The Impossible Ward Page 5

  Consequently Marianne entered the conversation with well-feigned affability, and with the marquess’ skillful connivance succeeded fairly well in keeping to impersonal topics until they reached the posting house where he planned to stop for a change of horses and some refreshments for the ladies. They found the ordinary bill of fare quite tolerable and sincerely welcomed the opportunity to stretch their legs, especially Marianne, who was not only completely unused to the rigors of traveling but also to physical confinement of any sort. She had told no more than the simple truth when informing the marquess that she ran her grandfather’s farm, to which her calloused hands and sunburned skin gave mute testimony. The sight of the marquess taking advantage of a lull in the rain to have Mountain saddled gave fresh impetus to her seething resentment as she stared fixedly at the chaise with distaste before entering it. In all fairness she could not but sympathize with the marquess’ desire to ride, but an uncharitable emotion she had no difficulty in recognizing as envy caused her to take a jaundiced view of his action. Not that she had so far experienced the slightest desire for his company, but now she would bear the full brunt of their companion’s excessive civility for the seemingly eternal afternoon. Never had an indifferent countryside been more thoroughly discussed. Except for Jack Richmond the two women had no acquaintance in common, and here all Miss Twistleton’s sly questions and hints of a closer bond than friendship between Jack and Marianne were met with a blank stare from the latter which, had Miss Twistleton been better acquainted with Marianne’s upbringing and lifestyle, she would have known reflected genuine surprise. As it was she felt rebuffed and became stiffly correct and formal in her manner, but since this was not accompanied by a corresponding lessening in the volume of her chatter, Marianne could not be said to have benefitted by the change. Indeed by the time they reached the posting house where they would put up for the night, Marianne was so surfeited with a steady diet of “your ladyship” this and “your ladyship” that that she must needs clamp her teeth tightly together to prevent a scream of sheer frustration at this hateful form of address. When at long last the marquess assisted her to descend the steps of the chaise in the inn yard, she fixed him with such a fulminating eye that he looked momentarily taken aback. By the time the trio had entered the large reception hall, however, he had grasped the situation and was wearing a faintly amused expression that did nothing to mitigate Marianne’s sense of ill usage.

  Later, in the private dining parlor he had hired, their host exerted his not inconsiderable charm to entertain the ladies at dinner, but his efforts met with indifferent success. To be sure, Miss Twistleton was all atwitter and giggled appreciatively at his wit in a manner more appropriate to a budding debutante than a maiden lady on the shady side of forty, but Marianne remained singularly unmoved by a really creditable performance, only speaking when directly addressed. She pleaded fatigue at the earliest possible moment and fell into bed in a state bordering on blank despair. She was intensely homesick and worried about leaving her grandfather and, despite his assurances that he was looking forward to devoting most of his time to a study of Egyptian history during the next months, was convinced that he would feel the gap in his life made by her absence much more keenly than he was admitting. They were very deeply attached to one another and he had had complete charge of her education for the past ten years. Consequently she had received the same type of instruction as his, former university scholars, and her mind was trained in the same manner. A day spent in the unnerving company of Miss Twistleton had served only to emphasize how sadly unfitted she was for the company of women. Her days were crammed full of practical problems concerning the running of the farm and her evenings spent in the erudite company of her grandfather and the rector. Until today she had never realized how subtly her life had changed following her grandmother’s death. In the past few years she had not even once experienced the pangs of guilt that had first assailed her whenever she thought of the exquisite embroidery work that her grandmother was noted for. She had been attempting to teach Marianne the skill with conspicuously little success at the time of her death, and Marianne had not picked up a needle in the intervening years. Her grandmother, being a thrifty Frenchwoman, had stressed homemaking skills, and Marianne was well able to order a household, but, she thought with unaccustomed self-pity, how little benefit such practical arts would be in the environment of wealth to which she was heading. For the first time ever it occurred to her that she had no feminine accomplishments at all. She had not once touched a pianoforte or a needle in ten years. As a very young child her drawings and attempts at watercolor painting had caused her grandmother to go off in fits of laughter. “You will never be the artist, chérie,” had been Grandmere’s judgment. “We must see to your musical education.” So while she lived, Marianne had been well taught and there was promise of future proficiency on the pianoforte. She had a pleasing voice too, but both skills had been abandoned when they moved to the farm following her grandmother’s demise. They had taken few possessions with them; her grandfather had been desolate at the loss of his wife and quite beyond thinking about music teachers and pianofortes at the time. Later, when they had settled into a comfortable routine on the farm, Marianne had been too thrilled by the freedom of outdoor living and the workings of the farm to regret the loss of her music. As her grandfather gradually became interested in taking over her education, she found herself completely happy with his program and his companionship.

  “I should have been born a male,” she mourned aloud, with sudden shattering conviction. “I have been educated as a boy would be, I’ve had the freedom of a boy—I am no kind of female at all.”

  It never occurred to her that, in all probability, if she had been a boy her life would have been very different, for her father would undoubtedly have taken over the upbringing of a male heir. She never thought of her father at all, for at this point in her unhappy musings she fell into a disturbed sleep in the unfamiliar, too soft bed.

  In the morning things seemed no better as she looked around the impersonal room with listless eyes, absently assessing its heavy solid appointments—anything to avoid dwelling on the prospect of another long day confined in a carriage with Miss Twistleton. A hasty glance outside confirmed her gloomy mood. A driving rain beat a tattoo against the window. The reluctant daylight barely lightened the shadowed corners of the room. She pulled a wry face as she swung her legs reluctantly out of the warm bed, then a thought caused the corners of her mouth to reverse direction and tilt up in amusement. She would confidently wager her next corn crop that the marquess was even less pleased with the weather than she was. The grin grew wider. No riding for him today! Well, she thought with a determined gleam in her blue-violet eyes, he could take a turn at being the little governess’ captive audience since he had arranged for her presence on this interminable journey. And to this end she began rummaging through her meager baggage, emerging triumphantly a moment later carrying the book her grandfather had pressed upon her at her departure.

  Thus armed she appeared at breakfast, wearing her customary cool composure as a protective cloak to cover her unhappiness. Her trustee, however, fixed a penetrating stare upon her face and thought he detected shadows beneath her eyes causing them to appear darker than ever. Marianne would have been astonished to discover that beneath his polite urbanity he was shrewdly assessing her every action, and had conceived a very fair notion of the anxiety she was experiencing as a future rushed up to meet her that she could never have contemplated in her wildest imaginings.

  He permitted a hint of a smile to lighten his expression as his eyes fell on the book she had placed beside her with a faintly defiant air. However he said nothing, preferring to allow her the discovery that reading in a carriage, no matter how well sprung, traveling at speed over indifferent roads was an impossible situation.

  And indeed she soon realized that a pounding head and swimming eyes represented too high a price to pay for a bit of isolation, no matter how desperately she
wished for solitude. The second day was even more interminable than the first, now that any sense of novelty had worn off. The rain continued unabated throughout the long day, but the marquess seemed to have hit upon the correct approach to reduce Miss Twistleton’s spate of anecdotal prattle to endurable, though admittedly tedious, proportions. He alternately teased and flattered her, pandering to her taste for tales of titled persons, describing visits to palatial estates that held the governess enthralled. When she succumbed to an anecdotal urge, he promptly capped her tale with one of his own. All of this was done in a perfectly straightforward manner, but from time to time Marianne, darting piercing glances at his serious countenance, surprised a dancing gleam in his eyes that gave birth to a potent suspicion on her part that his charming manner masked a strong and probably reprehensible sense of humor. At first she was inclined to be indignant for Miss Twistleton’s sake, but closer observation of that lady revealed that she was having the time of her life, revelling in the friendly attentions of a titled gentleman. Any hints that the titled gentleman in question was amusing himself at her expense would only serve to crush her sensibilities; so except for sending him a number of scathing looks which he blandly ignored, Marianne remained silent.

  On this and the following day her contributions to the conversation represented no more than the bare minimum demanded by common civility. She had been thinking deeply about her changed circumstances, but could find only one aspect that promised an agreeable situation. The marquess had told her that a cousin had inherited her father’s title and entailed estate. On questioning the identity of this cousin she was agreeably surprised to discover that not only was this unknown relative the son of her father’s younger brother, but that he was only a couple of years older than Marianne herself. She was even more delighted to learn that she was also possessed of a female cousin. Aubrey’s younger sister, Claire, was twenty years of age. Apart from her grandparents, Marianne had never had any relatives before, and she was inordinately pleased with this sudden influx of them. She longed to question her trustee more closely about Aubrey and Claire but there was never one moment during the journey when she could be private with him and, as it was clearly ineligible to be discussing family matters in the presence of Miss Twistleton, she was compelled to contain her impatience to learn more about these newly discovered relations.

  She reflected with wry humor that if she already chafed at the artificial restrictions imposed by Society on the nature of any and all contact between unmarried persons of the opposite sex, she would likely prove a severe trial to the poor marchioness who had undertaken to be responsible for the social behavior of her son’s ward. A very disconcerting question in her mind was just how willingly the marchioness had complied with her strong-minded son’s determination to carry out his friend’s dying wish. Marianne had been loved and wanted all her life by her doting grandparents. The discovery that her father had never even wished to make her acquaintance at any time during the twenty-two years of her life had been a severe blow. She had been much more deeply wounded than her pride would allow her to admit, even to her grandfather whose loving concern could always be relied upon. As for the marquess, her trustee, one glance at that handsome, confident, uncaring face had served to imbue her with a steely determination never to reveal any emotion or vulnerability in his presence. She had departed from this resolve only on that first occasion when his careless listing of her father’s plans for his previously unacknowledged daughter had so augmented the pain of being told her true situation that it had culminated in one short burst of fury and defiance. Since then she had not permitted herself to relax her imposed control in his presence. It had not been easy to maintain this rigid composure so foreign to her warm, impulsive nature, but she had instinctively divined his displeasure at her cool treatment of him, and all her perverse latent femininity rose to bulwark her defense against his insidious charm. She did not attempt to reach any understanding of why she was so bent on preserving herself from him; in fact, she refused to dwell on this aspect of her behavior, not even admitting to herself the existence of a malicious satisfaction at witnessing his well-concealed annoyance at her emotional inaccessibility to his charming overtures. Rather she diverted her apprehensive thoughts toward the situation awaiting her at the marquess’ estate, but this produced no abatement of her despondency. Would the marchioness resemble her shining son in looks or personality? Her gloom deepened as she envisioned a beautiful confident woman overwhelming her country visitor with patronizing charm. She was bound to prove a stunning disappointment to her hostess, she despaired, gloomily passing her meager wardrobe before her mind’s eye.

  Clothes and fashion had played no part in her life to date, since her only social outings consisted of an occasional Sunday dinner at the manse. Jack and the rector were their only regular visitors and neither would notice what she wore. Frowning in concentration, she tried to remember when she had last purchased a new gown. Of course, the green velvet length Jack had brought her from London. She had had the village seamstress fashion a dress, but somehow the results had been rather disappointing. Still it was a lovely color and ordinarily she would have worn it the night the marquess dined with them, had she not been so bent on confirming his obvious first judgment that she lacked all feminine attributes that she had startled Clara with a demand to retrieve an old black dress that had been her grandmother’s from a trunk in the attic. The yellow lace cap had been unearthed during a wild rummage in an old chest of drawers, and she had stubbornly persisted in wearing it over her usually unadorned locks ever since. Her lips quirked for an instant as she recalled Jack’s puzzled glance that had strayed to her unbecoming headgear on several occasions during that last meeting. That he had not twitted her about it was an indication that the news of her leaving had shocked him out of his customary bantering manner toward her. She sighed, knowing that Jack’s undemanding, good-natured companionship was another thing she would miss in the immediate future. He approved of her no matter what she wore.

  The occasional sight of a well-dressed feminine traveler during the last three days had convinced her that her appearance would prove a blow to any expectations the marchioness might have held of establishing her protégée socially. Marianne had never seriously considered her appearance but she did so now, reviewing her features individually and collectively. There was nothing particularly displeasing about any single aspect of her physiognomy she thought judiciously, but she feared the familiar collection failed to add up to an interesting whole. Also the marquess had told her her hands were not soft and white as a lady’s should be and she knew sunburned skin was frowned upon. In fact, she thought with an unhappy sigh, her dark coloring was very far removed from the standards of feminine beauty long admired in England. She grew increasingly restive as apprehension overcame the determined calm habitually wrapped around her vulnerability. Her contributions to the conversation became less and less, decreasing as the miles to their destination decreased, until she was answering in monosyllables.

  They were deep in rural Somerset now and the rain of the past two days had ceased. There were small patches of blue in the western sky and the lowering sun was gilding the pink edges of some fast-moving tattered clouds, as they turned off the road onto a lane that suddenly ran between stone posts past a charming wood and brick gatehouse.

  Her first sight of Lunswick Hall drew an admiring gasp from Marianne. Built of mellowed brick, it was a graceful Tudor structure with large windows ornamented with terra cotta enrichments in the Italian manner. Two wings extended at right angles from the main facade and, although she could not see the back from this vantage, she hazarded a guess (later confirmed) that the house had been designed in the shape of a letter H. There were many twisted and ornamented chimneys so typical of buildings of this period, and it was obvious from the appearance of the lawns and drives that no care and attention were spared to maintain the sparkling condition of the property. She was so busy admiring her surroundings that it came as a
surprise when the chaise swept to a halt in front of the central entrance. Immediately the doors were opened and what seemed to the bemused girl to be an army of retainers hastened down the steps to assist in their descent from the chaise.

  “Welcome to Lunswick Hall, Lady Marianne,” said the marquess smoothly as he handed her down.

  “Thank you, my lord,” she replied with equal formality.

  But all formality ceased as a diminutive, blue-clad figure appeared in the entrance way and moved with swift grace down among the footmen bringing in baggage under the direction of the butler to cast herself upon the marquess as he moved forward to arrest her flight.