Love Stories of Enchanting Ladies: A Historical Regency Romance Collection

by Bridget Barton

  Catherine decided not to put the man under any obligation to her other than to get her to her destination safely. And realizing it, the driver was clearly relieved.

  Catherine was aware that they had been in the Peak District for some time, and she had been awestruck by the sheer size of it. Not only its size but its extraordinary remoteness.

  There were towns, busy little places, but it did not take long for the carriage to drive straight through them and back into the wilds of the hills once more.

  The northern part of Derbyshire was so different from the flat, rolling meadows of Hertfordshire. There were hills in Hertfordshire, of course, but there was nothing to rival the hills and peaks she had seen in this new landscape.

  It was a breathtaking scene, sometimes lush, green, and inviting, but other times harsh, windswept, rugged, and remote. It seemed to Catherine that there would always be something to look at there, and the idea of it had transported her for a while, taking her away from her fears and cares as she studied all that passed by her carriage window.

  The journey from Hertfordshire had already taken several days, and they had stopped at various coaching inns en route so they might rest the horses overnight.

  At first, Catherine had felt very vulnerable. She had never travelled anywhere alone before, not even nearer to home. Her driver was good company enough, and she was sure that he would have protected her had she needed him to, but his presence did not stop her feeling conspicuous; a young woman who was obviously travelling without her family or a chaperone of any kind.

  She had felt a little humiliated by it, in the beginning, suffering the barely concealed glances of others as she had taken meals at coaching inns and other hostelries. But after the first few days, she had grown accustomed to the enquiring looks and had found it a little easier to ignore them as time had passed.

  Catherine thought it likely that her father would have been well aware of her discomfort in it all, but as in all other things, he did not care. Perhaps it was a further act of punishment, a last reminder of the power he had over her.

  As Catherine stared out at a vast, grass-covered hill, she thought once more of the strange relief at the idea that she would never have to look upon her father’s face again. Even if everything else in her uncertain future terrified her, she at least had that small mercy to fortify herself with.

  The carriage had drawn to a halt at the side of the road, and Catherine fought the urge to lower the window and listen as the driver jumped down and approached a well-dressed man just a few feet away. She could hear nothing but mumbled conversation, and seeing the animated pointing and explaining that the man was doing, Catherine realized that her driver was asking for final directions.

  So, Little Hayfield was to be her home, was it?

  With a sigh, she turned her attention back to the huge green hill. It was so wide that she could not see where it ended, and she thought it rather more a mass of land than a distinct hill. She could see a pathway snaking this way and that along its steep incline and thought that on such a sunny day, it seemed rather an inviting place.

  The sky was blue with not a cloud anywhere, and the green of the hill stood out against its brightness. For a moment, Catherine wondered if she would ever be permitted to walk along that snaking pathway and make her way to the top of that broad mass. Or would she simply be a prisoner somewhere, never allowed out on her own again to enjoy the beautiful scenery around her?

  Suddenly, Catherine felt the debilitating fear that had overtaken her more than once on her long journey. As much as she tried to take things as they came to her, not to assume anything at all, she could not help wondering how much her aunt would resemble her father.

  They were brother and sister after all, and Catherine knew that she would be naive not to expect some measure of cruelty from the woman. And even if she were not cruel, surely she could not be pleased to have a young woman, a stranger despite their relationship, foisted upon her indefinitely. Whatever way she looked at it, Catherine must surely be an imposition.

  Hearing the driver’s heels clicking along the narrow stone pavement, she looked over to see him hastening back to the carriage. Her palms were clammy, and her breathing was becoming a little ragged as she realized that her journey was coming to an end.

  She was here in Little Hayfield in the Peak District of Derbyshire for good or ill, and there was no turning back now. And where could she turn back to? There was nowhere else for her to go in all the world. Her father would not have her, and so it was a fact that Hertfordshire could never be her home again.

  She closed her eyes tightly when she felt the familiar prickling of hot tears begin to sting again. Catherine did not want to cry now, not so close to meeting the woman who was to be her jailer. It was too soon to give away any advantage and make herself look weak before her father’s sister.

  But the tears would not stop, and so all she could do was keep her eyes closed and hope to stem them. With her eyes closed, her mind’s eye seemed to open, bringing to her once again the dreadful image of her brother’s devastated face.

  His handsome fairness had been reddened with the effort to contain his emotions in those last terrible moments before she had left Barford Hall for the last time. As he had embraced her tightly, Catherine had felt the little tremors that ran through him like spasms and knew that he was struggling to hold back his own tears.

  Catherine had never seen her brother cry since he was a little boy, and the idea that Philip, the man, was about to be reduced to weeping almost tore her heart out. How could any of it be true? How could any of it really be happening? How could her father think she was so bad that this dreadful heartbreak was a fitting punishment?

  She had felt hot and sick, her emotions swaying wildly from the deepest sadness to the vilest hatred. She would never forgive her father for what he had done, even if he one day allowed her to return. That he would hurt his own children in such a way was unforgivable, for there was no circumstance on this earth that could justify it.

  As Catherine had been about to climb into the carriage, her father had finally appeared. She had not seen him all morning when she and Philip had sat silently in the breakfast room, holding hands and eating nothing. In the end, she had thought that she would never see him again, and in truth did not care much about it.

  But he strode out of the great entrance and down the steps, and she had thought that he was about to approach the carriage and speak to her. However, he did not even look in her direction and continued past the carriage and towards the stables as if on some matter of business there.

  Catherine knew him of old and knew that the whole thing was nothing but an act. He had timed his exit from the hall to coincide with her final moments, and he had done so to let her know that she would not be missed.

  This was the Earl of Barford’s way of dismissing his daughter, of telling her that she was already nothing more than a distant memory. She was done; finished.

  She was not upset by his appalling behaviour; she was simply made angrier by it. Her determination never to forgive him was made all the firmer by her belief that her father was nothing better than a spoiled, arrogant child.

  With the carriage door closed, she stared desolately out of the window to where Philip stood. She could see that he was barely holding himself together, and she wished that the driver would quickly pull away and leave her brother to his grief.

  Philip was a proud young man and would need his privacy to come to terms with his loss. And she knew that he would never have her see him in tears, even at such a moment. When the driver rattled the reins, she gave her brother one last look.

  She smiled bravely, and Philip winked. The idea that she would never see him wink at her again in that silly, secret way of theirs, was the final straw. There was only time for her to wink back and nod sadly before the carriage drew away, and she finally dissolved into painful, chest-racking sobs.

  Catherine reached into her velvet drawstring purse to retrieve
a handkerchief and gently dabbed her eyes, not wanting to rub the tender skin to redness in the moments before she met her aunt for the first time.

  The carriage pulled away again, and she knew that she could not dwell on everything that had happened and everything that she had lost. There would be plenty of time for that when she found herself alone again, but now, for the moment, she would have to stay present. She would have to be in the here and now, not some point in the past, and not wallowing in fears of the future.

  Catherine needed to concentrate all her energy on this most pivotal meeting. Above all things, she would not appear weak to this woman, for if she was anything like the Earl of Barford, her aunt would sense that weakness and seize upon it like a bird of prey.

  The carriage turned off the main road through the tiny village of Little Hayfield and began to grind its way along a winding gravel driveway.

  The driveway was narrow and tree-lined, making it a little dark and strangely claustrophobic, even though Catherine could see the sky if she opened the window of the carriage and looked up.

  Unable to see anything ahead for the twisting of the driveway and the many shrubs and trees, Catherine had leaned out of the window a little in the hopes of at least discerning something.

  When the end of the driveway came, the house appeared quite suddenly. It was a small manor house, not much bigger than one of the lodges on the edge of her father’s estate. But it was lovely nonetheless, built in a light grey stone.

  The stones were large and textured, not the smooth stone of the buildings of Hertfordshire, but the sort of stone that must have been quarried in this area. Her first thought was that it was much more pleasing to look at, especially with the darkest green ivy she had ever seen growing up from one side and across at least a quarter of the front of the building.

  The manor house was on two storeys, with square windows, their wooden frames painted white. And the wide wooden door was painted black, a gleaming black that looked almost wet it shone so.

  When the carriage finally drew to a halt, Catherine could hardly imagine what she should do next. She should be moving, but of course, she could not. Instead, she was rooted to the spot as if her gown had been sewn to the carriage seat.

  This was the moment she had been dreading, the moment she had been trying to put out of her mind every single day of her long journey to Derbyshire. She was about to meet her father’s sister when all she wanted to do was jump down from the carriage and run away.

  In her mind’s eye, she could see herself running down that twisting driveway; she could almost hear the crunch of the gravel under her boots. She would run and run until she had no more breath and what she did from that moment onwards hardly mattered at all. Catherine just wanted to be away.

  The carriage wobbled as the driver jumped down and continued to do so as he un-strapped her luggage from the back plate.

  Catherine remained in her seat, her mouth as dry as sand and her palms clammier than ever. And then she saw it; a movement out of the corner of her eye. It was the door, that gleaming, glossy black door slowly opening inwards. This was it; this was the moment.

  Catherine’s heart was pounding, and she wanted to look away, and yet she could not. All she could do was stare uselessly at that door and wait, not breathing until she saw her aunt at last.

  The woman in the doorway looked out curiously, her keen eyes taking in the carriage and the driver’s hurried occupations.

  She was wearing a dark blue gown that was simply cut with long sleeves, the toes of neat black boots peeping out from beneath its hem. Her hair was light, probably a little grey, but it was hard to tell given that she was fair-haired.

  There was something about the shape of the woman’s face that was familiar to Catherine, and she knew, without a doubt, that the woman in the doorway was her father’s sister.

  The woman suddenly came to life, hastening down the narrow stone steps and walking smartly towards the carriage. Despite all her determination not to show any signs of weakness, Catherine could not stop her hands shaking.

  She stared out of the carriage window as the woman approached, and the two of them locked eyes for a moment. The eyes were familiar too, for they were the same shape and colour as her father’s.

  The woman reached for the handle and opened the carriage door, and Catherine thought for all the world that she was going to faint at that moment.

  That was until the woman smiled. It was such a warm and welcoming smile that she no longer resembled the Earl of Barford in any way.

  “You must be my niece,” she said in the gentlest voice Catherine had heard since her own mother had died. “My dear Catherine, how tired you must be. Let us get you inside so that you may rest a while.” And with that, she reached into the carriage to take Catherine’s hand.

  Chapter 10

  Catherine’s little chamber at Ivy Manor always benefited from the sunshine first thing in the morning; when the sun was out at any rate. And that morning, it was shining brightly, proudly announcing that summer was well and truly upon them.

  Catherine had finally grown used to waking in that chamber, so small that it would have fitted into her old room at Barford Hall several times over. But, small as it was, she already felt at home there. She did not wake with the sense of muted dread that had been her constant companion for twenty years. Instead, there was a little sense of relief as she began to awaken every day, the sound of starlings and sparrows tweeting in the trees outside her window gently rousing her.

  But the sadness was still there, and she had come to realize in the last two months that it was something that would never go away. She had not just lost the only man she had ever loved, but she had been forced away from her beloved brother, and the pain of them both was something that she knew would be eternal.

  Still, Catherine knew how to be grateful for what she did have, even when what she had lost was without measure. She knew how to be grateful for peace at home, even the luxury of going down to breakfast at a sensible hour and not worrying about who would be at the table.

  Every day at Ivy Manor, to find either her aunt or uncle or both at the table was nothing short of a joy. They had both been so kind to her from the moment she had arrived, and it was a kindness that she had not expected for a moment.

  All her fears of a cruel aunt who thought and acted no better than the Earl of Barford had been dissolved into nothing within moments of her arrival.

  When her aunt had smiled at her so kindly and reached in to take her hands and help her down from the carriage, Catherine had almost wept with relief. She had been entirely unable to think of anything to say and had simply stared back at her dumbfounded aunt without making a sound, her mouth silently opening and closing as if there was something she ought to say but had forgotten how to say it.

  Celia Topwell had hurried her into the manor house, straight through into the drawing room. It seemed she had not been there a minute when a great tray of tea arrived, although Catherine was so dazed she could not have said who had set it down on the table.

  “You are quite shattered my dear, are you not?” Celia had sat down at her side on the little couch and had gently untied the ribbons of her bonnet and removed it for her. “I shall leave your cloak for a moment, for I think fatigue has left you a little cold. Still, a nice hot cup of tea will restore you, and food. You need food, my dear.”

  “You are so kind,” Catherine said incredulously and turned to look at her.

  Even though Celia Topwell’s eyes were exactly those of her brother, now that Catherine knew a little better, she could see the kindness in them. And even the shape of her face, which had so disturbingly reminded Catherine of her father, seemed to develop subtle differences before her very eyes, marking the woman out as somebody very different indeed.

  “You sound surprised, Catherine.” Celia laughed, and it was such a wonderful sound, so warm it was almost like an embrace. “But I cannot blame you for that. You no doubt wondered if I was the same sor
t of person as your father.”