by Carola Dunn
Constantia blinked away tears, blaming them on the champagne bubbles. Frank was regarding her with concern. She smiled at him, raised her glass, and silently mouthed, “Your health!”
“Your happiness,” he silently replied, and they both sipped their wine.
She was a peagoose to fear losing a friend. Whatever happened, she could not expect to go on seeing him daily for ever. Without his inheritance, without his sister’s engagement to her brother, she might never have seen him again once he left Westwood. Now he was going to be part of the family. She would seize any chance she was offered to visit Fanny and Felix in their new home.
As everyone returned to their luncheons, Felix said, “We have decided to leave the day after tomorrow to inspect the estates Fanny and Ingram have inherited.” He explained the situation to his parents.
So soon! Constantia thought, dismayed.
“Miss Ingram has no chaperon,” Lady Westwood pointed out. “Not even so much as an abigail, I collect.”
“I have always managed very well without, ma’am,” said Fanny.
“Indeed! But now you are connected with one of the first families of the realm and betrothed to my son.”
“Fanny is under my protection,” Frank said firmly.
“In her present circumstances a brother is insufficient,” the countess rebuked him with a frigid glance all too familiar to Constantia. “Miss Ingram requires a female companion.”
Fanny turned eagerly to Constantia. “Connie, will you come? I have been wishing for your company, though I didn’t like to invite you until we have set the houses in order.”
“A splendid notion,” said Felix.
“Please, do come, Lady Constantia.” The captain’s voice was quiet but his sincerity decided her.
“I should love to go with you,” she said.
“You most certainly shall not,” her mother at once forbade her. “It is out of the question.”
Perhaps emboldened by the champagne, Constantia argued. “I shall take Joan, Mama, and Felix will be there.”
“I’ll go, too, Connie.” Vickie entered the lists, unabashed by the lack of an invitation. “I can help to look after Anita.”
“Then Miss Bannister shall go with us, to chaperon us all,” said Constantia triumphantly--and quickly, before her mother could squash the proposal so thoroughly it was beyond reviving.
Lady Westwood’s next protest suggested a weakening resistance. “I hardly suppose, Constantia, that having invited you the Ingrams will be eager to accommodate your sister and a retinue.”
“They will be most welcome,” Fanny assured her, “if there is sufficient room at Upfield Grange.” She looked an enquiry at Mr Mackintyre.
“Plenty of room, Miss Ingram, plenty of room.”
“Lady Westwood,” Frank added his plea, “I shall be most grateful if you will permit your daughters to accompany Fanny. Quite apart from the need of a chaperon, I know my sister will be glad of feminine company.”
The countess looked from him to Constantia, then exchanged a significant glance with her husband. “Very well, you may both go for a short visit, until it is time to prepare for the Little Season.”
Even as she rejoiced, Constantia had qualms. She was sure her mother hoped that the captain, now well-connected and wealthy, might offer to take her recalcitrant daughter off her hands. Constantia had no reason to suppose he liked her well enough to want to marry her. She prayed he would not propose, for if he did she would have to refuse and she could not bear to hurt him.
* * * *
Grey rain pattered on the roof of the Westwoods’ landau as it turned, squelching, from the muddy lane into the equally muddy drive of Upfield Grange. An avenue of elms dripped on either side. One had fallen, doubtless some time past for no leaves showed green on the bare branches of its crown and the exposed roots were washed clean of soil.
“I’m surprised no one has used that for timber,” said Frank, peering out into the gloom, “or at least for firewood.”
Constantia smiled at him, glad that the evidence of neglect did not depress his spirits. He had borne the journey very well, sitting up rather than reclining on the seat, which was fortunate as Vickie and Miss Bannister shared the carriage. Anita spent half her time with them, too, alternating with Felix’s new phaeton.
“I daresay the duke would have had anyone transported who was so bold as to appropriate his wood,” Constantia suggested, “even if he did not want it himself.”
“Or hanged, drawn, and quartered,” Vickie proposed with relish, bringing a faint protest from her governess. Travel disagreed with Miss Bannister; she was out of curl though they had taken two leisurely days to cover the eighty miles.
“Bloodthirsty wench,” Frank said with a grin. “My grandfather may have been a tyrant, but things are going to change now that I’m master here. I hope there’s good fishing,” he added as they crossed a bridge over a murky stream.
“You have definitely decided that you shall have Upfield Grange, and Fanny Heathcote?” Constantia asked.
“Simply because your mama insists it’s not proper for Fanny to play hostess to her betrothed, and the Grange is in better repair for immediate occupancy. So I shall be your host.”
“I wager Mama didn’t like that much either,” Vickie observed.
“She didn’t, but apparently it’s acceptable since Fanny, your brother, and Miss Bannister will be in residence. I don’t believe I’ll ever really understand the ins and outs of propriety.”
“It sometimes seems a great deal of fuss over nothing,” Constantia agreed. “Thank heaven she gave her permission before she realized precisely what is involved. Oh, look, here is the house. Good gracious!”
The landau jolted to a halt before a large house in the most fantastical Gothic style. Towers and turrets, battlements and buttresses, arched windows and oriel windows, even gargoyles leering down from the roof parapet, nothing was missing.
Heedless of the rain, Vickie jumped down from the carriage, not waiting for the footman to descend from his damp perch to let down the step. “Oh!” she breathed in an ecstasy, “isn’t it heavenly? Does it not bring to mind mad monks and persecuted maidens? I’m sure you must have a ghost, Captain, or even two!”
Frank went off into peals of helpless laughter. Constantia eyed him uncertainly, wondering if he were more tired than she had supposed and growing hysterical.
With a gasp, he stopped laughing and said, “To think I expected to retire to an unobtrusive life in a modest country manor! Anyone residing in that must surely be destined to figure as either an ogre or a sorcerer--or possibly a mad monk.”
“Or an enchanted prince, or an Arthurian knight,” Constantia proposed. “It is certainly neither unobtrusive nor modest. Vickie, you will be soaked to the skin. Run to the porch at once. I cannot wait to see inside.”
Vickie scampered across the potholed, weed-grown gravel to the shelter of the porch, the open-arched ground floor of a tower superimposed on the façade of the central block. There she seized in both hands a massive iron door-knocker in the form of a dragon’s head. With it, she beat a zestful tattoo.
By the time Thomas had escorted the rest of the travellers under his black umbrella to the porch, the iron-studded and banded door was slowly creaking open. A small, balding man in a rusty black coat peered at them myopically.
“Us wasn’t expecting so many,” he quavered in a voice full of doubt.
Frank looked as if he was about to dissolve in laughter again, so Constantia took charge.
“I am Lady Constantia Roworth,” she said briskly, moving forward so that the butler--if such he claimed to be--was forced to retreat. “You must have received the letters regarding our coming, and in any case I am sure my brother and Miss Ingram have arrived already. They were well ahead of us upon the highway.”
“They’m come,” he conceded grudgingly.
“Are there dungeons?” Vickie demanded.
“For heaven’s sake, Vickie, the du
ngeons can wait. Miss Bannister is unwell, and I for one want nothing so much as a cup of tea.”
“And tea you shall have,” Fanny promised, emerging from an archway, “if you don’t mind drinking it in the kitchen. The drawing-room is all in holland covers, and goodness knows what is under them. Frank, are you...yes, you look well but you ought to sit down. My dear Miss Bannister, pray come and see if a cup of tea will not revive you. The kettle is on the hob.”
Before following the others through the archway, Constantia threw a glance around the chamber they had entered from the porch. To her delight, it was a Tudor Great Hall, smaller than Westwood’s had been, but with all the proper appurtenances: elaborately carved panelling, chimneypiece, and staircase; high, vaulted ceiling; and a gallery around three sides. On either side of the entrance tower, tall, leaded windows under pointed arches admitted a minimum of dull daylight through their grimy diamond panes. The woodwork was dingy, sadly in need of polish, and cobwebs hung from the gallery and ceiling beams, but that could be put to rights.
Frank was waiting for her by the archway under the gallery at one end of the hall. “I’m sorry,” he said, chagrined, as they proceeded along a dusty corridor. “I’d not have dragged you here for the world had I known what a shocking state the place is in.”
“I’d not have missed it for the world. The Gothic façade must be a quite recent addition since the hall is undoubtedly sixteenth-century, and just what I particularly like.”
“Is it, truly?” he asked, gratified. “It looks deuced--dashed--grim to me. Not that I haven’t been in some odd lodgings in my time, but I daresay Westwood and Nettledene have raised my expectations! To have to invite you to take tea in the kitchen is mortifying, to say the least.”
She touched his arm consolingly. “You will need to hire servants, that is all. There are bound to be women in the village who will like to earn extra money by coming in to help put everything in order to start with.”
“Mackintyre did warn us there is no one but an elderly couple, Mr and Mrs Biddle, as caretakers. I had not realized, though, just how much care a house needs. I’m glad you are come, for Fanny won’t have the least notion how to go about hiring servants.”
Constantia was pleased that he took it for granted she would assist his sister, but she said doubtfully, “I will do what I can. Our housekeeper and butler hire most of our indoor servants. Though Mama had me attend several interviews, some years ago, so that I would know how to go about it, the only servant I have ever chosen myself is my abigail, Joan.”
“That’s more than Fanny’s ever done. Where does one start?”
“With the vicar’s wife. She will know of respectable people in need of work.”
“Let’s hope the vicar is married, then. Oh Lord, I’ve just thought: if Mackintyre judges this place habitable, what condition do you suppose the house at Heathcote is in?”
At that moment they reached the kitchen. The spotless cosiness of the large room suggested that the Biddles spent most of their time there, but just now they seemed to have vanished. Miss Bannister was already seated at the well-scrubbed whitewood table, where Anita knelt on a chair with bread-and-jam in her hand and jam on her face. Vickie wandered about exclaiming over bright copper pans, wooden spoons, and other kitchen equipment unfamiliar to the daughter of an earl. At the wide fireplace, Fanny was swinging a hook bearing a steaming kettle off the fire.
The young footman, also steaming by the fire, sprang to help her. Felix was there first, potholders in hand.
“Do you remember, Fanny,” he said, lifting the kettle, “how once in Brussels I went to the kitchen to ask Henriette for tea and I claimed to be domesticated? You told me I must learn to make the tea for myself. The moment has come. What do I do next?”
Fanny laughed, plainly not in the least dispirited by her surroundings. “The teapot is already warmed and the tea-leaves measured into it, so all you need do is pour on the water. Connie, Frank, do sit down. Are you hungry? I can offer bread and jam.”
“So we see,” said Frank, grinning at Anita.
“It’s good jam, Uncle Frank.” Catching a drip, she licked her hand.
Soon they were all seated about the table with cups of tea, except Thomas, who bashfully accepted a mug but continued to stand steaming at the fire.
“Well,” said Frank, regarding his guests with a rueful air, “what can I say but welcome to Upfield Grange? I believe I can safely promise you all an unusual visit.”
They were laughing when Biddle reappeared. He was accompanied by a little old woman, bent with rheumatism, in a white cap and a grey gown with the wide, quilted skirts of a former age. Peering around the company, he spotted Frank and marched up to him, his wife in tow.
“You be Cap’n Ingram, the new master, sir?”
“That’s right.”
“Us can’t do it, sir, not nohow.” He made a helpless gesture at the horde invading his haven. “Us be caretakers, sir, me and the missis, not butlers and housemaids and cooks and such.”
Mrs Biddle nodded her crooked head and a tear trickled down her wrinkled cheek.
Frank took her hand in his. “My dear Mrs Biddle, you shan’t be expected to do anything beyond your strength. I hope you and Biddle will consent to stay and help as you can until I’m able to hire a proper staff, but whenever you choose to go, you shall have a pension.”
Constantia, sitting beyond Frank, saw the light of hope enter the old woman’s faded eyes. “Us’ll help, sir, to be sure.” She faltered. “‘Ee won’t bawl at un, like his grace do? I han’t made up but two beds yet, sir.”
“Fanny,” Constantia exclaimed, eyeing the twisted hand engulfed in Frank’s, “surely you and Vickie and I can make up the beds ourselves?”
Frank’s look of gratitude was reward enough for any amount of unpleasant labour.
“Oh yes!” Vickie appeared to regard the whole situation as a splendid adventure. “You’ll have to show us how, Fanny.”
“It won’t take long.”
“Joan should be here soon, too,” said Constantia, “with the luggage, and your man, Felix.”
“I shouldn’t dare ask Trevor to make beds,” her brother declared.
Fanny wrinkled her nose at him. “No, he is quite the most disobliging person. Mrs Biddle, have the linens been aired?”
“Oh, aye, miss, that they have.”
“Excellent. Thomas, if you are nearly dry, pray carry--” She stopped as the kitchen’s back door opened.
The Westwoods’ coachman and Felix’s new groom came in, the former with a decidedly grumpy expression. Though he seemed a trifle abashed to find the kitchen full of gentry, he addressed Felix in no uncertain terms. “Beggin’ your pardon, m’lord, but them stables is fit for neither man nor beast.”
Felix grimaced, then gave Frank an apologetic look. “I know,” he said to the coachman, “but you are to return to Westwood tomorrow with the landau. Dutton, have you managed to make my pair reasonably comfortable?”
Before the groom could answer, young Thomas stepped forward. “Please, my lord,” he cried, “Don’t make me go back to Westwood. My lady!” He turned to Constantia and begged, “Let me stay. I asked special to be let come to serve you. I’ll do anything, honest. I’ll make beds or...or even clean out the stables.”
Astonished, touched, even a little flattered, Constantia said, “Yes, you may stay, Thomas. Felix, did not Mama say Fanny and Vickie and I must take a footman to wait upon us?”
“She did.” He grinned. “However, I believe what she had in mind was your consequence, not my horses’ comfort.”
Frank groaned. “If anything is certain,” he said, “it’s that Lady Westwood would never have let you come, Lady Constantia, if she’d had the slightest notion of the state of things at Upfield Grange.”
Constantia smiled at him. “So we can only be grateful, Captain, that she did not know.”
* * * *
By the next morning, Constantia’s theoretical knowledge of runni
ng a large household and Fanny’s practical experience of providing necessary comforts had together resulted in a plan. Frank’s house was to be refurbished from attic to cellar. To start with, Felix had agreed to drive them into King’s Wallop, the nearest village, to call at the vicarage.
It had taken the efforts of both ladies to persuade Felix to postpone riding over to Heathcote to inspect his and Fanny’s future home. Their efforts had been less successful where Frank himself was concerned. He refused to spend the morning abed, recuperating from the journey. Thomas and Dutton had carried a chaise longue out to a sheltered corner of the overgrown courtyard garden behind the house, and there the captain consented to recline in the sun. Constantia and Fanny left him poring over an account of Upfield’s tenants and rents that Mr Mackintyre had given him.
Miss Bannister, still suffering from a slight headache, was resting in her chamber at their insistence. Vickie had taken Anita off to explore the house.
Having put on their gloves and bonnets, the ladies descended the three steps from the bedroom passage to the gallery, crossed the gallery towards the main stairs down to the hall. Voices came from below, where Anita and Vickie were studying the wonders of the ornately carved chimneypiece.
“Look, Aunt Vickie, there’s swans. I like giving bread to swans.”
“We’ll have to see if we can find some near here,” said Vickie. “Look at these little tiny fishes.”
“Bless her.” Fanny squeezed Constantia’s hand. “And bless you, too. What should I do without the two of you?”
“We are both enjoying ourselves immensely. You cannot imagine how wonderful it is to have something useful to do.”
As they approached the head of the stairs, the great oak front door crashed open. The man in riding dress who appeared on the threshold was so large, his posture so belligerent, that Constantia would not have been surprised had he roared, “Fee, fi, fo, fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman.” Had not Frank said the Grange resembled an ogre’s abode?
