Lady Hathaway's House Party Read online

  This Hathaway person was Avondale’s cousin, and while Sir Donald’s first hope that Oliver might be there, pulling strings, had been vanquished by the letter assuring Belle he wouldn’t be there, still the two were cousins. Some meeting might be attempted or arranged, pushing either a reconciliation or a divorce. It would get Belle out of this rural rut she had sunk into. Maybe prod her back to London, and maybe that would be the best thing too, to get rid of the puppy at her heels.

  “I hope Lady Hathaway won’t think it odd, your going with Henderson,” her father said.

  “Nothing is considered odd in that circle, Papa.”

  Glancing at Belle, he thought she must have been considered odd. A simple little country girl, green as grass, pitched into the middle of that unholy London crew. But she’d wanted a season, and her mama would have wanted it for her. Had always regretted she hadn’t had one herself.

  Still, her mama had done better than Arnold Henderson without benefit of a season, he thought contentedly. Arnold hadn’t been good enough for Belle before she became a duchess; it was odd beyond reason that he was looked upon with favor now. Before Belle went away to the city and became sophisticated she hadn’t looked twice at him, but when she came back two months later she’d changed.

  The wide-eyed hopeful look was gone from her brown eyes. Of course, her rowdy brown curls were tamed down too, and her dress fancier, but that hadn’t been the real change. She’d become different. Colder, indifferent. Donald was only a father, and couldn’t quite put his finger on the change, but it was there and he didn’t like it. She didn’t laugh as much, or sing, or hardly ever run anymore. She used to be a great tomboy, running around the yards like a young colt—but of course he was harking back a few years, when she’d been fourteen or fifteen. He supposed in some vague way that her being a duchess made such behavior ineligible now, but she wasn’t such a stiff, proper little lady when the duke had met her, and fallen in love with her, and married her.

  The man must have jawed the life out of her. Likely that was why she made those oblique remarks about Arnold being easy to live with. Belle wouldn’t like someone always pinching at her. He’d never done it himself, and in the ten years that her mama had been gone, no one else had corrected her much either. He would have been happy to see the old Belle back, but there was no sign of Arnold effecting the change. She was cool and citified with him too. He shook his grizzled head in puzzlement.

  Mr. Henderson’s plain black carriage pulled up to the house, and Belle arose to join him, without waiting for him to enter. She didn’t dash out to meet him, as she used to do with her beaux, but strolled resignedly to the door, as though she were on her way to her execution. “I’ll be home soon, Papa,” she said, kissing him lightly on the cheek. “Be good.”

  “You be good too,” he adjured playfully.

  “Don’t worry. I will.”

  “Yes, you’re with Arnold,” Sir Donald answered, and there was something akin to regret in his words.

  It was a long drive to Ashbourne. Long enough to occasion a stop for lunch and a change of horses. Arnold, with his usual foresight, had sent a team ahead to await them, and he would pick up this team on the way back. All these plans had been talked over with Belle. It was the sort of conversation they had with each other—mundane, practical, with occasionally little timid attempts at lovemaking. Very timid. So different from Oliver. Never mind, that was what she liked about him, that he was different from her husband.

  Belle found her heart beating a little faster to be going again amongst her London friends. She didn’t know who would be there, but at Lady Hathaway’s house, one did not expect to meet only provincials. Arnold—a cousin of Lady Hathaway’s husband—and she would be the closest thing to country folks, and she was asked herself as Avondale’s wife.

  Now that she was actually on her way, she found herself looking forward to the visit with some pleasure. The winter had been long and very dull, and the spring with all of nature stirring around her had awakened some latent desire to come alive again. Every time she walked in the meadow and saw the trees budding and the flowers opening, she felt this sense of urgency to start living. Just as she had always felt it when she was young. Just as she had felt last year, and what a thrill it had been to be getting to London.

  She had thought she would never feel it again. All the winter long she had dreaded spring, and the memories it must inevitably bring, but now that it was here, and she was getting out of her shell, she felt a tingle of excitement. She wished she weren’t with dull old Arnold Henderson, but some dashing, dangerous buck. Some daring man who would make Oliver sit up and take notice. But what nonsense that was. Oliver would not be there.

  As their carriage pulled up in front of the columned entranceway to Ashbourne, Belle heard the sound of wheels behind them, and turned with interest to see who else was coming. She thought she saw a crest on the door of the carriage, and her mind flew to Avondale, but the carriage, and especially the horses, were not fine enough to belong to him. Nothing but the best for the Duke of Avondale. As the door opened, she recognized the occupant to be Lady Dempster. A wicked old gossip of a woman. One would be sure of hearing all the doings of the city—and the city would be sure of hearing that the Duchess of Avondale had come out of hibernation too.

  Being a gossip, Lady Dempster was delighted to see Belle was attending, and rushed up to her, her tongue flying with a million empty expressions of pleasure. Their entering Ashbourne together caused a frown to fly to Lady Hathaway’s pouched face, for it had been her intention to confess the dreadful fact of Oliver’s coming the minute Belle set her foot inside the door. She wanted to get it over with, but it was not possible with Lady Dempster’s sharp ears flapping. Other guests too came almost immediately, so that it was a servant that showed Belle to her room, and she was left in ignorance of what dire fate awaited her. Ollie had said he’d be there for dinner—it was scarcely more than an hour away. He’d come anytime.

  As a result of her one other visit here, Belle was a little familiar with the layout of the place. She knew there was a very nice garden that could be reached through the library without entering the main saloon, where the other guests would be assembling. After her long trip in the carriage she wanted to go down to it and stretch her legs. She told herself that it was not a reluctance to go in and meet the guests that led her out the side door. She needed—wanted—air. Arnold had kept the windows closed the whole trip. So typical of Arnold.

  The others would only be gossiping and having wine. She knew the routine of house parties—remembered it well from the two she had attended with Oliver, one here and one at Crockett Hall. First wine and gossip, which was called “catching up,” but consisted in reality of the gentlemen gathering at one end of the room to discuss their horses, their mistresses and politics in that order, while the ladies talked around the grate of their friends’ lovers, for of course they none of them admitted to having one herself. She supposed her presence would be a boon for them. She could almost hear them. “My dear, she came with that gentleman in the corner. The tall one, rather handsome. Do you suppose he’s her lover?” “Well, she came with him!” “Does Avondale know?” “Does he care?” And a polite concerted laugh.

  She was a little peeved to see someone had had the same idea of escape to the garden as herself, till she noted it was only Arnold, then she walked smiling toward him.

  “Are you afraid to go in too?” she laughed.

  “I’ve been in. That strange-looking lady we met at the door, Belle, was there and gabbing like a goose. She looks like a witch. Black hair and a black gown and a pointy nose. She asked me if I was your latest cicisbeo, in the most meaningful voice. Maybe we shouldn’t have come together.”

  “It’s only Lady Dempster, Arnold. She will ask worse questions than that before the weekend is out. When she asks me whether you are my beau, I mean to remind her I am a married lady, so pray do not feel yourself compromised.”

  “It’s you I�
�m thinking of.”

  “I know. Tell her what you like. What did you say?”

  “I said I didn’t speak Italian.”

  A little gurgle of laughter escaped Belle’s lips. “She will tell the world you’re a savage! I’m ruined.”

  “What should I have said? I’m like a fish out of water with these city sharks.”

  “Why, Arnold, you have had a few seasons! You should have said she did you too much honor.”

  “And so she did,” he said, taking her arm and sliding it through his.

  Belle had a sharp feeling of resentment at this proprietary gesture. If he wasn’t willing to admit to being her beau, he shouldn’t take the freedoms of one. Anyone watching them—as they probably all were, through the curtains—would certainly take him for her lover. Yet he had been availing himself of her arm at his pleasure for a few months now, and she had not resented it before today. She had even felt a certain peace, a tranquility at his attentions.

  It had been good to get home to Easthill and lick her wounds after that disastrous season in London. It had been easy to slip back into the old ways, with the old people, and pretend the nightmare had never taken place. But here at Ashbourne with the nightmare people she realized the past could not be forgotten as though it had never been. There were indelible reminders that must be dealt with. There was her damnable new name, and there was Oliver—safe at Belwood, thank God, but there, alive and her legal husband, and really Arnold had—she had—no right to behave as though she were single again, only because she wanted to be.

  But she didn’t, she suddenly realized, want to be young, naive Belle Anderson again. She wanted to know what she knew now, and have a fair chance. Yes, she wanted to pit herself against that pack of wolves in London and outwit them. She had been so hopelessly unprepared when she went there, a romantic young girl with dreams of a handsome lord meeting her, and falling in love, and marrying her. But really that was more or less what had happened, she thought, and frowned. It was almost like the traditional fairy tale, except for the happy ever after.

  There had certainly been none of that. Hardly a single happy day after the marriage. Oliver, so charming and gallant a suitor, had become a very difficult husband to understand. He had changed, not gradually over a period of time, but almost overnight. When they were courting he used to laugh rather fondly at her country habits, and quiz her she lacked polish, but after the wedding the fondness was gone, and only the jibes remained. “Surely you’re not wearing that hat?” he would inquire with a lifted brow as she dressed to go out. But it was the self-same hat she had worn before her marriage, with no disparagement of its style.

  “My dear, go to see the Tower of London?” he had goggled in amazement when she suggested it. Her first visit to London, naturally she wanted to see the sights she had always heard of. But she didn’t see them with her husband. He was off to his clubs and his boxing parlor and to other pursuits of pleasure best not remembered, and she got about as best she could, with the friends he had chosen for her first, till she came to realize how much she hated them, and then she found a small circle of her own.

  Her love, and she had loved him once, was transformed first to pain and doubt, a feeling that she was doing something wrong. She was not pleasing him, but she hadn’t changed. He had known when he married her she was no city bird, but a country girl who enjoyed the simple things. No, it was he who had changed. Not that he had ill-treated her; he was always civil and polite and generous to an unwanted degree. Nothing seemed to ruffle him much, except that her little lack of polish might be a subject for laughter by the ton.

  That appeared to mean a great deal to him, what people would think. He deported himself always with the greatest decorum. He was polite to everyone, including herself. He must have the most polished manners in London, and the least real feelings. His gifts—costly, elaborate things—were given with the same polite detachment that he might hold a door open for a lady. Ridiculously rich gowns, even a sable-lined cape in late May—so unsuitable, so lacking in thought and appropriateness. Bracelets, rings and an endless stream of baubles, a “trifle” every time she turned around. What was she supposed to do with so much stuff in bad taste? For the fact was, Oliver’s taste did not coincide with her own. She was young, she liked simple things, but his gifts were invariably designed for a Junoesque dasher. She sometimes felt she had married a jewelry merchant, a man who was away all day every day, and usually half the night as well. All she had from him was the product he dealt in, but nothing of himself. Was she to live unhappily ever after?

  Chapter Three

  Avondale spent the night at Wimborne with his Hasborough relations, and proceeded on towards Ashbourne in the morning. The road took him northeast. At Eastleigh he stopped for lunch, and though he ate only half a partridge pie, the meal took over two hours. He needed no map to tell him he was twenty miles from Ashbourne. He regularly made Kay’s place an overnight stop on his way between London and Belwood, in Dorset. He needed no map either to tell him he was less than twenty-five miles from Belle’s home outside Amesbury.

  Prior to his marriage, Belwood had been his lodestar. It was from Belwood that he calculated the distance to Scotland or London or Cornwall. If he was at Derby for the races or at Brighton for sailing or at York for politics he carried at the back of his mind how far he was from home, and how long it would take him to get there. There was no exigent business awaiting him that made a dash home a likely thing. He had an excellent bailiff, a steward and housekeeper, and no infirm relative likely to take a turn for the worse. He was free to go where he pleased and stay as long as he pleased, but when your family has called Belwood home for over five hundred years, it cannot help but become the focus of your existence.

  Since his marriage, however, and more particularly since his separation, he found himself computing not only the miles and hours to Belwood, but also the miles and hours to Easthill. And now he was halfway, more or less, between Ashbourne and Easthill, and so he sat over his ale, running in his mind first one way, then the other.

  He knew (he thought) what awaited him at Ashbourne. Kay’s parties were always amusing. She had mentioned Raffles, and it would be interesting to hear him. Quite an authority on the East. It would get a few days in. Getting the long days in had become a burdensome task the last months, and with good company and a well-run home to beguile him, he was tempted toward Ashbourne. He was on his way to London, and had said he would attend her party— perhaps she had counted on him to round out her numbers. Kay ran a pretty tight ship.

  A year ago he would not have considered not showing up at a house party to which he had promised himself. He was quite severe about manners and social duties in those days, but he had become somewhat lax, without being aware of it. In his mind the map of England was spread out before him, and Amesbury seemed to grow larger the longer he sat over his ale, till at last all roads led to Amesbury, and via Amesbury to Easthill.

  He would have to go sooner or later. Foolish to keep putting it off, thinking she would come back of her own accord. She had been gone ten months, with never a word. Gone home for a week’s rest from the season, and never come back, nor honored her husband with so much as two lines scrawled on a piece of paper. She hadn’t even said goodbye, but gone home a day earlier than she had said, setting out in late afternoon instead of waiting for the morning. The last conversation he had had with her they had decided on her departure in the morning, and she hadn’t even given any explanation to the servants to be relayed to him. Nothing—she just left.

  The next thing he heard from her was a letter from her solicitor desiring an interview to finalize details of the separation. He still couldn’t believe it. After ten months of living with it, the thing still seemed totally incredible. How did a brand-new wife who had been treated with the greatest respect and generosity, had been treated in fact like the duchess he had made her, dare to serve him such a trick?

  Avondale was proud, and he was short-tempered, but n
o one had ever said he was unjust, and it was the injustice of it that he believed to be uppermost in his mind. Whether he was such a strict moralist that injustice should make his heart thud angrily might have been a moot point to his friends, but to himself he put no other construction but injustice on his anger. No one had the right to treat anyone with such contempt as that, and when the perpetrator was your own wife, a little country bumpkin that you had chosen to elevate to your own more lofty social position, it became an infamy. It was intolerable, yet for the past ten months he had been tolerating it with every outward sign of equanimity. It was doing some considerable damage to his nerves and temper, but no traces of his resentment were allowed to show.

  What had he done to merit such conduct? He had treated Belle with singular cordiality from the day he had met her. He had wooed her in the manner she had demanded, and that was highly distasteful to himself, he decided in retrospect, though at the time he had enjoyed it. Running at her skirts to every inferior do in town. After marriage he had taken pains to see that she had her own circle of friends. He had given her a larger allowance than any lady he knew, given her her own carriage, a very dashing high-perch phaeton and a team of cream horses to pull it, gave her a present every time he came through the door. He had never insisted she accompany him anywhere that she expressed the least reluctance to going. Did not forbid her running around to balloon ascents and the Tower of London like a dashed tourist. Not every husband would have been so considerate. He had pointed out to her the pitfalls a country-bred girl was likely to fall into, the gambling that went on in some homes that still passed for acceptable, the more reprehensible bucks, and notorious wives to be avoided.