The Lonely Earl

by Vanessa Gray

  “Can’t blame my uncle,” agreed Ned. “But we must get through the day ourselves, and the picnic will help.”

  The picnic, however, did not provide the panacea its advocates hoped for. Bucky, no lover of food alfresco, pleaded a headache. Upon being informed that the picnic was to take place that day, Lady Waverly sent word that she was too bruised in her feelings to enjoy herself. Faustina went up to plead with her. “You know, Aunt Louisa, that we cannot go unless you come along. It would be quite ineligible, you know.”

  “So,” said Louisa, looking determinedly out of the window, “I am to be regarded merely as a duenna? I assure you, Faustina, that such a role is not at all to my liking.”

  “Aunt, you look very fetching in your blue robe this morning,” said Faustina. “No one could possibly mistake you for anything other than a charming and delightful lady. The earl sent word,” she added mendaciously, “that he would not think it an amusing excursion without you.”

  Lady Waverly allowed herself to be persuaded to put on her pale blue redingote of twilled silk, and her wide-brimmed bonnet.

  For what she hoped was the last time, Faustina listened to her aunt say, as they came down the stairs, “I do not wish you will think I am throwing myself at your earl, Faustina. As your father was good enough to tell me,” she said with fine scorn. “I vow I had no idea of the depth of his envy.”

  Julia and Ned waited below. Ned heard his mother’s remarks, and said bracingly, “Mother, do stop going on this way. You’ll spoil all Julia’s chances!” An unfortunate remark, since Julia said scathingly, “I do not need you to forward my interests,” at the same time as her mother was informing Ned in a quelling manner, “I hope I know my child’s interests better than you.”

  At last they were ready to go. The pony cart was brought around, and Louisa flatly refused to trust herself in such a ramshackle vehicle. There was a delay while the caléche was readied and brought around. Faustina managed to say to Ned in an undertone, “I should think you would be ashamed to throw Julia to the wolves. It’s quite uncivilized!”

  Ned regarded her with astonishment. “You mean Pendarvis? You must be mistaken, Faustina. He strikes me as deserving of respect, at least in some ways. I do not give him a total endorsement, of course. But as to women, I think he’s above reproach.”

  She turned away petulantly, unaware of his thoughtful gaze on her. Ned knew nothing of Pendarvis, and yet he presumed to give her the benefit of his opinion. He had known him once, of course, but people change, as she had learned to her cost. He could just keep his opinion to himself, she thought crossly. She knew what she knew.

  The ride was only long enough for her to determine that she would deliberately ignore the earl, leaving him to deal with her aunt as best he could. The picnic, in her own mind, was planned for Althea’s pleasure, and she would make sure the child enjoyed every minute.

  Rendezvous was made at the top of a cliff facing the channel, three miles beyond Trevan. It was a place Faustina knew well, a perfect spot for an outing. The clifftop was broad and windswept, but there was a broad and safe path cut in the cliff face from the summit down to the broad shingle, where only a very high spring tide rattled the stones, and one would rarely run the risk of being cut off by the waters of the bay. The shingle here was covered with sand, and safe. But far along the beach, nearly out of sight beyond a headland, ran a long finger of irregular rocks like stepping-stones for a couple of hundred feet into the bay, tide-covered twice each day.

  The earl’s party had already arrived. When Hugh did anything, Faustina was about to learn, he did it in regular bang-up style. Two footmen unloaded hampers and spread blankets and tablecloths upon the ground. The earl himself took charge of a basket from which peeked long-necked wine bottles.

  Althea ran to swing herself on Faustina’s hands, and attached herself to her friend like a limpet. The party from the vicarage arrived on the heels of the Kennett caléche. The earl proved to be, when he set his mind to it, a delightful host. Helen Astley said so, adding, “I had no idea, since I confess I am not prone to alfresco dining, that the earl’s idea would turn out so well!”

  Faustina glanced indignantly at Hugh, who merely grinned in what she considered a very wicked fashion. So the picnic had not been Helen’s idea, after all!

  The vicar remarked that he missed Lord Egmont. Mary Bidwell received Althea’s open approval, as did Julia.

  The picnic progressed from chicken through ham, and arrived at imported grapes and wine. Hugh pointed significantly to the excise stamp on the neck of the bottle as it was opened, and Ned smiled slightly. This time, at least, he was not drinking smuggled wine.

  “I wonder why Mademoiselle should not feel it her duty to attend the child,” said Helen at last, raising her eyebrows. “Prudence is, I am sure, perfectly adequate as a nursemaid, but I should expect the woman who is charged with the responsibility not to shirk her duty. Lady Althea,” she added, turning to the child, “I am anxious to know how well your nurse does for you. Is Mademoiselle teaching you your letters?”

  Lady Althea said, “No, ma’am.”

  “Then what does she teach you? I suppose that she must be unwilling to venture upon teaching you your own tongue. I wonder she can speak it all. So many times these foreign servants never try to learn English correctly.”

  Faustina was tempted to come to the rescue of the absent Zelle, but in truth she could not help but agree with Helen’s basic premise — that Zelle was worse than useless. She knew, besides, that the fastest route to the earl’s limitless store of scorn was to suggest that he might be in error, and Faustina waited breathlessly for Helen to be blasted by a lightning bolt from Pendarvis.

  She waited in vain. Glancing sidelong at the earl, she saw his brow furrowed in attention. She drew a deep quivering breath. But Helen had not quite finished. “Lady Althea,” she said, “I think I must talk to Zelle about you.”

  Faustina felt Althea’s small hand quivering in hers. Quickly she glanced down at the child’s pale face. She’s afraid, Faustina thought, and at once interrupted Helen.

  “I for one feel like walking off this enormous meal,” she announced, rising and pulling Althea to her feet. “Come, Althea, will you join me? Please say yes. I don’t want to go alone.”

  Without waiting for an answer, Faustina strode toward the clifftop, hurrying Althea along with her. Behind her she could hear Helen saying, “The child needs supervision…” But the two of them had escaped.

  Behind them, Hugh’s eyes glittered. His scheme to bring Faustina to her knees was not working quite the way he had planned. She had been polite this afternoon, but he did not feel that she was even aware of his presence. True, she had been quite silent, but then, so had Lady Waverly and Julia. He suspected suddenly that events had occurred at the Chase after his departure that had left its mark upon the inhabitants.

  He was vaguely aware that Helen Astley was talking earnestly to him, but he could not have repeated a word of her speech. He watched Faustina and Althea running free over the gorse, and felt a strange urge to cast off all his duties and give himself over too to the exhilaration of running free before the wind, like a yacht.

  He must, he thought fleetingly, buy a yacht. His father had sold the venerable Gray Goose. But a new yacht lay — if he were not killed — in the future. Just now, he saw that Faustina and his daughter had reached the head of the cliff path and were almost out of sight down the path.

  The group around the picnic spread broke up. Julia rose and began to stroll toward the spot where the other two had disappeared, and, as though drawn by a magnet, Aubrey Talbot followed her.

  Ned stood up but did not move from his place. He smiled lazily at Mary Bidwell. “Miss Bidwell,” he bantered, “are you minded to join the children?”

  She smiled shyly. “I think I should like to go. Are you going, Helen?”

  Helen glanced at Hugh, who had the appearance of remaining fixed for hours, and reached for another bunch of white grap
es. “No,” she said with kindly superiority, “to play in the sand is a childish amusement, and one that I have long left behind me. But if you wish to go, Mary, then I do not mind.”

  Ned’s fists clenched and unclenched before he knew it. To treat Mary Bidwell in such a condescending manner struck him as grossly ill-bred. He said bluntly, “I think I had better see what my cousin and my sister are doing. Will you accept my escort, Miss Bidwell?”

  To Helen’s ill-concealed dismay, Hugh sprang to his feet. “I feel like a child myself. All this brings me to recollect my boyhood again. I might even challenge you to a footrace on the sand, Ned.”

  “I’ll race you anytime,” said Ned with enthusiasm, and the three departed toward the path.

  Helen watched them go. In repose, her face took on a moody expression, almost pouting. Mr. Astley, knowing his daughter well, bethought himself of certain wildflowers that he wished to add to his collection, and soon Lady Waverly and Helen were left to their own devices. Lady Waverly was not long at a loss.

  “My dear,” she began kindly, “I wish to tell you how fetching that new fichu is.”

  “Oh,” said Helen absently, her eyes and mind still on the fast-disappearing earl. “Do you like it? I am so glad.”

  “Another color perhaps would be better,” went on Lady Waverly. “At least, I myself would choose another color. And I fancy that there are those who would agree. I am quite noted, you know, for the fashions I wear in London. Nothing like what one would wear down here in the country, of course. I daresay the fashions I introduced last season might not appear in Devon for, say, another two years at most.”

  Helen eyed her companion without favor. “Fashion,” she pronounced, “as the Apostle Paul says, soon passeth away.”

  Lady Waverly was not daunted. Helen Astley, to her mind, was an overweening upstart, no matter how closely she was kin to the Hortons. And — she dismissed the Hortons with a mental wave of the hand — Helen was not going to interfere with Lady Waverly’s own plans.

  “You must realize, of course, and I mean this most kindly,” Lady Waverly said, “that the earl is above your reach. I would not do you the injustice of believing that you do not already know this. I am sure you would not be so lost to propriety as to dream of making such a brilliant attachment.”

  Helen at last jerked her attention back to the present. “You mean the earl is not wishful to marry again? Yet I have heard him say that it was his duty.”

  “I am sure we do not need to teach the earl his duty, my dear. But this is what I am saying — his duty will lead him to demand more in a wife than you can bring to him. And I should not,” remarked Lady Waverly with a fine disregard for truth, “wish to see you unhappy. So often our dreams outstrip our possibilities — didn’t a poet say that once? I am sure you would know,” she added with a touch of venom, “you are such a bookish person.”

  “My father always felt that a well-informed mind was the best dowry a bride could bring,” said Helen defensively.

  “And so it is,” agreed Lady Waverly recklessly. “I vow I should consider my son perfectly addled were he to bring home a bride who was stupid. But my advice to you, my dear, is, forget all this ambition of yours. You might find what you are looking for much closer home.”

  And that, thought Lady Waverly, will successfully remove that persistent Mr. Talbot from Julia’s side and attach him to Helen’s. She had remarked that Mr. Talbot was, while perfectly correct in his behavior, too noticing of Julia. Lady Waverly, although she had at first been tempted to enter the Pendarvis lists on her own behalf, had decided that country life was not for her. Her sole motive, contrary to Egmont’s suspicions, was to marry Julia to the earl. At once. So that Louisa herself could return to what she considered her own proper milieu, the few London blocks south of Grosvenor Square.

  Helen said demurely, “Thank you for your interest, Lady Waverly. It is so good of you to tell me what is in your mind, and I hope it is never said of me with truth that I failed to heed good advice.”

  As a first speech to one’s prospective mother-in-law, thought Helen, it was not bad. Imagine Lady Waverly actually thrusting her son Ned into Helen’s competent hands! Why else had Ned rushed posthaste from London? It was a veritable revelation to Helen! Her thoughts moved busily into the new paths outlined by her interpretations of Lady Waverly’s observations.

  *

  By the time the laggards arrived on the beach below the clifftop, there was already much industry in progress. Faustina, on her knees in the damp sand, careless of her dress, was directing the construction of a model replica of the residence of the earls of Devon. Tiverton Castle’s strong and simple lines, conceived in the turbulent days of the twelfth century, were easy enough for a novice in the art of sand-castle building. Althea’s crows of delight were strange in Hugh’s ears. Uneasily, he wondered whether he had ever heard the child laugh so heartily.

  It was a pretty picture, with Julia enthusiastically working nearby on what she claimed was Boadicea’s grave bar-row, but which looked to her critical brother like nothing more than a shapeless mass of sand. “Besides,” he pointed out, “nobody really knows where the queen was buried.”

  “Oh, Sir Edward” — Mary laughed — “don’t spoil it No one can prove she wasn’t buried in a grave barrow, either!”

  It was a timeless afternoon. The sea heaved gently, of a dark blue not so dark as Hugh’s eyes. The salt breeze swept ashore in little gusts, and Faustina, knowing the weather signs, thought it might well be a stormy evening. If the sky darkened, would Ned’s riding officers be out again?

  “A gloomy thought?” said Hugh softly. She had not heard him approach, and his voice startled her. “No,” she said, “only that the wind seems to be coming up a bit. See how it dries the top sand?”

  Althea announced suddenly, “My tower is not as strong as it should be. If it falls, then it is a sign.”

  “A sign?” asked Hugh, startled.

  “A sign,” she repeated firmly. “Mrs. Robbins says that the Lord gives us signs that tell us what to do. This sign will be to tell me that I am tired of building the castle.”

  In spite of themselves, the adults watched Althea’s tower — Hugh with skepticism on the subject of omens; Julia with impatience because Mr. Talbot had asked her to stroll with him along the beach, and she felt obliged to wait for the others to be free too; and Faustina with exasperation. Why did Hugh have to come to interrupt them when they were having fun?

  The tower fell, and as though released from a spell, Althea sprang to her feet. “I will run down the sand as far as I can see,” she announced. “But I will come back.”

  With little puffs of sand marking her running steps, she ran swiftly down the sand. Faustina jumped to her feet, brushed the sand from the front of her skirt, and said vaguely, ‘I must follow her. She doesn’t know the beach.”

  Faustina walked fast. She left Hugh behind, with his great friend Aubrey Talbot. The two of them would keep Julia company. Faustina herself wanted to be alone. Aubrey could keep Hugh from annoying Julia, she thought. Besides, Ned and Mary Bidwell were not far behind.

  Her thoughts were spirited company, and she reached the headland before she realized it. There was, she was startled to discover, no sight of Althea, except for fast-disappearing footprints in the sand.

  Faustina hurried to round the headland. Here a broad stretch of water spread out before her. The far coasts of the bay were of course not visible, but the near shore stretched out at hand. A curving crescent of shingle and sand, like the beach she had traveled to this point. Beyond was the long stone mole reaching out into the bay, and at the deep end, one larger rock a little beyond the tip of the mole.

  And on this last rock, a very small figure indeed, stood Althea, her white muslin dress whipping in the wind.

  The wind, Faustina realized, had risen a good deal in the last hour. The blowing sand at the replica of Tiverton Castle was only a hint. Here, where the wind had fuller sweep, it was brushin
g the water into whitecaps.

  And the waves, Faustina noted with shock, were already washing over the stones stretching out into the bay.

  Althea was trapped. The child, Faustina saw at once, knew she was in trouble. She stood, a frail figure, on the farthest rock, looking in puzzled fashion at the waves forming a barrier between her and the rock next inshore — a rock that had been almost dry when she had ventured out. Now the only dry spot was a small irregular oval on top of the stone. And a widening stretch of water, too wide to wade, between the two rocks.

  Faustina called to her. The wind whipped her words from her lips, and she could not tell whether the child heard her or not. She ran toward the spot where the stones met the sand. When she called again, Althea lifted her white, scared face to stare inshore.

  Her lips formed words, so much Faustina could guess, but no sound reached her. How could she have let the child get out of her sight? She was no better than Zelle! she thought angrily. But self-recrimination would have to wait.

  Rucking up her skirts, Faustina carefully ventured out onto the rocks. Calling again to Althea, she cried, “I’m coming! Don’t move!” and trusted the child to obey. She herself had all she could do to keep her balance on the rocks, covered with slimy green sea growth.

  Faustina could believe, very soon, that she had been slipping on wet rocks for days. Then she heard Althea’s piping voice: “Faustina!”

  She looked up hastily. She had reached the last but one stone, and stood on the brink of the racing water separating her from the child. Already the water lapped at Althea’s small slippers, and Faustina remembered that the tide was coming in. At high tide…

  There was no time to lose.

  “Hold on, Althea!” she cried. ‘I’m coming to get you!”

  “Vite, vite!” cried Althea.

  It was a measure of the child’s fear, thought Faustina remorsefully, that her words came out in the first language she had learned. I am to blame, she groaned inwardly.