The Baron's Honourable Daughter

by Lynn Morris

  “Now let us pray a prayer of Saint Dominic. I ask you to pray responsively.”

  May God the Father who made us bless us.

  May God the Son send his healing among us.

  May God the Holy Ghost move within us and give us eyes to see

  with, ears to hear with, and hands that Your work might be done.

  May we walk and preach the word of God to all.

  May the angel of peace watch over us and lead us at last by God’s

  grace to the Kingdom.

  Amen.

  The servants filed silently back to the servants’ passage. As Regina and St. John went toward the morning room, Mrs. Purefoy, following them, took Valeria’s arm in a companionable manner. “What a sweet little homily that was,” she said. “I was unaware that you had a family chaplain.”

  “Actually Mr. Chalmers is my brother’s tutor,” Valeria answered.

  “Oh? But surely he wears clergyman’s dress,” Mrs. Purefoy observed.

  “Yes, he is an ordained clergyman, educated at Cambridge. Unfortunately the benefice that he is promised is not yet vacant, and so he was gracious enough to accept the onerous responsibility of trying to educate my brother.” What Valeria didn’t tell this gossipy woman was that Mr. Chalmers had had to leave Cambridge early. His father was a gentleman, with a small estate near Bellegarde, but his bank had failed, and he had gone into bankruptcy. Mr. Chalmers had been forced to go to work to help out his parents. The Chalmerses were distant cousins of Lord Maledon’s, and Regina had persuaded him to offer Mr. Chalmers the position of tutor at the exceptional wage of eighty pounds per annum.

  The morning room was altogether a most cheerful room, and when no guests were at Bellegarde, the family took all their meals there. It was also the only room on the first floor that Lord Maledon had allowed Regina to redecorate and refurbish. From another dreary, dark parlor she had made it into a delightful breakfast room and sitting room. The earth-brown ceiling was painted a soft cool tan. The walnut paneling was painted cornflower blue, and the fireplace surround was painted white. Luminous botanical prints by Pierre-Joseph Redouté lined the walls. The draperies for the four large windows were a bright blue-and-yellow-striped damask. All the furniture was much more modern than the furnishings in the rest of the house; the sideboard and dining table and chairs were by Sheraton, and at the other end of the room the sitting area had comfortable sofas, settees, wing chairs, and side and tea tables by Hepplewhite.

  Trueman stood by the heavy-laden sideboard, impassive as always. Regina, St. John, Valeria, and Mrs. Purefoy had all helped themselves and were already seated and eating when the others began to come in. Miss Shadwell, clinging to Mr. Mayhew’s arm, was followed by Colonel Bayliss. Mr. Mayhew had a difficult time preparing his plate, as Miss Shadwell persisted in hanging on him and trilling on about his teaching her to play billiards. “Lady Jex-Blake learned so quickly, she assured me that I could learn quickly also, as she says—not that I believe it for an instant—but she says that I’m quite as dexterous as she—and she assures me that you are such an expert hand at the game…” On the previous evening, after more rowdy cards, the gentlemen had decided to play billiards. Lady Jex-Blake had insisted on accompanying them to the billiard room, which was particularly a male habitation, and declared that if they would teach her to play, she would soon beat all of them.

  Finally Mr. Mayhew, Miss Shadwell, and Colonel Bayliss got their plates and seated themselves. When Miss Shadwell took a bite and her unending sentence paused, Colonel Bayliss said, “I’ve a mind for some coarse fishing this afternoon, Mayhew, what about it, eh? Maledon tells me the lake is full-stocked with carp, pike, and tench. I relish a good wrestle with a pike, they’re cunning creatures. Good eating too, if you’re careful of the bones.”

  Mr. Mayhew answered in his bored drawl, “Don’t care much for coarse fishing myself.”

  “What about you, Lord Stamborne? Do you fish?” Colonel Bayliss asked.

  St. John’s eyes lit up. “Oh, yes, sir! And I do so like coarse fishing!”

  “Then what about it, Lady Maledon? I’ll take the boy fishing, and drag Mayhew along too. It’ll do him good to match wits with a pike, wake him up.”

  Regina smiled. “That’s very kind of you, Colonel. Now that St. John has heard you offer, I doubt I could say no even if I wished to. I do have a suggestion. Perhaps, ladies, we might have a picnic at the lake this afternoon, and watch the gentlemen in their struggles with the pike.”

  This was highly agreeable to Miss Shadwell and Mrs. Purefoy, and Valeria too. She had dreaded another endless afternoon in the drawing room watching Miss Shadwell and Mrs. Purefoy writing their letters. The ladies all began talking about the appropriate afternoon dresses and bonnets for a picnic.

  Lady Jex-Blake came in, looking very heavy-eyed, for the billiard players had stayed up until after three o’clock in the morning. She greeted everyone, and took her seat by St. John, smiling down at him. Then she waited expectantly.

  Although the footmen always served luncheon and dinner, they never served breakfast. The diners helped themselves from the sideboard. Trueman attended because he watched over the sideboard in case the dishes needed replenishing, replaced the silver warming-covers after the diners had helped themselves, and watched the warming candles to make sure they stayed lit.

  Regina, perceiving the situation, was making very small indications by her expression to Trueman, when Mrs. Purefoy abruptly said, “Lady Jex-Blake, you really must try this kidney pie, I declare it is the most sumptuous I’ve ever had! Here, allow me to show you—” She jumped up out of her chair and went to the sideboard, staring intently at Lady Jex-Blake, who suddenly looked chagrined, but quickly recovered and went to prepare her plate.

  Watching them, St. John looked greatly confused, and he opened his mouth, but quickly Regina said, “Lady Jex-Blake, we have decided to picnic at the lake this afternoon, for the gentlemen are going fishing. Would you care to join us?”

  “A picnic? Hm. Maledon said I might go for a ride this afternoon, I long for some exercise,” she answered.

  “Of course you’re welcome to ride,” Regina said graciously. “It is a full two miles to the lake, so perhaps you might join us if you should decide to ride in the south park.”

  “I would like that very much, thank you,” Lady Jex-Blake said.

  They were all discussing how they were to be transported to the lake when Lord Maledon came in. His eyes were brighter than usual, and he looked excited. Valeria thought that he often seemed excitable, restless, even to the point of agitation, these days.

  “Good news, good news!” he said, helping himself to dry toast at the sideboard. “Trueman, get me some ale, will you, can’t stand tea for breakfast anymore.” He sat down and announced, “Kincannon’s sent us an invitation to join him up at his shooting box in the West Riding. I’ve heard he’s got the best grouse and partridge south of Scotland. You know, I tried to get him to join us here but he said he had some affairs at home to attend to. He writes that he’s all settled up, and is having a large party join him at Clayburn.”

  “Who is invited?” Lady Jex-Blake blurted out. “Who is included in the invitation?”

  “All of you,” Maledon said expansively. “He knew of the party, you see, and he’s included all of my guests in the invitation.”

  “How thrilling! How kind, how obliging, how generous, for Lord Kincannon to include us!” Miss Shadwell said fulsomely. “After all, we only met him the one time, when you introduced us, Lord Maledon. How far, exactly, is it to his shooting box?”

  “About two hundred miles,” Colonel Bayliss said, frowning. “I was there last season. It’s a devil of a journey. But worth it, eh? You’re right about Clayburn, Maledon, it’s the best shooting I ever saw. One day we killed over three thousand birds!”

  Lady Jex-Blake said carelessly, “Well, Mrs. Purefoy, I for one think that traveling by post chaise to the West Riding would be the worst kind of nightmare. What abo
ut loaning us one of your carriages, Maledon? You can spare it, you have six.”

  “Seven,” he said proudly. “Don’t worry, I’ll make the travel arrangements for us all, it’s nothing. We’ll leave tomorrow.” He jumped out of his chair, then, as an afterthought, turned to speak to Regina. “By the way, my dear, Hylton sent us an invitation to Foxden Park for the opening of grouse. I’ll decline it, of course, we couldn’t possibly leave our guests stranded, could we?”

  “Of course not, dear,” Regina said softly. Again, only Valeria could see the trace of sadness in her mother’s deep-blue eyes.

  * * *

  Valeria couldn’t help but vent her anger to Joan as she was dressing for the picnic. “He’s behaving as if he’s some young bachelor rake, gadding about with his awful hangers-on!” she cried. “They all sat right there, so excited about going to Clayburn, making their plans, discussing it with such animation, right in front of my mother—who was not even invited!”

  Soothingly Joan said, “I’m of the mind that her ladyship wouldn’t wish to go anyway.”

  “She certainly wouldn’t. I know of Lord Kincannon, he’s been my stepfather’s friend for a long time. I’ve never met him, but Lady Hylton told me that he’s one of the worst libertines in England. He’s extremely wealthy, and she said that he spends thousands of pounds on his rowdy parties. And there was my stepfather again, snubbing my mother, telling her that he’ll decline our invitation to go to Foxden.”

  “Now Foxden is—?” Joan hinted.

  “Foxden Park is Lord Hylton’s shooting lodge. You did know that Lady Hylton—the current baron’s mother—is my godmother? And St. John’s too. Yes, her family is connected with the Segraves. Lady Hylton adored my father, it seems, and she has always been a good friend to my mother and me.” Valeria was silent as she recalled how Lady Hylton had been the only person able to persuade her mother to rejoin society—in fact, to rejoin the world—after Lord Segrave died.

  The estate of the Baron Segrave naturally passed from father to son, but as Guy Segrave had had no male heir, Ryalsmere was inherited by his nephew, his younger brother’s son. Guy’s brother, Valeria’s uncle, had died of typhoid fever in 1790, leaving one son, William. William was very unlike Valeria’s father: he was a rather shy, bookish man who was completely dominated by his mother. When William inherited and became the twenty-fourth Baron Segrave, and his mother became Lady Segrave, they wanted to move into Ryalsmere immediately, and the new lady of Ryalsmere made it very clear that Regina and Valeria were not welcome.

  In her grief Regina hadn’t wanted to stay at Ryalsmere anyway, for the memories of her happiness with her husband there were simply too overwhelming. Regina’s sole living relative was a younger brother, Matthew Carew, who had joined the navy at eight years old, and at the time had been twenty-two. Through Lord Segrave’s influence, Matthew had gotten his step to lieutenant. He had a small dismal flat in the seedy navy town of Portsmouth. Regina bought a roomy, comfortable cottage in the nearby village of Haverhill, and she and Valeria and Matthew moved in. Valeria could hardly remember her uncle; he was at sea for a year or two at a time, so he had been in port only three times during their five years at Haverhill. He had been killed at Trafalgar.

  Regina had seemed content, living quietly with Valeria, with Craigie and Platt their only servants. But after three years, Lady Hylton had insisted that Regina rejoin society and resume her life. Although reluctant at first, finally, when Valeria was ten years old, Regina agreed to go to London for the Season, staying with Lady Hylton in her town house. There she met the widowed Earl of Maledon.

  Lady Hylton had told Valeria once, long before her stepfather had started on his debauched downward spiral, “You know, Maledon was enchanted with your mother when she came to London with your father. His first wife was still alive then. Oh, he was very discreet, but I could plainly see that he was much attached to Regina. He never offered any impropriety, of course, for Regina would have been horrified and disgusted. But after the first Lady Maledon died, and Regina came out of mourning, he made it clear then that he was absolutely in love with her. He made your mother feel protected, cherished, secure. It was then, I think, that Regina came to see that though she might not be all aswoon with love, as she was with Lord Segrave, she could still find comfort and companionship with a husband.”

  Valeria begrudgingly thought that she understood, a little at least, why her mother had married Maledon. But what she could not understand was her mother’s loyalty to him now.

  Sighing, she murmured, “Oh, how I wish we could go to Foxden! My mother loves to spend time with Lady Hylton, and I, too, miss her. I just wish I could do something. Sometimes here at Bellegarde I feel as if I am literally stifled with boredom.”

  Joan finished tying Valeria’s stays and held up her petticoat to slip on. “Maybe her ladyship would like to go to Foxden after they’ve left,” she intoned.

  Valeria brightened. “You know, she very well might. Lady Hylton always includes St. John in her invitations, and Mamma really doesn’t like to go anywhere without him.”

  “But what about her son, the baron? Do his invitations include you and his lordship too?”

  “Hm, I don’t really know. But he and Lady Hylton are close, I believe. I would imagine that he goes along with her wishes.”

  “You don’t know the baron?” Joan asked with surprise.

  “Lady Hylton’s husband I knew, but he died two years ago. Their eldest son that inherited, Alastair, I only saw once, when my mother married Lord Maledon. I was eleven at the time, and he was about twenty, I believe. I remember thinking that he was very handsome but he took no notice of me whatsoever. I decided that he must not care for children, and that he was an old, mean man,” she said lightly.

  “I doubt you’d find that so now,” Joan said with amusement. “So, is it to be the yellow, or the white?”

  “The white,” Valeria decided. “Since now I know our guests are leaving so soon I have determined that at least until tomorrow I shall be very modest in my dress and very demure in my manner.”

  “That’ll put one in Lady Jex-Blake’s eye,” Joan said with relish.

  Valeria did look fresh and virginal in her picnic dress. It was a sturdy jaconet muslin with a checkerboard white-on-white weave. The sleeves were long, with four puffs tied with pink satin ribbon. Around the hem was a delicate pink floral embroidery that her mother had done. Valeria trimmed all her own bonnets, an art that she particularly enjoyed. This was a deep-brimmed chip straw that she had trimmed with pink satin ribbon, pink-and-white satin rosettes with pearl centers that she had made herself, white lace, and dried baby’s breath. She wore kid gloves and soft leather half boots of the same buff shade.

  Ewan was waiting for them outside with the open landau, and Regina, Valeria, Miss Shadwell, and Mrs. Purefoy rode down to the lake, enjoying the errant breezes on the warm August air. Now that Valeria knew that they would be gone the next day, she looked at the two ladies with a slightly more charitable eye. Miss Shadwell was silly, ignorant, and flirtatious, but Valeria thought that she really wasn’t immoral in her conduct; she now doubted that “Kit” and Mr. Mayhew were truly “carrying on” in the physical sense. As for Mrs. Purefoy, Valeria thought that she was actually rather dim, and had very little judgment. Apparently she really couldn’t see the perfidy in her friend Lady Jex-Blake’s behavior; her enchantment with titles, no matter how insignificant, appeared to be the sole guide informing her perceptions.

  At the lake there was a pleasant scene. Colonel Bayliss was standing between St. John and Niall, for as always St. John had insisted that his friend join him. The colonel was showing them how to bait. Mr. Mayhew sat on the bank a little ways off, placidly watching his motionless cork float.

  The footmen, Ned and Royce, had already brought down the cart with all the food and supplies. Invitingly laid out on a pallet underneath a spreading oak tree were several platters with silver covers, big baskets of all kinds of fruit, a silver
coffee service and tea service, bottles of wine and punch and lemonade, crystal tumblers, and plates of Meissen china. Splendid in their livery, Ned and Royce stood by, unmoving and expressionless as statues.

  As they drove up, St. John turned around and grinned. Holding his hand up high, he shouted, “Look, Mamma! Look, Veri! We have maggots, and they’re perfectly huge! Did you know that we have maggots? Colonel Bayliss says they are the very best bait for pike.”

  “Ah, the joys of having a six-year-old,” Regina said to the ladies. “I never thought a person could get excited about maggots. But then again, I’m not really surprised.”

  “I noticed that Lord Stamborne calls you ‘Veri,’” Miss Shadwell said to Valeria. “That’s a lovely nickname. I’m surprised he didn’t call you ‘Val,’ which I think is also a lovely nickname, like my nickname, ‘Kit.’ I think that Lord Stamborne may call me ‘Kit.’”

  To Valeria’s surprise, her mother demurred gently. “I’m sorry, Miss Shadwell, but I insist that my son call all adults by their proper names. Except for his own sister, of course.”

  “Oh! I’m so sorry, I meant no offense, Lady Maledon, of course it’s only proper that children address adults respectfully—not that I think anyone who calls me ‘Kit’ is being disrespectful—the style of address between friends is more relaxed, isn’t it, and I do so dislike ‘Katherine’ or ‘Kate’ or even ‘Kitty’…” Here Miss Shadwell went on with her paragraph-length sentences that lasted until the other ladies were seated on the pallet. Then she abruptly cut off her rambling and practically ran to join Mr. Mayhew.

  “Ned, Royce, you may serve now,” Regina said. “Valeria, Mrs. Purefoy, would you care for tea?” Ned and Royce knelt down on the edge of the pallet and removed the covers from the serving platters. There was ham, cold roast beef, three kinds of pies, a cucumber-and-celery salad, several kinds of cheeses, and fresh-baked bread. With their usual grace the footmen served up the ladies’ choices, then peeled the pears and apples and plums for them.