Your conscience would be clear, and a clear conscience was the next best thing to telling the devil to go to the devil!
Brought up in such a tradition, it was not surprising that Harriet was seldom at a loss when beset by problems. Despite his gallantry when afloat and determination when ashore, Admiral Yorke had successfully dissipated two small fortunes which had been left to him, and when his life was terminated during a minor affray in the Aegean Sea he departed this world without the comforting knowledge that his next of kin would benefit in any way by his demise. In fact, she was left penniless. Friends had rallied round, and one of them found her the position of governess to Sir Willoughby de Courcey’s motherless daughter. Sir Willoughby had two sons, one who went daily to conjugate Latin verbs at the local parsonage, and another who was already at Oxford. Unfortunately, however, from the point of view of both Harriet and the young de Courceys, Sir Willoughby got himself thrown when out hunting with local enthusiasts, and was brought home on a five-barred gate. He died within a few hours, and when his will was read it was discovered that he had made provision for his dependents by appointing them wards of a certain very noble gentleman, none other than the Marquis of Capel, heir to the Duke of Coltsfoot, who had apparently accepted the obligation without demur in addition to becoming treasurer of their considerable family funds.
When weeks and then months passed following the death of Sir Willoughby, and no indication was received from the Marquis that he intended to contact his wards or to shoulder his new responsibilities, a certain anxiety began to permeate the atmosphere at Lowthan Hall, where they resided. Naturally it was understood that Lord Capel was a very fashionable gentleman, with many claims upon his time and no doubt with a large number of friends who kept him preoccupied, but money was running short in Sussex. Little Mr. Moss, of Moss and Rutledge, the local firm of solicitors, said there was nothing at all they could do to alleviate the position without the consent of his lordship. They, too, had written to him, but without the smallest response. And Verbena was without a respectable gown to her name, Robert could not return to Oxford because there was no way in which his fees could be paid, and worse than that the cook was raising difficulties because the butcher refused to deliver the meat until his last bill was settled in full, and the local provider of groceries followed suit. There was a serious depreciation in the quality of the menus at Lowthan, two servants had already left to better themselves, and the head gardener had given notice—no doubt he, too, had decided that he could better himself.
There was no possibility that the butler would desert them, because no one else would employ him in his declining years. And the housekeeper, too, was loyal, and Penelope, the children’s old nurse. But apart from that the situation was becoming intensely serious, and though she dismissed from her mind the thought of her own unpaid salary, Harriet sat down and indited her first letter to his lordship. It was followed by a second, and a third ... and there was absolutely no response.
A letter to Lady Fanny Bingham, the Marquis’s sister, in Hill Street, brought an immediate response. She disclaimed all knowledge of any new obligations incurred by her brother, but suggested prompt action if anyone was prepared to take it; and as Harriet was the only one, apparently, who had thought it necessary to take rather more positive steps than the local solicitors, it seemed incumbent upon her to deliver her charges out of such a serious predicament. These were Lady Fanny’s own words, and they gave Harriet the clear view that that lady was at least as realistic as she was herself.
So, taking heart from such an obvious challenge, and being more than certain in her own mind that her father would have acted long before, she drew upon her own modest resources and hired a chaise to take her to London. It was her first visit to the capital, and under normal circumstances she would have appreciated such an adventure to the full, but being constantly worried that her funds would not last out, and that Lady Fanny might refuse to see her, she finally arrived in Hill Street in a state of great trepidation.
But Lady Fanny did receive her, and Lady Fanny was hearteningly blunt.
“Beard the monster in his den,” was her advice. “Don’t waste another moment, but insist upon seeing him.”
She was quite unlike anything Harriet had imagined, being the prettiest widow in her early forties anyone could possibly imagine, with a lively sense of humour, and clearly as much outraged by the position as anyone could desire. And if her sense of humour was rather more in the ascendant than her sense of outrage, then Harriet could not really complain. For Lady Fanny was extraordinarily gracious, offering to read her brother a lecture when she saw him next, and to point out to him the evils of such immoral conduct.
“For of course it is positively immoral to ignore those poor dear children,” she said, with a spark of appreciation in her bright blue eyes that startled Harriet, who in any case could not quite see young Robert de Courcey in the role of a poor dear child. “Although why in the world he accepted such a charge in the beginning I cannot imagine. It is so altogether unlike him. He is entirely without love for children, and although I have racked my brains I simply cannot remember his ever having referred to this Sir Willoughby—whatever it is that you say his name is? Or, rather, was!”
“De Courcey,” Harriet supplied. “I imagined they must be very close friends.”
Lady Fanny shook her head.
“If that is so, then it is one secret he has kept from me. But of course I do not know all his friends.”
She regarded Harriet a trifle more shrewdly, and enquired: “You said something about a fortune... quite a considerable fortune, I believe you meant to imply? Is all this inherited by the young people you are here to represent?”
“It is divided equally among them,” Harriet replied. “Sir Willoughby was particularly devoted to his youngest child, his daughter, and he saw no reason to make an unfair division.”
“I see.” The Marquis’s sister tapped her cheek with a small ivory fan. “Well, I must say I am inclined to the view that your late employer was an extraordinarily enlightened man and one for whom I feel a growing admiration, since in so many families the girls are almost entirely overlooked, and this leaves the poor things with an abysmally low chance of contracting a suitable marriage. However, in this particular case we need not anticipate any such difficulty?”
“Verbena is scarcely eight years old,” Miss Yorke told her a little drily.
“A pity,” Lady Fanny commented. “I might have offered to bring her out next season, when I have undertaken to bring out a favourite niece of mine, if she had been just a little older. The youngest Montague child was only just turned fifteen when she married the Earl of Devenham.”
She started to pace up and down her charming drawing room, which was decorated almost entirely in yellow and was matched not only by the big bowl of daffodils in the window but by the delicate lemon kid slippers which peeped from beneath her lavender gauze gown. Harriet, though she knew very little about high fashion, did not need to be told that Lady Fanny Bingham’s dress reflected her position as the daughter of a duke who would receive a very generous portion under the terms of her papa’s will and who had been left a magnificent fortune by the husband who had made her a widow at least three years before. She obviously favoured the present mode, and her robe was very slim and emphasised the delightful outline of her extraordinarily youthful figure. In order to be certain that her status as a widow was properly recognised she wore a Flemish lace cap, trimmed with lavender satin ribbons. Her curls, which were only partially looped up under her cap, were so dark that by contrast with them her skin seemed positively dazzling. And those vivid, kingfisher-blue eyes of hers were fringed with eyelashes which a large number of her friends insisted were darkened by the skilful fingers of her maid.
“Well, well,” she said, halting suddenly in front of Harriet and smiling at her with a dazzling display of beautifully even little teeth, “there is nothing more, I’m afraid, I can do for you, Miss Yorke. But I
do entreat you not to allow my brother to continue to evade his responsibilities, and in all our interests”—when thinking about it afterwards Harriet found it difficult to decide in what way Lady Fanny’s interests could be served by anyone as obscure as herself—“in all our interests you must continue most vigorously to champion the cause of these de Courcey children. If necessary you will have to camp out on the pavement outside my brother’s house in order to see him. Do not be put off by that ridiculous Pauncefoot’s efforts to protect him. And do not, above all, lose heart if you do not see him immediately. Stick to your guns, as my younger brother Bruce would say!”
She waved very pleasantly from the window as Harriet descended the steps of the house rather thoughtfully, and she succeeded in leaving an impression of a brightly plumaged bird with the governess, but one to whom it might be a little unwise to approach too close. It might even be a little unwise to heed any advice she gave, but Harriet, after discussing the matter intensively with her own former governess, Miss Marley, realised that she had no alternative but to force her presence upon the Marquis. Having met his sister she decided that he had probably forgotten all about the obligations he had incurred when he promised the late Sir Willoughby that he would act the part of a father to his children. Lady Fanny would probably make a very charming mother when she remembered the existence of her offspring—if, indeed, she had any—but the smallest excuse to do something that excluded them would always be happily seized upon by her. Daughters would represent a problem because they had to be bestowed in marriage, but sons—well, sons could look after themselves. That was her attitude to her brother, whom she probably hardly ever saw; and if his attitude was exactly the same as her own...
And it obviously was.
Harriet, having paid one visit to St. James’s Square that day, set forth again for a second visit with the determination not to be frustrated this time. At least Lady Fanny was right when she advised such a course of action.
CHAPTER
THREE
This time, very much to her relief, it was not Pauncefoot who opened the door to her. No doubt Pauncefoot, at that hour of the day, had other and better matters to occupy his attention, and it was the young footman who had let her out of the house following her morning visit who stood gaping at her in obvious astonishment and admiration when he answered her summons at the bell.
Harriet said immediately:
“I wish to see Lord Capel. If he is not at home I will come inside and wait,” with a firmness she was actually far from feeling.
“I don’t know about that, miss,” the footman objected. “I mean, I don’t know when his lordship
Harriet slipped past him into the candlelit hall. Despite the tall columns of wax in their glittering candelabra it remained shadowy, and to anyone who had no idea of the geography of the house it was somewhat confusing. To her all the solid mahogany doors looked exactly the same, and the corridor which led, she was sure, to Pauncefoot’s pantry filled her with apprehension.
“The library,” she said quickly, “I will wait in the library.”
“But perhaps I’d better acquaint Mr. Pauncefoot
She turned and confronted him with such a commanding flash in her green eyes that he yielded immediately.
“Very good, miss.”
When he had shown her into the library, and had seen the way she cast an approving glance around it as if she were very knowledgeable about that kind of furnishing and architecture, and had no hesitation at all about seating herself in the most comfortable chair, he paused before closing the door upon her.
“Can I bring you some refreshment, miss?” he suggested. “A glass of Madeira and some biscuits—?”
“A glass of ratafia and a very few biscuits,” she replied with a sweet, approving smile. “And there is absolutely no need to inform Mr. Pauncefoot that I am here.”
She decided, when he had left her alone, that she was dealing with him in what her father would have described as a very low-down manner. It was more than possible that he would be taken seriously to task for admitting her to the house at all when such an item of intelligence did finally come to the knowledge of the Marquis’s major-domo; and as for providing her with sustenance whilst she awaited the return of his lordship ... well, that would almost certainly be heavily frowned upon. She was reasonably certain that Pauncefoot had had his doubts about her from the moment she had descended from her hackney carriage that morning, and viewing the matter with detachment she could not but agree that her movements had a certain aura of suspiciousness about them.
But there was every possibility that Pauncefoot, in the absence of his master, and on a quiet Sunday evening, was securely closeted in his own particular sanctum, and he had probably already imbibed a sufficient quantity of his master’s claret to render him rather more than indifferent to what was going on around him.
At any rate, Harriet hoped so. She very earnestly hoped that Pauncefoot would pass into a state of tranquil oblivion before the night had drawn to a close, she having no doubt that her vigil was likely to be a lengthy one.
By the time the delicate French clock on the mantelpiece had chimed the hour of nine, she had gratefully consumed the ratafia and biscuits. The library was particularly silent, at the rear of the house, and therefore with windows overlooking the garden. Occasionally Harriet tiptoed to one of the windows and looked out between parted curtains, but there was nothing at all to be seen. It was a moonless night, and she wondered whether Lord Capel would risk being attacked by footpads and walk back to St. James’s Square from his club, once his evening there was ended, or whether he had arranged for his carriage to be driven to the club and return him to his house in greater comfort.
There were not many candles burning in their sconces, and finally several of them flickered, and one by one they went out. There was a fire burning in the grate, but that, too, merely smouldered.
She managed to stir one or two of the logs with her foot, and in the resulting, although purely temporary, bright yellow flame she was able to study the portrait which hung above the fireplace, and which she realised might very well be a portrait of the present Marquis’s mother. She had a look of Lady Fanny, but the eyes were deep and dark and lustrous. Had the Marquis of Capel bright blue eyes, or did they resemble those of the lovely lady in the portrait?
Harriet sighed, and returned to her chair. She felt very much like an interloper, one whom the Marquis might very well order to be ejected from his house if he returned in the sort of mood that rendered his temper uncertain. Nevertheless, she wished that he would return, and that an end could be put to this intolerable situation.
It had never once occurred to her that when he did return he might be accompanied by one or other of his friends, or even that he might go straight upstairs to his own apartments. In the latter event, once the idea presented itself, she determined that she would have to inveigle him downstairs again. Such an evening as this could not be altogether wasted.
But she was spared the ordeal of trespassing further into the remoter recesses of this forbidding house when the Marquis returned at ten o’clock. The little clock on the mantelpiece had barely finished chiming the hour when she heard the sound of voices in the hall. Unfortunately—and this she was not prepared for—he was not alone.
Harriet sat upright in her chair, and then glanced round wildly for some means of concealing herself—at any rate temporarily. The voices were plainly male, and they were approaching the library door with so little hesitation that she had barely time to take the decision to rush to the nearest window and seek the refuge offered by one of the long, voluminous velvet curtains before the door itself opened.
Two gentlemen entered the library—what a relief, Harriet thought, having discovered a peep-hole, that there were not more of them, and that they both appeared to be reasonably sober. In fact, they were completely sober. They were both dressed in formal evening garments that were undoubtedly the creations of first-class tailors, and the one
who she immediately decided must be the Marquis because of his likeness to both the lady in the portrait and Lady Fanny Bingham had a scowl on his face that was the blackest she hoped ever to see on the face of any man. Indeed, it even marred the extraordinary symmetry of his features, and as his hair was dark and his skin distinctly swarthy he reminded her more of a very angry gypsy or a central European nobleman than an English aristocrat.
He strode to the fireplace and kicked the logs into a blaze—with the toe of an elegant silver-buckled shoe, and then went round resentfully seeking to infuse life into the guttering candles. But despite his efforts the light in the library remained poor.
The Devil's Daughter Page 2
