Connie (The Daughters of Allamont Hall Book 3) (8 page)

Connie cried out in delight. “Oh, you live in a
castle!
”

Her two companions were vastly amused by this epithet. “Just because it has a crenellated roof does not make it a castle,” Lord Reginald said.

“Well, that is disappointing,” Connie said. “I should like to imagine archers lurking behind those battlements.”

“Ah, how romantic you are,” he said. “Sadly, there is no moat, either, nor a portcullis, nor any crevice for the deposit of boiling oil on enemies. There are two secret passages, however, and a priest hole.”

Connie’s eyes widened. “How exciting!”

“But not very accurate,” Lady Harriet said with her ready smile. “Reggie, do not tease so! The house was built long after the era of priest holes, and what Reggie is amused to describe as such is probably no more than a closet which has been boarded over. And the secret passages are stairs for the servants. Here we are at last. Are you ready, Constance?”

A troop of servants streamed out of the house to receive them, bustling about the carriage and the less luxurious coach behind them which conveyed Lady Harriet’s maid, Lord Reginald’s valet and all their many boxes. Connie stepped down onto the drive, looking about her with interest. From a distance, she had noticed only the impressive size and splendour of the house. Now that she was so close, she could see weeds growing through the gravel, faded paint on doors and windows, and the patched uniforms of the servants. It now struck her how worn was the velvet upholstery in the carriage. There was no deficiency in the attire of Lady Harriet or her brothers, but elsewhere there were noticeable signs of neglect.

Lady Harriet tucked Connie arm into hers. “I know you would rather rest, but Grandmama will want to meet you at once. Do you mind terribly?”

“Of course not,” Connie said, shocked at the very idea of refusing a Dowager Marchioness anything she might wish for.

The four dragons, as she still thought of them, were seated in the red saloon, an overpowering room decorated and gilded and embellished in every conceivable way. Massive portraits of previous occupants stared haughtily down from the walls. Four bewigged and powdered footmen stood as rigid as soldiers in the corners of the room, and an imperious butler watched everything hawk-eyed.

“Ah, Miss Allamont! Do come in,” boomed a large lady in purple filling a chair at the far end of the room.

“Grandmama,” whispered Lady Harriet.

Connie made her obeisances to the Dowager. On a sofa nearby sat the other three dragons in a row, the stout Lady Christopher Marford, the more slender Lady Ruth Marford, and the wafer-thin and very frail Lady Hester Marford. Connie wondered whether they deliberately chose to arrange themselves both by size and by age for effect, or whether it was entirely a matter of chance.

The dragons were not the only occupants of the room. Connie was very thankful for the hours of instruction received on the journey, for otherwise the array of companions, cousins and other distant relatives would have left her sadly confused. But there were two she recognised immediately — the Marquess and Jess Drummond, the latter sitting smilingly beside the Dowager. Connie was given a seat on the Dowager’s other side, and nothing could have been more gracious than that lady’s manner, all welcoming smiles and gentle questions and not in the least intimidating. And as the others beamed at her benevolently, she felt, in some extraordinary way, quite at home.

9: Tambray Hall

Connie passed ten days at Drummoor, and reckoned them amongst the happiest of her life. It was a little awkward to be the recipient of so many hinted good wishes for a betrothal she knew to be a sham, but Lord Reginald was always there to respond, so she never had to say a word. Her blushes were taken as the natural bashfulness of a woman soon to be a bride, and before too long she began to be quite easy about it. Then there were the pleasures of being a guest at Drummoor. She had her own bedroom for the first time in her life, and was assigned a maid who lasted precisely five minutes before unbending towards her and regaling her with all the below-stairs gossip.

Lord Reginald and Harriet took it upon themselves to show her every room and passage and closet in the building, and introduce her to everyone from the butler down to the blushing scullerymaid, rigid with fear at actually meeting members of the family. The Marquess and Jess were usually of the party, too, and there was so much teasing between the sister and brothers that the five of them got along merrily. Connie soon lost any trace of shyness and chattered away as if she had known them all her life. Even Jess was friendly, and since she was every bit as frivolous here as at Lower Brinford, treating life as one huge joke, and not in the least presumptuous or stuffy about her betrothal, Connie began to like her despite her best endeavours not to.

One day they all went up to the roof, which was much the same as any other roof, to Connie’s intense disappointment. However, the two brothers were grinning with glee.

“We have a surprise for you,” Lord Reginald whispered to Connie. “We are going to transport you back to the middle ages.”

With cries of triumph, they produced two rusty old swords from a corner where they had hidden them, and began bashing away at each other with great metallic clashes and shouts of delight, while the three ladies squealed and urged them on.

“Is this not the greatest amusement?” the Marquess said to Connie, when the two broke apart momentarily to catch their breath. “We are knights, you see, fighting for the hand of the fair maiden.”

“I was under the impression you had already won the hand of your fair maiden, my lord,” she said sharply.

“Oh — oh yes, of course.” He threw a quick glance towards Jess, then gave a little laugh. “It is just a pretence, of course. This is all in pretence, Miss Allamont.”

Then, with shouts of glee, the battle started up again. They went on until Lord Reginald clouted his brother on the ear, drawing blood.

Connie gasped with alarm, but the Marquess was laughing too hard for her to sustain any fears for his safety. “Ow, ow, ow! What are you about, brother? Look, I am bleeding! Supposed to be blunt,” he gasped, between bursts of laughter. “Good Lord, Reggie, were you trying to have my head off? A pretty scheme for the second son, eh?” And he went off into more peals of laughter.

“Is this not fun?” Lady Harriet said, slipping an arm through Connie’s. “They are idiots, of course, but very amusing.”

“Yes, very amusing,” Connie said, then added, half to herself, “Papa would not have approved.”

It pleased Connie greatly to find that the Marquess treated her exactly the same as before. He showed Jess no special attention, and was just as likely to sit beside Connie at dinner or while playing cards. Since the plan concocted by Lady Harriet and Lord Reginald was simply for Connie to provide an alternative to Jess, and wait for the Marquess to see the error of his precipitous betrothal, she need do nothing but enjoy his company, something she found all too easy to do. Nothing could have been more pleasant.

Even the dragons were far less fearsome than she had been led to believe. The Dowager Marquess could be a little stiff, it was true, but her three sisters-in-law were most amiable, and Connie enjoyed talking to them, and asking what Drummoor was like in the past.

“Ah, the glory days!” Lady Christopher sighed. “The masked balls! You never saw the like, my dear. And the fashions so much more robust than nowadays. These flimsy muslins have no substance to them, and no one dreams of wearing a woollen cloak any more, something heavy enough to deter a shower and defeat the wind. No, they must needs wear these silly little spencers, and then are astonished when they take a chill. I hope you are more sensible, my dear.”

“Oh, yes, I—”

“A woollen chemise all year round,” the Dowager said. “That is the way to avoid chills.”

“And a hot brick in the bed,” Lady Ruth said.

“Yes, very true,” the Dowager said. “For myself, I take a purgative every week, without fail, and a posset before bed. No malady can prevail against such a regime.”

Connie looked at the Dowager’s robust appearance, and suspected that no chill or fever would dare to inflict itself upon her.

Yet Lady Hester, the eldest of the dragons, looked as if a puff of wind would be too much for her to endure. She walked only with support on either side, wheezing as she went, and ate almost nothing. Connie wondered that she had made the effort to travel to Drummoor at all.

She got very confused, sometimes, too. “When you are married to Francis…” she would say.

Then Connie would gently pat her arm. “No, my lady, the Marquess is to marry Miss Drummond, remember?”

“Oh. Miss Drummond. Yes. I see.” But she would frown, as if she could not quite grasp the concept, and sometimes she would say, “Not you, Miss Allamont?” in a querulous tone.

Lady Hester’s companion was almost as old and infirm as she was, so Connie delighted in running little errands for them both, and indeed for all the dragons. She had never known her own grandparents or great-aunts, or the pleasures of a vast array of distant relations, and it pleased her beyond measure to be part of the Marquess’s extensive family.

Some mornings there were callers to receive, and on other days the ladies summoned the carriage to make their own duty calls around the neighbourhood. It was necessary for Jess and Connie to be a part of these expeditions, and Lady Harriet was quite shameless in hinting at their status as the future brides of Drummoor. Connie blushed and blushed again at the devious way it was managed without a single untruth, relieved beyond measure that she had no need to broach the subject herself. Still, she had agreed to the situation, so it was foolish to have reservations now, and in all other respects she enjoyed these outings immensely.

One such visit was of particular interest. Drummoor’s estate was bounded to the north by the land belonging to Tambray Hall, where Lady Sara’s brother lived.

“We really ought to pay a call at Tambray,” Lady Harriet said one day at breakfast. “We have not seen them for an age. Either they are away or we are, so we keep missing each other. But I had word yesterday that they are home again for a while. Should you like to visit them?”

“Oh, I should like it of all things!” Connie cried, clapping her hands together. “For I have never met my uncle and aunt at all.”

There were twelve people sat around the table, and they all turned to stare at Connie. One of the cousins raised a lorgnette to her eye.

“Never met them?” Lady Harriet said. “What, never?”

“Not once. They have never visited us at Allamont Hall and I have never been to Tambray Hall. Or to Hepplestone. Mama goes occasionally, but my sisters and I have never been invited.”

“That is extraordinary,” the Marquess said.

“Families are odd in a multitude of ways,” Lord Reginald said easily. “I daresay there is a good reason for it. Hatty, may I trouble you for the bread bowl?”

So to Tambray Hall they were to go, Connie, Jess and Lady Harriet in the carriage, and the two men on horseback. Connie could not quite disentangle her feelings in the matter. Naturally, she had a great deal of curiosity to see the house and meet her uncle and aunt, but at the same time, she had to agree with the Marquess that there might be some very good reason why she had never been invited there, and why her relations had never come to Allamont Hall. And none of them ever had, not from Mama’s side of the family, and not from Papa’s either. So many aunts and uncles and cousins and grandparents, but she could not picture them or their houses. They were just names.

Tambray Hall was a plain little house, very modern, built of the same yellow stone as Drummoor, but without any of the grandeur or style that epitomised the older residence. Nor were the grounds extensive. There were no sweeping vistas, follies or tumbling streams, just neatly trimmed low hedges arranged in squares, with a larger bush, trimmed to a perfect sphere, on every corner. There was no colour, no wilderness, not a leaf out of place.

They were shown into a square room with dark wainscoting, the upper walls covered in a dull blue silk. The ceiling was painted a paler blue. Connie felt quite nauseous, as if she were under water. Chairs and sofas, upholstered in the same blue as the walls, were arranged in a perfect square. How much these people liked squares! And how Connie longed to refit the room in paler colours, with more elegant furnishings.

Viscount and Viscountess Melthwaite rose to greet them, polite smiles on their faces. They glanced briefly at Jess and Connie, but were too well-bred to show any surprise. Connie watched them as Harriet curtsied and made her greetings, and then her two brothers. Her aunt and uncle! Such a strange way to meet them, and how astonishing to be faced with a man who had Mama’s mouth and nose and wavy blond hair. Even the eyes were the same, although where Mama’s were almost unlined, Uncle Edmund’s crinkled a little at the corners, as if he smiled a great deal. Or frowned, perhaps.

Jess was introduced first, and then Harriet turned to Connie. “And this is a lady you have never met before, I understand — your niece, Miss Constance Allamont.”

The squeals of delight were all that Connie could have hoped for. She found herself wrapped in a tight embrace from her aunt, who shed tears of joy over her.

“My dear, dear Constance! You cannot imagine how much we have longed to see you — indeed, all of you! Such a joy! Let me look at you! Oh, Edmund, is she not pretty? And you are staying at Drummoor! Such delight! Oh, my dear, this is a wonderful surprise. Your poor mother told us nothing about it, nothing at all.”

Connie laughed and cried, too, as much in relief as for any other reason. It struck her as odd, however, that they should have wanted to see the sisters so badly, and yet not contrived a meeting in twenty five years, especially when Mama had stayed at Tambray Hall on a number of occasions over the years. It was not as if there were an unbridgeable breach between the two sides of the family.

After a few minutes of these raptures, her uncle coughed in a meaningful way. Aunt Emma’s eyes immediately lowered demurely.

“Do please be seated,” she murmured. “How was your journey today? Are the roads tolerable?”

Lady Harriet responded in the same manner, and for several minutes the conversation was stilted and formal. But then Aunt Emma burst out, “Oh, my dear niece, how delightful this is!” And away she went again, in excited twitterings.

They stayed for two hours, Aunt Emma talking with barely a pause the entire time. Every once in a while, Uncle Edmund coughed and Aunt Emma subsided into polite nothings for a few moments before becoming animated again. Although she asked innumerable questions, she barely listened to the answers, and would ask exactly the same thing a few minutes later. Connie did not mind in the least. She set it down to excitement, and made allowances accordingly. She was almost as excited herself. Finally, she had met some of her family!

Still, it was odd how little her aunt and uncle knew of affairs at Allamont Hall. The Viscount and Viscountess had seen Lady Sara when they had stayed at Hepplestone just after Christmas, but they knew nothing of Amy’s marriage or Belle’s betrothal, and when Connie mentioned her brothers Ernest and Frank, Aunt Emma said casually, “They must be well grown by now, but even so, it will be daunting for them, taking on the responsibility of the Hall, and being head of the family. I have always been thankful that Edmund has not yet been called upon to shoulder that burden. The poor, dear boys! How are they coping?”

Connie hardly knew what to say. In the end, she could think of no gentle way to break the news. “They know nothing of it. They ran away from home seven years ago, and not a word has been heard from them since.”

Lady Melthwaite made a little mewing sound of distress, her hands covering her mouth.

The Viscount frowned. “Ran away? Seven years ago?”

“Yes, my lord.”

“But why? Why?” Lady Melthwaite wailed.

“We have no notion why they would do such a thing,” Connie said. “It is a mystery.”

“No, no! I meant to say, why would Sara not tell us about it? Why has she told us nothing at all about any of you?”

It was not a question Connie could answer, so she kept silent, although she clutched her reticule rather tightly.

Lord Melthwaite put a calming hand on his wife’s arm. “Sara was always a deep one, my love. She keeps her own counsel, and even as a child one never knew what was in her head. No doubt she has her reasons for her silence.”

“One cannot imagine what they might be,” Lady Melthwaite said indignantly. “We have never had any
real
quarrel with her, always corresponded, never cut her even when—”

Her husband coughed, and squeezed her arm, and she lowered her eyes at once. “Let us talk of pleasanter matters,” he said. “Do tell us more of your family, Miss Drummond. So you are neighbours to the Earl of Strathmorran?”