The House at Bell Orchard Read online

  Broken glass splintered beneath his feet as he slid rather than stepped down the sloping floor of the coach, but he steadied himself by gripping one of the leather straps and got his free arm round the woman’s waist, hoisting her to her feet. She clutched at his coat, saying in a dazed murmur:

  “What happened? Oh, my head!”

  Her voice was soft and well-bred, certainly not the voice of a waiting-woman, and Piers realized that it was not a servant but a friend whom Lavinia Fenshawe had so callously abandoned.

  “The coach lost a wheel, ma’am, and ended in the ditch,” he replied reassuringly. “Do you feel equal to being helped down on to the road?”

  “I—I think so,” she faltered. “I struck my head, and was knocked senseless for a moment.”

  She lifted her face towards him as she spoke, and the black silk hood slipped back from disordered, light-brown hair. For the first time he could see her clearly, and it was with a distinct sense of shock that he found himself looking down into the face which had lingered so vividly in his memory. He was astonished, and yet beyond astonishment was the curious feeling that this meeting was inevitable, and had been so ever since the moment he first saw her in London. Such odd fancies did not usually trouble the practical mind of Sir Piers Wychwood, and once again he wondered impatiently why this girl should have so strange an effect upon him.

  “Charmian!” It was Lavinia Fenshawe’s voice, petulantly inquiring, indicating that she had at length remembered her companion. “Charmian, are you hurt? Pray, Sir Piers, tell me what is amiss!”

  “One moment, Mrs. Fenshawe! Your friend is a good deal shaken,” he replied, and looked down at Charmian with a smile. “You will be out of here in a trice, ma’am, and then you will feel a great deal better. Come, let me help you!”

  He assisted her to reach the doorway, and saw her aided to the ground by Mrs. Fenshawe and the groom, who had at length been prevailed upon to leave his horses. Lavinia, apparently anxious to make amends, clasped the girl in her arms.

  “My poor child, are you sure you are not hurt? I vow I am the most heartless wretch alive to neglect you so!”

  Charmian, who, besides a blow on the head, had sustained the shock of being flung into a corner of the coach with Mrs. Fenshawe’s substantial weight on top of her, was in fact feeling considerably bruised and shaken, but managed to summon up a faint smile.

  “It does not matter, Lavinia, and I am not hurt, truly I am not. It was as great a shock for you as it was for me.” Lightning flickered above the hill behind them, and a rumble of thunder echoed her words. Piers, who had jumped down and gone to look at the horses, now returned to the two ladies and said briskly:

  “Mrs. Fenshawe, the storm is almost upon us and I fear there is no time to reach the Chase, but if you will condescend to come to the lodge, my people there will be glad to offer you shelter. Your servants can lead the horses up to the stables, and see to it that as soon as the storm is over, one of my carriages is made ready to convey you home.”

  Lavinia looked at her wrecked coach and then at the threatening sky, and realized that she had little choice. She disliked Piers Wychwood quite as much as he disliked her, looking upon him as a slow-witted country squire with no social graces, but the only alternative to his suggestion was to trudge the half-mile to the village and probably be drenched with rain before she got there. She inclined her head with frigid courtesy.

  “You are very kind, sir, and we will do as you suggest. Come, Charmian!”

  She swept past him with as much dignity as the situation permitted, and started back along the dusty road towards the lodge, leaving Piers torn between amusement and annoyance. He found this grand manner ridiculous, since not five minutes before she had been railing like a fishwife at her servants. Charmian had obediently followed her friend, and Piers delayed only long enough to issue a few brief orders to the coachman and groom before hurrying after the ladies.

  As he came up with them, Charmian stumbled and nearly fell, and he put out a hand to steady her, looking with some concern at her white face.

  “I fear you are still feeling considerably shaken, ma’am,” he said in his deep, pleasant voice. “Pray take my arm.”

  She did so with a murmur of thanks, and leaned gratefully upon it, for her head throbbed and she felt more than a little dizzy. Lavinia was walking a yard or two ahead and Charmian could not see her face, but did not need to do so to know that the elder woman was still in a furious temper. The situation savoured slightly of the ridiculous, and that was something Lavinia could not endure.

  A few drops of rain pattered down, heralds of the approaching storm, and without looking round Mrs. Fenshawe quickened her pace. Charmian would have done likewise, but Piers said calmly:

  “Do not disturb yourself, ma’am. We have only a few yards to go and the storm is still a little way off. We shall reach the lodge before the rain becomes heavy.”

  She realized that what he said was true, for though the hiss of the rain could be clearly heard as the storm swept down the valley towards them, the imposing gates of Wychwood Chase were now close at hand. She glanced up at her rescuer, really looking at him for the first time, for hitherto the only thing about him which made any impression upon her was his kindness, and the reassuring calm of his manner.

  He was a young man, tall and broad-shouldered, with a pleasant but somewhat serious countenance. There was a good deal of resolution in the firm lips and square chin, and the expression of the blue-grey eyes was extremely level and direct. His fair hair was drawn severely back in a ribbon, and his attire of brown cloth coat, buff breeches and gleaming top-boots almost austere in its plainness. Yet he had an air of quiet assurance which could come only from wealth and breeding, and there was some quality about him, a kind of serene strength, which Charmian found oddly comforting. The thought passed fleetingly through her mind that this was one man upon whom it would be safe to rely.

  When they reached the lodge they found that Lavinia had already gone inside, but the lodge-keeper was at the door to meet them, while his wife made Mrs. Fenshawe free of the tiny parlour. Both husband and wife were considerably flustered, a state of mind which Lavinia’s disdainful air did nothing to dispel, but the arrival of Sir Piers soon caused a calmer atmosphere to prevail. Charmian, seeing how with a word and a smile he set the couple at their ease, and observing the obvious affection with which they regarded him, could not help contrasting this with Bell Orchard, where servants seemed to be either cowed or intolerably insolent.

  Lavinia, belatedly recalling the demands of etiquette, formally introduced Sir Piers to Miss Tarrant, before inquiring, with a civility which failed to mask complete indifference, after the health of his mother and sister. He assured her that both were well, and thereafter they chatted with careful politeness upon topics of general interest. Charmian took no part in the conversation, but was glad to lean back in her chair and close her eyes, only half-attending to what was being said. The rain was now lashing furiously about the little house, and lightning and thunder followed each other almost continuously, and Mrs. Fenshawe, after some ten minutes of courteous but laboured conversation, left her chair and went to stand by the window, watching the violence of the storm. Piers remained leaning against the table in the middle of the room, and thoughtfully studied Miss Tarrant, who was still sitting with closed eyes. The significance of her black gown, relieved only by a narrow edging of lace about the neck, and a deeper fall of lace where the sleeves ended, was not lost upon him, and although the shocked bewilderment he remembered so vividly had faded from her face, the marks of a deeper and more enduring sorrow had succeeded it. He read it in the shadowed eyes and drooping lips, in the overwhelming sadness of her whole countenance as she sat, unaware of his regard and so totally unguarded, before him.

  The storm, for all its violence, was comparatively brief, and barely half an hour passed before the sky grew lighter, the downpour slackened to a drizzle and then stopped, and the sun began to break through t
he drifting clouds. Charmian opened her eyes to find the little parlour full of light, and Sir Piers’ gaze fixed with unexpected intentness upon her. She flushed and sat upright, lifting a hand to her disordered hair, aware of a confusion which was not altogether unpleasant.

  It was not long before they heard the sound of approaching hooves and wheels, and the lodge-keeper’s wife came to tell them that the coach was at the door. Lavinia gave a mere condescending nod as she swept past her and out of the house, but Charmian paused to smile at the woman.

  “Thank you for letting us shelter in your house,” she said in her soft, gentle voice. “It was very kind.”

  Out of the doors the air was indescribably sweet, for though the tattered remnants of the storm-clouds were still drifting away seawards, and the drip and trickle of water could be heard on every side, the sun was already drawing sweetness from flowers and grass and rain-soaked earth. For some reason Charmian’s heart lifted with pure pleasure, the first happiness she had felt since her father’s death, and she said impulsively to Piers, who had followed her from the house:

  “How beautiful everything is now! It almost makes the storm worthwhile.”

  “Charmian!” Lavinia, already in the coach, spoke irritably. “Come along, child, and do not stand there in the mud! Let us get home, in pity’s name!”

  Charmian started guiltily, and then suddenly the absurdity of the anti-climax struck her, and she gave a little gasp of laughter. As Sir Piers handed her up into the coach, her eyes met his for an instant, and she saw in them a rueful amusement that matched her own. The memory of that moment of shared laughter stayed with her as the coach bore her away, and she found it curiously comforting. No one at Bell Orchard, she reflected with faint surprise, seemed to laugh very much except in malice.

  Piers stood watching the coach until it disappeared into the woods, and then, after a few words with the lodge-keeper, he mounted his horse and rode thoughtfully up the hill along the avenue of splendid chestnut trees. Wychwood Chase was a stately building, rather less than a hundred years old, with terraced gardens upon either side, and an impressive entrance fronting the broad sweep of gravel before the house. Piers handed over his mount to the groom who was waiting there to receive it, and went quickly up the graceful flight of steps to the front door of the mansion.

  He found his mother and sister in one of the smaller drawing-rooms. Lady Wychwood sewing and Miss Dorothy idly fingering the keys of the spinet. Her ladyship, a dignified, grey-haired woman of middle age, with the same firm mouth and blue-grey eyes as her son, looked up with a smile as he came into the room.

  “So you are home again, Piers,” she said as he came to kiss her hand. “Surely you did not ride through the storm?”

  “No, I have been at the West Lodge,” he replied. “Mrs. Fenshawe’s coach met with an accident at our gates just as the storm broke, and I took her and her friend to the lodge for shelter. There was no time to bring them here.”

  “Praise be!” Dorothy put in mischievously as he paused. “Mrs. Fenshawe always makes me feel like a milk-maid—blowsy, buxom and bucolic!”

  Piers chuckled, but Lady Wychwood shook a reproving head.

  “This liveliness, my love,” she told her daughter, “is a tendency you should strive to check.” She turned to Piers. “Was the accident a serious one?”

  He shrugged. “Serious enough, but fortunately no one was much hurt. I fancy that Mrs. Fenshawe’s dignity, and consequently her temper, suffered more than anything.”

  He gave them a brief description of what had happened, and concluded by saying to his mother: “I think it would do no harm, ma’am, for you to call upon Mrs. Fenshawe. I have had some differences with the Colonel, but I understand that he has now returned to London, and it will not do to be upon bad terms with our neighbours.” He glanced at his sister, still seated at the spinet. “Take Dorothy with you.”

  Dorothy looked up, her blue eyes wide with surprise. “You said I was to have no more to do with the Fenshawes!”

  “I said that you were to have no more to do with Harry Fenshawe,” he corrected her, “and I have not changed my mind on that score, I promise you. There is no reason, however, why you should not go to Bell Orchard with your Mama. I should like you to make the acquaintance of Mrs. Fenshawe’s friend, Miss Tarrant, who, so I understand, suffered a tragic bereavement a few weeks ago.”

  Dorothy made a little grimace, raising her brows and pursing her lips, and ran fingers across the keys of the spinet to produce a mocking, tinkling ripple of melody. Lady Wychwood said mildly:

  “If the young lady is in mourning, Piers, it is not likely that she will be receiving company.”

  He had been regarding Dorothy with a faint frown, but at that turned back to his mother.

  “In ordinary circumstances I would agree with you, but I have a curious impression that the circumstances are not ordinary. Moreover, Miss Tarrant appears to be alone in the world, since if she had relatives she would scarcely be staying with Mrs. Fenshawe at such a time, and if she is treated with no more consideration than was shown her this afternoon, her situation cannot be a happy one.”

  Lady Wychwood looked puzzled. “Do you mean that she finds herself, as it were, in the position of a poor relation?”

  “No,” Piers replied slowly, “for she was dressed as fashionably as Mrs. Fenshawe herself, and appeared to be upon terms of equality with her. But, knowing that household as I do, I cannot imagine her receiving a great deal of comfort or sympathy there.” He laid his hand on the back of her chair, looking down at her with a smile. “Will you do this for me, Mama?”

  She still seemed slightly puzzled, but returned the smile and reached up to pat his arm.

  “Of course, my dear, if you wish it. I will go to Bell Orchard tomorrow.”

  Dorothy, still coaxing a lilting melody from the spinet, had apparently lost interest in the conversation, but her eyes were thoughtful, and presently, when Piers had gone out of the room, she jumped up and ran with a swirl of petticoats to seat herself on a low stool at her mother’s feet.

  “Mama!” she exclaimed breathlessly. “Piers seems to be excessively interested in this Miss Tarrant Do you suppose—?”

  “I suppose nothing, my love,” Lady Wychwood replied firmly, “and neither must you. You are too fanciful, Dorothy!”

  “But how wonderful if she could divert his mind from Selina Grey,” Dorothy persisted, “for you know, Mama, that you have been as worried as I have that he might offer for Selina. I vow I have been in a quake of fear ever since he rode out this morning, in case that was the reason for his visit to General Grey.”

  Lady Wychwood sighed. “Selina is an admirable young woman,” she said despondently, “but I will own that I have not the smallest desire for her to become my daughter-in-law. But it is your brother’s concern, Dorothy, and not yours or mine. We must not make any attempt to interfere.”

  “Well, I would interfere very happily if I thought it would do the least good,” Dorothy reported. “Piers is the dearest brother alive, and I do want him to be happy. And that he could never be if Selina were here, poking that long nose of hers into everything—”

  “Dorothy!”

  “But it is long, Mama! You know it is, and she is for ever prying into other people’s concerns and trying to make them behave as she thinks they should, and saying spiteful things about them in that horrid, self-righteous way she has. Oh, it would be too dreadful if Piers married her!”

  “We do not know yet that he has any such intention.”

  “Why else would he go so often to call upon General Grey?” Dorothy demanded bitterly. “Mama, we must prevent it, and if becoming acquainted with Miss Tarrant is the way to do so, then I, for one, will spare no pains to be kind to her. To be sure, I cannot imagine our sober, practical Piers doing anything as adventurous as falling in love at first sight, but he does seem excessively concerned about her.”

  “Dorothy, you must endeavour to conduct yourself with more pr
opriety,” Lady Wychwood protested. “You have no business to be talking in this fashion. Moreover, when you meet Miss Tarrant, you may like her no better than you like Selina Grey.”

  “No one could be worse than Selina,” retorted her irrepressible daughter. “I am sure I shall like her very well, and so will you. Why, the accident to Mrs. Fenshawe’s coach was the greatest good fortune imaginable! Just wait and see if I am not right!”

  5

  Wychwood Chase

  Lady Wychwood was as good as her word, and the next day saw her carriage making its way down the long, winding drive to Bell Orchard. Dorothy, seated beside her mother, had already convinced herself that her brother’s concern for the unknown Miss Tarrant betokened an interest far deeper than their brief, casual meeting justified, and was dwelling gleefully on the disappointment which this would cause the detested Selina Grey. Dorothy had a shrewd suspicion that it was Selina who had carried tales to Piers of his sister’s liking for the company of Harry Fenshawe, and she would not readily forgive this deliberate sowing of discord between her and Piers. The incident had provided a foretaste of what might be expected if Selina became Piers wife, and Dorothy felt that she would go to any lengths to prevent such a thing.

  Lavinia Fenshawe was by no means pleased when her butler announced Lady Wychwood and her daughter, but succeeded in hiding her feelings. She welcomed the visitors graciously, made Miss Tarrant known to them, and assured her ladyship that she had recovered completely from the shock of the accident.

  “Though it was my poor Charmian who suffered most,” she added lightly, “for I was flung quite on top of her, and the poor child struck her head a severe blow. But Sir Piers came most gallantly to the rescue, and made all right in a trice, did he not, my love?”