“I have no idea.” But he was thinking. “Not the queen, certainly, despite nearly twenty births. George the second’s queen died long after the birth of her last child. Queen Anne suffered endless unsuccessful pregnancies, which might have harmed her health, but none directly killed her. Queen Mary died of smallpox, and James the Second’s queen of cancer.”
“You’ve studied such matters?” she asked, astonished.
“I have a retentive memory. Elizabeth, of course, had no children, nor did Mary Tudor. Ah...”
“Jane Seymour!” Kitty said. “Henry the Eighth’s third wife. But that’s nearly three hundred years ago. So, we may all have taken as fact that queens and princessesdon’t die in childbirth. Hence the shock at the affront to natural order.”
“You’re smiling.”
Kitty realized she was. “Such speculations are fun. Is there a natural order?”
“I’d like to think so, and to preserve it.”
“How?”
“In any way I can.”
“I’ll help you if I can.” Kitty looked around. “Speaking of which, is there a portrait of Diane Dauntry here?”
“There must have been, but it was probably destroyed.”
“Thrown on a bonfire, with the dowager dancing around it, cackling?”
“Hush.”
She looked round quickly, but there was no one there. He was correct, however. She must guard her tongue.
He walked to the fireplace and rang the bell beside it. When a maid came, he sent her for Mrs. Quiller. The woman entered with a guarded expression and seemed relieved by the simple question.
“There were two portraits, milord, a miniature and a large one. They were returned to her family.”
“What was she like?” Kitty asked.
Mrs. Quiller bridled, as if insulted. “It is not my place to say, milady.”
“I simply meant in appearance.”
“Ah. Thin and blond, milady. Will that be all?”
“Yes, thank you.”
When the woman had left, Kitty slid a look at Braydon. “Perhaps she thinks I, too, will be soon gone.”
“I expect you to prove her wrong. Onward.”
“A moment.” Kitty returned to the portrait of the fifth viscount to study the miniature again. It didn’t help. The woman was definitely brown-haired and youngish, butdidn’t really resemble the young dowager. It wasn’t important, but the fifth viscount’s marriage and the flight of his wife tweaked her curiosity. The answers must be here somewhere.
She left the gallery feeling more comfortable by the moment. She still didn’t know her husband in all the many ways possible, but she could enjoy his company, which was something. It was a great deal.
He showed her the drawing room, which was in the wintry-perfection style but warmed slightly by a carpet in shades of peach and a number of paintings on the walls. It was not warmed by a fire, so must have seen little use recently. It was typically a lady’s room, and the dowager had her own.
A pianoforte and a harp sat in one corner. Kitty had been taught to play a keyboard but not kept up the skill. She’d never played a harp. Was an aristocratic hostess expected to entertain her guests in that way? In that case, she’d have to apply herself to practice, which had never been her forte. She found it hard to imagine herself staging grand entertainments here. Who did she know other than the village gentry?
A house like this should host events, however, even if only local ones on high days and holidays. What was she to do about that? What was she to do about anything?
Her comfort curdled.
Beauchamp Abbey was a large and complex house, and she knew nothing of the running of such a place. It was elegant, and she was not. Everything here was luxurious and spoke of wealth, and she didn’t know how to be rich. She’d known people who had come into money and wasted it or hoarded it or made ridiculous show with it. It took familiarity to deal with wealth graciously. Braydon had that. She didn’t. How was she to learn?
