The Fallen Angels

by Bernard Cornwell

  The lawyer laughed. “Your lordship is ever thoughtful.” He looked at Campion. “Such wit!”

  She dared not look at her father. She would have burst into laughter if she had caught his eye.

  “Now!” her father barked. “We are gathered here for a solemn occasion. What happens when I die.” She looked at him with sudden shock and he scowled at her. “Don’t you cry, Missy. I can’t stand weeping women! Your mother never wept, God bless her. Nothing worse than a weeping woman, ain’t that right, Scrimgeour?”

  “They are a bane, my Lord.” Scrimgeour was delicately hooking the wire earpieces of half-moon spectacles beneath his scrolled wig.

  “So.” Her father gave her a swift smile. “You sit and say nothing, my dear, and listen to us men talk. Tell her what’s in the will, Scrimgeour.”

  Campion looked from the lawyer to her father, and back to the lawyer again. She had known, of course, that Cartmel Scrimgeour had come to Lazen, but she presumed that it was no more than one of his normal visits. She had been summoned to her father’s room and had expected only to talk about the domestic accounts. Now this? Her father’s will? She wanted to protest, but the fat lawyer, his thumbs and fingers splayed above the papers as if he was casting a spell, spoke first.

  “You understand, my Lady, that despite this egregiously woeful topic, we all, of course, wish your father a long and most happy life.”

  “Christ!” The Earl groaned. “Get on with it.”

  Scrimgeour lifted a curling sheet of paper. “In the unhappy event, dear lady, of your dear father’s death…”

  “Father!”

  The Earl looked innocently at her. “Seen a spider?”

  “What are we talking about?”

  He smiled at the shock in her voice. “I am doing, dear child, what the priests tell us to do. I am preparing for my death.”

  “But…”

  “Be quiet, Campion. Carry on, Scrimgeour, she’s usually more sensible than this.”

  The lawyer smiled ingratiatingly. “In the unhappy event, dear lady, of your dear father’s death, the estate, and the title, of course, descends to your brother, Lord Werlatton.”

  “She knows who her brother is, Scrimgeour!”

  “Your Lordship is quite right to tell me!” He gave the Earl a happy, grateful smile. “Shall I add the details of Lady Campion’s own settlement?”

  “No. Let her wait till I’m cold.” The Earl smiled at her. “Periton House and a decent income. You won’t be cold. Will you please stop looking as if you’ve seen a spider?”

  She reached for his hand and held it in both her own. She supposed she should say something to him, but this cold-blooded and sudden immersion into the details of his will had left her too shocked to open her mouth.

  Her father seemed to understand for he raised her right hand to his mouth and kissed it. Then he nodded to his lawyer. “Go on, Scrimgeour, don’t mind this touching display of fatherly affection.”

  “It warms my heart, your Lordship.” Mr. Scrimgeour, as if to prove his point, dabbed at one protuberant eye with a plump finger. He smiled at Campion. “Unfortunately, dear Lady Campion, your father has felt it necessary to make precautions against a more unhappy outcome.”

  “What he means,” her father said, “is that if my damn fool son catches his death of a French bullet, then your cousin inherits the Earldom. Making Julius an Earl is like making an ape into an Archbishop, or a lawyer into a gentleman. Carry on, Scrimgeour, don’t mind my interruptions.”

  “They are always most illuminating, my Lord.”

  Campion had scarcely thought of the eventuality, yet suddenly it seemed horribly real. There was war. Toby was, at his own insistence, in France, and only Toby barred the Earldom from Sir Julius. She remembered her cousin pawing at her in the straw, she remembered his foul language, and she shuddered to think of him as master of Lazen.

  Cartmel Scrimgeour ran a finger beneath his stock. “In that event, Lady Campion, your father has decided that the property will be entailed upon Sir Julius’s issue or, if he has none, upon your own children.”

  “Let’s hope he has none,” the Earl growled. “Let’s hope it’s rotted off by the pox.” He squeezed her hand and she squeezed back.

  Scrimgeour went on as though the Earl had not spoken. “That would mean that Sir Julius, as Earl, would have no power over the estate. He may live at Lazen, he will receive an income sufficient to his needs, and a very generous one too, but you, Lady Campion, will have the administration of the estate until the death of Sir Julius, or, should he predecease his issue, until the majority of his heir or, should he have none, your own.” He smiled.

  She was astonished. In effect the whole estate would be given to her if her brother died to hold in trust for the following generation.

  She stared at the lawyer. Her father laughed at her. “Don’t pretend you’re surprised.”

  “Father!”

  “Christ! You think I’d let Julius have this? God! He’d gamble the whole damned thing away in a year! Wrote to me a month ago wanting more money. I told him enough was enough and now he’s praying for my death and Toby’s death. I just wish I could see the little bastard’s face when he finds out we’ve entailed the damned place. Do go on, Scrimgeour.”

  The lawyer waggled his eyebrows, a sure sign that he was approaching a difficult topic. “There is always the sad possibility, Lady Campion, that you will predecease your cousin in the sad event of your brother not succeeding to the Earldom.”

  “He means,” the Earl said, “that all my children will be dead. A united family once more. Go on.”

  “In which case, Lady Campion, the new will provides that your husband will continue your responsibilities, in which discharge he will be aided by Achilles d’Auxigny and by your humble servant.”

  “He means himself.”

  Scrimgeour bowed to her in his chair. “Your dear uncle and myself are named, in any case, to be your fellow trustees.”

  She smiled, trying to cover her astonishment. “I’m glad, Mr. Scrimgeour.”

  “Oh God! Don’t be nice to him. He’s a lawyer. He’ll have the skin off your back if you’re nice to him.”

  “Such wit,” murmured Mr. Scrimgeour.

  Her father drew his hand back and pushed himself up on the pillows. “Your uncle may be French, but he’s got more sense than anyone else in the family. As for Scrimgeour, well, he tells me he’s honest. He’s a lawyer, but he says he’s honest. Such wit.”

  Cartmel Scrimgeour let the jibes roll off his ample, sleek flesh. He smiled at Campion. “Let us fervently hope, Lady Campion, that our advice will not be required, and that your brother will live to a hale, hearty age to be much pleased with his own children.”

  “Amen,” Campion said fervently.

  “But if not,” her father said, “then you look after Lazen. And I mean you! You’ll make the decisions. You’ll get advice from Achilles and Scrimgeour, but the power is yours! I know you’re a girl, but you’ve got good sense. You should have been born a boy.”

  “You’d have liked that, father?”

  “Girls aren’t much use. All headaches and hair pins.”

  She put her tongue out at him. He laughed and reached for her hand. He held it and looked at her blue eyes. He smiled. “You may be a mere girl, Campion, but you’re the best of my litter.” He ignored her protest. “Your elder brother was a bore. And Toby?” He shrugged. “Toby doesn’t want the aggravation of it all. He wants to be a hero. I think he fancies a grave in Westminster Abbey.”

  “Nonsense, father.”

  “It’s not nonsense. And what it means, mere girl, is that Lazen hangs on a very thin thread. I’m using you to strengthen the thread.”

  She smiled. “A mere girl?”

  “Which makes it important,” her father said, “that you choose your husband wisely. However, there is no connection whatsoever between that statement and the next matter I wish to raise. Read it, Scrimgeour.”

  The lawy
er dropped one piece of paper and selected another. He licked his lips, peered archly over his spectacles at her, then read from the sheet of paper. “Lewis James McConnell Culloden, fourteenth…”

  “Forget his titles,” her father growled. He looked at Campion. “I asked Scrimgeour to find out who he was.”

  She knew she was blushing. She said nothing.

  Scrimgeour smiled at her. “Went to Eton College, of course, but didn’t we all?” He laughed lightly. “Then Kings, naturally, but did not stay up for his baccalaureate. The family lost their Irish lands, I fear his father was a gambler. Enough was saved from the wreckage for his Lordship, on succeeding his father, to buy himself a commission in the Blues. A most excellent regiment, of course. House in London, very fair, and property in Lancashire, Cheshire and the remnants of a small estate in County Offaly. All the latter mortgaged. No scandals, my Lord. He’s a communicant member of the Church of England, of course, and he has only spoken twice in the House of Lords; once on the subject of turnips, and the other time he advocated the adoption of the Austrian pattern of cavalry sword. His reputation, my Lord, is as a steady, quiet, solid man, plenty of bottom, whose family has fallen on hard times. He has never married.” Scrimgeour smiled and put the paper down.

  “What he means,” the Earl said, “is that Lewis ain’t got the pox.” Campion blushed, and the Earl smiled. “Upon which good news, Scrimgeour, I’d be obliged if you left us.”

  Cartmel Scrimgeour stood. He bowed. “My Lord. Lady Campion.” He walked with immense dignity from the room.

  “Well?” her father said.

  She stood. She walked to the window, rubbed a patch of glass clear of condensation, and stared at the light scattering of snow that had fallen in the night. The hedgerows seemed very black against the unusual whiteness. She hoped it would be warmer for Friday’s meet.

  “Well?”

  “Well what, father?” She turned.

  He stared at her. Her beauty was a constant solace to him, more beautiful even than his wife whose portrait, on an easel, had stood these fifteen years at the foot of his bed. “You’re not going to weep on me, are you?”

  “Why should I?”

  “Because my bowels, child, that I cannot control anyway, have started to pass blood. Fenner, who knows nothing, says it means nothing. He’s lying. Doctors always lie. They’re worse than bloody lawyers. I have pain like the very devil and I’m dying.”

  She wanted to cry. She wanted to throw herself onto his bed, into his arms, and cry.

  She stood still. She looked at him and felt the tears prick at her eyes.

  “Don’t weep on me, girl. Weep after I’m dead, but give me a smile while I live.”

  “Father.”

  He laughed at her, held out his good arm, and she went to him, let him hold her, and she cried anyway. His hand stroked her neck. “Get me a brandy, girl.”

  “You shouldn’t drink, father.”

  “It’s for you, fool.”

  She laughed. He always had been able to make her laugh. She dried her eyes on his pillow, smearing it with cosmetics, and the look of her face made him laugh. “Get us both a brandy, girl. Get drunk with your father, not many girls do that.”

  She gave him a small brandy, provoking a snort of disdain, and gave herself an even smaller one. “Well, father?”

  “Do you want to marry him, eh? Scrimgeour says he ain’t poxed, says he’s got bottom!”

  She had guessed that the question would be asked when he had dismissed the lawyer so brusquely. She said nothing.

  Her father drained his glass. “You’ve been looking miserable as a hound without a nose these last two months. Don’t you like him?”

  “I like him, father.” Yet how could she tell her father of her shame? The memory of going to the Long Gallery on Christmas morning, of going in hope that a servant would be waiting there. Each time she remembered it she winced at the thought, at the agonizing embarrassment of the thought. “I do like him.”

  “If you’re not going to drink that, give it to me.”

  She sipped and made a face. “Here.”

  He laughed, took the glass and drained it. “He wants to marry you. Stood there like a new-born foal, all twisted legs and shyness, asking for the privilege of your hand. God damn it, girl, it is a privilege. You’re the prettiest filly in the country.”

  “Father!”

  He stuck his tongue out at her. “So I told him to wait for a month. By that time Scrimgeour would have found out his bloodstock and you could give me your answer. So?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know, father.”

  He watched her as she walked back to the window. He sighed. “You want certainty?”

  She nodded. “I suppose so.” On the steamy part of the window, out of his sight, she had drawn a heart. She pierced the heart with an arrow. At the feathered end she traced her initials, CL. With a slow finger, with trepidation, she put a C beside the point of the arrow, and then crooked a line to make it into a G. She rubbed it out, full of shame, despising herself, unable to explain it to herself, wishing she had the sense and practicality that everyone else claimed to see in her.

  Her father patted the bed beside him. “Come and sit.”

  He looked at the portrait of his wife, and then at Campion. “Would you say your mother and I were happily married?”

  She nodded. She had only seen them together when she was very small, but she remembered their laughter.

  He smiled. “I didn’t know if I was doing the right thing. I know Madeleine wasn’t sure. Certainty isn’t part of it.”

  “It isn’t?”

  “No.” He shook his head. “But we were happy. You grow into it. It’s a responsibility. God, I’m being serious. It must be death creeping up on me.”

  She smiled because he wanted her to smile. She took his hand, seeing how thin it was, how his wedding ring hung loose on his finger. She raised the hand to her lips and kissed it. “I love you, father.”

  “Christ! You want me to cry?”

  “No.”

  He smiled. “Can you love Lewis?”

  “Should I?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know, child. I know one thing. I’m going to die, and not all the liars in England can stop that happening, and when I do die, my child, the wolves are going to come to Lazen. And if Toby’s dead then you’ll have to stop Julius stripping the flesh off Lazen’s bones.”

  “Toby should come home.”

  “I know. But bloody Paunceley wants him, bloody Paunceley would. And you can’t blame Toby, my child, because a young man should go out and dare the world. So let him be.” He squeezed her hand. “But if Toby dies, then every bastard in the kingdom will try to take Lazen. You need a man beside you, a good man, a strong one.”

  “Because I’m just a girl? All headaches and hair pins?”

  He laughed. “All tits and troubles, eh?”

  “Father!”

  He laughed again, the laughter turning into pain. “And if you die, my dear child, and women do die in childbirth like your mother did, then I need to know that a man, good and strong, is holding this Castle against the crucifying bastards.”

  “You want me to marry Lewis, father?”

  “Is there anyone else?” he teased her.

  She thrust the thought away, the ridiculous, stupid, demeaning, flighty thought, and shook her head. “Of course not.”

  Her father smiled. He looked so old, so tired, and so pained. “I think he’s a good man. I think he will look after you. So what do I tell him?”

  She half smiled. “You like him?”

  He nodded. “He’s good with hounds.”

  She laughed. She supposed her father was right, that certainty was a luxury, no more to be looked for in a betrothal than the fool’s gold of romantic ecstasy. Yet could there not be some small magic? A dash, no more? Since Lord Culloden had rescued her there had been only the slow, growing, undramatic certainty of their marriage.

  “Well?” the
Earl asked. He seemed anxious.

  She squeezed his hand and smiled. “Tell him yes, father, tell him yes.”

  He smiled back. “Thank you. I’ll get Scrimgeour to talk to him. Lewis ought to know the will.” He gripped her hand. She could sense the relief in him. He pulled her toward him and kissed her cheek. “You always were my sensible one.”

  She wished he had not said it, for what lady of sense would hold the memory of a horse-master in her heart? But what was said could not be unsaid, and she could only wait for the proposal and for the future which, this day of lawyers and snow, had begun to look so hard and cold and close.

  8

  “L ouis was a fool.” The voice was grating, harsh and unforgiving. “A damned bloody French fool.”

  “Yes, my Lord.”

  “A fat fool! They should have boiled him down for rushlight. He was no God-damned use for anything else!” The man who spoke was an old man of awesome ugliness. He had a small, round head that was perched on an unnaturally long neck. His skin was wrinkled and dark. There was something reptilian about him. He wore a dirty, old-fashioned wig over his baldness. His mouth seemed no more than a lipless slit.

  He sat behind a huge desk, a desk covered with papers and brilliantly lit by ranks of candles. In the center of the desk, just before his angry, sardonic gaze, was a large book of engraved pictures. It was a rare and inventive volume of pornography that his Lordship was savoring. Lord Paunceley, government servant, was a collector of such things.

  He turned a page that crackled as he handled it. He stared at a picture depicting Leda and the Swan. “If you were to disguise yourself, Owen, for the purposes of rape, would you adopt the guise of a swan?”

  “No, my Lord.”

  “Do you rape women, Owen, or for that matter boys?”

  “No, my Lord.”

  “You, being Welsh, would doubtless choose something less flamboyant than a swan. Would you be a peewit?”

  “No, my Lord.”

  “A priapic peewit?” His Lordship laughed to himself. “Better a priapic peewit than to be King of France. It took two drops of the blade, eh?”

  “Indeed so, my Lord.”