The Devil Defeated Page 6

  “That is true,” the Vicar agreed. “My wife was a very beautiful Yarde and Dorina is almost a replica of her. Rosabelle has, however, inherited, as I expect you have noticed, the blue eyes and fair hair that run in my family because somewhere far back in our ancestry we had Viking blood in us.”

  The Earl was interested and would have enquired further, but Rosabelle reappeared to say that Dorina had sent her to tell them that tea was ready.

  They went into the dining room and Peter joined them from upstairs, eager to talk to the Earl about his horses.

  As they sat down at the table, where everything was laid out on a clean cloth, the Earl realised from the very little there was to eat that Rosabelle’s story of starvation was not exaggerated.

  There were a few neatly arranged sandwiches, which he was sure that Dorina had cut quickly when he had said he would stay for tea.

  There were the remains of a cottage loaf, a small pat of butter and some plum jam in a glass dish.

  Dorina said nothing, but the Earl was aware that Rosabelle made a grimace when Peter passed the jam to her and he remembered when he was a boy disliking plums simply because there was such a profusion of them growing at Yarde.

  The Vicar, however, noticed nothing. He ate a sandwich absent-mindedly, talking to the Earl about the farmers on the estate and the lamentable fact that there was very little work for the young men of the village.

  “I cannot help feeling, my Lord,” he continued, “that if you could see your way to cut down some of the trees in the woods, which are badly overgrown, or perhaps to open up one of the old gravel pits which have been closed for the last ten years, it would give the boys growing up, as well as their fathers, something better to do than lounging about on the village green hoping that they might have a chance of holding a stranger’s horse if he called at The Green Dragon.”

  “I shall certainly consider it,” the Earl said. “Do you think it a good idea, Miss Stanfield?”

  He deliberately spoke to Dorina, who had been sitting at the top of the table pouring out the tea and making no effort to join in the conversation.

  “I think it an excellent idea, my Lord,” she replied, “if you are really considering doing something. But, of course, you may be too busy with your parties in London, in which case it would be a great mistake to raise everybody’s hopes only to have them disappointed.”

  The Earl realised that she was once again doing battle with him and he replied,

  “I understand what you are saying, Miss Stanfield, and I think it would be a good idea if you and your father could show me on a map those parts of the estate and the woods which you think need attention and the actual site of the gravel pits. As you are aware, I am a stranger to Yarde and have not yet found my way about.”

  He was amused as he realised that, strangely, he could read Dorina’s thoughts and she was trying frantically to think of somebody else who could advise him rather than her father or herself.

  Apparently no one came to mind and he added after a moment,

  “Another thing we should consider as soon as possible is who we should appoint as Manager for the estate in Richardson’s place. I intend to take a very active interest in what is going on, but I shall also need a Manager under me to carry out my orders.”

  “I wish I was old enough to do it!” Peter piped up. “Then I could ride your horses.”

  “I think we might discuss your doing that,” the Earl replied. “At the same time I am afraid that you will have to wait a few years and, of course, make a success of your schooling before I can appoint you to such an important position.”

  He realised that Peter was looking at him with an air of expectancy and excitement and he enquired,

  “Will you come up to the house tomorrow? You can show me the stables and perhaps we can find a horse you can ride when you are not too busy with your lessons.”

  Peter gave a cry of sheer excitement and, because it was difficult for him to express what he was feeling in words, the Vicar said,

  “That is exceedingly kind of you, my Lord, but I could not allow my children to be a nuisance to you.”

  “I assure you they will not be that,” the Earl replied.

  “If Peter is coming to the Big House tomorrow, can I come too?” Rosabelle asked.

  “You will have to ask your sister,” the Earl replied, “but I expect it can be arranged.”

  “In the meantime there will be no treats of that sort,” Dorina intervened sharply, “if your homework is not finished!”

  Immediately Rosabelle and Peter left the dining room and ran upstairs.

  When they had gone, the Vicar went to his study to find an old map of the estate, which he told the Earl would show the place where the gravel pits had been worked for hundreds of years.

  That left the Earl and Dorina alone in the dining room and, as he rose to his feet, she rose too.

  “I want to speak to you, my Lord.”

  “I am listening,” he replied.

  “I know you are trying to be kind and I think too that you are trying to make reparation for what has occurred in your absence, but please, do not think I am being rude when I ask you not to encourage Rosabelle to come to your house.”

  She did not look at him as she spoke, but he saw the faint colour come into her cheeks.

  For a moment there was silence. Then he said,

  “I know exactly what you are thinking, Miss Stanfield – perhaps as I now find we are related, I should say ‘Dorina’. But there is no possible chance of Rosabelle encountering the type of man that was by chance staying with me these last few days and I assure you that he will not be asked again!”

  “But – there are – other men,” Dorina said in a very quiet voice.

  “Of course!” the Earl agreed. “But they will be my personal friends and, I can promise you, of no danger to anyone so young as Rosabelle.”

  He hoped from the sincere way he tried to speak that Dorina would respond, but instead, to his surprise, she said,

  “I am sorry, but I still think it would be a – mistake for Rosabelle to be involved with your – friends.”

  She hesitated over the last word and the Earl thought that she was referring to Lady Maureen.

  Then his instinct told him it was more than that and after a moment he said,

  “Suppose, Dorina, you make yourself a little plainer. What are you really driving at? Whom are you afraid of your sister meeting? Unless, of course, as you have such a dislike of me that you are afraid that I might hurt her.”

  He was being, he thought, almost brutally frank in what he said, but he wanted to startle Dorina into telling him the truth.

  There was a little pause when she looked at him and then looked away again.

  “Tell me,” he insisted, “what you are thinking.”

  Slowly, as if every word was dragged from her mouth reluctantly, she said after a moment,

  “I do not wish Rosabelle to meet – unless it is absolutely – unavoidable – your cousin Jarvis.”

  The Earl was astonished. This was something he had not expected and after a moment he asked,

  “May I ask why? You must have some good reason for what you have just said.”

  “I have – no wish to give one, my Lord,” Dorina said quickly, “and surely it cannot matter to you. My father and I are willing to be useful for the moment, but once you have everything in your own hands, you will be able to manage very well without us.”

  “Perhaps you are right,” the Earl said. “At the same time, as for the moment, we are deeply involved with each other, but I don’t think you can cast aspersions against Jarvis Yarde, who is your cousin as well as mine, without substantiating what you have said.”

  “I see no reason why I should do so!” Dorina said crossly. “All I am asking is that you will help me where Rosabelle is concerned by keeping her away from your house and most especially from those you will have staying with you.”

  “And if I refuse?” the Earl dema
nded.

  Dorina drew in her breath, then she looked at him and he saw the anger in her eyes.

  “For Heaven’s sake!” he cried. “What are we fighting about, and why? I have apologised for the mistake I made in sending the wrong manager to Yarde and I have apologised for what occurred during the house party of people who were not my friends but acquaintances I had made when I first arrived in London.”

  “What you are saying is that they are friends of Cousin Jarvis!” Dorina said.

  “I suppose that’s true,” the Earl agreed. “He certainly greeted me very effusively when I returned last week and was in fact the only member of the family to do so.”

  “That was, I am sure, because nobody expected you back, since you had not notified anyone of your arrival. There are dozens of Yardes who would have been only too thrilled to offer you their hospitality and assure you of their delight that you had at last returned to take up your duties as Head of the Family. But I expect Cousin Jarvis wanted you all to himself!”

  The Earl looked at her speculatively.

  “What has Jarvis done to upset you? Has he made advances to you?”

  “Certainly not!” Dorina retorted sharply. “In fact, I doubt if he knows I exist. But I think, my Lord, you would – be well advised to choose your – friends very carefully in your – new position.”

  She spoke hesitatingly and then added quickly,

  “That is all I have to say! I am sorry that I cannot tell you any more.”

  She walked towards the door as she spoke and would have opened it if the Earl had not reached out first and prevented her from leaving the room.

  “You can hardly expect me to be satisfied with that,” he said. “Be sensible, Dorina! I am trying to find my way out of a maze and instead of helping me you are making things very much more difficult.”

  “I am sorry you should think that,” Dorina said. “At the same time I have nothing more to add to what I have already said.”

  “And yet you are asking me to keep Rosabelle and Peter away from Yarde! Well, you have not made out at all a convincing case as to why I should do so and, until you do, I shall ignore your request, simply because it is unreasonable.”

  “It is not unreasonable!” Dorina contradicted him. “Apart from anything else, you must realise that the way you live is very different from our way of life and it would be a great mistake for the children to develop expensive tastes and expensive ideas that they will never be able to fulfil in their own lives.”

  “You cannot be sure of that,” the Earl objected. “Moreover, I have just been asking your father’s help not only in getting to know the Parishes where I have the duty of appointing the incumbents but also of improving their position economically, which I understand is out of date with what is required of them at present.”

  Dorina’s eyes widened.

  “Are you saying in a somewhat roundabout way that you intend to increase their stipends?” she asked.

  “Where your father is concerned, I intend to do so at once,” the Earl replied, “because I need his help with the other Parsons and I suspect that the needs of each and every individual are different from the others.”

  For a moment Dorina could only stare at him. Then she said,

  “If you really intend to help Papa financially, I can only say ‘thank you’ from the bottom of my heart!”

  Despite her resolution to speak quietly and without emotion, tears came into her eyes and she turned away quickly, hoping that the Earl had not seen them.

  He did not say anything, he only opened the door and went out into the hall just as the Vicar came from the study with a map in his hand. *

  Ten minutes later the Earl was driving back to Yarde.

  As he did so, he was thinking of the very strange afternoon he had spent with Dorina and how much he had learned about his new possessions and the people he employed.

  It seemed extraordinary that there was really no one to guide and advise him as to what was expected of him in his new position, except apparently for a young girl who condemned him for everything that had happened and for which he felt he was not entirely responsible.

  Harry was waiting for him when he reached the Big House and, although in his absence he had been reading, he asked somewhat petulantly,

  “What has been keeping you? I thought you were going to join me, as we planned!”

  “I have had quite a number of problems to deal with, Harry,” the Earl said, “such as I never expected in my wildest dreams when I inherited the Earldom!”

  “I am waiting to hear about them,” Harry laughed, “but I don’t expect they are really insurmountable.”

  “I am not certain,” the Earl replied, “but first, I want you to tell me what you know about Jarvis Yarde.”

  “He is your cousin!”

  “I am aware of that!” the Earl replied impatiently. “I am serious, Harry, so tell me the truth.”

  “Because, as you are aware, I have been abroad for some time,” Harry said, “what I have heard about your relative is mostly hearsay from friends in White’s, who all gossip.”

  “What did they tell you?”

  Harry looked embarrassed.

  “I don’t want to make trouble.”

  “The only trouble you will be in,” the Earl said sharply, “is if you are not frank with me, which is something you have always been in the past.”

  “Very well,” Harry sighed, “if you want to know the truth, he is considered something of a bounder. He was exceedingly delighted when he learned you were returning from Paris to open Yarde House in Berkeley Square. As you must remember, he was your first visitor and might almost be said to have been sitting on your doorstep waiting for your return.”

  “He seemed sincere.” “Of course,” Harry agreed.

  “What do you mean – of course?”

  “You are the Head of the Family, old boy,” Harry replied, “and to all intents and purposes a rich man. Jarvis, I understand, is in dire straits and started borrowing money right and left even before your uncle’s death, which he knew was imminent and, after he had heard of the death of Charles, on the chance that you would be killed in the last few weeks of the war. After that, when the French were no longer firing at us with bullets but with words, he was not so cheerful.”

  “I don’t know what the devil you are saying!” the Earl exclaimed. “How can Jarvis Yarde benefit by my death?”

  “Either you are being extremely obtuse,” Harry said, “or else you have not troubled to enquire, which is more likely, into the position in which you now find yourself.”

  “I am listening,” the Earl countered curtly. “Go on!”

  “If you had looked closely into your family tree, you would have realised that Jarvis is your heir presumptive.”

  The Earl sat bolt upright.

  “I don’t believe it!”

  “It’s true! Just as you inherited rather as an outsider after both the direct heirs to the Earldom were killed, so, unless you produce a son, which is something I advise you to do quickly, Jarvis Yarde will become the eighth Earl of Yardecombe on your death!”

  “And you say he is borrowing money on it?”

  “As soon as your cousin Charles lost his life, Jarvis went to a usurer and obtained not a very large sum, but enough for him to indulge his very unusual tastes in women for a few more months.”

  “Why did you not tell me?” the Earl asked.

  “I think from the way he has been toadying to you ever since your return from Paris,” Harry replied, “you can be quite certain, in fact I don’t mind taking a bet on it, that he will try and touch you for a considerable sum of money within the next week or so.”

  “Then he will be disappointed!” the Earl said sharply. “I have no intention of settling the debts of my impecunious relations until I have calculated how much I have to expend on the estate and on the people I employ in one capacity or another.”

  “A very laudable statement!” Harry said mockingly. “
But I warn you, Oscar, that Jarvis, from all I hear, is one of those insidious creatures, who like an octopus, once he has wormed his way into your life, will enclose you and crush you with his tentacles until you find it impossible to be rid of him.”

  “I have never heard such a lot of nonsense,” the Earl scoffed, “and I don’t believe a word of it!”

  He thought his friend was exaggerating.

  At the same time he could remember all too vividly how he had compelled Dorina to tell him what she was thinking and how there had been, when she spoke of Jarvis Yarde, an undoubted note of horror in her soft voice.

  Chapter four

  When the Earl had left, Dorina went into the small sitting room and sat down to look at her mother’s portrait which hung over the mantelpiece.

  It had been painted by a local artist soon after she was married and, although he was not very skilled in his profession, he had somehow caught the joy, happiness and sweetness that had always exuded from Mrs. Stanfield and which to other people had been infectious.

  Dorina looked up at it and then she said beneath her breath,

  “Should I have told him, Mama? I felt he would not believe me and would think I was making it up.”

  There was no answer and Dorina sat thinking of the strange event that had happened after the old Earl’s funeral.

  A great number of Yardes had come to it and it had been arranged that they should have luncheon at the Big House when the funeral was over.

  Most of them had come from some distance and therefore, as soon as they had eaten and drunk and conversed briefly with relations they had not seen for years, they hurried away in their carriages, coaches and phaetons, so that sooner than Dorina had expected everybody had disappeared.

  She and her father had greeted everybody because they were the only Yardes who actually lived in Little Sodbury.

  Dorina knew that, if her mother had still been alive, she would have played hostess now that the two direct heirs to the title were dead and Oscar Yarde, the new Earl, was in France.

  The Earl had died five months after the Battle of Waterloo, when all hostilities had ceased.