Page 73 of Scandal at Greystone Manor

‘No, you do not.’ He pressed her gently back on to the pillow. ‘You are not moving from here until I am satisfied you are well enough. You are safer here.’

‘Safer?’

‘Lord Bolsover cannot touch you while you are here, can he?’ It was said with a smile.

‘You know?’

‘Your mother told us. The whole idea is preposterous.’ He had found references in his own library to the Civil War and to the second Baron Paget who had lived at Greystone Manor. He had been a staunch Royalist in an area of East Anglia that was largely on the side of Parliament. When the Royalists had finally been defeated he had lost his Manor to an early Cavenhurst. A second search of the church records had revealed the story of the suicide. Colin Paget’s mother was a Bolsover, a family based in Northamptonshire. That might explain Bolsover’s determination to regain the Manor, but not the reason he had offered for Jane. It was not love, he was certain of it.

‘I have no choice.’

‘The longer you are here, out of the man’s reach, the longer we have to think of a solution.’

‘There is no solution, Mark. Please do not raise false hopes in me. My duty is plain.’

‘Duty! Why must you always be the dutiful daughter?’ he said almost angrily. ‘Why can you not think of what you want sometimes?’

She sighed. ‘Mark, I love my family too much to see them brought low if I can prevent it.’

‘What about me?’

‘What about you? You are my dear friend, my confidant, partner in my charitable endeavours—I cannot imagine losing all that. I hope very much that will continue.’

‘Of course it will, whatever happens, but I—’

‘Please, no more, Mark. Will you send someone to help me dress? I wish to go home.’

She had to be strong and resolute because it would be all too easy to lie back on the pillows and play the invalid, letting Mark sit beside her and hold her hand when he should not be doing anything of the sort, and hoping Lord Bolsover would give up and go away. It was a forlorn hope and dwelling on Mark’s kindness and concern for her only made her want to cry.

‘Very well.’ He put the back of the hand he had been holding to his lips and left the room.

She rubbed at her hand contemplatively. He had seemed genuinely distressed by her plight and the way he had searched her face and held her hand made her wonder... Had she dreamed he said he loved her? The voice had been far away, like a distant echo, penetrating her unconscious mind. No, she must not think of it, must not strain to make it real. It was not to be. Isabel would marry him in a few weeks’ time and he would become her brother-in-law. She shut her eyes, but a tear escaped from under the lid and slid down her cheek.

* * *

‘Jane is determined on dressing and going home,’ Mark told his mother when he found her in the parlour doing the household accounts. They were easily wealthy enough not to worry about the cost of food and candles and things like that which could easily have been left to Mrs Blandish, but she insisted on doing them herself. ‘My mother always did hers and her mother before her,’ she had told him long ago when he had remonstrated with her. ‘And your father approves.’ His father was no longer there to approve or disapprove, but he let her carry on.

‘Surely not? She is not strong enough yet and Grace asked us to keep her here in any case, to buy them a little time.’

‘I know. I tried to tell her that, but she will not listen.’

‘Poor Mark,’ she said.

‘It is not poor Mark, it is poor Jane. See if you can persuade her, Mama. I have a mind to speak to Bolsover.’

‘No, Mark, you must not. He will make a game of you. You will end up fighting him and who will gain by that? Besides, there is enough gossip going the rounds already and you will only add to it. Squabbling over a woman when you are engaged to another just will not do.’

‘I must do something. If only I had known the true state of affairs at the Manor earlier, I might have been able to do something, lent Sir Edward some money to discharge them.’

‘You could not, Mark. By the time your poor dear father passed away and you came into your inheritance it was already too late.’

He knew she was right, not only about the money, but about confronting Bolsover. What he found so difficult to understand was why a man like Hector Bolsover, who enjoyed the life of the capital and spent most of his time at card tables, would want to come and live in a rural spot like Hadlea. It did not make sense.

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