Page 1 of Rivals at Ashmore Castle

CHAPTER ONE

January 1906

‘You will be nice to Miss Rowsham, won’t you?’ Kitty asked.

‘I’m nice to everyone,’ Richard replied, with a hint of irritation.

‘But especially nice,’ Kitty urged.

‘If this is an attempt at match-making, Pusscat, it doesn’t become you. Also, it would have been less blatant if you had invited some more people for this Saturday-to-Monday, and not just the Ravenscars.’ Miss Rowsham was Lady Ravenscar’s sister.

‘I did invite other people, but they couldn’t come,’ Kitty protested.

That made Richard laugh, breaking the tension. ‘Oh dear! Don’t ever go into the diplomatic service, will you? Deviousness is not your forte.’

Kitty didn’t mind him laughing at her. She knew it was affectionate, and she preferred mockery to his recent withdrawn and unhappy air. ‘But, dear Richard, she’s such a sweet girl, and she has a sad past.’

Richard leaned in and gave his sister-in-law a valedictory kiss. ‘So have we all, love,’ he said, and went away. He ran up the stairs, and stopped at the first landing to rub his shoulder.

Alice, his youngest sister, was coming down, and gave him a sympathetic look. ‘Is it bad today?’

‘The damp weather gets into the old war wound,’ Richard said lightly. He had indeed taken a wound in the South African wars, but then the same arm had been injured in a car smash. The second injury was more troublesome than the first.

‘Poor Dicky! I thought you looked uncomfortable at breakfast. Will it stop you hunting on Saturday?’

‘Oh, it’s not as bad as that. When do you go back to school?’ Alice was about to start her second year at the Blackwood School of Art in London.

‘Two more weeks,’ Alice said. ‘I’m really looking forward to it. I’m to join one of Mr Wentworth’s special classes.’

‘Ah, yes, the famous Ivor Wentworth! I must say his paintings are easier on the eye than some of the modern stuff that’s raved about these days. And you’re really going to live in lodgings, not with Aunt Caroline? I can’t believe Giles agreed to that.’

She frowned. ‘It sounds as if you trust me less than he does.’

‘No, I care more about you than our illustrious brother. You have too few legs to interest him.’

‘You’re the one who’s obsessed with cows,’ Alice retorted.

‘Please don’t say that in front of company at the weekend. I’m supposed to be making a good impression.’

‘Oh, has Kitty “had a word” with you about Miss Rowsham? I told her she shouldn’t. I told her you weren’t ready for it.’

‘And what do you suppose you know about it, miss?’

‘Don’t be miffed. Grandmère told me at Christmas you’d had your heart broken. But I think I’d have known anyway. I can tell the signs,’ she concluded wistfully.

Richard’s expression softened. ‘Don’t tell me you have a crush for someone? Won’t he love you back, the villain?’ He had a thought. ‘It’s not that stout lad you danced with at the Shacklocks’ ball, is it?’

‘Bentham Farocean is not stout! How can you say so?’

‘You jump to his defence so readily, it makes me suspect that he’s the one.’

Alice was about to refute it indignantly, then paused. It was a useful misdirection from the real object of her passion – a man everyone would think far below her station. She thought of that line in Jane Eyre: Your station is in my heart, and on the necks of those who would insult you. She imagined herself saying it to Axe Brandom. But Jane Eyre had been a poor female looking higher – it was somehow so much worse the other way round.

Richard was eyeing her curiously, so she had to distract him. ‘Who was it who broke your heart?’ she asked. ‘It must have been someone in London – you never pay any attention to local girls.’

He tweaked her nose. ‘None of your business, Lady Alice!’ And went on towards the library.

Adeline Rowsham knew herself to be a middling sort of girl. She had been neither the prettiest nor the plainest debutante of her year. She had been popular enough, without being one of those shining creatures other girls swooned over – the ‘delicious’ Lady This and the ‘heavenly’ Miss That. There had been a craze for autograph collection during her come-out year, and she had written in the pretty morocco-bound blank books of as many girls as had written in hers.