and had cast about desperately for some tenable excuse to return to Hartfield.
Now he had it, and just in time: this irritating obsession he had with possessing her had vexed him long enough. Deliverance from it lay in indulging it until it palled, and that was exactly what he intended to do. So her impending bankruptcy aroused little sympathy for it suited him and need never harm her. She would be well cared for. His women always were.
Dwelling on her delicate beauty softened the hard set of his features. Despite her grief on the day of her husband’s funeral, she had clung tightly to her composure, admirably dealing with her servants and her deranged father. She had dealt admirably with him too. Yet she had wanted him to stay longer and had poignantly lacked the guile to conceal it. Pride had made her try, he allowed with a wry smile, recalling her aloof civility and how sweetly vulnerable it had made her seem.
From the moment he had walked away and into the snow he had wished himself back with her. It was only later, at the Swan tavern, that he’d grudgingly accepted he’d run for cover. No other woman had ever rattled him the way she did, or made him feel simultaneously lecherous and caring.
On hearing another low, private chuckle, Jacob muttered beneath his breath, sprinted ahead up the steps of his master’s magnificent town house and rapped impatiently on the enormous stately door. Turning back, he watched his employer stroll on through the icy mist as though promenading on a summer’s day, hands thrust deep in his pockets, a vague smile about his narrow mouth.
‘It’s fate, that’s what it is. The stars have decided the matter for us,’ Aunt Matilda announced breathlessly on entering the dining room two mornings later.
Victoria enquiringly raised dark brows, while carrying to her father his tea and toast. She placed his breakfast close by him, retrieved his napkin from the carpet, replaced it on the polished mahogany table, then gave her aunt her full attention.
Matilda held out a letter towards her niece, shaking it excitedly. ‘See what the express has just brought. There, read that!’ she ordered. ‘It’s a sign. I swear it is. Charles, if you drop it again, you remain jammy-mouthed,’ she warned her brother as he furtively lowered white linen towards the persian rug.
‘Where are the kippers?’ Charles Lorrimer demanded, through the napkin scrubbing at his mouth. ‘I don’t want this…’ He sent the plate of toast and jam skidding away across the table’s glossy surface. ‘Where is my proper breakfast?’
‘You know kippers give you indigestion, Papa, and the bones catch in your teeth,’ Victoria calmly answered, while reading the letter in her hand. It was from her aunt’s sister-inlaw, Margaret Worthington, and its purpose was to invite Matilda and a companion to Cheapside in London to attend her daughter’s birthday celebration in two weeks’ time.
‘Well, you must go, of course,’ Victoria told her gleeful aunt as she handed back her letter.
‘We must go,’ Matilda stressed for Victoria. ‘You and I now have a reason for a trip to town and the perfect venue to socialise. Margaret has some very influential friends. You must remember her daughter, Emma. Nice enough but a plain little thing. I’ll warrant Margaret must be fair despairing of ever shifting her. She must be twenty-four now if a day. But the girl always was too much of an opinionated blue-stocking…’ Matilda halted mid-flow. ‘Of course! She has probably invited every eligible man for miles around to attend. It will be just perfect for us. You’ll outshine every female there. Margaret will be spitting mad…’
‘Aunt!’ Victoria cautioned, noticing that her father was leaning towards them in his chair, straining to listen, a crafty look crinkling his eyes and mouth. ‘You must go and enjoy yourself, Aunt Matty, but much as I would love to join you it’s impossible,’ she stated quietly and firmly as she noticed her aunt about to protest. ‘I am a recent widow. I know I promised Daniel not to mope and weep but extravagant socialising is too much. Besides, Papa needs me and so does Hartfield.’
‘Well, what you have to bear in mind, my girl, is that this might be your last chance for either of them to need you,’ Aunt Matilda hissed in an undertone. ‘There will soon be no more Hartfield to concern you. Every stick of furniture, every acre and barn will be sold…gone unless you find a man to take it all on. And as for your papa…’ She nodded meaningfully at her brain-sick brother, polishing the dining table with his napkin dipped in tea. ‘How long do you think he will stand the rigours of the parish relief? Or a lunatic asylum, for that matter? Your chubby solicitor suitor has no intention of burdening himself with either of us old ‘uns, you know.’ She gave Victoria’s arm an encouraging shake. ‘Daniel doted on you. He would want you safe and happy. With his last breath he decreed you enjoy your youth. You know that’s the truth. Besides, Margaret is my late husband’s half-sister and it is an age since we met. We are not gadding, simply visiting relations.’
Victoria started awake from her snooze as the carriage jolted. As it slowed a small exclamation of dismay escaped her. But mercifully it picked up speed. If they had halted once again and she had had to endure George Prescott pacing to and fro mumbling and grumbling that he was in a bit of a quandary, she was sure she would have resorted to hysteria.
Her tapered fingers whitened on the battered upholstery of Hartfield’s travelling coach as she leaned forward to blink sleepy eyes at the passing shadowy scenery.
The cottages were getting closer together and there were fewer intervals of wooded countryside—a sure sign that they were approaching the outskirts of the city. They had already lost several hours while Samuel’s uncle had dithered about going this way or that.
As Samuel could not be spared from managing Hartfield or caring for her papa in her absence to drive them to London, he had suggested that an uncle of his, now retired, would be happy to take on the job for a small consideration. A reciprocal small consideration from Samuel’s uncle would have been very welcome: to wit, an admission that the man had not travelled this route either as coachman or passenger for more than sixteen years and that his sight and his memory were useless.
Twice they had turned into narrow lanes leading nowhere. Manoeuvring their small carriage and two elderly greys about had proved arduous and almost impossible.
Twice Victoria had suggested cancelling the trip and returning to Hartfield. Then later in the week they could catch the stage from St Albans and travel to town in a sane and relaxed manner.
Beryl, for her own reasons, had heartily concurred with this. Her aunt had told Beryl to mind her business before impressing on Victoria, with a cautionary wag of the head, that they bear in mind the importance of this trip. Also, that Margaret Worthington was expecting them and would be horrified should they not arrive, suspecting all sorts of devilry had befallen them on the journey. This genuinely concerned Victoria. There was no way a message could speedily be sent to their hostess, who was kind enough to be putting them up for a week at Rosemary House in Cheapside. She was probably even now preparing for their arrival.
When George Prescott had then insisted that he was out of his quandary and into his stride, Victoria had relented. So they persevered towards London but were several hours behind schedule.
She glanced across at her two female companions, one propped in either corner of the creaking carriage, both sleeping soundly. Neither had spoken a word to the other since the clash of opinion about continuing to London. Thereafter, simmering resentment was limited to ostentatiously shifting as far apart as the small travelling coach allowed.
Beryl had sulked from the moment she had learned she would be acting as maid to Victoria and Matilda on this trip. Victoria knew it was not the thought of dressing a head of hair, which she did remarkably well, but the thought of Sally exerting influence over Samuel in her absence. But it would have been impossible to leave the two women together, sharpening their claws on each other while vying for Samuel’s favours. Separating the housemaids was the only option in her absence from Hartfield.
The carriage juddered and slowed. Victoria immediately pulled herself towards the window and peered out. There were two conveyances in front of them now and, on the right-hand side, a row of grimy building tenements.
London!