A Circus for Love Read online

  Author’s Note

  The Tower Menagerie was the most important collection of animals in Britain from a very early age.

  Lions were always the chief attraction and in the days of Queen Elizabeth they were all named after Kings and Queens.

  Towards the end of the seventeenth century the first hyena was shown in England and in 1739 a rhinoceros was brought from Bengal.

  King William IV closed the menagerie after six hundred years of unbroken history and the animals went either to the London Zoo or to Windsor.

  The London Zoo, originated by Sir Stamford Raffles opened in April 1826. It was to become an example to the whole world and every country in Europe began to copy it.

  Private menageries have existed for centuries.

  Julius Caesar had mentioned in his Commentaries that rich English landlords had Parks in which they kept hares, geese and chickens, not for eating, but almost as pets.

  The Norman Lords who came over with William the Conqueror appropriated Parks such as these for stocking with deer for the chase and sometimes with less common animals as well.

  There is a record of a Nobleman receiving a bear from William Rufus and King Henry I had at Woodstock, lions, leopards, lynxes and other animals.

  King Henry III was sent by his son-in-law King Louis XI of France a present of the first elephant ever seen in England.

  At the Tower Menagerie when King George IV came to the throne there was only one elephant, one grizzly bear and a few birds. By the end of the reign, however, the menagerie was very well stocked.

  Chapter One ~ 1818

  Thelma, riding back home through the spring sunshine, thought that her father’s house in the distance looked very attractive.

  It was originally a Tudor Manor, which had been enlarged over the generations and had housed the Fern family for three hundred years.

  The present Lord Fernhurst had been shattered when his only son was killed at the Battle of Waterloo.

  He had then given up being interested in his country estate and spent much of his time in London.

  The result was disastrous.

  This time he had returned to the country at the beginning of the year, having married a woman whom Thelma had disliked on sight.

  The feeling was mutual.

  The new Lady Fernhurst had done everything she could manage within her power to make her stepdaughter’s life a misery.

  At first Thelma had thought that her father would be reasonable.

  She was certain that he would understand how difficult it was for her to see someone strange taking her mother’s place.

  But Lord Fernhurst took the line of least resistance.

  He had consoled himself for the loss of his first wife and for the vagaries of his second by drinking heavily.

  It was incredible to Thelma that her father should alter so completely in so short a time.

  She had thought when first he had drunk so much after her brother’s death that it was a temporary palliative.

  She was sure that he would soon be returning to his normal self.

  In London, however’ he spent his time in his Club where they drank a great deal. Also in other places that she had heard deliberately encouraged drunkenness.

  When, after his last absence of very nearly six months, he returned to the country, it was difficult for Thelma to recognise him.

  After her mother’s death, she had gone to a Finishing School.

  It was when she came home for good that she found everything had changed, especially her father.

  There was no doubt that Denise Fernhurst herself also encouraged him to drink.

  This, Thelma thought scornfully was so that he would not be aware of her outrageous behaviour.

  She had never thought it possible that any lady could behave so badly.

  She would have been very stupid if she had not become aware that her stepmother had a lover.

  In fact there had been two since she came home. While she gathered from what she had heard the servants saying, there had been several previous to them.

  She was most definitely shocked and that was to put it mildly.

  Her mother had been sweet, gentle and very much in love with her father.

  Thelma had therefore never before come into contact with women like her stepmother.

  Denise was beautiful, no one could deny that, but she was hard, avaricious and entirely pre-occupied with herself.

  She was disagreeable to the elderly servants who had been at The Manor for many years.

  She would not call on the farmers on the estate or the old people in the village.

  She disparaged them at mealtimes, which meant that what she said was repeated over and over again all over the estate.

  At first Lord Fernhurst was obviously infatuated with her and it was clear that she could twist him round her little finger.

  Then, Thelma thought, that her father began to realise how unpleasant she was and, to prevent himself from acknowledging the situation, he turned again to drink.

  Thelma drew nearer to the house.

  She was riding one of the excellent spirited horses from her father’s stable.

  She felt herself shrink inside at the mere thought that in a few minutes she would be in the company of her stepmother.

  At the same time the thought of having to leave her home was just appalling. It would be goodbye to everything that was familiar and that she loved for all her lifetime.

  She supposed that there were cousins or perhaps one of her mother’s sisters, who would look after her if she appealed to them.

  Then a pride that was very much part of the family inheritance rose within her.

  It made her feel that it would be degrading to have to explain what had happened to her father.

  The groom accompanying her out riding came to her side as they then trotted into the courtyard and he reached out to take the bridle of her horse as Thelma dismounted.

  Once on the ground she patted the horse’s neck and he nuzzled against her.

  Then she knew that she could not possibly leave the horses she loved so much.

  However unpleasant her stepmother might be, there was always the relief of being able to ride away from the house with the wind in her hair and the sun on her cheeks.

  At least for the time being she could be out of reach of her bitter sarcastic tongue.

  “Thank you, Ben,” Thelma said to the groom.

  She walked up the ancient stone steps to the front door and into the oak-panelled hall.

  She took off her riding hat and put it with her gloves down on a chair.

  As she glanced at the clock, she realised that she was later than usual, so she decided to have breakfast first before she changed into a suitable gown.

  She walked along the corridor that led to the breakfast room and, looking out over the gardens, it caught the early morning sun.

  As she put out her hand to open the door she heard her name being mentioned in her stepmother’s voice.

  “How could we have imagined for one moment,” she was saying, “that Thelma would be left so much money?”

  “She is a very lucky girl,” a man’s voice answered.

  Thelma knew at once that it was her stepmother’s lover speaking.

  His name was ‘Sir Richard Leith’ and she had disliked him from when he first arrived at The Manor three months ago.

  “We will have to be clever about this,” Denise Fernhurst commented forcefully.

  “Clever?” Sir Richard enquired.

  He sounded curious, but not particularly interested.

  “Don’t you be so foolish!” Lady Fernhurst said sharply. “We want to get our hands on that money, at least you do!”

  “You don’t know wha
t you are saying,” Sir Richard replied.

  Denise Fernhurst’s voice dropped to a lower note and Thelma then guessed that she was bending across the table towards him.

  “Listen,” she said, “the first thing we have to do is to prevent Thelma from seeing the newspapers. Secondly you will leave at once for Canterbury.”

  “What for?” Sir Richard asked in a bewildered tone.

  “Because, my dearest darling, this is the opportunity that you have been praying for! You want money and now we know thatThelma has it!”

  “Are you saying and are you suggesting ‒ ?” Sir Richard began.

  “I am telling you you must marry the girl immediately before the fortune-hunters arrive to push you out of the way.”

  Sir Richard was obviously stunned into silence and Denise Fernhurst went on,

  “Just think, when all that money is yours, we can enjoy ourselves as we have never been able to do while I have to go down on my knees and beg for every penny!”

  She made a little sound of delight before she went on,

  “You can have everything you have always wanted, a place in London where we can be together, horses, phaetons and clothes that will be the envy of every beau in St. James’s!”

  ‘Denise, you are a genius,” Sir Richard exclaimed.

  “I have always thought so,” Lady Fernhurst agreed complacently, “but it is a question of moving quickly before Thelma and the drunken fool who I am married to realise what has happened.”

  “Shall I speak to Thelma at once?” Sir Richard enquired.

  “No, of course not!” Denise Fernhurst replied. “Say nothing until you have the Special Licence in your hands. Then I will force her to marry you before the Solicitors can inform her what is in the Will.”

  Thelma did not wait to hear any more.

  She knew that she had to see the newspapers, which her stepmother would hide from her.

  She ran as swiftly and as silently as she could across the hall.

  At the end of another passage there was her father’s study.

  She knew that she would find a newspaper there on the stool in front of the fireplace.

  Every morning old Pearson the butler, as he had done for the last thirty years, put The Morning Post on the breakfast table and The Times in her father’s study.

  Thelma opened the study door.

  She ran to where she saw that The Times was laid out with some magazines on the stool by the fireplace and picked it up.

  She looked towards her father’s desk.

  As usual there was a pile of letters, which would later be sorted out by Mr. Simpson the estate agent when he arrived.

  Thelma had often thought it would be far easier and more convenient to put her father’s mail, which he never looked at, directly into the Estate Office.

  But that went against tradition and Peason would never swerve from the duties he had always carried out punctiliously.

  Thelma turned over the letters until she found what she was seeking.

  It was quite obvious, she thought, that it came from a firm of Solicitors.

  Their name was printed in bold on the back of the envelope, Marlow, Thestlethwaite and Downing.

  She slipped it into the pocket of her jacket and then she walked to the door that she had left open.

  She did not pass through it, but stood behind it and then opened The Times, searching for what she expected to find.

  It was on the second page and printed quite clearly.

  It began,

  “DEATH OF THE DOWAGER DUCHESS OF WINTERTON.

  We deeply regret to announce the death of the Dowager Duchess of Winterton at the age of ninety-eight. The Duchess, who was a hereditary Lady-of-the-Bedchamber to Her Majesty the Queen, had been ill for quite some years. She died peacefully in her country home in Northamptonshire.”

  It went on to describe in detail how the Duchess had been the daughter of the fourth Lord Fernhurst and had married the Duke of Winterton when she was just eighteen.

  He had been the second son of the Duke of Winterton and when his brother had died, he became the heir and eventually the second Duke.

  Then followed a long list of the charities that the Duchess had been a patron of, the many positions she had held of influence and all the honours that she had received.

  It continued,

  “The Duchess inherited a large fortune through her Godfather, Sir Trevor Hayton, who was adviser to several Eastern Potentates. He had never married, but came back to England leaving on his death everything he possessed to his Godchild.

  It is understood that the Dowager Duchess has left her fortune to her great-niece, the Honourable Thelma Fern, who is the only daughter of the sixth Lord Fernhurst.”

  Having read the report quickly, Thelma refolded The Times and put it back on the stool where she had taken it from.

  Then she hurried quickly back to the breakfast room. She opened the door and instantly her stepmother and Sir Richard, who had been still talking in low voices, were silent.

  They both looked at her in a way she would have thought strange had she not understood all too clearly the reason for it.

  “Good morning, Stepmother,’” she began brightly.

  “Good morning, Sir Richard.”

  Neither of them made any response.

  She went to the sideboard to choose what to eat from the silver dishes that stood there with lit candles beneath them to keep the food warm.

  Then she sat down at the table saying as she did so,

  “I am very sorry if I am late, but it was so lovely out riding this morning in the glorious sunshine that I went rather further than usual.”

  “I am glad you enjoyed it, dear,” Lady Fernhurst said in a much more pleasant voice than she normally used.

  As she spoke, she flashed Sir Richard a meaningful glance and he rose from the table.

  “I had better be on my way,” he said. “I do hope you will not mind if I borrow a phaeton from you and a team of your excellent horses?”

  “No, of course not,” Lady Fernhurst said, “and try not to be late for dinner.”

  “Where is Sir Richard going?” Thelma asked in an innocent tone as he walked towards the door.

  “He is going to visit some friends,” her stepmother replied vaguely.

  Thelma was aware that Sir Richard looked back before he left the room and a glance passed between him and her stepmother that was very revealing.

  She pretended, however, to see nothing.

  “How is Papa this morning?” she asked, as she filled her cup from the silver coffee pot.

  “Your father is asleep,” Lady Fernhurst replied, “and don’t wake him.”

  “No, of course not,” Thelma answered.

  Lady Fernhurst rose to her feet holding The Morning Post tightly in her hand.

  “I am sure that you will have plenty to do, Thelma,” she said, “and I will be rather busy this morning.”

  “I understand,” Thelma replied, “and I will be busy too.”

  She thought of the old adage as her stepmother left the room, “Many a true word spoken in jest.” It was very pertinent.

  She had a great deal to do and not much time in which to do it.

  She finished her breakfast and then hurried up the stairs.

  As she went, she was making a note in her mind of the things she required.

  She went into her bedroom and found that the maids had already tidied and cleaned it. She closed the door and sat down so that she could think clearly.

  She knew that she had to leave home.

  She was far too intelligent not to realise what would happen.

  Her stepmother would make it impossible for her to refuse to marry Sir Richard Leith.

  She was only just eighteen and that meant that by the Law of the land her father was her Guardian and whatever he decided she had to obey him.

  She knew only too well that, when he was drunk, her stepmother could twist him into agreeing to anything that she wan
ted of him.

  She had already spent, Thelma knew, far more money than he could afford and he had even mortgaged part of the estate that was not entailed so that she could have more.

  She would have sold the pictures if it had not been impossible.

  They were in Trust for whoever would succeed her father. Unless he had another son this would be a nephew whom he had never liked.

  Thelma knew that the idea of gaining a fortune would be irresistible to her stepmother.

  She would use any means in her power, however degrading, to seize it into her clutches.

  Only she could have thought of a plan quite so appalling as marrying her stepdaughter to her penniless lover.

  Sir Richard had conducted himself in a way that Thelma had thought was humiliating and outrageous.

  When her father was sober enough to fully understand what was being said, Sir Richard ‘toadied’ to him.

  He would flatter and compliment Lord Fernhurst.

  Then as soon as he had staggered or been carried off to bed, he would snigger about him to her stepmother.

  ‘I hate him!’ Thelma said to herself. ‘He is despicable.’

  She knew as she spoke that she would rather die than be married to such a man.

  It was difficult to make up her mind where she should go.

  She must hide somewhere where she could not be found and before Sir Richard returned to The Manor with the Special Licence.

  She now guessed that one of the things her stepmother was doing at this very moment was preparing the Chapel.

  Built at the same time as the house, it was very beautiful.

  Thelma always thought that it was redolent with the faith of all those who had devoutly worshipped in it.

  When her mother was alive, her father’s personal Chaplain, who was also Vicar of the Church in the village, would come to The Manor every Sunday.

  He would conduct a Service for all those who worked in the house or were staying in it.

  The Services, which Thelma had known since she was a small girl, had always seemed very inspiring.

  She had appreciated that everybody present was in a way part of the family.

  The older servants always thought of The Manor as belonging to them.

  They had revered her father and mother as their parents had.

  They had loved Thelma and her brother, Ivan, because they had known them since they were born.