Regency Collection 2013 Part 1. Louise Allen

it after dinner.’

      ‘Is it any good?’

      ‘Ghastly. It is all about how depressed the moors make her and how the lowering face of nature reflects something or another in the human spirit. I wish she would fall in love like Caro—at least she droops about quietly.’

      ‘No one in this house droops, least of all young ladies. Darling, how are you? You look frightful!’ Jack grimaced as his mother swept out of her sitting room and kissed him, then took him by the shoulders and stood back to survey him. ‘Are you running a fever, Lovell?’

      ‘Possibly—I was a little under the weather when I left London. Nothing a good night’s sleep won’t cure. I was just telling Penny that the stage was hideously uncomfortable.’

      ‘Did you have to travel in the basket?’ his youngest sister crowed. ‘And look at your hair! Is it all the crack?’

      ‘It is very smart and I am sure your brother travelled inside in a perfectly respectable manner,’ her mother said bracingly, but the look she shot Jack showed thinly veiled anxiety. He realised she had noticed the scar on his temple. ‘Have you had breakfast?’

      ‘I could eat another one.’ He grinned at her reassuringly. ‘Where are Susan and Caro?’

      ‘Here!’ Jack surrendered to being kissed, hugged and questioned and finally, with relief, to being dragged off to the small dining room, where he could take refuge in his own chair to wait for the simple snack he was assured Cook would toss together in a moment. Knowing Cook’s views on what constituted ‘proper’ food suitable for his lordship, he was resigned to a wait of at least half an hour, so he sat back and regarded his family affectionately.

      ‘That is a very fetching cap, Mama. And, Caro—is it possible you were in such looks before I left?’ His elder sister, at eighteen, was suddenly growing into a beauty. She blushed, but did not respond to his teasing. Possibly Penny was right—was he going to have to investigate George Willoughby’s suitability? He could recall very little about the man, he only hoped he was eligible. Interfering in someone else’s love affair would be far from his inclination at the best of times—now the very thought touched raw nerves. ‘And, Susan, how does the epic poem progress?’

      ‘Very well.’ At seventeen Susan was not yet a beauty like her elder sister, and possibly, with her solemn expression, never would be, but she had a serious charm all of her own. ‘I have every expectation of seeing it published.’ She spoilt this confident assertion by wrinkling her nose at her younger sister. ‘Whatever Penny says.’

      The incipient argument was quelled by the arrival of the coffee pot. Lady Allerton poured and the three girls sat round the table, watching him attentively. Despite his tiredness, Jack burst out laughing. ‘Are you all going to sit there watching me eat my breakfast?’

      ‘Of course,’ Penelope replied with dignity. ‘We have missed you.’

      ‘I cannot believe you have missed watching me break my fast.’ The coffee was bliss, warming through his veins like strong drink.

      ‘Well, no,’ she conceded. ‘You are always so silent at breakfast.’ All four women watched him, three of them far too well bred to demand of the head of the household a full account of his business in London and news of his success, and the fourth all too aware that to clamour to be told would result in her being sent off to her room forthwith.

      What to tell them? How much to say? And should he tell them the decision he had finally reached by mid-afternoon the day before, when the stage had finally reached York?

      Jack smiled. ‘I will tell you all about my adventures before dinner,’ he promised. ‘I am going to eat my breakfast and then sleep for hours.’

      ‘Dull,’ Penny pronounced, caught her mother’s eye and subsided as the platter of ham and eggs was borne in, followed by a steaming sirloin and a trencher of bread and cheese. ‘Cook must think you’ve been starving in London.’

      ‘I have. No one cooks like this.’ Jack pulled the sirloin towards him and inhaled. It was a vile slander on Mrs Oakman’s kitchen, but it would get back to Cook and please her. ‘Tell me all your news while I eat.’

      They all joined in, telling of their doings, the local gossip, the good news about the state of the flocks, and Jack ate, half-listening, content simply to be home. He glanced round at the room with pleasure, which turned to unease the longer he looked. Despite the best efforts of his mother and the housekeeper the hangings could hardly be called pleasantly faded any longer—they were looking downright shabby. And the ceiling was blackened from years of log fires, the furniture not so much antique as old.

      They had all grown used to the castle, loved it too much to be critical. By going away he had come back with fresh eyes. What would Lily make of it? It was the first time he had allowed himself to think directly about her since he had climbed out of the coach at the Saracen’s Head. Would she be fascinated by the age of the place or critical of the state of it? Charmed as he was or appalled? Or worse, amused.

      Jack accepted a second cup of coffee with a murmur of thanks and tried to imagine how Lily would redecorate in here. ‘What are you smiling about?’ Penny demanded.

      ‘I was thinking that a little redecoration might be in order.’

      ‘Did you see many fashionable interiors in London?’ Susan put down the pencil with which she had been listing rhymes for ‘gloom’ in her notebook, and looked up with interest.

      ‘Some. One house in the very forefront of fashion—I was thinking how it would translate here.’

      ‘Describe it, please, dear.’ Even his mother sounded interested.

      ‘Well.’ Jack closed his eyes, the better to conjure up Lily’s best spare bedroom. ‘It is in the Egyptian manner—’

      ‘With mummies?’

      ‘No, Penny. No mummies. But the couches were in black and gold upholstered with leopard skins, and instead of legs they were supported by gilded crocodiles. The carpets were woven with borders of papyrus and strange birds and the torchères were made like palm trees. Oh, yes, and some things had camels embossed on them.’

      ‘Gilded crocodiles!’ He opened his eyes and saw Penny’s fascinated expression. ‘Whose house was it? The Prince Regent’s?’

      ‘No, it belonged to a very rich and very fashionable lady.’ He caught Caro watching him, realised he was still smiling and straightened his face. His sister’s eyebrow lifted, just a touch. Caro always could read him better than any of them.

      ‘I do not think crocodiles would be right in here,’ Susan said doubtfully. ‘And we would have to change all the furniture.’

      ‘I promise, no crocodiles. But new hangings, perhaps?’ Everyone looked cheerful at the thought and Jack grimaced inwardly. He had hardly been home an hour and he had given the family the impression that there was money to spare for redecorating the castle. That was what came of being so ill disciplined as to be thinking about Lily when he had promised himself that he would do no such thing.

      The trouble was that everything conspired to bring her to mind. He had longed to see her sweeping into the coffee rooms of the inns along the way, demanding fresh coffee and her eggs done just so. He could even imagine her trying to hold up the stage while she finished her meal, blithely confident that even the formidable coachman would sacrifice his sacred schedules if Miss France demanded it.

      It was easier to imagine Lily, bossy and demanding, than to recall her face as he had left her on the terrace, flushed and breathless after that cruel kiss, pain and anger in those wide green eyes.

      ‘Shh, he’s asleep.’ It was Penny, attempting a tactful whisper. Jack opened one eye and found his family regarding him tolerantly.

      ‘I beg your pardon.’

      ‘Go to bed, dear,’ his mother said, making him feel eight years old again. ‘And do not come down until dinner time!’