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“That is enough, Clarissa! You are a Wentworth, and my only direct descendant. This is Wentworth Hall and is now your home. You are my granddaughter, and I will do what is best for you, no matter how sadly your father disregarded his heritage and his responsibilities. Now I will hear no more about it.”
Even I, so brand new to the family, knew that however I felt, the subject - for now, at least - was indubitably closed.
“For the moment,” I dared to say and garnered a quiverful of sharp glances from the assembled gathering. “Now I need to know how much money to give you.”
He glared at me.
“Money? For what?”
“For Saracen. I told you I would purchase him.”
Our eyes locked with the ferocity of clashing swords.
“Saracen is sold to Stanhope.”
“No longer.” Deliberately pausing, I took a bite of an awful looking mess of what appeared to be fish and some sort of grain. It was terrible, worse tasting than anything you might find in the quarters. I would not even feed this strange concoction to my dogs. “If you remember, he withdrew his offer when I promised to outbid any offer you might receive.”
“Such behaviour is simply not acceptable,” snapped Aunt Lucinda. “Surely such unladylike carryings-on are not the norm in your precious benighted America. Here ladies behave properly instead of acting like common horse copers!”
“A good horse coper is hardly common,” I said with an unwise touch of humour. While the situation was hardly conducive to laughter, humour was a better choice than the ragings of temper I felt rising in my breast. “Now, Sir Mordecai, please give me a figure so that I can write to Coutt’s Bank to see the money transferred.”
“Just what are you going to do with such a beast?” asked Great Aunt Zipporah in scandalised tones.
“As I said earlier, I intend to take him back to South Carolina, where I will ride him as well as put him to stud. If he foals true, he will be a wonderful addition to our stable.”
“Such vulgar language, and at the breakfast table, too!” Great Aunt Zipporah moaned, fanning herself with her handkerchief. “This is what comes of her father going into trade!”
“Our niece seems determined to flaunt her common upbringing,” Aunt Lucinda muttered.
“I will not hear of such,” Sir Mordecai rumbled. “Such goings-on are not acceptable for a lady and especially not for a Wentworth!”
“Then why not sell Saracen to Stanhope,” I said. It was a battle to keep my voice soft and my words civil. “I will then purchase the beast from him. With the hundred pounds profit.”
“Enough!” Sir Mordecai’s roar made the chandelier rattle. “I will hear no more, miss! You will do as you are told.”
I was ready to join in full battle, and most unwisely would probably have done so, had not the dining room door opened and a vision walked in.
“Gracious,” said the vision, hovering half in and half out of the dining room. “Have I come at an infelicitous moment?”
Perhaps Stanhope was the handsomest man I had ever seen, but this creature was surely the prettiest, with delicate features, white-gold hair carefully and most artificially arranged, and a slim, lithe body that could almost be called frail. A cherub come to life. A heavenly being in mortal clothes. And, I thought with an unnatural cynicism, he most certainly knew it, striking a careful pose using the doorway as a frame as if he were a painting by a master.
“Edwin! You have come!” Great Aunt Zipporah cried with an almost girlish glee, holding out her arms.
Edwin crossed the room with a graceful mincing gait, took both the older lady’s hands and bestowed lover-like kisses on the back of each before bending to place another on her withered cheek which, under such attentions, was blushing like a schoolgirl’s.
“Clarissa, I want you to know my nephew Edwin Draycott, grandson of my late husband’s dear brother.”
Great Aunt Zipporah spoke with a reverence and an excitement which would not have been out of place had she been announcing the Prince Regent.
Edwin went around the table to come to my side, then without permission picked up my hand - which I had not extended - and on the back planted a much longer and more serious kiss than those he had bestowed on his aunt. “My dear cousin Clarissa,” he murmured. “You are even more lovely than the joyous news of your arrival suggested.”
“You are too kind, sir,” I murmured and surreptitiously reclaimed my hand. I longed to wipe it on my napkin, as his palms had been unpleasantly damp, but with everyone’s eye on me did not dare.
No, not everyone’s eye. Sir Mordecai and Mountjoy were both staring at the newcomer, displeasure writ on their faces.
“Back again, Draycott?” asked Sir Mordecai, his face a thundercloud. I was truly beginning to wonder if he possessed only variations of this expression. “Have you now made this your place of residence?”
“Sir Mordecai, surely you do not begrudge me a visit from my only nephew?” cried Great Aunt Zipporah, her lower chins wiggling in a signal of incipient tears.
