“Do you mean to tell me,” she said, eyes flashing as she abandoned her slumped posture to sit bolt upright, “that all this time our wretched father has been turning off clients and keeping you in poverty? Well! Of all the low-life, despicable, disgusting, abominable, infamous, unbelievablydetestablethings to do! I have not the words to describe how much I loathe that man!”
After which she found enough words, and with very little repetition, to abuse him soundly for a half hour, at least.
“But what can we do?” she said at length, her railing having wound itself down into no more than intense irritation. “Whatcanwe do, if every client can be bribed or blackmailed or cajoled into dropping you?”
“About the clients? Nothing, except to find some who are not afraid of him, perhaps. But I shall tell you what Iwilldo, Juliet. I am going to Edlesborough to confront him, and ask him what he means by it. Do you know what is the worst of it? When I left Edlesborough, he made me promise not to go into society, and not to go to White’s, for I was already a member by then. In essence, I was not to take my place in society, and meekly I did as I was bade. I did not want to shame him by letting it be known that there had been a breach between us. I abandonedmy friends from Eton, who might have been some help to me. I could even have lived in some degree as a gentleman, instead of hiding myself away. I kept my side of the bargain, and all he did was cut my feet from under me.”
“I suppose we are lucky he did not take away my little inheritance,” Juliet said.
“He had no power to do so,” Simon said. “The house was Aunt Tabitha’s, and her small amount of money, and when she left all of it to you, her executors were duty bound to see it done. Even our father cannot overturn the majesty of the law.”
“I would not put it past him,” she muttered darkly, making him laugh. “Simon, you are remarkably sanguine about this. You should be outraged. Why are you so calm?”
He laughed again. “Nothing can dent my good humour just now, sister, for I have a pocket full of gold.” That was not the only reason, but there was no need to tell anyone about his secret joy. “Thwaite cannot commission me to build his house, not without prejudicing his own future, but I persuaded him to recompense me for my time over the last couple of years. Five hundred sovereigns, in gold, if you please, no linen, so nothing traceable. Nothing that my father will ever know about, anyway, and enough to keep us in coal and claret for quite some time, and to pay for a post chaise to Edlesborough. Will you come with me?”
“Me? Go back to Edlesborough, and see that man? I could not! I have avoided him all these years, and that can continue indefinitely as far as I am concerned.”
“You could ask him about your mother.”
“I would not ask any favour of him.”
“Are you not curious to see him?”
“No! To turn up at Edlesborough and say,‘Good morning, I am your daughter whom you sent into exile at the age of three’?Indeed, I could not do it. How he would sneer at me, at what I have become, because of him.”
“What have you become?” he said gently.
“A pathetic spinster, brother. Unwed and unwanted at the age of forty-one. He would laugh at me and the servants would pity me. I could not bear it.”
“No one would know you there. In fact, we could have some fun with this. You could go there with me under a false name… I know, you could be my rich bride, being taken on a wedding tour to visit our various relations. That would annoy him so much, to think me rich after all his efforts, would it not? And he would vent his spleen against me, and not you.”
“I have no clothes for a bride,” she said. “A rich bride would have a vast new wardrobe to show off.”
“Oh. Trust a woman to think of that.”
“Trust a man to forget about it. Besides, I am far too old a bride for you. No, Simon, no subterfuge. If we are going to do this, let us at least be honest — which is more than he has ever been.”
“Very well, but I hate to appear before him so… soshabby.You could borrow some clothes from the duchess, for she is much of a size with you. I have no wish to appear in front of our father like a whiny schoolboy, complaining of ill-treatment. Much better to take a position of strength. We expect nothing from him, after all, but at all costs let us not show him how low he has brought us.”
The duchess, who never refused an opportunity to improve a woman’s wardrobe, responded to the idea with enthusiasm. Since she did not hesitate to broadcast the story of Mr Thwaite’s visit and the Earl of Edlesborough’s perfidy throughout the house, Simon found himself unexpectedly drawn back into the duke’s favour.
“I always knew Edlesborough was a snake, but this is beyond anything,” he said, having summoned Simon to his study to commiserate with him. “It is bad enough to cut off a son, but such things do happen. Who knows what goes on in families and what differences there might be, and what cause a man might have to cut out the dead wood of the family? Not that I say that description applied to you, Payne, I dare say, for you seem a respectable enough man in most respects.”
“Thank you, your grace,” Simon murmured, amused.
“Apart from the business of little Miss Sophia, of course,” the duke went on, the eyebrows lowering ominously. “Still, you have had your hair combed over that already, so I say nothing more about it. But this! To deny a man the right to follow his chosen profession — that is not the act of a gentleman. I cannot abide such scurvy dealings. I am minded to build your orangery, and that fancy bridge too, just to spite the man, and I should tell everyone about it, too. My support still carries some weight in society, I believe.”
Simon laughed out loud at that. “Your grace is very kind to suggest it, but I would not have you commission a design of mine for such a flimsy reason as that. If you choose it, make it be because you like it better than any alternative. I do not wish to make my name because my father treated me badly.”
“Ah, you have your pride,” the duke said. “I cannot quarrel with that. Very well, whenever Richard has finished his own designs, I shall choose the one I like best… or I might leave Rowena to choose, since it is in her honour. Do you wish to borrow one of my carriages for your journey, Payne? The ducal arms on the door will give Edlesborough pause, eh? He will know that you have at least one influential friend in the world, for I am not quite nobody, I believe.”
The secretary and comptroller laughed dutifully at this witticism, and agreed to offer whatever assistance was in theirpower. Simon’s crime of aspiring to Sophie’s hand was, if not quite forgotten, at least set aside in the interests of putting Lord Edlesborough’s nose out of joint. So while Juliet was rigged out in the duchess’s unwanted finery, attempts were made to bring Simon up to the mark, too. Sadly, only Mr Godley was of a size to donate clothes to him, and the chaplain’s attire was even shabbier than Simon’s. In the end he had to make do with supplies of linen, silk stockings and soft leather gloves from Richard.
Three days later, in the duke’s own carriage, piled high with luggage, and accompanied by a valet and maid, two footmen standing behind and two grooms as outriders, Simon and Juliet set off for Warwickshire to confront their father.
***
Sophia was delighted to have Simon restored to favour, so that they could meet openly again. They were both too discreet to make any show of affection in public, but there was a pleasure in being in the same room each evening. She dressed with more than usual care, and although she never dared to sit beside him, there were shared glances sometimes and one evening she sat opposite him at the vingt-et-un table. It was a pity his change in circumstances meant that he would soon be leaving Staineybank, but he would return very soon, as he made sure to tell everyone.
