The Poor Governess Read online

  “Miss Wade thinks I could be very good if I tried hard.”

  “So she has been telling me,” the Marquis said, “and now you can tell me far more eloquently by playing than by words.”

  Georgina smiled as if the idea amused her.

  Then she said,

  “Yes, of course, Uncle Ulric.”

  She started to play an Aria from the opera La Traviata, which Lara had played to her at the beginning of the week and which had caught her fancy.

  It was quite a strenuous composition and not, Lara thought, the soft dreamy sort of music the Marquis would have expected from a child.

  Because she thought that it was a mistake to encroach too closely on Georgina, she deliberately sat down on the sofa a little way from the piano.

  As if he understood, the Marquis also moved away to lean against one of the pillars.

  First of all he watched Georgina, then Lara was aware, even though she did not look at him, that he was watching her.

  It made her feel shy.

  At the same time she was so anxious for Georgina to succeed in impressing her uncle that she could not relax, but sat upright, her fingers laced together in her lap and, although she was almost unaware of it, she was praying.

  As always when she was at the piano, Georgina after a short hesitation became completely absorbed in the music and oblivious of everything else.

  She was swept away into a world of her own that was different from anything she had known before in her dull little life.

  When she finished, there was an unmistakable radiance in her face.

  Just for a moment, as she took her hands from the keys, she did not move and Lara knew that she was still in her dreamworld before she came back to the reality of where she was and what was happening.

  She did not speak, but sat waiting until with a little sigh that seemed to come from the very depths of her body, she asked,

  “Was that all – right?”

  She looked at Lara who said,

  “It was very good considering you have only played it two or three times before.”

  As she spoke, she looked at the Marquis challengingly as if she dared him to disagree.

  He walked towards the piano.

  “As Miss Wade has said, that was very good, Georgina,” he said, “and now we have to decide what we shall do about you in the future.”

  “What do you – mean?”

  “If you are going to be a musician,” he replied, “you will have to have the very best teachers and it may be possible to find somebody here in the country who could teach you for a year or so. But I think ultimately it will mean that you will have to be in London at least during the week to study with somebody from the Royal Academy of Music.”

  “That sounds very exciting, Uncle Ulric!” Georgina enthused. “But will I also be able to ride in London?”

  “I thought that question would arise sooner or later,” the Marquis smiled, “and the answer is of course ‘yes’. It will mean riding in Hyde Park as I do every morning, but you will still be able to gallop on the Racecourse when you come home on Saturdays and Sundays.”

  Georgina looked up at him.

  “It sounds wonderful! Wonderful, Uncle Ulric! Do you really mean I can do that and learn to play as well as Miss Wade thinks I will be able to?”

  “I have a feeling that you will have to work very hard to live up to her expectations,” the Marquis replied.

  He looked at Lara as he spoke and she had the feeling that he was being slightly provocative.

  Then he said as if he wished to be honest,

  “You are, of course, quite right, Miss Wade, and, before you say it for me, this is something I should have found out a long time ago.”

  Lara gave a little laugh.

  “You are being unexpectedly generous, my Lord, but I have always been told to beware of the Greeks when they come bearing gifts!”

  The Marquis’s eyes twinkled and it seemed to erase for the moment the cynical lines on his face.

  “Now that you and your protégée have convinced me of what has to be done,” he said, “I shall certainly concentrate on it and give it priority over the other items demanding my attention.”

  “Thank you, my Lord,” Lara replied with delight, “I cannot tell you how happy this makes me, my Lord.”

  Almost as if she could read the Marquis’s thoughts, she knew that he was wondering why the child whom she had met only a week ago mattered so much to her, but thought it a mistake to ask the question which she suspected trembled on his lips in front of Georgina.

  She knew it would have been impossible to tell him the truth, but, although she had never been unwanted, she had known the loneliness of being a child without other children to play with.

  Also in a small way she had felt she had a talent that she should express, although she was not quite certain how she could do so.

  It flashed through her mind that all this could form part of her novel, but until this moment she had not concerned herself with the children in it who were just shadowy figures she had given no substance to.

  “Shall I play you something else, Uncle Ulric,” Georgina asked eagerly. “Miss Wade has taught me a very gay waltz by Offenbach, which she said she is sure you dance to when you go to balls in London.”

  The Marquis flashed a quizzical glance at Lara, but he merely answered,

  “I should enjoy hearing you play it, Georgina.”

  Georgina struck the first chord, then she was playing one of the tunes which had captured the imagination of Paris and which to Lara typified all the gaiety of the balls she had read about and imagined but had never attended.

  Because Georgina played so well, the music made Lara want to dance and in her imagination she was gliding around the room in a dazzlingly beautiful gown in the arms of a handsome partner.

  Then, as the melody came to an end, she realised that once again the Marquis was looking at her and, she thought, questioningly.

  ‘Perhaps he thinks I should not have talked about him in such a way to Georgina,’ she thought uncomfortably.

  Because the idea perturbed her, she rose to her feet.

  “That was very good,” the Marquis approved. “In fact let me say once and for all, Georgina, I am very impressed with how you play the piano and I promise you that shall play as often and as much as you like with the best teachers I can provide.”

  “Thank you – thank you, Uncle Ulric,” Georgina cried, “and perhaps if I try very hard – one day you will be – proud of me.”

  Lara drew in her breath, wondering if the Marquis would understand how much his answer to this remark would mean to Georgina. It was as if for the moment she had transferred her longing for the father and mother she no longer had to him.

  She also felt that if he failed the child now she would never forgive him.

  “I am very proud of you already, Georgina,” he said in his deep voice, “just as I was proud when you won our race. I think we ought to have another tomorrow morning. Do you agree?”

  He put out his hand as he spoke and Georgina slipped hers into it.

  “That would be lovely, Uncle Ulric, and if Snowball beats Black Knight again I am sure he will become very conceited.”

  “I am sure he will,” the Marquis replied, “so perhaps I had better not give him such a big start as he had last time.”

  “But, please – very nearly as – long,” Georgina pleaded.

  The Marquis smiled.

  “We will have to see tomorrow morning and, of course, it all depends on how well you ride him.”

  “I know that, Uncle Ulric, and I am trying to ride as well as you and Miss Wade do.”

  “You are quite right to do that,” the Marquis said, “as we are both rather exceptional.”

  Holding Georgina by the hand, he stepped down with her from the dais and came towards Lara.

  The Marquis’s understanding and kindness to Georgina made her feel so happy that she looked at him and said very softl
y, feeling that he would understand,

  “Thank you – my Lord.”

  *

  Nanny put Georgina to bed, having been rather disagreeable because they were late in coming upstairs and also because the child was excited at all that had happened. She was obviously jealous and Lara went to her own room to change before she had supper.

  Because her mother had always insisted that they change for dinner at home however meagre the meal might be, she always had a bath at seven o’clock and even though she ate alone at The Priory, she changed into a different gown from the one she had worn all day.

  She had little choice of what she could wear seeing that her own wardrobe was so scanty and Jane’s clothes were not much better.

  There was one rather pretty blue semi-evening gown that Lara had not yet tried and was rather anxious to do so.

  Then she told herself that it was a waste of time and it was also wrong to wear out Jane’s precious clothes when it was unlikely that, like herself, she would be able to afford more than one or two really useful frocks every year.

  She was taking one of her own gowns from the wardrobe when Agnes came into the room.

  “Sorry I’m late, miss,” she said, “but we’ve been ever so busy downstairs.”

  “Why is that?” Lara enquired. “I thought the house party was arriving tomorrow.”

  “That’s what we all thought,” Agnes replied, “but when ’is Lordship got back ’e said fifteen people were arrivin’ late this evenin’ instead of tomorrow as we expected, so as to be ’ere before the Prince of Wales and Lady Brooke.”

  “Oh, I see!” Lara exclaimed. “So I suppose you have been unpacking for those who have just arrived.”

  “It’s been a real rush to get it all done before dinner,” Agnes complained, “and the visitors’ own lady’s maids because they’ve ’ad long journeys only want to supervise and leave us to do all the ’ard work.”

  “All the same, it cannot be hard work to unpack all those pretty clothes you have been describing to me.”

  “I tell you what we’ll do, miss,” Agnes said, as if she had just thought of it. “Tomorrow night when I’m tidyin’ the bedrooms, which I usually ’ave to do when the rest of the staff ’ave gone down to supper, I’ll take you with me and show you some of the lovely gowns that Lady Lesley ’as brought with ’er.”

  “Then Lady Louise has come again?” Lara asked curiously.

  “Yes, and from all I ’ears ’is Lordship wasn’t expectin’ her. She just turned up with Lord Magor and says she was intendin’ to stay with somebody else, but they’ve let ’er down and she was sure ’is Lordship’d be pleased to see ’er.”

  “How do you know she said that?” Lara enquired.

  “Mr. Newman, the butler, was tellin’ us what ’er Ladyship said when ’e announced ’er and Lord Magor. But ’e says ’e fancied his Lordship was none too pleased to see ’er! That didn’t surprise all of us, for there’s been bets in the servants’ ’all as to ’ow soon ’is Lordship’d be lookin’ for a new face.”

  Lara suddenly felt ashamed not of Agnes but of herself.

  It was one thing to want copy for her book, but another, she felt, to discuss the Marquis with his servants.

  She did not know why she suddenly felt ashamed, she only knew that she wished she had never asked Agnes any questions or had ever heard of Lady Louise.

  “Will you do up my dress, Agnes?” she asked, changing the subject. “Otherwise I will be late for my supper when it comes upstairs and I hate food that is cold.”

  “Yes, of course, miss, and tomorrow night I’ll take you down with me when they’re all safe and sound in the ’ousekeeper’s room.”

  Lara did not answer and she told herself when Agnes had left that she would not do anything so reprehensible as to inspect anyone’s gowns when they were not aware of it.

  At the same time she could not help thinking of what inestimable value all this was for her novel.

  This past week she had written the whole of the third chapter and she was sure that her description of the heroine’s feelings at seeing the Duke’s ancestral home, which was, of course, based on The Priory, was better than anything she had ever written before.

  ‘I know I am going to sell this book and make money both for Papa and me,’ she thought, ‘and if I have to do things that Mama would not approve of, I must not be too squeamish about it.’

  At the same time she was determined that however adventurous she might be she would not go into Lady Louise’s room.

  ‘I am sorry for her,’ she told herself, ‘sorry that she has been made unhappy by losing the Marquis, but, of course, it’s very wrong for her to be interested in him in the first place when she is married.’

  Then she thought that it would be impossible for her to describe what a married woman felt for a man she could not marry and how she justified herself in being unfaithful to her husband.

  ‘I must keep to a straight happy love story,’ she decided.

  Then she was well aware now that she had learnt as much as she had already about the Marquis’s friends and the behaviour of the Prince of Wales, that her story would certainly not sound authentic if the love affairs in it were all pure, innocent and completely blameless.

  ‘Perhaps the only way I can make money,’ she thought, ‘is just by being a Governess.’

  She wondered if that was what she would do when she left The Priory.

  Then it struck her that when she did leave she was going to miss not only Georgina but the Marquis’s horses and indeed the Marquis himself.

  Although she found him overpowering, she realised that it was a fascination she had never expected to talk to him because he was so different from any man she had ever met before.

  Not only was he a magnificent rider, but he had, she was aware, an extremely intelligent mind.

  Although Jane had not mentioned it, Lara had recognised that, since she had been at the Priory, the efficiency with which it was run, the excellence of the servants and the prosperity of the estate was all due to the direction which came from the top, in other words from the owner himself.

  Her father had once said that what people needed was inspiration, guidance and an ideal to aim for and she knew that in his own way that was what the Marquis gave those who served him.

  The servants, one after another, were always saying in their own words,

  “This is what his Lordship expects.”

  “His Lordship’ll be angry if we don’t do this.”

  “We expect things to be perfect at The Priory!”

  That was what made the whole place, Lara was certain, an example that perhaps other similar houses tried to emulate but were not so successful.

  Inevitably the question she found herself asking was why, when he had so much, did the Marquis look bored, cynical and, as she was sure in her own mind, unhappy?

  She wished that she were brave enough to ask him what was wrong and then laughed at the idea of being so inquisitive.

  She finished her supper, the footman took away the tray and, as she knew that nobody else would return that evening, she locked the door of the schoolroom.

  Tonight, because she wished to write down in full what had happened when the Marquis listened to Georgina playing the piano, she took out her manuscript books and first of all made notes which she realised had become, since she had been at The Priory, more and more like a diary.

  When her notes were completed, she started Chapter Four.

  She realised that so far what she had written had been entirely about the heroine.

  Now it was time to introduce the hero and she began to describe the Duke, only to realise after she had written nearly two pages that she had in fact described very accurately and rather cleverly the Marquis himself.

  She reread what she had written and asked,

  ‘Do I really intend him to be the hero?’

  He would certainly fit the Ducal coronet without any difficulty. At the same time the dream man s
he had envisaged before she came to The Priory had been very different.

  She was not certain what an innocent wide-eyed Governess who was like Jane would feel about a man who was like the Marquis.

  ‘She would be afraid of him,’ Lara thought.

  Once again she looked back over what she had written and as she did so, she heard a slight sound and looking across the room saw the handle of the door turn.

  Thinking for a moment that she must have imagined it, she watched the handle turn again and was aware that somebody was outside.

  And knew who it was.

  There was a knock on the door, soft enough to be made by a person who did not wish to be overheard.

  Lara did not move, but she knew whoever was outside would have seen the light under the door and known that she was not in her bedroom.

  Then she heard a voice a little above a whisper, but quite clear, say,

  “Miss Wade, I want to speak to you!”

  Now there was no doubt who was there and for a moment Lara felt her heart leap in fear.

  Then she remembered the strong lock on the door and sat back in her chair careful to make no noise, enjoying the feeling that Lord Magor was locked out and that there was nothing he could do about it.

  She heard his voice again.

  “I must speak to you. Let me in.”

  She knew that he was listening to hear her response.

  Then after several seconds, as if he realised that he was defeated, she heard him move away and go slowly and carefully down the stairs.

  It was then she clasped her hands together with delight and wanted to jump up and dance because he had been made to look a fool.

  ‘That should teach him to leave wretched Governesses alone,’ she thought and wondered how he had escaped so early from the party downstairs.

  Then she looked at the clock on the mantelpiece and realised to her surprise, for she had no idea how long she had been writing, that it was after one o’clock. She suspected that the first night after their journey the party had gone to bed early.

  She realised how frightened Jane would have been in her place and she thought it was entirely her own fault.

  ‘I suppose she thought that the servants would think it odd if she locked the door,’ Lara ruminated.