Page 7

Leonora was disconcerted and felt her cheeks grow warmer. It was considered impertinent to draw attention to someone’s physical size, but he seemed to be quite unembarrassed and she thought she should be as frank. ‘I’m afraid we don’t. But our sporting neighbour, Sir Roderick Fopling, runs a whole stable of hunters. I’m sure he’d be happy to lend you one of his.’

‘That would be very kind, Miss Appleby. Perhaps we could make a visit this afternoon?’ He met her eyes with an enthusiastic gleam.

‘I have a previous engagement so will not be able to accompany you, I’m afraid.’ Her face brightened with a happy thought. ‘But the Foplings are well known to Miss Blythe and her family, the vicar and his wife. I’m sure Charlotte Blythe would introduce you. It would be perfectly appropriate if Mr Fleming accompanied you both.’

The men set off to return to the Manor while Leonora headed for the Vicarage to call on Charlotte. The house had all the charm of its occupants. An old, honeyed-stone building over three floors, with symmetrical latticed windows placed three on each side of a porticoed front door. Late roses of golden yellow still bloomed on the trellis round the door and bees were busy in the red and purple hollyhocks, taller than Leonora. As she walked up the path, Charlotte opened the door, her face bright with the excitement of the previous night. ‘I’m so glad it’s you! Come in.’

‘I can’t stay. I have to get ready to go to Rokeby Abbey. But Lottie, would you mind introducing Mr Lockwood to Sir Roderick Fopling? I hope he’ll be able to borrow one of his hunters. He’s too big for ours.’

‘Of course I will. But what about last night?’ Charlotte could not suppress her curiosity. ‘What do you think of him?’

‘I am pleasantly surprised that he seems to be such a countryman, despite his dandyish appearance.’

‘Oh, no! You couldn’t call him a dandy! He’s just finely dressed, surely? But what about his character?’

‘He seems perfectly amiable and I hope will be an excellent custodian of our beloved Manor estate.’

Charlotte was impatient with Leonora’s prevarication. ‘Of course he will! But did you like him?’

Leonora laughed. ‘He seems well enough, but it’s too soon to say if I like him. More to the point, do you?’

‘Of course I like him. I think him really fine. He fills a room! Rarely do we have the pleasure of any personable young man in our midst.’

‘This is why I think you should at least have a partial Season in Town to meet some other young men and realise the world is larger than Hasterleigh, however lovely it is here.’ Leonora turned to go. ‘Thank you, Lottie, for taking my place this afternoon. I think if you can charm a good hunter out of Sir Roderick, then Mr Lockwood will be happy to set off on his tour of the estate with our bailiff.’

She ran from the Vicarage, aware that she had to hurry if she was going to be punctual on her first visit to Rokeby Abbey.

2

MISS BLYTHE’S WORLD SHIFTS ON ITS AXIS

As Leonora ran into the Manor, she heard the church clock strike once and immediately went in search of Mrs Priddy. The older woman was busy pickling walnuts in the kitchen. She wiped her hands on her apron and looked up with a lively eye. ‘Nora dearest, I do wish you would change your gown and wear something more charming. I don’t like to see you hiding your light under such dowdy apparel.’

‘Oh Nanny P, it’s not a social call; the only person we will see is Stowe. I’m there to tune the piano-forte, that’s all.’ Leonora went to collect her case of tuning instruments, changed her shoes, and found a capacious apron to protect her dress from the dust from the internal stringing of such an instrument. She threw her old green pelisse over the offending plain blue dimity and with Mrs Priddy beside her, walked round to the stables. ‘I thought it easier if we went in the gig. It’s a bit far for you to walk, Nanny P,’ she said, looking down fondly at the small bustling figure by her side.

Martin, the groom, was busy brushing mud from the fetlock of her grey mare when Leonora asked him to harness up Clover, their hack. She handed her elderly nanny onto the seat who then patted the wood beside her. ‘Lucky it’s not far. For someone as slender as you, my love, this is a hard seat to sit on for long. Luckily, I have natural cushioning.’

Leonora climbed into the gig, picked up the reins and they trotted out of the stable yard and onto the lane that led to Rokeby Abbey. She had only ever trespassed in the grounds and glimpsed the buildings through the encroaching woods, but had never actually approached the house from the main entrance. The drive passed through an avenue of overgrown chestnut trees, their lower branches bending to the ground and making it difficult to navigate. As they followed the sweeping bend, the mansion was slowly revealed to them. Leonora could not suppress a gasp. The ancient Abbey ruins loomed over the house, roofless, its great gothic windows empty of glass, ivy falling in curtains down its walls. The desolate atmosphere was intensified by a roost of ravens which had exploded into the sky, screaming their warning to a magnificent osprey circling in the warm air currents overhead.

Mrs Priddy felt Leonora flinch and put a hand on her knee. ‘It’s always had a rather forbidding aspect, but it’s looking more derelict than I recall.’

Leonora drove the horse past the ruins to draw up outside the great house, built against the west wall of the old Abbey. The main wing was Elizabethan with three enormous windows adding elegance to the central section, the many panes of glass glittering like marcasite in the late summer sun. Ancient stone cloisters united the ruined Abbey with its tower at the farther end, and the stone portico round the front door to the house was distinguished by an old yew tree.

Leonora jumped down and walked around to help Mrs Priddy to the ground. Clover stood patiently while her mistress looped the reins over a rusty hook in the wall. ‘I’ll ask if the Rokeby groom can take her to the stables, as we’ll be some time. You have your knitting, haven’t you?’ She pealed the doorbell and both women listened while it echoed through the house.

Eventually they heard footsteps and the locks drawn on the great oak door. It swung open slowly and an elderly man, his face the colour of parchment, stood uncertainly on the threshold. Mrs Priddy walked forward with a friendly greeting, ‘Sam! You remember me? Peg Priddy.’

‘Of course I do, Mrs P. I remember you coming here when the Countess was alive. In better days.’ His face dropped further.

Leonora gave him a friendly smile. ‘Good afternoon, Stowe. I’m Leonora Appleby. The Earl asked me to tune the piano-forte.’

The old man nodded and turned to lead them towards the back of the house, complaining to Nanny P about the state of the property, too long empty. Leonora, following in their wake and full of curiosity, was free to look around. The hallway was dark and cheerless, the ancient oak staircase rising in stately flights to the even dimmer recesses of the upper floors. Dried leaves had blown in and collected in small dusty piles.

All doors to other rooms were closed, which added to the sense of gloom and decay. How she longed to see what lay beyond those mahogany defences. Rokeby Abbey was so much grander than the Manor but lacked the colour, light and life of her own childhood home. And yet Leonora sensed this was a house just waiting to have windows and doors flung open, to be loved again.

She hurried to catch up with Stowe and Nanny P, just in time to see the farthest door opened into a drawing room filled with light. It ran along the back of the house and despite its vast size, seemed a more welcoming space. Five tall windows drew the eye to the overgrown garden with the distant glitter of the lake. Her lake. There were sofas on either side of a great ecclesiastical stone fireplace and the piano-forte stood at the far side in an alcove in the window.

Stowe walked with them towards it and lifted the lid, securing it open with its rosewood prop. A fire burned in the fireplace, which Nanny P eyed with gratitude.