Chapter Twenty-Nine
Daisy rushed downstairs to the library, where Arthur and Ashton were working with the family lawyer to understand the morass of family finances.
“There’s a coach coming—I think it may be your uncles,” she said, setting off an explosion of reaction. Together they rushed through the entry hall and ordered the front doors shut behind them.
As the coach neared they could see it was well sprung and glossy black with immaculate yellow wheels, clearly hired by someone of means. The minute it stopped, the windows were lowered and bonneted heads poked out. Daisy stopped dead on the small portico as the coach door swung open and a footman bolted forward to help a well-dressed lady descend.
“Mama?” Daisy choked on the word.
The tall, handsome, older woman shook out her skirts, smoothed her corded silk traveling ensemble, and straightened her hat before looking up. Three more familiar figures poured from the coach and stood gaping at the great house and the men who had come rushing out to meet them.
“Frankie? Claire? Sarah?” Daisy’s heart thumped hard, then lurched and pounded in her chest. “It’s really you? You’re really here?”
Her mother’s rigid bearing melted as she hurried to Daisy with open arms. “My Marguerite—my sweet Daisy!”
Daisy stood frozen with shock until the warmth of her mother’s arms melted her disbelief. She threw her arms about Elizabeth, incapable of saying more than “Mama.” A moment later, they were inundated by young females, being hugged and jiggled and deafened by squeals of joy.
It took a few minutes for Daisy to extricate herself from their greedy embraces and onslaught of questions. Red came rushing out of the house, halted, and then howled with delight. He lifted and whirled his nieces about until they squealed and laughed. They had missed him as much as Daisy.
“Just look at you!” Daisy clapped her hands to her cheeks. “How you’ve grown, Sarah. And you, CeCe, you’ve blossomed—and howdy! Still playing, I hope.” The auburn-haired beauty lifted the violin case in her hand. “And, Frankie—how I’ve missed you. I want to hear everything about everyone.” She motioned the others to join their embrace and stood with her eyes closed, exulting in the rush of love and belonging between them.
When her mother joined them there was a moment of perfect silence. A discreet throat clearing caused her to come back to her senses and Daisy stepped back to look them over with pride. Three young women, dressed in dark-hued traveling silks and simple bonnets that framed their fresh faces to perfection. They were jewels, precious and beyond price.
“You look wonderful, too, Daisy,” her mother declared, dabbing at her own wet eyes. “So very ladylike.”
“And you, Mama—” She looked ten years younger than when Daisy had last seen her. “I can hardly believe you’re here. How did you find us?”
“We docked at Portsmouth, took the train up to London, and went to your house first. They told us you were in some place called Oxford, but opened rooms for us to stay. We asked after the duke and found that his name was well known. The staff had no idea when you would return, and we couldn’t wait, so we decided to come and find you.” She wrapped an arm around Daisy’s shoulders and lowered her mouth to Daisy’s ear. “Now which of these handsome gentlemen is to be my son-in-law?”
“Your Grace.” Daisy held out an arm to Arthur. “I want you to meet my mother, Elizabeth Bumgarten. She’s come from New York to see us.”
“Arthur, Duke of Meridian. At your service.” Arthur took her proffered hand and kissed it lightly while she made a stilted curtsy.
“Your Grace,” Elizabeth said, her voice oddly small.
Daisy had never seen her mother at such a loss for words. Elizabeth couldn’t meet his gaze, overwhelmed to find herself in the presence of true nobility. Her daughters, however, were eager to meet “Daisy’s fellow” and crowded around to be introduced one by one.
Arthur reddened and was rendered speechless by their sweet curtsies and open adoration.
“And this?” Elizabeth had spotted Ashton leaning against a portico pillar with his arms crossed. The family resemblance was unmistakable.
“His Grace’s brother, Lord Ashton,” Daisy said, wincing at the way her sisters stared with interest at the handsomest rake in England. She was only mildly reassured when he gave them a smile of polite disinterest.
“Oh, and the countess, Lady Evelyn Hargrave, Countess of Kew . . . who has been my guide and companion through my travels and adventures.”
“I owe you a great debt, Lady Evelyn,” Elizabeth said. “You have been a blessing to my daughter, and through her, to our whole family.”
The countess smiled and introduced Elizabeth to the continental greeting of kisses on each cheek. The younger Bumgartens were treated to the same dignified greeting and barely contained their embarrassment at not knowing how to respond.
“You must be exhausted,” the countess said, then looked to Arthur. “Surely, Your Grace, there are a few guest rooms that have been freshened?”
“Bless me—of course. Daisy, you can put them in rooms near yours, so you can have time together.” He looked around over their heads to locate the old butler in the doorway. “See to their baggage, please, Edgar.” Opening his arms, Arthur shooed them through the doors and into Betancourt.
The Bumgarten girls gaped in amazement at the entry hall, staring at the paintings, gilt-work, and dignified old furnishings. Daisy felt an odd sense of pride in the old house. It was, after all, home to seven generations of Meridians. She led them up the stairs past portraits of long-dead dukes and duchesses, and down the hall toward her room.
The chambers closest to hers had been cleaned after their aged guests departed. She saw each of her sisters settled in and put her mother in the room next to hers. Soon they all were collected in Daisy’s chamber, testing the bed and chaise, peering out the window at the view, and investigating her wardrobe and trunks and the bottles and brushes on her makeshift vanity.
“Girls, girls!” Elizabeth called them sharply from their nosiness. “Manners, please.” She pulled Daisy to a seat on the chaise and ordered her sisters onto the bed and foot bench. “Now tell us—everything. How on earth did you meet the duke and manage”—she looked around and waved a hand—“all of this?”
“Duke Arthur and I were properly introduced by an acquaintance of the countess’s. He was in London with his uncles. He’s a naturalist and was not very sociable at first. In fact, I thought he was deadly dull when we first met. But the countess helped me set a course to get to know him better.
“We met again at the Earl of Albemarle’s estate.” Her sisters ooh-ed at the mention of another nobleman, an earl. “We got on wonderfully and he invited us here for a visit. His aunt and uncles weren’t especially nice, and while we were here Arthur discovered they had been mismanaging his estate and drained Betancourt’s accounts. There was quite a stir, during which he proposed to me, sent his vile relatives packing, and asked his brother to remain and help him set things right.”
Elizabeth studied her daughter, sensing with a mother’s intuition that there was more to the story. But she held her tongue and let the girls ask questions that betrayed their girlish sense of romance.
“Did he kneel when he proposed?”
“Did he give you a jewel? I thought dukes were supposed to give you a fabulous jewel when you married them.”
“Did he kiss you?” Sarah giggled. “Is he a good kisser?”
“Yes—tell us about the kissing!” Frankie crowed, delighted by her mother’s shock.
“And the music you hear,” CeCe said with exaggerated dreaminess, “when he embraces you ever so tenderly.”
Daisy grinned as she turned to her red-faced mother.
“They’ve been sneaking novels again, haven’t they?”
* * *
The Bumgarten girls went down to dinner that night dressed in fetching dinner gowns. The colors they wore—sky blue, teal green, autumn gold—were chosen to complement hair and complexion and betrayed their mother’s artistic eye. They pinned their hair up with simple elegance, all but Sarah. At fifteen she was still required to wear it down with ribbons.
Arthur, Ashton, Red, and Reynard Boulton were waiting in the grand parlor, along with the family lawyer, William Drexel, a dignified fellow with a shock of white hair and a ruddy complexion that betrayed a love of the outdoors. When the ladies entered, there was an audible intake of breath, followed by a stunned silence that was finally broken by Red.
“Damn, if you girls aren’t a sight for sore eyes!” He bussed each one on the cheek with taunting pleasure. “Look at ’em. Pretty as pictures.”
They were indeed. Fresh, lovely, ladylike, and filled with emerging sensuality, they were as potent a threat to bachelorhood as any man present had encountered. Only Arthur seemed to retain use of his faculties, greeting Daisy warmly and taking each offered hand with undisguised admiration. There, however, his social acumen was exhausted. Elizabeth quickly began to make rounds in the parlor, speaking to each gentleman in pleasant, gracious tones and making small talk as if she’d been born to the task of melting social ice. The countess and Red soon joined her.
By the time they went in to dinner, conversation had revived enough to permit the traditional seating of alternating lady and gentleman. To Daisy’s surprise, Ashton managed to recall and insert into conversation that one of her sisters was a wonderful musician and another was something of a wizard with animals—horses especially. That left only the one who had a terrific memory and recalled absolutely everything and everyone. When he looked Daisy’s way, their gazes met and she smiled at him with a softness that conveyed more than simple gratitude to any watching.
Arthur, seated at the head of the table, was watching. Ashton’s identification of Daisy’s sisters by characteristics only she would know, surprised him. It recalled to mind other looks that had passed between them.
By the time they quit the table for the parlor, the wine and laughter had warmed the company. When Daisy begged CeCe to get her violin and play for them, the others joined in requesting a performance. She went to collect her instrument while they served coffee and found seats.
Whatever they expected of a lovely young American girl, it wasn’t the full, vibrant tones of a virtuoso violinist. From the moment she first dragged her bow across the strings, they were captivated. She played a piece that expressed her joy at being reunited with her older sister, then one that spoke of the beauty and desolation of her beloved home in the West. Not a muscle twitched as they absorbed the purity of the sound and the intense emotion of her playing. As they roused from the spell she had woven around them, she struck up a spritely dance that soon set their feet tapping and their hands clapping. Her music somehow compelled movement and joy.
Red jumped up and pulled the countess to her feet, leading her in a spirited country dance that delighted Daisy, Elizabeth, and the girls.
CeCe ended her performance on a more evocative note . . . playing a song of her own that was by turns simple and soulful and then wild and impassioned. It ended in a richly melodic movement that brought Daisy to the edge of her seat. She looked to Arthur, who smiled at her with delight and then looked back at CeCe. She glanced at Ashton and their eyes met. For a second time that night, feeling flowed between them. She looked away quickly, unsettled by the power of that brief exchange.
There was applause, of course, for Claire’s performance. Arthur took her hand and kissed it with what could only be called reverence. But when the ladies retired for the night, the men groaned with relief and stared at each other, visibly shaken.
“God Knees, I need a drink.” Reynard staggered to his feet. “Or ten.”
“I know just the place,” Ashton said, looking a bit unsteady himself. He turned to Arthur. “You coming?”
“Really? You want me to come?” Arthur brightened.
“Hell, yeah, son.” Red clapped him on the shoulder. “After an evenin’ with all my girls, a feller needs to get his beak wet. Why ya think I took up drinkin’?”