Venetia Read online

  Her sole companion on this expedition was an amiable if vacuous spaniel, bestowed on her by Aubrey, when he had discovered that besides being of an excitable disposition the pup was incurably gun-shy. As escort to a lady on her solitary walks he was by no means ideal, for, his unfortunate weakness notwithstanding, he was much addicted to sport, and after impeding her progress for a few hundred yards by gambolling round her, jumping up at her with hysterical yelps, and in general enacting the rôle of a dog rarely released from his chain, he would dash off, deaf to all remonstrance, and reappear only at intervals, with his tongue hanging out, and an air of having snatched a moment from urgent private affairs to assure himself that all was well with her.

  Like most country-bred girls of her generation Venetia was an energetic walker; unlike most of her gently-born contemporaries she never scrupled to walk alone. It was a custom developed in her schoolroom days, when her object was to escape from her governess. An hour spent in strolling about the paths in the shrubbery was thought by Miss Poddemore to be sufficient exercise for any lady; and on the rare occasions when circumstance or persuasion induced her to set forth on the mile-long walk to the nearest village her decorous pace was as exasperating to her pupil as was her habit of beguiling the way with instructive discourse. Although not so highly accomplished as Miss Selina Trimmer, whom she had once met and ever afterwards venerated, she was well-educated. Unfortunately she possessed neither Miss Trimmer’s force of character nor her ability to inspire her pupils with affection. By the time she was seventeen Venetia was so heartily bored by her that she marked her emergence from the schoolroom into young ladyhood by informing her father that since she was now grown-up and perfectly able to manage the household they could dispense with Miss Poddemore’s services. From that date she had had no other chaperon than Nurse, but, as she pointed out to Lady Denny, since she neither went into society nor received guests at Undershaw it was hard to see what use a chaperon would be to her. Unable to say that there was any impropriety in a girl’s living unchaperoned in her father’s house, Lady Denny was obliged to abandon that argument, and to implore Venetia instead not to roam about the countryside unattended even by a maid. But Venetia had only laughed, and told her playfully that she was as bad as Miss Poddemore, who had never wearied of citing the example of Lady Harriet Cavendish (one of the pupils of the distinguished Miss Trimmer), who, when staying at Castle Douglas before her marriage, had never ventured beyond the gardens without her footman to attend her. Not being a duke’s daughter she did not feel it incumbent on her to take Lady Harriet for her model. ‘Besides, ma’am, that must have been ten years ago at least! And to drag one of the maids with me, when she would rather be doing anything else in the world, I daresay, would destroy all my pleasure. No, no, I didn’t rid myself of Miss Poddemore for that! Why, what should happen to me here, where everyone knows who I am?’

  Lady Denny, sighing, had had to be content with a promise that her independent young protégée would never go unescorted into York, or Thirsk. When Sir Francis had died she had renewed her entreaties, but without much hope of being attended to. It distressed her that Venetia should say she had outgrown her girlhood, but she could not deny it: Venetia was then twenty-two, perilously near to being on the shelf.

  ‘Without ever having been off it, Sir John – though that’s not precisely what I mean, only that it is a wicked shame, so beautiful as she is, and so full of liveliness, besides having the best disposition imaginable! For my part, I hold that aunt of hers pretty cheap! She never made a real push to persuade Sir Francis to let Venetia go to London for a season when the poor child first came out, and if she has urged her to go now that he’s dead I have heard nothing of it! I believe her to be as selfish as her brother was, and if it were not for the expense, and our own girls to bring out – for even if anything should come of that attachment between Clara and Conway, which I don’t at all reckon on, I am determined that all five must and shall be presented at Court! – well, as I say, if it were not for that I should be strongly tempted to take her to London myself, and I shouldn’t wonder at it if she made a very respectable marriage, even though she isn’t in the first blush of youth! Only, you may depend upon it she would refuse to leave Aubrey,’ she added in a despondent tone. ‘And soon it will be too late, if only she knew it!’

  Venetia did know it, but since she could see no remedy while Conway remained obstinately abroad she continued to make the best of things. Lady Denny would have been astonished had she been allowed to know with what misgiving Venetia regarded the future.

  For any female in her position it was bleak indeed, and seemed to offer her no choice between marriage with Edward Yardley or the life of an ageing, and probably unwanted, spinster in her brother’s household. Mistress of an easy competence, it was convention and not dependence that would force her to remain at Undershaw. Single ladies did not live alone. Sisters, past the marriageable age, might do it; years and years ago the Lady Eleanor Butler and her dear friend, Miss Sarah Ponsonby, had done it, but in the teeth of parental opposition. They had fled to a cottage somewhere in Wales, renouncing the world just as if they had been nuns; and since they were still living there and had never, so far as anyone knew, stirred from their retreat, it was to be inferred that they were content. But Venetia was no eccentric, and even had she possessed a bosom friend she would not for an instant have entertained the thought of setting up house with her: marriage to Edward would be preferable to such a ménage. And without indulging her fancy with girlish dreams of a noble and handsome suitor Venetia felt that marriage with another than Edward would be the most agreeable solution to her difficulties.

  She had never been in love; and at five-and-twenty her expectations were not high. Her only acquaintance with romance lay between the covers of the books she had read; and if she had once awaited with confidence the arrival on her scene of a Sir Charles Grandison it had not been long before commonsense banished such optimism. In the days when she had now and then attended the Assemblies in York she had attracted a great deal of admiration, and more than one promising young gentleman, first struck by her beauty and then captivated by her frank manners and the charm of her smiling eyes, would have been very happy to have followed up a mere ballroom acquaintanceship. Unfortunately there was no possibility of following it up in the accepted mode, and although several susceptible gentleman inveighed bitterly against the barbarity of a parent who would permit no visitor to enter his house none of them was so deeply heart-smitten after standing up with the lovely Miss Lanyon for one country-dance as to cast aside every canon of propriety (as well as to the horrid dread of making a great cake of himself) and ride out of York to Undershaw, either to hang about the gates of the Manor in the hope of achieving a clandestine meeting with Venetia, or to force his way into the house.

  Only Edward Yardley, Sir Francis’s godson, had been accorded tacit permission to cross his threshold. He was not made welcome, Sir Francis rarely emerging from his book-room during his visits, but since he was permitted to walk, talk, and ride with Venetia it was generally believed that an offer from him for her hand would be accepted by her morose parent.

  No one could have described him as an impatient lover. Venetia was the magnet which drew him to Undershaw, but it was four years before he declared himself, and she could almost have believed then that he did it against his better judgment. She had no hesitation in declining his offer, for however much she might value his good qualities, and however grateful she might be for the various services he performed for her, she could not love him. She would have been glad to have continued on the old terms of friendship with him, but Edward, having at last made up his mind, was apparently as determined as he was confident. He was not at all cast down by her refusal; he ascribed it variously to shyness, maiden modesty, surprise, and even to devotion to her widowed father; assured her kindly that he perfectly understood such sentiments and was content to wait until she knew her own heart; and began from
that day to develop a possessive manner towards her which provoked her very frequently to run directly counter to his advice, and to say whatever occurred to her as being most likely to shock him. It did not answer. His disapproval was often patent, but it was softened by indulgence. Her liveliness fascinated him, and he did not doubt his ability to mould her (once she was his own) to his complete liking.

  When Sir Francis died, Edward repeated his offer. It was again refused. This time he was more persistent, which Venetia had expected. What she did not expect was that he should suddenly suppose that her continued reluctance to accept him sprang from what he called the peculiar delicacy of her situation. He said that he honoured her for scruples which she privately thought absurd, and would forbear to press her for another answer until Conway, her natural protector, came home. What should have put such a notion into his head she was at a loss to discover, only two possible solutions presenting themselves to her puzzled mind: the first, that while he was strongly attracted to her he was by no means convinced that as his wife she would add to his comfort; the second, that his mother had suggested it to him. Mrs Yardley was a colourless little woman, always submissive to his will, and kindling to mild warmth only in his presence. She had never been other than civil to Venetia, but Venetia was quite sure that she did not want Edward to marry her.

  With the news that there was a very real hope that the Army of Occupation would soon be withdrawn from France the problem of the future had drawn suddenly close to Venetia. As she walked through Undershaw’s small park she turned it over and over in her mind, but to no good purpose, as she ruefully acknowledged to herself. So much rested upon conjecture, or, at the best, possibility, the only certainty being that when Conway returned Edward would expect a favourable answer to his suit, and would not easily be persuaded to accept any other. That was her own fault, of course, for having been too ready to seize the respite offered by his peculiar notion of propriety; and to agree, even if only tacitly, that nothing could be decided until Conway came home. Edward could hardly be expected to understand that her answer must depend largely on what Conway meant to do. There had been a rather sentimental girl-and-boy attachment between Conway and Clara Denny before he joined, to which Clara at least seemed to attach importance. If Conway attached an equal importance to it she would find herself with a sister-in-law all too ready to resign the conduct of her household into the hands of one whom she had all her life regarded with humble admiration. That, thought Venetia, would be very bad for her, and very bad for me too, but I don’t think I could play second fiddle to poor little Clara at Undershaw!

  Marriage to Edward would be safe and comfortable. He would be a kind husband, and he would certainly shield her from inclement winds. But Venetia had been born with a zest for life which was unknown to him, and a high courage that enabled her to look hazards in the face and not shrink from encountering them. Because she did not repine over her enforced seclusion Edward believed her to be content, as he himself was content, to pass all her days under the shadow of the Cleveden Hills. So far from being content she had never imagined that this could be her ultimate destiny. She wanted to see what the rest of the world was like: marriage only interested her as the sole means of escape for a gently-born maiden.

  In fact, thought Venetia, as she emerged from the park on to a narrow lane which separated it from the neighbouring estate of Elliston Priory, my case is clearly past remedy, and I’ve nothing to do but decide whether to be an aunt to Conway’s children, or a mother to Edward’s – and I have a lowering presentiment that Edward’s children will be dreadfully dull, poor little things! Where’s that wretched dog? ‘Flurry! Flurry!’

  After she had been calling for several minutes, in growing exasperation, her canine friend came galloping up, full of amiability, his flanks heaving, and his tongue lolling. Being considerably out of breath he was so obliging as to remain within her sight until, a few hundred yards down the lane, she entered the grounds of the Priory through a turnstile set beside a heavy farm-gate. This gave access to an ancient right of way, but Venetia, on excellent terms with Lord Damerel’s bailiff, was at liberty to roam where she liked on his domain, as Flurry well knew. Refreshed by the brief interlude on the lane he raced ahead, in the direction of the woods which straggled down a gentle declivity to the stream which wound through the Priory’s grounds. Beyond the stream lay the Priory itself, a rambling house built in Tudor times upon the foundations of the original structure, subsequently enlarged, and said to be replete with a wealth of panelling, and a great many inconveniences. With the house Venetia was not concerned, but the grounds had for years been the favourite haunt of the three young Lanyons. Sir Francis’s vagaries had not led him to neglect his estate, which he kept in excellent order. His children preferred to seek adventure in less neat surroundings. The Priory woods, which partook of the nature of a wilderness, exactly suited youthful ideas of what was delightful; and if Venetia, grown to maturity, felt it to be a pity that the place should be neglected, it still held its charm for her, and she frequently walked there, and, since its owner rarely came near it, could allow the disobedient Flurry to range at will, chasing rabbits and flushing pheasants without danger of drawing wrath down upon his head. The Wicked Baron, as she had long ago christened Lord Damerel, would neither know nor care: the only party he had ever brought to the Priory had certainly not been a shooting-party.

  His family was an old and a distinguished one, but the present holder of the title was considered by the respectable to be the neighbourhood’s only blot. It was almost a social solecism to mention his name in polite company. Innocent enquiries by the children, who wanted to know why Lord Damerel never came to live at the Priory, were repressed. They were told that they were too young to understand, and that there was no need for them to think about him, much less talk about him: it was to be feared that his lordship was not a good man; and now that was quite enough, and they might run away and play.

  That was what Miss Poddemore told Venetia and Conway, and they naturally speculated on the possible (and often impossible) nature of his lordship’s crimes, rapidly creating a figure of lurid romance out of Miss Poddemore’s mysterious utterances. It was years before Venetia discovered that Damerel’s villainy included nothing as startling as murder, treason, piracy, or highroad robbery, and was more sordid than romantic. The only child of rather elderly parents, he had no sooner embarked on a diplomatic career than he fell head over ears in love with a married lady of title, and absconded with her, thus wrecking his own future, breaking his mama’s heart, and causing his papa to suffer a paralytic stroke, from which he never entirely recovered. Indeed, as it was succeeded, three years later, by a second and fatal stroke it was not too much to say that the shocking affair had actually killed him. All mention of his heir had been forbidden in his household; and after his death his relict, who seemed to Venetia to have had a marked affinity with Sir Francis Lanyon, lived in semi-seclusion in London, visiting the Yorkshire estates only at rare intervals. As for the new Lord Damerel, though many were the rumours about his subsequent actions no one really knew what had happened to him, for his scandalous behaviour had coincided with the short-lived Peace of Amiens, and he had spirited his stolen lady out of the country. All that was thereafter known about her was that her husband had refused to divorce her. For how long she had remained with her lover, where they had fled when the war broke out again, and what had been her ultimate fate were problems about which there were many conjectures. The most popular of these was that she had been cast off by her lover, and left to fall a prey to Bonaparte’s ravening soldiers; which, as the villagers did not fail to point out to their erring daughters, was what she deserved, and the sort of thing that was bound to befall any girl careless of her virtue.

  Whatever the truth might be, one thing was sure: the lady was not with Damerel when he returned to England, some years later. Since that date he appeared (if only half the stories told of him were true) to have devot
ed himself to the pursuit of all the more extravagant forms of diversion, going a considerable way towards dissipating what had once been a handsome fortune, and neglecting no opportunity that offered to convince his critics that he was every bit as black as he had been painted. Until the previous year his occasional visits to the Priory had been too brief to allow any of his neighbours to do more than catch sight of him, and very few had even done that. But he had spent one whole week at the Priory in August, under perfectly outrageous circumstances. He had not come alone; he had brought a party of guests with him – and such a party! They had come for the races, of course: Damerel had had a horse running in one of them. Poor Imber, the old butler who had been caretaker at the Priory for years, had been thrown into the greatest affliction, for never had such a fast, ramshackle set of persons been entertained at the Priory! As for Mrs Imber, when she had discovered that she was expected to cook for several rackety bucks and for three females whom she recognised at a glance for what they were, she had declared her intention of leaving the Priory rather than so demean herself. Only her devotion to the Family had induced her to relent, and bitterly did she regret it, when (as might have been expected) none of the villagers would permit their daughters to go to work in what was little better than a Corinth, and it had been necessary to hire in York three far from respectable wenches to wait on the raffish company. As for the amusements of these dashing blades and their convenients, his late lordship, declared Imber, must have turned in his grave to see such lewd goings-on in his ancestral home. If the guests were not indulging in vulgar rompings, such as playing Hunt the Squirrel, with those shameless lightskirts squealing fit to bring the rafters down, and egging on the gentlemen to behave in a very scandalous way, they were turning the house into a gaming-hell, and drinking the cellar dry. Not one but had had to be put to bed by his valet, and that my Lord Utterby (a loose-screw, if ever Imber had seen one!) had not burnt the Priory to the ground was due only to the chance that had carried the smell of burning to the nostrils of Mr Ansford’s peculiar, who had not scrupled to track it to its source, though she had been clad only in her nightgown – not but what that was a more decent cloak to her opulent form than the dress she had worn earlier in the day! – and had torn down the smouldering bed-curtains, screeching all the time at the top of her very ungenteel voice.