by Mary Nichols
‘Oh, dear, I can see squalls ahead. Kate, you have been having your own way for far too long.’
‘Grandmama, I am a mature widow. I am not a newly come-out innocent who knows nothing of anything except to obey her father until she is married and then obey her husband. I have had a measure of independence and I value it.’
‘It is not too late, you know.’
‘What for?’
‘To cancel the wedding. It will cause a dreadful scandal, but we should live it down eventually, but it would mean you would never have another offer.’ She paused. ‘It comes down to whether you can accommodate yourself to the Viscount’s ways or say goodbye to ever having a family of your own.’
‘Of course I am not going to cancel it. Whoever heard of such a thing, especially over something as trivial as who should be my bridal attendants? Now, please say no more about it.’ She spoke sharply because her grandmother had only put into words the doubts and worries she already had. Would there be squalls or would she learn to subjugate herself to Robert’s will? She shook herself. ‘I must go and see to the children’s tea.’
She went up to the schoolroom, where Michael was teasing Annie and she put the Viscount and her wedding from her mind to deal with them.
The drawing room at Cranford House in Upper Brook Street was crammed to suffocation. It seemed to Kate that half the haut monde was there, all talking at once, all with raised voices, trying to make themselves heard. This was not how she expected to meet Robert’s daughters and she began to wonder if she had made a mistake in the day or the hour. But the invitation, sent by Mrs Withersfield, had definitely said Tuesday the twenty-fourth of June at two o’clock of the afternoon.
She had dressed with care, not wishing to seem dowdy, or outrageously modish. The impression she wanted to create was a naturalness that the children could understand, neither top-lofty nor girlish. She did not want them to be shy of her, or disdainful either. The weather was warm and a yellow muslin seemed to fit the bill. Joan, who was learning fast from Corinne, had put up her hair upon which she had tied a straw bonnet trimmed with silk daisies. A pair of white cotton gloves and a neat little reticule completed the outfit. Now, in this gathering, she felt decidedly under-dressed.
As they were spotted, the hubbub of conversation died and everyone turned towards the newcomers. ‘They have been gossiping about us,’ she whispered to her grandmother.
‘Let them.’ Lady Morland put her chin in the air and made her way towards a tall, regal lady in mauve silk and a dancing feather head-dress, who was so like Robert in looks, the same dark hair and arched brows, that Kate did not doubt she was his sister.
‘Lady Morland, so good of you to come to my little gathering,’ she said, though there was little warmth in her voice. ‘And this must be Mrs Meredith.’ It was said almost as an afterthought, as she looked Kate up and down, her lip curling disdainfully at her simple dress.
‘Mrs Withersfield,’ Lady Morland said. ‘May I present my granddaughter, Mrs Meredith.’
‘Mrs Withersfield.’ Kate refused to be cowed by her haughty look. ‘How do you do?’
‘Very well, thank you. Do take a seat. Tea will be served directly. Robert is about somewhere. I will go and see if I can find him.’
‘She is going to have to come down off her high horse when you are the Viscountess,’ her ladyship whispered to Kate, as she left them. ‘I do not think she will like it, not after having the ordering of his household for so long. I hope Cranford has made her position clear to her.’
‘I do not think it will make much difference,’ Kate said. ‘Robert intends to leave her at Cranford Manor with the children while we are in Austria.’
‘Hmph.’
Robert was approaching them and they stood up to be greeted by him. He enquired how they were and if they had been offered refreshments, all very polite, all said with a smile, but Kate could not help feeling that he would have treated every other lady in the room with equal courtesy and she was no different. Her doubts were assuming gigantic proportions and it took an effort of will to keep them down.
‘My lord, I thought I was to meet your daughters today,’ she said.
‘So you shall. My sister will fetch them down directly.’
‘Here, in this crowd?’
‘Yes, I thought it best. You will be able to speak to them and see how well behaved they are in company, and they will think nothing of it.’
‘You haven’t told them, have you?’ It was an accusation. ‘You have not told them you are to marry again, nor that I am to be your wife and their stepmother.’
‘I will do so this evening, after everyone has gone.’
‘And am I to be present?’
‘I think not. Not on this occasion. Later, when they are used to the idea.’
As he finished speaking Mrs Withersfield re-entered the room with a little girl on either side of her. They were dressed exactly alike in pink dimity dresses with wide ribbon sashes and pink ribbons in their dark curls. They were paraded round the room and stopped to curtsy to each guest and say ‘good afternoon’ before moving on. Kate and her grandmother were treated in exactly the same way.
Kate was having none of it. She smiled at them and held out her hands to take one of each of theirs. ‘Now let me see,’ she said, leaning back a little and looking from one to the other, as if trying to decide. ‘You must be Roberta and you are Caroline.’
The youngest of the two giggled, but it was quickly stifled by a look from her aunt. ‘No, I am Caroline. That is Roberta.’
‘Oh, dear, how can I have got it wrong? I do beg your pardon. I am…’ She paused. Mrs Meredith sounded so formal. ‘I am Mrs Kate. I hope we shall be friends.’
They curtsied again. ‘Thank you, ma’am.’
Mrs Withersfield moved them on and very soon they left the room to go back to their own quarters. Kate watched them go, feeling sad. It was not how she had imagined the meeting would be. She had hoped for informality, for questions and answers, to ask them about themselves, to tell them a little about herself, perhaps give them a little hug.
‘Mrs Kate,’ Robert murmured beside her. ‘Where did that come from?’
‘One of my foster children. It seemed less formal than Mrs Meredith, and I could not ask them to call me Mama, could I? Not yet.’
‘No.’ He paused. ‘How are the wedding arrangements coming along?’
‘Very well. The invitations have been sent, the caterers booked and the food and drink decided upon. My gown is being made. The only thing yet to be determined is what my bridesmaids will wear. Have you decided whether Roberta and Caroline will attend me?’
‘I think not. My sister thinks it will be too disruptive for their routine and seeing me married again might upset them.’
‘But won’t they enjoy dressing up and being with their relations? And they must surely be curious about me after our meeting.’
‘Their curiosity will be satisfied when we spend two days at Cranford Manor before leaving for Austria.’ He paused. ‘Do you need attendants? Have you no friends or relatives to be bridesmaids?’
She wondered why he allowed his sister to make such decisions. ‘Yes, of course,’ she said. ‘I have promised Annie and there is Charlotte, my cousin Elizabeth’s eldest.’ She did not explain who Annie was and was glad he did not ask.
‘Good. Now, let us take a stroll about the room and I will introduce you to some of our friends. Many of the names you will recognise, for they are on the guest list…’
And so the visit drew to a close and Kate returned home, feeling confused and disturbed and wondering if she would ever fit into Robert’s life the way he expected her to. She could not help thinking that if it had been Simon’s children she was being introduced to, they would have been chattering away in no time, and ready to be hugged. He was that kind of man; he would ignore the convention that said a gentleman must hold himself aloof from his children, that bringing them up was the domain of women: wet nurses, governesse
s, school teachers, and sometimes their mothers. He would be down on the floor with them, making them laugh, making her smile too.
He did not visit her again and she missed him dreadfully, but perhaps he was wise to stay away; his presence was too disturbing. The Viscount was busy himself, but on the few occasions he called, he enquired if the children had gone, to which she replied, ‘Not yet, but there is plenty of time.’ But time seemed to be hurtling towards the day when she became Viscountess Cranford. If it had been Simon she was marrying, she would have been as excited as her grandmother, but it wasn’t Simon, it was Robert. Why, in the middle of all the preparations for her wedding, was she having thoughts like that? She must stop it at once.
Simon was sitting in the office at the Hartingdon, wondering what Lady Eleanor would say when he told her the children were coming back to the Home. He should never have allowed Mrs Meredith to take a child into her home, and certainly should never have agreed when she enthusiastically offered to take four. Now he had four children for whom he had to find homes or squeeze them into the Hartingdon, which was already bursting at the seams. He supposed he would manage something; after all, he had been doing the job successfully for the past three years.
In the beginning the work was part of his determination to put Isobel from his mind. Having decided never to marry, he had made the children of the Home his family. As he settled into the role, it became all-engrossing and gave him a great deal of satisfaction. He told himself he did not need women. Meeting Kate had changed all that. He cursed Viscount Cranford for taking her away, not only from the children, but from him and making him vulnerable again. It was a feeling he did not like and he rejected it with the same determination he used for everything else and set to work, writing letters. He wanted to place Michael where he could make something of himself and Sarah needed to go into service with a kind family who would not treat her as a drudge.
He posted the letters on his way back to his lodgings and his lonely dinner, only to find his Aunt Matilda ensconced in one of his armchairs waiting for him. ‘Aunt, what are you doing here?’
‘I have come to see what you are up to. Have you done anything at all about finding a wife?’
‘I have had no time.’
‘You mean that charity is still taking up all your time?’
‘Most of it.’
‘Then find someone else to do the work. I should not have to remind you of your duty. Your uncle was saying only two days ago that he wished he could see his next heir before he cast up his accounts.’
‘Is he ill? I thought he was in the best of health.’
‘He is perfectly well, but I still think you should make a push to find someone to marry. If you do not, then offer for Isobel. It is your uncle’s wish.’
‘It was his wish she should marry Charles, in spite of the understanding we had. If he had not interfered…’
‘You cannot blame him entirely. Charles and Isobel wanted it and her father was all in favour. After all, Charles was the heir.’
‘And now Charles is dead, I am to step into his shoes and his bed. No, thank you, Aunt.’
‘Then find someone else. There must be any number of young ladies come up for the Season from which to choose.’
‘They are not lining up to marry me, Aunt,’ he said wryly, thinking of Kate.
‘Then do something about it. Go to Almack’s, that’s the place to meet them. I can get vouchers.’
‘I do not doubt you can, but—’
‘I will entertain no buts. We will go next Wednesday.’
‘Is my uncle with you?’
‘No, you know he abhors the capital, especially in the Season.’
He was relieved to hear it. ‘Where are you staying?’
‘Not here, you can be sure. I never saw such poky rooms. Could you not have found something better?’
‘These are bachelor rooms and they suit me perfectly well.’
‘I shall stay with my cousin Emmeline. You will call for me at eight o’clock on Wednesday dressed in evening clothes and that means breeches and stockings.’
He sighed. ‘Very well, Aunt. Just to please you.’
The first person Simon saw on entering Almack’s ballroom that Wednesday evening was Kate, dressed elegantly in cerise silk decorated with rosebuds. Naturally she was accompanied by the Viscount. He knew he should have bowed to her and passed on, but when he tried to do so, she smiled at him and wished him good evening as if genuinely pleased to see him and that meant he had to present her and her escort to his aunt.
He knew he was compounding his folly, but his pride was at stake and so, after the courtesies had been completed, he asked her for a dance.
‘Yes, of course,’ she said with a smile, handing him her card on which the Viscount’s name was inscribed twice, along with two or three others. He scribbled his name against a waltz and handed it back. ‘I shall look forward to it,’ he said, bowing before walking away beside his aunt.
‘Who is she?’ she asked him.
He told her how he had met Kate and about her involvement with the children and her engagement to the Viscount, to be answered with the withering comment, ‘Then you are wasting your time there, young man.’
The evening proceeded as evenings at Almack’s always did, with a strict eye being kept on etiquette by the ladies who ran the events which took place every Wednesday with the sole purpose, so it seemed to Simon, of introducing naive young ladies to eligible bachelors. The refreshments were scanty and the drinks provided non-alcoholic; he decided one would have to be desperate to resort to looking for a wife under such circumstances. But he was not looking for a wife, he was looking at Kate, saw how she and Cranford leaned towards each other to murmur comments and the intimate way they smiled at each other, and concluded she was truly looking forward to being the Viscount’s wife. He danced with several young ladies, daughters of his mother’s friends, and then the time came to claim his waltz with her.
As always they danced well together, but he would have enjoyed it more if he had not been so aware of Viscount Cranford watching them.
Kate stopped her chatter when he appeared unresponsive and looked up into his face. He had a faraway look in his eyes, as if he were struggling with a dilemma. ‘I am sorry,’ she said.
‘Sorry? Whatever for?’
‘Giving you more problems to solve.’
The only problem he had at that moment was reconciling himself to the fact that he was in love with her and that endangered all his hard-won immunity from women, however attractive. And she was certainly that. And already spoken for. ‘Solving problems is my forte,’ he said lightly.
‘I am glad you were able to take time from them to enjoy an evening’s leisure,’ she said. ‘You cannot be at work all the time.’
He gave her a wry smile. ‘The work I do is my pleasure, Mrs Meredith. I derive a great deal of satisfaction from seeing poor children happy.’
‘Oh, so do I.’ It was said with the genuine warmth he had come to expect of her. ‘If I were not going to Austria, I would become more involved, but as it is, I have put you in the suds.’
‘Not at all.’
‘Then why the long face?’
Only Kate could speak so personally without risking a put down. ‘Do I have a long face? Rest assured, I am not sad, not when I am with you. I enjoy dancing with you, but I was thinking that this is very different from waltzing under the stars.’
‘Yes,’ she said thoughtfully, remembering the terrace of Hartingdon House. ‘And from dancing to a pianoforte in the schoolroom, and Michael trying to learn the steps with Annie and treading on her toes.’
‘They will miss you,’ he said, meaning I will miss you.
‘And I them. But I shall think of them often. Will you write to me from time to time, tell me how they are faring?’
‘Not a good idea, Mrs Meredith,’ he said laconically. It was not so much that he did not think it was a good idea for her to cling to her relationship with the
children, but what correspondence with her would do to him. Knowing she was making a new life with a new husband would only prolong the agony in both instances.
‘I see,’ she said. He evidently did not want to keep in contact with her and that disappointed her because she thought they had established a good rapport that went beyond the business of the charity. At least, they had until she told him she was going to be married and he must find other homes for the children. Since then he had become distinctly frosty. She did not really blame him. ‘You are probably right. You did warn me not to become too attached to them.’
‘Yes, I did, didn’t I? You must harden your heart, as I have had to do.’
‘You! Hard-hearted? I do not believe it. You could not do the work you do if that were true.’
‘Neither could I do it if I fell to pieces every time I saw a child in rags, begging in the street. We have to stand back from it and get on with doing what we can to alleviate their condition.’
‘Have you always been able to do that?’
‘No, I have had to learn it. It is the same for many things we are faced with in this life. We have to override our feelings, in order to function. Bear that in mind, Mrs Meredith, won’t you?’
She was not sure what he was trying to tell her. That she should be more like him and not mind when the children were hurt? Or was there something else behind his words? Had he guessed how he affected her, made her yearn for something she could not quite explain, even to herself? She was mortified to think he might have.
The dance ended and Simon returned Kate to the Viscount and strolled back to his aunt to find her talking to Isobel. She was a little plumper than he remembered, but still a very beautiful woman. ‘Good evening, Cousin,’ he said, recovering quickly from the shock of seeing her. He knew his aunt had engineered the meeting and was annoyed that she had said nothing to him. ‘I did not know you were here.’
‘I arrived a little late.’
‘No, I meant in town.’
