Cousin Kate Read online

  Since Sarah regarded all actresses as abandoned, this suggestion sank her spirits so low that she actually appealed to Mr Nidd to exert his influence over the orphan. He told her never to fear, but, as she knew how much there was to fear, this large reassurance quite failed to allay her anxiety. The stage now joined servants’ halls and modistes’ workrooms in the nightmares which rendered sleep hideous, for Kate, in her reluctant endeavour to obtain another governess’s situation, was meeting with rebuffs. Too Young! was what prospective employers said, but Sarah knew that Too Pretty! was what they meant, particularly those whose families included sons of marriageable age. And you couldn’t blame them, thought Sarah, thrown into deeper gloom, for anyone prettier, or with more taking ways, than Miss Kate would be hard to find. Not only Mr Nidd’s three grandsons, but the stable-boys too, and even Old Tom, who was notoriously cross-grained, and had charge of the stables, made cakes of themselves about her! ‘What,’ demanded Sarah of her sympathetic but speechless spouse, ‘is to become of her, if her aunt don’t pay any heed to my letter? That’s what I want to know!’

  No answer, beyond a doubtful shake of the head, was forthcoming, but the question was rendered supererogatory, some ten days later, by the arrival, in an ordinary hack, of Lady Broome.

  Mr Nidd, enjoying the spring sunshine at his favourite post of vantage on the balcony, observed the approach of this vehicle with only mild interest; but when a tall, fashionably dressed lady stepped down from it, and sought in her reticule with one elegantly gloved hand for her purse, he cast aside the shawl which was protecting his aged legs from quite a sharp wind, and nipped with surprising agility into the house, to give Sarah forewarning of the arrival of Miss Kate’s aunt.

  Emerging from the kitchen, with a rolling-pin in her hand and her arms generously floured, Sarah gasped: ‘Never!’

  ‘Well, we ain’t looking for no duchess to come a-visiting us, so if it ain’t a duchess it’s my Lady Broome!’ replied Mr Nidd tartly. ‘Bustle about, my girl! She’s paying off the jarvey, but she don’t look to me like one as’ll stand higgling over the fare, so you’d do well to stir your stumps!’

  The advice was unnecessary: Sarah was already in the kitchen again, stripping off her apron; and, within a few moments of hearing the knocker, she was opening the door to her visitor, looking as trim as wax, and in very tolerable command of herself.

  An imposing figure confronted her, that of a tall, handsome woman, wearing a velvet pelisse, bordered with sable, and carrying a huge sable muff. A close hat, of bronze-green velvet to match her pelisse, and trimmed with a single curled ostrich plume, was set upon a head of exquisitely dressed dark hair; her gloves were of fine kid; and her velvet half-boots, like her hat, exactly matched her pelisse. Her countenance was arresting, dominated by a pair of brilliant eyes, in colour between blue and gray, and set under strongly marked brows. Her features were very regular, the contour of her face being marred only by the slight heaviness of her lower jaw, and rather too square a chin. She looked to be about forty years of age; and, at first glance, Sarah found her intimidating. Her smile, however, was pleasant, and her manners, while plainly those of a lady of quality, were neither high nor imposing, but at once kind and gracious. She said, with a faint smile, and in a voice more deeply pitched than the average: ‘Good-morning! I am Lady Broome. And you, I think, must be Miss Sarah Nidd. Or should it be Mrs Nidd?’

  ‘Mrs Nidd, if your ladyship pleases,’ said Sarah, dropping a curtsy.

  ‘I beg your pardon! I have come – as you have guessed – in response to your letter, for which I am very much obliged to you. I was unaware of my brother’s death, or of the uncomfortable circumstances in which my poor little niece finds herself. May I see her?’

  ‘Yes, indeed, my lady!’ replied Sarah, holding the door wide, and dropping another curtsy. ‘That is, she isn’t here, not just at the moment, but I expect her to be back any minute. If your ladyship would condescend to step upstairs to the parlour, you will be quite private there, for only Miss Kate uses it.’

  ‘Thank you. And if you will bear me company I am persuaded you will be able to tell me a great deal about which I might hesitate to question Miss Kate, for fear of embarrassing her. You must know that since my brother’s unhappy estrangement from the family we lost sight of each other: indeed, I was barely acquainted with him, for there was a considerable disparity of age between us. You wrote of his death as of recent date: I collect it was not the result of a military action?’

  ‘No, my lady,’ Sarah replied, leading her up the stairs, and throwing open the parlour door. ‘He’d sold out, which, at the time I was glad of, thinking it was time, and more, that he settled down. On account of Miss Kate, my lady – but I should have known better!’

  ‘He did not, in fact?’ said Lady Broome, sitting down in one of the chairs which flanked the fireplace, and indicating, with a smile and a gesture, that Sarah should follow her example.

  Sarah obeyed, but with a little reluctance, choosing the extreme edge of the chair to sit on. ‘No, my lady, he didn’t. And it’s my belief he never would have, even if he’d won a fortune, like he said he would, because he was a gamester, ma’am, and I’ve often heard it said that such can’t be cured. He was knocked down by a common tax-cart, and hit his head on the kerbstone, being not – not tosticated, but – but muddled!’

  Lady Broome nodded understandingly. ‘And Miss Kate’s mother, I think you wrote, died some years previously? Poor child! Were her maternal relatives informed of this sad event?’

  ‘Yes, my lady, they was!’ said Sarah, her eyes kindling. ‘Being as how I was Mrs Malvern’s abigail before ever she eloped with the Major – not that he was a Major in those days! – I took the liberty of writing a letter to her papa, but I never had an answer. I wouldn’t wish to speak ill of the dead, and dead both he and my mistress’s mama are, but it’s my belief they didn’t neither of them care a straw what became of her, nor of Miss Kate! And as for Miss Emily, that was my mistress’s sister, she’s as full as a toad is of poison, my lady, as I know, and I wouldn’t write to her, not for a fortune!’

  ‘Well, I am very glad you wrote to me, Mrs Nidd,’ Lady Broome said. ‘I shall certainly not permit my brother’s child to engage on any menial occupation – for such, from what I have observed, seems to be the fate of governesses!’

  ‘Yes, my lady, and there’s worse to be feared!’ said Sarah eagerly.

  ‘Tell me!’ invited her ladyship, so sympathetically that Sarah plunged straightway into an account of the dire schemes which had entered Kate’s head.

  In the middle of this recital, Kate came into the room, pausing on the threshold, and looking in bewilderment from her aunt to her nurse. ‘Mr Nidd – Mr Nidd tells me – that my aunt has come to visit me!’ she stammered. ‘But I don’t understand! Are you my aunt, ma’am? How did you – Sarah! This must be your doing! How could you?’

  Lady Broome broke into a deep laugh, and rose, casting aside her muff, and advancing with her hands held out. ‘Oh, you pretty child!’ she said caressingly. ‘Why, Mrs Nidd, you didn’t prepare me for such a little piece of perfection! My dear, I am happy to be able to tell you that I am your Aunt Minerva.’

  She folded Kate in her arms as she spoke, and lightly kissed her cheek. Overwhelmed, Kate felt herself obliged to yield to that soft embrace, but the look she cast Sarah was one of deep reproach. This made Lady Broome laugh again, giving her a little shake, and saying, in a quizzical tone: ‘Was it so dreadful of Mrs Nidd to have written to me? I promise you, I don’t think so! She told me something I never knew before: that I had a niece!’

  ‘Only – only a half-niece, ma’am!’ Kate faltered. ‘And one who has no claims upon you!’

  ‘Ah, you don’t understand! How should you, indeed? You are too young to know what it means to have been an only child, when you reach my age, and have no close relations, and no daughter! I ha
ve always longed for one, and never more so than now! It’s true I have a son, but a boy cannot give one the same companionship. Dear child, I’ve come to carry you off to Staplewood! I’m persuaded I must be your natural guardian!’

  ‘But I am of age, ma’am!’ protested Kate, feeling as though she were being swept along on an irresistible tide.

  ‘Yes, so your kind nurse has informed me. I can’t compel you – heaven forbid that I should – but I can beg you to take pity on a very lonely woman!’

  At this point, Sarah, perceiving that her nursling was much shaken, effaced herself with a murmured excuse. Kate said: ‘You are very good, ma’am – Aunt! I am excessively grateful, but I couldn’t – no, I couldn’t – subsist on your generosity! Why, you know nothing about me – you might even take me in dislike!’

  ‘So I might,’ agreed Lady Broome, looking amused. ‘So might you take me in dislike! If that were to happen there would be nothing for it but to part. You wouldn’t be my prisoner, you know! Come! Let us sit down, and talk the matter over! You must tell me, if you please, how in the world you come to be unmarried, for it seems to me to be quite extraordinary. Your mama must have been very beautiful: I don’t remember my brother very clearly, but I don’t think you resemble him much, do you?’

  ‘No,’ admitted Kate, blushing faintly. ‘That is, I was thought to favour my mother, but she was much more beautiful than I am.’

  ‘And she died when you were twelve? Poor child! I wish I might have known, but I was still in the schoolroom when my brother married her, and only a child when he first joined, so that he was almost a stranger to me. Do you blame me for not having tried, in later years, to better my acquaintance with him? Pray do not!’

  ‘Oh, no!’ Kate said. ‘He did not, either.’ She glanced up into that handsome countenance, a tiny crease between her brows, and in her eyes a doubtful question. ‘Don’t you remember him, ma’am? He remembered you!’

  ‘Very likely: he was six-and-twenty when I was sixteen. I only wish he may have remembered something to my credit, but when I look back upon myself I realize that at that age I must have been a detestable girl, with a very good conceit of myself, and my head stuffed with every sort of ambitious notion, from making a brilliant marriage to winning the admiration of all by some improbable deed of heroism! I fear my governess was to blame: she was much addicted to reading sentimental romances, and she permitted me to do so too.’

  Kate smiled, reassured. ‘Papa did say that you were very ambitious,’ she admitted.

  ‘He might well! I hope he knew that I outgrew such nonsense, and instead of marrying a Prince or a Duke fell in love with my dear Sir Timothy. I must tell you, my dear, that he was almost as pleased as I was when he learned of your existence. He would have accompanied me to London if I had allowed him to do so, but I was obliged to forbid it. You see, I have to take great care of him: he doesn’t enjoy good health, and the journey would have quite knocked him up. So he charged me with a message, that a warm welcome awaits you at Staplewood.’

  ‘How kind – how very kind he must be!’ Kate exclaimed, much moved. ‘Pray tell him how grateful I am, ma’am! But –’

  ‘No, no, let us have no buts!’ interrupted Lady Broome. ‘You shall come to Staplewood on a visit merely. You can have no objection to spending a month or two in the country. Then, if you are still determined to seek another situation, I must try if I can find one for you.’ She smiled at Kate’s quick look of enquiry. ‘Yes, I can, you know – and a better one than you could discover for yourself. However, we shan’t think of that yet. In another fortnight we shall be in May, and must hope that this odiously sharp wind will have blown itself out. Ah, you can’t conceive of any place more beautiful than Staplewood in summer!’

  It was too tempting; it would be too churlish to refuse. Kate stammered her thanks, was silenced, and found herself listening to a description of the household.

  ‘Sir Timothy,’ said Lady Broome, ‘is many years older than I am, and has become very frail. I am his second wife, you must know, and my son, Torquil, is his only surviving child. He is some years younger than you.’ She hesitated, looking all at once a little stern; then she sighed, and continued quietly: ‘I am sorry to say that his constitution is sickly. It has never been possible to send him to school. He is under the care of Dr Delabole, who also attends Sir Timothy, and lives with us. So you see, my dear, why I have so much wished for a daughter! I am a very lonely woman.’

  Feeling all the embarrassment of one made the recipient of such a confidence, Kate murmured: ‘Yes. I mean, I see!’

  Lady Broome leaned forward to pat her hand. ‘You don’t of course, but never mind! You will! Now, we must decide, must we not, what it will be proper to pay your nurse for having housed you. Do you think –’

  ‘Oh, no!’ Kate exclaimed, recoiling. ‘No, no, ma’am! I beg you will not offer Sarah money! I shall give them all presents – Joe, and Mr Nidd, and the nephews as well! – but I must pay for them out of my own savings!’

  ‘Very well!’ said her ladyship, rising, and drawing her pelisse about her again, and buttoning it at the throat. Her eyes ran over her niece; she smiled, and held out a gloved hand. ‘Au revoir, then! I am putting up at the Clarendon. You will take a hackney coach, and join me there tomorrow: it is understood? Good! Now, do you think that Joe, or Mr Nidd, or even one of the nephews, could procure me a hack?’

  ‘Yes, ma’am, on the instant!’ replied Kate, starting up from her chair, and running to the door. ‘Only wait, I do implore you!’

  Pausing merely to cram a hat over her dusky locks, and to huddle a cloak about her person, she darted down the stairs, and out into the yard, to be pulled up in her tracks by Mr Nidd, who, from his vantage-point on the balcony, saw her, and briskly commanded her to stop. Rising, not without difficulty, from his seat, he adjured her not to be a hoyden, but to come back into the house this instant. ‘Ah, I know!’ he said. ‘Going to summon a hack, ain’t you? Well, you won’t, see? You’ll leave that to them as is better able than you to do it, my girl! Back with you into the house, miss! And take that nasty hat off your head!’

  ‘It is not a nasty hat!’ retorted Kate indignantly.

  But, as Mr Nidd had dived through a doorway out of sight, this reply fell on the ambient air; and a few minutes later Old Tom came grumbling out of the stables, and hobbled across the yard to the gateway.

  ‘Oh, Tom !’ uttered Kate, in remorseful accents.

  ‘You let him be!’ said Mr Nidd, emerging from the stables behind him. ‘Joe and Jos and Ted being gone off with loads, there ain’t nobody but that gormless hunk, Will, in the stables, and likely he’d come back with the oldest hack in the rank. You get back up them stairs, missy, and go on gabbing to her ladyship!’

  This, however, proved to be unnecessary, her ladyship having descended the stairs, and penetrated to the kitchen, where she found Sarah testing the heat of the oven with her hand, prior to inserting a large steak pie. ‘Oh, don’t let me disturb you, Mrs Nidd!’ she begged. ‘Dear me, how cosy it is in here, and what a good smell! I shall sit down on this chair, and watch you.’ She seated herself as she spoke, and smiled graciously at her hostess. ‘Well! you will be happy to know that I have prevailed upon Miss Kate to pay us a long visit,’ she disclosed. ‘I wonder would you be good enough to let me know her measurements? And the colours she prefers? Ah, thank you! What forethought!’

  She stretched out her hand, and Sarah put the list into it, looking frowningly at her. It seemed to Sarah that she had taken possession of the house; and the feeling that her mantle was cast over its inmates, and even over the stables, grew upon her, and could not be shaken off. You couldn’t say that she was condescending, for she was very affable. Patronage! that’s what it was: my lady stooping from her height to be kind to a carrier’s wife! No doubt she would be just as kind to Joe, and would laugh easily at Mr Nidd’s sallies.
She was putting the paper away in her reticule, and had drawn out her purse. Sarah stiffened, but she only selected half-a-crown from amongst the coins it contained, and laid it on the table. ‘Will you give that to the stable-boy who has gone to summon up a hackney coach for me?’ she asked.

  Sarah nodded, still frowning. But Kate looked in at that moment, seeking her aunt, and, at sight of her, said gaily: ‘Why, ma’am, when I couldn’t find you in the parlour I made up my mind to it that I had dreamt the whole!’ She saw Sarah’s worried expression, and said, with a droll look: ‘Oh, faithless one! I’ll never forgive you! Or shall I? Yes, perhaps I shall! I can’t tell! Aunt Minerva, Tom has procured a hack for you, and it is waiting in the yard.’

  ‘Then you shall escort me to it,’ responded Lady Broome, rising, and holding out her hand to Sarah. ‘I’ll take my leave of you, Mrs Nidd. I daresay it may be impossible for you to get away, but if you can contrive to do so I hope I need not tell you that you will be welcome at Staplewood?’

  ‘No, my lady,’ replied Sarah, with a slight curtsy. ‘Oh, dear me, no!’

  Lady Broome then preceded her niece out of the kitchen. Five minutes later, Kate came back, her eyes dancing, and her cheeks aglow. She clasped Sarah round the waist, and hugged her. ‘Oh, Sarah, I’ve thrown my cap over the windmill, and whether I’m glad, or whether I’m sorry, I don’t know, but I think I’m glad! To own the truth, it has been a struggle to know how to support my spirits, for the very thought of another situation as governess sinks me into gloom! Particularly now, when you have petted and cosseted me so much. Yes, but I’m a little frightened as well. How shall I go on in such a house as Staplewood seems to be? The Astleys’ was nothing to it, I feel sure! There will be a butler, of course, and – do you think footmen?’