Madeleine Robins Read online

  “You, miss, are an abominable bully.” Lady Bradwell turned to Margaret, protesting, “You see how ill I am used in my own home, child? Well, all right, I suppose I shall never hear the last of it if I do not retire gracefully. Good night, dearest.” She offered a cheek to her son to kiss. “Good night, Miss Margaret. I shall enjoy having you here, I think.” She smiled again at the girl, then gave her arm to Rowena. “Lead on, tyrant.”

  “O no, ma’am!” Meg could hear Rowena explaining patiently as she led Lady Bradwell from the room. “You have the cases mixed. You are the tyrant and I am the tyrannized. I do wish you will strive to recall...”

  “Wonderful woman, your cousin.” Lord Bradwell observed to Margaret. “Keeps Mamma in line with barely a word at it. More than I could ever do, I assure you. Game of backgammon?” Margaret mutely assented, and they were finishing the third game when Rowena reappeared to suggest that perhaps they too should retire early. Lord Bradwell said all that was awkward and cordial in his good night, and retired to the library, where he was obviously much more at home. The Misses Cherwood were able to make their way to Rowena’s rooms for a comfortable coze.

  “But still no sign of the plaguey, prodigal Mr. Bradwell,” she mused as they climbed the stairs.

  Chapter Two

  Rowena had every intention of leaving Margaret with Lady Bradwell the next day, so that she could retire once more to the office and finish with details for the party. She had calculated that one more day’s work would do it, which meant that the next day could be spent in frivolities such as mending a dress, writing letters to a number of long-neglected friends, and considering what to wear in the evening for the party. But Lady Bradwell, although she took no exception either to Margaret’s company or the general whole of Miss Cherwood’s schedule for the day, ordered her companion to spend some part of the afternoon out of doors.

  “You look dreadful,” she said flatly. “Everyone in the county will say that I have worked you to the bone-certainly I have, but not with an eye to making you lose your looks. This afternoon, all afternoon, I want you to ride, or sketch, or walk. Do something in the sun, my dear, and get some of the color back in your face.”

  “I had no idea I was that pasty-faced, ma’am,” Rowena answered, rapidly figuring in her mind what she could displace in order to comply with her mistress’s orders and complete her own work. “Well, I shall certainly try to get some time out of doors. But will you —”

  “Never mind about me. I shall abuse your cousin’s good nature and keep her by me all day — you won’t mind too dreadfully, will you, child? — and you may rest assured that she will not let me transgress even one of the doctor’s odious rules.”

  “Well, in that case...” Rowena had visions of the time between three and six, the hour when the dressing bell was rung, spent in sketching the prospect of Broak Hall from the north, at the site of the Diana temple and the rill beside it.

  In actuality, it was closer to four than three when Miss Cherwood established herself and her paints by the little brook. “And a wonder I am here before midnight!” she thought, amused. The morning had included a visit by Mr. Greavesey, Dr. Cribbatt’s obsequious assistant, as well as a tantrum by Cook, who was in a mood again but seemed incapable of explaining exactly what had so upset her. Still, aside from these minor alarums her work had progressed more smoothly than she had expected, and she was able to see the end of her arrangements and list-making in sight.

  “Now, if only the prodigal were to decide to stay away!” she hummed under her breath. “I suppose I ought not to be so ready to dislike that man, but his inconsideration surpasses everything, and if his absence throws my lady into a relapse I shall murder him with — with a paintbrush to the heart, if need be!” She added a stroke of green with a vengeful swipe at the paper. It was not so much the extra work that Miss Cherwood objected to: She had been for a long time so used to running her parents’ establishments on the continent that the running of a Devonshire country seat was a relatively small matter to her. “Only because I have become an incurable manager,” she admitted readily. Lyndon Bradwell’s behavior endangered his mother’s peace of mind, and thus her health. After the patient nursing that Miss Cherwood and Taylor, Lady Bradwell’s maid, had done over the past six months, Rowena was not prepared to brook any setback.

  “Not that Lady B has asked me to shield her from her son!” she admitted. But years of trailing in the wake of her adventurous and travel-mad parents, included as an adult member of their haphazard entourage, attending fetes and tending to the management of their household, had given her a protective attitude toward those she loved which Rowena found difficult to shed. In fourteen years the Cherwoods had lived in India, in the American states, and practically all over Europe (subject, of course, to which countries were under the thumb of the Corsican Monster at any time). Her acquaintance included officers of the staff in Brussels, nabobs in China, and a highly ornamental Marquis in Spain, and Rowena’s education had been as original as her upbringing. This idyllic, if original, existence had continued until Waterloo year, when Mr. Cherwood had taken the typhus while helping the wounded that poured into Brussels after the great battle, and had died. Stunned, Rowena and her mother had returned to London, where Mrs. Cherwood, declining gently for almost a year, had followed her husband at last. And Miss Cherwood, left without her beloved and impractical parent to manage for, had gone to the house of her father’s brother, Margaret’s father. Despite all her best attempts, Rowena was forced to admit at the end of a year that she and her aunt were utterly inimical, and she had begun, over Dorothea Cherwood’s outraged protests, to look for employment.

  And now: What are we to do with Meggy? she thought absently, washing the page in pale pink. The best, of course, would be to marry her off so that she needn’t return home at all, but I doubt that Lord Bradwell is up to her weight.

  Who else is there in the neighborhood? Perhaps she could marry the prodigal! The idea made Rowena snort in a very unladylike manner. But not if he’s as chuckleheaded as his brother. Or as inconsiderate as he seems to be. What a wretched man. So the subject came full circle back to the irritating Lyndon Bradwell.

  “Damnation,” she said aloud. Then looked about her from habit, to see if anyone had overheard her unbecoming comment. A blotch of green had dripped from her suspended brush onto the sketch, precisely on the north wall of Broak, over which she had labored for some time. With a soft rag she set about repairing the damage, which work absorbed all her attention for some minutes and thus kept her from ruminating on the shortcomings of Mr. Bradwell. She was not aware of the man strolling toward the house until he was almost beside her.

  “Good afternoon,” he said, in tones of mild curiosity.

  Miss Cherwood jumped, spoiling her picture irredeemably with a startled brush stroke. “Da — do you always creep up on people in that fashion, sir?” she demanded a little breathlessly.

  “I hardly crept up on you, Miss —” He paused, but she was too irritated to oblige by supplying her name. “I thought I made rather a great deal of racket, stalking up on the house this way. You were rather deep in your work, you know.” He gestured toward the ruined paper. “Quite a nice sketch, except for that streak of brown across it — you have captured the color of the light at that corner exactly.”

  “The streak,” Rowena informed him icily, “was not intentional. But it’s of no import now.”

  “Was that my fault? Truly, I am sorry.” He spoke with lazy sincerity. Rowena, glaring up at him, felt her gaze drop again. The stranger was tall — tall enough so that even had she been standing, Miss Cherwood would have been forced to tilt her head up to observe his face. He was nicely if not exquisitely dressed, in a coat of blue superfine, buff pantaloons, and well-polished Hessian boots, and his light hair was tossed by the wind — or brushed to give that effect. His eyes, which she thought were blue or gray, were his most remarkable feature, displaying intelligence, humor, and kindliness. It was the kindliness
which both won Rowena and infuriated her. Who was this man?

  “Do you belong to the house?” he drawled.

  “Do I belong there? I’m not chattel goods, sir, if that’s what you mean.”

  “Good God, no. I assumed that you were a visitor here, or else a neighbor come to take advantage of the prospect for sketching. I was only hoping to ask who I might find at the house.”

  “Are you a friend of the Bradwells, sir?” Miss Cherwood asked. “We are unaccustomed to seeing pedestrians appear on the grounds at half-past four, particularly since Lady Bradwell has been ill.” She was emphatic.

  There was no reaction from the stranger at all. After a moment, Rowena decided it was simplest to answer the man’s questions. “Lady Bradwell is in, of course, although if you mean to call on her, I wish you will be guided by me and leave her to rest this afternoon: She is in the midst of planning a party for one of her sons, and has been taxing herself more than I can like. She has only been persuaded to rest this afternoon by a combination of efforts. Lord Bradwell I think you might find somewhere about the grounds, but I suspect that he is off with the gamekeeper discussing stock for the pond, or some such.”

  “Lady Bradwell’s giving a party, is she?” The stranger frowned. “What, is Jack getting buckled or something of that sort?”

  “No, the party is being held for her other son, who —”

  “Damnation!” The stranger snorted. “Why the devil is she taxing herself — I collect that you have not encouraged her in this foolishness. Thank God Mamma is at least surrounded by some people of sense. Well, Miss —” He paused, and a look of comprehension came into his eyes, to match the look which had lately come into Rowena’s. “You must be Mamma’s Dragon! You will forgive me calling you so, but I have been thinking of you that way since I got Mamma’s last letter, for you seem to keep her in line, and I know what that must take.” He smiled and offered his hand. “I am pleased to meet you. I’m Lyn Bradwell.”

  Miss Cherwood, who had reached that conclusion sometime in the middle of this last speech, regarded the hand stretched out to her with mixed feelings, but took it all the same and favored the Prodigal with a very halfhearted smile of welcome. That his coming had overset his mother was bad enough, but that he should introduce himself to her in a fashion guaranteed to put her at a disadvantage (as well as having made her spoil a very promising watercolor) was really too bad.

  “I am sorry,” he added after a moment’s uncomfortable silence. “But I regret to admit that I cannot recall your name. I had grown so used to thinking of you as —”

  “The Dragon,” Rowena supplied sweetly. “Well, if you tire of that form of address, Mr. Bradwell, you may call me Miss Cherwood,” she finished coolly.

  “Now you’re at outs with me.” Bradwell sighed. Rowena had begun to rinse out her brushes and fold her painting kit away. “But you must realize that I had been envisioning a much older woman, sort of a —”

  “Dragon,” Miss Cherwood repeated succinctly, although her sense of the ridiculous was slowly reasserting itself and her tone was less venomous than it had been a moment before. “It’s quite all right, Mr. Bradwell. I regret, of course, that I cannot oblige you by being the martinet of forty you expected, but I assure you that I am older than I may appear, and quite capable of keeping your mother from overtaxing her strength under most ordinary circumstances. But she would have this party, thirty couples from the neighborhood, indeed, and everything fine about it —”

  “Except that you don’t think Mamma’s health is up to it.”

  “It may be, sir, if she will let me have the ordering of things and will refrain from wasting strength on unnecessaries,” she admitted, folding up the little stool on which she had been sitting. Bradwell reached to take it from her, but she had already placed it atop her painting box and was setting off in the direction of the house.

  “I had no idea Mamma would do anything so idiotish —” he began.

  “It’s hardly idiotish to wish to welcome home her prodigal son, gone these six years,” Rowena began hotly, in defense of her mistress.

  “Five,” Bradwell corrected mildly. “And I’m not criticizing the thought, Miss Dragon-Cherwood, but that fact that Mamma was silly enough to think I would expect a party of her when she is so lately out of the sickroom.” There was nothing in that speech that Rowena could take exception to; in fact, it was a reiteration of many of her thoughts on the subject. She found herself a little more in charity with Bradwell, although she could not remember the last time she had been so in and out of favor toward anyone in such a short time.

  “Can you tell me how Mamma is going on aside from taking too much upon herself with this party, as we have both agreed?”

  “The doctor says she has mended remarkably and that it is only her eyes we must take especial care of. She hates to wear her spectacles — blue glass, and not very becoming — and will do so only with the greatest reluctance. And when I have tried to interest her in things that will not strain her eyes, she throws up the most imaginative obstacles! I taught her to knit, and she is perfectly adept to it, only says it is shabby genteel and she won’t be seen by anyone but me while she does it. You may see that her temper is improved. Or worsened, rather, but I think it is a good sign.”

  “But her eyes? What is the danger there?”

  “It is hard for me to say, exactly, when even Dr. Cribbatt dislikes to test them too far for fear of straining them. Lady Bradwell goes without the spectacles in the house, and can see quite clearly now, although she is still forbidden close work and reading and writing. And on no account must she go into the daylight without those spectacles, no matter what she says.”

  “And I wager she’s the very devil to persuade about them, ain’t she?” Bradwell smiled. “She’s a vain puss, is Mamma. Should I tease her about them?”

  “Sir, if you’ve half the influence with her that I imagine you have, I think she will wrap herself in blue glass if she thinks you would like it,” Miss Cherwood advised drily.

  “Coming it a bit too strong, Miss Cherwood. I apologized for ruining your painting, didn’t I? What other crimes — other than calling you a dragon, but I will be excused for that, won’t I, since my image of you was so far from the reality — of what else am I accused?” He smiled again at her; it was really a very nice smile, and lit his fine eyes. They were gray, Rowena decided. “You think me abominably rag-mannered, don’t you? My only excuse is that I am only just returned from seeking my fortune on the continent, and I have forgotten the common civilities of an English drawing room.”

  “And did you find your fortune, Mr. Bradwell?” Miss Cherwood asked sweetly.

  “I’m afraid that the people who arrived before me had completely cleared the palaces of the continent of their treasures, Miss Cherwood. I have hopes of making my way in the Foreign Office, but I will have to acquire some more acquaintances there than the ones I made through my soldiering days.”

  Rowena sighed. “I suppose if you had tried the drawing rooms on the continent you would have discovered more useful contacts there. I never had the least difficulty in recalling what was due the English drawing room, for I found the drawing rooms of France and Spain and Portugal and Austria to be very similar to the ones in Devon and Sussex.”

  “I suspect that was a setdown, Miss Cherwood. Have you actually lived in any of those places?”

  “All of them, Mr. Bradwell. But I promise not to contradict you in front of your Mamma.” Rowena gave him a smile and entered the house.

  o0o

  “I must say, Mamma,” Mr. Bradwell commented later, when the first flush of their reunion was over, “that that Miss Cherwood of yours —”

  “Rowena? Isn’t she the greatest love in creation, Lyn? I cannot tell you how good and how patient she has been with me, aside from taking over all the management of the house while I was so ill, although that was by no means expected of her.”

  Lyndon Bradwell, still unsettled by his meeting with
his mother’s companion, thought that perhaps seizing the management of the household would be the more precise term, but wisely refrained from voicing it.

  “Jack, even, thinks that she is a good creature, and you know that the last female of whom Jack said any such thing — always aside from his mares, of course — was Jane Ambercot. Of course, Rowena is too wise to think they would do anything but bore each other to death if he offered for her. Although I could almost wish, for Jack’s sake, that she would take him.”

  Mr. Bradwell disregarded the disquieting idea of Miss Rowena Cherwood as his sister-in-law. “No, I don’t think a strong-minded female past her first youth is quite the thing for Jack, Mamma.”

  “What a fashion in which to describe Rowena, you monster. Lyn, you haven’t taken her in dislike, have you? I only meant that if Jack will not reconsider Jane — and yes, I know better than to try to raise that engagement again, even though everyone knew they would have been terribly happy together — where was I? O yes, well, sometimes I wish that Jack had not been such a fool.”

  “I see very little comparison between Miss Ambercot and Miss Cherwood, Mamma.”

  “Well, in looks, certainly not. Jane, fond of her as I am, does have the most annoying tendency to freckle, and she is rather short, and the only dress that really suits her is riding habit. But she and Jack would have suited so well together, I can’t mind her appearance at all. I do regret their quarrel sometimes.”

  “So does Jack, I’m sure,” Mr. Bradwell observed thoughtfully. “There’s also rather a disparity between your Miss Cherwood and Miss Ambercot, as I recall, in temper.”

  “They’re both commonsensical creatures, Lyn, and I know that Jane would have managed Jack to a nicety.”

  “Just as your Miss Cherwood sees to you, ma’am?” He wondered privately if this Miss Cherwood was not something of an opportunist.

  “Precisely. But Lyn, you’ve been sitting here in my room for above an hour, and have not told me how long you intend to stay.”