She was quite prepared to argue the case all night if need be, but her mother said hastily, “Lord Tarvin made a speech in the House last week, Izzy. He is becoming such an asset to the government, is he not, Alvira?”
Mrs Edward’s face softened at once. “Oh, indeed! Such an asset!”
Izzy felt she could not endure any encomiums on the virtues of Edward, the present Lord Tarvin. His predecessor, Aunt Myrtle’s husband, she had liked well enough, but since there had been no issue from that marriage, the title had passed to Mrs Edward Harfield’s son, also called Edward, who took his responsibilities as head of the family very seriously. He was otherwise an inoffensive young man, but Izzy had never warmed to him or his mama.
There was another Mrs Harfield, the wife of the youngest son, Jack, who had a large family, but they lived some distance from the Priory and were never spoken of, so Izzy knew little of them, except that they were reputed to be wild and uncouth. All hopes rested on the new Lord Tarvin who would, his mother was sure, soon make a splendid match and set up his nursery at the Priory.
The butler wheezed into the room to announce dinner, and they all followed him through. For at least half the meal, Izzy wondered if perhaps she should have stayed in her room. The conversation was insipid, focused on the banal, such as the food, or the uninteresting, mainly the marital prospects of Lord Tarvin. His mother had been trying to arrange a match for him since he had inherited the title three years earlier, at the age of twenty-four. If Izzy had been in a less fractious mood, she would have enjoyed his continuing success in doing exactly as he pleased.
Yet she could not look at her mother, placidly eating her dinner and making light conversation as if nothing at all had happened. As if she had not just been abandoned, like the spent stems of pea vines, their fruits plucked and eaten, tossed onto the compost heap. How could she be so calm? Izzy wanted to scream and rage and throw things about. So much expensive china and glassware on the table, just begging to be hurled against the wall with a satisfying crash.
She pushed a piece of veal about her plate unseeingly, listening to these stupid women talking about Lord Tarvin’s marriage as if marriage was the be all and end all of a man’s existence. Or a woman’s… Till death us do part, her father had promised, but Mama was not dead and yet she was parted from her husband, just as Izzy was.
The servants cleared the table for the second course. Her plate gone, Izzy held tight to her wine glass as if it would hold herabove the waves in stormy seas. Mrs Edward was still prattling on about her precious son, something about town and society and being goodton.
“Do you not agree, Lady Farramont?”
Izzy stared at her uncomprehendingly. Then, with a sharp crack, the stem of the wine glass snapped.
“Oh, Lady Farramont!” Mrs Edward cried, gesturing to the butler. “Quick, a cloth to bind Lady Farramont’s hand.”
“I am not Lady Farramont!”Izzy screamed. “I am notLadyanything. I am Miss Isabel Atherton and Mama is Miss Caroline Horncastle, we are neither of us married, so let us not pretend that everything is normal. Nothing is normal, and will never be normal again.”
Into the shocked silence, she stormed from the room, and ran for the stairs.
“My lady! My lady!” a voice puffed behind her. The wheezy butler, a cloth in his hand. “You are bleeding, my lady.”
She snatched the cloth from him with an exclamation of pure frustration, wrapped it roughly round her hand, and ran away. It was the sheerest luck that led her straight to the right wing of the house. She stopped, recognising the big bowl of dried honesty on a console, tried the door beyond it, and there she was. Or was she? She crossed to the dressing table to check that the brushes laid out were hers, then gasped at the sight of herself in the mirror. Her lovely white gown, so admired in town, was streaked from waist to hem with blood.
It was too much. She backed away in horror, tears welling, until she found herself against the wall. Sliding down to the floor, she buried her face in her satin-clad knees and wept for all she had lost. Even her gown was spoilt, as if to say,‘You have nothing any more, no husband, no home, no place in society. You will never dine at Marford House again or be complimented by the Prince of Wales.’
Sometime later, although whether minutes or hours, she could not say, her mother came to find her.
“Oh, Izzy, dear!” she said softly. “It is not so bad as all that. You will marry Ian again and all will be well.” She picked up the miniature of Ian that Brandon had placed on the bedside table and gazed at his serious face. “He is a good man, Izzy, and will not treat you or the girls any differently after this. You chose well five years ago. I expect he is on his way to collect you as we speak.”
“I hate him!” Izzy cried. “I hate Papa, too, and so should you, for what he has done to us.”
“It is not his fault, dear,” Lady Rennington said. “He has suffered as much as anyone over this. He has lost his family, and he feels it keenly, as you must be aware.”
“He still has his title,” Izzy spat.
“Well, I intend to keep mine, too,” her mother said, with a wry smile. “I know that legally I am merely Miss Caroline Horncastle, but I have been the Countess of Rennington for thirty years, and I find I cannot change now. If my friends continue to call me Lady Rennington, I shall not correct them. Besides, how inconvenient it would be to have to get new cards made.”
She laughed, but Izzy could not see any humour in the situation. “But you cannot be happy to think of him marrying some silly bit of a girl, surely.”
“I hope he will not do anything so foolish, but a somewhat older woman, with good sense and enough years left to her to give him a stout son or two… yes, I should be content with that. Izzy, we must all do our duty. A woman’s duty is to give her husband sons to inherit. So I have always taught you girls, and so I believe still. Since I cannot do that, I willingly step aside so that your father may find someone who can. But you are young enough to give Ian a dozen sons. That is where your duty lies.Now let me ring for Brandon to help you into a clean dress. Will you not come downstairs? You will not want to play for us, not with your hand injured, but you could sing, dear. You have such a lovely voice.”
“I do not want Brandon, or a clean dress, or to sing anything.”
“Very well, dear. Josie is attending to the baby at present, but shall I send her to bear you company when he is settled?”
“No… thank you. I need to be alone.”
“Your hand—”
“It is fine, Mama. The bleeding has stopped. Please do not fuss.”
Lady Rennington nodded and went away again, but Izzy was not surprised when Brandon appeared shortly afterwards with a bowl of warm water and cloths. There was no glass left in the wound, so after cleaning it, applying a salve and then a bandage, Izzy told her to go.
