Moonlight And Mistletoe

CHAPTER FIVE

Miss Prudhome arrived back at the same time as the vicar’s wife called, so Hester had Ii opportunity to ask her about the pearls before she greeted her visitor. Mrs Bunting was as well rounded as her husband and equally as welcoming to the newcomers to her parish.

She settled in the front room in a rustle of skirts and beamed cheerfully on Hester and Prudy once the initial exchange of introductions and greetings was done with. ‘Now, my dear Miss Lattimer, I understand you require some respectable women to do the rough cleaning. I can thoroughly recommend Mrs Dalling and Mrs Stubbs. They are both widows; decent women who are bringing up their families by thrift and hard work.’

‘Then by all means I must follow your recommendation. May I offer you tea, Mrs Bunting?’

‘Thank you, Miss Lattimer. I will speak to both women when I leave you and ask them to call this afternoon, if that is convenient. I am glad to be able to say that the inhabitants of this village are as honest and hard-working as may be found anywhere. You have certainly found a most pleasant place to settle and I hope you find it so.’

Hester smiled back, delighted to have found approval from the vicar’s wife. She would go a long way to establish Hester’s credit in the neighbourhood. ‘I am so glad to hear that. Mrs Bunting. I had been somewhat concerned, for it seemed that someone had made their way into the house this morning.’

Prudy gave a squeak of alarm, then subsided with a nervous glance at Hester. Hester sighed inwardly; somehow she was going to have to teach Prudy to be a more self-assured companion and not keep nervously in the background as a proper governess must.

‘Oh dear, surely you arc mistaken?’ Mrs Bunting looked quite amazed. ‘No one here would behave in such a way and I would have heard if there were any tramping fellows about. The churchwardens are very alert for that sort of thing, you know. The last thing they want is any vagrant settling in and attempting to claim parish support.’

‘Oh, it is a relief to have you say so.’ It was anything but. A sneak thief was a familiar London nuisance that could be guarded against. Now she was left with no explanation again-and no defence.

‘What made you think something was amiss?’ Mrs Bunting asked.

‘Perhaps it was nothing after all. It was just that some pearls that had been in a dish were scattered all over the floor and I could think of no other explanation,’ Hester said lightly.

‘Oh.’ Mrs Bunting looked both thoughtful and somewhat disturbed. ‘How very…odd. Has anything else out of the ordinary occurred?’

‘No.’ Hester was not going to describe the state of the dressing room again. ‘Nothing.’

‘Well, that’s all right then.’ The vicar’s wife looked relieved. ‘There will be a perfectly rational explanation.’ She sipped her tea, then added vaguely, ‘I never think it a good idea to listen to village gossip.’

Hester decided to ask right out. ‘Mrs Bunting, is there some rumour circulating about this house? Only the vicar said something that made me wonder, and now you mention village gossip.’

The older woman looked distressed and flustered. ‘My foolish tongue! It is inexcusable of me to alarm you. The villagers will talk so, but I am sure it is only because this house has been empty for so long. They tell a silly tale of blighted love or some such nonsense concerning the lady who last lived here. But that was such a long time ago.’ She fanned herself with her lace handkerchief and took another sip of tea. ‘There is a local story of the scent of roses-although how anyone could know I have no idea because Sir Edward Nugent never allowed anyone in except for his agent and the occasional workman.’

Hester shivered. She had smelt roses as she had entered the house for the first time-roses on a warm breeze in a cold airless room. ‘The garden is full of them, quite untamed and half-wild. There are even a few now with a flower or two despite the season. It is no wonder that the scent is noticeable here.’

‘A very sensible observation, my dear Miss Lattimer,’ Mrs Bunting remarked. ‘My husband and I have only been in the parish for four years so we know little of the earlier history. However, there has been talk of lights being seen here at night, quite recently. That seems to be a new rumour. I think it would be sensible to check all the window catches, just in case someone has started using it as a shelter. Although with you in occupation they would soon be scared away, I am sure.’

‘Yes,’ Hester said slowly. ‘That would be a wise precaution. How recently were the lights seen?’

Mrs Bunting cocked her head on one side and thought. ‘Two or three days before you arrived, that I heard of. But it will have been some tramping fellow I am sure, now long gone-or imagination.’

Hester turned the conversation and began to talk about the garden and her plans for it. In Mrs Bunting she found she had another enthusiast for horticulture and was soon overwhelmed by offers of plants and cuttings in the spring. ‘Thank you so much, ma’am, but I had better not accept anything until I have the front garden under control somewhat or I will have nowhere to put the plants. I suppose I should be concentrating on plans for the house, but I confess that I look to the garden to distract my eye from the Old Manor opposite.’

‘Hideous, my dear, I quite agree. And such a pity when one considers how perfectly charming the rest of the houses around the Green are. Even the humblest cottage has some picturesque merit to it.’

‘I wonder that a gentleman should wish to take it at such a time of year,’ Hester said, hoping that she was not sounding too interested.

‘Indeed!’ Mrs Bunting settled more comfortably into her chair, reminding Hester of a broody bantam sitting snugly on her nest. ‘After Boxing Day for the hunting, perhaps-but now? The villagers will have it that the earl is avoiding his creditors, but that must be nonsense, one only has to look at his horses to see he does not want for money.’

Hester thought of the casual way he spoke of not only buying her house, but resettling her wherever she wanted to go. No, Lord Buckland was not in want of a fortune. Naturally she could not tell Mrs Bunting this.

‘How long has he been here?’ She poured tea and placed the biscuits within reach.

‘Why, not much longer than you have yourself, Miss Lattimer. Three or four days before, I cannot quite recall.’ She began to tick off on her fingers. ‘He was not in church last Sunday, that I know. Mr Bunting called on him on Wednesday I think, in very heavy rain. Yes, I recall now. He arrived on Monday.’

Hester put her cup down with a little clatter. Lord Buckland had been in the village three days before she had arrived and during that time mysterious lights had been seen in the Moon House for the first time. She racked her memory for signs that anyone had been there, but the floors had been roughly swept in all the main rooms and there had been no betraying footprints in the dust. The dressing room had been unswept, of course. That had certainly not been entered-the dust had lain unmarked like grey snow.

Could he have been in the house? To what end? If, as it seemed, his purpose for staying in Winterbourne St Swithin was to persuade her to sell the Moon House, why should he need to enter it clandestinely and prowl about by candlelight? She did not like feeling this suspicion, it went against her instinctive liking for him.

Mrs Bunting was speaking again and Hester hastily composed her mind and her face and listened attentively. ‘…a small afternoon party only, you understand. Just the intimate circle of ladies in the village. We do not have a large social group actually in the village, although when one includes all the families in outlying houses and estates there is a not inconsiderable throng whenever someone holds a dance.

‘However, I am keeping it small because I hope to persuade Miss Nugent to attend. She is still in mourning, of course, it is only two months since her father died, but it will do her good to enjoy a little feminine company.’ She beamed at Hester. ‘Will you and Miss Prudhome be able to join us?’

‘Thank you, we would be delighted to. Um… which day did you say, I am afraid I did not quite catch…?’

‘Wednesday next week. At three. You cannot miss the vicarage, it is just up the lane next to the church.’

Shortly after she departed, leaving Hester prey to some very mixed emotions. It was excellent that she had been invited to Mrs Bunting’s At Home, for the sooner she met and began to mix with the local ladies, the sooner she would find her feet in this small community. And some more callers coming and going would certainly help to make visits by Lord Buckland less conspicuous. But the prospect of such an exclusively feminine society was somewhat daunting. She had become so used to male company. But repining about that was pointless. She had needed a new home, a home of her own, and it was up to her to make this a success and to learn to put the dangerous pleasures of masculine company out of her mind.

Prudy hovered anxiously, wringing her hands. ‘Oh, Hester dear, has there really been a burglar?’

‘I have no idea,’ Hester responded briskly. ‘But if there was, he’s gone now. We must just be careful of the doors.’ Prudy was still looking wretched. ‘What is it, Prudy?’

‘Did…did Mrs Bunting truly invite me as well?’

‘Yes, Prudy,’ Hester said firmly. ‘You are my lady companion, it is only proper that you go about with me. We will look at your gowns, I am sure one of the afternoon dresses we bought will do admirably.’

‘Thank you, Hester,’ the little woman responded, looking terrified.

What was I thinking of, employing her? Hester wondered, then reproved herself. A chaperon, however ineffectual, was essential; without one she would be socially unacceptable, and she knew only too well what that was like. ‘You will soon become familiar with local society,’ she said kindly. ‘And I would be so grateful if this afternoon you could look over the hampers of linen and make me an inventory. I am sure you will do a much better job of it than Susan,’ she added mendaciously, rewarded by the tremulous smile she received.

Once alone, there was nothing to distract her from her imaginings. Hester carried the tea tray out to the kitchen with an abstracted air, trying to convince herself that her qualms about his lordship were simply because of his mysterious desire to buy her house and not because she believed for a moment that he had been creeping about the place at night.

There was also the complication that he showed an alarming tendency to flirt with her and that she showed an even more worrying susceptibility to that flirting. She had even allowed herself to be held on his knee, for goodness’ sake! Only… he was so very attractive, and there was something in his expression when he looked at her that made her want to trust him. And he had only taken her on his knee to comfort her, hadn’t he?

‘Oh, bother men!’ She set the tray down with more force than judgement, setting the fragile cups jumping.

‘And so say I, Miss Hester.’ Susan emerged backwards from a cupboard on one side of the wide fireplace, tugging at a large wicker hamper by its rope handle. ‘I don’t know how many times I’ve asked Jethro to drag this out so I can use this cupboard for my brooms and brushes, but he’s off setting the china to rights in the dining room, which is much more important than me trying to get this dratted kitchen straight.’

‘What is in it?’ Hester enquired, deciding from long experience it was not worth getting in the middle of one of Susan and Jethro’s periodic fallings-out.

‘Just old pots and pans and some cloths. I’ll have a look later and see what is any use.’ Susan gave the hamper a last vicious shove into a corner of the kitchen and attacked the now empty cupboard with her broom.

Hester dodged the cloud of dust that emerged and opened the door on the other side of the hearth. It appeared to be the mirror image of the one Susan was attacking and was quite empty. Why on earth she could not use that one for her brushes Hester could not imagine, unless, once she had asked him, she was determined that Jethro must empty the first one. But it was dark and dank and a large spider was sitting firmly in the middle of the floor. Hester shuddered, shut the door and went in search of Jethro.

She found him in the other front reception room, which he had decided should be the dining room. It was now graced with Hester’s dining table, four chairs and a dresser, giving an effect she was more than pleased with. Jethro was unpacking the good china, rinsing it in a bowl of water, drying it and setting it on the dresser.

‘Jethro, I wish you would give Susan a hand for a little while, I found her dragging the most enormous hamper out of a cupboard in the kitchen.’

‘Yes, ma’am.’ He put down his cloths obediently and got to his feet. He showed Hester a willing face, but as she entered the kitchen on his heels he did not hesitate to continue the dispute that he and the maid had obviously been stoking all morning. ‘What’s wrong with the cupboard on the other side, then?’

‘It’s damp, I told you.’ Susan looked up red-faced from her position hanging over the hamper. ‘Must be a crack in the wall or something, letting the water in. This side’s dry as a bone. Faugh!’ She flapped a hand in front of her face. ‘Look at the state of this cloth. Give me a hand to drag it into the yard, Jethro. It’ll all have to be burned.’

Disinclined to chase spiders around the kitchen, Hester wandered back to the front of the house. ‘Find something useful to do,’ she castigated herself. ‘Stop mooning around wondering about Guy Westrope’s motives.’

As absolutely nothing was more absorbing than considering his lordship, ideas about helping with the inventory of the linen, doing some mending, creating a plant list for the spring garden or thinking about menus for the week paled into insignificance.

Hester found herself curled up on the sofa, chin in hand, brooding not unpleasurably on the sensation of sitting upon the earl’s knee. It had felt safe… no, not safe, that was the wrong word. She had felt protected, but at the same time vulnerable and flustered. It was an intriguing feeling and when the knocker banged she grimaced with annoyance at the break in her train of thought.

She waited, but obviously Jethro and Susan were out of earshot. A glance in the glass was reassuring: at least this time she was not going to appear a complete hoyden, opening her own front door.

It was a footman, tall and dressed in a subdued livery suitable for country use. ‘Good day, madam. His lordship asked me to deliver this. Would you wish me to wait for a reply?’

Hester took the proffered letter and gestured the footman into the hall as she broke the seal. ‘A moment, please… yes, if you will wait.’

It was an invitation. Hester spread it open on her writing table.

Lord Buckland requests the pleasure of the company of Miss Lattimer and Miss Prudhome at dinner… It went on to give a time of seven on Monday evening. Hester’s eyes widened at the fashionable hour; if she was invited for seven, it was unlikely they would sit down before eight, a daringly late hour for country society.

Across the bottom of the formal note, in a bold, less disciplined version of the same hand, he had written, I have invited a most respectable company, so you need not be alarmed at an invitation to a bachelor’s table. Tell your stickler of a butler that I will make sure a footman walks you home and bring your dragon of a companion. The letter G filled the remaining corner of the sheet in an arrogant scrawl.

Should she go? Such short notice meant that the rest of the ‘respectable company’ might not be present to lend her countenance and poor Prudy was hardly a defence against an earl with a whim to flirt or worse. Then she smiled at her own naivety; everyone in the neighbourhood would be agog to be invited by such a host and her presence would fade into insignificance. Any previous engagements would be ruthlessly broken, she felt sure. Was it arrogance on his part, she wondered, or simply a shrewd knowledge of human nature? Probably the latter.

Without giving herself time to think, she pulled a sheet of paper towards her and dipped her quill in the standish. Miss Lattimer thanks Lord Buckland for his kind invitation… Miss Lattimer and Miss Prudhome would be delighted…

The footman took the finished note with a respectful bow and marched back across the street, leaving Hester prey to sudden qualms. Should she have done that? she wondered as she went back to pick up the invitation. What would local society say to an unmarried lady accepting-even if there were other guests?

‘Did someone call, Miss Hester?’ Susan popped her head round the door.

‘Look. Lord Buckland has invited me for dinner on Monday. He says he has invited other people, so I suppose I should not concern myself, but do you think it will cause talk?’

‘You being a single lady?’ Susan came into the room, revealing that she was wrapped in a vast sacking apron. ‘I was just about to start on that range,’ she explained, seeing Hester’s expression. ‘Soot everywhere, I’ll be bound. It wouldn’t have mattered in Portugal,’ she said, applying her mind to Hester’s question. ‘No one thought anything of it if you went out to dinner or dances when your papa was away. Don’t know about London, though…’

‘Neither do I,’ Hester admitted. ‘I was hardly in a position to go out into society when I was living with Sir John.’ She pushed down the memory of the snubs and the scandal arid focused on the present. ‘I think I can risk it; after all, everyone is going to be so agog to receive an invitation that they will probably assume that I am just the same. Safety in numbers,’ she added ambiguously.

Oh, Miss Hester! You don’t think he would…?’

‘Certainly not,’ Hester said, wondering guiltily what Susan would have said if she’d seen her cradled on his lordship’s knee in her own bedroom. ‘After all, Miss Prudhome will be with me. Now, what am I going to wear?’

‘You’ve got several good gowns. Any of them would do.’ Susan undid her apron strings. ‘I’ll just go and shake them out so you can decide. I’ll need to press something for church tomorrow in any case.’

‘You do not think they might be too fashionable for local society?’ Hester worried out loud as they went upstairs. ‘I would not like to seem forward.’

Although in her time living with Colonel Sir John Norton she had never been able to go out in public with him, he had liked her to dress well and enjoyed their evening meals together with her well gowned, her hair coiffed and with jewels at her throat. Dear John, she thought wistfully as they entered the bedroom. Marriage had been out of the question, she had finally made him accept that, but the venomous dislike of his distant relatives at his funeral and the scandal that had sent her fleeing from London still made her cringe inwardly.

‘They’ll be interested to see what’s in vogue,’ Susan prophesied. ‘And in any case, all the ladies will be wearing their finest, I’ll be bound. What about Miss Prudhome?’ she added dubiously.

‘Prudy!’ Hester called down the landing. ‘We are invited to dinner at his lordship’s! Come and talk about gowns.’ She exchanged a rueful smile with Susan at the sound of Prudy’s shriek of dismay.

Sunday proved to be a welcome respite from housework, thoughts of Lord Buckland and lurid imaginings about the house. Even Prudy stopped working herself into a state worrying about her modest dinner gown, the fact that she would be expected to make conversation and the knowledge that she must guard Hester from the advances of a Dangerous Man.

They arrived in good time for matins, and Hester found herself escorted courteously to a pew by the verger. ‘Here you are, Miss Lattimer, ma’am, the Moon House pew.’

And sure enough, there was the crescent moon carved on the panelled door of the highbox pew. Hester entered with Prudy on her heels, hoped that Susan and Jethro had found themselves suitable seating in the gallery and composed herself to pray.

When she resumed her seat she looked around with some interest. Most of the congregation were now in their places. Bonnets and an assortment of male heads could be glimpsed. Near the front she could see the jet-black rim of a heavily veiled bonnet next to a dark head: the Nugent brother and sister, possibly. On the other side there was one blond crown of hair she would recognise anywhere; his lordship was dutifully attending church. Hester felt her heart give an odd little skip and tightened her hands on her prayer book; it was unseemly to even think about a man under these circumstances.

After the service Hester waited, eyes modestly upon her prayer book, until the front pews had emptied before stepping out. Their occupants had vanished and she let out a sigh of relief. What if Lord Buckland had decided to renew his pressure on her to sell in such a very public place?

Mr Bunting greeted them warmly at the church door and received her compliments on the efforts of the choir with enthusiasm. ‘One of my interests, you know, Miss Lattimer. It had been sadly neglected before my time, but I flatter myself it is as tuneful a gathering as any in the county now.’

He turned to the next parishioner and Hester made her way back across the Green, musing aloud to Prudy that they must embroider new pew-seat cushions and kneelers. The cushions were thin and offered little protection against hard old oak, the kneelers sagged under the weight of her knees, bringing them into contact with cold stone. That would be a most suitable occupation for a young lady, and one where she could exercise both her artistic sensibilities and also concentrate her mind upon suitably reverent religious symbolism.

Yes, entirely suitable and far more respectable than any of the ways she had been occupying her time recently.