Cousin Kate Read online

  From the moment of her arrival at the Clarendon Hotel, she felt that she had been pitchforked into another, and more affluent, world. Received with great civility, she was led upstairs to my lady’s apartments, a large suite of rooms looking on to Albemarle Street, and welcomed affectionately by my lady, who kissed her, held her at arms’ length, and exclaimed ruefully: “How very pretty you are! And what charming taste you have! I don’t wonder at it that that horrid young man made up to you! Ah, Sidlaw, here she is—my little half-niece! My love, this is Sidlaw, my dresser, and once, like your Sarah, my nurse!”

  Not for nothing had Miss Malvern spent six months in a gentleman’s establishment: Miss Sidlaw’s mien might be forbidding, and her curtsy majestic, but Miss Malvern knew better than to offer her hand. She smiled, and acknowledged the curtsy with a gracious inclination of her head, well aware that by this manner of receiving an introduction she had risen from the status of Poor Relation to that of a Lady of the First Stare.

  Dinner was served in my lady’s private parlour: not a large dinner, but one of great elegance, beginning with a soup, going on with lobster, dressed in a sauce known only to Jacquard, reaching its climax in a capilotade of ducklings, and ending with a dish of peu d’amours. Miss Malvern, abandoning herself to the flesh-pots, enjoyed every mouthful.

  While she ate, she lent an attentive ear to my lady’s discourse, which was devoted to the glory of Staplewood and the Broomes. She learned that a Broome had been one of King James the First’s braw new knights; and that ever since that day son had succeeded father in an unbroken line; she learned that while none had achieved fame, many had been distinguished; and she learned that each one had made it his business to enlarge, or to embellish, the original manor. Lady Broome promised to show her the sketches and plans of the house over more than two hundred years, adding: “My part—or, rather, Sir Timothy’s—has been to improve the gardens, and to build a belvedere, commanding a view of the lake.”

  There was an appreciative twinkle in Kate’s eye, but her aunt was choosing a peu d’amour, and she did not see it. It seemed to Kate that although Lady Broome might have outgrown a girlish desire to marry a duke she still had her fair share of ambition. It was directed into worthier channels; her enthusiasm for the Broome family was certainly not assumed; and when she spoke of Staplewood it was with reverence, and a great deal of knowledge.

  She sent Kate early to bed, warning her that she must be ready to start on the long journey at five in the morning. “You won’t object to traveling all day, I hope? I don’t care to be away from Sir Timothy for more than three nights—and I never sleep well in posting-houses.”

  “Of course I don’t object, ma’am!” instantly responded Kate. “I have frequently travelled all day, in the Peninsula, and over shocking roads! In antiquated carriages, too, when I have had no horse to ride.”

  “Ah, I was forgetting! I am afraid parts of the road are very bad, but my chaise is particularly well-sprung, and I employ my own postilions. A sad extravagance, when I go about so little nowadays! But when one is obliged to travel without male escort trustworthy boys are a necessity. Now I am going to take you to your bedchamber, just to be sure that you have everything you want for the night.”

  She cast a keen, critical glance round this apartment, but Kate’s gaze fell on the ermine stole and muff laid out on the bed, and remained riveted. “But—those aren’t mine, ma’am!”

  “What are not yours? Oh, the furs! Indeed they are! The first present I have ever given my niece: do you like them?”

  “Oh, yes, yes, but—Aunt Minerva, I do thank you, but you mustn’t crush me with benevolence!”

  Lady Broome laughed. “Mustn’t I? Foolish child, do you mean to throw them back at me?”

  “No, I’m not so rag-mannered, and I like them too much!” said Kate naively, lifting the muff to her cheek. “Oh, how soft! how rich!”

  She might have said the same about the chaise which bore her so swiftly north next morning, and did indeed say that so much unaccustomed luxury was putting quite unsuitable notions into her head. Lady Broome, with a significant glance, at the back of Sidlaw’s bonnet, smiled, but requested her not to talk nonsense. Sidlaw, occupying the unenviable forward seat, smiled too, but sourly. However, when my lady had fallen asleep, which she very soon did, and she heard herself addressed in a cautious undervoice, she unbent a little. “Tell me about Staplewood!” begged Kate. “You must know that I have spent almost all my life in the Peninsula, under the roughest conditions, and have never stayed in an English country house, or had a proper come-out, or—or anything! How shall I do?”

  “You will do very well, miss—being as her ladyship has taken a fancy to you.”

  “I hope I may be worthy of her regard!”

  “Yes, miss. My lady has had many crosses to bear.”

  “Does that signify that you hope I may not become another cross?”

  After a moment’s hesitation, Sidlaw replied, picking her words: “Oh, no, miss! Merely that you might disappoint her—but that I’m sure you won’t do.”

  “I trust I shall not!”

  “No, miss. My lady is kindness itself—to those she likes.”

  The inference was plain. Kate sat pondering it, a slight furrow between her brows. Instinct forbade her to inquire more closely, but the silence was broken by Sidlaw, who said: “I believe, miss—but I am not positive!—that my lady hopes you may provide Mr Torquil with the youthful companionship which he has missed, through no fault of his own.”

  The slowing down of the chaise as it approached the lodge-gates woke Lady Broome. She opened sleepy eyes, blinked them, and became aware of her surroundings. She sat up, gave her shoulders a little shake, and said: “So we arrive! My love, I do beg your pardon! So impolite of me to fall asleep! Ah, Fleet! You see me home again before you expected to! And is all well here? Very well? You relieve my mind! Go on, James!” She turned her head, and smiled at her niece. “This is Staplewood,” she said simply.

  The chaise bowled at a slackened pace through the park, allowing Kate plenty of time to see, and to admire. It had been a fine day, and the sun was setting redly. Kate’s first view of the great house drew a gasp from her, not of admiration but of dismay, since it seemed to her for a moment, staring at the huge facade, whose numberless windows gave back the sun’s dying rays in every colour of the spectrum, that the building was on fire. Shaken, but realizing that her aunt had not correctly interpreted her gasp, she murmured appreciation.

  “Yes,” said Lady Broome, in a purring voice that reminded Kate irresistibly of a large, sleek cat. “It is beautiful, isn’t it?”

  She put aside the rug that covered her legs as she spoke, and prepared to alight from the chaise. A footman, hurrying out of the house, let down the steps, and offered his arm, and an elderly man, whose habit proclaimed his calling, bowed to her, and said: “Welcome home, my lady!”

  “Thank you, Pennymore. Kate, dear child, you must let me make Pennymore known to you! Our good butler, who knew Staplewood before ever I did. How is Sir Timothy, Pennymore?”

  “Quite well, my lady, and will be glad to see you home again. Mr Torquil too—as Dr Delabole will doubtless inform your ladyship.”

  She nodded, and led Kate into the house, saying: “You will think it difficult at first, I daresay, to find your way about, but you will soon grow accustomed. We are now in the Great Hall, and that is the Grand Stairway.”

  “I can see that it is, ma’am,” responded Kate. “Very grand!” She heard the sharp intake of breath behind her, and shot a mischievous look over her shoulder. The next instant, however, she had schooled her features into an expression of rapt interest, and was able to meet her aunt’s eyes limpidly enough to allay suspicion.

  Before Lady Broome could conduct her up the Grand Stairway to her bedchamber, a tall, Gothic door at one side of the Great Hall was opened, and an old gentleman came into the hall. His hair was white, his frame emaciated, and his skin the colour of parchment. H
is eyes struck Kate as the weariest she had ever seen; and when he smiled it was with an effort. He said, in a gentle voice: “So you have brought her to Staplewood, Minerva? How do you do, my dear? I hope you will be happy with us.”

  Taking the fragile hand he held out to her in her own warm clasp, she answered, smiling at him: “Yes, sir, I hope so too. It won’t be my fault if I am not.”

  “Well, as it certainly won’t be mine, you will be happy!” said Lady Broome quizzically. “Sir Timothy, I must take her up to her bedchamber! You, I see, have changed your dress, but we, I must inform you, are sadly travel-stained, and it wants but half an hour to dinner! Come, my love!”

  Kate, meekly mounting the Grand Stairway in her aunt’s wake, paused on the half-landing to look back. Below her lay the Great Hall, stone-paved, and hung with tapestries. A log fire smouldered in the wide stone hearth, which was flanked by armoured figures, and surmounted by an arrangement of ancient weapons. A highly polished refectory table supported a pewter dish; an oak coffer with brass hinges and locks, burnished till they shone, stood against one wall; an oak armoire against another; several high-backed chairs, also of oak, completed the furniture; the tall windows were hung with faded tapestry; and the Grand Stairway was of black oak, uncarpeted. Kate, critically surveying the scene below her, found that her aunt was watching her, the corners of her mouth lilting upward.

  “Well?” said Lady Broome. “What do you think of it?”

  “It isn’t very gay, is it?” replied Kate honestly. “Or even very cosy! No, I don’t mean cosy, precisely—homelike!”

  A chuckle from Sir Timothy brought her eyes to his face, a most mischievous twinkle in them. Lady Broome’s triumphant smile vanished; she put up her brows, saying: “Cosy? Homelike? Not, perhaps, to our modern notions, but the Elizabethans would have found it so, I assure you.”

  “Ah, no, my love!” gently interpolated Sir Timothy. “The Elizabethans, whose taste was not to be compared with yours, would have covered the beams with paint, you know. My father had it stripped off when I was a boy.” He added, dispassionately considering the tapestries: “And the hangings must have been very bright before the colours faded, and the gold threads became tarnished. Eheu jugaces!”

  “My dear Sir Timothy, how absurd you are!” said Lady Broome, with an indulgent laugh. “Don’t heed him, Kate! He delights in bantering me, because I care more for these things than he does.”

  She swept on up the stairs, and across the hall to a broad gallery, down which she led Kate. Opening one of the doors which gave access to it, she said archly, over her shoulder: “Now, pray don’t tell me that you think this room unhome-like! I have taken such pains to make it pretty for you!”

  “No, indeed!” exclaimed Kate, turning pink with pleasure. “I never saw a prettier room, ma’am! Thank you! A fire, too! Well, if this is the way you mean to use me you will never be rid of me! What can I do to repay so much kindness? I hope you will tell me!”

  “Oh, you will find a great deal to do! But I don’t wish to be rid of you. Good evening, Ellen! This is Miss Kate, whom you are to wait upon. What have you put out for her to wear this evening?”

  The young housemaid rose from her knees by Kate’s trunk, and bobbed a curtsy. “If you please, my lady, the white muslin, trimmed with a double pleating of blue ribbon,” she said nervously. “Being as it came first to hand!”

  “Well, show it to me!” commanded Lady Broome, with a touch of impatience. She nodded at Kate. “A country girl! I hope you won’t find her very stupid and clumsy.” She surveyed the dress Ellen was holding up. “Yes, that will do very well. Put it down, and go and desire Sidlaw to give you the package I gave into her charge!”

  “Yes, my lady!” said Ellen, curtsying herself out of the room.

  “It is almost impossible to get London servants to come into the country,” remarked Lady Broome. “When we gave up the London house I did make the experiment, but it didn’t answer. They were for ever complaining that it was lonely, or that they dared not walk through the park after dark! Such nonsense! By the by, I do hope you are not nervous, my dear?”

  “Oh, no, not a bit!” replied Kate cheerfully. “After all, I’m not at all likely to be snatched up by a party of guerrilleros, am I?”

  “Extremely unlikely! Yes, that is the package, Ellen, but there is no need to enter the room as though you had been shot from a gun. My love, this is a shawl for you to put round your shoulders: I hope you will like it. I shall leave you now. When you are dressed, Ellen will show you the way to the Long Drawing-room.”

  She moved towards the door, and paused before it, looking at Ellen with raised brows. With a gasp, the girl scurried to open it for her, curtsying yet again. Having carefully shut it, she turned, gulped, and said: “If you please, miss, I haven’t finished unpacking your trunk!”

  “Well, you haven’t had time, have you? Oh, pray don’t keep on dropping curtsies! It makes me feel giddy! Have you found a pair of silk stockings yet? I think I should wear them, don’t you?”

  “Oh, yes, miss!”

  “I bought them yesterday,” disclosed Kate, rummaging through the trunk. “My old nurse said it was a sinful waste of money, but I thought my aunt would expect me to have at least one pair. Here they are! The first I’ve ever had!”

  “Oo, aren’t they elegant?” breathed Ellen, awed.

  “Well, I think so! Tell me, how much time have I before dinner?”

  “Only half an hour, miss. Being as it’s half past six, and dinner’s at seven. Generally it’s at six, but my lady had it put off, in case you’d be late. If you please, miss!”

  Kate laid her furs down on the bed, and began to unbutton her pelisse, glancing thoughtfully round the room. “It was very kind of her to make so many preparations for me,” she said. “Are those blinds new?”

  “Yes, miss, and the bed-curtains, made to match!” said Ellen, with vicarious pride. “Such a time as we all had with them, Mrs Quedgeley, which is my lady’s sewing-woman, saying as they couldn’t be made up, not under a sennight! So we was all of us set to stitching, and Mrs Thorne—that’s the housekeeper, miss—read to us, to improve our minds.”

  “Goodness! Did it improve your mind?”

  “Oh, no, miss!” answered Ellen, shocked. “I didn’t understand it.”

  Kate laughed, tossing her hat on to the bed, and running her fingers through her flattened curls. “My aunt must have been very sure she would bring me back with her,” she commented.

  “Oh, yes, miss! Everything always has to be just as my lady says.”

  Kate did not reply to this, possibly because she was trying to unfasten her dress. Seeing her in difficulties recalled Ellen to a sense of her new duties, and she hurried to her assistance, even remembering, once Kate had stepped out of the dress, to pour warm water from a brass can into the flowered basin upon the wash-stand, and to direct her attention to the soap, which, she said simply, was a cake of my lady’s own, from Warren’s, with ever such a sweet scent.

  Having washed her face and hands, Kate sat down at the dressing-table, in her petticoat, and vigorously brushed her hair, threading a ribbon through it, and twisting the ringlets round her fingers. Her handmaiden, watching with great interest, said: “Lor’, miss! Is it natural?”

  “Yes, quite natural!” Kate answered, amused. “Isn’t it fortunate for me? Now, if you will do up my dress for me—oh, and open the package my aunt gave me!—Good God, what a beautiful shawl! It must be Norwich silk, surely!—Where is my trinket box?” She dived into her trunk again, and dragged from its depths a small box, which she opened. After critically inspecting its contents, she selected a modest string of beads, and a posy-ring; and, having clasped the one round her throat, and slipped the other on her finger, disposed the shawl becomingly, and announced that she was now ready.

  “Oh, miss, you do look a picture!” exclaimed her handmaiden involuntarily.

  Heartened by this tribute, Kate drew a resolute breath, and stepped out into
the corridor. She was led down it to the hall, and across this to a picture gallery, where brocade curtains shrouded no fewer than fifteen very tall windows. Wax candles flickered in a number of wall sconces, but did little to warm the gallery. Kate drew the shawl more closely about her shoulders, and was reminded of a draughty chateau near Toulouse, where she and her father had had the ill-fortune to be billeted for several weeks.

  “This is the anteroom, miss!” whispered Ellen, opening a door, and walking across the room on tiptoe to where heavy curtains veiled an archway. She pulled one back a little way, signifying, with a jerk of her head and a frightened grimace, that Kate was to pass through the archway.

  There were only two people in the Long Drawing-room, neither of whom was known to Kate. She hesitated, looking inquiringly from one to the other.

  Standing before the fire was a well-preserved gentleman of uncertain age; and lounging on a sofa was the most beautiful youth Kate had ever seen. Under a brow of alabaster were set a pair of large and oddly luminous blue eyes, fringed by long, curling lashes; his nose was classic; his petulant mouth most exquisitely curved; and his pale golden hair looked like silk. He wore it rather long, and one waving strand, whether by accident or design, fell forward across his brow. He pushed it back with a slender white hand, and favoured Kate with the look of a sulky schoolboy.

  His companion came forward, bowing, and smiling. “Miss Malvern, is it not? I must make myself known to you: I am Dr Delabole. Torquil, dear boy, where are your manners?”

  This was uttered in a tone of gentle reproof, and had the effect of making Torquil get up, and execute a reluctant bow.

  “How do you do?” said Kate calmly, putting out her hand. “I shan’t eat you, you know!”

  Light intensified in his eyes; he laughed delightedly, and took her hand, and stood holding it. “Oh, I like you!” he said impulsively.