Not by so much as a blink of the eyelids did he betray that he had observed Mr Philip Broome’s improper conduct, but Kate was almost overcome by confusion, and, as soon as Pennymore had withdrawn, took her betrothed severely to task.
He had gone back to his own seat, on the other side of the table, but he was quite impenitent. ‘Bless you, my pretty widgeon, we’ve nothing to fear from old Pennymore!’ he said.
‘What if it hadn’t been Pennymore, but James, or William?’ she demanded. ‘Or the doctor? Or Torquil? A pretty scrape we should have been in!’
‘Stop scolding, archwife! Delabole was finishing his breakfast when I started to eat mine; and Torquil – having, according to Delabole’s account, passed a disturbed night finds himself very languid this morning. I imagine that Delabole laced his lemonade, last night, with whatever drug it is that he uses to keep him quiet. He became drowsy, after drinking it; yawning, and complaining that he couldn’t keep his eyes open – for which, I assure you, I was profoundly thankful! I had the devil of a time with him, you know. I think the full moon excites him: he was quite determined to go down to the lake. The only thing to do was to try whether I could tire him out.’
She asked in quick alarm: ‘Was he violent? I thought he was in – in one of his distempered freaks, before he went down to dinner, but then he seemed to recover, and I did hope – But when Dr Delabole came into the drawing-room, I saw his eyes change – you know how they do?’
He nodded. ‘Yes, I know. He wasn’t violent, but within amesace of flying into a passion when Delabole tried, in his hamhanded way, to coax him up to bed. When he got to threatening to climb out of his window, and boasting of the number of times he’d done so in the past, I thought it was time to intervene – before Delabole became sick with apprehension!’
‘Intervene? You don’t mean you compelled him to go to bed, do you? I don’t doubt you could, just as my aunt does, but I hope you did not, because it would set him against you. It even sets him against my aunt, when she makes him knuckle down to her, and she is his mother!’
‘No, of course I didn’t! Much heed would he have paid! I accused him of trying to play nipshot, to escape having to own he couldn’t beat me twice. That was quite enough for him! He forgot everything else in a burning desire to prove me wrong.’
She smiled. ‘If he won the first game, you must have been playing very skilfully, I think! You are a far better player than he is!’
‘I was playing skilfully,’ he said, with a rather rueful laugh. ‘It takes a deal of skill to miss one’s shots by a hair’s breadth! And even more just to win against a suspicious youngster, let me tell you! All the urging he needed to challenge me to a third game was supplied by Delabole, who again tried – or seemed to try – to induce him to go to bed.’ He drew his snuff-box from his pocket, flicked it open, and took a meditative pinch. ‘Everything he said might have been expressly designed to set up Torquil’s bristles. That was either another example of his hamhandedness, or a very shrewd piece of work. I added my mite by showing reluctance to go on playing, which made young Torquil all the more determined to embark on a third game. He was still full of vigour: the only things he complained of were the heat, and thirst. That was Delabole’s chance to drug him, I fancy. At all events, he soon became sleepy, began to play badly, and ended by flinging his cue down in a rage, and staggering up to bed. Delabole then entertained me with a glib explanation of his behaviour. He would have done better to have kept his tongue! Said he was afraid Torquil had a touch of the sun, if you please! He embroidered the story this morning. I don’t pretend to understand the jargon of his trade – he didn’t intend that I should – but the gist of it was that Torquil’s constitution is still so sickly that the least excitement, or over-exertion, makes him feverish.’ He shut his snuff-box with a snap, and restored it to his pocket, saying, as he flicked away a grain from his coat: ‘He was also at pains to tell me that his extreme reluctance to allow Torquil to go out last night arose not from the fear that the boy would escape from the grounds, but from the fear that he would take cold, if he went from a hot room into the night air.’
‘Well, I suppose that is possible,’ said Kate reasonably. ‘People in England seem to dread the night air, and, if Torquil has a weakly constitution, no doubt the doctor is afraid a cold might turn to an inflammation of the lungs, or even a consumptive habit.’
‘I should rather say that he has a remarkably strong constitution, to have survived all the illnesses which have attacked him.’
‘Has he had a great many illnesses?’
‘Oh, everything you can think of, including small-pox!’
‘Small-pox! But he’s not marked! He must have had it very slightly!’
‘He did, but I don’t advise you to say that to Minerva. She and Sidlaw nursed him, and she made what she said to be his critical condition her excuse for calling in Delabole – and putting an end to Dr Ogbourne’s attendance on the family.’
‘Oh, Philip, Philip !’ Kate protested. ‘How can you say such things? If Torquil is prone to catch diseases, no wonder she keeps Dr Delabole at Staplewood! Sir Timothy, too! Oh, it is too unjust – I won’t listen to you!’ She glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece, and jumped up. ‘Good God, it is nearly eleven, and I said I would see the chef at half-past ten! He wishes to know what are my orders for the day! If I thought this meant anything more than casting an eye over his bill of fare, and approving it, I should develop a headache, and send a message that I was too unwell to see him.’
She went to the door, but he reached it ahead of her, and barred her passage, laying a detaining hand on her arm. ‘Wait!’ he said. ‘You think me unjust! But at least believe that what I have said to you doesn’t spring from prejudice! If I could be proved to be mistaken, I would own to it gladly – not reluctantly!’
She smiled tremulously, and said simply: ‘Of course you would. Let me go now! If l keep him waiting any longer, I shall wound Gaston’s sensibilities, and find him once more bent on leaving Staplewood immediately!’
He released her, and opened the door. His countenance was set in stern lines, but there was a look of deep concern in his eyes. Seeing it, she was impelled to kiss her fingers and to lay them fleetingly on his cheek as she passed him. The sternness vanished; he even smiled; but the concern in his eyes remained.
Eighteen
By the time Kate had had a lengthy session with the chef, a lengthier one with the housekeeper, and had been forced to endure the slow garrulity of the head-gardener, it was past noon, and she was feeling very ready for a nuncheon. Few things, she ruefully decided, were more exhausting than being obliged to listen to what amounted to monologues, delivered in a rambling style, and almost wholly devoid of interest. The chef, not content with having his suggested bill of fare for dinner approved, laid several alternatives before her, and enthusiastically described his method of dressing various dishes, even going to the length of disclosing the particular herb he used to give its subtle flavour to a sauce of his own devising. Mrs Thorne, with equal enthusiasm, described, in revolting detail, the various ailments to which she was subject; and Risby, seeing her go into the rose-garden with a basket on her arm, joined her there, watching her proceedings with a jaundiced eye, and prefixing his subsequent remarks with the information that she shouldn’t ought to cut flowers in the heat of the day. He then followed her round, discoursing in a very boring way on the proper care of gardens, with digressions into the different treatment demanded by what appeared, from his discourse, to be plants of extreme delicacy and sensibility. Escaping from him at last, Kate realized that she had been subjected to these floods of eloquence because Lady Broome never encouraged her servants to talk to her of anything beyond the sphere of their duties, not even Mrs Thorne, who had come to Staplewood from the Malvern household, and was slavishly devoted to her. They all stood in awe of her, the only one amongst them to whom she unbent being
Sidlaw.
Pennymore met Kate, when she entered the house, with the intelligence that Mr Philip had taken Sir Timothy out in the tilbury. He was beaming with satisfaction, and when she said: ‘Oh, I’m glad! It will do Sir Timothy good!’ he replied: ‘Yes, miss, it will do him good, as I said to Tenby, when he was misdoubting that it might be too much for his strength. “What Sir Timothy wants to do,” I said, “won’t harm him!” Which he was bound to agree to, seeing that he knows as well as I do that Mr Philip will have an eye to him, and turn for home the instant he thinks Sir Timothy is growing tired. Wonderful, it is, the way he perks up when Mr Philip comes to stay! It seems to put new heart into him, as one might say. Now if you will give me your basket, I will myself put the roses into a jug of water, Miss Kate, until you have eaten a nuncheon. You will find it waiting for you in the Red saloon.’
She also found Dr Delabole waiting for her. He was eating strawberries with evident relish, and he instantly recommended them to her, saying that they had been picked that morning, and were still warm from the sun. As the sun was streaming in through the window, this was hardly surprising, but he rattled on, extolling the superiority of strawberries plucked and eaten hot from their bed over those bought in London; and drawing her attention to the particular excellence of the strawberries grown at Staplewood. ‘I have never tasted better!’ he said earnestly. ‘But everything grown at Staplewood is so good! Her ladyship’s genius for providing food to delight the eye in her arrangement of the flower-gardens does not lead her to neglect the inner-man! She is a remarkable woman, as I am persuaded you must agree! Truly remarkable! All is done under her supervision! She even orders what vegetables are to be grown; and the fruit trees, you know, are of the choicest varieties!’
‘How is my aunt today?’ Kate asked, hesitating between a ham, and some cold beef.
‘Not as stout as I could wish,’ he replied, ‘but better! decidedly better! As I foretold, nothing would do for her this morning but to leave her bed. And now she is determined to see you! Had she wished to see anyone else I must have witheld my permission, but you, I know, can be trusted not to chafe her nerves. I daresay you may think I am making a great fuss about nothing: she certainly thinks so! but the truth is – though she would rip me up for daring to say so! – that she is not quite herself yet! These stomach disorders are not to be trifled with. And her attack was a particularly violent one: indeed, at one moment I was really alarmed!’
It struck Kate that he was more uneasy than the occasion seemed to warrant, but before she could do more than assure him that she would try not to chafe her aunt’s nerves Pennymore came in, carrying a covered dish, which he set down before her, saying that he had ventured to suggest to the chef that a baked egg might be welcome to her. ‘Which, miss, he was very glad to cook for you, knowing, as he does, that you never partake of anything at breakfast but a scone, and a cup of tea.’
‘Why, how kind of you both!’ said Kate. ‘Pray tell Gaston that it is precisely what I was wishing for!’
‘And precisely what I should have recommended, had I been applied to!’ said the doctor, in a hearty tone. ‘But we can always rely on our good Pennymore!’
Pennymore was so much revolted by this playful remark that he became suddenly afflicted by deafness, and left the room without betraying by so much as the flicker of an eyelid that he had heard it.
Undismayed, the doctor said archly: ‘You are to be congratulated, Miss Kate! You have made yourself beloved of us all, from Sir Timothy down to the kitchen-maids! One would say you had been managing large households all your life!’
‘I am afraid you are offering me Spanish coin, sir,’ she replied coolly. ‘I have never met the kitchen-maids, and have had very little to do with managing the house.’ She saw that he was about to utter another of his fulsome compliments, and said, before he could do so: ‘How does Torquil go on today? I am sorry he should be laid up again.’
‘Oh, it was nothing more than a touch of the sun, and becoming overtired! He was a little feverish last night, to be sure, but he is a great deal better today, and will come down to dinner, I hope. I could have wished that Mr Philip Broome had not come out on to the terrace yesterday – and that you, Miss Kate, had not called to him to take your place at quoit-throwing! Not that I blame you! You cannot be expected to understand the effect Mr Broome’s visits have upon Torquil! It is sad that it should be so, but Torquil is never so well when his cousin is at Staplewood.’ He sighed, shaking his head. ‘He is so excitable, and so anxious to vie with Mr Broome! It is very natural, and very natural that Mr Broome should encourage him. Most good-natured of him indeed! But he does not appreciate how necessary it is that Torquil should not be allowed to exert himself beyond his strength. It would be wonderful if he did! Young men of vigorous constitution seldom realize how easily such frail boys as Torquil can be knocked-up.’
She returned no answer to this, and, after a moment, he said, with a little laugh: ‘And now I learn that he has taken Sir Timothy out in the tilbury! No doubt with the kindest of intentions, but imprudent – very imprudent! I wish I may not have Sir Timothy on my hands, as well as her ladyship!’
Kate had meant to have preserved a strict silence, but this was too much for her resolution. She raised her eyes from her plate, and stared at the doctor, saying, with an air of astonishment: ‘But surely, sir, I have heard you trying to persuade Sir Timothy to go out for drives?’
‘Ah, yes, but in the barouche, not in a tilbury! It is an effort for an old man to climb up into any of these sporting carriages, you know.’
She rose, pushing back her chair, and said: ‘I expect he had as much assistance as was needed. Excuse me, if you please! I have been cutting fresh roses for my aunt’s room, and must now go to arrange them in a bowl. Do you permit me to take them to her myself, or is she, perhaps, resting?’
‘Oh, certainly, certainly!’ he said, hurrying to open the door for her.
She went out, and, some twenty minutes later, mounted the Grand Stairway, carefully carrying the glass bowl in which she had arranged a dozen half-opened roses. At the head of the stairs she encountered Sidlaw, who had been lying in wait for her in the upper hall. She said pleasantly: ‘Is her ladyship ready to receive visitors? Dr Delabole tells me that at last it is safe for me to see her. I am so glad she is better.’
Sidlaw’s sniff expressed her opinion of the doctor. She said grudgingly: ‘She is in a way to be better, miss, but further than that I will not go. I thought I would drop a word of warning in your ear, which is why I’ve taken the liberty of intercepting you.’
‘No need,’ Kate said lightly. ‘The doctor has already warned me not to chafe her nerves.’
‘Him!’ Sidlaw ejaculated. Her face worked; she spoke with suppressed passion, twisting her bony fingers together. ‘He doesn’t know – nobody knows except me! It was worry that wore her down, till she was in a state to take any infection. She’s never given way, never once let a living soul suspect what a struggle it has been to her to support her spirits. She’s had nothing but trouble – she that I thought to see become a leader of fashion! Such style as she had! Everything prime about her! And so beautiful!’
‘She is still very handsome,’ offered Kate, hoping to check the flow of this unaccustomed eloquence.
But Sidlaw was obviously suffering from pent-up emotion, and she swept on, unheeding. ‘She ought to have married a nobleman – one of those who were the sprigs of fashion, twenty years ago! There was several dangling after her, for she was very much admired, I promise you! She was born to be a Duchess, as over and over again I told her! And what must she do but throw herself away on Sir Timothy, a man old enough to have been her father!’ She gave a gasp, and made an effort to control herself. Darting a rancorous look at Kate, she said: ‘I shouldn’t have said so much. I’m sure I don’t know what came over me, miss.’
‘I don’t regard it,’ Kate
replied. ‘I know how anxious you have been since my aunt took ill, and how devotedly you’ve nursed her. You’re tired – overwatched! Will you take these fresh roses in to her, and see if I may go in? I don’t wish to disturb her if she’s sleeping.’
‘Sleeping!’ Sidlaw said scornfully. ‘It’s little enough sleep she’s had for weeks past!’ She took the bowl from Kate, muttering that it was to be hoped Kate would do more for her aunt than cut roses, and walked off down the gallery to Lady Broome’s bedroom.
She reappeared a minute later, carrying a vase of wilted flowers, and told Kate, ungraciously, that she might go in to sit with my lady. ‘And you’ll please to remember, miss, that she’s in a poor state!’
‘I’ll remember,’ promised Kate.
Sidlaw dumped the vase down, and went before her to open Lady Broome’s door. ‘Miss Kate, my lady!’
‘Come in, Kate!’ said Lady Broome. ‘That will do, Sidlaw! … Dear child, come and sit down where I can see you!’
She held out her hands, and, when Kate took them in hers, pulled her down to kiss her cheek.
She was reclining on a Carolinian day-bed, drawn across the foot of the great four-poster, and wearing one of her elegant dressing-gowns. At first glance, Kate did not think that she looked ill, but when she studied her more closely she saw that the lines on her face were accentuated, and her eyes rather strained. She said, with a smile, and a gesture towards the fresh roses, which had been placed on a small table beside her: ‘There has been no need for Sidlaw to tell me who has kept my room supplied with flowers every day! Thank you, my love! Such a refreshment, their scent! So tastefully arranged too!’
‘I think roses arrange themselves,’ said Kate, sitting down on the low chair by the day-bed. ‘Are you feeling better, ma’am? After such a violent catching, I expect you are sadly pulled.’
‘A little,’ Lady Broome acknowledged. ‘It is a judgment on me for boasting that I am never ill! I am keeping my room today, but I shall leave it tomorrow. What a shockingly bad chaperon I’ve been to have left you alone! I am afraid it must have been awkward for you, my poor child.’