Learning to Love Read online

  As a bride her face should have been covered and it would have been his privilege to raise the veil when they had reached the Vestry.

  Of course at some weddings it was the practice to kiss the bride.

  The Earl drew in his breath.

  He did not want to think about it.

  It would be best for him to concentrate on the splendid horses.

  They drove on and as there was little traffic outside London, the Earl was delighted with the speed they were maintaining.

  He only wished that John or one of his other friends could be with him as they would appreciate this outstanding team.

  Because he felt he must say something to his bride, he drew in his reins a little and with a great effort remarked to her,

  “These are the finest horses I have ever driven. Have you or your father had them long?”

  For a moment there was silence.

  Then in a voice he could hardly hear she replied,

  “No, I – have never – seen them – before.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  The Earl thought that it was a strange answer to his question.

  He was however busy turning a corner so he did not say any more.

  They drove on in silence until he found that they were close to the Crown and Anchor where Mr. Randon had arranged their luncheon.

  The Earl drove into the courtyard of the inn and ostlers came running to take the horses’ heads as the groom jumped down from his seat.

  Knowing that the horses would be well looked after, the Earl walked round to help his wife out of the chaise to find that she had already alighted.

  “This is where we are taking luncheon,” the Earl announced, thinking he must say something. He supposed that she must know already as she did not reply. She merely walked ahead of him into the hostelry.

  The proprietor was waiting to receive them with so much bowing and scraping that the Earl understood he was very impressed by their arrival.

  While he was talking to the proprietor he saw a maid in a mob cap escorting his wife up the stairs.

  “A private room has been arranged for your Lordship,” the proprietor informed him, “if you’ll please come this way.”

  He walked ahead down the passage and opened a door. The private room was small but comfortable and there was a table laid for two.

  There was also, the Earl noticed, a bottle of champagne on ice and he accepted a glass which the proprietor poured out for him.

  He wanted to ask questions as to how everything had been organised and who had done it, but thought it would be a mistake.

  The proprietor, having handed him a menu left the room.

  When the Earl looked at what had been provided for their luncheon, he sensed that it had been chosen with great care. It was definitely a luncheon far beyond the usual meal that could be obtained in a country inn.

  He thought that one thing about his new father-in-law was that if he did anything he did it well. No one could appreciate more than he did the team of horses he had been driving.

  He finished his glass of champagne.

  He was wondering why his bride was taking so long to join him when the maid in the mob cap entered the room.

  She bobbed a curtsy before she said,

  “Her Ladyship’s compliments, my Lord, and as she’s feelin’ tired she hopes you’ll excuse her not coming down to luncheon. She’s havin’ a little soup in her room and will be ready to continue the journey when your Lordship sends for her.”

  The maid gave her message in a hurried, breathless voice as if she was afraid she might forget what she had been told to say.

  “Will you tell her Ladyship that I completely understand,” the Earl answered, “and I hope she will feel better for the rest.”

  The maid bobbed another curtsy and departed.

  He sat down with a sense of relief as at least he would not have to talk during the meal and the sooner they reached Cariston Hall the better.

  When the food arrived it was excellent and he enjoyed his luncheon and the wine that was served to him.

  When he had finished he called to the waiter,

  “Please bring my bill and ask someone to tell her Ladyship I am ready to proceed on our way.”

  The waiter left the room.

  A few minutes later the proprietor appeared.

  “There’s no bill, my Lord. Everything was accounted for when your Lordship’s luncheon was ordered.”

  “Who gave the orders?” the Earl enquired.

  The proprietor hesitated.

  “A man, I think, my Lord, he was a senior servant, ordered the luncheon and paid for it on your Lordship’s behalf. I hopes it were to your satisfaction?”

  “It was indeed excellent.”

  The Earl was curious who the servant could be and he gained the impression that the proprietor knew little more than he did.

  He tipped the waiter generously and then walked to the courtyard where the groom had already turned the horses round and was looking as if he too had enjoyed a good meal.

  The Earl climbed into the driving-seat wondering how long his wife would be.

  Perhaps she was going to be one of those women who was late for every appointment. If so it was something he would find very annoying in the future.

  However it was only two or three minutes later when Kristina appeared. She came hurrying through the door still wearing her hat with the veil and sprang lightly into the seat beside him.

  The Earl wondered if, in fact, she had not been as tired as she had said, but merely wished to avoid having a meal alone with him.

  But he dismissed the thought as it was most unlikely that a young girl would feel that way for most women were only too delighted to be in his company at a meal whether it was a good or bad one.

  He drove off realising that there was only another two hours to go before he would reach Cariston Hall.

  He had left early yesterday morning in despair and now he was returning in triumph, driving horses that he never imagined in his wildest dream he could afford to own.

  It did occur to him that now he could replenish his stables and perhaps in the not too distant future he would be able to go to Tattersall’s sale rooms to buy some really outstanding horses.

  Then he scolded himself severely.

  There was a great deal to do first with his newly acquired wealth before he could think of indulging his own pleasures.

  A Herculean task was waiting for him at the Hall and it would require time, effort and thought as well as money to set all matters right.

  As he drove on he was thinking that the farmers must come first. He would repair their buildings and see that they had all the livestock they required. They would need new ploughs and new farm machinery for their fields.

  He was deep in thought.

  They had nearly reached Cariston Hall before he realised he had completely ignored his wife sitting beside him. She had not said a word since they had left the Crown and Anchor.

  Trying to make his voice sound as pleasant as possible the Earl informed her,

  “We are nearly home and I do hope that when you see it you will admire my house.”

  He paused for a moment before continuing,

  “I expect your father will have told you that the Hall is in a very bad state of repair. There is a great deal to be done to it as well as to the estate all of which will certainly keep me extremely busy.”

  There was no reply.

  He glanced at his wife wondering if perhaps she had gone to sleep but she was however sitting upright looking straight ahead.

  Although he could not see her face because of the veil, he was sure she was wide awake.

  “The Hall,” he continued, “actually goes back as far as the sixteenth century when the original house was built by the second Earl of Cariston. I have some prints of it which you might find interesting, but of course it has been altered and added to over the centuries. My grandfather spent a great deal of money putting on a new front at
the beginning of the century.”

  He finished speaking and waited for a reply and at last it came.

  In a voice he could hardly hear, his wife replied hesitatingly,

  “It – sounds v-very – i-interesting.”

  The Earl felt he had done his best and could do no more.

  Maybe she was feeling ill or she was disliking the situation in which they found themselves as much as he did.

  All he could think about was the sooner they arrived at the Hall the better and if she wanted to rest, there were plenty of empty rooms available.

  Finally the Earl turned in at the iron gates which were always open because there was no longer a lodge keeper.

  As he did so he felt with a sigh of relief that at least he was home. If nothing else there would be everything that was familiar to welcome him.

  He drove up the long drive.

  The grass on each side needed cutting and was thick with fallen leaves and branches from the ancient oaks. Ahead he saw the lake, the bridge over it in need of repair and then the Hall itself.

  It was still beautiful despite the fact that a large number of windowpanes were cracked and the roof over the East wing had fallen in.

  The Earl drew up the horses outside the impressive front door.

  He notice that the front door was open and there was a man standing just inside and he wondered who it could be.

  It was most likely to be someone from the estate, who would have come as soon as he appeared to complain of more damage or more likely an unpaid bill.

  The groom sitting behind the Earl jumped down and came to his side to take the reins.

  “The stables are through the arch over there on the left,” the Earl told him. “I am afraid you will find conditions are rather difficult, but my groom, Jim, who came on ahead of us, will be able to help you find proper accommodation for this excellent team.”

  “I am glad your Lordship is pleased with them,” the man said respectfully.

  “Very pleased indeed.”

  As he finished the conversation he found his wife had stepped out of the chaise without help and was waiting for him at the bottom of the steps.

  “I think we have made the journey in record time,” he said as he joined her. “Now let me show you my house.”

  When he reached the top of the steps, he saw what appeared to be a smart butler bowing respectfully to him at the open door.

  “Welcome home, my Lord,” the man said, “and may I have the privilege of wishing your Lordship and Ladyship every happiness.”

  “Thank you very much, now will you tell me who you are?”

  “My name is Brook, my Lord,” the man answered, “and Mr. Randon sent me and my wife here, thinking you might find us useful.”

  “You have worked for Mr. Randon?”

  “For seven years, my Lord. We have been travelling with him in America, but when he left England this morning in his yacht he had no further use for us.”

  “Then I shall be very glad to employ you at Cariston Hall.”

  “We will do our best to serve your Lordship in the same way we have served Mr. Randon,” Brook continued. “My wife’s an excellent cook, although of course she’s always had help in the kitchen.”

  “As I expect you have already found, the only people in the house at the moment are a very old couple, the Hunts, who have been looking after me because they have nowhere else to go.”

  There was a hard note in the Earl’s voice as he spoke as he had been forced to dismiss all the other servants.

  The old couple had begged that they might stay even if he did not pay them, as they were too old to find other employment and might be forced into the workhouse.

  They had therefore stayed on doing what they could, preparing his scanty meals and making his bed for him.

  The Earl recognised at once when he looked at Brook that he was a competent man.

  “We also brought with us, my Lord,” Brook was saying, “an elderly maid who was prepared to leave Claridge’s so as to attend to her Ladyship.”

  “I am glad to hear that, and later I will talk to you about the household requirements and decide what additional staff we will need.”

  He thought as he was talking to Brook that he should by rights be consulting his wife.

  So he turned to speak to her only to find that she was already half-way up the stairs accompanied by an elderly woman who he imagined was the lady’s maid Brook had been talking about.

  He thought it a little surprising that she had walked away without saying anything to him.

  “I took the liberty, my Lord,” Brook said, “of putting a bottle of champagne on ice in what, I think, must be your Lordship’s study. Perhaps you would like a glass after such a long journey?”

  “Thank you very much, Brook, that is an excellent idea.”

  The Earl thought that matters were certainly different from what he had expected on his arrival.

  At the same time he could not help feeling a slight resentment. Mr. Randon had organised everything without taking him into his confidence and he would have liked to have expressed his own wishes regarding the new arrangements in his own house.

  He was however only too aware of what a mess the place was in. It had been impossible for the old couple, Hunt and his wife, even to clean out the fireplaces and during the winter he had just thrown a log or two onto the ashes.

  The floors were obviously unbrushed and all the furniture undusted.

  The Earl walked into his study and did not fail to feel ashamed at the torn and worn leather covers on the chairs and the curtains were almost in shreds.

  There was however, as Brook had said, a bottle of champagne waiting for him in a silver ice-bucket that was emblazoned with his crest.

  It was a valuable piece of silver which fortunately – although it had seemed at the time unfortunately – had been unsalable as like the rest of the silver it was entailed.

  Brook poured out the Earl a glass of champagne and handed it to him on a silver salver which he noticed had been beautifully cleaned.

  As he took the glass the Earl said to Brook,

  “Having seen the house and the dilapidated state it is in are you and your wife prepared to stay with me? You know without my saying so that I need servants and a large number of them, to clean the house and restore it to what one might call working order.”

  He thought as he spoke that Brook was doubtless aware without being told that the servants could now be paid and why the house was in such a desperate need of repair.

  “We’re not only prepared to stay, my Lord, if you’ll have us,” Brook replied, “but I’d like to take on the responsibility of running the establishment off your Lordship’s hands. It is what I always did for Mr. Randon, who was far too concerned with his business to have time, after his wife died, to engage servants or to see that they performed their duties properly.”

  The Earl paused for a moment.

  He realised that in a way that he would be sacrificing his authority and that it should really be his wife’s job to run the house.

  Yet as Brook and his wife had been with her father she would no doubt be content to allow him to put the house into proper order.

  The Earl stood with his back to the empty fireplace and thought carefully before he responded,

  “What I want to do is to employ as many people as possible from the villages that I own. There are five of them, the largest one being at our gates.”

  “In that case, my Lord, I am sure it’ll be easy to find the housemaids we require, women for the kitchen, and the footmen who I am prepared to train.”

  “That would certainly be a load off my shoulders, and I am sure that her Ladyship will be agreeable, as I am, to you taking charge.”

  Brook bowed.

  “I will do my best to give your Lordship every satisfaction and I’ll make enquiries immediately as to who is available locally.”

  “Thank you very much, Brook.”

  “If Your Lordsh
ip will excuse me, I will go and see if her Ladyship requires tea. Will your Lordship prefer tea in here?”

  “This is the only room I have been using,” the Earl answered. “I shut up the drawing room some time ago, as you have doubtless already discovered.”

  He had in fact shut all the other reception rooms, as it depressed him to see the dust covers over the furniture with all the curtains drawn and to know the dust was accumulating day by day and there was no one to do anything about it.

  He slept in the master bedroom where his father and his ancestors had always slept.

  Downstairs he only used the study and the dining room and as it was a very large room, he would not have eaten there if there had been an alternative nearer to the kitchen.

  Unless he had eaten in the servants hall, it was the nearest for Hunt, who had rheumatism in his legs, to carry the food his had wife cooked.

  The Earl thought now he could open all the rooms with footmen in the hall as there had always been when he was a boy.

  He could employ a number of housemaids and a housekeeper, who would rustle round the bedrooms seeing that everything was spotless.

  In the past the windows had shone like jewels in the sun and he could remember big log fires warming every room in the winter.

  An elderly servant’s duty had been to keep all the fires burning. He had gone round the house putting a fresh log on each fire every half hour.

  ‘I can hardly believe this can all happen again,’ the Earl sighed to himself.

  Tomorrow he could take a message of joy to the farmers who had been so despondent.

  If Brook was filling the house with servants, he must not forget the gardens. His mother would have wept if she could see the overgrown flowerbeds and the unmown lawns. Weeds had crushed what was left of the flowers in the herbaceous borders.

  ‘Who could have better luck than I have?’ the Earl asked himself again.

  Then he remembered the source of his luck and that she was upstairs.

  He felt a little shiver surge through him.

  It was so intense that he poured himself another glass of champagne, although he knew it was unnecessary to drink any more when he was just about to have tea.