Page 69 of The Secrets of Ashmore Castle

‘No!’ Richard said.

‘She is your mistress. Some men take ballet girls. Sir Thomas is susceptible to young female musicians. Last year it was a flautist—’

‘It’s nothing like that, I swear to you,’ Richard said.

‘But you,’ she said suspiciously, ‘have never cared a jot for anyone but yourself.’

It was true, and he knew it, but it still stung a little. A fellow could change, couldn’t he? ‘It’s different this time. I don’t understand why,’ he admitted, ‘but somehow her talent has affected me, and I don’t want to see it go to waste. I want to help. Please, Grandmère, only hear her play, and you’ll want to help too.’

She was silent, considering, and he was wise enough to say no more. She disliked to be importuned. At last she said, ‘I do not leave my room until eleven, as you know. The maid has finished with the drawing-room by nine. Let her come then. She can play until half past ten. She will leave the drawing-room door open, and I will be able to hear her from here. If she is as you say, she shall come every morning, from Monday to Friday, at the same time. If she is not, I will send a note round to you, and you shall tell her to come no more.’

‘Thank you, Grandmère,’ Richard said excitedly. ‘I swear to you she—’

She held up her hand to stop him. ‘Do not swear. I shall listen, that is all. I shall not see her or speak to her. She shall present herself at the front door and be admitted, and let herself out afterwards. No-one will bother her. If she is a true musician, she will prefer that. What is her name?’

‘Miss Sands,’ Richard said – and only as he said it, he felt a sick fear in his stomach that she would know the name.

But it seemed to mean nothing to her. ‘I shall tell Chaplin to admit her. Let her come on Wednesday. Not tomorrow – I will have the piano tuned tomorrow. It is time in any case that it was done. She shall come on Wednesday, and we shall see.’

Richard jumped up and kissed her hand, then her cheek, and she brushed him off carelessly, like a fly. ‘But I still do not understand,’ she said, ‘what you are about – why you should want this.’

‘Quite honestly, Granny, I don’t understand myself,’ Richard said, with enough surprise to convince.

‘Don’t call me Granny,’ she commanded.

Kitty would have preferred not to go out on Monday evening, but Lady Bayfield insisted. She wanted to parade her engaged daughter before the ton. Urged by her, Sir John had sent off the notice to The Times at once, and it should be in the paper tomorrow – not that she had any fear Stainton might withdraw. From what Sir John said, he needed Catherine’s money badly. That did not trouble Lady Bayfield. Money she had. Status was what she wanted. She could never now be better than a baronet’s lady, but her grandson could be an earl, with a seat in Parliament, and land. Ancestral acres. At Lady Bayfield’s deepest core was the very English hunger for land that had sent explorers out through the centuries to find unclaimed stretches of it, no matter how bleak or remote. She did not know, of course, of Lord Stainton’s reservations about his offer, and would have dismissed them if she had. Land was land: it endured when all else failed. It was a fair bargain.

She did not for a moment consider Catherine’s feelings. A mother’s duty was to get her daughter married as well as possible; and a daughter’s duty was to obey. Had she known any real harm of Stainton – a hideous disease, say, or previous wives who had died in mysterious circumstances – she might have paused for thought, but he was a healthy-looking, pleasant-seeming man, so Catherine could have no objection. It annoyed her that the child did not behave in a more lively manner in Lady Vaine’s drawing-room that evening. But it hardly mattered: Lady Bayfield supplied enough triumphant joy for both.

In the small hours of the next morning, Nina was lying sleepless, staring at the ceiling and waiting for dawn, as troubled people do the world and time over, when the communicating door opened, and Kitty came quietly in and got into bed with her.

‘Your feet are like ice,’ Nina discovered. ‘Your hands, too. Are you all right?’

‘Yes,’ Kitty said, but there was a world of trouble in that small word. Nina gathered her friend into her arms and held her close, warming her, feeling her tremble. ‘Do you hate me?’ Kitty asked after a long time.

‘Hate you? Of course not! Why on earth should I?’

‘For marrying a man who doesn’t love me.’

‘Oh, Kitty!’

‘I know he doesn’t. Mama told me he’s in financial trouble and needs my dowry.’

Yes, Nina thought, she could believe Lady Bayfield would be that honest.

‘Do you think I’m wrong to accept him?’

Nina couldn’t answer. Had her words to Stainton brought this about? Let some good come of this. Had she been trying through Kitty to keep him near her? Would he have proposed anyway?

Kitty spoke again. ‘But I love him, you see – so much! And I can make him comfortable. Even if I can’t make him happy, I can do that.’

‘But will you be happy?’ Nina asked.

‘It is my dream,’ Kitty said. ‘To be with him – to be married to him!’

Yes, Nina could sympathise with that. Guilt racked her – and jealousy – and despair. Her aunt had warned her against the glamours of the Season. She had thought she was too sensible to be taken in. She had believed that the mind controlled the heart. Well, it should do so in future, she determined. This sickness would pass, and then she would be sensible for the rest of her life. At all costs, she must never let Kitty know how she felt.

‘I’m glad for you,’ she said now, putting all her warmth into her words. ‘Didn’t I tell you, back at Miss Thornton’s, that you would fall in love and marry a handsome prince?’