Page 74 of The Mistress of Ashmore Castle

‘Yes, my lady,’ said Rose.

‘It seems ridiculous to keep this great house going,’ Linda said to her mother, ‘if we aren’t going to entertain any more.’

‘There will be callers. And I expect we shall have girls and their mothers to tea,’ said Maud, leafing through the morning’s invitations.

‘But now that Uncle Stuffy’s moved to his club, there’s only the three of us,’ said Linda. Her children were still staying with the cousins, who seemed happy enough to keep them. She hoped they could stay with the Tullamores until they went back to Scotland – and then, ideally, go with them for the summer. The savings would be considerable, which made it all the more galling to her frugal spirit that her mother was wasting money on a house with a ballroom after the ball was over.

Maud looked up. ‘Where would you expect us to stay?’

‘At Aunt Caroline’s,’ Linda said promptly. ‘Richard’s left, Kitty and Alice have gone home, and Giles will be leaving tomorrow, so she’ll have room. It’s such a waste of money.’

Maud did not look up from her letters. She might have said, ‘It isn’t your money being wasted,’ but she didn’t. It was vulgar to discuss money – even more vulgar to care about it. In Linda’s position, she, Maud, would have done something about it, without ever letting anyone know ‘it’ existed. She said indifferently, ‘The house is taken until the end of July, so it doesn’t matter either way.’

Linda thought they would be much more comfortable at Aunt Caroline’s, with her well-trained servants and lavish style of living. And in her mother’s place, she felt sure she could have negotiated a discount for quitting early. She sought for something else to provoke her with. ‘Why is the Prince of Usingen always hanging about us? Are you seriously considering him for Rachel? Because if not, you ought to send him away. I’m sure he’s putting off other suitors.’

Maud turned over a letter without answering.

Linda’s eyes narrowed. ‘Have you had any offers for her?’

This was a sore point with Maud. Rachel’s ball had been a stunning success, and she was obviously a very popular debutante – she never sat out a dance, and constantly had a group of gallants hanging about her. But the flood of offers Maud had expected had not materialised. There had been the expected approach from Mr Freehampton, but he had no money at all, and he put himself forward for virtually every girl who came out, so it was not a compliment. And there had been some sidelong hints from Lord Lansleigh, but he was a well-known trap, a confirmed bachelor who never came up to scratch. As Maud recalled, he had danced with Linda at her come-out. The eligible young men whose offers she would have considered seriously, who had clustered round Rachel like bees around a honey-pot, were not putting their obvious liking into action.

They might, of course, just be taking their time, and there was no absolute necessity to get her off in her first Season; but it always smacked somewhat of failure when there had to be a second. Second-season girls might have to make do with younger sons or even the sons of business people. Still, she told herself fairly, the Season was not over yet. Offers would come in. She just wished she had two or three under her belt already, for insurance. Or even one.

‘It’s early days,’ she said, still not looking up.

Linda was affronted on the family’s behalf, though there was a small, secret and shameful part of her that was pleased, because her own marriage had not been all it should have, and it would have been galling if Rachel, also the daughter of an Earl of Stainton, had done better without a dowry than Linda had done with one.

Maud lifted her head at last. ‘What are you still doing here?’ she asked, irritated. ‘Why do you not go home?’

Linda’s nostrils flared. ‘I am helping you, Mama. I know how you dislike having to take Rachel to all these engagements. I could take more of them off your hands if you let me. You are looking tired—’

‘I am not looking tired,’ Maud snapped, ‘and I do not dislike escorting Rachel. Indeed, it is a very pleasant way to keep up with my old friends.’

Linda knew her mother didn’t have any old friends, but she didn’t quite dare say so. ‘I thought you might be a little more grateful to me,’ she said.

‘You helped me with the ball, but I don’t need you any more,’ Maud began, when the door opened and a footman came in.

‘The Prince of Usingen has called, my lady,’ he said. ‘And there is a telegram for Lady Cordwell.’

Linda took the telegram from the tray. ‘You can go,’ she said to the footman. ‘I’ll ring if there’s an answer.’ And when he had departed, she said scathingly to her mother, ‘The prince here again? If he is going to make an offer for Rachel, I wish he’d get on with it. He’s making the place look untidy.’

‘It is not for you to decide who calls and who does not call at my house. Attend to your own affairs. If Cordwell is so desperate as to send you a telegram, you had better read it.’

With a snort, Linda opened the envelope, began to read, and looked puzzled. ‘It’s not from Cordwell. It’s from Colonel Havering of Frome Abbey, our next neighbour.’ Her puzzlement increased. ‘It just says, Terrible accident. Come at once.’ She looked up. ‘What does it mean?’

‘I cannot imagine,’ Maud said impatiently.

‘Oh, God, I suppose there’s been a flood, or a fire, or something. Or the roof has fallen in. We’ve been expecting that for months.’

But Maud was thinking. If something had happened to the house, Cordwell would have written himself. The message coming from a neighbour suggested he was not able to write. ‘You had better go,’ she said tersely.

But Linda had no wish to return to Dorset. ‘It can’t be anything urgent. I’ll send a reply and go tomorrow.’

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

The train was crowded, and until Salisbury, where she changed, Linda had to share the compartment with four others: a middle-aged woman with two grown daughters, who chattered without pause, and a dyspeptic elderly man, who looked as though he believed women ought to travel in separate carriages. Luckily, the three females got out at Salisbury, leaving behind a magazine. Linda lingered long enough behind them to seize it before she descended, despite the old man’s glaring at her and tutting. There was always half an hour to wait for the branch-line train to Frome Magna, and the latest Tatler was a godsend, though she would never actually have spent money on it.

There was no station at Frome Monkton, and it was a long time since she’d had any horses, which meant taking a cab to Holme Manor. When she stepped out into the station yard, however, there was a carriage waiting, with a coachman who touched his hat and a groom who opened the carriage door for her. She recognised them as the servants of her neighbour, Colonel Havering.