Chapter 14
“Perhaps you’ll light me up to my room, dearest Mabel?
” Orla leavened the request with a smile, for there were gentlemen present.
The meal had been delicious, the dishes brought to the sideboard hot, the conversation political, and Mabel—had she learned nothing from her failures?
—had opined vigorously on any topic about which her perspective had been sought.
Orla turned her head to glance at the clock on the mantel, gauging the angle of her chin so her sapphire earbobs would catch the light.
“Of course, ma’am,” Mabel said as Richard rose to hold Orla’s chair. “I’m sure it’s time for the gentlemen to enjoy their port, and we’ve kept you up later than usual.”
St. Didier held Mabel’s chair, though the girl had been managing her skirts unaided for years.
She’d trotted out some old dress from her few weeks in Town, and though the colors flattered her, the cut was hopelessly behind present fashions.
No jewels, save for that silly, little gold bracelet she’d inherited from her late mother.
“I daresay you thought you were back in Mayfair,” Orla observed as she made a slow progress up the steps with Mabel at her side. “All that talk of tariffs and rotten boroughs and habeas whatever. I vow my digestion would have suffered had it gone on much longer.”
“Habeas corpus is all that stands between John Bull going about his day as he intends and being snatched off the streets to languish in prison indefinitely in the absence of a single charge. Parliament suspends that right at peril of causing the very revolution the crown claims to dread.”
“Please, no more, Mabel. You were outspoken enough through five courses, including the raspberry compote. I was not best pleased by your deportment.”
Mabel seldom needed correction in recent years, and she usually took any fault-finding too seriously. Orla was then subjected to pensive frowns, brooding silences, and days of overly meek behavior.
“Outspoken?” Mabel gained the top of the steps.
“Perhaps I was, though you might have contributed a bit more to the discussion and spared me some effort. You well know the lot of the yeoman farmers here in Yorkshire, for example, and the Corn Laws have bankrupted many of them into accepting distressingly low wages in the manufactories.”
What on earth was one to say to that impertinence?
Mabel opened the door to Orla’s apartment, strode in, and used her carrying candle to light the candelabrum on the mantel.
She apparently did not intend to apologize for her forward behavior. “Mabel dearest, did you perhaps have too much wine?”
“I did not. I simply enjoyed some stimulating conversation with a pair of well-informed and articulate gentlemen. Shall I turn down your bed?”
“Please.” This boldness on Mabel’s part was most unwelcome, but then, the whole shire knew Mabel was on the shelf, and utterly eclipsed by the prettier, more youthful Wealtha. That status could tempt a woman to recklessness.
Orla’s step-daughter marched into the bedroom and made quick work of turning down the covers. She built up the fire, ran the warmer over the sheets, lit a few more candles, and generally did the work of the chambermaid better than the chambermaid would have done it herself.
Mabel did have her uses, though she’d always been obstinate to a fault. Even Joseph had admitted that much about his daughter.
“How did you and Richard amuse yourselves at the orchard?”
Mabel set about banking the fire in the sitting room hearth. “We enjoyed a picnic. Ham sandwiches. We discussed estate matters, and Richard summarized his dealings with Wopley for me. Richard also said that he’ll be increasing Wealtha’s settlements considerably.”
A fine and probably accurate summary. “Did he say how much?”
Too much, and Wealtha would become unmanageable. Not enough, and she would also become unmanageable.
“You and Wealtha will have to discuss that with him.” Mabel exchanged the poker for the hearth broom and swept ashes back toward the coals. “Sweet dreams, ma’am.”
“I might instead have nightmares, Mabel dearest. Your behavior today has given me concern.”
Ah, finally. Mabel’s brows drew down. Her expression lost the animation she’d had at supper. She ceased fussing among the ashes.
“I apologize for causing you any worry. In what regard are you anxious?”
“Your conversation at supper was quite outspoken. I can blame that on the wine and hope you exercise more restraint in future. That said, if you must picnic with his lordship, please do so in sight of the entire household.”
Orla sank into a wing chair, yielding to genuine fatigue—with the day, with present company, with the whole ridiculous situation.
“Admittedly,” she went on, “you have made choices that ensure you are unlikely to marry, much less marry well—regrettable, foolish choices. We cannot help your unfortunate past. By the grace of the Almighty, you still have a reputation. I must remind you, however, that your behavior reflects upon me, Wealtha, and even on his lordship.”
“Richard is the head of this family,” Mabel said. “I have ridden with him over hill and dale, walked the bridle paths with him, and you never once remarked on any of that. After a day spent in York, he and I sought to enjoy the Glen’s fresh air. Nothing more.”
Angels abide, the girl was growing fractious. “I suspect the outing to York has left you overly tired, Mabel, else you’d never use that insolent tone with me, but perhaps plain speaking is for the best. Your past is scandalous.”
Orla drew a lap robe over her knees while Mabel stood before the fire, the flames making the plain little bracelet wink on her wrist.
“Richard has dwelled among polite society in London at length,” Orla said, choosing her words for maximum impact.
“He either knows of your unsuccessful foray into society and contemplates ungentlemanly overtures toward a desperate spinster, or he does not know and will think badly of you if he finds out. Your interests are best served by sending him back from whence he came. The sooner, the better.”
Mabel put the fireplace broom back on the hearth stand. “Do you honestly think I can tell that man what to do?”
“Yes, actually. You’ve told him which fields to fallow and which to seed with clover.
You’ve suggested we need a new plow, and we now have two.
I am very certain that this herd of goats recently purchased in York was all your doing.
If you can’t bring yourself to order Richard off the property, then at least eschew the near occasion of lengthy picnics and meals tête-à-tête at one of the best inns in York.
It won’t do, Mabel. It simply won’t do.”
Mabel secured the screen before the hearth.
“I appreciate that you are concerned for me, Orla, but you are leaping to conclusions that have no bearing on reality. Richard enjoys the Glen, and that is a good thing. The property is not entailed, and he could sell it outright tomorrow. I’ll bid you good night. ”
A solid parting shot, though even if Richard sold the Glen, he’d likely retain possession of the dower house, stash his female relations therein, and return to London, where he belonged.
Better still, he might travel all the way to Portugal.
“Please consider my advice, Mabel. Of all of us, you dwell at the Glen on sufferance, and I would hate to see your future in any way imperiled by shortsightedness on your part now. Good night, my dear.”
“Good night, ma’am.”
Mabel departed without another word. To Orla’s discerning eye, her step-daughter was moving a bit more slowly and with less of her characteristic assurance.
Mabel would not admit wrongdoing—she’d salvaged her reputation locally with a similar silence—but she had learned from her mistakes, and she could be relied upon to heed a warning meant in her best interests.
“Wealtha keeping to her rooms for a whole day makes me uneasy,” Richard said, pouring two servings of brandy at the library’s sideboard.
“And yet,” St. Didier replied, “the quiet, the calm, the peace of the hours without her presence means you would not disturb her for all the sheep in Yorkshire.”
“And Northumberland.” Richard passed St. Didier a glass. “To peaceful days.”
“And nights.” St. Didier sipped abstemiously. “You had this shipped out from York.”
“The Glen’s stores are perilously low. I also brought some decent libation with me from Town. I was assured this vintage was adequate, and it is, but only adequate. Orla was ominously quiet at supper.” Also, as was her habit, overly fashionable for a rural meal with family.
Sapphires, for pity’s sake?
Amabel, in far simpler attire, had been fiercely articulate. Richard had played devil’s advocate to her rabble-rousing politics simply for the pleasure of matching wits with her. Her arguments were organized, ruthlessly rational, and succinctly put.
“And now you are quiet,” St. Didier said. “Bad of you, to provoke Miss Fielding at supper.”
“I did not provoke. I inspired. If the Commons ever admits women, she’ll have the lot of them in hand with her first speech.”
St. Didier settled into a wing chair before the modest peat fire. “Does she have you in hand?”
If only… Richard ordered that prurient thought from his mind. “She finds me worth a look. I am not to get ideas above my station.” He tossed another square of peat onto the fire, poked some air into the flames, and took the second wing chair.
“You have ideas, Miss Fielding’s admonitions notwithstanding.”
Ideas and aspirations. Possibly even a few dreams. “Miss Fielding is understandably cautious when it comes to her dealings with men. I proceed carefully with her or not at all, by order of Miss Fielding.” Or those were her orders, as best Richard could make them out.
“Swidhelm, is this wise? She is a decent woman with little experience of the world. What are you about?”
While the question was polite, the tone suggested severe consequences for foolishness. St. Didier was nothing if not consistent in his loyalties.