A Hazard of Hearts Read online

  Serena sighed for her cousin.

  ‘We are country folk,’ she thought, ‘the fashionable world is not for us.’

  She thought how it would have simplified things if only she had cared enough for Nicholas to marry him. They would have lived a quiet uneventful life looking after the estate, taking an interest in local affairs and bringing up their children in placid, God-fearing happiness without bothering for a moment about the intrigues, the heartbreaks and the excitements of London.

  Serena found herself almost regretting that she had not accepted Nicholas’s proposal of marriage. It had been generous of him to make her the offer. He had done it for her sake, putting aside his own interests and his love for the Lady Isabel.

  Dear Nicholas! She had refused him because of her pride, her sense of honour and because too she could never for a moment imagine herself in love with or married to her cousin.

  How funny life was, Serena mused. It was almost easier to fancy oneself married to a man one did not know than to someone one had known since childhood and thought of only as a brother.

  The coach suddenly drew up and she looked out expecting to see the courtyard of another inn, but to her surprise they were out in the open country.

  What could have caused them to halt, she wondered and then the door was opened by a footman and the Marquis stepped in and sat down beside her.

  “We are only five miles from Mandrake,” he said, “and I thought I would ride with you the last part of the journey.”

  “That is kind of you, my Lord,” Serena answered, tidying the ribbons of her bonnet and moving a little further into the corner.

  The door of the coach was closed and with a jerk the horses started again.

  “You are tired?” Lord Vulcan enquired.

  “Not in the least,” Serena replied. “It has been an easy journey. Your coach is a very comfortable one.”

  “I had it specially built for speed,” the Marquis answered and then, turning to look at her, he enquired, “Are you afraid?”

  Serena did not pretend to misunderstand him.

  “My Cousin Nicholas has spoken to me of Mandrake,” she said. “He tells me that it is a very wonderful place although he has never seen it. But your mother, my Lord, what will she – think of my unexpected arrival?”

  “It will not be unexpected,” Lord Vulcan replied and Serena fancied that his tone was somewhat grim. “I sent a messenger to Mandrake early this morning to tell my mother that I was bringing you home.”

  “Will she be displeased?” Serena questioned.

  “That remains to be seen,” Lord Vulcan answered suavely. “My mother’s reactions are often unexpected, but try not to be afraid of her.”

  “I will try,” Serena answered and then added a little daringly, “Is she very formidable?”

  “People tell me so,” Lord Vulcan answered with a faint smile, “but they say the same thing about me.”

  “And there they are right.” Serena spoke quickly without thinking and then added impulsively, “I am sorry. I should not have said that. Please forgive me.”

  “There is nothing to forgive,” Lord Vulcan said. “I appreciate frankness occasionally.”

  “That is a good thing,” she replied. “You see, my Lord, I am only a country girl, but ever since I grew older I have been very much my own Mistress. I have said what I thought and done what I wanted and there has been nobody to tell me nay. I am afraid you will find me very unpolished beside your Society ladies.”

  Lord Vulcan turned his head towards Serena again and it seemed to her that for the first time there was an expression of interest in his eyes. He looked at her for a second or two without replying and then at length unexpectedly he asked,

  “Will you make me a promise, Miss Staverley?”

  “If I can,” Serena answered.

  “Then promise me that you will always tell me the truth,” Lord Vulcan said. “The world is full these days of people pretending and lying. Pretence has always bored me and lies I cannot abide. You may hate me, but at least do me the courtesy of telling me the truth. Will you promise me that?”

  “Why not?” Serena answered. “It is a promise that is easy to make, my Lord, for I swear to you that I always tell the truth.”

  Lord Vulcan sighed.

  “I hope you will find it easy to continue to do so.”

  There was silence after this and Serena looked at him sideways under her eyelashes.

  What a strange man he was! For a moment he had spoken to her as if he was interested in what he said rather than in his customary languid manner.

  ‘Is he unhappy?’ Serena reflected and then added quickly to herself, ‘And why should I worry if he is or he is not?’

  The coach was gathering speed as it went downhill. Serena looked through the window and saw that the sun was sinking and the sky was golden with its setting.

  “Are we nearly there?” she asked.

  “You will see Mandrake in a few moments,” Lord Vulcan replied.

  Serena was never to forget her first sight of Mandrake. Half-Castle, half-mansion, its roof and chimneys were silhouetted against a red-gold sky. Hundreds of its windows gleamed a golden welcome out into the twilight and beyond, below and almost around it was the sea – a moving mass of living gold.

  It was all so dazzling that she must close her eyes against its glittering beauty.

  When she opened them again, Mandrake was looming nearer – so vast, gaunt and impressive that she felt insignificant and afraid.

  She heard the Marquis’s voice beside her,

  “It was originally built as a fortification and each succeeding generation has added to it. My family have been here for hundreds of years and all of them have contributed their quota of improvements.”

  He spoke very quietly and yet there was a sense of pride of possession beneath his words that could not entirely be subdued.

  ‘He truly loves the place,’ Serena thought shrewdly and was somehow not so apprehensive as she had been of its overpowering size and magnificence. To Lord Vulcan, strange though he was, this place was home even as Staverley had meant home to her.

  She had one last glance at the sea and the great cliffs and then the coach turned inwards, leaving the coast road so that they approached Mandrake from the North, driving in through wrought-iron gates and entering what seemed like a huge inner courtyard.

  The coach stopped, a footman sprang down to open the door and now Serena felt sweeping over her the tiredness that she had denied. It had been a long journey and apart from that she felt ill equipped to face what lay in front of her.

  She pulled her pelisse around her and stretched out her hand to Lord Vulcan as he waited to help her to alight.

  “Welcome to Mandrake,” he said quietly as she stepped from the coach onto the flagged courtyard.

  Through a pillared portico she could see that a door was open and a row of liveried servants were awaiting their entrance. For one moment she felt sheer panic creep over her and instinctively and without conscious thought her fingers tightened on Lord Vulcan’s.

  “Your maid and your dog will be awaiting you,” he said and she understood that he offered her the only possible comfort in telling her that she was not entirely friendless.

  Gratefully she smiled at him and allowed him to lead her forward in through the doorway.

  The servants bowed, footmen came hurrying forward to take his Lordship’s hat and gloves. A vast hall lit with hundreds of candles, a long carpeted corridor, great banks of hothouse flowers and the feeling that it must all be a strange dream were Serena’s impressions as she moved forward.

  Then suddenly a door opened into a room glittering with light. There were hangings of crimson velvet against green and silver walls, shining iridescent mirrors, huge portraits in gilt frames, more flowers, yellow, white and scarlet and the leaping flames of a welcoming fire.

  “Justin! I did not expect you for at least another hour,” a voice cried and a woman came across the ro
om towards them, a woman glittering and sparkling with the many jewels she wore.

  But however flamboyant her gems, however daring her dress, it was her face which was so arresting that Serena could only stare in astonishment at the Marchioness of Vulcan.

  She had expected someone so very different, but first and foremost someone who was older. This woman seemed almost the same age as her son and it was only when the first surprise was over that she noticed the lines beneath mascaraed eyes and the tell-tale sagging of the ivory throat.

  At first it was hard not to be overwhelmed, not to cry out in astonishment at such beauty, at the dead-white magnolia skin and the deep, almost violet eyes with their darkened lashes, at the perfect oval contour of her face, the exquisitely chiselled nose, her eyebrows dark-winged beneath a square forehead and crowning it all, the amazing, glorious deep-red hair curling naturally at the temples and arranged over her diamond-pierced ears in the very height of fashion.

  “What does this mean?” the Marchioness was saying, speaking quickly and impatiently. “This letter I received from you this morning? I cannot understand a word of it.”

  “It means what it says, Mother,” Lord Vulcan answered, “and may I present Miss Serena Staverley.”

  For the first time the Marchioness looked at Serena. She was tall and Serena had to look up at her. When she did so and their eyes met, she felt a sudden tremor, either of apprehension or of fear, pass over her.

  If Lord Vulcan’s face was inexpressive, his mother’s was the very opposite. In the Marchioness’s eyes Serena saw anger and also what seemed to her a hatred such as she had never encountered in her life before.

  For a moment the two women stood looking at each other and then the Marchioness made an expressive gesture with her hands.

  “Faugh! The whole thing is ridiculous, Justin, and you know it.”

  “On the contrary,” the Marquis replied, “it is a sober fact, my dear Mother, that I must ask you to accept.”

  “A fact that you are to marry this girl?”

  The Marchioness spoke as if Serena were not there.

  “That is still to be decided,” Lord Vulcan answered quietly. “In the meantime Miss Staverley is our guest.”

  The Marchioness turned from him impatiently and looked again at Serena.

  “My son has informed me that you and he are affianced,” she said sharply. “Who are you and where have you met him?”

  That the Marchioness was obviously unaware of the reasons why she had been brought to Mandrake gave Serena a momentary sense of confidence.

  “Your son will doubtless explain that to you, ma’am,” she said quietly. “The situation is not of my making.”

  “What does she mean by that?” the Marchioness snapped.

  “I will tell you everything in a little while,” Lord Vulcan answered. “In the meantime Miss Staverley is tired and would wish to retire to her room.”

  He walked across the room and pressed a bell by the mantelpiece. Almost instantly, as if the summons was awaited, the butler appeared.

  “Where is Mrs, Matthews?” his Lordship asked sharply.

  “She is here, my Lord.”

  The housekeeper came into the room, her black silk dress rustling as she moved, her hair hidden by a white cap.

  “Good evening, Mrs. Matthews.”

  The housekeeper curtseyed.

  “I hope I see your Lordship well.”

  “Well enough. Kindly show Miss Staverley to her room and see that she has everything she requires.”

  “Certainly, your Lordship. Will you come this way, ma’am?”

  The housekeeper curtseyed again and Serena went with her, feeling a moment of utter loneliness as she went out into the great hall. They climbed the stairs, not stopping on the first floor but climbing to the second and going along strange twisting passages.

  “We are now in the old part of the house,” Mrs, Matthews explained as the corridors grew narrow and they kept descending a few steps and climbing another two or three to find the level of the floor. “Her Ladyship thought that you would be more comfortable up here.”

  She spoke in a suppressed manner and Serena knew, as if she had been told so more plainly, that the Marchioness had chosen for her one of the worst guest rooms in the house rather than one of the best.

  “You have a nice view of the sea, ma’am,” the housekeeper said as she opened a door anxious, Serena thought, to placate someone who was obviously his Lordship’s honoured guest, if not his mother’s.

  Serena had an answer ready, but the words went from her mind when she saw first Eudora unpacking a case by the dressing table and then Torqo rushing towards her with his tail wagging in excitement and bounding up and down on his massive paws like an excited puppy.

  “Oh, Eudora, I am so pleased to see you,” Serena said, “and you too Torqo. How did he cope with the journey?”

  “With laudable patience, Miss Serena,” Eudora answered primly and Serena knew from her tone of voice that something was wrong.

  “If there is anything you want, ma’am,” Mrs. Matthews was saying in the doorway, “would you be kind enough to ring the bell? You will, I hope, understand if it takes a moment or two for the housemaid to answer it, for this room is somewhat far away, although, as I have explained, it has a nice view of the sea.”

  “I am sure that I shall be very comfortable, thank you,” Serena answered and then, as the door closed behind the housekeeper, she ran across the room, Torqo at her heels, and put her arms round Eudora.

  “Thank goodness you are here! What a frightening house, it is so big!”

  “It’s more than that,” Eudora answered in her deep voice. “It’s unfriendly.”

  “I know it,” Serena answered. “I had no welcome from his Lordship’s mother, I can assure you.”

  “I have only been here a short while,” Eudora said, “but I sensed at once that something is wrong.”

  “They have given me this room as a discourtesy.”

  “I was aware of that as soon as they brought me up here and the bed has not been slept in for years. I put my hand inside it, felt the damp and asked for hot bricks. They could not get the fire to draw as the chimney was blocked.”

  Serena looked round the room. It was panelled in dark oak, low-ceilinged and somewhat gloomy, but it was as good as any of the rooms at Staverley and the carved oak furniture, if unfashionable, was ancient and doubtless valuable.

  “Why worry about the room?” she asked. “Her Ladyship does not want me and takes a pretty way of showing her dislike. Why should we care?”

  “I care for you,” Eudora pointed out.

  Serena smiled at her quickly.

  “You are a dear, Eudora, but you cannot fight all my battles for me now that I am grown up.”

  “I would if I could,” Eudora murmured.

  “Yes, I know you would,” Serena answered, “but you worry overmuch. You look fatigued. Was the journey a bad one for you?”

  She knew that it was often agony for Eudora to be shaken about in a coach.

  “Not too painful,” Eudora replied. “His Lordship’s valet was most kind and got a cushion for my back. I have made a friend of him, maybe he will prove useful.”

  “I am glad we have a friend at Court,” Serena smiled.

  She spoke sincerely for Eudora made few friends and many enemies. Now the little woman came nearer to her and her voice sank to a whisper.

  “He warned me of the Marchioness. You must be careful.”

  “What of?” Serena asked.

  “He warned me,” Eudora repeated, “but since I came to this house I have needed no warnin’. There is evil here. Evil and danger.”

  Serena put her hands up to her ears.

  “Stop, stop, Eudora. I cannot bear anymore. It has been a vastly disturbing day and I am very tired.”

  There was the sound of tears in her voice and instantly Eudora went to her, uttering soothing noises like a hen clucking to her chickens.

  “T
here, there, my little love, you are tired and why should you worry your pretty head about such things. Torqo and I will look after you. Now sit down by the fire and I will take off your shoes. Give me your bonnet and next your gloves.”

  Serena allowed herself to be led to the fireplace, thankful for the moment to let Eudora forget her broodings in doing more practical things for her.

  When at last she had slipped off her travelling dress and sat wrapped in a soft cashmere shawl, sipping the warm milk that Eudora had fetched her, she relaxed and felt more at ease.

  “Dinner is at eight o’clock,” Eudora said. “I exclaimed that I thought it fashionably late and they said that everything was very up to date here. About thirty guests will dine tonight.”

  “Thirty!” Serena exclaimed.

  Eudora nodded.

  “His Lordship’s valet tells me that it’s the same every night. Numbers of people to dinner and some arrive later and then they gamble until dawn.”

  “Gamble? Here? At Mandrake?” Serena exclaimed.

  “Yes, the valet tells me that her Ladyship thinks of little else. ‘She lives for it,’ he said.”

  “How strange!”

  “There is every kind of play,” Eudora went on. “And oft-times they dance.”

  Serena sighed.

  “I shall be sadly out of place, for you know, Eudora, how much I dislike games of skill and anyway, I have no money to stake.”

  “And a good thing if you ask me,” Eudora said tartly, “for great sums change hands every night. His Lordship’s valet was tellin’ me how the Duchess of Dover lost six thousand pounds the other evening. A gentleman, I forget his name, wagered his coach and horses when all else had gone and would have had to walk home if one of the other guests had not taken pity on him.”

  “Good gracious. It’s a good thing we have nothing to lose, Eudora.”

  “It’s not the right sort of place for you,” Eudora answered ominously.

  Frightened that once again Eudora would begin to express her forebodings, Serena tried to change the subject.

  “Where does that door lead to?” she asked, pointing to a small oak door on the other side of the room.

  “I was told that we could use it as a powder closet,” Eudora answered. “It’s a weird little turret room.”