“Beg pardon, your grace, Miss Merrington, but there’s a Lady Juliet Payne and Mr Simon Payne just arrived.”
Lily’s face registered bewilderment. “I do not know them. Sophia, do you? No? Are they perhaps acquaintances of the duke, Froggett?”
“Not that I’m aware, your grace.”
“Perhaps they are stranded by the snow… a carriage breakdown,” Sophia suggested.
“I don’t think so, madam,” the butler said. “They seem to think they’re expected… something to do with the plans for the orangery.”
“Then Richard must have invited them,” Lily said.
“Oh, yes, of course,” Froggett said, brightening. “That will be it, and I dare say he forgot to mention it, what with the snow and all. It’s a pity he’s out with the oxen team just now. I’ll let Miss Hester know. She can arrange rooms and deal with them.”
“Oh, no, indeed, I must receive them myself,” Lily said at once. “As a noblewoman, Lady Juliet will expect it.”
The two visitors stood rather forlornly in the Marble Hall, their luggage in a puddly heap near the door, while an assortment of servants awaited instructions. Mr Payne was gazing around the Marble Hall with its array of pillars reachingimperiously to the high ceiling, his expression of awe one that Sophia entirely understood. She had never quite accustomed herself to the grandeur of Staineybank herself. Lady Juliet, oddly, was engaged in watching Mr Payne.
They were a strange couple. Lady Juliet was tiny, a doll-like figure of around forty, while Mr Payne, perhaps ten years younger, was a large man in every sense, both tall and broad of chest, and as handsome a man as Sophia had ever seen. No… that was not quite true, for there had been a man of ethereal beauty at her very first ball, but he had not even noticed her and she had never seen him again. Nevertheless, he remained an ideal of manhood, but she suspected that Mr Simon Payne, once unwrapped from the many layers of his winter travelling garments, might come very close.
“Lady Juliet, welcome to Staineybank,” Lily said. “I am the Duchess of Brinshire.”
It was, perhaps, an unnecessary introduction, for the flurry of bows and curtsies from the assembled servants must have suggested her rank, but Lady Juliet turned to her in some surprise.
“Oh! Duchess! I had not expected…” Only then, rather belatedly, did she drop into her own curtsy.
“You are here to see Mr Richard Merrington, I understand?” Lily said brightly.
“Well… I am not sure…”
“It is about the orangery, is it not? Then that is his project.”
“Is it? I did not know that,” she said vaguely. Then, in a sharper tone, “Simon, do not wander away when her grace is speaking.”
“But it is a perfect cube,” he said, his face alight with inner fire. “And the pillars… Corinthian, and the frieze is so elegant. Do you not think?”
“Well, I am sure, but do please pay attention when her grace is addressing you.”
He turned puzzled eyes on her. “I am complimenting her house, Juliet. She cannot object to that, can she?”
Lady Juliet sighed, but Lily only laughed. “Actually, Mr Payne, I am very pleased that you admire Staineybank, but I find it oppressively grandiose myself.”
“Oh no,” he said solemnly. “It is beautiful. Campbell, you see. Wonderful architect.”
“I am sure he was,” Lily said diplomatically. “But if you are not here at Mr Richard Merrington’s behest, who was it who invited you?”
“Goodenough,” Mr Payne said. “Attorney. Brinchester.”
“Mr Goodenough!” Sophia cried. “But there is no such person!”
“I assure you there is,” Lady Juliet said robustly. “He wrote to us and then brought us here himself from London in the most commodious style. The carriage is still outside, awaiting our instructions.”
“I am afraid it is quite true,” Lily said. “Mrs Richard Merrington arrived here last year in precisely the same manner — a letter from a person calling himself Goodenough, who brought her here, whereupon he disappeared. There is no attorney in Brinchester by that name.”
Lady Juliet turned and almost ran across the Marble Hall, wrenched open the door before the footman could reach it and raced outside. The others followed more slowly, knowing what she would find.
The drive was empty, only the twin tracks in the snow betraying that a carriage had arrived and had now left, making its way down the drive and not to the Staineybank stables.
“Then it is true,” Lady Juliet said. “We have been duped. Butwhy?Why would anyone play such a cruel trick on us?”
