Another Heartbeat in the House (28 page)

‘Don't call them ugly!' I said. ‘They're the most beautiful babies ever made. Especially you, my little minx,' I told the one nearest my heart. ‘My fighting girl, my darling, my sweet little hellion, my pretty pet!'

‘Have they taken to the teat?'

‘She has,' I said with pride. ‘He seems altogether more fussy.'

‘It's not good for you to get your milk flowing, Eliza. It will be agony once they're gone.'

Maria reached for St Leger's son and heir and unlatched him from my nipple. He puked in protest.

‘Take him and welcome,' I told her, pulling the shawl back over my shoulder. ‘He can sup his fill at the wet-nurse's dug.'

I shifted in the bed, resting my left elbow against the pillow so that my daughter's head nestled more comfortably in the crook of my arm, watching the rhythmic pull of her mouth.

‘You must stop, Eliza!' said Maria crossly. ‘You'll rue it if you get an infection. I came down with a bad fever when my youngest wouldn't take to the nipple and my breasts became engorged.'

‘
She's
taken to it! See how she has! My little guzzle-guts.'

‘But she'll be gone from you soon,' went on Maria. ‘Mark my words – you'll regret then that you allowed her to feed so lustily. Here – give her to me.'

‘No, no, Maria,' I said, looking up at her with a smile. ‘You may take the boy. I won't renege on my promise to St Leger. But I'm not parting with this little miss.'

‘You're not keeping her!'

‘Yes, I am.' I looked down at the fierce, tiny face, and my daughter returned my gaze, her slate blue eyes full of ancient, arcane knowledge. ‘She's my kismet – my Ananke. Her name's Clara Venus, and she's staying with me.'

THE RUSHING SOUND
of the river splashing over the rocks meant that Edie wasn't aware of Mr O'Brien until he was almost upon her.

‘I'm done now,' he said.

Edie set Eliza's manuscript aside and scrambled to her feet. From where he was pootling about in the shallows, Milo shot Mr O'Brien a belligerent look. He clearly didn't like the cut of his jib, either.

‘You've had a good scout around, then,' said Edie. ‘What are your thoughts?'

‘The place has potential,' he conceded.

She was glad to see that he had at least a modicum of aesthetic sensibility. ‘I think so too,' she enthused. ‘Simply
masses
of potential. Are you planning on converting it, or might you live here yourself?'

Mr O'Brien looked as if she'd just asked him a question in Ancient Egyptian. ‘Live …
here
?'

‘Well – yes.'

He shook his head. ‘I'm interested in getting an industry going.'

‘An industry?'

‘A fishery.'

Edie had never heard of a fishery being described as an ‘industry' before.

‘I run one up in Connemara,' continued Mr O'Brien, ‘and I'm planning to expand. There's increasing demand for Irish salmon worldwide.'

Edie looked down the garden towards the lake. Beneath the glittering surface swam silvery specimens weighing as much as seventeen pounds, like the one Uncle Jack had landed. She remembered how he had taken her and Hilly on an angling expedition, the summer they turned thirteen. She had caught nothing, but Hilly had hooked a little silver trout that they had immediately disengaged from the fly and sent spinning back into the water, praying it would survive.

‘How do you propose catching them?' she asked. ‘With lines?'

Mr O'Brien gave a derisive snort. ‘With draft nets. There's no money in line-caught fish, dear.'

I am
not
your dear, Edie wanted to say. How dared this man condescend to her just because he was wealthy and handsome! But it behove her to be civil if she was to get Uncle Jack's house sold.

‘Won't there be transport costs involved in getting produce to market?' she enquired.

He gave her a blank look.

‘All that ice, for instance, for packing.'

‘We'll not be transporting fresh stock. We'll do everything here. Hold 'em in ponds, strip the ova, rear the fry in a hatchery.' Looking down at the tumbling river, he made a clicking sound with his tongue against the side of his teeth. ‘As an added bonus, looks like we could operate an eel weir. Boil 'em, pack 'em, seal 'em and sell 'em.'

‘But … what will you do with the house?'

He looked at Edie as if she were half-witted.

‘What do you think? Pull it down.'

Edie couldn't countenance this man any more. Casting around for an escape route, her eyes fell upon Milo frolicking in his paddling pool.

‘Oh, my little dog!' she cried, rounding upon the startled animal and scooping him into her arms. ‘He's drowning!'

‘He looks perfectly fine to me,' said Mr O'Brien, reaching out a finger to scruffle Milo under his chin. ‘Jolly little chap, isn't he?'

‘Fuck off,' said Milo.

Edie was genuinely shocked. ‘Milo! Mind your mouth! Don't growl like that at the nice gentleman.'

Mr O'Brien quickly withdrew his hand and stuck it in his pocket. Looking around, he squinted up at the window of the bedroom that overlooked the stream and shook his head, making that clicking sound again. ‘What
amadán
thought it would be a good idea to put a window in directly above a river?' he said. ‘You wouldn't get a wink of sleep all night.'

Now Edie really was fed up with him.

‘Well, good day to you, Mr O'Brien. I must go and dry my dog.'

‘Just as well I didn't bring my fella along with me,' said Mr O'Brien. ‘German Shepherd, he is. He'd have made mincemeat of your cream puff.'

‘Now, there's an idea! Canned minced meat for dogs.'

‘I've already thought of that,' smirked Mr O'Brien. ‘There are hundreds of ponies running wild in Connemara. Dime a dozen, they are. Boil 'em, pack 'em, seal 'em and sell 'em. That's my motto.'

And Mr O'Brien tipped his hat at Edie and was gone.

She watched his progress as he rounded the corner of the stable yard and set off along the overgrown avenue, swiping at rhododendron bushes with a stick. ‘What a B,' she said. ‘What a thoroughly unpleasant oik. I hope he doesn't get this place. I shall tell Uncle Jack he's a bounder.'

‘A fucking bounder.'

She looked down at the little dog in her arms and gave him an ebullient squeeze. ‘There were two babies, Milo!' she crowed. ‘There were two! And she's keeping one!'

‘Sophia did not quit her chamber for a month when she had our daughter. She did not leave the house until two months clear had gone by.'

‘Your daughter was born dead, St Leger. No wonder Sophia did not choose to quit her room.'

‘I cannot condone this behaviour, Eliza! You will wear yourself out.'

St Leger had happened upon me as I walked in the garden of Lissaguirra with Clara in my arms. It was washday, and the smell of lye from the scullery pervaded the downstairs rooms; I would have gone mad cooped up inside. Besides, the weather was fine – blue-skied and mild for so late in the autumn – and I wanted the exercise. Having spent so many months carrying a pair of rowdies around inside me, I took great pleasure in having my body all to myself for a change. I yearned to let loose and kick up my heels. I longed to dance. If Sir Silas Sillery had asked me to accompany him in a quadrille, I would have accepted in a transport of ecstasy.

‘Oh, tush, you old fogey!' I said, lobbing an apple core at the donkey (who had been acquired as a companion for my pony). ‘Babies are portable, and women are the stronger sex. If I were Chinese I would be hard at work in the paddy fields by now.'

‘Sophia says that –'

‘I care not what Sophia says! I simply could not bear to be indoors in this weather.'

I tramped on down the path, my boots making a satisfying thud against the packed earth. St Leger followed, looking put-out.

‘She is not making a public show of herself, at any rate,' he muttered.

‘Is she confined still, with our son?'

‘Yes.'

‘And nobody suspects a thing? Not even the wet-nurse?'

‘If she does, she is not likely to put her job in jeopardy. She is paid well for her trouble.'

‘How is he?'

‘He's thriving.'

‘Does he sleep?'

‘Very well. The nurse tells me that she is hardly disturbed at night.'

‘She doses him with Godfrey's Cordial, I have no doubt.'

I sounded pettish, and I was. I was jealous of anyone who slept through the night. At three weeks old, Clara Venus was the most beautiful and intelligent baby who had ever drawn breath, but Morpheus was her enemy, and she was perpetually hungry. I carried her everywhere with me, slung in a shawl like an Indian papoose, so that I could nurse her on demand to keep her quiet.

I knew little about her brother, for St Leger had managed to pay me but one visit since the babies had been born. The boy was called George, after Sophia's father. By all accounts (well, by St Leger's account, and his was the only one that mattered) George the elder had been so overcome with joy at the birth of his grandson that he had staged a show of fireworks in the grounds of his palatial home, Roesworth House in Buckinghamshire. Thanks to the fecundity of his daughter and her husband, the male bloodline was established, succession was secure, the family fortune was safe in St Leger's hands, and Sir Silas Sillery could go sing for his supper. There was to be a great christening in London in Westminster Cathedral, his godfather was to be Sir Huddlestone Fuddlestone (or some such blue blood), and he was to have his ‘manly character' instilled from the age of five, when he would be sent away to be educated first at Mr Pampellone's Academy in Wandsworth, then at Eton. I was mildly surprised that he was not already in line to be married to some Spanish infanta or Austrian princess.

‘Are they alike, the twins?' I asked St Leger.

‘All babies are alike to me,' he said.

‘Look properly!' I said, presenting his daughter's adorable face to him.

‘George is uglier.'

‘What do you mean, “uglier”?'

‘He's – well, he's a boy. He's bound to be uglier.'

I gave him an affronted look. ‘From that I infer you think Clara Venus ugly.'

‘No. No, Eliza. She's not ugly. She's a bonny wee thing. Or would be if her ears didn't stick out so much.'

‘Her ears do not stick out! And if they do, it's your fault, for she inherited them from you.'

He laughed, and caught me by the waist. ‘She will be a beauty,' he said, kissing me. ‘How could she be anything but, with a stunner like you for a mother?'

I took his arm, and we strolled on towards the lake.

‘How long can you stay?' I asked.

‘How does tonight and tomorrow night suit you, my lady?'

‘I shall have to consult my pocket-book.' Clara Venus squawked, and I began to unbutton my bodice. Uneasily, St Leger looked around. ‘Don't be alarmed,' I told him. ‘Christy has seen me nurse her, and he didn't bat an eyelid.'

‘I wish you would hire a wet-nurse. It is unseemly for a gentlewoman to give suck.'

‘If I did not suckle her, you would not be so free and easy with my person. A wise old
accoucheuse
once told me that –'

‘A pox on your wise old
accoucheuse
! Has anyone asked about the child?'

‘Oh, yes. I've told everyone I found her under the gooseberry bush.'

‘No one has been curious?'

‘I'm sure there is gossip galore about St Leger's brat. But I have heard none of it. And it is unlikely to be malicious, for both the Biddies are fond of me, and they
love
your daughter.'

‘You are cosy then, and happy.'

‘Yes. Although I am glad you are come. The Biddies are good women to be sure, but I can't converse with them on any subjects other than the weather or what is on the menu for dinner. It's salmon tonight, by the way. Christy took it straight from the lake this morning.'