Wish for Love Read online

  Then she remembered that hidden away in a drawer in Jeremy’s bedroom was the pretty black embroidered bag that he had stolen from Lady Coddington, and felt exceedingly uncomfortable.

  She told herself that only by making the Earl and his sister feel at home could she somehow erase a little of her guilt.

  When dinner was finished, Lynne without asking her went up the stairs and Mariota guessed she was going to see the Earl.

  “You are not to talk to him for too long,” she said warningly. “He had a headache today and Dr. Mortimer says he must rest and sleep as much as possible.”

  “You have said that before,” Lynne replied, “but you cannot be so selfish, Mariota, as to want to keep such an attractive man all to yourself.”

  “I am not trying to do that.”

  “Of course you are!” Lynne argued. “You are behaving like an old goose with only one chick. I am not going to take him from you, I just want to talk to him.”

  As she finished speaking, she looked back and saw the expression on her sister’s face and added quickly,

  “I am sorry, Mariota. I was only teasing, dearest, and if you want to know, I feel quite certain he has fallen in love with you.”

  “What do you – mean?” Mariota asked in a voice that did not seem like her own.

  “It’s all the little things he says and, dearest, if he does ask you to marry him, think how wonderful it would be for all of us!”

  “I think you are crazy!” Mariota said as they reached the top of the stairs. “How can you imagine for one moment that the Earl – who is so important – so grand, would look at me?”

  She gave a little laugh that was rather mournful.

  “Have you any idea what I look like compared to his sister in this gown I have worn for three years and which is now too tight for me? And it is difficult after so many washes to know what its colour was in the first place.”

  “Yes, I know, dearest,” Lynne said, “but you are very lovely. Papa thinks so too.”

  “How do you know that?” Mariota asked.

  “I asked him one day if he did not think I was pretty and he replied, ‘very, and I am a good judge! But as Mariota is so like your mother, you will never be as beautiful as she is’.”

  Mariota looked at her sister in astonishment.

  “Did Papa really say that?”

  “I promise you he did, and so, Mariota dear, make a little effort to make the Earl feel the same or if you are not careful I shall try to marry him myself!”

  As Lynne made the last remark with her eyes twinkling, she ran ahead of Mariota and whisked into the Earl’s bedroom before her sister could catch up with her.

  But Mariota was not trying to.

  She was standing still in the passage thinking for the first time that the Earl was actually part of her Fairy story.

  And her heart told her it was a very big part.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  “I suppose,” Lynne said, as she helped herself to another piece of peach-fed ham, “that when the Earl leaves we shall go back to rabbit, rabbit and rabbit!”

  Mariota did not answer and Lord Fordcombe was also engrossed in his thoughts.

  “It will be very dull,” Lynne went on, “and as soon as I am old enough I am going to find a man for myself who looks exactly like him.”

  “In the meantime,” Mariota remarked with a slight edge to her voice, “if you don’t hurry with your breakfast, you will keep the carriage waiting and you know that annoys the Squire.”

  “He has not a horse in his stable as good as the one that belongs to the Earl,” Lynne said, “so yesterday I asked his Lordship if I could ride one of his horses and he is having one sent here for me at the weekend.”

  “Lynne!” Mariota exclaimed. “I have told you before, you are not to ask the Earl for presents of any sort.”

  “He is only lending me a horse,” Lynne replied. “You can hardly call that a present.”

  “I am determined we will not impose ourselves on him.”

  “Well, if you ask me, he has imposed himself on us,” Lynne argued. “And if anybody deserves a present, it is Papa because it’s his house and the Earl is causing a great deal of commotion by staying here.”

  Lynne spoke defiantly, but she looked so lovely as she did so that Mariota knew it would be difficult for anybody to be angry with her for long.

  At the same time she thought again that the Earl had disrupted their quiet life and it was a mistake from Lynne’s point of view.

  As if he was suddenly aware what his daughters were discussing, Lord Fordcombe came out of his reverie to ask,

  “How is his Lordship this morning? I was a little worried about him yesterday.”

  “He had one of his bad headaches, Papa,” Mariota replied, “because he would get up when the doctor advised him against it. So after he had sat at the window for an hour he was quite happy to crawl back to bed.”

  “Good!” Lynne exclaimed. “That means he will not be leaving for some time. I heard Dr. Dawson say that it was fatal for people who have suffered from severe concussion to rush about too soon.”

  Mariota knew that this was true and she also felt glad, although she was ashamed to admit it, that the Earl would not be well enough to leave as quickly as he had expected to.

  “The doctor will be here soon, Papa,” she said. “He told me he would make this one of his first calls.”

  Her father quickly looked at his watch.

  “I shall not wait about for him, Mariota,” he replied. “If he wants to see me, he can come to the study but, as you know, I am busy.”

  “Yes, of course, Papa.”

  Lynne finished her last mouthful of ham, then said regretfully,

  “I suppose I had better go. I would like to eat a peach, but I am sure the carriage is outside.”

  “I am sure it is,” Mariota agreed, “and you can have a peach tonight, when you return.”

  Lynne rose from the table and then impulsively she flung her arms around her sister’s neck.

  “I am sorry if I was disagreeable, dearest,” she said. “You are so wonderful in all you do for us and sometimes I am a pig to you!”

  “I understand,” Mariota smiled, “and hurry or perhaps the Squire will refuse to send the carriage for you in future and you will have to ride to The Grange very very slowly on Firefly.”

  “I would rather walk,” Lynne exclaimed, “it would be far quicker!”

  She ran from the room as she spoke and Mariota knew that she would pick up her bonnet from the hall and be tying it on her golden hair as she ran out of the house and down the steps.

  ‘Lynne has been lucky,’ she told herself. ‘Elaine Fellows likes her and the Squire has been kind enough to let them do lessons together. If we had to pay for Lynne’s education I cannot think where the money would come from!’

  She had the uncomfortable feeling that if there were no Governesses for Lynne, she would have to teach her and so would her father and she knew how much he would resent having to give up the time from his book.

  All the same he had seemed quite eager to lay it aside when Lady Coddington came and, she thought a little wistfully, that since the Earl’s arrival her father had not consulted her as he usually did or shown her what he had written.

  Then she told herself that as soon as they were back to normality her father would need her as much as everybody else did. At the same time things would never be exactly the same again.

  She cleared the breakfast dishes and carried them into the kitchen for Mrs. Brindle to wash up.

  Then she hurriedly went to the drawing room to dust it, take away the flowers that were beginning to droop and to know, however many other things there were to do, she would have to go into the garden and pick some more.

  “I hate a room without flowers,” her mother had said once. “It looks unloved and to me flowers always mean love.”

  “I suppose that’s true, Mama,” Mariota agreed. “We give flowers to people when they are happ
y, like when they are married and flowers to remember them when they are dead.”

  “There are far too many flowers at funerals,” Lady Fordcombe had replied. “I have always believed that we should give flowers to people when they are alive to show we love them and, when they are dead, I am sure they have enough flowers in Heaven.”

  Mariota had laughed.

  “That’s a lovely idea, Mama, but think how upset everybody in the village would be if our wreath was not on top of the coffin.”

  Now, she thought, she must pick flowers not only for the drawing room but also for the Earl’s bedroom.

  She knew it might not be possible for him to come downstairs today and the flowers would cheer him up, making the King’s room look beautiful and smell fragrant.

  It struck her that in his own house and certainly when he was staying with the Duke, there would be huge vases of flowers from the greenhouses, perhaps orchids and malmaison carnations that her mother had told her were to be seen in all the great houses in London.

  He would therefore not be impressed by the flowers in the garden outside, which without being tended and cared for were almost wild.

  ‘I suppose,’ Mariota reasoned, ‘that is what Lynne and I look like to him too, country girls who, although pretty, are just like weeds compared to the exotic beauties he is used to in London.’

  It was almost a pain to have such thoughts.

  Then, because she felt that she wanted him to deny it was so, she ran into the garden to fill the basket her mother had always carried with every flower that was in bloom.

  She arranged several vases and thought they really looked very pretty, before she went upstairs with two that she had specially prepared.

  Hicks came to the Earl’s bedroom door and she asked,

  “How is his Lordship? May I bring these in?”

  “His Lordship will be pleased to see you, miss,” Hicks replied.

  But Mariota had the idea that there was a warning note in his voice and the Earl was not in a good temper.

  He was sitting up in bed and he looked, she thought, extremely handsome, while there was no doubt that the bruise on his forehead was gradually fading from black to pale blue and brown.

  She saw, however, that there was a hard line around his lips and his blue eyes looked unusually stormy.

  Then he saw her and to her surprise he smiled and she felt as if the sun had come out.

  “Good morning, my Lord.”

  “Good morning, Mariota. I see you have very kindly brought me some flowers.”

  “I know you are unable to go into the garden today, so if Mohammed cannot go to the mountain, the mountain must come to Mohammed!”

  The Earl laughed.

  “I am feeling very cross.”

  “I thought you would be, but Dr. Dawson will be delighted that he was right, and you were wrong.”

  “I am fed up with being an invalid!”

  “The old people in the village always say, ‘you must make haste slowly’, and that is what you have to do.”

  “Are you preaching at me?”

  “Of course,” Mariota smiled. “Could I resist such an opportunity? I have the feeling, my Lord, that you are always right and everybody tells you so.”

  “I get the message,” the Earl said. “This is a salutary lesson for me. It will teach me not to be so sure of myself in the future.”

  “I hope it won’t.”

  The Earl raised his eyebrows and she said,

  “I think people who are leaders always have to be sure of themselves before they can make other people follow them.”

  “Do you think people follow me?”

  “I am sure they do.”

  The way she spoke made the Earl glance at her before he enquired,

  “Have I been playing a part in one of your dream-stories, Mariota?”

  Because the question surprised her, she blushed and, as he watched the colour come into her cheeks, he thought it was very lovely.

  There was a little pause before he added,

  “I have been dreaming too, Mariota, and I would like to see you gowned fashionably and looking like you do in my dreams.”

  He spoke very softly and for a moment Mariota was almost mesmerised by what he was saying.

  She could see herself in one of the high-waisted gowns that she knew were the fashion, trimmed with lace or flowers round the hem to match the puffed sleeves and the elaborate bodice.

  It was, of course, Lynne who learnt what the fashions were from Mrs. Fellows, and brought home The Ladies’ Journal and other magazines for Mariota to see the type of clothes they should be wearing.

  They had not the slightest chance of ever possessing such exquisite creations, but at least, Mariota consoled herself, it cost nothing to look and to dream.

  Now, as if the Earl knew what she was thinking, he said,

  “One of the presents I intend to give to your father will be gowns for you and Lynne. So if you will give me your measurements, I will send to London and order them, whether you will allow me to do so or not.”

  He spoke in a manner that revealed he was aware she was going to be difficult.

  She came back from her dream to reality.

  “You know we could not – accept clothes from – you,” she said because she knew it was expected of her.

  “Nonsense!” the Earl replied. “I shall explain to your father that they are part of the expression of my gratitude for being an unexpected, uninvited guest for so long and I am sure he would not refuse my gift.”

  Before Mariota could say anything he went on,

  “Of course you can always throw them away or give them to a beggar in the village.”

  She laughed.

  “Can you imagine anybody in the village walking about in a fashionable gown? They would be put in the stocks because everybody would think they had gone mad!”

  “All the same you must promise me you will wear the gowns I intend to give you,” the Earl said firmly, “and quite frankly, Mariota, I don’t feel well enough to have an argument about it.”

  “Your head is hurting you?” she asked quickly in a different tone.

  “I shall certainly have one of my headaches if you oppose me.”

  She looked at him for a moment, her grey eyes searching his face.

  Then she said,

  “I have a feeling that you are not only blackmailing me, but also getting your own way by the most underhand, sneaky and unsportsmanlike means!”

  The Earl laughed.

  “Then you accept that I shall have my own way with or without your consent!”

  “I suppose so,” Mariota murmured. “And it would be – wonderful to have just – one fashionable gown!”

  “Then give me your measurements. I will give them to my sister who will convey them to my secretary who is waiting for his orders at Madresfield.”

  “Your secretary is travelling with you?”

  “I seldom go anywhere without him and at this moment when I need so many things, he is waiting there.”

  “But surely – he should be here – with you?”

  “I did not dare to suggest it,” the Earl replied. “I have already foisted myself and Hicks upon you and, as you will not let us pay for our board and lodging, it would be an impossible burden to add a secretary and several grooms to my entourage.”

  Mariota looked embarrassed.

  She was aware that his groom came over every day from Madresfield to look after the stallion and to exercise him.

  She had never thought of suggesting that he might stay at Queen’s Ford, but she thought now it was what she should have done.

  It was only because she was so ignorant of the manner in which anybody as important and as wealthy as the Earl would travel that it had not crossed her mind.

  “I-I am sorry,” she said after a moment.

  “Forgive me,” the Earl replied. “I was really only teasing. I am very comfortable and everything is perfect as it is.”

 
“I am afraid that’s not true,” Mariota said unhappily. “I am very ignorant of the way that you and your friends live, but I know that the Duke is very grand and everybody talks about the parties he gives at Madresfield.”

  There was a wistful note in Mariota’s voice, which the Earl did not miss and he said,

  “As soon as I am well enough, you shall have a party, but not at Madresfield.”

  “No, definitely not at Madresfield.”

  “Why not?”

  “Papa would not let me accept the invitation, even if I received one from the Duke, because it would be impossible for us to entertain him in return,” Mariota explained. “But why should you not want me to go there?”

  She thought the Earl would have some easy explanation, but to her surprise he looked away from her with a frown between his eyes.

  Because he had obviously no intention of answering her question, he said,

  “Have the newspapers come? I want you to read to me about what is happening in Parliament, for I think it is a mistake for me to tire my eyes after the way they ached yesterday.”

  “Yes, of course I will read to you,” Mariota agreed eagerly.

  One of the delights of having the Earl in the house was that Hicks had ordered every daily newspaper and also a number of sporting magazines that he said the Earl always read.

  While he was having his headaches, Dr. Dawson had forbidden him to read and Mariota had read to him aloud everything he had asked her to.

  She had also gone on reading the newspapers while he slept and found an answer to so many things she wanted to know, besides being fascinated by what was happening in the world outside Queen’s Ford.

  Lynne had found the sporting magazines boring and begged Hicks, when Mariota was not listening, to purchase some of the ladies’ magazines for them.

  Mariota had been angry when they arrived, but when Hicks had explained that the Earl always bought them at his house in the country when he had lady guests staying there she had not made him cancel the order as Lynne had feared she might.

  She could not bear to spend any of the precious sovereigns that Jeremy had left her on anything so frivolous.