Chapter 8
Stoneleigh House received her differently the second time.
Viola could not have said what had changed: the hall was the same, the Persian runner worn rose down its center, the gilt-framed lords watching her pass with the same painted patience.
But she had come this time not as a visitor to be overwhelmed by it, but as its mistress, however little she felt the part, and that small shift of purpose steadied her more than she had expected.
Mrs. Hartley was waiting in the hall.
She was still in her blacks, and she came forward without ceremony, as she had the first time, only now there was no tour to apologize for intruding upon.
“Miss Trent. I am glad you have come back to us.” There was no flattery in it, only a plain gladness that Viola found she believed.
“Mr. Phillips has had your rooms made ready, and Mrs. Roberts will go through the household accounts with you whenever you wish it, though there is no need to face it all today.”
“I confess,” Viola said, “I do not know where I should even begin.”
“No. One never does, at the first.” Mrs. Hartley said it as though it were the most ordinary thing in the world, and not a confession of unfitness at all.
“When I came to Lady Warrington I knew a very little of running a house of this size, and a great deal of being afraid I should be found out. I had kept my husband’s house, which was a small one, and then I had kept nothing at all for a time.
” Something passed behind her steady eyes and was set aside.
“Her ladyship had me at her side the better part of fifteen years, and there is not a corner of this house, nor a name among the staff, nor a charity in the parish, that I do not know as well as my own hand. You need not carry any of it alone, Miss Trent. That is what I am here for, if you will have me.”
Viola looked at her — at the calm, kind, unhurried face, the mourning black she wore for the woman who had pulled her up out of whatever low place a widow with nothing came to — and felt something in her chest unknot by a single, careful degree.
“I should be very glad to have you,” she said, and found she meant it entirely.
“Then we shall do very well together.” Mrs. Hartley’s mouth curved, the first time Viola had seen it do so.
“Her ladyship was not an easy woman to lose. But she had a great gift for knowing what a person needed before they knew it themselves, and if she chose to leave you this house, Miss Trent, then you may depend upon it she had her reasons, whether or not they have shown themselves yet.” A pause.
“I have found it best, with her, to trust that the reasons were good ones.”
Dinner that first evening was laid in the small dining room — which was small, Viola discovered, only in the sense that the great one was greater.
Hannah had driven back to Cavendish Square to see the last of their boxes sent on, and would not return until late.
So the table, which would have seated a dozen, was set for one, at its head, with a branch of candles at either hand and more burning in the sconces along the wall, and Viola stood in the doorway a full moment before she could make herself go in and sit where the footman held the chair.
Six candles. Eight. She lost the count and caught herself reckoning what they cost the way she had reckoned all her life — her father carrying his single taper from room to room, pinching it out at the door — and her hand was half lifted to ask that some be put out before she stopped it.
They were hers. The candles were hers, and the wax, and the light itself. She could burn every taper in the house and answer to no one. The thought did not feel like freedom. It felt like wearing another woman’s gown that had not yet been taken in.
When the first course had been set and the servants had withdrawn to their stations, the quiet came down so completely that she could hear her own fork against the plate. She bore it as long as she could.
“Mrs. Hartley.” The companion had appeared in the doorway, as she seemed always to appear, just when wanted. “Would you — that is, if you have not dined — I should be very glad of your company. If it is not improper to ask.”
“It is your table, Miss Trent. There is no impropriety in it that need trouble either of us.” Mrs. Hartley said it with perfect composure, and took the chair the footman set, and, without appearing to do anything at all, made the room bearable.
She talked of small things — the parish, the neighborhood families, the story of a stain got out of the blue drawing room carpet in the year six — and under the gentle run of it Viola ate a better dinner than she had eaten in a fortnight.
Only once did the older woman glance at the blazing sconces, then at Viola, with something quiet and knowing in her face.
“Her ladyship dined by two candles when she was alone,” she said.
“She called the rest of it lighting the room for the furniture. You must keep the house your own way, Miss Trent, but you need not learn extravagance as though it were a duty.”
Viola laughed, surprising herself, and felt the grandeur of it all fit a little closer.
* * *
Viola tried not to glance at the others walking through Hyde Park, her hand on her sister’s arm.
It had been Hannah’s notion to step out — to walk among society and show them all that nothing was amiss — though Viola felt strained and brittle with everything that had passed.
Removing to Stoneleigh House the day before had been both thrilling and terrible, and she was near awash with exhaustion for it.
She had slept poorly. The bedroom they had given her was three times the size of her chamber at home and was hung in a blue so deep and rich she felt she had no business sleeping in it.
The bed alone could have slept her whole family, and the small sounds of the great house settling in the dark — a creak here, a far-off door — had kept her wakeful long past the watchman’s calling of the hours.
Hannah had insisted that sun and warm air would do her good, and bring the color back to her cheeks.
“Hyde Park used to be familiar to me,” she murmured, as if the very trees might overhear and gossip among themselves. “Always full of movement and conversation, a place of warmth. Today it feels as if I am some small creature put out to be studied, every step of mine watched.”
Hannah patted her hand, her hair stirring in the gentle wind. “It is to be expected. This inheritance has made you more visible than you have ever been. You cannot deny that.”
Viola grimaced and wondered whether a dark enough expression might turn back the gentlemen who nodded to her so pointedly.
Some stopped altogether, hoping, perhaps, that she would pause to speak, but she kept her eyes on the path and did not.
The ladies were different. They showed no wish to speak with her at all, only watched, their faces hovering between curiosity and calculation.
The walking dress she wore was one of Madame Lefebvre’s first deliveries, sent round to Stoneleigh in its own box only that morning — fine sprigged muslin, lighter than anything she had owned in her life, and the first gown she had ever worn that had been made for her and no one else.
She was not yet used to it. More than once she caught herself smoothing a sleeve that wanted no smoothing, half expecting her fingers to find the worn seam she had mended so many times at home.
There was none. Everything she wore was new, and she hardly knew what to do with hands that had nothing left to mend.
She thought, with a sudden ache, how her father would have liked to see her thus — and how he never would, unless she could coax him to London at last. He would say she looked like her mother. He always had, on the rare occasions there had been anything new for her to wear.
“They know you have removed to Stoneleigh,” Hannah said practically. “There will be a flurry of it, and then it will fade. I promise you.”
“It is exhausting.” Viola’s voice was faint. “To be so studied takes every ounce of strength I have.”
“You cannot hide away, Viola. I know you think it would be easier, but it would only make the whispers grow. Recall that Papa wishes us both to remain a while. That is a good thing. It will let society see you stand tall, refusing to be cowed by anything said of you.”
Viola said nothing and turned her steps toward a path that led to a wide duck pond, the water mirroring the clear sky. There were fewer people here, for which she was grateful, wishing all the while that Hannah might consent to go home soon.
Her eyes moved from one face to another, and her breath stuttered. Lord Carrington was approaching. His gaze found hers at the very same moment, his brows shooting up, and, to her surprise, something like relief crossed his face.
“Miss Trent.” He came toward her with quick steps, sweeping off his hat to bow, a warmth in his greeting she had not looked for. “Lady Manion. A pleasure to see you both.”
Viola did not believe for a moment that he was truly glad of her company, but she said nothing and curtsied, her sister doing the same.
“Lord Carrington.” Hannah’s words were clipped, her voice a touch high. “We are taking the air, as you see. If you will excuse us — we should not like to keep you from your walk.”
“You keep me from nothing, I assure you.” He glanced at Viola and back to Hannah. “Might I beg to walk with you a few minutes? I give you my word, I have no wish to return to our last conversation.”
Viola felt the weight of the question settle on her, for Hannah said nothing and left it entirely to her.
She hesitated, wetting her lips. “You give me your word the house will not be mentioned? You will have heard I have taken up residence there, and I cannot help but wonder if you mean to speak of it.”