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It took some persuading, but finally she told me. The child of an impoverished Wentworth cousin, she had been in love with the local curate, who professed his love for her as well. Unfortunately, with her emotional storms and petty demands, Great Aunt Zipporah had driven away the last in a string of companions, and Sir Mordecai had declared he would pay for no more fussy females when there was one in the family who should work for her keep. He’d then set about making sure that his desires were met. The church was in his living, so he had threatened the curate with expulsion if he spoke to Patience again. He told Patience that she would be cast out on the streets if she did not agree. Apparently the curate, threatened not only with expulsion, but a complaint lodged against him with the church itself, agreed and relocated to far north Yorkshire, an act which I thought both cowardly and contemptable.
“And you did nothing?” I asked in astonishment. “You simply allowed it?”
She shrugged. Her face was tragic.
“I had no choice. And you have no choice, Clarissa. He will get what he wants one way or another.”
“That’s what they said about King George and his taxes,” I said, the heat of rebellion rising in my heart. “I will never give in, even if I have to elope in the middle of the night. Don’t look so astonished.”
“But how...?”
Desperation sent my mind spinning. I needed an ally.
“There is no reason either one of us have to give in. You can have a wonderful life in America, a free life where you can make your own choices.” That was something of an unfortunate exaggeration, but true when compared to the constrictions of her life here. “Come with me when I leave.”
For a singular moment her eyes flashed with hope, then darkened again.
“It will not be allowed. Not for either of us.”
“I am not asking permission. We did not ask permission of the King to become a separate and better nation. Will you?”
Her face worked with a storm of conflicting emotions, then stolidly she nodded.
“What must we do?”
“We must be of stout heart. I don’t know just what yet, but I will think of something!”
******
It was to my great grief that, by the time we were dressing for the Duke’s party, nothing had occurred to me. Our going had been problematic. At breakfast Sir Mordecai had declared Aunt Lucinda was to send our regrets as he wished nothing to do with the ‘demmed Duke’ only to be unaccustomedly challenged by both Aunt Lucinda and Basil. Aunt Lucinda had long desired to claim the Duke and his Duchess as friends, while Basil appalled me by continuing to insist that the Ducal dinner would be the perfect place to announce our forthcoming marriage.
The gleam in Sir Mordecai’s eyes was terrifying, and as was his later pronouncement to me that I would regret not agreeing with every sign of happiness. I said nothing even as my mind flew frantically in a perfect paroxysm of terror.
Patience, whom I had insisted should accompany us, was performing the duties of maid for me again that afternoon; I refused to allow the ham-handed village woman to touch my best ball gown, a delicate confection of white satin and sarsenet trimmed with tiny diamond flowers which had been packed with such joyous anticipation of a lovely time with my family. I felt such sad sympathy for that happy and heedless innocent I had been. Patience herself looked handsome, if somewhat matronly, in a trim dress of plum silk edged with darker plum embroidery in the Grecian style.
“What are we going to do?”
“I don’t know,” I replied, trying not to wince as her trembling hands pulled my hair. “But something will happen.”
I never expected what.
The drive to the Gersham residence of Hawker’s Rest was not overly long and, had my mind not been fully occupied with the seeming inexorability of my fate, I could have enjoyed the beauties of an English spring. Instead, my mind was full of turmoil. Should I be like Patience and be resigned to the duty everyone else had decided I owed, or should I live up to my American breeding and rebel against such a distasteful and unwanted fate? Should I fight until the last gasp? Would I even be allowed to? Was I doomed to become the next Lady Wentworth of Wentworth Hall, leg-shackled to the odious Basil for the rest of our lives?
In spite of all good intentions, I glanced across the carriage and saw him, staring out of the window, his face a mask. I had hoped that he would go in the wagon with the others, but Sir Mordecai had insisted that he, Basil, Aunt Lucinda, and I travel together. It was, as he announced, the way that things would be from now on.
I shivered.
“Are you chilled, dear?” Aunt Lucinda asked solicitously. She looked like a cat who had been at the cream pot. Was it because my money was going to save the family, or more simply because my presence here gave her an excuse to cosy up to the Duke and Duchess? Either way I felt as if I were nothing more than a pawn.
When her face lit up with something like greed, I knew that we were at Hawker’s Rest. It was a beautiful place, much larger and more stylish than Wentworth Hall. Made of a soft-coloured light stone, it sprawled with comfortable elegance in the middle of a meticulously maintained park, looking much as, in my ignorance, I had imagined Wentworth Hall might look.
Our arrival was suitably formal. Sir Mordecai of course was first, with a simpering Aunt Lucinda on his arm. I was next, of course partnered with a smug Basil. The rest of the party, comprised of Great Aunt Zipporah, Patience, Mountjoy and Edwin, spilled out of the wagon behind us and followed. I had never met a Duke or a Duchess, had never even thought I would, but they looked just as one would think that they should. He was tall and blonde and had eyes of blue, as did his wife, who was as beautiful as a Greek statue. Both were warm in their greetings to me, in direct contrast to their rather formal behaviour with the rest of the family.
“I do hope you will forgive the informality of the evening,” Her Grace murmured, linking her arm with mine. “We are shamefully lax here in the country, but we did want to meet you so badly.”
With the ease of an accomplished hostess, she moved me around the room, introducing me to at least a dozen people. It didn’t take me long to realise that she was deliberately moving me away from Basil. Realising it as well, he did not like being excluded and, through some embarrassingly obvious manoeuvring, always managed to pop up again by my side.
That changed with dinner. The dining table was as long as a ship, and set with a glittering carpet of china, crystal and silver. I was, of course, seated to the Duke’s right, just as Sir Mordecai was to the long-suffering Duchess’ right, at least a league away at the other end of the table. Basil was openly unhappy at being stuck somewhere in the middle; obviously he thought that I could do something about it, because he never took his angry eyes off me. The whole effect was so unsettling that I cannot remember a single thing about what we ate, which I do regret, as it must have been excellent.
