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Harriet smilingly wagged her finger at him and left the room, with every intention of keeping as far away from the viscount as good manners allowed, for she was perplexed to find that his very presence suddenly seemed capable of exercising the strangest effect upon her composure. At the morning service, for instance, he had elected to stand next to her in the family pew and his fingers had (quite accidentally, she was sure) brushed against hers as she had leaned forward to pick up her prayer book. This, for some reason that she could not fathom, had prevented her from finding her place and he had taken her book from her and had handed her his own, open at the correct page. She was not even sure that she had given her responses correctly, so aware had she been of Sandford’s own resonant, articulate returns. Worst of all, she was sure that she had detected an undercurrent of suppressed laughter in his voice and a swift sideways glance at him had revealed his amused scrutiny of her discomposure. His eyes had held that same disconcerting gleam, which she had done her best to ignore on the previous evening. When he had helped her into and out of the carriage his hand had seemed to linger on her arm a fraction too long and she had, once more, been conscious of the unrelenting intensity of his gaze as he sat opposite Lady Caroline and herself during the ride home from church.
Mentally shaking herself, Harriet hesitated outside the earl’s door, unable to decide whether to return to the safety of her own room and stay out of harm’s way or to venture downstairs. The events of the last few days were clearly affecting her brain, she concluded, and turned resolutely to the head of the stairway, only to perceive the object of her reverie emerging from his own chambers nearby.
‘Ah, Miss Cordell!’
Sandford registered Harriet’s violent start at his appearance but made no comment. He had, in fact, been listening somewhat impatiently for the click of his father’s door-latch to signal her emergence; therefore his presence was no accident.
‘You have been regaling his lordship with a fuller and more entertaining account of last evening’s delights than that with which I was able to furnish him, I imagine?’
He seemed to Harriet to be in possession of some private and amusing intelligence and this added to her sense of confusion.
Oh, well—yes—that is—I did my best to do so,’ she answered, in breathless agitation, at the same time attempting a decorous retreat to her own quarters, but he put out his hand to stay her movements.
‘Would you care to join me in a carriage ride?’ His voice suddenly seemed almost boyish in its eagerness. ‘It is such a lovely afternoon and I have to inspect some cottages. I would be honoured if you would accompany me.’
Harriet’s eyes widened in surprise. ‘That is very good of you, my lord,’ she said cautiously. ‘I confess I should be glad to get out into the air. If I may just collect my bonnet … ?’
Sandford, watching her disappear into her room, had a sudden insane urge to leap on to the banisters he was holding and slide down them, just as he and Philip had done in their youth. Instead, to March’s grinning amazement, he bounded down the stairs two at a time and ordered up the carriage.
Sitting on his box behind the driving-seat, Tiptree wondered dismally if he was witnessing his colonel’s’ last stand. Having been privy to most of the ‘guvnor’s intermittent campaigns into ‘petticoat territory’, he had to admit that he couldn’t recall anything quite like this one. There had been that stunning blonde in Vienna, he mused, until Lord Sandford had discovered that the lady was a damned sight more interested in his money than in his manners and a certain contessa in Salamanca had seemed to be streaking to the winning post except for her unfortunate tendency to gamble heavily—not one of his lordship’s favourite pastimes, Tiptree knew, considering the anguish such profligacy had brought to certain close members of the family. Other beauties had been guilty of having either no conversation at all or far too much and one memorable dazzler had kept dogs! Tiptree shuddered at the recollection of trying to keep three dribbling lapdogs under control in his lordship’s open carriage whilst his master accompanied her ladyship into a milliner’s salon. Those boots had never recovered, he thought, scowling at the back of Harriet’s chip-straw bonnet, as though she were to blame. So, what was special about this one? he wondered. Her dad had been a real good goer, he allowed, and her ma—well she had been a proper trooper in her time. He’d never heard anything either good or bad about the daughter. She was certainly no beauty, not to his taste, anyway, with her ginger hair and cat’s eyes, although she was quite a taking little thing—plucky, too and with a laugh that ‘fetched the sun out', so he’d heard Smithers say, not that there was much sign of it at the moment, he observed.
Harriet was doing her best to remember Martha’s teachings. Her back was straight, her feet were together and her gloved hands were clasped neatly in her lap. Her eyes she kept firmly to the front, on the road ahead. She had exhausted her entire fund of polite conversation, wondering glumly if the English gentlewoman’s lot in life were always this dreary and almost wishing that she had stayed at Beldale. Sandford, on the other hand, seemed to be enjoying himself hugely. Out of the corner of her eye she had caught sight of a wide grin on his face, his beaver hat was tipped rakishly to the back of his head and his whole bearing seemed to be one of carefree relaxation, while she herself felt foolishly stiff and uncomfortable.
‘How about the hedges?’ His voice was brimming with suppressed laughter.
‘I beg your pardon?’ She half-turned towards him, and then quickly recovered.
‘Well now, let’s see,’ he continued. ‘We’ve had the weather—yes, it is extraordinarily warm for the time of year! And it is fortunate that the rain is keeping off for the haymaking and, yes, the orchards are full of fruit and, yes, I do consider thatching to be the most skilful of crafts!’
Harriet could feel a chuckle starting in her chest and struggled to suppress its unruly behaviour. ‘Wh-what about the hedges?’ she asked, holding her breath, but refusing to look at him.
‘Let’s think,’ he said, his head on one side, considering. ‘Do they need trimming, I wonder, or shall I have them pulled up, burnt down or simply consign them all to the Devil!’
Harriet put her hands up to her mouth in an effort to maintain her composure, but it was to no avail. Her lips curved into a smile, her eyes began to sparkle and the wayward chuckle burst into a peal of laughter.
A delighted Sandford reined his horses in to a halt and motioned to the widely grinning Tiptree to jump down and hold their heads. Taking out his handkerchief, the gleeful viscount then proceeded to mop up the tears of merriment that were spilling down Harriet’s cheeks.
‘Not fair—not fair,’ she gasped, pushing him away. Her lips still quivering, she attempted to straighten her bonnet, which had somehow cast itself adrift, and regarded Sandford disapprovingly from beneath her wet lashes.
‘Ah, but don’t they say ‘'all’s fair …''?’ he said, reaching out to take her hand and leaning towards her but, just at that precise moment, there came the sound of horses’ hooves on the lane and Tiptree’s low warning, ‘'Ware ‘'parkers'', guv.’
Harriet looked on with undisguised interest as Tiptree vaulted back on to his seat and the viscount spurred his team once more into action.
The occupants of the oncoming chaise saluted Sandford as the two vehicles passed one another and his lordship, although smilingly lifting his whip in reply, wished them in Hell.
Truth to tell, he was feeling slightly abashed at his conduct.
He knew perfectly well that he would have tried to kiss Harriet had it not been for the interruption, but knew equally well that their relationship was far too tenuous to survive such precipitant action. Glancing down at her, he wondered if his rash behaviour had indeed set his cause back still further. He immediately resolved to make up any lost ground without further ado, but found himself forestalled.
‘I do believe you were setting up a flirtation, my lord,’ said Harriet cheerfully, rearranging her skirts.
Sandford, totally unprepared for this challenge, reddened and could only stammer, ‘Not at all—you are mistaken—I must apologise …’
‘Oh, come now, sir,’ Harriet apostrophised. I am not a schoolgirl—you surely do not think that you are the first gentleman who has tried to kiss me? Although, upon reflection, I must confess that I have never before been ravished on the public highway!’
‘Ravished, madam!’ Sandford was appalled. ‘I have never ravished anyone in my entire life—I’ll have you know …’ He stopped, having caught sight of her laughing countenance, and grinned ruefully. ‘Touché—your hit.’
He drove on in sheepish silence for some minutes until a thought occurred to him.
‘Where did gentlemen try to kiss you, may I ask? Not since you have been under my protection, I trust?’
‘Certainly not, my lord,’ replied Harriet, demurely peeping up at him from beneath the brim of her bonnet. ‘There was a very dashing subaltern in Lisbon, I recall—two, as a matter of fact.’
‘And did they succeed?’ asked Sandford, all agog for her reply.
‘Succeed? Oh, I see.’ Harriet laughed in delight at his masculine phraseology. ‘Well, one did—kiss me, that is— but then the other discovered us in the alcove and offered to ‘'darken his daylights''—I believe that was the expression …?’
Sandford’s lips twitched. ‘Sounds about right,’ he said carefully. ‘What happened then?’
‘Well, my first gallant appeared to doubt the other’s ability to do any such thing and responded with a similar offer of his own—something about ‘'drawing his cork” and ‘'spilling his claret''—as I recollect.’ Harriet said mischievously.
‘Your memory serves you well,’ said Sandford, grinning as he pictured the scene. ‘And then?’
Harriet sighed deeply. ‘They then seemed to be more intent on having a mill than making love to me,’ she said, in rueful reminiscence. ‘So I returned myself to the party!’
The viscount gave a shout of laughter and lightly flicked his whip at the horses’ heads, his good humour having suddenly returned.
‘I wish I had known you in those far-off days,’ he said, recalling some of the headier moments of his own time in Portugal.
‘We were introduced on one occasion, my lord,’ she offered. ‘I doubt you will remember—I was only sixteen at the time—a mere child curtseying to your exalted personage. I fancy that your thoughts were more occupied with the very colourful señora two paces to my left …’ She dimpled at his look of shocked recollection. ‘I see that you recall the lady—a capitano’s wife, I believe?’
‘Yes—well, perhaps the least said about that particular incident, the better,’ Sandford interposed hurriedly, ignoring his passenger’s laughing eyes. ‘And that was the only time we met?’
Harriet considered. ‘My friends and I used to run to watch you ride past at the head of your company—you were something of a hero to us,’ she said, her lips curving in memory. Then she collected herself and laughed a little selfconsciously. ‘We were only children, of course—I doubt if you noticed us.’
‘I never thought of myself as a hero, certainly,’ protested Sandford, remembering many such scenes. ‘But I am sorry that I was not better acquainted with you—I wish I might have doffed my hat to you all as we rode out of town!’
‘And what ecstasies we would have fallen into then, my lord,’ replied Harriet gravely, although her mouth twitched at the corners.
Sandford’s eyes gleamed with amusement.
‘If you are trying to provoke me, Miss Cordell,’ he said, his enjoyment mounting, ‘you would do well to remember that you are no longer a child—and must therefore be prepared to accept the consequences of such fulsome encouragement.’
Harriet laughed out loud and shook her head at him. I withdraw all such comments, my lord,’ she chuckled. ‘And you may be assured that I had outgrown all such adulation well before my teens had ended.’
‘Now that is a pity,’ Sandford groaned, in mock despair.
‘I was quite prepared to accept just a modicum of adulation.’
‘Oh, no, sir,’ replied Harriet, mirthfully aware that she had won the round. ‘You have persuaded me that I must seize every opportunity to discourage such vanity!’
‘Hoist by my own petard, dammit!’ he laughed, pulling in the reins.
The curricle had reached a fork in the lane and Sandford had slowed the horses to negotiate the narrower of the two ways. This smaller track led down to a row of ramshackle dwellings, the furthest of which had obviously been destroyed by fire.
‘Mr Potter’s cottage, I collect?’ said Harriet, looking about her with interest as, with Sandford’s assistance, she descended from the carriage.
He nodded, surprised but gratified that she had remembered Ridgeway’s tale.
‘We’d been trying to persuade him to move out for months,’ he said, walking over to the ruin. ‘The rest of the tenants were rehoused last year in the new cottages by Top Meadow …’ He gesticulated back towards the fork in the lane. ‘Old Josh refused to go—said he’d lived here since he was first married and he intended to die here.’
‘Pretty near did, too, by all accounts,’ interjected Tiptree, who, having tethered the horses, had joined them. ‘Set fire to his bed with his pipe, so I hear. Lucky for him Jack Rawlings was driving his cart along the top lane and got him out.’
‘Was he hurt?’ Harriet asked, her sympathy for the old tenant immediately aroused.
‘Not really, so I’m told,’ replied the viscount, ‘superficial burns to his hands and legs. Meggy—his daughter—soon sorted him out, according to Charles, but she’s had the Devil’s own job trying to keep him away from here.’ Sandford indicated the blackened roof timbers. ‘Going to fall in any minute, I should say. We’d better get a gang on to it right away. The whole row should be pulled down and rebuilt.’
‘Poor old man,’ said Harriet, her eyes pricking with involuntary tears as she surveyed the pitiful ruins of Josh Potter’s belongings. She bent down and picked up part of the charred remains of an ancient book.
‘Oh, look!’ She showed it to Sandford. ‘It’s his family bible—how awful! His whole history written off in a single stroke.’
She placed what was left of the ruined volume reverently on the stone windowsill and, as she did so, a withered blossom fluttered from between its leaves. Harriet caught the faded, almost transparent pressing in the palm of her hand and stared down at it bleakly.
Sandford could see the tears trickling down her cheeks and stepped hastily towards her.
‘Please don’t distress yourself,’ he said, holding out his hands. ‘I should not have brought you here—I hadn’t realised it would be so—you are recalling parallels, I imagine?’
Harriet nodded. ‘As you say, my lord.’ There was a catch in her throat and she smiled tremulously at him as he once again applied his handkerchief to her face. What a watering-pot you must think me!’
‘You never allow me to tell you what I think of you,’ brusquely returned his lordship, resignedly pocketing his damp accessory. ‘What have you got there?’ He pointed to her hand.
She showed him the pressed flower, then looked at him in sudden inspiration. ‘Do you have a card-case with you, my lord?’
Sandford frowned and nodded. ‘Of course,’ he said, patting his breast pocket. ‘Why do you ask—you surely do not require me to leave a calling-card here?’
‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ sighed Harriet patiently, as though to a child. ‘I need to keep this memento safe for Mr Potter. You can slip it carefully between your cards until we return to Beldale—then I shall think of something.’
‘Yes, I’m sure you will,’ said Sandford, eyeing the relic in distaste, but he handed over his card-case as requested and watched in amused silence as Harriet gently placed the ancient favour between its folds and tucked it into her reticule.
The return journey to Beldale was accomplished without incident. The interchanges between them were friendly and relaxed and when Harriet mentioned that she would be riding with Judith early the following morning Sandford, anxious to avoid damaging the fragile tenure of their newly forged relationship, forbore from insisting that she should take a groom.
Chapter Eight
The two horses cantered side by side to the top of the hill and their riders reined in together, laughing. Judith dismounted gracefully on to a stone block set there for just that purpose and moved away to allow Harriet to do likewise. Tethering their mounts to a nearby sapling, they seated themselves on a fallen tree trunk and surveyed the magnificent view below them.
Harriet breathed in deeply, savouring the fresh morning air. ‘This is such a glorious country, Judith,’ she said. ‘At first I wasn’t sure if I could get used to it—after the heat and the mountains, you know, but now I think I shall never want to leave. I do hope I shall like Scotland as much.’
Judith looked at her curiously. ‘Are you to visit Scotland? You have not mentioned it.’
Harriet recollected herself with a start. She had grown to be so at ease in Judith’s company that she had quite forgotten that there were still things not to be shared with her new friend.
‘I believe I am to visit my grandfather,’ she said carefully. ‘He has an estate near Edinburgh and he has expressed a desire to—to meet—my betrothed,’ she finished, on a sudden inspiration. She pleated the folds of her habit between her fingers, unhappy at having to lie in this way to someone of whom she had grown so fond, but Judith appeared not to notice her discomfort.
‘That sounds delightful,’ she said, nodding absently and, rising to her feet, she strolled across the grass and sat down under a spreading beech tree and began to pluck the daisies, which grew in profusion around her. Harriet watched her in amusement. Already she was beginning to judge her friend’s moods to a nicety and had been waiting for Judith to speak first but now, she realised, it was up to her to venture the subject.
‘Did Charles enjoy the evening?’ she asked suddenly. Startled, Judith dropped her miniature bouquet and, flushing, bowed her head as she bent to retrieve the scattered flowers.
‘Y-yes—I believe so—at least—I don’t really—I haven’t …’
She gave up, looking ruefully at Harriet, who grinned encouragingly at her.
‘I suppose Lady Butler gave you the expected scold,’ said Harriet. ‘You haven’t committed any great sin, you know, and it was an amazing party!’
Judith nodded, her eyes brightening. ‘Yes, everyone has said so. I’m so pleased that it was a success and you were so popular—that is very important, you know, for you will be Countess of Beldale one day and to be well liked by the locals is a feather in your cap.’
Harriet blanched at the thought and quickly changed the subject. ‘Will you ever marry again, do you think, Judith?’
‘I have no need to,’ replied Judith, in a low voice. ‘Philip left me very well provided for—we have no financial worries and, of course, it is my—my duty to see that Christopher inherits his father’s estates in good order and …’ And Charles no doubt regards it as his duty to do the same, interrupted Harriet. ‘What a pair you are—you do like him, don’t you, Judith?’
‘I have known him all my life,’ laughed Judith, selfconsciously straightening her stock. ‘The twins always chaffed me about him—he used to bring me wild strawberries on a dock leaf when I was a little girl—I never thought of him in—you know—that way—I never loved anyone but Philip—but I get so lonely sometimes that everything suddenly becomes very hard to bear.’
She stared bleakly at the horizon, watching the early morning sun slowly ascending the cloudless blue sky.
‘Well, you must have seen that he’s absolutely dotty about you,’ said Harriet bluntly. ‘He’ll never say so, of course, because of convention and protocol and—oh, Judith, don’t waste the rest of your life! Surely Philip wouldn’t want you to be sad forever?’
Judith smiled briefly. ‘No, but then we didn’t exactly discuss the possibility of one of us remarrying—we were too busy being happy, I suppose.’
She looked down at her entwined fingers and then faced her friend. ‘Mother always expected me to marry Robert, you know,’ she said, in a rush. ‘They were both forever in and out of Staines—my home—and Mother always thought it would be Robert who would offer for me, but I chose Philip. Father liked both Hurst boys and was perfectly happy with my choice, which was why he made over half of our farmland to Philip on our marriage. The earl settled Beldale’s western boundaries on Philip and we built Westpark House. My parents remained at Staines until Papa died and then Mother let the house out to tenants and moved in with us, lock, stock and barrel, as they say—she even brought most of the old staff with her and expected Philip to find them positions. He did his best, of course, and organised pensions for those whom we couldn’t accommodate. Mother has always held a grudge about that, even though she doesn’t concern herself in the least about servants—she just took it as a personal slight.’
She glanced at Harriet. ‘I’m being fearfully disloyal telling you all this, aren’t I?’
Harriet shook her head. No, it explains a lot,’ she said. ‘I couldn’t understand why she took me in such dislike—obviously she hoped that his lordship would come back from the wars and snap you up—I’m only amazed that he didn’t!’ She burst out laughing at her friend’s look of astonishment and Judith found herself laughing in return.
‘Well,’ she said, in relief, ‘it doesn’t really matter. I couldn’t possibly have married Robert. That would have seemed quite immoral somehow—I love him as a brother. Charles is different altogether but..it will be terribly difficult …’ she paused wistfully ‘—he is such a proud man.’
‘That’s true.’ Harriet nodded. ‘So it is up to you to show him how much you depend upon him—how you can’t manage without him, in fact. Gracious me, but aren’t you lucky to have all these fellows crazy in love with you—it makes me positively green with envy!’
She got to her feet and began brushing the bits of grass from her habit, thereby failing to see Judith’s look of puzzlement at her final remark.
‘Now we really must get back,’ she said, leading Clipper to the mounting block. I told them ‘I would return for breakfast.’
‘Oh, dear,’ said Judith, scrambling to her feet. ‘I promised Mother I would bring you back to have breakfast with the children.’
Harriet paused for a moment to consider this invitation.
‘Well, I dare say I could stay just for the veriest minute—it is still very early and I could do with a drink, couldn’t you? All this heart-searching is very thirst-making!’
Laughing together, they made their way back down the hill and on to the lane that led back to Westpark.
