Page 36 of A Gentleman's Offer
‘I may be an impudent hoyden, but at least I’m not a thief and a swindler! And you can’t cast me off. That’s a ridiculous thing to say, because Francis is my trustee too, and he will make sure I receive every penny of my inheritance, won’t you, Francis?’
‘Of course I will! And, while we’re at it, I know you haven’t been paying my stepmother and Meg all the monies you owe them for their upkeep, and I will take care of that, too! There are going to be a lot of changes in this family, and since you’re plainly not fit to be head of it, I’m taking over! You will no longer have control of any of the revenue from the estate or the funds, and if you object, sir, I will gladly see you in court!’
‘Bravo, Francis!’ his sisters said in unison. Their brother seemed quite transformed by the events of the last few days, and was almost visibly growing in confidence with every moment that passed, while their father, in a strange sort of symmetry, appeared to shrink into himself. His lips were moving convulsively, and Meg thought he must be telling over a list of the precious things he was so soon to lose. She felt a pang of sympathy, but then remembered all his deliberate, wicked cruelty and hardened her heart.
‘I will pay you a small allowance for your personal needs, and arrange appropriate accommodation for you, but there’ll be no more bankrupting the family by buying fusty old manuscripts!’ Francis went on inexorably. Lord Nightingale’s face twitched with acute pain as these words made their impact on him, but he made no other sort of response.
Meg had been aware for a little while of some sort of unusual disturbance outside in the hall; it was hard to imagine what it might be, in so well regulated a household. She certainly could not conceive that the butler would be so foolish as to attempt to interrupt what he must be aware was no ordinary family encounter by admitting a visitor, however insistent they might be. But she soon found she was mistaken; the door opened somewhat abruptly, and a voice that was not quite level, as if the servant too had suffered a severe shock in recent moments, announced, ‘Lady Nightingale!’
37
Dominic watched in fascination as a lady of perhaps forty summers strolled into the room, perfectly mistress of herself and of the highly unusual situation. Hermione Nightingale was tall, built along magnificent lines, and greatly resembled her daughters, though her hair was a little darker and her eyes more green than blue. She was dressed rather eccentrically for a woman of rank, in a shapeless round gown of no particular colour which appeared to have undergone ungentle treatment in recent hours. It was sadly creased and liberally stained – it was almost too good to be true – with what appeared to be ink. Lady Nightingale clasped a substantial leather bag that must surely, he thought, contain a manuscript, and which she had obviously not wished to entrust to the butler’s care. Her unconventional appearance in no way diminishing her poise, she surveyed the room, smiling at her daughters, her stepson and Dominic himself, though he was a stranger to her. Then she said superbly, regarding her estranged husband with a critical gaze, ‘Good God, Augustus, you look simply frightful! Do you never go outside or take any exercise? What in heaven’s name have you been doing to yourself since I left?’
Lord Nightingale’s mouth was hanging open in his grey face; he seemed to have no answer for her, and perhaps he had temporarily lost the power of speech altogether at this fresh shock. Meg crossed the room swiftly to her side and embraced her warmly. ‘Mama!’ she said, emerging from her arms a little dishevelled. ‘I am excessively glad to see you, and your timing is superb, but how come you to be here, and today of all days?’
‘Wrote to her myself, Meg,’ Francis explained, rubbing his nose, a little embarrassed. ‘Must have forgotten to mention it to you in all the excitement. Was pretty confident we were going to discover that the old… that my father had been up to something dashed havey-cavey, so I thought Her Ladyship should be here to see the upshot of it all. Sent my valet to Bath by the mail coach, got him to hire a post-chaise when he got there. Glad it’s come off all right and tight – very good to see you after all this time, ma’am.’
‘Thank you, Francis, it was most kind of you to think of me,’ she said, bestowing a beaming smile upon him. ‘It was very clever of you to arrange all the details, and the carriage journey – most comfortable, really, compared with the stage – has allowed me finally to finish my manuscript, which I will now be able to deliver in person. Matters have worked out excessively well, I think.’
‘I am very happy to make your acquaintance, ma’am,’ Dominic said, stepping forward and bowing low to her. ‘I am Dominic De Lacy, and I look forward to the opportunity of becoming better acquainted with you.’
She surveyed him comprehensively from head to foot, smiling a little. ‘I apprehend that you are the highly eligible young man my daughter was so desperate not to marry.’
‘One of your daughters, ma’am, to whom I owe an apology. Not, I trust, the other.’
‘Well, certainly as society is currently arranged you can only marry one of them. It would be as well to make sure you pick the right one,’ she replied tranquilly.
‘Oh,’ he said, ‘I promise you, I have.’
Maria said gleefully, ‘I knew I was right! I knew you’d be perfect for each other almost as soon as I met you, Sir Dominic. I warn you, I shall always take the credit for this match and remind you of it often!’ Dominic smiled briefly at her, but all his attention was focused on his beloved.
When he looked up from her at last, he saw that Lady Nightingale had crossed the room to her eldest daughter’s side, and rather tentatively reached out to her. ‘I’m so sorry, my dear Maria,’ she told her now. Her apparently unshakeable confidence seemed to slip a little now, and she did not attempt to conceal her uncertainty. ‘I should never have left you here with your father, and if you cannot forgive me for it, I do not blame you. I have been a terrible mother to you, and will be forever grateful if you allow me at least to try to make amends for it, though I do not know if I ever truly can.’
‘I won’t deny that I have been angry with you,’ Maria said. Tears were streaming down both their faces unheeded, and Meg made a small sound of distress that caused Dominic to wish that he could put his arm about her, to give her what comfort he could. ‘For five years I have blamed you for leaving me, and I have been jealous that you took Meg, so that I lost her too. But I know better now. I know that you were faced with an impossible choice, and made the best of the situation you found yourself in through no fault of your own. My father is hideously selfish, and took pleasure in driving a wedge between us – our estrangement was his intention all along, and if I persist in being at outs with you, Mama, I am only doing what he wants. I refuse to give him that satisfaction any longer. The responsibility for all the dreadful things that have happened in this family is his, not yours.’
Lord Nightingale had been standing, unheeded, apparently uncomprehending, still clutching the chair back, as all this emotion swirled around him. It was impossible to tell if Maria’s words caused him any distress – Dominic would have wagered that the potential loss of his beloved collection was what had devastated him, rather than the openly expressed scorn of his family. His wife turned to him again and said, ‘Augustus, you are a ridiculous little man, really, and now that I see you again after so long, I wonder that I was ever frightened of your scorn and your harsh words. I have every confidence that Francis has arranged matters so that you will do no more damage, to us or to anyone else you encounter. I hope your poor sister Susan too can be freed from your petty domestic tyranny, and make a better life for herself at last. I do not know how she has endured you as long as she has, and I am sure that you have kept her financially dependent on you on purpose; it is all of a piece with your other wickedly controlling behaviour.’
‘I haven’t forgotten her, ma’am,’ Francis responded promptly. ‘My idea is that this house should be let – my father hardly needs such a great barn of a place just for himself, and lord knows I have no wish ever to live here – and part at least of the profit from that should go to helping my aunt Greystone establish herself just as she wishes.’
‘That’s a very good idea,’ said his stepmother warmly. ‘Really, Francis, I must say, you have thought of everything in a most impressive and gratifying manner. My sister-in-law may come and live with me for a while, if she would like it, while she decides what to do, and she is welcome to remain forever if that is what she would prefer. I apprehend that I may soon have ample space in my home, if Meg is indeed shortly to be married.’
‘I tell you what,’ Francis said suddenly, ‘I’m not a literary sort of cove, like some of you, and God knows I have no desire to be, not my line at all, but I must say, this does remind me of something. That play I was talking about the other day, I’ve been racking my brains for the name of the writer johnny, but I dare say it’ll come to me eventually. Can’t say I understood all of it, but it had an ending much like this. There was a villain in it, smoky sort of fellow, wanted to marry some lady well above his touch, but he was shown up, all the confusion sorted out, and in the end everyone else got married! Quite a striking thing, and dashed appropriate!’
‘You’re quite right,’ Meg told him, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. ‘It’sTwelfth Night, isn’t it? Shakespeare, you know, Francis. “Journeys end in lovers’ meeting, Every wise man’s son doth know”!’
‘That’s the ticket!’
38
The newly invigorated Mr Nightingale took charge of the situation now, and ushered his unresisting father out of the room, explaining that his lawyer Mr Clarke, and Lord Nightingale’s man Sallow – who clearly had decided which side his bread was buttered and gone over wholly to the opposition – were waiting in another room to supervise the signature of papers that would place all of the Baron’s financial affairs, and those of his family, in the hands of his son. ‘Some of this concerns you, De Lacy, if you’re to marry Meg,’ he told Dominic as they left the room, ‘and I may need a witness or two besides, so if you wouldn’t mind accompanying me…? I’m not quite sure why you switched from Maria to Meg, though I can tell right enough that you’re all dashed happy about it, but I daresay the writer fellow Whatshisname would have understood it better – sort of thing he specialised in, wasn’t it?’
Dominic agreed, his voice quivering only slightly, that it was, and with a swift, intimate smile at his betrothed he followed. The women were left alone together, and a little silence fell after all the uproar, which Maria broke by saying with a touch of defiance mingled with anxiety, ‘Mama, I must tell you that Lady Primrose Beacham is my love, and that we mean to set up house together!’
‘I was beginning to suspect something of the kind,’ said Lady Nightingale drily. ‘I am very happy for you, my dear, and look forward to meeting her directly. I hope you will not insult me by implying that I should be expected to disapprove. I disapprove of nothing in life except meanness: an absence of love and liberty, such as your father exhibits. And Francis is quite right, you know – everything really has worked out with quite remarkable neatness; if I arranged it so at the end of one of my novels, I would surely be accused of the excessive use of coincidence.’
‘Not coincidence, Mama – providence,’ Meg said with a smile. ‘Concordia: the universe operating in harmony for once. And if the solution to our comedy of errors should truly be excessively neat, we should expect now to see Francis happily settled along with the rest of us, perhaps with one of Lady Primrose’s sisters – to avoid introducing entirely new characters who’ve never even been mentioned before at this late stage in proceedings, you know.’
‘That’s a thought,’ Maria said, much struck, taking her jest quite seriously. ‘She does have a great many sisters, mostly unmarried, and Francis seems estimable, perhaps even destined for great things, always supposing he has the right woman to take charge of him. I am sure such a thing could easily be arranged, without the least awkwardness, if between us we put our minds to it.’
