“Yes. Well, I’m still here, you see.”
It was difficult to credit but Collingwood had stayed faithfully at this post after the great victory of Trafalgar, doing his duty by the nation, and had not once set foot on land, while others had returned to bathe in the delirium of public adulation that had followed their release from the mortal fear of invasion.
His genial face was careworn and old. It was said that while he yearned for peace and retirement the government had been too fearful to let him go for want of any with his formidable skills as a diplomat and strategist.
“Flags will give you your fill of orders, signals and so forth, so let me tell you something of how the larger situation has changed our position here.”
The dog curled up under his chair while he gathered his thoughts.
“The main purpose of the Mediterranean fleet remains the same. To deny the French the Mediterranean. To that end we’ve a close blockade of Toulon and the same at Cartagena. But there’s complications as you’d expect of Boney.
“We’ve lost Naples but we must perforce keep Sicily or the eastern Med is denied us.
“In the west we have the Barbary Deys in Morocco and similar to be polite to, else we lose our beef and water, but further east it’s much more troublesome. The Russians have ambitions to be a player upon the world stage and have thereby sadly affronted the Turks, who consider themselves to be the reigning power in the east. As they are our allies both, it makes for tiresome dealings.”
“My lord, what of Bonaparte’s decree? What is its effect in these waters? And you are speaking to one only recently returned from the Caribbean.”
“His grand Continental System? Then it has to be said that it’s a sore trial to our manufactories and traders in their northern markets but in these parts, while we suffer his ships to moulder in port, he cannot enforce it.”
He sighed and gave a sad smile. “Here we sit, Kydd, in the full knowledge that it is in our power to lose the war for England in a single day. Yet in this peril we are given less force by far than a year ago. And all the time we are commanded at a distance by a landlubber first lord and a parcel of ninnies in government who have no conception of sea power and expect me to act upon their vapourings of the moment.”
Kydd murmured something but Collingwood hadn’t finished. “At times I wake up from a dream where I’m a circus whip, who prowls up and down to keep the wild beasts at bay, armed with nothing but a goad and a fierce look. All it needs …”
He stopped, then brightened. “But let not my maunderings spoil the hour. You’ll stay to dinner? And you shall send for your officers. Are there any performers at all? We have a very passable theatre troupe of amateurs, who display their talents upon the slightest provocation …”
CHAPTER 4
“LORD AND LADY BARRADALE,” the master of ceremonies intoned.
A portly noble in crimson and gold with silk breeches and an old-fashioned wig brought his wife forward on his arm. He made an elegant leg to the Countess of Farndon and a polite bow to the dowager countess and the earl, while his wife sank down in a curtsy.
Cecilia bobbed with a smile. “It was so good of you to come. And in this tiresome weather.”
The viscountess was sharp-faced and wore no less than seven strings of pearls over her elaborate gown. She answered in cool tones, “Our pleasure to be here, Lady Farndon. I do hope you are settling in well. I find servants can be so trying at times, don’t you?”
Cecilia recognised the look but she herself was a countess and had precedence over a mere viscountess.
“Farndon does not allow familiarity and will not brook insolence in any form,” she said sweetly, and allowed her gaze to slide to the next couple.
This was the neighbouring Earl Chervil, who seemed a jolly enough fellow, and Cecilia warmed to the prospect of a returned visit.
Her years with the Marquess of Bloomsbury, as companion to the marchioness, were paying off handsomely. She knew every bit of the code, all the artifices of snobbery and aspiration, and backstairs she had acquired a sound understanding of how things were actually contrived. She was thus perfectly able to cope, acting as hostess directly instead of at the bidding of others.
Beside her, Nicholas was performing his noble duty but she knew he took it too seriously for it to be a pleasure and it would be her mission to lighten his burden.
Chervil was earnestly holding forth to him about the soils of north Wiltshire. She fanned herself daintily, taking the opportunity for a discreet survey of the ballroom. It had been a good response to the invitations even if, she suspected, many had accepted only out of curiosity.
As her mother-in-law had predicted, the newspapers had seized on the occasion of a society wedding out of the ordinary and had speculated wildly. A young earl-in-waiting who had disappeared into the world, some said for eccentric scientifical pursuits, others for salacious wanderings in exotic parts, was recalled to his duties by his father’s demise. And had taken for bride a nameless country girl in defiance of society.
Their conclusions, however, were generally the same. It was not unknown for an ageing noble to marry a compromised milkmaid, but this could not be the case here, for in the peerage Lord Farndon was a most eligible catch. There was no other explanation possible than that it had been a truly romantic match, the noble lord smitten by an unknown beauty.
It had made splendid copy, with Cecilia an object of intense interest.
The reception line ended. She caught the eye of the orchestra leader and nodded discreetly.
The music faded and a loud chord was struck.
The Earl of Farndon turned and stood attentively.
The dear fool. “Nicholas!” she hissed. “Come on-it’s for us! They’re waiting for us to start the ball.”
She swept him out into the centre of the floor for the minuet and they danced together under the magnificent chandeliers.
The canopy of the four-poster great bed was prettily patterned with interlocked heraldic flowers, holding in the candlelight a soft mystery of time and ancestry. Cecilia lay looking up at it, still coming to terms with what she had become-and the man she had married.
He was next to her, reading from a volume of verse, which she now knew he invariably did before sleep. She had learned other things: he was serious and thoughtful, reflective and calm, and it were better she allow him to reach a conclusion by his chain of logic than to interrupt with a stab of practical intuition.
But there was so much she didn’t know about him, now, as they set out on their married life together.
She rolled over to face him. “Nicholas, my love.”
“Oh, yes, my darling?” But his eyes were still on his book.
“Can we talk?”
“Oh?” he said, in concern, laying down the book and turning to her.
“Yes, do you mind?”
“What is it, Cecilia, my very dearest?”
“Nicholas, don’t you agree that if we love each other and worry about things, we shouldn’t keep it to ourselves, we should share them?”
“Why, I suppose so.”
“Then we shouldn’t have secrets from each other?”
“Do we? What, then, should I tell you, dear?”
“Nicholas-one question only.”
“Certainly.”
“Who are you?”
“I … I beg your pardon?”
“I know nothing about you really, Nicholas. You’ve told me so little about yourself.”
“Oh.”
“Yes. I think you should tell me the story of your life so that I’ll know just who it is I’m now joined to.”
“All of it? I really don’t think-”
“All of it, Nicholas,” she said quietly.
“Well, I was born here at Eskdale Hall some many years ago and-”
“I’m serious, Nicholas. I want to know what in the past has made you … you.”
He looked at her with great tenderness, then turned and lay back, staring up into the blackness for so long she thought he was rebuffing her.
Finally he spoke. “Yes, my dear. You are right-there will be no secrets between us and you have every right to know who I am-although this is a question I’m not sure I can answer.