Page 27 of The Affairs of Ashmore Castle

Nina took a bracing breath. ‘Speaking’ to Mrs Mitchell had always meant listening while she told Nina how things would be. But Mrs Deering wasn’t like that. And speaking to the housekeeper was something a real lady of the house did, a proper, grown-up married woman. She didn’t feel particularly grown-up, but she thought that Mrs Deering would help her through. It would be her first dinner party as hostess – a milestone.

It might even be fun.

For all his greater age and experience, Mr Cowling proved more nervous about the engagement than Nina. He fussed about the menu Mrs Deering had chosen. He fussed about the bareness of the dining-room. He fussed about the laying of the table. He fussed about what Nina should wear.

‘Is that all the jewellery you’ve got? You should have more. Why didn’t I buy you more stuff before now?’ he mourned.

Nina had worried that the diamond necklace he had given her for a wedding-present was too fine for the occasion. ‘I don’t think the Crawfords will be very dressy,’ she ventured diffidently. ‘I didn’t want to look too—’

He wasn’t listening. ‘That’s real silk, anyway, your dress. And they won’t have seen it, which is a blessing. But we must get you up to London and buy you more things. You ought to have a dozen evening frocks. You ought to have a tiara.’

‘A tiara? Surely that would be too much,’ she protested, but uneasily – perhaps she was wrong and a tiara would be expected.

But Mr Cowling said, ‘No, of course not for this dinner, but for when we’re invited somewhere grand. I don’t want you to be caught out. I don’t want people thinking we don’t know what’s what, or I can’t afford to buy you the best. I don’t want anyone looking at you sideways.’

‘I don’t want to let you down,’ Nina began.

He clutched her hand. ‘You couldn’t let me down if you tried! Never think it! I’m the awkward one. I’m just a plain village cobbler got rich.’

Nina was glad, on the whole, that her first dinner party was such a small occasion, so that she got to practise without too much anxiety. The guests had obviously taken the occasion seriously, for Mr Crawford’s hair was freshly cut and his white tie looked new – bought that day, she wondered, after invitation? Mrs Crawford’s evening dress did not look new, but was covered all over with bugle beads, and in a fashionable shade of mauve. Her figure was corseted into the correct serpentine shape, her hair was piled up into the fashionable style, and decorated with small feathers and a spray of crystal beads that glittered distractingly every time she moved her head.

Conversation in the drawing-room over sherry was stilted at first, but the men soon got onto current events and business news so the women were able just to listen. Then when Moxton, in his guise of butler, escorted them into the dining-room, Mrs Crawford exclaimed spontaneously, ‘Oh, it does look nice! Such a beautiful room, this, I always think. We dined here a few times, when old Mrs Ampleforth was alive. The flowers are quite lovely. Did you do them yourself, Mrs Cowling?’

For her liking of the dining-room, Nina was prepared to forgive her for making her admit she hadn’t arranged the flowers herself. And it gave her a conversational opening, in asking Mrs Crawford about the previous owners – a topic Mrs Crawford found comfortable, so the chat went on mildly though the dinner. Nina had accepted Mrs Deering’s suggestions for the menu wholesale, not knowing any better, and thought it all good: artichoke soup, fillets of salmon, roast lamb with broccoli and new potatoes, coffee blancmange, a savoury of soft roes of herring, and dessert. She caught Mr Cowling looking at her down the table at one point, but didn’t know what the look meant. Both the Crawfords seemed to have good appetites, despite their thinness – or perhaps they were thin because they didn’t eat very much at home. In sudden anxiety, Nina pressed her guests to second helpings.

When dessert was finished, Nina rose and led Mrs Crawford into the drawing-room, as she had seen done, leaving the men to talk business. Mrs Crawford made the rest of the evening easy for her by talking about Market Harborough and local families, a topic that interested Nina and about which Mrs Crawford had plenty of information. The men were so long that when they finally returned, the party reunited only to divide again almost immediately as the Crawfords departed.

‘Well?’ Nina asked Mr Cowling when they were alone.

‘Pretty well,’ said Mr Cowling. ‘The dinner was nice enough, though it could have been more fancy – only one soup, no duck or fowl, no choice of sweets.’

‘But I think for just four people . . .’ Nina said uncertainly. ‘More dishes might have been overpowering. Or don’t you think so?’

‘Aye, well, you could be right. But one of these days we’ll give a right grand slap-up banquet and invite everyone. That table’d take thirty round it, easy – and I’ve a notion there’s more leaves somewhere in one of the attics. Then you can wear your tiara,’ he added, in what might have been a joke.

‘Did your business talk go well?’ Nina asked, to distract him from that train of ideas.

‘Very well. He’s got an interesting plan, all right.’

Nina waited, but he didn’t elaborate, his brow buckled in thought. ‘What is it?’ she asked at last.

He came back from contemplation. ‘Eh? The plan? Oh, I won’t bother you with it tonight. You must be tired. And I want to look over the papers he’s left me again. There’s a lot to digest. You run on up, my love. I shall be a while.’

It was showery on Tuesday morning, rain and sunshine chasing each other like frowns and smiles across the same face, but after luncheon – which she took alone, Mr Cowling and Decius Blake having been out since early that morning – the sky cleared, the clouds grew high and white and innocent, and Nina went out into the garden with Trump for some much-needed exercise.

She was coming back through the wilderness from the lake when she met Decius coming the other way. ‘You’re back!’ she exclaimed. ‘Have you been at the factory all this time?’

‘Yes, and Mr Cowling is still there, but he told me to come back and see that you’re all right. He said I should take luncheon with you.’ He smiled. ‘I don’t think he has any idea of the time. You must have lunched long ago.’

‘I did. Are you hungry? I could ask Mrs Deering for something for you.’

‘No, thank you,’ he said. ‘I’m rarely hungry at this time of day. The luncheon idea was for your benefit rather than mine. But I do need to stretch my legs and seize a few mouthfuls of fresh air.’

Nina made an expansive gesture. ‘Take all you like,’ she said. ‘Shall I walk with you, or do you want to be alone?’

‘Walk with me, please.’ Nina turned with him and headed back down towards the lake. ‘I’m charged with telling you about Mr Crawford’s plan. You asked Mr Cowling last night, apparently, and he snubbed you. He’s quite anxious about it. Were your feelings hurt? Do you actually want to know what the plan is?’

‘No, and yes. I quite understood that he needed more time to digest it. And of course I’m interested. What goes on in that huge, handsome factory?’