Lord Greywell's Dilemma (8 page)

There was a snort of amusement from Greywell, and Sir Edward leveled a haughty gaze in his direction just as Beeton entered to announce dinner.

“Not a moment too soon,” Elspeth murmured, rising.

Greywell offered her his arm, the amusement gone from his mouth, though a trace of it lingered in his eyes. Elspeth could feel her chin come up as she laid her hand so lightly on the black cloth she could scarcely feel his arm beneath her fingers. What did he find so amusing in the situation, anyhow? His future was as much under discussion as her own. And it was a wonder Sir Edward had not come right out and said the two of them should be married. Elspeth very much doubted her father would show that amount of restraint for long.

The dining room at Lyndhurst was large, and there was a mahogany table that spread down three-quarters of the length of the room, but Elspeth routinely chose convenience over formality. The three place settings were grouped together at one end, and Greywell held a chair for her on the right-hand side before rounding the table to seat himself opposite her. Sir Edward began a systematic questioning of their visitor as to the extent of his estate, what crops and livestock it supported, the neighboring towns and villages, and any acquaintance he might have with the local gentry.

“Coventry, eh?” he said, narrowing his eyes in thought. “I was there once, as I recall. Has a considerable woolen manufacture and a dozen handsome gates left from the old wall enclosure. Ah, and I remember something else,” he said, his eyes switching to his daughter with suppressed jocularity. “Elspeth, you will dote on Coventry, I promise you. They have a procession on the first day of the Trinity Week fair in honor of Lady Godiva, when the figure of a naked woman is carried on horseback through the town.”

Elspeth gave him a scathing look and said nothing.

“It’s true,” Greywell interjected, drawing her attention. “The first lord of Coventry, who died during the reign of Edward the Confessor, was married to Godiva. When Leofric was offended with the people of the city, he burdened them with extra taxes, and his lady, a woman of exemplary virtue and piety, solicited him to ease their burden. Thinking her modesty too great to allow her compliance, he offered to remove the new duties if she would ride through the most frequented parts of the town naked, in daylight. But she was moved by the distress of the city and gave orders to the citizens that all doors and windows should be shut and no one attempt to look on her under pain of death. Then she rode naked through the streets on horseback, with her long hair hanging loose and covering her down to her legs. There’s a legend that a tailor couldn’t resist looking out, and that he was struck blind for his folly. The window from which he looked is still shown with an effigy of the ‘Peeping Tom’ newly dressed on the anniversary of the procession.”

“So during Lady Godiva’s ride the townspeople didn’t look upon her nakedness,” Elspeth summarized, “and now, in the procession, everyone for miles around looks on the figure of a naked woman instead. That speaks very well for the town’s morals, Lord Greywell.”

His lordship cast a helpless glance at Sir Edward, who shrugged and said, “That’s the way Elspeth sees things, my dear fellow. I shouldn’t let it bother me, if I were you. After all, it’s the sort of thing any religious man might declaim against from the pulpit, save its being a tradition. Tradition, especially such a delightful tradition, is the one thing the church doesn’t seem ready to take a stand against. It’s a great pity, in some ways. Sermons would be a great deal livelier if some vicar would take on the habits of the past. They’re willing enough to rant against harmless folklore, of course, but not against anything of substance. I’d love to see Blockley get up there and wave his skeletal arms while he declaimed the injustice of rotten boroughs or spendthrift ways in high places. By God, I might even attend his services if he’d talk about something of interest.”

Elspeth listened with grudging admiration as her father adroitly changed the subject, but she would not hear Mr. Blockley denigrated without a word in his defense. “Mr. Blockley’s sermons are well above the average, Papa, as you would know if you ever bothered to listen to one of them. He expects Christian behavior from the rich and the poor alike. In fact, if anything, he expects the highborn to set an example for their less fortunate neighbors.”

“He expects a great deal too much,” Sir Edward retorted, helping himself to another serving of the saddle of mutton. Turning to Greywell, he asked, “What sort of fellow do you have in your parish? Do you have the living in your gift?”

“Yes. We have an older man, a gentle soul, not given to ranting about anything at all.” He surveyed the crimped cod with oyster sauce before tentatively taking a bite of it. “Very nice. My cook isn’t much of a hand at crimped cod.”

“Elspeth can bring the receipt,” Sir Edward generously offered.

Greywell met her eyes over the low arrangement of flowers between them and smiled his sympathy. He was finding it difficult to know which of them to feel in charity with, since the conversation took so many unexpected turns. When she failed to acknowledge his commiseration, he returned his gaze to his plate and took another bite of the cod. The best thing he could do, he decided, was leave Lyndhurst first thing in the morning. That would alleviate Miss Parkstone’s discomfort, and put him out of range of Sir Edward’s dubious plotting.

“Well, I’m off.” Sir Edward announced suddenly, standing abruptly and waving Greywell to remain seated. “Elspeth will entertain you, my lord. She’s quite proficient at the pianoforte.”

And without another word, though carefully avoiding his daughter’s eyes, he left the room.

Greywell stared after him, uncomprehending. Slowly his eyes moved back to Miss Parkstone, who sat rigid in her chair, a deep flush having invaded her cheeks. Her chin was high, all the same, and she addressed him with a calm born of something like desperation. “My father doesn’t find it necessary to abide by normal rules for polite society, Lord Greywell. I hope you will forgive his . . . unusual departure. No doubt he has some urgent business which takes him off at such a time.”

“Hogwash! His intention is perfectly clear. He’s leaving us alone to get better ‘acquainted.’ The man is a menace to society.”

“He means well.”

“Is this the sort of thing he does often?”

Elspeth met his angry gaze. “No. Generally his behavior is unexceptionable . . . at home. Or at least, with company. Oh, you know what I mean. He doesn’t give much weight to other people’s opinions of him, but as a matter of course he behaves as one would expect. Please don’t feel constrained to remain here with me. It’s but a short ride into Aylesbury, where there is diversion to be found. You might wish to finish your meal first.”

“I have every intention of finishing my meal.” Greywell could not recall a previous occasion on which he’d felt so entirely disgruntled. His companion. however, seemed to be taking the matter in stride now, forking a bite of mutton as the high color faded from her cheeks.

What would it be like to be in her position, living with a ramshackle fellow like Sir Edward? It was a wonder to him that she appeared to wish to stay here. He would have expected her to welcome himself (or any one of the alleged suitors) with open arms, for the sake of being rescued from a life of confusion, embarrassment, and downright neglect. Maybe she was as perverse as she had previously hinted.

The third course came with an apple custard and a cabinet pudding after the jugged hare. Greywell noticed that his companion had nothing but a tablespoonful of the custard with a minuscule glob of whipped cream, which she barely tasted before sitting back in her chair and nodding to the waiting footman to remove her plate. There was nothing wrong with the custard, he found; in fact, it was superb. Apparently Miss Parkstone had made a decision, because she regarded him thoughtfully for a moment, dismissed the servants, and said, “It’s obviously of no use pretending you are an ordinary visitor, Lord Greywell. I cannot imagine how my father has induced you to come here, but, as you see, it’s for the purpose of marrying me off to you. Were you aware of that before you came?”

Her frankness intrigued him. If they were going to endure an evening together it was best that all the cards be placed on the table so they both knew what was going forward. Sir Edward had already effectively overset propriety, leaving them nothing but honesty to deal with, if they were going to communicate at all.

“My uncle wrote me about you. His suggestion that you would make me a good wife seemed preposterous.” Greywell flicked a finger negligently, to indicate he was not criticizing her in any way, but merely the situation. “My wife died only a few months ago; I wasn’t looking for another. It’s true that I am in despair over my son’s health, and that if circumstances were otherwise I would be headed for the Congress of Vienna at this very moment. But those circumstances are real, and I couldn’t see that adding a wife to the concoction would be of the least assistance.”

Greywell was remembering the letter and how he had produced it for his neighbor. A wry smile twisted his lips as he shook his head in exasperation. “Abigail Waltham happened to visit me just after I’d read Hampden’s letter, and, to my surprise, she concurred with his advice. She appeared to know you, or of you, and also thought you would be a splendid solution to my problems. She agreed you were an Angel of Mercy.”

“Abigail Waltham?” Elspeth’s brow wrinkled. “The name is not familiar to me.” But she was pleased that someone so far away had heard of her. To think of her praises being sung by people she didn’t even know! Elspeth was flattered and said modestly, “I’m afraid the term ‘Angel of Mercy’ is an exaggeration.”

“It doesn’t matter,” he said, amused as he watched the struggle to overcome pleasure with humility pass across her face. “What mattered was that both of them thought so highly of you. And, of course, that they both assumed you would be willing to marry me for the sake of my child.”

His voice held a note of query now, but Elspeth ignored it.

“So you wrote to Papa?” she prompted.

“I merely wrote Sir Edward that I would be in the area and hoped to call on him. He wrote back and graciously invited me to stay at Lyndhurst. I accepted. Neither of us made mention of you in our letters.”

“I see.” Elspeth studied the floral arrangement between them for a moment. This would be the last of the autumn flowers, she supposed, and for the duration of the winter she would have to provide dried plants to decorate the table. They had come to the sticky part of the discussion, and her mind would not concentrate on how to broach the next question. Would it be better to ascertain how he felt about the arrangement now that he was here, or to state her own aversion to marriage straightaway?”

“Which brings us to the present situation,” he concluded, unnecessarily, but trying to give each of them a little time to think. “We are, as your father so succinctly put it, in similar predicaments. No, perhaps that’s not altogether true. Neither of us has to do anything. I can remain at Ashfield with Andrew, but I will still be unable to change matters there. You can remain at Lyndhurst, and perhaps you have no wish to change matters here. Your position doesn’t look very glamorous from where I sit,” he admitted, shrugging, “but it may be entirely to your liking.”

“Setting aside my position here,” she said a bit stiffly, “you must realize, Lord Greywell, that there would be no reason my coming to Ashfield, as your wife or in any other way, would make a difference to the child. It’s possible a different wet nurse might help him, but by no means certain. Having a substitute parent for him might ease your fears on his behalf, but it’s really not at all likely there is anything I could do that hasn’t already been done.”

He listened carefully to what she had to say, accepting the truth of it, and yet not accepting it as the whole truth. “What you must understand,” he said finally, “is that they’ve all given up on him. Everyone is convinced Andrew will die, as his mother did. Sometimes I feel as though I’m fighting their fatalism as much as anything else. Right now I don’t seem to have enough influence to change that attitude. I’m too melancholy myself to force an optimism on them that they don’t share. Perhaps I don’t even feel it myself. I’m too numb to feel much of anything, Miss Parkstone.”

Against her will, Elspeth felt a surge of sympathy for him. And also for the poor child. She had wished to stay at one remove from both of them, keeping her involvement to some practical advice and some strong encouragement. Greywell’s eyes, when he talked, developed a haunted quality, a power to move her that she hadn’t expected.

“It’s not unusual to see that sort of fatalism in country people,” she admitted. “It’s a way of shielding themselves from more disappointments than they’re able to bear. You mustn’t think it’s that they value human life any less than the gentry do; in fact, I almost think they value it more. But they’re in a position of seeing more of their family members die, without the proper care, and they’ve come to accept that in a way I don’t think I ever could.”

Greywell wouldn’t have minded a glass of port, but she’d dismissed the servants, and he refrained from glancing toward the mahogany sideboard where the bottle had already been set out. “There is, of course, such a thing as unwarranted optimism,” he said. “The child’s health has been feeble since birth. I suppose those more knowledgeable than I have seen babies of his weakness die in large numbers. The odds may be against his survival.”

“If I were you, I wouldn’t be interested in the odds. I would only be interested in keeping him alive until he’s old enough to gain strength.” Elspeth glanced behind her to see if the port was there before asking, “Would you like a glass?”

“Thank you. I’ll help myself.”

Before he could rise, Elspeth motioned him to stay seated.

“I’ll retire to the sitting room and have Beeton serve you.”

“Please don’t leave. I’d like to continue our discussion.”

Elspeth hesitated. Though she wanted to stay and talk with him, she also wanted to prove that someone at Lyndhurst could behave with the sort of social finesse he had every right to expect there. “I could have Beeton bring the port to the sitting room,” she suggested.