Page 12 of Rivals at Ashmore Castle

‘It’s not that easy. She has her own ideas.’

‘Playing Wily Beguiled, is she?’

‘Let’s say I’ll have to do some hard work to persuade her.’

‘It’s the things you have to work hard for that give the most pleasure,’ Giles said. ‘And as far as I’m concerned, you can have your cows’ tea-shop, if my brother thinks it’s right.’

‘Thank you, my lord.’

‘And good luck with your inventing. I shall be interested to see this machine when you have it working.’

‘That’s years away, but you shall,’ said Woodrow.

At breakfast, Giles looked up from the newspaper as Richard came in and said, ‘Report here says the train crash at Canons Ashmore was caused by a broken rail. It looks as though the heavy rains washed away some of the soil underneath the track, where it curves before the station, and the lack of support caused the rail to crack. Then when the up train went over it, it broke.’

‘Interesting,’ Richard said. ‘Of course, the railway company would be eager to exonerate itself: it can’t be blamed for the rain. But a lot of people have said the train was going too fast.’

‘There’s something about that here, not in the official report but the newspaper’s commentary. Says there’s a speed limit on that curve, but drivers are encouraged to ignore it so as to keep to the company’s timetable.’

Richard grunted. ‘If it scotches talk that the driver was drunk it’ll be welcome. That’s what Shacklock, along with many others, was spouting. A positive geyser of poison. One has to think of the driver’s family.’

‘Indeed. And the down train’s driver was a local man,’ Giles said. ‘Did you know?’

‘I did. Name of Fossey. The Benevolent Society is taking up a collection for his widow. I’ll be glad when they get the repairs finished,’ he added.

The railway was operating on single track running between Canons Ashmore and the next station, Coopers Halt, which inevitably meant delays.

‘The timetable means nothing at the moment, and it doesn’t do to have the churns hanging around on the platform. The station master told me he caught a man absent-mindedly about to throw a cigarette end into one. Thought it was a rubbish receptacle – or so he claimed. I suspect it was one of those idle moments when you think, I wonder what would happen if I did this?’

Giles shook his head. ‘Talking of milk, I spoke to Woodrow this morning.’ He was going to raise the topic of the milking parlour when Kitty, who had been reading a letter, gave an exclamation.

‘Oh, how exciting!’ She looked up. ‘Wonderful news from Nina! She writes that she’s expecting a baby.’

It was a good job that Richard was there to make the appropriate noises because Giles had lost his tongue. He bent his head over his toast and marmalade to hide his face. He remembered that night he had spent with her, how, after they had made love (oh, God!), she had said she had never done it before. He had wondered whether that was the case: she had been married three years to that old man with no sign of a pregnancy. He quite liked Cowling, which was a drawback, but he had secretly hoped the man was impotent, and even more secretly thought it served him right for marrying a girl half his age.

Without wanting to hear anything that was being said, he heard Richard ask and Kitty answer that the baby was due in July. He counted back. It meant the conception was in October.

In October, when he had attended that lecture in London on a whim, having nothing else to do that evening, and Nina had been there. Everything else had unfolded with the inevitability and rightness of music.

She was expecting a baby. She was with child. And was that child…? Surely it couldn’t be…?

He could not bear to keep still any longer. He thrust his chair back, muttered an apology and went out.

He walked, blindly, with no idea of where he was going, no realisation that it had started to drizzle and he was getting wet. She had not written a word to him – well, indeed, how could she? Every letter that came into the house passed through the servants’ hall. Someone would make it known to Kitty and she would ask, in all innocence, why Nina was writing to him instead of her. But she – they, the Cowlings (damn him!) – had spent Christmas at the Castle, she had been in the house all over Christmas, and there would have been opportunities for her to speak to him alone if she had sought them. But she hadn’t.

After that night, they had said goodbye knowing it could never be repeated and must never be spoken of. It was one time to pay for all: beautiful, joyful, sorrowful. The full stop at the end of their story. So of course she would not refer to it, in person or by letter. He had not expected it. At Christmas she had almost ostentatiously treated him like the husband of her friend and nothing else. A common acquaintance. At the time, he had seen the necessity and admired her strength of character.

But now – this!

Damnit, this was different! If she was carrying his child, she must, surely, let him know somehow, even if the pretence was always to be that it was not his, that it was—

The thought halted him.

Unless.

Unless it was not a pretence. When she said she had never done it before, perhaps it was lover’s talk, to make him feel better. Or romantic talk – yes, she had said, ‘Not like this.’ Which could mean anything. Which could mean never with these sensations, not as I love you. But there was no knowing that Cowling had not been exercising his marital rights all this time – indeed, why would he not, with a young, desirable wife like Nina? Had been exercising them, and she had simply not ‘caught’ before, which could happen to anyone.

She had gone back, after that one night together, to her lawful married husband, who had all the opportunities in the world to bring about the ‘wonderful’ situation, what Kitty had called ‘so exciting’.