by M C Beaton
“It was my father,” said Perry. “He told me that respectable women were completely different from the other kind and that any woman who responded to me ardently would respond to any man ardently.”
“Stuff!” said the Marquis. “I’ve never heard such rubbish. But why then did you lash out at Jennie and call her frigid?”
“That,” said Perry primly, “was simply because she was not performing her marital duties.”
“Oh, Perry, Perry. If it is not too late, I would make most violent love to Miss Sally the next time you see her.”
“But that is lust!” exclaimed Perry.
“It would only be lust if you didn’t love the girl. How can I have known you so long,” said the Marquis, “and not have realized what a load of Methodist garbage was swimming around in that kennel you call a brain? No. Don’t call me out. Someone has got to put you right. I shall do my best for you. If you like, I shall gently warn Mr. Porteous off but I cannot make him keep away from Miss Byles if Miss Byles is hell-bent on flirting with him.”
Unaware that he was the subject of so much heart-searching, the tutor, Mr. Porteous, arrived at the Marquis’ house early the next morning carrying a battered valise and anxious to start his duties as secretary.
He looked with satisfaction around the comfortable room assigned to him. He would make his fortune yet! He had long known that the road to advancement lay in the South.
Roberts showed him into the study and said that his lordship had left instructions that Mr. Porteous was to deal with the morning post. The newspapers had been ironed and taken up to his lordship and after his lordship had finished with them, it would then be Mr. Porteous’ duty to clip out all articles pertaining to agriculture, in case his lordship might have missed anything. The estate books from the Marquis’ various properties were being sent to him, said Roberts, so that Mr. Porteous could audit the accounts and suggest improvements.
Roberts retired, leaving Mr. Porteous to look proudly around his new domain. He tugged open the French window, which led out to the small garden at the back of the house, letting in the warm, scented morning air of summer. A blackbird sang from the opposite rooftop and the scent of roses and lime drifted into the room.
Mr. Porteous drew a chair up to a fine rococo pedestal desk and began to go through the correspondence.
Almost the first thing to catch his eye was a large heavy red seal on a long letter—a seal that was all too familiar.
With a suddenly thudding heart, he cracked open the seal and carefully spread out the thick parchment.
“My dear Charrington,” he read, holding the letter in hands which had become damp and moist, “I trust you are still finding our good Porteous satisfactory. However, I must beg of you to send him back. My youngest boy, Ian, is about ready to start cramming for Eton and I know of no one else who would get the boy past the entrance exams like our man Porteous. He is a brilliant scholar and I am glad I was able to give him the opportunity of this working holiday in the metropolis, but I am worried about my son’s education and, of course, Mrs. Porteous would be delighted to see her husband again. In fact, I have had to forceably restrain the good lady from making the journey to London. I fear our Porteous is a devil with the ladies! Congratulations and felicitations on your marriage. We would be delighted to entertain you on your next visit north. Yr. humble and obedient servant, Westerland.”
Mr. Porteous stared at the letter while the bird outside sang on and a little errant breeze gently moved the heavy heads of the roses. There was the sound of movements upstairs and then the sound of someone descending the staircase.
With a shaking hand, Mr. Porteous lit the corner of the letter and threw it into the fireplace.
Just in time! A minute later, the door opened and the Marquis strolled in. Mr. Porteous rose and bowed, and then turned and sat down again, bending his head over his work. He did not see how curiously Chemmy was staring at the wisp of smoke in the fireplace or how intently he was staring at the small red pool of sealing wax which was dripping slowly from the andirons.
But the Marquis only said, “I am going out, Porteous. There is a prime Arab mare on sale at Tattersall’s and I am anxious to purchase it for my wife. Do not tell her. I wish it to be a surprise.”
Mr. Porteous rose and bowed without looking fully at the Marquis.
“Oh, just one other thing, Porteous,” said the Marquis. “I do not wish you to encourage the attentions of Miss Byles. You do understand?”
“Yes, my lord,” said the tutor in a grim voice, staring at the floor.
Chemmy left in a thoughtful mood. His secretary had just burned a letter and he, Chemmy, was very interested to find out what letter it had been.
But first, the horse. He was anxious to study his wife’s reaction to the present.
He returned some two hours later, pleased with his purchase and furious with his company.
Guy Chalmers had joined him at Tattersall’s and had stuck to him like a leech, prattling on about the days when he and Jennie had gone riding. He had insisted on accompanying the Marquis home. Chemmy had noted the way Jennie’s face lit up at the sight of Guy and had sent the horse to the stables, taking himself off to his private sitting room to indulge in something remarkably like a sulk.
His usual good nature reasserted itself, however, and he descended the stairs to look for his wife, only to find to his fury that his surprise present was a surprise no more. Mr. Chalmers, Roberts informed him with gloomy relish, had informed her ladyship of her new mount and her ladyship had gone to the Park.
“With Mr. Chalmers?” grated the Marquis.
“No, my lord,” said Roberts, pleased at being able to impart some good news to his grim-faced master, “with John, your groom. Mr. Chalmers had a pressing engagement.”
Not knowing that Guy had told Jennie he had left, Chemmy could only think that she was more interested in her present than in the giver and was as spoiled and avaricious as he had come to believe.
He sent Mr. Porteous on an errand and then went into the study to examine the hearth.
There was no ash in the hearth and the andirons had been scrubbed and polished until they gleamed like silver.
The Marquis stared at the fireplace, his brows drawn together. He suddenly thought it would be a very good idea if he wrote to the Duke of Westerland and asked His Grace to send the reply to his club.
Jennie was enchanted with her horse. It was the daintiest thing imaginable, with delicate mincing steps and a long silky mane. “What shall I call her?” she asked John.
The groom put his head on one side and studied the prancing little horse. “The way she moves,” he said, his face creasing in a rare smile, “puts me in mind of Mr. Garforth’s Rosalind that won the Subscription Cup at Oxford.”
“Then Rosalind it shall be,” laughed Jennie, patting the mare’s golden mane. Jennie felt as if she had just emerged from a nightmare. Chemmy must have some regard for her. No man who hated and disliked his wife would ever have bought her such a beautiful present. What a pity he had not been at home so that he could see her setting off. They could even have gone riding together.
The sun sparkled on the grass and, as it was not yet the fashionable hour, there were few people in the Park.
“Please, may I gallop, John? Please,” begged Jennie. “I know it is not the thing but there is hardly anyone around.”
She looked so young and so pretty in her blue velvet riding habit that John grinned and nodded his head. “I’ll have a bit of a gallop as well, my lady. Off you go!”
Instead of gallopping along the cinder path, Jennie swung her mount over a long stretch of grass. The little mare sped like an arrow and Jennie laughed aloud with the sheer exhilaration of the sport. Suddenly the mare bucked and then reared violently.
Had Jennie been more aware, had she guessed for a minute that she was about to be thrown and tensed her body, she might have broken her bones. But it seemed to her that one minute she was on her horse and then ne
xt, she was hitting the ground with a sickening thud.
John came racing up, dismounted and helped her to her feet. The little mare pranced away from them, rolling its eyes, flecks of foam on its mouth.
“I’m all right,” gasped Jennie. “See to Rosalind.”
John managed at last to catch the horse by the reins and patted its nose and talked to it in a soothing monotone until it stood still. But it still trembled and rolled its eyes. John studied it for a minute and then bent down and unbuckled the girth and lifted off the saddle. A thin trickle of blood rolled down the mare’s flanks.
John turned over the saddle and stared at it while Jennie came up and looked over his shoulder. A half inch of wicked-looking spike was sticking out of the saddle.
“An evil trick,” muttered John. “This spike was so inserted into the saddle that it would eventually work through it and stab the animal in the back.”
Jennie began to shake with fear. She had a sudden vision of Chemmy stabbing the desk, Chemmy who had bought her the horse and had immediately gone out instead of giving her the present himself.
“I could have been killed,” she whispered.
“Maybe,” said John. “His lordship had better hear about this.”
He already knows, thought Jennie.
Chemmy heard the tale of the spike and, after John had been dismissed, he turned to his wife. “There is only one person who could have done this… Guy Chalmers.”
Jennie stared at him in shocked disbelief.
“My lord,” came Mr. Porteous’ voice, “I have here an urgent letter from a Mrs. Waring begging for an appointment. She says she has important news for you.”
“Burn it,” said the Marquis, without looking around.
“Very good, my lord,” said Mr. Porteous, and Alice, who had meant to tell Chemmy all about Guy’s iniquities, was never to have the opportunity until much, much later.
Jennie was a mass of seething emotions, jealousy being the predominant one. She said, “You were saying, my lord, that there was only one person who could have done this… you forget. There is yourself.”
“Is that what you think of me?” said the Marquis in much his old lazy manner, although his eyes were like chips of ice.
“Oh, I don’t think anything. I have no mind,” snapped Jennie. “Yes, I do think one thing. I think I would like to get as far away from you as possible. I shall go to Runbury and occupy my time, supervising things there.”
“As you will,” said her husband distantly.
He watched her flounce out of the room, his face withdrawn, then got to his feet and strolled into the study where Mr. Porteous was bent over his books.
“Porteous,” he said abruptly, “My wife is traveling to Runbury Manor. I want you to go with her and guard her at all times. Send to me a daily report of her doings. I also want you to instruct the servants and my steward not to allow Mr. Guy Chalmers admittance to any part of the estate. Do I make myself clear?”
“Yes, my lord.”
“Very good. You may take a break from your work if you wish.”
“Certainly, my lord,” said Mr. Porteous, his face brightening.
Sally Byles stood in the hallway of her parents’ town house and read the little note which had been slipped into her hand by the tutor who had been waiting for her outside her home. It read:
“I am to travel to Runbury Manor with her ladyship. I am distressed to leave this city which holds all that my heart desires. Farewell. Andrew.”
“Andrew,” breathed Sally. “What a beautiful name!”
She rushed in search of her mother and bewildered that poor woman with an impassioned tale of how Jennie desperately needed her companionship at Runbury Manor.
Mrs. Byles at last gave her consent for Sally to go. Mrs. Byles had taken Mr. Deighton in dislike and thought it would be a good excuse to remove her daughter from town.
The Marquis of Charrington called at Mr. Guy Chalmers’ lodgings to be told he had gone from town.
Mr. Peregrine Deighton called at the Byles’ residence the following day to be told that Miss Byles had already left for the country.
The two friends, Perry and Chemmy, were left to enjoy the sports and amusements of their former days, but somehow the savor had gone.
Damnable women, thought Perry. They ruin everything!
Chapter Ten
The first few weeks at Runbury Manor were surprisingly pleasant. There was so much to do, so much new furniture to arrange, so many curtains to hem and wallpapers and paints to choose for the walls.
The only thing that Jennie found amiss was the peculiar amount of gamekeepers patrolling the grounds. Every time she went for a sedate walk with Sally to supervise new improvements to the gardens, a man with a gun seemed to pop up from behind every rose bush. She had asked the steward the reason for it but he had only smiled and said he was following the Marquis’ instructions.
The old servants had arrived to a joyful welcome from Jennie. Their duties were to be extremely light as there was, by the time of their arrival, already an army of servants in residence.
Jennie enjoyed all the bustle and noise and the banging, hammering and painting of the workmen. It also meant that Sally had little time to be alone with Mr. Porteous. Jennie was fond of her tutor but could not help feeling that his attitude to her young friend was somehow rather predatory.
But as the weeks went by and a long period of rainy weather set in, Jennie’s excitement began to wane. Try as she would to concentrate on the fact that her husband was a philanderer and more than possibly a would-be murderer, she found her treacherous body aching for his touch. She was not pregnant and that also distressed her. That splendid night of lovemaking had meant nothing to her husband and she had not even the prospect of a child to console her.
She had not heard from Guy and was strangely relieved. She thought more and more of what Chemmy had said about Guy being the guilty party and she wondered if it could possibly be true.
She also became increasingly worried about the growing relationship between Mr. Porteous and Sally, and wished fervently there was some older person to advise her. Sally was already chattering about how she would inherit money from her grandmother when she was twenty-one and was perpetually telling Jennie that elopements were “quite dreadfully romantic.”
Jennie walked into the drawing room quietly one morning and stood aghast at the sight of the tutor clutching Sally in his long bony arms, and kissing her with passionate savagery. She whisked herself out of the room and stood in the hall. “What shall I do?” she prayed. “Dear God, let something happen to stop this.” Feeling very young and bewildered and alone, she ran to her room and indulged in a hearty bout of tears and then lay prone on the bed and ached for her husband. “I don’t care if he wants to kill me,” she muttered into the uncaring pillow. “I shall write and beg him to come to me.”
After some time, she rose and dried her eyes. The problem that was Sally and the tutor must be faced. She was, after all, as a married woman, Sally’s chaperone and she must not be put off from her duty by her own lack of years. She would speak sternly to Sally and, if Sally would not listen to her, then she would write to Mr. and Mrs. Byles.
She marched firmly down the stairs. Galt, Runbury Manor’s new butler, a thick-set individual of awe-inspiring stateliness, waylaid her in the hall.
“There is a young lady to see you, my lady,” said Galt with a strange tinge of amusement in his voice. “I have put her in the Blue Saloon.”
“Did she give a name?”
“Oh, yes, my lady. A Mrs. Porteous.”
“Mrs. Porteous? A young lady!” exclaimed Jennie, and then carefully schooling her features, she said, “very good, Galt. I will see her immediately.”
Galt bowed and threw open the double doors leading to the now refurbished Blue Saloon.
The lady standing by the empty fireplace seemed very young but, as she walked forward, Jennie noticed that she was, in fact, somewhere in her thirties.
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She had a thin, pale face and pale, myopic eyes. She was dressed in a plain round gown of gray alpaca and from under the brim of her severe bonnet, wisps of red hair escaped.
She spoke in a clear, well-bred English voice, “My lady, the Marquis of Charrington, your husband, told me I should find Mr. Porteous here. He wished to write to you to apprise you of my coming but I said to him, I said, ‘Nay, my lord, I wish to surprise my Andrew.’ The Duke of Westerland is anxious to secure Andrew’s services again and, after receiving a letter from your husband, His Grace kindly suggested I should travel to England to fetch my husband.”
“Mr. Porteous is your husband,” said Jennie flatly. It was not a question.
“Oh, yes, my lady,” said Mrs. Porteous. “We have been married these past ten years and have two fine boys. I was lady’s maid to Her Grace, the Duchess of Westerland, when I met Andrew. I hope it is not an imposition, my arriving like this?”
“No. Oh, no,” said Jennie faintly. She tugged at the bell rope.
When Galt appeared, Jennie said: “Pray inform Mr. Porteous that there is a lady to see him. Do not tell him that his visitor is Mrs. Porteous. Mrs. Porteous wishes to surprise him.” Jennie did not want Sally to overhear and so receive the shocking news from a servant.
“Quite, my lady,” said Galt. “I do understand.”
Jennie sat very tense, listening to a murmur of voices in the hall. Then, to her dismay, she heard Sally cry, “Dear Andrew, is this perhaps one of your fair charmers? A rival for your affections?” and Mr. Porteous’ deep answering laugh.
Galt said something in a low voice and Mr. Porteous’ answer rang out clearly, “Nonsense, man. Whoever the leddy is I am sure Miss Byles is as anxious to discover who it is as I am.”
The doors swung open and Mr. Andrew Porteous stood on the threshold with Sally’s hand on his arm.
