The Devil Defeated Page 4

  They set off with shouts of goodbye and thanks for a very enjoyable party.

  Only when the horses were moving down the drive did the Earl turn to find his one remaining guest, Harry Harringdon, standing beside him.

  “Well, thank God that’s over!” he exclaimed.

  “I thought you were feeling like that,” Harry said. “Another time you want to give a party, I suggest you choose your own guests rather than let Jarvis choose them for you.”

  “That is what I was thinking,” the Earl replied, “and I have no liking for Chatham.”

  “Nor have I,” Harry agreed, “a nasty piece of work! I have heard some rather unpleasant stories about him.”

  “What sort of stories?” the Earl asked sharply.

  Harry Harringdon paused for a moment. Then he said,

  “Oh – the usual vices that you and I find revolting! A penchant for very young girls and that type of thing.”

  The Earl’s lips tightened before he said angrily,

  “Why the hell did you not tell me?”

  His friend looked at him in surprise.

  “I had no chance to do so. Anyway, what was the point when the man was already your guest?”

  “The sort of guest I do not intend to have again,” the Earl stipulated. “There is something else, Harry, that I have to check on. Wait for me in the library. I will not be long.”

  “It will give me a chance to catch up on the newspapers,” Harry said cheerfully and walked away in the direction of the library.

  He and the Earl had been at school together and they had joined their Regiment on the same day.

  The Earl had pulled strings with the Duke of Wellington to ensure that Harry stayed in France with the Army of Occupation when he did so and they had enjoyed Paris together.

  As Harry had said when it was time to go home,

  “Enough is enough! I have had a surfeit of paté de foie gras and shall be glad to return to roast beef and apple pie.”

  “So shall I,” the Earl had said, “and, as I shall have a great deal to do in England, I shall need your help, Harry.”

  “To hear is to obey, O Master!” Harry had laughed.

  The Earl knew that Harry would do anything for him he wanted and he thought now that he would tell Harry everything the Vicar’s daughter had said to him and see what he made of it.

  As Harry disappeared towards the library, he looked round the hall and realised that Carter, the butler, had not been there to see the guests leave.

  He thought it rather strange and he said to one of the footmen,

  “Where is Carter?”

  There was a pause before the footman replied rather reluctantly,

  “I think, my Lord, Mr. Carter’s restin’.”

  “Resting?” the Earl exclaimed. “At this time of the day?”

  Instinctively he glanced at the large grandfather clock at the bottom of the stairs.

  He spoke curtly as he ordered the footman,

  “Find Carter wherever he may be and say I wish to speak to him!”

  “I expect he’s in the pantry, my Lord,” the footman murmured.

  “Never mind, I will find him myself,” the Earl said. “You stay here on duty.”

  He walked away, moving through the hall into the long passage that led to the servants’ quarters.

  He was well aware that after luncheon in the dining room the butler usually had some time off, but that was no excuse for Carter not being in the hall when his guests were leaving.

  The Earl was also thinking that the waiting at meals had not been as well performed as he would have expected and that could only be the fault of the butler whom Major Richardson had engaged for him.

  He decided that after all Miss Stanfield had told him, he would speak with Richardson first and find out why he had sacked the older servants in what was obviously considered an arbitrary and unjust manner, although he felt certain that Richardson must have had his reasons.

  Richardson was an Officer in another Regiment, which was returning to England to be disbanded and vaguely at the back of his mind he remembered when he engaged him as his Manager, he had asked him,

  “What exactly do you want me to do, my Lord, until you arrive?”

  “It is difficult for me to answer that question,” the Earl had replied, “as I have never been to Yarde. But I understand my uncle was an old man when he died, so things must have become pretty slack. Do what you can to bring them up to date and bring a little youth and vitality into what I expect has become something of an old people’s home!”

  He had laughed as he spoke, but now he suspected that perhaps Richardson had taken him too literally.

  ‘I must find out exactly what has happened,’ he told himself and realised that he was passing the Manager’s office on his way to the kitchen quarters.

  He opened the door to stand transfixed at the scene that greeted him.

  Richardson, who had been a good-looking soldier with a cavalry-type moustache, was lying back in a comfortable armchair in front of the fireplace.

  Sitting on his knee was a large blousy woman whom the Earl recognised as having spoken to him in one of the upstairs passages to introduce herself as the housekeeper.

  She had one arm round the Manager’s neck and opposite them in another chair was Carter, the butler, in his shirtsleeves, his tailcoat thrown carelessly on the floor beside him.

  They were all three of them holding glasses in their hands and there was an empty bottle of claret on the desk and another that was only a quarter full.

  The Earl knew that it was the best claret that they had drunk at luncheon, which together with his disgust at the scene before him, added insult to injury.

  For a moment he just stood in the doorway staring, as if he could hardly believe his eyes.

  Then Major Richardson said in what was undoubtedly a slurred voice,

  “D’you want me, my Lord?”

  As he spoke he made an effort to rise from the armchair, unbalancing as he did so the woman on his knee so that she upset over her gown the glass of claret she was holding in her hand.

  “Be careful what you’re doin’!” she shrieked in a vulgar manner.

  The Earl walked a little farther into the room. Then as Carter staggered unsteadily to his feet, he said,

  “Don’t trouble to move! You will all leave this house and my employment within the next two hours, without either a reference or wages!”

  He turned as he spoke and then left the room, closing the door quietly behind him.

  Then, as he walked back along the passage towards the hall, he asked himself how he could have been such a fool as to come to Yarde on his first visit with a large house party, which had prevented him from finding out what had been happening before he took over his inheritance.

  *

  Dorina was putting away the tea things as her father left the dining room and the children were eating the last piece of cake.

  “I expect you have some homework to do, Rosabelle,” she said to her sister, “and I know Peter has.”

  “I am bored with homework!” Rosabelle protested. “I have been studying the most boring subjects with Miss Soames and now I want to enjoy myself!”

  “I know, dearest,” Dorina replied sympathetically, “but you know as well as I do that Miss Soames cannot teach you all you have to learn in the few hours you are with her.” “If you ask me, I don’t think she is a very good teacher,” Rosabelle said.

  “She is the best in the village, and the only one we can afford.” Dorina spoke with a note of despair in her voice because she had thought for a long time that Rosabelle had learned almost everything Miss Soames could teach her and that really she needed much more experienced Governesses for all she still had to learn.

  She had tried to persuade her father to give Rosabelle some lessons, but while he had promised to do so, he always forgot or else was so immersed in cataloguing and looking up the history of his cacti that he would forget what lesson he was su
pposed to be teaching her and in consequence they just talked together.

  The same applied to Peter, although, as far as he was concerned, they had been fortunate enough to find a retired Professor from Oxford who lived in the next village.

  Because he was bored at having so little to do and was genuinely fond of the Vicar, he had agreed to teach Peter for a ridiculously small sum. Peter, in consequence, was, for his age, very well educated.

  At the same time Dorina was sure that there were a great many subjects that a younger man would be able to teach better than a man of over seventy.

  She suspected the Professor was not sufficiently up to date in many of the subjects that Peter required if he was ever to go to a Public School.

  ‘How can we ever afford it?’ she asked herself night after night and she would lie awake for hours trying to think of some practical way she could make money.

  Sometimes she imagined that one of her father’s cacti was so original and unusual that collectors would pay large sums of money to acquire it.

  At other times she told herself that hidden somewhere in the attic of the old Vicarage was a picture which disguised by age and dirt was really a masterpiece worth a fortune.

  When morning came, she was always back to facing the unpalatable truth that she had only a few shillings to spend for the rest of the month, while the bills had added up to what would take half of next month’s housekeeping allowance.

  ‘What can we do?’ Dorina would ask a million times, only to find that there was no answer to her problem.

  Rosabelle, having eaten the last morsel of cake, piped up,

  “I hope you have something nice for supper, Dorina, because to be truthful, I am still hungry.”

  “So am I!” Peter came in. “If you ask me, we had a very mingy tea!”

  “I am sorry, darlings,” Dorina replied, “I will try to find something nice for you for tonight.”

  She spoke optimistically, but she had an uncomfortable feeling that the larder was bare and Nanny would say firmly that they would have to make do, mostly with potatoes and a few greens from the garden.

  ‘We cannot go on like this!’ Dorina told herself.

  At that moment Rosabelle, who had walked into the hall, gave a scream of excitement and came flying back into the dining room.

  “Dorina!” she exclaimed. “There’s a phaeton outside which is smarter than anything we have ever seen, and a gentleman, I know it is the Earl, is getting down from it. He has come to call on us – he has, really!”

  For a moment Dorina was still. Then she said,

  “Go and do your homework, Rosabelle, and don’t tell Papa that his Lordship is here. I want to speak to him alone.”

  “Why? What are you going to say to him?” Rosabelle enquired.

  “That’s my business!” Dorina answered. “Just do as I tell you!”

  “But I want to see him, I want to meet him!” Rosabelle protested.

  Because Nanny was out and there was no one else to answer the knock on the front door, Dorina was obliged to do so herself.

  When she opened it, she saw the Earl standing outside looking exceedingly smart and, as he lifted his tall hat from his dark head, she could not help being aware that he was also very good-looking.

  “Good afternoon, Miss Stanfield, I would like to come in and talk to you if you are not too busy.”

  “I have very little time, my Lord,” Dorina said coldly after she had curtseyed, “but please, come in.”

  Rosabelle, who had been standing in the background, ran forward.

  “I know you are the new Earl!” she said eagerly. “I saw you this morning riding in the Park on the most magnificent stallion!”

  “Rosabelle!” Dorina rebuked her sharply, then to the Earl, “I apologise, my Lord, that my sister and brother have been in the Park without your permission. But it was something they were always allowed to do in the past.”

  “Please,” Rosabelle pleaded before the Earl could speak, “may we go there now? It’s miserable just to walk about in the village when we would much rather be in your beautiful, beautiful woods.”

  “I am delighted for you to go there whenever you wish,” the Earl replied.

  Rosabelle gave a cry of delight.

  “I hoped you would say that, but Dorina was very strict with us and said we were not to impose on you.”

  “I assure you, you are not imposing in the slightest.” “Thank you, oh, thank you!” Rosabelle beamed. “I think you are very kind – and a wonderful rider!”

  “I would like to see your stallion too,” a voice said from the staircase and, before Dorina could stop him, Peter came running into the hall.

  “When the last Earl was alive,” he said, “old Hawkins used to let me help him with the horses. He said that I was better than any of the stable lads and a great help to him, but Dorina will not let me go there now.”

  The Earl glanced at Dorina with a touch of amusement in his eyes.

  “I feel,” he said, “that your sister has been somewhat unfriendly. If you were waiting for my permission, please go to the stables as often as you like. I am sure you will not do anything to upset my grooms.”

  “No, of course not!” Peter cried. “And thank you, thank you very much!”

  “And now,” Dorina said severely, “as his Lordship is in a hurry, will you please go upstairs and finish your homework?”

  “It will not seem so dull now that I can go in the Park,” Rosabelle said irrepressibly.

  Dorina led the way into the drawing room and the Earl followed her, aware as he did so that, while she was still extremely incensed with him, at the same time she was undoubtedly one of the prettiest young women he had ever seen in his life.

  Without the unbecoming, plain bonnet she had worn when she called on him this morning, she was wearing a cotton gown which, because it had been washed many times and in consequence had shrunk, revealed the perfection of her figure.

  He thought as she went to the end of the room and turned to face him that with her golden hair and grey eyes she looked like a young Goddess who had stepped down from Mount Olympus to take human shape and bemuse the human beings.

  Then he told himself that he was being fanciful in what was undoubtedly an uncomfortable situation.

  “May I say, before we start talking seriously, Miss Stanfield,” he began, “how charming I find your sister and brother? The former will doubtless in a few years be a beauty!”

  “You mean to be kind to them, my Lord,” Dorina replied, “but I feel, for reasons I would rather not express, that it would be best for them not to be involved in any way with your Lordship.”

  The Earl seated himself in an armchair without being invited to do so and said,

  “Because I find it rather exhausting to keep fighting with you all the time, Miss Stanfield, let me say at once that I have already learnt that you were quite right in everything you said to me. I can only apologise humbly for doubting what came as a complete surprise to me.”

  Dorina’s eyes widened and he knew that she was astonished that he should apologise so fully.

  Then, before she could speak, he went on,

  “I am sure you will be glad to hear that I have summarily dismissed Major Richardson and the woman whom he had appointed as housekeeper and the butler whose name was Carter was dismissed with them. They had all left Yarde before I came here!”

  “I am glad – very glad!” Dorina said breathlessly.

  “Now that I have depleted my household, Miss Stanfield, I can only look to you to replace them as quickly as possible.”

  Dorina stared at him as if she could hardly believe what she had heard. Then she said,

  “Are – are you really – suggesting that I should – find you the people you should employ, my Lord?”

  “Unless you do so, I have no idea where I shall find replacements,” the Earl answered.

  Dorina pressed her hands together.

  “I know Burrows the old butler would be thr
illed to go back and I am sure you can persuade Mrs. Meadows, although she is rather bitter about the way she was treated.”

  “I don’t think it is a question of my persuading her! As you are aware, I am a stranger and I don’t know how I can fill the gaps that have been caused by your revelations which so unfortunately were true!”

  Dorina drew in her breath.

  “I can tell you which cottages Burrows and Mrs. Meadows live in.”

  “I think it would make things very much easier,” the Earl said, “if you would come with me and introduce me to two people who I am well aware know a great deal more about my house than I know myself.”

  Dorina stared at him.

  “Do you really – mean that?”

  “As it happens, I never say things I do not mean,” the Earl said, “and to save my own face I would like to claim I am not often as mistaken about somebody’s character as I was about Richardson. I read his credentials provided by his Commanding Officer and they were very impressive, but I suppose I made a mistake in thinking that a good soldier would make a good Manager. I was wrong and therefore you must forgive me. That, surely, would be the Christian thing to do?”

  Dorina, who had been staring at him as if mesmerised, looked away.

  “I-I think, my Lord, you are laughing at me!”

  “Not really,” the Earl said quietly. “I came here to apologise, and also I have a great desire to put matters to right.”

  “Then I shall be very glad to help you, my Lord!”

  She spoke eagerly. At the same time the Earl was aware from the expression in her eyes that, while she was delighted at his change of heart, she was still condemning him and was, in a way, wary of him.

  He could not explain how he knew this except that to him her eyes were very revealing and, although she was young and quite obviously inexperienced in the world, she had an undeniable personality which was impossible to ignore.

  He had the strange feeling that he could read her thoughts and he was certain that, while she accepted the olive branch where it concerned Yarde, she was still suspicious of him and, although he disliked the word, disapproving.

  He suspected that this sprang from her meeting with Lady Maureen and he told himself that if he was to reinstate himself in Miss Stanfield’s eyes and through her win over the village and the employees, he would have to tread very carefully.