Chapter 9 #2
Hawkney did not look up from his soup, but replied, “You may read what dreadful nonsense you like, as you well know. Not that my opinion would change a thing. I only asked you do not leave such titles lying about in full view of the servants, and more to the point, Della.”
“Oh, Alex, honestly. I’m not a child,” Della protested, glaring at her brother.
“No, but you are not a married lady either, and until such a time, I am responsible for you,” Hawkney replied calmly.
Della rolled her eyes but said no more.
“Are you related to the Derbyshire Bancrofts?” Hawkney asked, startling Meg so much she almost dropped her spoon.
“I… do not know,” she replied, for that was certainly true.
“My father was my only family, and he mentioned no other of his kin still living. Certainly, I know any grandparents are long dead. I believe he had an older brother, but he died when my father was still a child. But he never mentioned aunts or uncles. He used to say it was just ‘thee and me.’ I had no reason to doubt that.”
“And your mother’s family?”
“Hawk,” Nat said sharply. “Don’t interrogate her.”
“It’s all right,” Meg intervened hastily, not wanting to provoke an argument. “I’m afraid the same applies. My mother died when I was young. I believe she was estranged from her family, for they did not approve the match and so she had no further contact with them.”
“And you never thought of renewing the association when your father died?” the duke asked, regarding her thoughtfully.
Meg bristled. “Certainly not. Any family who could turn their back on their own child simply because she fell in love with the wrong man are not people I have any wish to apply to for charity.”
“That’s a little short-sighted, surely?” he replied mildly.
“Perhaps the head of the family disapproved, but it was your mother who cut all ties. Or perhaps there are members of the family who were in sympathy with her who would be glad to come to your aid? In any event, the sins of the mother ought not to be visited upon the daughter.”
“I do not believe falling in love is ever a sin,” Meg said frostily, holding the duke’s gaze, too annoyed to feel intimidated by him any longer.
“Not a sin, certainly. But it can be devastating to families if the people involved are too selfish to act rationally.”
“Love is not rational, and it need not have been devastating to anyone if they had simply accepted the position. She was not marrying a wicked libertine, or a felon, or a man worthy of pity or disgust. My father may not have been wealthy or powerful, but he was a good man, an honourable one, and he loved my mother. Her death destroyed him.”
Meg took a breath and placed her hands in her lap. She realised she was shaking and looked up to see Nat watching her. There was admiration shining in his eyes, and concern too.
She forced a rueful smile to her lips to reassure him.
“Well, that told you, Hawkney. Keep your nose out of it,” the dowager said with a cackle of laughter.
“Quite so,” the duke replied placidly, and gestured for a footman to refill his glass. Meg picked up her spoon and returned to her soup before glancing up the table, relieved to discover his grace was talking to Uncle Charles.
“Don’t let Hawkney ruffle your feathers.”
Meg looked at the dowager, who was regarding her with interest.
“No, indeed, I shall not,” Meg replied.
“Ain’t afraid of him, are you.” It wasn’t a question. The old lady looked pleased by her statement.
Meg returned a rueful smile. “I’m uncertain that’s entirely true,” she admitted, for her heart was still beating too hard. “But I do not respond well if I feel I am being cornered or interrogated. My wilful tongue is my besetting sin, I’m afraid.”
“Nothing wrong with standing up for yourself, or what you believe. I can’t be doing with these namby-pamby modern notions of what a girl ought to be.
The men have taken the upper hand, telling us all we ought to be weak and submissive and do as we’re told.
Bah! Let them get away with it and there’s no telling where it stops. ”
“Quite right, Granny,” Della said, still smarting from her brother’s earlier words.
“Why should we pretend to be hen-witted and biddable? I’m neither, and if I pretended to be such and then married a man who expected a docile wife, why, how wretched I should make him!
Not to mention myself. No indeed, I shall be just who I am and say exactly what I think and to the devil with any fellow who does not like it. ”
“There speaks a De Vere!” the dowager said with pride. “Vero nil Verius!”
“Nothing truer than truth,” Meg translated. “Your family motto, ma’am?”
“Aye, on my mother’s side. This house belongs to the De Vere line, left to the eldest daughter in the family. It will be Della’s one day,” she said with satisfaction.
“It will be mine before Della,” Lady Louisa remarked tartly, giving her mother a sharp look.
“Not if I outlive you,” the dowager shot back, her eyes sparkling.
“Gee-Gee,” Nat reproached her softly, shaking his head.
Lady Louisa huffed and reached for her wineglass.
“I do hope you are not inciting sedition at your end of the table,” the duke remarked dryly, giving his grandmother a warning look.
“Why? Frightened, are you?” she demanded, looking as if she relished the exchange.
“Of you? I’d be a fool not to be,” his grace replied with a snort.
Meg glanced at him once more, surprised to discover there was a deal of warmth in his voice, and he looked genuinely amused. He loved his grandmother, she realised. Perhaps he was truly not as terrible as he appeared.
The soup was removed, and the table laden with such a vast variety of dishes Meg was relieved it was up to Aubrey to serve her. He did so with elegance, placing a little of each of her preferred dishes upon her plate.
“What was your mother’s name?”
Meg glanced at the dowager, relieved it was she who had asked and not the duke. “Margaret. I was named for her, you see. She was Margaret Fairchild before she married Papa.”
The dowager skewered a roast potato with her fork, murmuring to herself. “Fairchild, Fairchild, that rings a bell. Where did she hail from?”
Meg swallowed a sigh of impatience, wishing they would leave it alone. “Somerset, I believe. Possibly near Bath, though I could not say where precisely.”
“Do you have none of your father’s papers?” the dowager demanded impatiently.
Meg sent Nat a look of appeal, for she could not explain that she had nothing but a small carpet bag, that her father’s papers had all been kept by the lawyer who had dealt with his affairs, for what could she do with them?
She could not reveal that every item they had owned had been sold save for that one precious book.
Nat stepped in at once. “I believe the papers remained in the hands of the lawyer, Gee-Gee. Now let poor Meg eat her dinner in peace. Between you and Hawkney, you’ll give her indigestion.”
His grandmother harrumphed but let the subject drop, much to Meg’s relief, and she got through the rest of the meal unscathed. After dinner, the gentlemen remained to linger over the port, whilst the ladies went with the dowager duchess to the sitting room.
Tea was ordered, though the dowager decided upon a brandy.
“Would you like a cigar with that?” Louisa demanded, with a little sniff of disapproval.
The dowager ignored this remark. “You can be mother and pour the tea, Louisa, and I’ll enjoy my little nightcap in peace, if you please,” she said, settling down in her chair beside the fire.
“You, miss, come and sit beside me,” she said, gesturing to Meg, who obeyed. “No, not you, Mabel. Entertain Miss Percy, there’s a dear, for she looks like a fish out of water and Louisa is ignoring the poor girl. Keep everyone busy and let me speak to Miss Bancroft in private.”
Mabel hurried off to do the dowager’s bidding, and Meg sat down with some trepidation.
“Tell me more about yourself,” the dowager commanded, her intelligent eyes alight with interest. “Tell me about your life in Hereford. Dull, was it?”
Meg laughed. “I suppose many girls might have thought it so, and there were certainly times when I longed for pretty dresses and to go to balls like those I read about in books, but I cannot honestly say I found it dull. Papa educated me as he would have done a son. I believe he had hoped for a son, in truth. Eventually, however, he said he was glad I was a girl because a son would have gone off to seek his fortune and see the world, but I was a companion to him.”
The dowager snorted, and Meg smiled ruefully.
“I know he could be selfish, but I was happy enough. I had books and my own horse. I could walk or ride out for miles with no one to gainsay me, and in the evening Papa and I would eat together and discuss our day, his work, or what book I was reading, what I had learned.” Meg shrugged, feeling rather wistful for her old life, as restrictive as it had been.
It had been safe, at least, or so she had thought.
If she had known what fate had in store for her, or how badly her father had managed their meagre finances, she might have felt differently.
“Hawkney’s right about one thing. You should contact your kin.
Your father ought to have sent you to your mother’s people years ago, and what’s more I think you know it,” the dowager said, holding up a hand when Meg opened her mouth to protest. “If they were as wicked as all that, they’d have refused to take you, and if they took you and ill-treated you, you could have returned home.
But they might have regretted losing their daughter, and they might have welcomed their granddaughter with open arms. Who are you, Miss Hoity Toity, to deny people the chance to make amends?
Or do you believe there is no room for forgiveness in this world?
A sorry state we should all be in if that’s the case, don’t you think? ”
Meg stared at her uncertainly. “I-I have never thought of it that way before.”