agree with you, my lady,” she heard herself saying smoothly. “Too many of our young poets place wit upon a pedestal and disregard good taste and common sense.”
Alarmed to hear herself agreeing with a female she suspected of lacking rudimentary tolerance towards art in any form, Sylvia was relieved when the doors of the Italian Saloon swung open, and Hobson ushered in another visitor.
Sir Geoffrey Huntsville was not one of her favorite gentlemen, but his arrival could be counted upon to change the tone of any gathering he happened to grace with his presence. He was jovial, gregarious to a fault, and considered himself to be a poet of no small merit.
After a perfunctory greeting for his hostess, the baronet turned a beaming countenance on the dowager.
> “My dear Lady Longueville,” he gushed in a stirring baritone that served him well in the choir at the chapel every Sunday, “I am enchanted to have this unexpected opportunity to welcome you home again.”
Sylvia guessed this to be a bouncer of major proportions. Sir Geoffrey’s household staff, like that of all neighboring gentry, was largely local, and gossip was no less the chief entertainment of servants in Cornwall than in the rest of England. She suspected that Sir Geoffrey had known to the minute when the party from Longueville intended to visit Whitecliffs.
“You have been sorely missed, my lady, let me tell you,” the baronet continued in his caressing voice. “The yearly bazaars at Helston have been dull affairs indeed without your inspired patronage. And the glitter of our social gatherings has diminished to the point of becoming a mere flicker of what it was when your ladyship presided over them.”
At that moment he appeared to notice the earl, standing quietly beside Mrs. Hargate.
“Longueville!” the baronet exclaimed warmly, stepping forward to pump the earl’s hand energetically. “How provident that your lordship is back among us once again. The Castle has languished far too long in the shadows. My dear Martha was remarking to me only this morning over the breakfast table that she despairs of ever attending another of your famous Public Days. I trust I may relieve her mind on this score, my lord. No doubt you will wish to restore Longueville to its former glory. How well we all remember those summers when the Castle was filled with guests from London, and music, and laughter.”
An uncomfortable silence followed this tactless remark, and Sylvia wondered whether the baronet had not thrown it out deliberately to stir up painful memories. She recalled Aunt Marguerite mentioning that Sir Geoffrey had rather fancied himself as the young countess’s cicisbeo during that first—and last—summer of her marriage to Longueville. As had a number of other young gentlemen who flocked to Cornwall to enjoy the earl’s hospitality. According to her aunt, the new countess had seemed to attract and relish the male attention. Perhaps beyond the bounds of what was entirely proper, Sylvia had guessed, given the rare note of censure in Lady Marguerite’s tone.
“I do not believe you have met my aunt, Mrs. Hargate,” the earl cut in coldly, breaking the tension that had settled over the group. “She visits Cornwall infrequently, and I hope to encourage her to make her home here.”
Sir Geoffrey transferred his attention briefly to Mrs. Hargate, but Sylvia suspected that he saw nothing of interest in the short, plain-faced widow, for after a few perfunctory remarks he turned back to the dowager.
“I trust your ladyship will condescend to dine at Huntington Hall next week,” he said. “My dear Martha has planned a small, select dinner party to celebrate the publication of my latest volume of poetry, and I know she would consider the occasion incomplete without your presence, my lady.”
There was another pregnant pause after this announcement, which Sir Geoffrey appeared not to notice, for he continued to elaborate on the favorable reviews his little book—as he chose to call it—-had received in such prestigious journals as the Edinburgh Review.
Sylvia had read these reviews, and could not for the life of her find anything remotely favorable in them. Perhaps they were not as scathing as some that appeared in that prestigious journal, she reasoned, and had refrained from comment, unwilling to incur Sir Geoffrey’s wrath.
“We shall have to see, Sir Geoffrey,” she heard the dowager saying with an aplomb that Sylvia envied. “We have not yet unpacked our trunks, and as you can imagine, Longueville has almost ten years of estate matters to catch up with. I must congratulate you on your marriage, however, even though I am sadly late in doing so. I remember Martha Grenville as a very sweet and biddable girl.”
“Oh, indeed she is, your ladyship,” Sir Geoffrey gushed, evidently gratified at the dowager’s condescension in remembering his personal affairs. “And one who knows her duty as well, I might add. My dear Martha has already presented me with four lovely daughters, and is even now in hopes of adding a son to make me the happiest man in Cornwall.”
With his uncanny knack for broaching topics calculated to stir up controversy, Sir Geoffrey again managed to create another awkward pause in the conversation.
Sylvia noticed that the earl’s face had turned rigid and that he
cast a stem glance at the dowager, who abruptly took her leave of Lady Marguerite and swept out of the room.
On the whole, Sylvia had to agree with her aunt after the earl and Mrs. Hargate had followed the dowager’s lead, the visit had not been an overwhelming success.
The ride back to the Castle was fraught with uncomfortable undercurrents. After listening to the dowager disparage, at great length and with obvious relish, the Sutherland females for their deplorable lack of propriety, the earl lost his patience.
“If our neighbors are so distasteful to you, Mother, I wonder that you encourage the connection,” he remarked shortly.
The dowager glanced at him in amazement. “And I wonder how you can ask such a thing, Nicholas,” she said reprovingly. “Marguerite is my oldest and dearest friend. Her letters sustained me through those long years in India. And I cannot begin to tell you how much her friendship meant to me during our time together at Miss Harris’s Academy. Marguerite was absolutely fearless. She actually laughed at the old dragon’s threat to tell your grandfather about that dancing master. ...” Her words tapered off, as though the dowager had suddenly realized her slip.
“And what was there to tell about that dancing jack?” the earl could not resist asking innocently. His imagination boggled at the notion that his mother, always a stickler for propriety and decorum, might have strayed from the path of virtue by so much as a hairsbreadth. But women, he had found to his own sorrow, were not always what they appeared. Had he not been roundly deceived by his own wife, like some inexperienced rudesby?
“Nicholas!” his aunt exclaimed sharply, although the earl caught a tremor of amusement in her voice. “How can you tease your poor mother so? Do you see any dancing masters installed at the Castle, my dear boy? Shame on you!”
The dowager looked genuinely distressed, and Nicholas regretted his cavalier attitude.
“Oh, Lydia,” she wailed, her hands fluttering nervously at her throat, “how can you say such a thing? I never did enjoy dancing above half, as even Marguerite will tell you. I cannot imagine what inspired her to bring up that man at all, unless she wished to tease me.”
* * *
As Nicholas made his way upstairs to change for dinner, it struck him that the enigmatic lady an gray had once again intruded upon his thoughts. He shook his head impatiently, but by the time his valet had teased his cravat into in intricate version of the Mathematical, Nicholas realized that between Lady Sylvia herself, the wind-tousled apparition she had presented on the cliff, and The Lady in Gray staring down at him from the walls of Whitecliffs, his imagination had been stimulated to a degree he found unsettling, to say the least.
It was the dowager, however, who gave the earl the first clue to the possible nature of his dilemma.
“I think we should remove to London as soon as possible, Nicholas,” she remarked, quite out of the blue, over the baked salmon with buttered turnips at dinner that evening. “I do not believe I am quite up to the tedious round of country soirees and insipid dinners that pass for entertainment here in Cornwall. Sir Geoffrey has grown more pompous with age, and I fear his literary endeavors may reflect this deplorable folly. Then there is Morley Court to be refurbished before I can feel comfortable receiving our friends in Town.”
“London in July!” Mrs. Hargate exclaimed, her blue eyes round with astonishment. “Surely you are jesting, Dorothea. The Metropolis is entirely devoid of company in the summer, besides being unhealthy. I trust I misunderstood you, dear.”
“You may count upon it, Aunt,” the earl responded calmly. “My dear mama is exaggerating, of course. And in any case, there is no way I can get away before October
at the earliest. I intend to spend another month or two here with Gates; then I have arranged to visit Falmouth. Ned Barker writes that two of our ships are due in September, and I want to be there when they dock. Particularly since Jason Ransome is the master of one of them. You remember Jason, Mama? That red-haired rogue who allowed you to beat him at whist every time you played?”
“He did nothing of the sort,” the dowager snapped. “I count myself a superior player, and Captain Ransome has graciously admitted it any number of times. A charming rascal, of course, but why the son of a marquess should fritter away his life as a common sailor I shall never understand.”
“He is making his fortune, as we all are in the shipping business,” the earl answered tersely. “Jason’s ambition is to own a fleet of his own, as it was mine. He will do it, too, before he is much older.”
The dowager motioned to a footman to fill her glass and glanced reprovingly at her son. “You have led the poor boy astray, Nicholas,” she protested. “His mother, the marchioness, is a dear friend of mine, as you know, and Lucy tells me that Jason received a tidy inheritance from her brother, so he could have spent his days in England living like a gentleman instead of roaming the world like some scruffy pirate. How he ever expects to find a suitable wife and settle down is beyond me. Poor Lucy has quite washed her hands of him.”
Nicholas grinned at his aunt, who had listened to this tirade with her usual patience. They both knew that the dowager would always find fault with any scion of a noble family who sullied his hands in Trade. She had never forgiven Nicholas for his astonishing success in establishing a shipping route to India, although she seemed to have no qualms about spending the money brought into the family coffers by such despised activities.
The Lady in Gray Page 4
