Nicola Cornick (7 page)

‘I thank you, madam; you have said quite enough!’ Mullineaux interposed with exasperation as she paused to draw breath. Their gazes clashed and held, both bright with anger. After a moment Mullineaux shook his head slowly in disbelief. He was not at all clear how they had managed to get into such a situation of conflict yet again. Why did she always bring out the worst in him?

He knew that the terms of his proposal had scarcely been flattering and was not even sure what quixotic impulse had led him to make it. He’d had no intention of doing so until he had seen her that morning; indeed he blamed her recklessness for compromising them both. Yet she had seemed so small and tired when she had come down for breakfast and so in need of protection. How misleading, when she had proved as little in need of protection as a tigress!

Her spirited rejection of his suit had perhaps been deserved, and, of course, she was right in that to become betrothed would be madness. He had no wish for their names to be linked, and his reputation would suffer far less than hers by the gossip that would inevitably follow this escapade. Nevertheless, her refusal rankled with him. And, confusingly, some element of him felt an obscure disappointment, but he knew he could not afford to examine why. Already his emotions were becoming dangerously involved.

‘I thought that you would be glad to add a better title to your fortune,’ he said, to give vent to his feelings, and almost immediately felt ashamed that he had allowed his distaste for her past behaviour to force him into rudeness. He watched the hot colour flood her face at the insult. How amazingly good she was at playing the hurt innocent! But what was the point in pretending to him?

Not for anything would Alicia show him how much his accusations hurt her. They cut through all the protective layers she had painfully built up over the years and exposed the unhealed scars beneath. This
man had once held her in his arms and murmured words of love in a tone so far removed from his current one that it seemed like another world, another time…That man and this…The change was too great. She rallied all her forces to defend herself.

‘You may consider me an adventuress, Lord Mullineaux,’ Alicia said, getting up to leave the room, ‘but had you thought that
you
might be seen as a fortune-hunter in proposing to me? After all, you would be regaining a piece of your lost patrimony. And I am so very rich, you see,’ she added sweetly, ‘that no doubt people would quickly recognise the temptation my fortune, if not my person, presents to an impoverished Marquis!’

Well, Mullineaux thought, smothering a sudden grin, he had asked for that. She was quite capable of countering his ill-bred accusations with her own. At nineteen, Alicia Broseley had had plenty of spirit, but a sweet nature to accompany it. Now she seemed both decidedly outspoken and unfashionably quick to offer an opinion.

‘Well, then, no doubt I should simply be grateful to have escaped marriage with a shrew!’ he stated unforgivably, and once more they were left glaring at each other with bitter hostility.

The sky was a pale washed blue later that morning as Alicia trudged along the road to Ottery Manor. The road was still damp underfoot, but most of the flood waters had receded beyond the ditches, and lay across the low flat fields like a silver mirror. The faint, plaintive call of the curlew floated across the drowned landscape, and a single buzzard wheeled high overhead. The fresh breeze had brought a little colour back into Alicia’s cheeks, but she was less inclined than usual to pause to enjoy the scenery.

Only the coldest words of farewell had passed between herself and the Marquis of Mullineaux. He had gone to the stables to oversee the preparation of his curricle, eager to be away, and Alicia had consulted Jack about the salvage of her carriage before setting off to the Manor. Jack had been hopeful that the repairs might be effected that day, which left Alicia with the dilemma of how to pass the time before she could resume her journey. The thought of whiling away time at Ottery Manor under the curious eyes of Mrs Henley’s guests was almost intolerable, but the prospect of spending more time at the inn was equally unacceptable.

Alicia’s thoughts turned back to Mullineaux and she felt sick at heart at what had passed between them. He was worse than a stranger, some
one to whom instinct persistently drew her, whilst fate placed apparently insurmountable barriers between them. It was horrible that she still found him so undeniably attractive when he held her in the deepest contempt. For the sake of her sanity she would just have to keep out of his way in future. This melancholy reflection brought her to the stone gateway of Ottery Manor, and the low, rambling building came into view.

If Mrs Henley was taken aback to receive a visitor when her guests were still at breakfast, she hid it well. Shutting the breakfast parlour door in the frankly curious faces of Mrs Eddington-Buck and her daughter, she drew Alicia into a charming, sunlit drawing-room and settled her in a chair by the fire. Her shrewd brown eyes appraised Alicia’s face with concern.

‘You look a trifle out of curl this morning, Lady Carberry, if I dare say so,’ she ventured at last. ‘I am so very sorry we were not able to return for you in the carriage; indeed, John did try, but the Lilley had burst its banks, and the road was under several feet of water. We were at a loss as to what to do, and Miss Frensham was nearly beside herself with distraction!’ She did not add that Miss Frensham’s usual discretion had deserted her and that her wailed lamentations had added immeasurably to a scandal which her guests had been quick to seize upon.

Alicia looked up, her tired green eyes meeting Mrs Henley’s observant brown ones and seeing nothing but kindness there. The urge to confide in someone was overpowering. Alicia swallowed a lump in her throat.

‘Oh, my dear ma’am, do not apologise! The fault was all mine for thinking it best to send Miss Frensham on ahead, although—’ she shuddered ‘—I would hardly have wished to condemn her to a night in that appalling inn! But now Miss Frensham has probably taken a chill anyway, and I have lost my reputation—which is, I suspect, a longer-lasting handicap!’

It seemed that her granddaughter resembled old Lady Stansfield in plain speaking, Mrs Henley reflected. Certainly Lady Carberry was very likeable, and one could not but sympathise with her predicament. Even so, Mrs Henley hesitated to offer advice and chose to address the easier part of Alicia’s comments first.

‘Well, I fear Miss Frensham is rather poorly this morning, my dear. She did not feel able to take any breakfast and has stayed in bed to rest. I expect the news of your arrival will cheer her, though. As for
your own dilemma…’ she took a look at Alicia’s expression and decided to risk it ‘…well, it is rather difficult, is it not?’

Alicia managed a smile at this masterly piece of understatement whilst still looking despondent. Watching her unconscious grace even whilst she was drooping with tiredness, Mrs Henley felt grateful that her impressionable younger son was not at home. At nineteen he was ripe to fall in love, and Alicia was the perfect romantic heroine.

‘You are very welcome to stay here as we had originally planned,’ Mrs Henley ventured, with complete truth, ‘but I fear that it might be rather uncomfortable for you. Mrs Eddington-Buck is an unkind creature, and as for Mrs Evelyn—well…’ She did not need to complete the sentence, for that lady’s lack of discretion was legendary. ‘I imagine,’ Anne Henley said carefully, ‘that they may be capable of inventing all kinds of fascinating tales for public discussion. Not that I do not believe you able to cope with such tabbies, Lady Carberry, but—’

‘But it would be poor repayment for your kindness, ma’am, to cause you such trouble,’ Alicia finished. ‘No, I will not stay. If I may trespass on your hospitality further and beg to borrow a carriage, I will continue the journey which was interrupted yesterday. My own vehicle may be ready on the morrow, but I have no wish to delay my business. Miss Frensham may have told you, ma’am, that we were on our way to my father’s house.’

‘Indeed, my dear,’ Mrs Henley murmured. Now she was very surprised. To her knowledge, Alicia and her father had not met for seven years.

‘Nothing could be simpler than you borrowing a carriage,’ she added, ‘if that is what you wish. And perhaps you are right in thinking that the scandal will die down in your absence. Certainly I will do all I can to squash it. Does the Marquis of Mullineaux have plans to travel on today?’

Alicia smiled faintly. ‘I believe he does, ma’am, although I know little of it. Believe me, the Marquis was too displeased by my folly to think of indulging in much conversation!’ She stared miserably at a bright square of sunlight on the carpet. ‘Not,’ she added suddenly, ‘that any blame for this situation can lie with him. He was generous enough to offer me the protection of his name, but I declined.’

Mrs Henley’s eyes opened very wide at her words. What sudden impulse could have prompted Mullineaux to offer for Alicia Carberry when he so clearly despised her? And why did Alicia feel that she had
to refuse him but still make it clear that he had behaved as a gentleman ought?

‘I had no choice but to refuse his offer,’ Alicia was saying softly, more to herself than to Mrs Henley. ‘How could I accept, knowing that he detests me so?’

Their eyes met and what Anne Henley saw reflected there made her think that perhaps she understood. Lady Carberry’s predicament was worse than she had originally imagined, for, whatever Mullineaux’s motives had been in proposing, Anne Henley knew Alicia had refused him because she had the misfortune still to be in love with him.

A
licia slept for most of the journey from Ottery to her father’s home north of Taunton and woke only as the carriage turned in at the black iron gates of Greyrigg. Despite the wonders worked on her appearance by Mrs Henley’s maid, who had both dressed her hair and miraculously removed all dirt from her clothing, Alicia felt both worn and tired. Her eyes were gritty from lack of sleep and she already had a slight headache which she wryly ascribed to tension. Her first meeting with her father after seven years was bound to be difficult and she did not feel best prepared to face it, but having got this far she was determined to go through with it.

A line of bare chestnut trees bordered the gravel drive which led up to the house. Greyrigg had once been the home of an impecunious Viscount but had been purchased some twenty-eight years previously by Alicia’s father, Bertram Broseley, who was a fabulously wealthy nabob. Broseley had made his fortune in trade with both the Indies and the African continent, and the Viscount, who had considered him to be an upstart of the most encroaching sort, had nevertheless seized the opportunity to turn the least favoured part of his estate into hard cash.

It was easy to see why the Viscount had felt no attachment to the house. On this wintry day the grey bulk of the building was uncompromisingly ugly as it stood amidst its park. Not even the carpeting of wild snowdrops beneath the trees could lend it any charm. It was as though the house had absorbed some of its owner’s characteristics over the past decades, and now it had an air of gloom and neglect.

As the carriage drew up outside the imposing portico, the door of the house opened and a liveried butler emerged. The groom jumped
down and opened the carriage door for the occupants to descend. Alicia tilted her head to gaze up at the massive edifice and could barely repress a shiver. Taking a deep breath to sustain her, she turned to greet the butler, who was advancing across the gravel with an unctuous smile on his face.

‘May I welcome you to Greyrigg, my lady.’ Obsequiousness did not become Castle, who had the physique of a prizefighter and, indeed, was more at home in dealing with the unsavoury side of Bertram Broseley’s business affairs than in greeting his guests. His black boot-button eyes flicked over Alicia with an unpleasant expression which reminded her of their last meeting. Things were different now. She raised her chin.

‘Thank you, Castle.’ She sounded as coldly regal as the Dowager Countess of Stansfield herself. Nothing would induce her to say that she was pleased to be home.

Alicia preceded the butler up the steps and into the gloomy entrance hall with her borrowed maid trotting along behind, seemingly awed into silence by the oppressive atmosphere.

Although Alicia had been nineteen when she had left Greyrigg for her London Season, the house now looked smaller, as though she had previously seen it through a child’s eyes. There was a smell of mustiness and decay in the hall which she did not remember. Huge cobwebs festooned the grimy central chandelier and there was a spartan emptiness which suggested the recent removal of various pieces of furniture. Alicia wondered briefly if her father’s business affairs were ailing and the neglect of his house was a direct result. Certainly the marble floor had not been cleaned for an age and the air had a stale smell which made her wrinkle up her nose in disgust.

The front door closed and Alicia had the oddest idea that a trap had closed with it. She shrugged the fanciful idea away impatiently. It was natural that she should feel uncomfortable, for she associated her father with the unhappiness of her marriage and her recent meeting with James Mullineaux could only put such matters back at the forefront of her mind.

Even before the meeting at Ottery, she had never had any intention of staying long at Greyrigg, having come reluctantly at Broseley’s behest only to take her sister to London for the forthcoming Season. It would be pleasant, Bertram Broseley had written, for Annabella to have the opportunity for a come-out, just as Alicia herself had done. This had seemed perfectly reasonable, but Alicia had felt both hurt and manipulated. Three years before, when Annabella had been fifteen, Alicia
had tried to mend the breach with her father so that she could see her sister again. Her approach had been brutally rebuffed by Broseley, who had never contacted her again until the day three weeks before when his letter had arrived out of the blue.

Despite their past differences and the fact that all Alicia’s letters to Annabella had been returned unopened, she had unwillingly bowed to her father’s pressure, anxious to prevent a fate similar to her own from befalling her sister. Broseley’s letter had pointed out urbanely that Alicia’s home at Chartley was close enough for her to come to Taunton to collect Annabella, and Alicia had not been able to find a gracious way to refuse. Now she wished she had tried harder.

Suddenly the door of her father’s study was flung open and Bertram Broseley himself came striding across the floor to greet her, hands outstretched as though she were the prodigal daughter.

‘Alicia! My dear! It is a happy day for us now that you are once more beneath the roof of your home!’

He met his daughter’s sardonic eye but did not falter. Castle smirked. Alicia, overwhelmed by a feeling of revulsion, found that she was utterly unable to respond in kind. In fact, she was unable to respond at all and simply stood, struck dumb. She had underestimated how unpleasant it would feel to be confronted with her father again. Old fears and memories were stirred up, confusing her. As she struggled to frame a suitable response, Broseley spoke again.

‘We expected you yesterday and were somewhat concerned when you failed to arrive. I hope you did not experience trouble on the journey?’

‘Merely some damage to my carriage on the Ottery road,’ Alicia replied, dismissing all the events of the previous twenty-four hours in one fell swoop. She was already feeling profoundly uncomfortable. She had hoped that Annabella would be ready to leave immediately, yet there were no trunks in the hallway, no signs of imminent departure. Suspicion stirred, faint but disturbing.

‘It’s a bad road,’ Broseley commented, his shrewd grey gaze making an inventory of his daughter’s appearance as though totting up exactly how much her clothes and jewellery had cost. An indefinable hint of satisfaction entered his manner. He had already calculated how expensive her outfit was.

‘Never mind, you are here now. And you are looking very…’ He paused, and for an insane moment Alicia thought he was going to say
‘rich’. ‘Very well indeed. I hope that you will feel able to stay for a little time.’

Nothing would have pleased Alicia less. She tried to think of a polite rebuff, but once again the effort of framing the appropriate words defeated her. Fortunately the silence, which was already threatening to become strained, was broken by the sound of running steps on the stair and by Annabella’s voice.

‘Lud, sister, can it really be you?’

Alicia could have said much the same thing. The voluptuous beauty who had reached the bottom step and was now pausing for effect bore little resemblance to the skinny little sister of eleven whom Alicia had not seen in seven years. Annabella Broseley justified the term statuesque and her clinging scarlet riding habit made her charms abundantly clear. Unlike Alicia, who had, of course, inherited the glorious but unfashionable copper hair of their maternal grandmother, Annabella was blonde. Her eyes were of a paler green than her sister’s and hers was a bold, flaunting beauty which she used to advantage on all the men she met.

Annabella’s gooseberry-green eyes were now appraising her sister with a patronising regard. She was deeply jealous of Alicia, though she would never have admitted it. Not only was her sister very wealthy in her own right, but she was also an acknowledged beauty who had earned the sobriquet of the most desirable widow in Society. Society’s opinion mattered a great deal to Annabella and it seemed unfair to her that a widow of twenty-six, who should have been at her last prayers, should have such an enviable existence.

Both sisters had the same heart-shaped faces, but the dramatic lines of the cheekbones and the determined chin which gave Alicia both beauty and resolution were already blurring into fat on Annabella’s face. Her mouth was accustomed to droop with bitter discontent and her low voice was cultivated to be deliberately sultry.

Alicia’s taste in clothes was far too subtle to appeal to Annabella, who, unlike her father, dismissed the superbly cut bronze travelling dress as plain in a single glance. Mrs Henley’s maid had taken Alicia’s hair up beneath the elegant bronze wide-brimmed hat and this, with its contrasting ribbon, was again too simple to win her sister’s favour. Patting her own be-ribboned and flower-decked hair with complacency, Annabella walked around Alicia, inspecting her as one might the points of a horse.

‘La, Alicia, you are so thin!’ This was not a virtue in Annabella’s
eyes, for she saw her sister’s slenderness as ugly. ‘And so pale!’ She eyed Alicia’s porcelain skin suspiciously. ‘I see you do not favour cosmetics to improve your looks. Oh!’ She gave an affected little shriek. ‘Never say those are freckles on your nose! Are freckles become the fashion in London, then?’

The words were naive but the look which accompanied them was anything but simple. Belatedly she offered her own enamelled cheek for her sister’s kiss and stood back to watch the effect of her words.

Alicia merely smiled at her sister’s malice. Annabella had always been like a kitten sharpening its claws, although now the kitten showed signs of having developed into a fully grown cat. For a brief moment she wondered how the two of them could possibly coexist peacefully during the next London Season, at the end of which she hoped Annabella would be safely married and off her hands. It looked as though it was going to be a difficult prospect.

‘You are looking very well, Annabella,’ she observed peaceably. ‘Are you intending to go riding? I had hoped to be away as soon as possible, for it is a few hours’ journey back to Chartley, and—’

‘Oh, but you must stay for refreshments at least!’ Annabella had flashed a look at their father who had stood silent throughout this exchange. She slipped her arm through Alicia’s, steering her in the direction of the drawing-room.

‘Unfortunately I have a prior engagement to go riding, but there is plenty of time, and I know Papa hopes for the chance of a chat! Perhaps we might stay until after dinner? Or indeed until tomorrow, since I do not suppose you to wish to travel after dark?’ She made it all sound comfortably domestic and cosy, and her gaze was bright and innocent. There was no reason for Alicia to feel the same vague uneasiness stir within her, but she did and she could not place the reason. Perhaps it was Annabella’s deliberate insouciance, or perhaps she was simply imagining things.

‘I would prefer to leave today,’ she said, a little stiffly. Above all, she wished to be home at Chartley to achieve a little peace. ‘I had made no arrangements for an overnight stay.’

‘Oh, very well.’ Annabella seemed to dismiss it as of little importance. ‘But tell me about London! We hear much about you, even buried here in the country! We are so dull.’ She pulled a face. ‘I saw Severn’s heir when he was staying with the Milburns at Stoakely Manor. You must have had windmills in your head to refuse his proposal, sister dear—a Viscount, and so handsome! Thirty thousand a year! Why, I
declare, if I had half your chances I should not waste them as you do! Lud, to think—’

‘Annabella—’ There was something in Bertram Broseley’s voice which brought the colour rushing to Annabella’s face. She paused in the drawing-room doorway.

‘La, here I am running on so, and you must be fagged to death after your journey! I will ask Mrs Rivers to send in refreshments, and—’ she turned to the maid with a dazzling smile ‘—Castle will escort your maid to the housekeeper’s room whilst you wait. Until later, then, sister dear!’

She swung out of the main door, shouting for her groom, and Bertram Broseley took Alicia’s arm in a firm grip and guided her into the drawing-room. She found that she had to make a conscious effort not to brush him off, so strong was her feeling of distaste. The atmosphere of constraint in the house seemed very strong; this visit was proving even more difficult than she had imagined. She had seldom felt so uncomfortable, although her father seemed quite unaware of her feelings.

‘Do you ever see your cousin Josiah?’ he enquired sociably as they crossed the threshold and the door was shut on Annabella’s demanding voice.

Alicia sighed. It was scarcely a happy choice of question with which to start the conversation rolling after seven years. Josiah Broseley, the son of Bertram’s younger brother, was foolish and feckless, and aspired to live the life of a gentleman in London. Alicia seldom saw him unless he came begging for funds, but despite her exasperation with him she found she could not dislike him, for he had a surface charm that was engaging. What worried her more was the knowledge that, in his more impecunious moments, Josiah had undertaken some work for Bertram Broseley. He was not discriminating when it came to funding his more questionable habits, nor was Broseley selective if he felt he could use someone to his advantage.

Alicia returned some slight, negative reply to his enquiry and looked about the room with interest. It was dark and oppressively hot. There were heavy curtains which all but hid the windows. It was an ugly room, and Alicia realised that it had not been altered since the last time she had been in it. Now the furnishings looked old and outmoded, the wall-hangings a threadbare shadow of their former rich show. An huge fire was burning in the grate and added to the overpowering warmth. The heat and tension between them were combining to make Alicia’s headache much worse, but Bertram Broseley seemed totally unaffected.
He had spent much of his life in tropical climates, and no doubt felt the cold, particularly during an English winter.