Page 29 of What the Lady Wants
Cassandra swiftly became aware that her plan to provoke Lady Ashby into jealousy and thence into realising her true feelings for Captain Winterton – assuming those feelings to be loving ones – had disastrously misfired. She did not so much as set eyes on Leo that day until the party gathered for dinner, since he made no appearance at nuncheon and was absent from the Castle for the rest of the afternoon, which was an ominous sign in itself, if one paused to think about it, but she did spend time with Isabella, who was looking pale, tired and perhaps even a little unwell. She found it impossible to divine precisely what had happened, but clearly something had, and it could scarcely be anything good. She might have consoled herself with the supposition that Lady Ashby had become aware of her own tender emotions and mistakenly believed them unrequited – such tangled romantic misunderstandings being all too common, in her own experience – had it not been for Leo’s prolonged absence, which was unusual and surely boded ill.
As Bastian had predicted, the afternoon was enlivened by several visits from ladies who had been at the assembly the night before; they came on the slenderest of pretexts or on none,and while some of them were well-bred enough to converse civilly and normally with their hostess, and with an animated Mrs Winterton and a rather subdued Lady Ashby, some shot obvious glances about the room, as if imagining that one of the young gentlemen might be concealed under a sofa or behind the heavy velvet curtains, and merely needed rooting out. A couple of them even ventured brazenly to enquire where the Countess’s other charming guests might be, and would have entered into a discussion about precisely where Mr Welby’s home was situated in Yorkshire and how large it was if Cassandra had given them the least encouragement. Presuming on the licence given by their remote family connection with the Wintertons, Mrs Peters – accompanied by her daughter Susannah, who was in high bloom and excellent spirits – was bold enough to ask where the dear Captain was that afternoon, as they had been so looking forward to seeing him again. ‘It is so good to see him returned home after so long away, for we have missed him, have we not?’ Mrs Peters gushed. ‘I hope he intends to make his home permanently amongst us now and cease gadding about in London? I am sure we should be delighted to see more of him, would we not, Susannah?’ Susannah assented with obvious sincerity that they would, and seemed to feel it necessary to ask again where dear Cousin Leo might be just now, and if his return could be imminent.
His mother made some smiling answer to all these rather pointed questions, even going so far as to agree enthusiastically with Mrs Peters that Susannah and her son had made a most handsome couple as they danced together last night, and as she spoke Cassandra surprised a brief expression of misery, rapidly suppressed, upon Lady Ashby’s face. Once this round of visitors left, she was not astonished to hear Isabella say in a colourless voice that she found she had the headache and begged Lady Irlam to excuse her. Cassandra had the headache too, for thatmatter, but this deluge of guests was her own fault and she could not escape them without a display of gross incivility that would do her lasting damage in the county.
She was able to snatch a moment’s conversation with Lady Carston as they waited to go in to dinner later; a lifted brow sufficed for that intelligent woman to respond, ‘I have no more idea than you do, but it certainly does not look promising. Poor Lady A looks fit to drop; I’ll try to converse with her and find out what is the matter, for plainly you cannot. If I discover anything and can’t find a moment to speak with you afterwards, I’ll send a note by Louisa’s abigail.’
It was a large enough group of persons that some constraint between two of its members, which both were trying hard to conceal, made little impact on the general success of the evening. Lady Ashby and the Captain were both quiet, initiating no topics of conversation but responding suitably when addressed, but Cassandra thought that most of the party remained blissfully unaware of this fact, always excepting her husband, who was a great deal more perceptive than most people would give him credit for, and had already been concerned about his cousin for weeks.
Lady Carston did not approach her hostess before the party broke up – earlier than usual, for everyone was a trifle fatigued – but a note was brought to Cassandra’s chamber as promised. It was not very informative, merely saying:
She did not tell me anything, but my impression that she is most unhappy was confirmed. She spoke of leaving the Castle quite shortly and how it might be managed. I did not feel able to question her even a little, our acquaintance in reality being so very slight and she plainly resolved not to speak. I am sorry I do not have better news for you. J.
Cassandra showed the missive to Hal, who sighed and said, ‘I’m not surprised, though I am sorry. Leo spent the afternoon drinking with Bastian, Matthew and Tom in the village, and Basty said he was lifting his elbow more than he’d ever seen him do before; you must have observed that Leo is pretty abstemious as a general rule. My brother thought he was rather under the weather and out of spirits, and mentioned it to me; I fobbed him off with some jest about Leo not caring for all the attention last night, which God knows is probably true enough.’
‘I didn’t know. Well, that sets the seal on it, I fear – they have quarrelled in some fashion, do you not agree? It seems most likely that he has declared his love at last and been rebuffed.’
‘Must have done. Don’t look so worried, Cass – you know it was bound to happen soon enough, unless she changed her mind. It’s not in the least your fault, and you were only trying to help.’
She rumpled his dark locks affectionately. ‘It’s good of you to say so. But I fear I may have provoked some argument that might not otherwise have happened. They both look very sad.’
‘I could cheerfully bang their silly heads together,’ said her lord robustly, seizing her hand and kissing it. ‘We still don’t have the least idea how she feels about him, but I think you may be right that her affections are engaged – she looks more glum-faced than a falling-out with someone she doesn’t care two pins for should call for.’
‘That may be true – in fact, I believe it is – but they are both looking so miserable that there can’t be any reason to hope for a happy outcome. He has proposed, and been summarily rejected, I am quite sure of it. How provoking it all is!’
‘You must be right. Well, in any event, you’ve shot your bolt, Lady Irlam, and there’s nothing more to be done. Some people can’t be helped.’
His wife conceded that this was probably true, and found some measure of consolation in his strong embrace, as the Castle fell quiet, undisturbed by any nocturnal wanderings for once.
33
It was not possible for Leo to absent himself from the Castle for the whole of another day while he remained a guest there. He might resolve to be far distant from the blue saloon, generally used for receiving guests, during the hours in which morning calls were generally paid, but he found he simply didn’t have the stamina for another afternoon spent trudging through muddy fields and then drinking in the village inn. Tom Wainfleet was too quiet for him, and Bastian and Matthew too cheerful, too damn young and bright-eyed and happy together. Everything irritated him. He felt as though a layer or two of his skin had been removed, and quite normal things – the bone-chilling cold, loud noises such as a startled bird bursting from the undergrowth, a dropped spoon at table – affected him in a manner he found frankly pathetic.
He hadn’t spoken to her, nor she to him. Not really. The commonplaces exchanged in front of others did not count. To be close to her, and yet so at odds, was a torment he was not sure he could long endure. But if he left…
To set a cap upon the day, his mother cornered him while he was mooching miserably about the Castle late in the morningand dragged him into her sitting room – she had her own pleasant suite of rooms, decorated and furnished to her taste, that were always at her disposal – for a comfortable coze: words to strike horror into any son’s guilty heart.
‘What’s the matter, Leo?’ she asked once there, in tones that took him straight back to his boyhood. She had usually been able to soothe his petty worries then, but he knew she could not help him now. Nobody could.
There was little point in dissembling, though he had no intention of telling her everything. ‘Is it so obvious?’ he said, smiling bleakly.
‘Of course it is. I’m your mother, for heaven’s sake. I thought at first that you were out of humour because of the ridiculous fuss all those young ladies made over you at the assembly.’ She had the gall to say this as though she’d had nothing to do with this occurrence and hadn’t enjoyed every minute of it enormously. ‘But I’ve realised it’s more than that. What is it?’
‘I have developed a… tendre for Lady Ashby. I had begun to think, to hope, that she might reciprocate my feelings in some measure.’
‘She was watching you the other evening when you were dancing, though she tried not to show it,’ agreed his mother complacently. ‘I must admit it crossed my mind too.’
How had she had time to notice that when she’d been so busy matchmaking? It was a mystery he did not care to enquire too deeply into just now. ‘I began to declare myself…’ He could not truthfully say that he had asked Isabella to marry him, for she had not let him get that far. ‘But she was horrified. She told me plainly what indeed I should have known already: that she is devoted to the memory of her dead husband, and never intends to marry again.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said his mother soberly. ‘I could see, of course, that you were attracted to her immediately upon your arrivaland hers.’ Why ‘of course’? She saw the thought cross his face – apparently, he was as easy to read as Isabella was, for his mother at least, which was unwelcome news – and she said, ‘Naturally I can tell these things where you are concerned. But I had no idea it was so serious. And I suppose I thought you might consider her out of your reach, as the widow of a duke’s son.’
‘When did any man ever truly consider the woman he loved out of his reach?’ said Leo bleakly. ‘But, not that it matters in the least now, she isn’t. Her parents are gentlefolk of a similar standing to ourselves; she merely married well. Much like your sister.’
‘I had not known. She does not talk about herself a great deal, and I felt she would not welcome questioning she might consider vulgar.’
‘I doubt that’s true; she is very straightforward when one comes to know her. But she doesn’t care to speak about her husband. They were not married a year before he fell at Waterloo, and was brought back to her in Brussels, mortally wounded, to die in her arms.’
‘She has told you much, for one who does not talk about her husband,’ remarked Mrs Winterton shrewdly. He was hardly going to tell her why, and so said nothing. ‘She’s seen terrible sights no woman of her age, or any age, should be obliged to see. I’m sure it’s no wonder it should have affected her so deeply. It may take her a long time to recover from them. It’s barely been eighteen months, after all.’
