by M C Beaton
By the time the gentlemen joined them, Bess had decided to leave for London with the happy couple in the morning and Lady Frank was enthusiastically arranging an outing for the rest to the River Barnes.
Jean was heartily glad that Bess was leaving. Romance had mellowed Mary so much that she had become a happy, lighthearted girl. But Bess was still so full of venom and jealousy that she had made Jean’s stay in the pleasant Oakley Manor most uncomfortable, making spiteful remarks and watching her as closely as a cat watches a mouse.
Bess insisted that Miss Taylor accompany her on the journey despite that good lady’s protests that the Duchess of Glenrandall had employed her to be a companion to Jean.
Chapter Eight
The diminished house party met in the hall in the morning, preparatory to their outing, in high spirits. Sir Giles and Lady Carol had elected to stay behind since they had other duties to attend to and, with Bess’s oppressive personality removed, it was with a feeling of holiday that they set off. Even the fact that Lady Frank insisted Jean accompany herself and her brother in their carriage, leaving the marquess and Lady Sally to ride together, could not dampen Jean’s spirits. No Bess to mar the day with her malicious barbs, no Miss Taylor with her anxious looks of sorrowful concern, no Lord Ian and, above all, no Uncle Hamish.
As the carriage swept out of the drive past huge banks of rhododendron at the lodge gates and out onto the country road, Jean felt, for the first time in her life, as if she were on holiday. Frank was a jolly companion, the countryside was alive with birdsong, lilacs, may blossom, early roses rioted in the hedgerows and the sun blazed down from a cloudless sky.
For his part, the marquess was preoccupied, much to the annoyance of Lady Sally. He decided that his treatment of Jean Lindsay had been shameful. He would treat her with kindness and courtesy and find a suitable opportunity to propose to the girl and have done with it. If only she weren’t so damned incalculable. What if she refused?
Well, if she did, he would settle down with a young female of impeccable birth and beget heirs. He was getting too old for all this useless merrymaking.
The River Barnes, swollen by the recent rain, was in full spate. It hurtled through the placid meadows, foaming and sparkling like beer in the morning sun, sweeping the long branches of the weeping willows along with it as if it would pull them down into the water and carry them off to the sea.
They settled on a pleasant grassy spot next to a pile of huge boulders and under the shade of a stand of alders. The party sprawled around on the grass, watching the servants from the Manor setting up the picnic table and chairs and opening the hampers.
Jean settled back against the sunny warmth of a large boulder and, in her mind, the grim memories of Dunwearie, the London Season, and the attempts on her life dwindled away, leaving only the delicious peace of the present. The glossy leaves above her rippled, turned and shone in the light breeze and a thrush poured out the full-throated glory of his summer song to a comforting if mundane accompaniment of clinking glasses and dishes.
Her reverie was interrupted by Sally’s tinkling voice. “John, dear. Could you escort me a little way along the stream. It’s so magnificent, I would like to get a closer look but I am afraid of falling in and I need the strong arm of my protector.”
“With pleasure.” The marquess got lazily to his feet and offered his arm. Lady Sally was wearing a filmy dress in rose-colored muslin, embroidered with tiny rosebuds, which the breeze whipped around her body, displaying her excellent figure and leaving little to the imagination.
“I declare I don’t know what’s come over young gels these days,” said Frank, getting to her feet and gazing after the couple. “She ain’t even got a camisole on an’ it’s Carlton House to a Charlie’s shelter, she’s wearin’ one of them new scanty petticoats and little else!”
Jean’s new blue silk suddenly felt as heavy as serge. How could she compete with Sally, who had all the ease of great wealth and a title. It was “dear John” this and “dear John” that.
Frank glanced at Jean’s downcast face out of the corner of her eye. “Shake a leg, Freddie,” she said, stirring up her brother with her foot. “Walk with Jean for a bit and keep an eye on Sally. If she don’t get raped by Fleetwater, she’ll catch her death of cold in that rig. Here! Throw a shawl over her.”
Grumbling, Freddie got to his feet, clutching the shawl and then, remembering his manners, offered Jean his arm and led her along the river bank toward where the marquess and Lady Sally could be seen walking in the distance.
Freddie looked down at the sad little face next to him and tried to think of something to say. “Lovely day, what?”
“Lovely,” said Jean dully.
“Hear all those birds? Used to imitate them when I was a boy. I say, would you like to hear some?”
As she nodded, he let out a long screech like a barn door being opened.
“Now, what’s that?”
“An owl.”
“An owl! That was a rook, clear as anythin’. Hey, you ain’t very good, are you? Try this one.” He delivered himself of a long, dreary, wailing sound.
“A lesser-crested grebe with its foot stuck under a rock,” said Jean acidly.
“No, no. A curlew. Plain as day. No need to be sarcastic, you know. Here’s another.” Freddie cackled loudly.
“I haven’t the faintest idea.”
“It’s an easy one. Here, I’ll do it again.” Exquisite in faultless morning dress and gleaming Hessians, his curls combed carefully into fashionable disorder, Freddie stood up on a boulder and cackled happily, flapping his arms up and down.
Jean began to giggle. “It’s a duck in a fit.”
“No, don’t be funny. This is a good ’un. Look, this is its wings.” He spread Sally’s lace shawl wide over his shoulders and went into even more frantic antics until Jean, with the tears of laughter rolling down her cheeks, begged him to stop.
“All right, Freddie,” she gasped. “I give up. What is it?”
“It’s Freddie Blackstone’s cure for gettin’ Jean Lindsay out of the dumps,” he grinned, jumping down from the rock.
“Oh, Freddie. You and Lady Frank are so kind to me!”
“Yes, ain’t we just,” said Freddie amiably, “and mopin’ after a certain gentleman is bad for your looks.
“Tell you what—we’ll throw this demned shawl over Sally—m’sister’s right, you know. Her mama would have a fit if she saw her in that dress, and we’ll go off and explore. Everything too serious around here lately.”
As Jean happily agreed, he hurried her along the bank to where the couple stood engaged in conversation. Lady Sally stood with her hand resting on the marquess’s arm. In her clear, bell-like voice, she was outlining her plans for the future, how many children she would like to have and the type of establishment she would like to set up. She was rudely interrupted by the arrival of Freddie who threw the shawl around her and said irrepressibly, “Frank says you’ll catch cold in them scanties,” and turned to lead Jean away.
“Wait a minute, Freddie,” said the marquess. “Lady Sally was giving me her views on the running of an establishment and, as I know it’s a subject close to your heart, perhaps you would like to hear her views while I escort Miss Lindsay.”
“Fustian,” said Freddie cheerfully. “My establishment’s the worst run in the county and I couldn’t care less. We won’t interrupt your tête-à-tête. We’re goin’ to explore. C’mon!” And seizing Jean’s arm, the pair of them ran off.
Lady Sally coughed delicately to catch the marquess’s attention. “Really, I have never seen Miss Lindsay quite so animated. Come, John. Let us leave them to their hoydenish games.”
“I must agree,” said the marquess. “I have never seen Miss Lindsay look better. The fresh air has brought a good color to her cheeks.” And with that dampening remark, he turned to escort her back to Lady Frank, vowing to have a word with Freddie later.
But Freddie showed no signs of hurrying back to
the party. From thinking that Jean Lindsay was a poor sort of choice for the marquess, he had rapidly changed his opinion. He decided she was too good for him.
Freddie had at last found a female companion who was prepared to indulge his boyish enthusiasm for throwing stones in the water and looking for birds’ nests. Accustomed to walking long distances over rough country in the Highlands, Jean was as indefatigable as he and found she was enjoying herself immensely. The world of jealousies, social manners and correct form was left far behind as the pair ranged far and wide and finally showed up at the picnic table, breathless and happy.
Jean was swinging her straw hat by the ribbons and wearing a crown of wild roses in her hair. “How very rural,” said Lady Sally. “No doubt you were taught to weave those sylvan wreaths for your hair in that little village—Weariesome or something—that you hail from.”
“Oh, no,” said Jean innocently. “Freddie made it for me.”
“Freddie!” said both the marquess and Lady Frank in chorus. Freddie blushed and made a few choked sounds worthy of his friend, Mr. Fairchild, and buried his face in a tankard of champagne to get away from the gaze of the others.
Lady Frank was looking at him speculatively and thinking that if Freddie was deciding to run after a petticoat, she would rather have someone like Jean Lindsay as a sister-in-law than Lady Sally or any of her breed. Lady Sally was delighted at the unexpected match that seemed to have sprung up. The marquess was furious.
He had had the day nicely planned. He had meant to walk Jean Lindsay off to a secluded corner and propose. He had foreseen no obstacles in his way. Now it looked as if he would have to reckon with that well-known misogynist, his best friend, Freddie. Freddie, of all people!
Freddie surfaced from his tankard.
“Have some champagne,” he offered Jean. “It’s great after all that runnin’ around.”
“I am sure Miss Lindsay would much prefer a glass of ratafia,” said the marquess repressively.
“But I would love some champagne!” Jean held out her glass, giggling, to Freddie who grinned back. The marquess suddenly felt like a stuffy, aged parent.
The sun shone through the trees. The champagne sparkled, Jean sparkled and the Marquess of Fleetwater was bitterly jealous. Well aware of the fact and enjoying every minute of it, Jean encouraged Freddie to play a game of tongue twisters with the loser paying forfeit by draining off his or her glass.
“Can’t you stop them?” the marquess whispered to Lady Frank.
“Why? They’re havin’ fun. If she gets a bit tiddely, there’s no one here but us, and I’ll take her home in the carriage. Poor little thing, I don’t know when I’ve seen her so happy,” said Lady Frank indulgently. She was as tired as her brother with the Gothic undertones of the past few days and considered Jean more at peril from the attentions of the marquess than from any tipsy play with her brother.
“Look at those boys fishing,” said Lady Sally, anxious to turn the gentlemen’s attention elsewhere. “Will they catch anything, do you think?”
Two boys were perched on boulders farther up the bank.
“Shouldn’t think so,” said Freddie. “The current’s too strong.”
Even as they watched, one of the boys missed his footing and plunged headlong into the stream. He struggled frantically against the powerful rush of water and, for a moment, it looked as if he would make it to the bank. He grasped frantically at a dead branch sticking out from the shore but it broke and he was swept down the stream, his head disappearing under the foaming water.
It all happened so quickly that the party at the table sat frozen like a pastoral tableau.
Then the marquess leapt to his feet and, tearing off his jacket and cravat, ran down the bank to where the boy had disappeared and dived into the water. Freddie and Jean raced after him, tripping over stones, branches tearing at their clothes. The marquess’s head had reappeared and he swam strongly downstream and dived again. After an agonizing wait which seemed like hours, he surfaced again farther down, clutching the boy to him and striking out for the shore. Again and again the river swept them farther away.
“Jump in and help them,” screamed Jean. “I can’t,” yelled Freddie above the noise of the rushing water. “Can’t swim.”
Jean and Freddie, beside themselves with fear, ran on down the bank of the stream after the fast-disappearing figures.
The banks of the river grew more wooded, the undergrowth thicker as the stream narrowed before it plunged headlong into the falls. Jean, her dress in rags, ran on, praying under her breath, “Please, don’t let him die! Oh, please!”
Just before the falls, the marquess managed to wedge his shoulder against a rock and rested, holding the boy’s head above water. He saw Freddie and Jean. “Get a rope!” he called.
The couple turned and scrambled back headlong the way they had come, calling frantically for help. When they had nearly reached the picnic spot, they were met by Lady Frank with several of the servants and, sobbing and gasping, they shouted for a rope. One of the servants miraculously produced a thick coil and back they all rushed, Frank, unaware of her pregnancy, loping along with great strides.
When they had reached a clearing before the falls, they stopped in amazement. For the marquess was approaching them slowly with the unconscious boy cradled in his arms.
Jean would never forget how he looked as he stood there, smiling in triumph, his gray eyes sparkling, the sun shining on his blond hair and the whipcord of his muscles showing through the thin, wet cambric of his shirt. He looked like a young god. She fell so much more in love with him that she realized there could be no going back, no flirtations with Freddie to ease the pain. She would love him completely and absolutely until the day she died.
Unaware of the final victory over his beloved’s heart, the marquess beamed on them. “The boy will be all right. I pumped some of the water out of him. Not bad for an old man, eh, Freddie?”
Freddie slapped him enthusiastically on the back. “Demme, if you ain’t the greatest Corinthian that ever was. You went into that water like a demned cod.”
“Come, come, Freddie,” teased the marquess. “A Poseidon, a merman, a seal, but spare me the cod.”
The boy moaned and opened his eyes and the marquess placed him gently on the ground. He looked up at the circle of concerned faces, the marquess in his dripping clothes, the servants in their livery, and began to wriggle away.
“Hey, wait a bit,” said the marquess. “We’ll take you home.”
But the boy like many of his class had learned to distrust the whims of the Quality. One minute they could be smiling at him, the next they could be horsewhipping him for polluting the river. He squirmed away from their helping hands and ran off. There was no sign either of his earlier companion.
“Let him go!” said Lady Frank. “I’ll find out his direction from the vicar and see that he is all right. Let us all go home and get changed. You’re soaking, John, and Jean and Freddie look like ragbags.”
But the marquess had caught the look of adoration in Miss Lindsay’s eyes and suddenly wished that all the boys in Barminster would fall into the river so that he could rescue them.
“Nonsense!” he said roundly. “The sun is warm and we are en famille so to speak. Let us finish our lunch.”
“Talkin’ about bein’ en famille reminds me that I’m goin’ to drop this brat before its time if you lot get up to any more shenanigans,” grumbled Lady Frank, making the servants laugh and Jean blush.
As they approached the picnic table, Lady Sally, who had been told of the rescue, got prettily to her feet and, letting the shawl slide from her shoulders, raised her glass to the marquess. “My hero,” she sighed, smiling mistily up at him.
“You mean you just sat there as calm as cucumbers,” raged Frank. “Your hero, as you call him, was nearly down the falls and into his grave.”
Lady Sally looked scornfully at Jean’s torn dress. “I have been brought up to behave like a lady at all times,
no matter how strong the emotion.”
“Well, in that case,” snapped Frank, “don’t get married ’cause you ain’t goin’ to be much fun in b…”
“Frank!” yelled Freddie, outraged.
“Oh, well, anyway,” said Frank huffily, “I’ll join Jean in a glass of champagne.”
“Y’know,” said Freddie, “I’m beginnin’ to have fun. All this rustication was a good idea of yours, John. Don’t care if I never see another ballroom.”
“Are all our pretty dresses to stay locked in our trunks,” pouted Sally.
“If you don’t think you’re all too grand for a local hop, there’s a dance at the Assembly Rooms in Barminster tonight,” said Frank.
“Oh, please let’s go,” pleaded Sally. The ballroom was her battlefield and the one setting where she was sure she would outshine Jean Lindsay.
“What do you think, Jean?” asked Frank. “I’ve seen the Master of Ceremonies and put our names in the book so we can go any time.”
Jean thought of her beautiful new ball gown which had been sent to her by her godmother and, as yet, unworn.
“I would love to go.”
“That’s settled then,” said Frank. “As long as John don’t go around fightin’ duels over any old frumps. I’ve had enough excitement for one day.”
After a lazy lunch, the party started to head back to the Manor to have a nap and refresh themselves for the ball. The marquess deftly swept Jean off to his curricle, leaving Lady Sally to travel with Frank and Freddie.
The marquess debated whether to propose on the road back and decided against it. The mood would have to be perfect and he was feeling exhausted after his swim. He contented himself with holding her hand and the pair returned, slowly and speechlessly, in a state of silent ecstasy.
Jean did not go to sleep. She was too excited and meant to spend every single minute preparing for the evening ahead. Curl papers had to be put in her hair, Denmark Lotion on her face, fan, shoes, shawl and reticule to be chosen with care, and dreams to be dreamed.
