Love Under Fire Read online

  “The inconvenience?”

  The question seemed to tear itself from Lord Wye’s lips.

  “But, of course,” Lady Cleone said with one of her polished smiles. “What can a bachelor know of the needs of a child? How can a bachelor household accommodate someone of Elvina’s age without altering the whole routine of how the house is run?”

  She paused for a moment and then, looking at Lord Wye standing a little apart from her, she said,

  “Of course if you was married, it would be very different.”

  Her dark eyelashes fell, sweeping her cheeks. She portrayed, most admirably, a picture of pretty confusion and Lord Wye knew that this was his cue.

  Yet something made it impossible for him to speak.

  He had only to take one step forward. He had only to say the words that Lady Cleone was waiting to hear and he knew that he would be a betrothed man.

  “If I was married, “he asked and even to himself his voice seemed to come from far away, “do you imagine that my wife would welcome Elvina?”

  Lady Cleone gave a little laugh.

  “She could at least take the trouble of her off your hands,” she replied. “That is after all what wives are for, to save a man trouble when it comes to dealing with such tiresome things as other people’s children.”

  “You think a wife would do that?”

  Lord Wye’s voice was solemn.

  “But, of course,” Lady Cleone went on, “Elvina will doubtless find her sister and, if the sister does not exist, which I am beginning to suspect, then she should be put in a Seminary and educated. Indeed I know just the place. It specialises in taking the daughters of impoverished gentlefolk. The girls are educated, brought up properly and then found employment. They become Governesses and companions and Elvina would, I assure you, fare well there.”

  Lord Wye was silent and Lady Cleone held out her hand to him.

  “Come and sit near me,” she suggested. “We are wasting precious time in discussing your little Portuguese protégée when we might be talking about ourselves. Don’t give her another thought, I beg of you. I will see to everything. She can go to my old Nanny and then at the beginning of the term I myself will take her to Mrs. Dawson’s Seminary. Now is your mind at rest?”

  “And why are you doing all this?”

  Lord Wye’s question seemed to echo around the room.

  He had not moved one step towards Lady Cleone and yet she appeared unaware of his reticence, her hand remaining outstretched towards him.

  Now the other one came out to join it, white fluttering little hands with long thin fingers and polished nails.

  And her beautiful face tilted up to his was very alluring.

  “Are you really so stupid?” she asked softly, “Do you not know the answer to that question.”

  “Yes, I think I do know the answer,” Lord Wye replied. “I am sorry, Cleone, but I cannot do it.”

  Her hands fell, palms downwards into her lap.

  “Cannot do what? What do you mean?”

  Her voice was hard.

  “I cannot marry you,” Lord Wye said.

  “Why not?

  “Because I love Elvina. I have fought against it and tried to hide the fact even from myself,” Lord Wye answered. “But I love her.”

  “You are insane! You cannot love her. She is only a child!”

  “She will grow up,” he replied. “I shall send her to school. Not to the Seminary you suggest for Governesses and companions, but to the best school in the land. And when she is old enough, I shall marry her.”

  “Marry a Portuguese brat with no parents, no breeding and no background!” Lady Cleone screamed. “Do you think that will make you happy? You fool! When I was ready, yes, I confess it, to give myself to you.”

  “I am very sensible of the honour that you would have accorded me,” Lord Wye said with a note of sarcasm in his voice. “Although I think, Cleone, we can be frank with each other, you and I. You would not marry me if I was a penniless soldier without wealth or title.”

  “Why should I throw myself away on anyone in such circumstances?” Lady Cleone asked, her eyes flashing.

  “Why should you indeed,” Lord Wye replied. “Yet, if she loved such a man, Elvina would.”

  He said the words gently and for the first time since the argument started he moved.

  He walked towards the chaise longue and stood looking down at the woman who sat there, her eyes blazing with anger and her breasts heaving.

  “Goodbye, Cleone,” he said. “I think, if you ask me, we have both had a lucky escape.”

  “You are mad enough for Bedlam!” Lady Cleone spat at him. “You will be sorry for this. But don’t say I did not warn you!”

  “I will not,” Lord Wye retorted.

  He lifted her hand perfunctorily to his lips and then, as she snatched it petulantly away, walked across the room and out of her life.

  He therefore did not see Lady Cleone beat her hands against the silk pillows and throw them one by one onto the floor.

  It was only a short step to Berkeley Square and Lord Wye almost ran the distance.

  Quite suddenly the way was clear before him.

  His doubts and fears and miseries were gone. He wondered why he had been so stupid as not to have thought of this solution before.

  He would explain everything to Elvina.

  Gently, of course, so as not to frighten her, not mentioning the kiss and what it had done to him, letting her believe that the love she had shown him so ardently and so unashamedly was reciprocated in a like manner by his devotion and affection for her.

  Dear little Elvina! He felt his whole being surge out towards her.

  He wanted to be with her again, to see the happiness in her smile and to see her eyes light up as he came into the room.

  She would understand why he had been away so long. She at least made no demands upon a man. She had only ever asked for one thing – that she might be with him and that he would not desert her.

  One day they would be together forever. He would tell her that. It would be something for them both to live for.

  He tried not to think that four years was a long time. He could marry her at seventeen, perhaps a few months earlier. But, even so, it was a long wait and they would both have to be very brave about it.

  “Elvina! Elvina!”

  He said her name aloud and, hurrying to his own front door, beat upon the knocker impatiently because the footman on duty did not open the door as quickly as he wished.

  He handed his hat to Simpkins.

  “Bring some wine to the study,” he ordered, “and tell Miss Elvina that I wish to see her immediately.”

  He did not wait for an answer, but went into what he always thought of as his room.

  He could remember Elvina looking round it last night when they had come there and he had known that she had been a little overawed by the magnificence of everything.

  And yet, by her very unselfconsciousness, by her grace and by the way she always seemed to know how to do the right thing, she had not appeared gauche or in any way alien to such surroundings.

  Lord Wye almost snorted aloud. Let Lady Cleone say what she liked with her bitter tongue. Elvina was well bred.

  All the time they had been together he had never seen her do anything that was not an action of distinctive good taste.

  “I beg your pardon, my Lord.”

  “What is it, Simpkins?”

  “Miss Elvina is not here!”

  “Not here? What do you mean?”

  “She went out, my Lord.”

  “Alone! And you let her?”

  “I am afraid I knew nothing about it, my Lord. She left first thing this morning, before your Lordship was called.”

  “She left the house? How could she have done so? Who authorised such a thing? Send Mrs. Maltravers to me at once.”

  “She has been waiting to see you, my Lord. The young lady left a note behind.”

  “Then bring it to me
! For God’s sake, man, bring it to me! What are we waiting for?”

  It seemed to Lord Wye that he waited for almost an interminable time before Mrs. Maltravers appeared.

  She came rustling into the room in her black gown and held out to him the note that Elvina had left on the writing table.

  Lord Wye took it from her.

  He broke the wafer and some other part of himself noted that his hands were trembling.

  He read what Elvina had written. Read it once and then again before he said in a voice that he hardly recognised as his own,

  “Where did she go? What orders did she give to the carriage?”

  “She did not take one, my Lord, as far as we know,” Mrs. Maltravers answered. “The footman found the front door open, so she must have unbolted it herself.”

  “Where could she have gone? She knew no one in London.”

  “She does not say in the note, my Lord?”

  “No, of course she does not or I should not be asking you,” Lord Wye snapped and then, seeing Mrs. Maltraver’s face, added, “I am sorry, believe me. I am overwrought and worried. She is only a child, Mrs. Maltravers. She has never been in London before. What will become of her?”

  “She will not have gone to any relations, my Lord?”

  “She would not know where they are. There were no messages for her? No one called?”

  “No, my Lord.”

  “Then I must find out about her sister.” Lord Wye declared. “She has one, I know. She is married to a man named Thompson, Captain Thompson.”

  He turned and glanced at the clock over the mantelpiece.

  “The War Office will be closed now. It will be useless for me to go there before the morning. Question the household, Mrs. Maltravers. See if anyone, anyone at all, saw Miss Elvina leave this morning.”

  “I think Simpkins has already done that, my Lord, but I will do it again,” Mrs. Maltravers said.

  She curtseyed and would have left the room had not something in Lord Wye’s face prompted her to say,

  “She seems a very sweet young lady, my Lord. Rose says she spoke most gently and kindly to her and was very grateful for everything that was done for her comfort. We should all be very upset if anything should happen to her.”

  “Upset!” Lord Wye said. “It will be more than that, Mrs. Maltravers. Miss Elvina is – ”

  He paused for a moment before he finished very distinctly,

  “ – everything in the world to me.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  “He is coming!”

  The old lady in the window held up a letter in triumph towards her elderly husband standing by the mantelshelf.

  “Is he, by gad!” Lord Clanwarren exclaimed. “You must have used your wiles on him, My dear. Or did you tell him the truth?”

  Lady Clanwarren chuckled.

  “I told him that I had something of import to communicate, which I believed would be of interest to him.”

  Lord Clanwarren said nothing for a moment and then in an unexpectedly gruff voice he remarked,

  “And supposing he is not interested?”

  His wife clasped her hands together.

  “As if I had not thought of that,” she said in a worried tone. “Just suppose that the poor sweet child has been all through this for nothing. I cannot bear to think of such a thing.”

  “We may have to face it,” Lord Clanwarren replied.

  “I know, I know,” his wife agreed. “But I cannot believe that his Lordship’s heart is not a little inclined towards her. I know he only saw her in rags and with that awful walnut juice on her skin. Oh, the horror of that dye! I thought we should have to skin the poor little love before it finally came away and left her as white and beautiful as God intended her to be.”

  “Like her mother,” Lord Clanwarren answered almost beneath his breath. “Yes, George, like my darling Sybil. Sometimes I forget and think that she is back with us again.”

  Lord Clanwarren walked across the room to lay his hand on his wife’s shoulder.

  “It was my fault, my dear. I ought never to have driven her away. I have regretted it always, but my damned pride would not let me say so.”

  “No, no, George. You are not to torture yourself,” Lady Clanwarren cried, putting out her hands towards him in a protective gesture. “Sybil was very foolish, but she was young and innocent and that man swept her off her feet.”

  “That swine! I would wring his neck if he was here.”

  “I don’t think, from what Elvina has told me, that we could wish him anything worse than what he has inflicted on himself,” Lady Clanwarren said. “If you could only see the poor child’s back. It’s still scarred by the whippings that wicked woman gave her.”

  “If I was a younger man,” Lord Clanwarren asserted. “I would go out to Portugal, tell them both what I think of them and see that they got their deserts.”

  “No, no, leave them alone. It’s all over now, Elvina is with us and safe. It’s only that alas her heart is elsewhere.”

  “What do we know about this fellow, Wye?” Lord Clanwarren inquired. “His father was a decent fellow, I remember him. But young Wye may be a waster for all we know.”

  “No, no, my dear, people speak most highly of him, and Elvina loves him. That is what really matters.”

  “I should have thought that it was more important to ask whether he loves her,” Lord Clanwarren replied.

  His wife rose to her feet

  “If anything was to go wrong for Elvina now,” she said with a quaver in her voice, “I don’t think I could bear it. That is why I wrote to him. George, did I do wrong?”

  “No, no, my dear, I am certain you did right. ’Twas a little risky though.”

  “I felt that the child had to know the best or the worst,” Lady Clanwarren replied. “I know that she has been thinking of him day after day, struggling to make herself beautiful. And now she is afraid, yes, afraid, George to face him for fear that his affections are already engaged elsewhere.”

  “How do you know all this?” Lord Clanwarren enquired.

  “From what she has told me I know too that she has sat up night after night composing a letter to him, only when morning has come to tear up everything she has written.”

  “So you took matters into your own hands,” Lord Clanwarren said quietly.

  “Yes, George. You don’t think I have made a mistake?”

  “I have never known your instinct at fault,” he replied gallantly.

  She gushed a little and raised her face to his with a pretty gesture. He was just dropping a kiss on her cheek when the door opened and they both turned to see Elvina come hurrying into the room.

  “Grandmama!” she called in her sweet voice. “I have been down to the stables and Foxhunter has a foal. Is it not very exciting?”

  “It is indeed my love,” Lady Clanwarren answered, turning towards her granddaughter with a look of deep affection on her face.

  “I had no idea that foals could be so gay and skittish from the moment they are born,” Elvina said. “And, Grandpapa! Johnston says that I can ride Clarion today. Will you take me out with you this afternoon?”

  “Not this afternoon, my dear,” Lord Clanwarren answered. “We have a visitor.”

  “How disappointing!” Elvina exclaimed.

  “Tomorrow morning,” he suggested. “That is if you still want to go with me.”

  “As if I should want to do anything else,” Elvina replied fondly.

  She smiled from one to the other of the old people and held out a hand to both of them with a pretty impulsive gesture that touched both their hearts.

  “You are so kind to me,” she said. “It is so wonderful to be here, to see the things that were my mother’s and to know that I belong.”

  “You are happy, my darling?” Lady Clanwarren asked.

  There was just a moment’s pause before Elvina responded,

  “Very, very happy, if only – ”

  She stopped suddenly but her grandmoth
er knew how the sentence would have ended.

  An elderly woman in a mobcap came into the salon carrying a silver salver on which reposed a large glass of milk.

  “Your milk. Miss Elvina,” she said.

  “Oh, not more milk!” Elvina cried. “I swear if I drink another glass, I shall turn into a cow! Besides, I am so fat already that my new gowns will have to be let out even before I have worn them.”

  “That is a very pretty frock you are wearing now,” Lord Clanwarren remarked looking down at the sprigged muslin with pale blue ribbons that became Elvina’s white skin and fair hair.

  It made her look as sweet and fresh as a flower opening to the first rays of the sun.

  “They are all lovely!” she exclaimed.

  “Your milk, Miss Elvina,” the old woman insisted.

  “Nanny, you are a bully,” Elvina pouted, but taking the glass of milk she drank it down.

  “It is delicious,” she said. “I ought not to complain. When I think of the thin blue stuff that we called milk in Portugal, I could drink great buckets of this for the sheer delight of tasting the cream.”

  “We hope you will,” Lady Clanwarren said.

  “Then I shall be so fat that you will be ashamed of me!”

  “I don’t think you could ever be that,” her grandmother said, looking at her delicate fairylike features and the young, still too slender body that was, however, filling out.

  “You grow more like your mother every day,” Lord Clanwarren observed.

  “Indeed, she does, my Lord,” Nanny agreed, “though it was hard to see the resemblance the night she arrived here. I shall never forget my first glimpse of her.

  “‘Who’s that servant girl at the door?’ I says to old Newman.

  “I happened to be passing through the hall and saw her. It was getting dusk or I might have looked closer.

  “‘Somebody for her Ladyship,’ Newman answered.

  “‘Her Ladyship’s tired,’ I says, quite snappy-like.

  “Then the servant girl, for I swear I thought she was nothing else, takes a locket from round her neck and holds it out to me.

  “‘Will you take this to either Lord or Lady Clanwarren,’ she says in her pretty voice. I has one look at it.