A Teacher of Love Page 2

  “A charming young gentleman would not have your brains, Papa. And if he was like most of the young men I have met in London, he would not have the slightest idea what I was talking about!”

  Her father chuckled.

  “Now you are flattering me, Tasia. Come into the drawing room. There is a glass of champagne waiting for us there and I have brought you a present.”

  “Oh, how kind of you, Papa, but the best present I can possibly have is you.”

  “I hope you will always think so, my dearest.”

  Tasia slipped her hand into his and they walked together into the drawing room.

  As he had said there was a bottle of champagne on ice and pâté sandwiches as well.

  Tasia did not care too much for champagne, but she knew her father liked her to have a drink with him, so she took half a glass and sipped it slowly.

  “What happened while you were away, Papa?” she asked. “You said you were going North on business, but I was not sure what that entailed.”

  “Actually I was staying away with an old friend,” he replied slowly, “and the business I was having with him concerned you.”

  “Concerned me? How could that be?”

  Her father did not answer at once and she knew he was feeling for his words.

  Impulsively she demanded,

  “What is it, Papa? I know that you are upset and worried about something. You must tell me what it is.”

  “Actually it is you, Tasia.”

  “Me? Why me?”

  “I have been realising for some time now how you have missed out on that which is most important to every young lady – your debut in the London Season.”

  “Oh, that,” Tasia said scornfully. “How can you worry about anything so stupid? You know we both had to be with Mama! Honestly and truthfully Papa, I don’t miss all those traditional debutante dances and competing with girls of my own age for some silly young man puffed up with his own self-esteem!”

  He laughed as if he could not help it.

  “That is not what you should be saying and those ‘silly young men’, as you call them, are important because they are the husbands with whom a girl sets up her family. Nothing is more crucial in a woman’s life.”

  “Not in mine! I can assure you I am perfectly content to be with you, Papa, so don’t worry about me, please.”

  “But I do worry,” he protested, “and that is why I went to see a very special friend of mine who I particularly want you to meet.”

  Tasia looked at him suspiciously.

  “Are you saying in a roundabout way that you want me to marry him?”

  Her father hesitated a moment.

  “Actually he wants to marry you.”

  Tasia stared at him.

  “How could he possibly do so when he has never met me?”

  “He has heard you talked about – and because you are my daughter he is very anxious that our families should be joined together in an unbreakable union that I am quite certain will make us all happy.”

  Tasia just stared at him, incredulous.

  “I cannot believe what you are saying, Papa,” she replied at last. “Are you really expecting me to consider this man as a husband before I have even met him?”

  Lord Salwicke sat back in his chair.

  “I think, my dearest child, that you have trusted me all your life and I am quite certain you can trust me now to find you a husband you will be extremely happy with.”

  “That is quite a different thing altogether. But, from all I have read and from what I think about marriage, if it is to be successful and happy, it must be because two people feel instinctively drawn to each other with their hearts and souls.”

  Her father made an impatient gesture.

  “That is the sort of stuff you read in novels, but it’s not true to life.”

  “Why not, Papa?”

  “Because what you feel at your age is something you are most unlikely to feel in ten or twenty year’s time. What you require is security, and that is what you will get with George Hazelbury.”

  Tasia put her fingers up to her forehead.

  “Hazelbury,” she murmured, almost as if she was speaking to herself. “I have heard you speak of him, but surely he is very old?”

  “Nonsense,” her father replied sharply. “George is still a young man and a very clever one, which I know will appeal to you. He is also extremely rich and in fact he has more money than any man I know.”

  He paused, but Tasia did not speak and he went on,

  “He was married when he was younger, but his wife died in childbirth. He was too busy in the following years to worry about marriage or the son he must produce to inherit all his millions. Both he and I are convinced that you are the ideal wife for him.”

  Tasia drew in her breath.

  “I am sorry, Papa, but I have no intention of being married to a man just because he is rich or because he is a friend of yours. Of course, I will want my future husband to get on with you, but I must come first.”

  “Which you will with George. As I have told you, he is a most intelligent man, who has made his fortune in shipping and is likely to double it in the next few years.”

  “I am not at all interested in his money, Papa. You have not yet told me how old he is.”

  Her father hesitated and she knew instinctively he was not going to tell her the truth.

  “Now let me see. I think George must be a little over thirty-five, but very young in some ways for his age.”

  “Well, quite frankly, Papa, he is far too old for me and I have no intention of marrying him!”

  “Don’t be ridiculous – ”

  He brought down his clenched fist angrily on the arm of the chair.

  “You are far too intelligent and always have been for any man of your own age. And having been with me so much, I am certain that your conversation and thoughts are far beyond those of a man under thirty.”

  Tasia realised that this was really a compliment, but she merely commented sarcastically,

  “You are not talking of me going into business with your friend Lord Hazelbury – but of marrying him!”

  Her father now thought he had gone a little too far.

  “Now don’t you upset yourself, my dear. George is coming down to London in two days time and when you meet him you will know I am absolutely right in choosing him as your future husband. I promise you that you will be very happy and of great help to him in everything.”

  “Is that why he wants to be married?” asked Tasia aggressively.

  “Of course it is one reason. In his position he has much entertaining to do in London and in Liverpool, where his business is. I cannot imagine anyone who would look more beautiful at the end of his table than you.”

  “If it was just a question of remaining at the end of his table, it would not trouble me, but being married, as far as I am concerned, involves something hugely different!”

  Tasia was thinking of all the stories she had always told herself when she was out riding alone –

  Of the man who one day she would fall in love with and how they would do everything together.

  He would, of course, be an exceptionally good rider and they would ride through the woods she loved.

  He would feel, as she did, that the birds, the rabbits and the squirrels were all friends and they would welcome them into the enchantment that every wood held for her.

  She had even, when she was alone, ridden to the mysterious pool in the middle of one of her father’s woods that the village people believed was magical.

  The housemaids had told her how they would drop a coin or something precious into the water and then that night they would see in their dreams the face of the man they would eventually marry.

  There was also an oak tree in another wood where the young men in the village would carve their names and next day they would return hoping to see the name of the girl who found them attractive carved beneath it.

  Tasia had always loved list
ening to the stories and legends told by the village folk and believed that one day the man she loved would enjoy listening to them too.

  They would travel abroad together, and she could imagine nothing more exciting than being in Greece with the man of her dreams, climbing the shining cliffs of Delphi.

  She was completely convinced that they would then become part of the Greek legend of lovers and they would travel on to Delos, the birthplace of Apollo, to ask for his blessing on their marriage.

  So much of what she had read and so many places she had visited in her dreams were linked to a companion – he would always be with her, would be her darling husband and she would love and adore him for ever.

  All these thoughts passed swiftly through her mind, before she responded quietly,

  “I am sorry, Papa, the answer is no. It is quite unnecessary for Lord Hazelbury to come here to meet me for I have made up my mind!”

  It was then that Lord Salwicke lost his temper.

  He rose to his feet upsetting his glass of champagne and stood stolidly with his back to the fire.

  “Now just you listen to me, my girl,” he exploded. “Ever since your mother died you have had your own way in everything, and done exactly as you wished. But now the time has come when you must remember that I am your father, your Guardian in the eyes of the law, and you cannot marry without my consent.”

  Tasia did not answer and he rambled on,

  “I have a suspicion that you think yourself in love with some whipper-snapper, who doubtless wants to marry you because you are my daughter and will one day grab my fortune!”

  “That is absolutely untrue, Papa, I am not in love with anyone. As you well know I have been in the country whilst you were away and have only just come back to London.”

  “Then if you ask my opinion, it’s time you were safely married. Good Heavens, girl, you don’t wish to be an old maid, do you? As you well know, most girls are married by the time they are twenty.”

  “Whether they are or not does not concern me, but I am not, Papa, going to be pushed into a marriage with an elderly man who merely desires a wife to entertain for him and who is probably too old to have children!”

  Lord Salwicke gave out a roar of fury.

  “I have never heard such nonsense in the whole of my life! Of course George Hazelbury is capable of having a family and the only reason he did not marry again after his wife’s death was simply that he was too busy – ”

  Tasia did not speak and he added,

  “Doubtless he was mourning the fact that she was no longer with him.”

  Tasia was just about to repeat her refusal to marry George Hazelbury when the door opened.

  “Dinner is served, my Lord,” Yates announced.

  Lord Salwicke picked up his champagne glass and placing it carefully on an ornate card table, turned towards the door ahead of his daughter.

  Then, before he reached it, he proposed,

  “We will continue this after dinner. I have no wish for the servants to overhear what I am saying.”

  Tasia did not answer as she well knew how to deal with her father when he was in one of his rages – it was to let him simmer down before she put forward her own point of view.

  She had spoken up now only because she had been taken by surprise – an arranged marriage was the last thing she ever thought her beloved father would inflict on her.

  She had been well aware that he had been deeply upset by her mother’s death and mourning had prevented him carrying out his plans to launch her debut in London.

  She had thought at the time that he was expecting too much in anticipating that she would be the belle of the Season and the toast in every Club in St. James’s.

  Now Tasia realised, far better than her father, that she was neither.

  As she put it herself, ‘I am neither fish, fowl nor good fresh herring!’

  It did not worry her a bit and she was quite happy to continue to act as hostess for her father, although she did recognise that very many of the girls of her own age, some she had even been at school with, were already married.

  They reached the dining room.

  The chef had prepared an excellent dinner and Yates and two footmen waited on them.

  The table itself was beautifully decorated, not only with four golden candlesticks but also with purple orchids.

  It was Tasia’s dear Mama who had always insisted on having fresh flowers whenever possible.

  Lord Salwicke sat at the top of the table with Tasia on his right.

  It would have been easy to seat thirty or more in the dining room and as she looked around the vast table, it suddenly struck Tasia that they were a somewhat lonely couple.

  ‘What Papa should have had,’ she pondered, ‘is a really large family, especially several sons, which would have prevented him concentrating on me as he is now.’

  Dinner progressed slowly with her father hardly addressing a word to her, and she knew it was going to be very difficult to prevent him carrying out his ambition to see her the wife of Lord Hazelbury.

  Her Papa loved her deeply and would do anything in his power to make her happy and yet he was also a very pig-headed man when it came to ensuring his own way.

  She knew without being told that she was going to have to fight him in a way she had never done before if she was not to end up married by the end of the month – the wife of a man she had never seen and was quite certain she could never love.

  Of course she had heard and read about arranged marriages especially with Royalty.

  She had always thought it callous and an insensitive way of ensuring family continuity. However where Royalty was concerned, it was an arrangement of advantage to both countries concerned.

  ‘But I am not a Royal,’ pondered Tasia, ‘and even though Papa thinks himself of great importance, I consider it my right to give my heart to a man and receive his!’

  She was far too intelligent not to appreciate that her father would gain something by having Lord Hazelbury as his son-in-law, and he in turn would doubtless improve his businesses by acquiring the right sort of wife.

  ‘But that wife is not going to be me,’ Tasia thought decisively to herself.

  At the same time she was apprehensive and dreaded the conversation she knew would continue after dinner.

  Thus she found it impossible to eat very much. Her father, however, enjoyed an excellent meal and drank a great deal of the best claret.

  Tasia moved from the dining room to the drawing room and Yates brought them coffee and his Lordship’s favourite liqueur.

  For a short moment after they were alone, there was silence and then Lord Salwicke began,

  “We must not quarrel over this. All you have to do is to receive George pleasantly and when you do meet him you will realise that I have chosen the right man for you.”

  “I can see it is going to be difficult,” replied Tasia slowly, “to make you understand, my dear Papa, that I have no intention of obeying you!”

  He parted his lips to speak but she went on quickly,

  “I am very grateful for all you have ever done for me, and for making Mama extremely happy, even in the last year when she was so desperately ill. At the same time I intend to choose my own husband.”

  “I have already told you, Tasia, that is something I will not allow. Let me remind you again that the law is on my side, as I am your legal Guardian and you are underage. If you disobey me, then I can make things very difficult for you.”

  “In what way?” she responded defiantly.

  He thought for a moment.

  “I can easily alter my will for one thing, although it is something I would be very distressed to do. Perhaps you would miss your horses more than anything else?”

  “Are you saying that, if I do not marry this man you have suddenly produced, you will not allow me to ride?”

  “It is merely passing through my mind and I would much regret it, but you are my daughter and it is your duty to obey me. So let’s leav
e it at that.”

  Tasia put down her coffee cup and rose to her feet.

  “I think this conversation is quite pointless, Papa, and will only upset us both. I am going to bed. I am riding tomorrow morning after breakfast in Rotten Row, so I hope you will not take my horse from me before then!”

  She did not wait for her father’s answer and walked swiftly out of the room, deliberately closing the door quietly behind her.

  She did not hear her father throw his liqueur glass into the fireplace.

  He was shaking with anger.

  He was totally and absolutely determined that he would have his own way in this and nothing and no one would stop him.

  Upstairs in her room Tasia found her lady’s maid waiting for her.

  She was a middle-aged woman called Ruby, who had been with her ever since she came back from school and Tasia found her delightful.

  “You’re early, Miss Tasia!” she exclaimed.

  “I am tired and I want a good night’s sleep.”

  “That’s so real sensible of you, miss. I often thinks late nights be too much after a while and you were ever so late the night afore last.”

  “I did tell you not to wait up for me, Ruby, so you should not know how late I was!”

  Ruby laughed.

  “One of them footmen told me and you can’t help people in this house gossipin’– they got nothin’ better to do!”

  “I wonder if you will do something for me, Ruby?”

  “Course I will, Miss Tasia, I’d do anythin’ for you if it’s at all possible.”

  “Well, when you get a chance, but don’t make it seem obvious, ask Papa’s valet what he knows about Lord Hazelbury. Papa has just been staying with him.”

  “Oh, him!” exclaimed Ruby. “We’ve heard a real lot about him and his big house. A right funny gentleman he seems to me.”

  “In what way, Ruby?”

  “Well, from what Mr. Yates were sayin’, he’s got pots of money, but he’s ever so careful with it. He doesn’t pay his staff half what us gets here and he’s always suspectin’ someone or other of stealin’ things as belongs to him.”

  Tasia was listening intently.

  “That seems strange, when he is not married and does not have a son to leave his money to when he dies.”

  “I suspects, miss, like all them men who be ever so careful, he hopes to take it with him!”