The Peculiar Folly of Long Legged Meg Read online

  "Before he died," she continued, "your father said to me: Persephone, I ask of you only one thing. To guard and guide Honoria in any way that you can. And I swore, there and then, while that dear man lay upon his deathbed, that I would uphold his wishes."

  Albert lowered his arm slowly to the table, the spoon's purpose postponed further.

  "I took this vow to mean in matters of the heart, as well as any other," she added. "I, after all, have some experience of these torments, having lost two husbands I adored."

  The only response to this impassioned plea was a frigid sigh, little more than a breath one might exhale upon pinching one's finger in a well-sprung gate hinge. But Persephone waited patiently, familiar with her stepson's lack of animation and the slow, unenthused tempo with which he digested anything she ever said. As if he might have some reason to be suspicious of her motives and think her a woman of wicked cunning. Which she most certainly was not. Three quarters of the time.

  He studied the spoon in his hand, and then the boiled egg nestled in its little silver cup. One by one, the items on the table before him received a thoughtful scrutiny, while the dowager marchioness waited, somehow restraining herself from beating him about the head with her leather gardening gauntlets, trying desperately to remember her place. She might be his father's widow, and thus entitled to a degree of respect from the very proper marquess, but she was, in fact a year younger than he, and that always caused a certain friction in their debates.

  He suddenly raised his napkin now in his left hand, but it was not to wipe his lips. Apparently a slight bubble of inconvenient wind, like a mischievous squirrel, had nibbled its way up inside his trunk and must now be disposed of, somehow, in that silent room. He gave what was almost a wince, his cheeks coloring slightly in the effort of maintaining decorum.

  "Good heavens, Albert, don't try to stifle it. You'll develop an ulcer," she warned. "One hearty belch would do you the world of good. Should I bring you some of my stomach powders? You know they are very effective. Your dear father swore by them."

  But the dark hollows, peering at her above his napkin, appeared to suggest that any ulcer he might suffer could be blamed solely upon her presence.

  When he finally struck the shell of his boiled egg, it was with just a little too much force, and the yolk spurted out onto the cuff of his coat. Much to his stepmother's amusement, a change was finally wrought to Albert's physiognomy, as he gazed at the new, brilliant gold trimming to his coat sleeve.

  It was quite beyond her to resist a jaunty, "Oops. That's sure to stain."

  At this point, Albert's wife decided to assert herself shrilly into the conversation without having listened to most of it. With her plate filled from the chafing dishes on the sideboard, she lowered herself grandly to a chair across the table and exclaimed, "Of course my husband wants the best for Lady Honoria. That is without question. So is the fact that, as her elder brother, it is his place to decide what constitutes a good match."

  "That's what I am afraid of," Persephone muttered into her coffee cup.

  The younger woman bristled. "And what, pray tell, is that supposed to mean?"

  "Like most things I say, it is nothing of any import to you, I'm sure, Minty dear."

  "I have asked you before, many times, not to call me by that dreadful sobriquet! My name is Araminta. It is disrespectful to shorten it in such a fashion. Minty, indeed! Albert, I wish you would tell her."

  The dowager marchioness set down her cup and looked innocently at her daughter-in-law. "But we are family, my dear." She stirred more sugar into her coffee. "Folk call me Persey all the time. It is a term of affection and if it puts people at their ease in my presence I do not object to it."

  "But Persey does not have the connotation of a humbug!"

  Persephone quickly looked down at her lap, clutching a napkin to her lips, for fear of exploding with laughter.

  "My stepmama," Albert finally intoned with grave formality, "has a distressingly informal manner, applied to everything she does. It amused my father greatly and so it was never discouraged, but rather the opposite."

  "And now we reap the consequences by having so much grievous laxity about the place," his wife exclaimed, adding smugly, "But that will change now."

  Albert inclined his head a half inch. "Since I inherited the marquessate I have done what I can to steer the place with a firmer hand— something that my lord father relinquished in his latterly years, when self-indulgent pleasures often overcame his duty to efficiency and responsibility."

  "As one of those decadent pleasures, I suppose you'd be rid of me if you could, Albert dear," his stepmother remarked, not entirely in jest. "Pension me off somewhere, even farther away than the lodge. Erase all sign of my short reign at your father's side altogether."

  He gave a pained sigh. "My lord father found good in you, Persephone, and I know you are a woman of mostly decent intentions." Here his wife exhaled a skeptical snort of great dimension, but he did not look at her and continued addressing his stepmother. "Your efforts on behalf of the parish sick are much to be commended. And I must admit that, despite the difference in your ages and my own doubts when he first brought you here, you made my lord father's last six years enjoyable. I make no argument with that. I simply wish you would now take your new place as his widow, satisfy your need to meddle with those worthy missions you have taken on about the village, and leave me to manage my sister and other matters of the estate."

  "But that is just it, Albert. Honoria is not a matter of the estate! She is not an overgrown yew tree hedge, a crumbling wall, or a portrait in need of restoration. She is your sister, a young woman with a beating heart and deep feelings. She is desirous to marry for love."

  Unlike you, she might have added, but thought better of it. Her daughter-in-law watched and listened at that moment with the sharpened senses of one determined to find fault, and Minty had a habit of contriving sly, effective ways to get her vengeance if she thought herself slighted. For example, a few pretty pieces of furniture, including a dressing table painted with doves and lovebirds, had recently been removed from the dower house because Minty must have them and they were, in her words, "not suited for an older woman."

  "My sister knows she has a duty to marry well, and I'm sure she wishes to please me," Albert replied, pushing his disappointing egg aside. "There are two suitors I have deemed acceptable. I cannot see why she needs a greater choice than two. Indeed, she is fortunate to have the indulgence of a choice at all. When a young girl is given too much variety in life, the likelihood of making a dire mistake is increased."

  "But I'm afraid Honoria has considered both those gentlemen that you were so kind as to offer her— has considered them at length— and she cares for neither enough to marry."

  "And why, pray tell, does she not come to me herself with this news?"

  "Because she adores you, Albert, and does not want to let you down. She dreads your disapproval."

  He rolled his eyes toward her as if they were heavy in their sockets. "So she thought you would serve as a better, more agreeable messenger of this news?"

  Persey chuckled softly. "Your sister knows I am already dented and bruised. She bears me before her like a shield that has withstood too many blows. One more can hardly damage me."

  There was, very nearly, a smile from the marquess. Or perhaps it was simply another swallowed belch. Whatever it might have been, the expression was aborted in the next moment when Araminta scraped her fork tines across her plate and her voice across their nerves at the same pitch.

  "Your sister is an ungrateful chit who cannot be satisfied, Albert. She will never be content in life, because nothing pleases her. She is a sulky, selfish girl, unappreciative of our efforts on her behalf."

  Persey held her temper as tightly as she clutched a crumpled napkin in her hand. "I believe she appreciates everything her brother does for her, and very much so."

  "Humph!" Araminta stabbed her herring and then dropped her fork, as if the
effort of eating was all too much for her after all.

  "Albert," Persey turned to implore her stepson again, "please try to understand that your sister's heart must be won before she can agree to marry. I know it sometimes happens that love comes after the wedding, growing gradually over the years and with tender familiarity. But often times it does not and in such cases there is only misery for both parties. Your sister does not want that risk for herself, or for her future husband. And since she need be in no haste, surely—"

  "The girl has never been sensible, and you fill her head with more romantic nonsense," the woman across the table muttered.

  "Think of passion, Albert," Persey persisted. "The inexplicable connection between a man and a woman that cannot be bought or arranged or negotiated. Think of the quickening pulse, of the shortened breath, the longing and gladness one feels in one's heart, the exquisite yearning heat that comes with — "

  He held up his hand for silence, his creaking trunk pressed slightly backwards as if by a stiff gale. "That's quite enough, Persephone. I do not care for that sort of talk in any guise, but especially not at breakfast. Particularly when discussing my virtuous, little sister. The less she feels of that the better for all." A quick, uncomfortable glance at his wife followed this remark, but Minty was busy admiring herself in the silver creamer, momentarily distracted again. He continued addressing his stepmother. "I believe you know my opinion on the dangers of getting oneself overheated, madam. I understand some folk have less capability of maintaining self-control, but only you appear to think such failure worthy of celebration rather than censure."

  "One cannot control one's heart, Albert. It is not an egg to be boiled and served on command."

  "That may be true for a weaker person with little else to consume their thoughts. One who thinks of mischief at all hours of the day and night. A person, for instance—" he turned his sad eyes to her "—who has a very comfortable existence and wants for nothing, might spend far too much time on the contemplation of romance, and when they are beyond it themselves, they might begin to assign their own passions and ideas to the minds of young girls who are easily bent to their will and lured from the path of duty. It is all too common for one who feels her own better days might be behind her, to seek a life vicariously through someone younger."

  Well, that was wholly unfair, she thought, tossing yet more lumps of sugar into her coffee. He was very fortunate that she happened to be fond of trees and couldn't hold the occasional snagged skirt or sleeve against them. The one thing she must always remember about Albert was that he rarely felt an insult himself and therefore was surprised when anybody else did.

  "But you want your sister to be happy, do you not? Your father did not interfere in your match."

  "Of course my father did not interfere," he said crisply. "He knew that I would not make my choice with a head clouded by love and romance. None of that was imperative to me when I chose my future companion. I looked specifically for a woman who would not arouse those kind of disturbances as you describe in my pulse and my heart— an organ, incidentally, that must continue to function steadily, without interruption, in order to keep me alive and of use to this estate. I looked for a woman of everything plain."

  During this speech, his wife had put down the silver creamer and begun to listen again as Albert talked proudly of the lack of passion in his married life. Persey felt her daughter-in-law's eyes, like wasps, darting about, looking for somebody to sting. Oh, this would not be good for her at all.

  Hastily Persey finished her coffee and declared that she had better go, since she just remembered a visit from the vicar was imminent. A swift lie, but really, she thought, at her time of life did one more tiny fib much signify?

  Before she could get fully up out of her chair, Minty exclaimed, "I'm surprised you have so much time to spare fretting about Lady Honoria's prospects, madam, when you have so many of your own to keep in order."

  Persey took her favorite, floppy straw hat from the seat beside her and proudly thrust it onto her head, very much aware of her daughter-in-law's disdain for this most tattered of garments. "My prospects?" she asked nonchalantly. "What can you mean?"

  The other woman squirmed in her chair, relishing her moment as Albert's attention— usually taken up by anything else at hand— now turned toward her again. "I hear your cook is busy at all hours, catering to gentlemen callers at the dower house. Cake, cheese, cold pie and picnic baskets, roasted quail and chestnuts, blancmange, strawberries and the best champagne at a moment's notice."

  "You sound surprised that my cook provides food, Araminta. What else is she supposed to provide?"

  "Perhaps you will accept some kindly meant counsel, madam, since you are always so eager to give your own, whether it is required or not." She glanced sideways at her husband, but now he dabbed futilely at the egg stain on his sleeve and it was clear that he had shut his ears, probably because he felt this conversation veering into another subject he found uncomfortable.

  Left to carry her own petard, Araminta proceeded primly, "Please remember that we must set an example for Lady Honoria. I fear you are in danger of acquiring a reputation, madam, if you do not proceed with a little more discretion when entertaining these gentlemen. Therefore, I suggest you pay more attention to your own dealings there, than worry about ours here at the great house."

  "Yes, I am fortunate to keep some good society now that I am out of mourning. I happen to enjoy lively, inspiring company— of both genders. And although I don't pretend to be a young maiden any longer, I am not yet ready to be wheeled about in an invalid chair, don woolen mittens and eat nothing but milk puddings, even if you think I should, Araminta." She pulled on her worn leather gardening gauntlets. "But I can assure you that I consider none of my gentlemen visitors to be suitors in that sense, and would not view them with such an eye until Lady Honoria Foyle is safely and very happily settled. My stepdaughter's prospects are of far more import than my own. She is now my priority; the one task charged to me by her father, my dear Jebediah." Her piece said, Persey picked up her trug and pruning shears and said a cheerful "Good day to you both," before heading for the French doors.

  But she was stopped again, when her daughter-in-law exclaimed, "Have you told her yet about our plans for the grounds of the estate, Albert?"

  Persey looked back, one hand on the door to open it. "Plans?" Her heart beat faltered at this ominous word. Neither Albert nor his wife generally had much interest in the gardens and so she always enjoyed her peaceful strolls through the grounds of Holbrooke, tending the flowers and bushes with a loving hand, knowing she was unlikely to be disturbed by the sudden appearance of either one of them.

  Albert cleared his throat and announced, "I have decided to make some improvements."

  "Improvements?"

  "The estate needs..."

  While he still sought for the word, his wife gave it to him. "Modernizing." With a hard look at Persey, she added, "Out with the old; in with the new."

  "Yes, modernizing." He nodded. "I believe that is the word people use these days. The grounds have not been changed for generations. They need refreshing. One should strive for progress where there has been stagnation."

  Persey gripped her pruning shears tighter and glared at them both from beneath the wavy brim of her old straw bonnet. "But the grounds of this estate are beautiful. How might they possibly be improved?"

  "I have hired a garden designer— deuced clever and talented, so I understand. Bainbridge had him last year and he completely over-hauled the place. Looks so different I barely recognized it when I was last there."

  "His name is Radcliffe," his wife added smugly. "He is all the mode. Everybody wants him. And as I said to Albert, we simply must have him for Holbrooke, no matter what the cost. Out with the old," she said again, "in with the new."

  It seemed this was another of Minty's acts of vengeance against her, for Persey's love of the grounds was well known. Albert was never much for change and usually far to
o slow to bring any about, even when it was needed. No, this was Minty's doing.

  "What about Beamish and Quigley? They've served as joint head-gardeners here since your father was a young man, Albert."

  "And that does not change."

  "But times must," Minty exclaimed, "and those grumpy, old fellows will too, if they wish to keep their posts at Holbrooke. Radcliffe is in charge of the grounds now. He knows what is modern and new. He knows what all the most fashionable people are doing with their estates."

  There was nothing more Persey could say. As the widow of the previous marquess, she retained very limited power over any decisions made and was merely a tolerated presence on the edge of the estate, a mare put out to grass.

  Now her successor even planned to take away that grass and rearrange it into something "fashionable".

  "I see," she said carefully, determined not to give Minty the satisfaction of seeing her upset. "Thank you for informing me. That is most interesting news."

  Her stepson, having been nudged by his wife's slipper beneath the table, now eyed Persey in that pained, wary manner. "I hope, madam, that you do not cause complications of any nature for Radcliffe while he is here. I know you like to involve yourself in the upkeep of our gardens, walks and groves, but he is an expert. I should like him left in peace to do the job for which he is to be paid the handsome sum of five guineas a day."

  She swallowed a gasp of shock for that was a considerable amount of money to be squeezed out of Albert's notoriously tight purse. How had his wife managed that?

  He continued, "I have, of course, warned him that he is to solicit approval on the various stages of his plan only from myself or the marchioness. As this is mostly her project."