Page 56 of How to Lose a Lord in Ten Days

For a moment, Lydia was certain of being in some sort of strange dream. For so incongruous was the idea of Ashford, here, in Marnsley, that she could not believe her eyes. But there he was in the doorway. Lydia’s heart began to quicken.

‘He called on us this afternoon,’ Mrs Lindell said, speaking very quickly through a beaming smile.

‘To inquire after Rose Cottage – it is for let. I could hardly believe it, but he was most amicable. He tarried with us for an hour, chatting about the village – asking after you specifically, Miss Hanworth! And there was I, not knowing you shared a friendship! I invited him tonight, of course I did, but I had no real expectation of his … I shall go and greet him!’

As she bustled off, Lydia’s eyes were still glued to Ashford’s figure.

He passed through the threshold of the ballroom, unhurried, though his eyes were scanning the room hungrily.

People turned to regard him as he passed, with a little curiosity, but not as much as there would be as soon as word spread as to his identity.

At the moment, he simply garnered the same excitement any handsome stranger must inspire.

Lydia wondered if she was going to be sick.

‘It is rather warm in here,’ Aunt Mildred observed, slipping her hand through Lydia’s elbow. ‘Let us take escape to the terrace where I believe they are serving lemonade.’

Ripping her eyes away from Ashford – now greeting Mrs Lindell with a smile – Lydia followed Aunt Mildred, only just managing to keep her pace to a sedate walk and not a mad dash.

Mrs Lindell had set up a refreshment table on the terrace – though as the dance floor was so well populated, they were almost the only people making use of it.

Lydia accepted a goblet of iced lemonade and took an unladylike draught. The sudden tartness on her tongue had her eyes watering, and she jolted back to herself with a start.

Aunt Mildred said nothing but fixed her beady eye upon her.

‘It appears,’ she said, ‘that perhaps my sister did not apprise me of the entire story.’

‘I …’

Lydia could not think what to say, how to begin to explain. What was he doing here?

But Aunt Mildred’s gaze was looking over her shoulder now. ‘Brace yourself,’ she warned.

For there was Mrs Lindell, veritably skipping towards them with a wide smile, and Ashford behind her, putting up a hand to shield his eyes from the setting sun.

He looked quite irritatingly well, bathed in golden light akin to one of the Renaissance paintings in Hawkscroft’s gallery, and how dare he, really?

Come here, to disrupt her life in such a way when she was only just beginning to like it, looking such a way?

It was appalling behaviour.

‘There we are!’ Mrs Lindell said. ‘I was worried you had disappeared. May I present to you Lord Ashford, Miss Hanworth?’

Ashford bowed before Aunt Mildred. ‘A pleasure to make your acquaintance. I have heard a great deal about you.’

Aunt Mildred looked him over in that hard-eyed way she had, as if she were sucking out your soul with the force of her gaze. Ashford bore it with only a flicker of nervousness.

‘Of course I do not need to introduce you to Miss Lydia, do I?’

Ashford bowed again. Lydia did not curtsey. She had found herself, suddenly and abruptly, awash with more rage than she would have believed her body possible of containing.

‘What are you doing here ?’ she demanded.

‘Miss Lydia!’ Mrs Lindell breathed.

Ashford rose from his bow and smiled. ‘As you may tell, Miss Lydia and I are old friends.’

‘No, we are not!’ Lydia snapped.

‘Close acquaintances?’ he suggested.

‘No!’

Ashford paused, appearing to consider. ‘Reluctant enemies?’

Aunt Mildred gave a soft snort of laughter. Mrs Lindell looked ready to swoon. Lydia only glared.

‘Well,’ Mrs Lindell said faintly, ‘I believe they are about to call the next set so I shall …’

She backed away slowly.

‘Perhaps I might have this next dance?’ Ashford held out a hand towards Lydia with an encouraging smile.

‘I’m afraid my dance card is quite full!’

Ashford looked her over. ‘You do not have a dance card.’

‘ That’s how full it is!’

Aunt Mildred raised her eyes to the heavens. ‘Lydia, my dear, Lord Ashford wishes to speak privately with you.’

Lydia cast her a look of betrayal. Was she on his side, now? ‘His wish is not reciprocated.’

Having spent the better part of a fortnight desperate to see him, she now very much found that she wanted nothing more than to never see him again.

‘Now, now,’ Aunt Mildred chided. ‘Lydia, dear, perhaps you might gift Lord Ashford with a few moments of your time. He has travelled such a long way.’

Lydia scowled. From the corner of her eye, she saw Ashford reach into his pocket.

‘If you take out your snuffbox now,’ Lydia said, ‘I shall scream.’

Ashford withdrew his hands, holding them up, supplicating.

‘Why don’t you show him the gardens?’ Aunt Agatha said. ‘You might locate your brother, while you are there.’

Lydia’s hands clenched.

‘I can leave now, if you truly do not wish to see me,’ Ashford said softly.

She did not want that, either. ‘Oh, very well.’

She stormed past him, ignoring his proffered arm, and made for the flight of stone steps that led down to the gardens.

It was not dark – it would not be, for several more hours, country balls taking place so much earlier than those in the city, and with the summer equinox still ahead of them – but still, Mrs Lindell had placed lamps all along the walkways, and there was the faint sound of music.

Clearly, she expected people to take a turn of the gardens, and yet as they walked, Lydia did not see a single one.

They walked in silence for several moments, a yard of distance between their shoulders, Lydia’s eyes trained resolutely forward.

‘You do not seem pleased to see me,’ Ashford observed.

‘How astute you are.’

A brief silence.

‘Your aunt does not seem … quite as monstrous as you described.’

Lydia decided she would ignore such conversational sallies. She would not be drawn into a trifling exchange of commonplaces, as if they were friends, until he had explained himself.

‘Lady Phoebe sends her best regards,’ he tried next.

Alas, fury and curiosity were not mutually exclusive emotions. ‘How is she?’

‘As well as can be,’ he said. ‘Keeping herself characteristically busy: selling the diamonds, the house. Dacre is helping.’

‘He is still at Hawkscroft?’

‘He intends to remain until a seller is secured,’ Ashford said. ‘At which point, he will return to his own country seat – with Reeves.’

Her eyes sprang, unbidden, to his. ‘Lady Phoebe has permitted it?’

Ashford nodded, smiling. ‘He goes with her blessing. If the house sells, she is unlikely to need both a housekeeper and a butler – and, as luck would have it, Dacre had a vacancy.’

‘Fortuitous timing, indeed,’ Lydia said, unable to prevent herself from smiling any longer. There was one happy ending, at least.

They had reached a fork in the garden’s path and Ashford paused. ‘Which way do you …?’

Lydia veered left at random, leading them away from the rose garden and towards the entrance to the hedge maze.

With the light quickly fading, to be alone in such a place – even with Aunt Mildred’s permission – was not quite the thing, but at that moment Lydia did not particularly care and Ashford followed her agreeably enough.

Perhaps, if she got very cross with him, she would leave him within.

‘How did you know where to find me?’

‘I visited your aunt and uncle, in Berkley Square,’ Ashford said.

Lydia narrowed her eyes. ‘They are not in Berkley Square.’

‘As I found out,’ Ashford said pleasantly. ‘It took a little while to track down their Brighton lodgings, which accounts – in part – for my delay.’

She turned to look at him, startled.

‘Careful,’ Ashford warned, nodding to where a branch had fallen across the path.

She thanked him distractedly. He had gone all the way to Brighton ? ‘Was it … an enjoyable reunion?’

‘Not particularly,’ he said. ‘They were not very impressed with me – nor I with them.’

A thousand questions sprang to Lydia’s tongue – most inconvenient, given her recent vow of icy reticence. But as they made another turn, following by instinct the sound of bubbling water which surely heralded some kind of fountain at the maze’s centre, Ashford spoke.

‘I wish to apologize. I thought my letter would have prevented your banishment.’

It was a good beginning, but Lydia was not feeling charitable. ‘You cannot be so surprised, you are so often wrong.’

For the first time, Ashford’s patience slipped.

‘Am I to be continually insulted in this conversation?’ There was a slight bite in his voice. ‘Or are you able to speak civilly?’

Lydia fired up at once. ‘What did you expect? How dare you be so presumptuous – so presumptuous as to presume to—’

‘Presume my presumption?’ Ashford suggested.

They had turned the last corner, reaching the maze’s heart.

At its centre stood a decorative fountain, with a vast half-moon tastefully illuminated at its centre.

Magnificent in size and depth, it was said to be modelled, as Mrs Lindell frequently boasted, on the Fountain of Neptune, though neither Lydia nor Ashford spared it more than a cursory glance.

‘I own I was not expecting quite so fierce a reception.’

Lydia whirled on him with a furious glare.

‘How could you not?’ she demanded. ‘You rejected me, you sent me away, and now, when I am finally feeling easy again, here you are like some deluded scent hound – for what?’

‘I told you, to apologize and to—’

‘You might have written the same lacklustre apology,’ she interrupted, ‘not—’

Ashford raised his voice to override her. ‘I did not think a letter would have felt quite as romantic a gesture!’

This took some of the wind out of her sails.

‘R-romantic?’ she faltered. Then, valiantly rallying the last of her ire: ‘Attending Mrs Lindell’s waltzing-ball is not exactly a Herculean task.’