“And we must not spoil that friendship by doing anything stupid like getting married,” she cried.
“Indeed we must not.”
“So we are agreed. But whatever are we going to do now?” Vanda asked.
“Your father will not be pleased by our decision, but if he tries to harass me I shall simply refuse to discuss the subject.”
“That is all very well for you,” Vanda retorted darkly. “You can keep away from him, but I cannot and you know how he goes on and on. It is not going to be pleasant listening to him complaining at me from morning to night.”
“You will suffer more than I will,” Robert commented, pitying her.
He was remembering how often the Lord Lieutenant had got his own way, actually forcing people into doing what he believed was right.
“We must do something,” he mused, without really meaning to speak.
There was silence. Then Vanda said,
“I am going to leave home.”
“My dear girl! And go where?”
“Anywhere,” she replied firmly.
“That might prove a rather difficult destination.”
“I am of age. Quite a middle-aged spinster really. I have my own money. I can do as I like.”
“I am afraid that a woman can never really do as she likes,” Robert said sympathetically. “In that respect it really is an unjust world.”
“I cannot afford to worry about being persecuted,” Vanda said in her decided tone. “I must do what I think is right for me, whatever the world says.”
“And you think running away is right for you?”
“I am not running away. I am leaving home. There is a big difference.”
“But Miss Sudbury –”
“Why have you suddenly started to call me 'Miss Sudbury', instead of Vanda?”
“You told me to,” he explained patiently.
“But that was ages ago. Anyway, it's all different now.”
Robert tore at his hair.
“I pity the man who marries you,” he breathed through gritted teeth. “You will drive him into an early grave.”
“Well, as long as it isn't you,” she replied heartlessly, “you need not worry.”
“I begin to think it should be my duty to marry you and save some other poor fellow from a dreadful fate.”
“Why on earth should you do that?” she asked, fascinated.
“Because when I arrive at the bar of Heaven, St. Peter will show me this frail, distraught creature who was once your husband, and say to me, 'you could have saved him! You knew what she was like. Instead you allowed this poor creature go to his doom without a word.'”
“Yes,” she parried with relish, “and then you will be punished for enjoying your wicked life with all those disreputable ladies, instead of yoking yourself to me and suffering like a man.”
“That's right, and – what do you know about my disreputable ladies?”
“I told you before – I hear the gossip.”
“Gossip about the marriage market, but you said 'disreputable ladies'.”
“Yes, I did, didn't I?” she said, giving him a challenging look.
He decided that it would be safer not to pursue this probe any further.
“We are getting off the subject,” he said hastily.
“What was the subject?”
“You and this absurd idea of running away.”
“It's not absurd. Papa is going away next week to visit his brother in the far North. He will be gone for at least a month. As usual he is trying to tidy up everything before he leaves, including you and me.”
“I don't like being tidied up,” Robert observed.
“Neither do I. As soon as Papa has left, I shall go abroad. I have been planning to visit France and Italy for some time. I have learned the languages, but never found a chance to use them.”
“But you cannot just go travelling alone.”
“I shall not be alone. I shall have Jenny.”
“Your maid is hardly an acceptable companion. Vanda, you must abandon this wild idea.”
Her eyes kindled in a way he recognised as the approach of temper.
“May I remind you, sir, that you are not my husband, and have no right to give me orders!”
He ground his teeth.
“It was not an order, madam, but a friendly suggestion.”
“It was an order.”
“It was not.”
“It was. And I do not take orders from a man to whom I have just escaped marriage by the skin of my teeth.”
“On the contrary. You were never in the slightest danger. But as your friend –”
“You think you can assume an authority over me. You are mistaken. There is no way you can stop me.”
“I could warn your father.”
He regretted the words as soon as they were spoken. Vanda leapt to her feet, her eyes wild with betrayal.
“You would do that?”
“No, no, of course not. I didn't mean it, Vanda. I just cannot bear the thought of you going off into the wide blue yonder with no male protection.”
“I don't need male protection.”
“You do.”
“I do not!”
“You do, and stop arguing, I am trying to think.”
She fell silent but began to pace the room, occasionally throwing him ironic glances as he frowned with the effort.
“Well?” she asked at last. “Have you come up with a suggestion of staggering brilliance?”
“Yes,” he said with an air of sudden decision. “I have.
I am coming with you. That way I won't have nightmares about your safety.”
“Are you serious?”
“Perfectly. When your father returns and finds you gone, I don't want to be here. This way we will both escape.”
“But can we travel together without scandal?” she breathed.
“We will be brother and sister. What could be easier?” Robert was becoming fired with enthusiasm. “And who knows? When we return one or perhaps both of us may have found the answer to our problems.”
“You mean we might find the love of our life?” she asked eagerly.
“I certainly think we are more likely to find that by travelling away from here where we already know everyone.”
“You are right. I will leave Papa a letter saying that I have gone to visit friends in Europe. And you can always say you are fishing in Scotland or Ireland and people will accept it as a matter of course.”
“As long as he doesn't suspect that we are together,” she said. “Then he would try to say that we must marry because I was compromised. But we will not allow that to happen.”
Quite unexpectedly Robert laughed.
“I do not believe it,” he said. “Here we are planning this outrageous trip as though it was the most natural thing in the world.”
“Can we really do it?” Vanda asked.
“Of course. We will go to Paris first –”
“Paris!” Vanda sighed. “We can see the Paris Exposition. It is still on, isn't it?”
“Yes, until November.”
“Then we can see everything – that tower they say is the tallest in the world –”
“The Eiffel Tower,” Robert supplied.
“That's right. And there are so many other places to see –”
“We will see them all,” he promised. “And then we'll live from day to day, go wherever we want and leave or stay just as we want.”
Vanda gave a cry of delight.
“It's a wonderful idea. And it will be very difficult for Papa to find out exactly where we are.”
“That's settled,” said Robert. “I will leave now and start making my arrangements. If your father departs in two days' time, we will depart the very next day, early in the morning, before anyone is awake.”
“It is the most exciting thing that has ever happened to me,” Vanda said. “I feel in my heart that we will be successful. No one, not even Papa, can stop us now.”
Robert laughed.
“If we are successful and I am sure we will be,” he said, “I will be exceedingly grateful to the powers-that-be for the rest of my life.”
He walked towards the door, opened it and looked back at Vanda “One thing is very obvious,” he said.
“What is that?” Vanda enquired.
“No one can say we haven't tried,” he replied.
Then, as he shut the door, he heard her laugh.
*
For the next few days Robert was extremely busy, sending messages to everyone with whom he held engagements for the next few weeks.
He and Vanda made their arrangements in an exchange of notes. Her carriage would be waiting behind the rear wall where it could not be seen from the house. Robert would drive up in his own carriage. His valet and coachman would deposit his bags in Vanda's coach and then his coachman would return home with a tale of having delivered him to the nearest railway station.
Several times the Lord Lieutenant called to see him, but Robert sent messages to say that he was not at home. Only on the last day did he receive Sir Quentin, but he refused to allow him to mention the dangerous subject.
He achieved this by the simple method of talking constantly about his fishing trip to Scotland. As he babbled on and on, he realised that he was sounding slightly foolish, but anything was better than allowing Sir Quentin to speak.
At last the Lord Lieutenant gave up and departed, only saying,
“I shall call on you as soon as I return. We have many plans to make.”
Robert groaned, and resolved to double the time he would be away. Sir Quentin made him feel hounded and nothing could drive him away more certainly than such a feeling.
He had felt hounded for far too long. Young women and their parents pursued him, attracted, he was sure, by his wealth and title.
He was not a vain man and so it did not occur to him to consider the likely effects of his good looks and charm. He merely assumed that their interest in him was mercenary and it had made him cynical.
He had long ago made up his mind that he would not marry unless he was very much in love with his dream Goddess, and quite certain that she was the woman who would give him the happiness that no other woman would be able to do.
He had seen so many of his friends get married and regret it as soon as they had walked up the aisle.
“I was a damn fool,” one of them had said to him. “We seemed well matched to me and our parents were so anxious for the marriage that I was a bridegroom almost before I became aware of it.”
“And it was a failure?” Robert had asked.
“A complete failure,” his friend replied. “I found her tiresome and disagreeable with nothing in common – which, to be fair, may be as much my fault as hers.”
Other men with whom he had been at school had found themselves in the same position.
One had a wife who had run off with another man and left him with two children.
It was friends like these who had made Robert swear to himself that he would never suffer as they were suffering.
He had never once met a girl who had made him feel that she could be the right wife for him.
'Perhaps now I never will,' he thought, as he made urgent preparations to escape yet one more father who was determined to force him up the aisle.
The irony of the fact that he was escaping in the company of the very daughter he was refusing to marry was not lost on him.
The Lord Lieutenant was due to leave that evening. To make sure that he had really gone, Robert allowed one of his grooms, who was sweet on a housemaid at Sudbury Grange, to have the evening off to court her. The lad returned to say that Sir Quentin had departed and to deliver a letter for the Earl.
Opening it, Robert found just one sentence written on the sheet of paper.
I will be ready tomorrow morning at six o'clock before everyone in the house is awake.
There was no signature, but he knew it was Vanda's handwriting.
He sent a note by return which was as brief as hers.
Six thirty and don't be late.
He arrived promptly next morning. Vanda met him, smiling with relief.
As her coachman started to help with the baggage she said in a voice loud enough to be heard by anyone,
“I am so glad that you're on time, because the London train leaves Maidstone at seven-fifteen.”
“And I certainly don't wish to miss it,” Robert replied in the same tone. “My friends in London are expecting me, as, I dare say, are yours.”
“Yes, indeed,” she said brightly. “Do you intend to remain in London for long before moving on?”
“A week perhaps,” he replied. “Then I will be heading for Scotland and some really good fishing.”
Having made sure that everyone knew they were going to London, they took their seats in the carriage. Jenny, Vanda's maid, chose to sit on the box. She had eyes for the coachman who was certainly very handsome.
“What will your father think when he finds you gone?” he whispered as they moved off.
“I left a note saying I am staying with friends. I have given the name of people who do not exist and said we might all be going abroad for a week or two.”
Robert laughed.
“You are a genius, that is just what you are!” he told her. “I hope I have been as clever as you, but I doubt it.”
“Never mind,” she smiled kindly. “I don't suppose duplicity comes as naturally to you as it does to me.”
“Does it come naturally to you?” he asked, slightly startled by this frank speech.
“It does to every woman. As you said yourself, the world is unjust to women. This is how we survive.”
When he was silent she said,
“Now I have shocked you.”
“Not really. When I think of my sisters, there isn't one of them who is capable of telling a plain fact, or confining themselves to the truth if they could think of a better fantasy.”
“It's easy for you to disapprove. You are the master and can afford to be plain. A woman has to use roundabout and subtle ways.”
On reflection he had to admit that she was speaking a great deal of truth.
“We ought to consider what we are going to call ourselves,” Vanda suggested.
“I have thought about this. I believe I should keep my own name. It will be a lot simpler.”
“Then who am I?”
“One of my sisters.”
“Which one?”
“It doesn't matter,” he said with a grin. “Everyone lost count of them years ago.”
“Yes, I see how that could work,” she mused. “Anyone who is confused about which one I am will not be able to say so.”
Soon the carriage was driving into the forecourt of Maidstone Station. The coachman summoned a porter to assist them with the luggage.
“These are for the London train.”
“I will go and buy the tickets,” Robert said, beginning to walk into the station.
“Goodbye Cooper,” Vanda said. “Hasten home.”
“Hadn't I better stay and see you aboard the train, Miss Vanda?”
“That won't be necessary,” she said brightly. “Goodbye, Cooper.”
“I don't know, miss. It seems to me –”
“Goodbye, Cooper.”
After what seemed like an age he drove away. Vanda and Jenny hurried into the station, to find Robert buying tickets.
“Our luggage is on its way to the Dover platform,” he said. “I explained the change as soon as we were out of Cooper's sight.”
“I had the greatest difficulty getting rid of him,” Vanda said gloomily. “Let's hide in the waiting room until the train comes.”
“Hide? Are we a pair of hiding criminals, then?”
“It feels like it. Isn't it fun?”
After a moment he was obliged to admit that it was at least a novel experience.
“How much do I owe you?” she asked as they entered the waiting
room.
“Nothing.”
“You cannot pay for my ticket and Jenny's. Now how much?”
Seeing the baleful look in her eyes, he hastened to tell her the amount. Vanda counted it out and thrust it forcibly into his hand in a manner that reminded him of Lady Macbeth plunging in a dagger.
“Thank you,” he said meekly.
When the train reached the station, they boarded it without further incident and a couple of hours later they were steaming into Dover. Robert purchased the ferry tickets, after promising Vanda that she could pay her share and soon they were aboard.
Vanda stood eagerly at the rail, watching the bustling port, almost stamping her feet with eagerness to be gone.
“Will you be patient?” he asked her.
“No,” she replied at once.
Robert laughed.
“I might have guessed you would say that.”
“I suppose you find me very annoying,” Vanda responded cheerfully.
“No, I am feeling very kindly towards you at the moment. I was feeling a bit bored with my life and you have found me a new adventure.”
He eyed her mischievously as he added,
“It may, of course, all end in tears and recriminations.”
“Never,” Vanda said firmly. “Because you have been brave enough to take me on this marvellous voyage, I will always be grateful, even if at the end of our journey, I return to find that Papa has discovered another Earl or perhaps even a Duke who he would like as his son-in-law.”
“Ahah! You are planning to exchange me for a Duke! Now I see the whole plot.”
Looking up into his face, alive with laughter and the breeze ruffling his hair, Vanda thought that at that moment she would not exchange him for any other man on earth.
It had never occurred to her that he was so handsome.
'But he probably looks especially good to me just now,' she thought, 'because he is giving me my own way. It is just my over-bearing, high-handed nature that's giving him a halo.'
The thought made her laugh, and Robert looked at her quickly.
“What is it?” he asked.
“Nothing, I – oh, look we're moving.”
They had indeed started to glide away from the quay and in another few minutes they had left the port behind.
“We are on our way,” Robert said to Vanda and she laughed with joy.
In Search of Love Page 3
