Joan Wolf (12 page)

As Giles had been born on August 23, for the last four years Gerald and I had combined the festival with a celebration of the heir’s birthday.

I had not intended to have the festival this year.

No one expected me to have the festival this year.

Stephen had not been gone above an hour before I decided that I would have the festival after all.

I immediately sought out Aunt Fanny to share my decision with her. Hodges directed me to the drawing room, where I found Nell practicing on the pianoforte. Aunt Fanny was seated on the sofa behind her daughter, writing letters on the mahogany drop-leaved sofa table. The cherubs in the painted roundels upon the ceiling looked down with approval on this peaceful scene.

Aunt Fanny was horrified when I told her what I proposed to do.

“Gerald is not dead six months, Annabelle!” she said, sitting back on the yellow tapestry sofa and wringing her hands in the way she always did when she was distressed. “People will be scandalized if you entertain so soon.”

Nell stopped playing the piano and turned to listen.

The dogs went to lie down under the rosewood table with the inlaid chessboard, their favorite spot in the drawing room.

“It will be just for our own tenants and servants this year, Aunt Fanny,” I explained. “They enjoy it so much, and they look forward to it all year long. It does not seem fair to deprive them.”

The hand-wringing continued. “They don’t expect a birthday festival this year, Annabelle, so they will not feel deprived.”

I chose a mahogany shield-back chair close to Aunt Fanny’s sofa and sat down, folding my own hands in my lap.

“Giles has been very disappointed that we are not going to celebrate his birthday this year.”

I looked at Nell in surprise. I thought that in fact Giles had been extraordinarily quiet about his birthday this year.

Nell saw my expression. “I expect he did not want to worry you, Annabelle,” she said. “He understood perfectly why you could not have the celebration, but he wouldn’t be a normal child if he hadn’t been disappointed.”

“I suppose that is so,” I said. I did not like the idea that Giles would confide in Nell and not in me.

Aunt Fanny was still looking worried. “You are not planning a party of your own? “

Gerald and his father had always invited a houseful of friends to stay for the festival.

“No,” I assured her. “It will be just for our own people.”

Nell said, “The tenant children have also been disappointed that there was to be no birthday festival this year. Annabelle is right, Mama. They look forward all year to the pony rides and the games.”

“What about the rector?” Aunt Fanny asked me.

“Of course the rector must come.”

Aunt Fanny pinched her lips. “And the squire?”

My voice was firm. “Sir Matthew must come as well.”

“I suppose you will feel obligated to invite the rest of your fox-hunting friends also?”

I said soothingly, “Just Sir Matthew, I promise.”

Aunt Fanny’s mouth relaxed and her hands quieted. “Well, I suppose it will be all right if it is just for our own people.”

“There is absolutely no reason for you to be concerned, Mama,” Nell said. “You must realize that no one in the vicinity of Weston would ever dream of criticizing Annabelle.”

I thought I detected a trace of bitterness in Nell’s voice, and for the second time in a minute I looked at her in surprise.

Aunt Fanny apparently heard only the words and not the tone. “Dear Annabelle.” She smiled at me. “Nell is right. You are universally loved in Weston, my dear.”

I said slowly, “I am glad that you approve of my having the festival, Aunt Fanny.”

“Dear child.” Aunt Fanny reached forward and patted my hands. “You are the mistress here; you do not need my permission to hold your festival. It is just your kindness that makes you ask for my opinion.”

“I have always valued your opinion, Aunt Fanny.”

She laughed merrily. “What a whisker, my dear. The only people whom you ever listen to are Grimes and Sir Matthew. And, when you were children, Stephen.”

I began to protest, but she waved her hand to silence me. “You must do as you wish with the birthday festival, my dear, and Nell and I will help you in any way we can.”

My eyes moved to Nell. She said, “I’ll organize the children’s games if you like.”

“Thank you, Nell,” I said with gratitude. Nell had done the games for the last two years, and they had never been better organized or more fun. She was wonderful with children.

As I looked into her familiar slanting brown eyes, I thought I must have imagined that trace of bitterness.

* * * *

Giles was ecstatic when I told him that we were going to have his birthday festival after all. It was only when I saw the joy in his face that I realized how disappointed he must have been that I was not going to have it.

“It is only going to be for the servants and the tenants, Giles,” I said, thinking that perhaps I should have gone ahead and held the whole thing.

“That is all right, Mama.”

We were in the playroom and he picked up his hobby horse, straddled it, and began to prance around the room, chanting, “We’re going to have my birthday party! We’re going to have my birthday party!”

I said to Miss Stedham, “I had no idea he felt this way.”

“I don’t think he wanted to distress you, Lady Weston,” she said. “He understood that you would not be in the mood for a party.”

It was exactly what Nell had said.

I looked at the little boy who was galloping so gaily around the room and thought, I shouldn’t be so surprised by this reaction.

It wasn’t that Giles had not grieved for Gerald, but Gerald had been a very small part of Giles’s life. Gerald had spent at least half of the year in London, and when he wasn’t in London he was visiting friends or having friends to visit Weston. I had always thought that one of the reasons Giles loved his birthday festival so much was that, for however brief a time, it made him the focal point of Gerald’s attention.

Gerald had been the same kind of father as he was husband: affable, benevolent, undemanding, uninvolved.

I said to the moving figure on the hobby horse, “I thought we might ride around the valley this afternoon and tell the tenants that we will be having the festival after all.”

The hobby horse came to a halt.

“Me and you, Mama?”

“You and I,” I corrected him.

“Can Genie come, too? “ Giles asked. “She never gets to leave the house, Mama.”

I looked at Miss Stedham in time to see color stain her cheeks. She said quickly, “That is not true, Giles. I walk in the gardens every day, and you and I go for walks also. Why, I even went fishing with you and your uncle!” Her eyes moved to my face, and I saw apprehension reflected in their warm brown depths. “Your mama will think I have been complaining,” she said.

I felt a pang of guilt as I looked back at the lovely young woman before me. Miss Stedham had come to us only two months before Gerald died, and I had been so involved with my own feelings ever since that I had had little thought for her.

She was clearly worried that I would think she had been trying to manipulate Giles.

“Do you ride, Miss Stedham?” I asked.

“Really, Lady Weston, there is no need—
n

“Giles is right. You need to get out more. If you don’t ride, we will take the phaeton. There is room for three of us on the seat; we’re all thin enough.”

“Actually,” Miss Stedham said in a low voice, “I do ride.”

“Splendid.” Next, I realized that she probably did not own a habit. “If you don’t mind wearing one of my skirts, we’ll ride.”

The color was still flying in her cheeks. She had the kind of skin that one saw occasionally on redheads: so translucent that one could almost see through it.

“You don’t want me to wear your clothes, Lady Weston,” she protested.

“You know what my riding skirts look like, Miss Stedham,” I said humorously, gesturing to the ancient garment I was wearing at the moment, “If you don’t mind being seen in one, I don’t mind you wearing it.”

That earned a smile.

“What about boots?” I asked next.

“I have some half-boots.”

“Fine. I’ll have one of the chambermaids bring a skirt up to you.” I smiled at my son. “You can come along with me now, Giles. We’ll meet Miss Stedham in the Great Hall in twenty minutes.”

He pranced to my side, still fancying himself a horse. He continued to prance as we went down the stairs. I waited until we had reached the second floor before I said to him, “I’m proud of you, Giles, for thinking about Miss Stedham’s welfare.”

He turned his face up to me. “Are you, Mama?”

“Yes. You were right. We must try to get her out of the nursery more.”

“I like Genie, Mama,” he said. “She’s fun.”

I had deliberately engaged a young governess for him for just that very reason: I did not want him taught by an inflexible and joyless tutor. I thought again of that apprehensive look in Miss Stedham’s eyes.

Poor girl, I thought. I shall have to pay more attention to her in the future.

The prospect of finding new employment should she lose her position with me was not bright for a young woman like Miss Stedham. A lovely exterior was an asset when one was looking for a husband; it was a decided nuisance when one was looking for a position as a governess. There were not many employers who would deliberately place a face and form such as Miss Stedham possessed into the orbit of their husbands.

In fact, Miss Stedham had been released from her last position without a character. She had told me, with choking voice and flaming face, that the master of the house had got drunk one night and tried to get into her bedroom. Once this reprehensible behavior had come to the attention of the mistress of the house, the blameless Miss Stedham had been escorted to the door.

I had hired her because I thought she would be good for Giles, and I had known I could trust Gerald to keep his hands off her. Not that Gerald wouldn’t notice her; he was a man who always noticed a pretty woman. But he would not take advantage of a well-bred young woman who had no protection.

Besides, I was always present at Weston to keep an eye on him,

“It is very important to think of others,” I said now to my son as we stood together in front of a small piecrust table upon which was placed a priceless Chinese vase from some dynasty whose name I could never remember.

“You are a fortunate little boy, Giles,” I continued. “You have been born into a great position and one day you will have great wealth. That is why it is so important for you to be mindful of others, because you will have it in your power either to help or to harm them.”

We continued to descend the stairs until we reached the main floor. Giles had ceased to prance like a horse, and the look on his face was as sober as his gait. He didn’t speak until we had turned to the right to go to my suite of rooms.

Then, “I want to be just like you, Mama,” he said. “Everyone loves you because you are so kind.” We stood before the door to my dressing room, and he gazed up at me trustingly and smiled. “And so pretty.”

I looked down into eyes that were a mirror reflection of my own. “Thank you, darling,”
I
said, accepting with forced graciousness a compliment that I knew I didn’t deserve.

* * * *

It took us all afternoon to ride around the valley delivering our invitations. By four o’clock I was hot, crabby, and too full of lemonade. I heartily wished I had given the invitations to a- servant to deliver.

Our tenants’ wives and children had been uniformly delighted to see Giles and me, which was why I had undertaken the chore in the first place, of course.

The only farm we missed was the Washburn farm. I got around having to go there by asking Susan Fenton if she would have her husband tell Jem about the festival. Susan had agreed and invited us in for lemonade.

Miss Stedham proved to be an excellent horsewoman, which made me feel guilty for never before having given her an opportunity to ride. I tried to make up for my thoughtlessness by telling her that she could take a horse out anytime she pleased, but she demurred.

“I am perfectly serious, Miss Stedham,” I assured her as we stood together in the stableyard and watched our horses being led into the stable. “I have five just-off-the-track Thoroughbreds eating their heads off in my stable, and they all desperately need steady work. You would do me a favor by riding them.”

She smiled politely and thanked me, and I could see that she would never ride one of my horses unless I specifically invited her to accompany me.

Damn, I thought crossly. Why did she have to be so afraid of encroaching? I did not want the responsibility of making certain that Miss Stedham got opportunities to ride. I already had too many people whose welfare I felt responsible for.

I tried again. “Shadow, in particular, could use miles and miles of steady trotting. You could take her up to the Downs.”

Her eyes glimmered. She would have loved it. The glimmer died, and once more the polite smile appeared. She wouldn’t do it.

Giles said, “Perhaps Genie could come with us, Mama, when we go up to the Downs.”

I liked the tune I had alone with my son. I did not want to include his governess.

“What a good idea, Giles,” I said.

He beamed. He was a truly generous and thoughtful child, and I was proud of him.

Miss Stedham said, “This has been a lovely afternoon. Thank you, Lady Weston, you are very kind.”

I managed some sort of innocuous reply and sent the two of them off to the house, as it was almost time for Giles’s dinner. I stayed at the stable to talk to Grimes for a while, and then I too turned my steps toward home.

I was frowning as I walked along the gravel path under the shade of the beeches. Too many people had called me kind today, and my conscience was bothering me.

Giles was kind.

Stephen was kind.

I wasn’t kind. True kindness came from the heart. My care for people came from a sense of duty.

It was easy for a countess to seem kind. It was easy to give a party, to send a footman to the dentist, to give a Saturday off to a young chambermaid who was homesick. It was easy to be generous with your horses when you had a stableful of them. It was easy to be pleasant to people. It was easy to live on the untroubled surface of a financially comfortable life.