Chapter Eleven
It was a small New Year’s gathering, but Eleanor felt more nervous than she could ever remember being. Lucy was playing with her new china doll and her dolls’ house, the front piece opened so that the rooms could be easily viewed as she sat at her chair and table to one side of the fire. On the other side on two large sofas her first cousin Frank Rogerson and his wife, Ilona, were in a lively conversation with Jacob.
Grandmama was asking Lucy about what was inside the rooms and Eleanor’s daughter was giving her a running commentary on even the tiniest pieces of furniture.
‘It’s the smallest table in the world, Grammy, but it still has four legs and there are cups and plates that can sit on the top, see. If I pressed down hard I would squash it all to pieces like a giant.’
When did people lose that love of words, Eleanor thought as she watched her daughter, that uninhibited joy in all that was around them? She prayed that Nicholas might like Lucy. She also prayed that Lucy might like him.
* * *
The evening light was just fading as the Viscount arrived, shown into the front drawing room by the butler. As soon as he saw her he smiled, the dimple on his un-ruined cheek deeply etched in the light.
‘Lady Eleanor.’
‘Lord Bromley.’
They were formal here, polite and most correct, but she felt the thrill of his notice even as she stood and introduced her daughter.
‘This is Lucy, my lord. She has just come back to London from Millbrook House.’
She could see the interest in his face. ‘You look just like your mother.’
‘That’s ’cos I have the same colour hair, but mine’s not so long.’ Small hands brought her plait around to show him. ‘But I like my red ribbon. I got it for Christmas from Mama. It has sparkles.’
When he nodded Eleanor could tell he had not been around children much, his face a picture of uncertainty and a kind of fright. So she helped him.
‘Lucy was most fortunate this season and got a dolls’ house and another dolly as a present. Would you like to show the house to Lord Bromley? I am sure he would love to see it.’
The thought hit her then just how much the Viscount’s appearance contrasted so forcibly with their daughter, her child’s soft perfectness balanced against his wounded hand in its sling and the terrible slash across his cheek. And yet in the way they held their heads and watched people there was a decided similarity. Her eyes were exactly his colour.
‘You can play with the dolls if you want to. You can have the baby one because I don’t like her clothes as much as the other new one,’ Lucy chatted on as she found the swaddled china figure and held it out to him.
Without another option she saw Nicholas square his shoulders and walk forward to kneel to the side of the dolls’ house.
Looking away, she caught her brother’s glance upon her and flushed. Jacob was looking at her strangely and she could tell that he thought something was amiss.
* * *
She was not as small as he had thought she might be, this child of Eleanor’s, but she was beautiful in the way of all little girls. He smiled at this because in truth he’d hardly had any contact with children in any part of his life.
Except Emily.
The name brought a cold rush of air into the warmth and his fingers shook as he held out his hand to receive a tiny china baby doll all wrapped in white cloth.
‘You can put her to sleep if you like.’ Up close he could see Lucy’s eyes were not blue, but a warm golden brown.
‘In here?’ A miniature bed was in the room on the top-left storey and it seemed to be this she was pointing to.
‘No, silly. That’s a baby. She needs to go in the cradle, not the big girl’s bed.’
Her hands found an even smaller piece of furniture, pink ribbons festooned in every corner and rockers beneath it.
‘It even lifts up and down, see.’
And it did. The sides had been fashioned so that a lever could be pushed and the wood collapsed in on itself. With all the care in the world he placed the baby doll in its cradle and looked at Lucy for what to do next.
‘Now we have to tuck her in. Here.’
A minuscule quilted pink blanket was then placed in his hands and he brought it over the doll, her fingers touching his as she finished the job for him.
She had dimples. Deep dimples on each cheek.
‘Do you have a little girl, too?’
He shook his head.
‘Mama only has me and I have her and Uncle Jacob and Aunty Rose and Grammy and Aunty Ilona and Uncle Frank and Vic.’
‘Vic?’
‘My dog. Vic is what we call him, but his long name is Victory. He is black and he always licks us, but Mama does not like that very much. He is this big.’
Little hands were held out as far as her arms could go, but Nick looked past this to Eleanor and saw the horror in her eyes. And the truth.
He cursed beneath his breath as the whole world dropped out of sight and he understood all that Eleanor Huntingdon had tried to hide from him.
Lucy was his. Theirs. Their daughter. Even without any memory he knew that she was. Her eyes. Her dimples. Her age. Her hair.
‘How old are you, Lucy?’
‘I am five years and three-quarters of months. My birthday is in May on the seventh and then I will be six. I know how to write my name and read, too. I can count to lots and lots. Do you want to hear how I can?’
As she began to count Nicholas’s mind calculated the number of months between a week after August the fifteenth and May the seventh.
Nine months, give or take a few days. His vision lightened and his heart beat so fast in his temples he could not hear the spaces in between.
She had his eyes. That thought came through the shock. It was like looking at his own in the mirror, gold shards on the edge of brown. Her cheeks were his, too, high boned and broad. His gaze took in other parts of her greedily, desperately, trying to see everything at once and all that he had missed for so very long. She was perfect and flawless and splendid. He wanted to wrap his arms about her and never let her go.
Rose Huntingdon had bustled in and must have caught Lucy’s recounting of her age because, suddenly, Rose was full of chatter. ‘Oh, how lovely that you could come and have a supper with us, Lord Bromley, but you look a bit pale. I hope you are not catching a cold.’
Jacob began to rise with anger from his place near the fire and Rose peered at him sharply. ‘Georgiana’s cousin has been taken to bed for a month with an ailment of the chest and it is most important to consider one’s actions carefully in the light of such information.’
Underneath the words Nick could hear a breathlessness and a warning and he wondered at Jacob’s wife’s strategies. Her fingers were tightly held before her, the reddened crescent of nails clearly visible on the soft white skin on each hand.
His daughter had risen at her words, her hand reaching out for Eleanor. Small hands still slightly rounded from babyhood. Every tiny detail of her was a joy to him.
‘Dinner is served, so if you will follow me in. Grandmama, perhaps you could bring the Viscount. Ilona, you, of course, should accompany Frank. Lucy, as a special treat you can take Uncle Jacob’s hand and sit with us for a little while before your nanny comes to fetch you. Eleanor, perhaps you and I could bring up the rear.’
Rose’s voice was hard to hear through the rush of noise in his ears.
* * *
Eleanor felt cold with shock, though Rose’s fingers against hers squeezed so tightly it brought her back with a desperate whisper.
‘Get through the meal, Ellie, and then have your conversation. I will arrange it. But for now...’
Nodding, she took in a fearful breath. Frank and Ilona were lovely, but both were great gossips and she needed to hold on to her secrets until she could explain them properly. To Nicholas.
Rose had come into the room and heard Lucy, she was sure of it, for she had never seen her sister-in-law become quite so effusively shallow or overtly bossy. Even Grandmama was looking at her strangely. For such a deliverance Eleanor could only be eternally grateful.
Nicholas was seated as far away from her as Rose could manage, between Frank and his wife and opposite Grandmama, Lucy and she were at the other end of the table, Jacob and Rose between them. Everyone, save Lucy and the Rogersons, looked less than comfortable.
Eleanor could feel the Viscount’s gaze upon her and Lucy, but didn’t look up. She did not know how she might make it through a whole meal with the emotions that raced through her rendering her mouth dry and her pulse quickened. The grand clock in the corner showed only the hour of five forty-one.
She was glad for the wine that the footman poured and when Jacob finished his toast for the New Year she drank down a good portion of her glass. A temporary buttress, a provisional support. She waited as the footman topped it up again.
‘Can I have some wine, too, Mama?’ Her daughter’s voice carried on the air and Nicholas Bartlett turned to listen to her answer.
‘You may have some lemonade, sweetheart, but only a little as it is nearly bedtime.’
She was amazed her voice sounded so normal, so sensible, so very parental. The footman behind them half-filled her daughter’s glass and then stood back.
‘London suits you, Eleanor.’ Ilona said this and her husband nodded his head. ‘I said to Frank this afternoon how very relaxed and content you look. I think you are losing years rather than gaining them.’
‘It must be the Christmas season then, Ilona.’ Her smile was tight and false. ‘I always enjoy it.’
‘It’s a Huntingdon tradition to treasure family gatherings for the connections and discoveries they foster.’ The darkness in Jacob’s voice made Eleanor stiffen.
‘We all of us enjoy it.’ Rose added this quickly in a completely strained tone and the way she sat up so straight gave a clue as to how tense she really was.
‘Jacob was informing us before your arrival this evening of your recent return from the Americas. Did you celebrate the Yule season abroad, Lord Bromley?’
‘I lived mostly in the country, Mrs Rogerson. Christmas did not have a big presence there.’
‘But you have been away a very long time?’ The implication in Ilona’s voice told Eleanor that her cousin’s wife knew a lot more about his absence than she was letting on. Another problem. She was certain that the gossip of the Viscount’s return had been as damaging and false as that of the talk of her own mysterious husband’s death, embellished so much that even she had sometimes found the tales amusing.
‘Too long, it seems.’ Nicholas Bartlett’s voice held a harshness she’d never heard from him before.
She felt a further rush of red come to her cheeks and caught the Viscount’s glance at exactly that moment, the anger in his eyes clearly visible.
Anger. Of course he would be furious, but she had not even thought of that. She’d imagined questions or even joy. Such rage had her straightening in her seat and taking a breath. Two could play at this game and if he thought it had been easy for her all these years to be the sole parent of a child without a father then he had another think coming.
She would not cower.
So when Frank told a funny story about one of his childhood Christmases she made sure to laugh loudly and look as if she was enjoying the tale immensely. The wine helped, of course, and she was on her fourth glass before she saw her brother shake his head at the footman who came to refill it.
There was a bottle already left on the table of a fine red so she helped herself to the rest of that instead.
* * *
It was becoming easier, this charade, as time marched on and when Lucy’s nanny came to retrieve her for bedtime at seven Eleanor made a show of kissing her daughter on the forehead and looking like the most congenial of parents.
‘Say goodnight to everyone, darling.’
She had expected Lucy to simply bid the table adieu and was surprised to see her cross to each person and kiss them on the cheek. When she came to Nicholas she hesitated.
‘Goodnight, Lucy.’ He said the words quietly, the deepness of his voice filled with regret. Whether it was this or the wounds that he carried, but her daughter simply fell into his arms and kissed him twice.
‘That one is for your hand to get better and that one is for your face. Mama always kisses my hurts better.’
‘Thank you.’
Shame flooded her. Her small five-year-old daughter had acted with more grace than she had and as sorrow began to take over from false animation, all Eleanor felt was an endless tiredness.
She was careful to place her glass down on the table before standing, the wobble in her voice presumably as noticeable as that in her gait. ‘I think I should probably retire as well, as I have drunk far, far too much, so I wish you all a good evening.’ She made a point not to look in Nicholas’s direction at all.
Then she was free, walking out into the lobby and up the stairs, following her daughter to the nursery.
She could not talk to Nicholas tonight. Not like this. She needed to understand what she might say, needed to know just what she wanted from him as a father and as a man.
‘He was nice, wasn’t he, Mama? The man who came last. The one who played dolls with me.’
‘He was, darling.’
Well, at least she had the answer to one of the questions she had posed herself earlier in the evening.
Her daughter liked Nicholas a lot.
* * *
Nick ate the cheese and figs and swallowed the last of his wine. When he looked at the clock it was just past nine and he knew he could not stay much longer, for more hours of smiling and pretence would simply do him in. His eyes went to the dolls’ house Lucy had played with, the front of the edifice shut now and the dolls inside.
He loved her. He did. He loved his daughter so fiercely that it hurt his heart.
They had all lied to him. That thought was what had kept him rooted to the seat when Eleanor pleaded tiredness and excused herself. Jacob fidgeted in the way he always did when he was worried and Rose looked more and more desperate.
Only Grandmama kept smiling at him, her dark eyes watchful.
‘Your grandmother would be pleased with how you have turned out, Lord Bromley, especially given your antics as a youth after the loss of your parents.’
He inwardly groaned. Was there nothing in this family that was off limits, no notice of that which was awkward or uncomfortable?
‘You knew her well?’ It was all he could think to say to try to divert her attention.
‘Like a sister. We came out together and I was her bridesmaid when she married your grandfather. She was a strong woman just like Eleanor is with her own opinions and certainty.’
He suddenly understood where this was heading. My God, did the whole entire family know what he had not? When he looked across at Jacob he saw the apprehension on his face was reflected in his wife’s.
If Eleanor had not seemed more than a little intoxicated he might have demanded to see her right there and then, but Frank and Ilona Rogerson were patently not in on the family secret and he did not wish to make a fuss in front of them.
So he did the next thing he could think of. He finished off his wine and stood to take his leave, insisting Jacob stay at the table with his cousin and that he would let himself out.
A moment later he signalled to his driver and waited till the Bromley conveyance came to a halt beside him.
‘The town house, please, Thackeray.’
It wasn’t a long drive and as the horses gained speed he leaned back and expelled his breath. He would return in the morning and demand to see Eleanor Huntingdon, that much he was certain of, for she and her brother had lied to him about everything. The implications of that rebounded in his head. How many others knew of Lucy’s parentage? Were they ever going to tell him? Was there some test he needed to pass before they considered him worthy?
A sudden noise caught his attention, the shout of strangers and the stoppage of the horses. Outside Nick saw two men running along the side of the carriage, their faces masked in cloth, weapons in their hands.
He was off his seat before he realised it, opening the door and jumping. He rolled up to a stand, not even feeling the heavy thump of the road in his anger, his arm shooting out and taking one of the hidden faces with his fist. When the man went down the second was already upon him and he felt the crunch of his nose as the man made a wild swing at him, the blood running thickly down the back of his throat.
Turning, he ripped the mask from his attacker’s face. A snub-nosed stranger stared back at him, surprise about the only thing registering before he tore himself away and disappeared into the night, the iron bar he held clanking down on the street. When Nick looked around the other attacker was running, too, for a side alley a few yards up the road.
Panting with exertion, he came down on his haunches, trying to catch a breath, his left arm hurting like hell and his nose feeling painful and swollen. Then Thackeray was there, his voice unsteady.
‘Shall I call somebody, sir.’
Nick stood. ‘No. They have gone. Just take me home.’