Page 1 of The Derbyshire Dance (Kendall House #3)

Chapter one

The Vicar

“ D ear me,” said Aunt Lucy, pulling aside the lace curtain to peer through the window.

She had hung the frilly curtains despite her niece’s express disapproval, but they did get in the way of a close inspection of imminent company.

“I believe the new vicar is coming up the path. Good heavens! The wind has caught his hat, and he is chasing it. I thought him very dignified in the pulpit on Sunday, but now I shall never see him without thinking of those long gams galloping about our garden.”

“Aunt Lucy,” admonished Bel, sitting across the room and sipping her tea.

“Come away from the window. The poor man does not need to see you giggling at his misfortune.” It was more of a suggestion than a command, for Bel knew how difficult it was to pry her aunt away from her amusements.

Their quiet life in the country was not how Lucy would have chosen to spend the final decades of her life, and, predictably, she took full advantage of whatever liveliness she could find in the Derbyshire countryside.

“Oh, very well,” said Aunt Lucy with a good-natured huff.

She removed herself from the window and walked over to the polished silver candle sconces above the fireplace.

Using the silver as a mirror, she straightened her lace cap.

“Jenny!” she called with a raised voice.

Their maid-of-all-work popped her head into the parlour.

“We’ll need another teacup and plate, for we’re about to have company. ”

Bel continued to sit steadily in her own armchair, refusing to make a fuss about something so un-fuss-worthy. “I wonder why the vicar would be calling in such unfavourable weather?”

“Upon my word!” Aunt Lucy flounced over to a chair to sit down. “What a question! Perhaps he feared that if the weather were fine, he would never find you here in the house.”

Bel was not certain that the vicar’s visit hinged on her presence, but she could not argue with the truth of her aunt’s statement.

She had already been bemoaning the fact that the rain blowing sideways would keep her from walking the perimeter of her estate today.

Not all hope was lost, however. After tea was over, she intended to don a pair of breeches, wrap herself in a greatcoat and muffler, and check on the sheepfold.

Aunt Lucy leaned forward conspiratorially. “I expect the vicar has already visited the Brownlees at Mullhill Manor as they are first in consequence in the neighbourhood.”

“Of course, he has,” replied Bel. “Mr. Brownlee was the one responsible for his appointment. The vicar must have been known to him long before now.”

“Yes, well, I daresay, after the Brownlees, he may have tried to call on the Audeleys. But the Audeleys are away in London. So, we must be his second visit.” Lucy’s eyes grew bright with anticipation. “Or, considered in another light, his first visit with unmarried ladies.”

“His first visit with the parish spinsters, don’t you mean? I daresay his predecessor warned him that a pair of old tabby cats lived at this farm.”

“Tabby cats! Upon my word—”

Bel’s eyes sparkled at her aunt’s sputtering denials.

Aunt Lucy was fifty years old if she were a day.

Bel herself was still on the right side of thirty, but it had been years since she considered herself an eligible miss.

If it were not so impractical, she would be wearing a lace cap too.

Between the two of them, there was certainly no one in this parlour to attract the attention of a young bachelor clergyman.

“Mr. Davies would never speak so ill of us to the new vicar,” protested Aunt Lucy. “I gave him ever so many remedies for his gout, and he was particularly fond of my strawberry preserves. He could eat half a jar of it in one sitting.”

“Which may have been the reason his gout never got better.” Bel arched an eyebrow—the left one, the one that always gave her a cynical appearance. “You must admit that his convalescent trips to Bath almost always happened shortly after you dropped off a jar of preserves at the vicarage.”

Aunt Lucy made another feeble protest, but she could not deny the truth of the matter.

For the last several years, their previous vicar, Mr. Davies, had refused to amend his diet and had instead been making regular visits to Bath to buttress his ailing health.

This year, in early autumn, the ponderous cleric had opted to retire to Bath permanently.

The Derbyshire living had sat empty for two months while Mr. Brownlee, the largest landowner in the parish, decided where to bestow the living next.

The parish folk had begun to wonder why the process was taking so long.

Surely, there must be a respectable curate somewhere in search of a promotion?

Finally, just in time for Advent, Mr. Brownlee had made his decision, and the new vicar had arrived.

Hopefully, Mr. Horace Townsend would be abstemious enough with the strawberry preserves and robust enough in constitution to avoid gallivanting off to a spa town at regular intervals.

But as yet, no one knew enough about the new vicar to predict anything.

“Bel,” said Aunt Lucy, leaning forward in her armchair. “Before he comes in, I want you to promise me something.”

Bel wrinkled her nose. “Not until you’ve told me what it is.”

“Promise that you won’t bring up anything peculiar—like crop rotation, or grain prices, or hoof diseases!”

Bel crossed one leg over the other beneath her grey kersey skirt. “What on earth is peculiar about those topics? I heard Mr. Brownlee himself discussing agriculture with the vicar as we walked past after the Sunday service.”

“Yes, but you know it is peculiar for you to discuss such things. A lady does not show interest in such earthy endeavours.”

Aunt Lucy was of the mind that true ladies could only dabble in embroidery, painting, pianoforte, and strawberry preserves, but none of those pursuits appealed to Bel.

She debated whether to respond to her aunt or to let the matter lie.

But before she could say anything, a fast-moving bundle of fur catapulted onto her lap and began to nuzzle into the waist of her woollen day dress.

She uncrossed her leg and began to scratch the creature behind the ears.

“There you are, Magpie,” Bel said soothingly.

“Wishing for the wind and drizzle to stop, no doubt.” Her cat was as much a creature of the outdoors as she was, but the finicky puss did draw the line at parading through puddles.

On a clear day, there was nothing Magpie liked better than a long ramble through the fields, but on a rainy day, going to sleep on Bel’s lap was often a second-best option.

Bel balanced her teacup carefully as Magpie’s tail swished against her arm.

The two ladies heard a knock on the front door. Aunt Lucy clutched the arms of her chair with visible excitement. “Mr. Horace Townsend,” announced Jenny, bobbing a curtsy to the ladies in the parlour.

“Ah, Mr. Townsend,” said Aunt Lucy, bounding from her seat to take the vicar’s hand.

The man was tall and lanky and dressed in a dark coat and dark trousers that hid the raindrops well.

It was impossible to tell the colour of his bedraggled hair, but Bel suspected it might be an ashen blond.

She wondered if it would be impolite to offer him a towel to dry himself off—she certainly would have wiped down a horse if it had entered the stables in that condition.

Aunt Lucy beamed at the wet visitor. “How kind of you to call on us so soon after your arrival. I am Miss Lucy Morrison, and this is Miss Belinda Morrison.”

The vicar took Lucy’s hand, and she held his fingers as reverently as if they belonged to the archbishop.

“You’ll pardon me for not rising to greet you,” said Bel dryly. “My cat Magpie does not like to be disturbed, even for clergymen.”

“Ah, yes, quite all right,” said Mr. Townsend. His alert blue eyes took in the purring white cat with its patches of black. “I understand that cats are a particular favourite of ladies. I must admit that I prefer dogs. ”

“How interesting,” murmured Bel, predisposed to discount his opinion already. She might have known that he would have liked dogs based on his Sunday sermon. It had been overly authoritarian in herding people about, just like a young sheepdog who needed a few years of maturity under its fur.

“What part of the country do you come from?” asked Aunt Lucy, gesturing for him to be seated. “And won’t you have some tea?”

“I’m a Shropshire lad. Most recently from London, but born and bred in Shropshire. And yes, tea would be splendid.”

A Shropshire lad? Bel managed to keep herself from rolling her eyes.

One should stop referring to oneself as a lad after leaving the hallowed halls of Eton, and she was quite certain that Mr. Townsend had not darkened the door of Eton for a dozen years or more.

He looked almost the same age as she was, the perfect age for a spinster to relegate herself to the shelf…

and the perfect age for an established gentleman to marry. Such was the irony of life.

Since Magpie was still purring contentedly on Bel’s lap, Aunt Lucy assumed the office of hostess and made up Mr. Townsend’s tea.

To Bel’s surprise, he wanted no milk or sugar in his drink.

He did not seem like the sort of fellow who would enjoy a bitter beverage, but perhaps his enthusiasm for religion affected his enthusiasm for tea.

“Are you married, Mr. Townsend?” asked Aunt Lucy, offering him the question along with the teacup. There had been no wife with him on Sunday, but maybe the vicar had come ahead of his family to settle into his new position, and his spouse was still en route from London…or Shropshire.