Lady John

Lady John

Madeleine Robins

Book View Café edition
February 28, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-61138-150-4
Copyright © 1982 Madeleine Robins
www.bookviewcafe.com

For my parents with much love and separate but equal gratitudes.

His Grace the Eighth Duke of Tylmath, having completed the
troublesome letter before him in his best, most formal style, was yet unsatisfied.
His dissatisfaction was not so much the missive itself, but with the subject it
concerned, and its recipient. At length, and with reluctance, his Grace decided
to seek the advice of his mother. That lady, as he well knew, was to be found
at this hour of the afternoon seated in her parlor, writing letters, reading
subscription library novels, or lecturing whichever of her female children were
in residence and had made themselves available for the purpose. When Tylmath,
having crossed the Great Hall, passed through the stair hall and ascended the
stairs which led thence through two corridors, finally attained the chambers of
the dowager Duchess, he found, beside his mother, his married sister Lady
Susannah Reeve, his niece Amarantha, and his mother’s
dame de compagnie,
Miss Frances Weedwright. The
latter was the first of the ladies to notice the Duke’s presence, starting up
nervously and announcing that His Dear Grace had come to pay His Dearest Mamma
a visit. The Duchess was not visibly impressed by this show of filial duty.

“For heaven’s sake, Fan, take Ammy off to Nurse before she
drives me to a fit of nervous prostration,” Lady Susannah said irritably. Miss
Weedwright immediately gathered Amarantha to her spare bosom and departed in
search of the nurse, much to the Duke’s relief.

“Well, Julian, to what am I beholden for this signal honor?”
Judith Honoria drawled coolly. It was no secret, save perhaps to Miss
Weedwright, that the Duke was the least favorite of his mother’s children. In
fact, the Duke was not the favorite of any member of his large family, owing to
a temperament neither obliging nor tactful, and a rather mean intelligence
unseasoned by humor or humility. A person less certain of his own consequence
would have paused, at least, under Judith Tylmath’s scrutiny, but the Duke had
come a considerable distance from his bookroom to consult with his mother, and
he schooled himself to stand fast.

“I’ve come to ask your advice, ma’am,” he announced, as if
this were an everyday occurrence.

Lady Susannah, a plump, handsome woman dressed in a round
gown of purple jaconet trimmed in mourning ribbons, raised an eyebrow at her
brother. “Good God, Ju, next you’ll tell us you intend to
follow
the advice as well!”

His Grace favored his sister with a disagreeable look.

“Children.” The Duchess stared down her short nose at her
offspring. “Now, Julian, since you are so obliging as to request my counsel,
what is the matter?”

“It’s this widow of John’s, Mother,” he said, as if that
made all clear.

“This
widow of John’s?
My dear boy, you speak as if John had left a veritable stable of widows from
which to choose! What about her troubles you, pray? Have you heard from her
since we agreed to invite her to Catenhaugh? I had supposed that you or Peele
wrote some months ago.”

His Grace stirred uneasily in his chair. “To tell the truth,
Mamma, what with one thing and another—the righting of the estate after my
father’s death, and—”

“Fustian!” his mother interrupted. “I collect you are going
to say that you are only now trying to write the girl! What on earth could have
possessed you? We have no idea what the situation is in Brussels now, or even
how John left his wife situated there. Why, the girl and her mother—it was her
mother Kit mentioned living with them, wasn’t it, Sue?—they might be starving
for all we know of the matter. How could you be so impossibly remiss? And don’t
try to bam me by laying the blame at your father’s door; I know as well as you
the state in which Tylmath left his affairs, and that Peele and Garifeather
between them have had the entire management of Catenhaugh and the other
properties since he died. You are the head of the family now, as you take such
pains to remind us; it is your duty to see to the welfare of your brother’s
widow. So?”

The sparks in the Duchess’s eye boded ill for her son; he
looked every which way for some moments, wondering why, now he was a Duke, he
was still unable to command respect and obedience in his own house.

“Mamma, it isn’t as simple as that,” he hedged. “What if the
girl’s unacceptable? I’ve heard tales of marriages the soldiers were making in
Brussels before the great battle, as well as what sort of society was convened
there. Need we saddle ourselves with some strange young woman and her mother—no
better than they ought to be, I suspect—because John married her in a
distempered freak? As to her starving—” he uttered a laugh which might have
been meant to indicate sardonic humor. “I place no dependence upon
that.
These sorts of females never starve, ma’am.
I am loath to suggest anything which may prove offensive to your sensibilities,
but—”

“Gammon,” Lady Susannah countered roundly. “You are
perfectly delighted to suggest all manner of horrid things about this poor
creature, whose one crime was that she married John. And you always disliked
John, Julian.”

“I consider that remark to be wholly beneath my notice,” the
Duke replied loftily, returning to his mother. “Think, ma’am. What female with
aspirations—” he sniffed significantly— “would refuse to visit here? And once
she is come, and from such a distance as Brussels, too, I misdoubt we shall
ever be rid of her. I have the strongest apprehension about the whole affair.
Of course, if you wish it, I will send my letter and extend the hospitality of
Catenhaugh to her, but I shall thank you to remember
my
feelings in the matter when it turns out that
the chit is no better than she should be.”

“Good heavens, Julian, you sound like a mifty abigail!” the
Duchess snorted.

Lady Susannah was outraged. “The poor thing must think herself
entirely cast-off by us by now, Mamma. It is full six months since John died,
and if she has received no word from the family at all—”

“Not quite that, Sue. I bestirred myself to write the girl a
letter when hers arrived with the news of John’s death. And received a very
pretty, proper note from her in return. At which time,” the Duchess turned her
gaze reproachfully on her eldest-born, “it was decided that she should be
invited to spend the summer at Catenhaugh.”

Tylmath regarded his mother with the air of one determined
to predict the direst of outcomes. “I will, of course, invite her, ma’am, if
you wish it. But—”

Lady Susannah opened her mouth to jibe at him, but he turned
upon her first.

“It is easy enough for you to talk, Sister. Reeve will take
you back to Dorset whenever you request it, and you need have no further
connection with the Widow. It is upon the rest of us—”

“As to that, if our new sister comes, I’ve a notion to write
Reeve and tell him I shall prolong my visit here.” Lady Susannah eyed her
brother with a speculative air. “After all, it will be such good sport to watch
you eat your words. And I make no doubt the child will need some protection
from your tempers, Ju.”

The Duchess’s voice, smooth and inexorable, spread itself
over the escalating conflict between her children, effectively smothering it. “Julian,
once John’s widow is arrived I shall not trouble you to do more than maintain a
semblance of civility toward her. It is no secret in the
ton
or elsewhere that you disliked John, so it
will surprise no one if you do only what is civil for his wife. But you
will
do that,” she assured him. “As for the rest,
Bette and I, and Susannah if she is able, will see to—what is the chit’s name?
Olivia? Thank you. We shall see to Olivia’s comfort. After all, my dear,” she
reminded him, “Kit has met her and says she is a very good sort of girl. We
know her family is good, although I cannot recall having met any Martingales in
Town these last many years.”

His Grace favored his mother with a sulky look ill-suited to
the dignity of his seven-and-thirty years. “I shall not scruple to remind you,
ma’am, that my brother Christopher’s standards for a ‘good sort of girl’ may
not be the most stringent. However—” he cut off a rising protest from his sister.
“I shall of course do my possible to oblige you, and to assure that Miss
Martingale’s—damme, that Lady John Temperer’s stay at Catenhaugh will be
comfortable. I hope I know my duty well enough for that. I can only hope that
you will not have cause to regret this ill-considered—”

“Enough,” the Duchess said shortly.

“But I must reiterate—”

“No, must you?” Lady Susannah interjected pointedly.

“Since neither you nor my sister wish to discuss this matter
seriously, Mamma, I shall take my leave of you.” The Duke favored the ladies
with a short, petulant bow and swept from the room.

“Quite like Covent Garden,” Lady Susannah remarked dryly.

“Certainly, dear. He always was, although why you insist
upon plaguing him I do not know.” The Duchess smoothed the black bombazine of
her skirts over plump knees and settled more comfortably on her sofa. A woman
of impressive size, she was dressed in mourning for the death of her husband,
nearly a year before, and the death of her youngest son only four months after.
The sober hue of her gown combined with her massive presence to make her an
awesome personality, until one noticed lips which invited a smile and the eyes
which lit with a shrewd and humorous intelligence. “Kit did say the girl was
acceptable, didn’t he?” she asked belatedly.

“As I recall, Mamma, he said that she was a beauty, an
out-and-out charmer, and that he could see no reason for her to have
leg-shackled herself to our nodcock John.”

“Dear
Christopher,” the
Duchess said feelingly. “Well, if she is a beauty and a charmer, perhaps she
and your sister Bette can keep each other company this Season in London.”

“And think, Mamma, if the widow were in Town this Season,
she could chaperone Bette to some of the parties, and save your strength for
the affaires you wish to attend.” It was a popular fiction in the Temperer
family that the Duchess was easily exhausted by the exertions of managing her
household, her family, and the lives of her neighbors. In fact, despite her
bulk and her six-and-fifty years she was in remarkably prime twig, taking as
much pleasure in the activities of her life as she had done twenty years
before.

“But the girl will be in full mourning until December, Sue,”
she reminded her daughter.

“Well, ma’am, so will we. And in any case, if Julian only
sends his letter to Brussels today, it may take a month or more to reach—what
is
her name?”

“Olivia.”

“Olivia. And there you have July quite gone. By the time she
can rid herself of her establishment and return to English soil, I warrant we
will be deep in September. Even if she came to Catenhaugh for a few months, by
the end of them all of us must be out of mourning at last, and she and Bette—and
you and I, of course!—can go to the warehouses for a new wardrobe for the
Season.” Lady Susannah’s eyes shone with visions. “I wonder if she’s been
presented yet. She and Bette could attend the same Drawing Room, sponsored by
you, of course. Wouldn’t
that
put Julian’s
back up!”

Judith Tylmath smiled speculatively. “It would, wouldn’t it?
Not but what you are a wretched child to think of the matter in such a light,
Sue.”

“Nothing of the sort, Mamma. Company for Bette, and I should
think that the widow will be in need of some gaiety after a year of mourning. I
feel heartily sorry for her.”

“I only hope that Tylmath will not be too difficult,” the
Duchess murmured.

“Bother Julian. I’m of a mind to write to Kit and ask him to
forego his trips to Yorkshire this fall during the hunting if the widow does
come, to lend the poor little thing some countenance. And wouldn’t
that
destroy Julian completely? I suspicion this
Olivia will need all the support we can muster, and I intend to ensure that she
has it.”

“Susannah, I must admit that this unnatural delight you take
in plaguing your brother is rather disturbing,” her Grace chided mildly.

“Do you disapprove?”

The Duchess smiled broadly, and a little wickedly at her
daughter. “In principle, of course. In actual fact, and given what an odious
toad Julian has become since your father died—not in the least. In any case, there
is one catch we have not considered. What if the girl and her mamma have other
plans? It may very well be that while they are amenable to a visit of courtesy
at Catenhaugh they will not like to be presented or run through a Season, even
under our sponsorship.”