Chapter 24
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Darien heard the stir below when Sir Jasper returned that afternoon, shaking off the dust of the Great North Road.
There followed the sound of quick, booted steps on the stairs first to the family parlor, then the nursery as Jasper threw himself into the embrace of his loving wife and daughters.
Darien wondered what explanation was being given for his presence, and what Jasper would have to say about it.
Jasper was quite a different father than the marquess had been, taking a keener interest in his children’s daily lives. Darien knew which pattern he would follow if Henrietta ever granted him the great good fortune of setting up a household with him.
He set aside his book when Henrietta came in later, her face drawn and white, to report that a summons had come from a footman in royal livery, scheduling an audience with His Majesty the King at the request of Prime Minister Pitt.
Clarinda convened a war council, calling it dinner, and the marquess consented to attend.
Darien intercepted his father when he arrived at Hines House. He needed to warn him, in private, of the role Wardley-Hines funds had played in the wars in Mysore. The marquess might change his mind about Henrietta, though Darien would not.
“His money supported General Cornwallis’s troops?” The marquess stood at the window of the blue parlor, looking over the square, his fists clenched over the skirts of his dress coat. Darien thought again of those white streaks beneath his wig.
“For the Third War, as I understand it,” Darien answered.
The marquess sighed heavily and turned. “That wasn’t the battle that took Lucien anyway.
He disappeared after the Treaty of Mangalore, after the Second War.
I wish to God I knew where he is.” He met his son’s eyes, his expression bleak.
“Kings will have their way with us, lad. ’Tis how the world turns. ”
Not in the American colonies, Darien thought, and it seemed not in France either.
His father belonged to an old order, as did the Wardleys.
But the Hines were of a new order, one that prided industry over birth and name.
Darien offered her an alliance with one of Britain’s oldest peerages, and Henrietta Wardley-Hines was the only woman in the realm who did not spring at the title.
He wondered what it would take to persuade her. What he could possibly offer that would make her want to bind herself to him.
“Hello, Uncle Daring,” said a timid voice, and Darien turned with disbelief as a young woman entered the room. She was a slim young thing of fourteen, with yards of midnight hair and the Bales blue eyes.
“Horatia? Why on earth did he drag you down from Bellamy Hall?”
“Grandfather thought I might like to see London.”
Darien guessed that producing his niece was a last, desperate gambit in his father’s campaign to guilt Darien into taking charge of Horace’s estate.
The girl did not appear to be thriving in his cousin Rathbone’s care; she was rail-thin and dressed in a childish white frock that accented her pallor.
The knowledge was a fresh lash in an open wound.
Darien had failed Lucretius, and he was failing Horatia too.
Henrietta took the girl in hand before introductions were completed.
“You lovely thing! Come meet my sisters and the baby,” and she whisked Horatia to the nursery, no doubt to regale his impressionable niece with tales of reform societies, charitable works, and Wollstonecraft.
By the time they sat to table, Henrietta had brought another stray to her bosom and Horatia was in thrall.
Darien could not say he was surprised. Who would not want to be in Henrietta’s orbit? Who would not want to dwell in that pure, sane, steady light?
It occurred to him that he might use Horatia to ally Henrietta to his cause, then realized over dinner that his father intended to use the same tactic.
The marquess responded to Sir Jasper’s friendly questions about Bellamy with a grim picture of an estate left in limbo after Lucretius died.
With the legal guardian absent, Rathbone could spend the estate’s income as he wished but saw no reason to invest in the land or Horatia’s care.
Construction on the canal Darien designed had stalled, and after a bad harvest, the tenants had ground the year’s seed corn to get them through the winter.
Hoof-rot had decimated the sheepfold, and there were more women and children in the workhouse than the parish had ever seen.
Rathbone raised rents and yet claimed there was no money for improvements, while he and his wife attended the races, hunting parties, and assembly balls.
Henrietta’s eyes lit with a fire Darien recognized as the marquess described a forsaken people who, while not yet in starvation, were watching it limp down the road toward them.
“All this because Lord Lucien was lost in Mysore.” Sir Jasper put down his knife. “You must know the King used a loan of mine to fund the last war.”
“I do not hold you responsible.” The marquess’s gaze held steady, as did his voice.
“I do.” Quite against convention, Jasper stood and walked down the table to where the marquess sat in the place of honor next to Clarinda. “My condolences, Langford. And my apologies as well.”
He extended his hand, and the marquess rose and gravely shook it. Charley raised his glass to Darien, a silent offering, and Darien drank with him. Charley had brought him to Henry and thereby saved him. One Bales life for another.
“Hetty rang a peal over my head, if you must know,” Jasper said as he seated himself. “She won’t have our family support war, and I agree.”
“Will my son be a hen-pecked husband?” the marquess asked.
Jasper laughed. “They’ll need breeches of two sizes in that house, for certain.” He smiled down the table at his daughter, who sat beside Darien, cutting his food into tiny pieces.
“To peace!” Sir Pelton proclaimed, lifting his wine in a toast. The footmen rushed forward to fill glasses.
“And what arrangement has been made for your schooling, Miss Bales?” Henrietta asked.
She heaped spinach pudding onto the girl’s plate after spooning a healthy portion for Darien.
“At Miss Gregoire’s Academy in Bath, we were allowed to study anything we liked.
Miss Gregoire does not hold that female education should be restricted to music and dancing and art. ”
“I am not allowed dancing,” said Horatia. “Aunt Perdita says it would be improper to have a young man teach me. I am only to practice with my friends, but I don’t have any friends.”
“Doesn’t she—” Darien began, but Henrietta cut him off.
“Art and music, then?”
Horatia shook her head. “Too frivolous. She will have tutors for her girls, and I may learn from them when they are older. I am allowed to study French and a little history.”
“Astronomy?” Henrietta said. “Mathematics? The natural sciences? Miss Gregoire says philosophy is the foundation of any education.”
Horatia accepted a generous helping of beef ragout. “How I should adore a place like Miss Gregoire’s.”
“You will fit right in. All the girls there are very lively and smart.”
“I am not at all à la mode,” Horatia said, comparing her plain frock to Henrietta’s elegant open robe of green satin, which brought out the green in her eyes.
She looked with envy at the embroidered coral stomacher and the graceful fall of the sleeves.
“Aunt has dresses made for her daughters, but—”
“I daresay your aunt could feed you better,” Henrietta went on, serving the younger girl another helping of mushroom fricassee.
Horatia ate not as one starved, so long deprived as to be ill or without appetite, but as a healthy and growing girl whose diet was restricted more than was good for her.
“I perceive your aunt favors the welfare of her own children above yours.”
Her mild tone held no accusation, but Rutherford looked stricken. Darien suffered another lashing of guilt.
Horatia focused on her plate. “My aunt and uncle have been most generous,” she said carefully.
“My aunt has been good enough to see to my keeping, even though I have a mother who—” Her voice broke, but she recovered and plunged through.
“A mother who ought to take charge of my care and conduct, instead of racketing through Europe with her cicisbeo.” Her tone quavered on the last words.
“It is not easy to have a cuckoo in one’s nest.”
“Horatia,” Henrietta said gently, “your aunt and uncle are living in your family home, supporting themselves and their children in fine style on the income that should be going toward your future.”
“Henry,” Darien said in warning. She didn’t need to air his family ills before the Pomeroys. Nor rake him over the coals in public. He had his father for that.
“Your son will have told you I am a tragic meddler,” Henrietta said to the marquess. “But if Mr. Bales is to marry my cousin, I think it fair we inquire after his prospects. The living at Bellamy cannot be awarded until Lord Lucien returns, can it?”
“It cannot, indeed,” the marquess agreed. Darien stared at his plate.
“Well, then, let us have some cheerful news,” Henrietta said. “Papa! May I?”
Darien sat at attention, panicking. He did not have a betrothal ring. He’d meant to ask his father about his mother’s jewels.
“What, tell us that you’re to be hauled before the King like common rabble?” Jasper teased, helping himself to a dish of artichokes.
“My other news.” Henrietta looked around the table with solemn glee.
“I,” she announced, “am owner of the old corn mill at Bamford! Hodge accepted my terms—I think Jasper had something to do with that, thank you, Papa—and my solicitor is drawing up the papers as we speak. I”— she lifted her glass triumphantly—“shall be in trade! Though I do not expect it will prohibit me from being transported, if Prime Minister Pitt has determined on it.”