Page 28 of The Mistress of Ashmore Castle (Ashmore Castle #3)

At that moment the door opened and Kitty and Alice came in.

Kitty’s eyes flew to his face; but Alice dashed past her and flung her arms round her brother impetuously.

‘ Darling Giles! You’re back! I was afraid you were going to miss the ball, and Mama said it would look terribly bad if you weren’t here, though Uncle Stuffy could always do the honours, but it wouldn’t be the same, and apart from putting Mama in a temper, I ’d have hated it if you weren’t there.

Have you had a dreadful journey? You do smell rather oily and sooty. But it’s lovely to see you.’

He embraced her absently and said, ‘The journey was long rather than dreadful. I see you haven’t grown up yet.’ He was looking past her at Kitty.

‘Heaven forbid!’ Alice said. ‘I mean to make the most of my last year.’

He put her gently aside and went to Kitty, who had remained just inside the door as if halted there by some invisible force.

He took her hands, which were folded at her waist, and held them away from her.

He felt a shock, but kept it, he hoped, out of his face.

Instead, he said teasingly, ‘What have you been up to, Lady Stainton?’

She was not able, in this first moment of seeing him, to accept a joke, even one so mild. What she wanted, what she needed, was a wholehearted delight in her condition. She said, rather stiffly, ‘How are you, Giles? You look very thin. Didn’t they feed you in Egypt?’

He waved that away. ‘My dear, are you . . . You’re expecting a child?’ She nodded, waiting for his reaction. But his expression didn’t change from the slightly quizzical. ‘When?’ he asked.

‘In July or August.’

He hardly needed to ask, really. There had been just one occasion, shortly before he left.

She had clung to him, and he had been carried away by the moment, and by memories of previous times.

That must have been when it happened. He felt shocked by the randomness of Fate – that a life could be begun with so little thought or intention.

And she had been carrying his child for five months, all the time he had been in Egypt and in ignorance.

He couldn’t decide how he felt about it, apart from surprised. ‘I didn’t know,’ he said blankly.

She searched his face. What was he thinking? His expression gave nothing away. At last she had to say, ‘Are you pleased?’

It brought him back to himself, to his duty. ‘Of course I’m pleased,’ he said automatically. But as soon as he heard the words, he discovered that he really was . ‘How could I not be?’

Another child to love as he loved Louis.

His feelings for his son were so blissfully uncomplicated, free of history, of the anxieties and tangles, misunderstandings, hurt, nuances, apprehensions, huffs and cold shoulders that made adults so hard to keep loving.

Louis beamed at the mere sight of his father’s face.

He chuckled in delight when his father lifted him up.

To grab Giles’s nose and have him honk with pretended shock was for Louis the pinnacle of fun, a moment of sheer, unshadowed pleasure.

He knew that it could not be like that for ever, that Louis would grow up and change, but that made it even more precious.

And a second child – the other son they needed for dynastic reasons – could only be more of the same delight.

He came back from his thoughts to see that Kitty was still waiting, the smile she had managed to summon drooping at the corners with the effort of maintaining it.

His recent guilt over Giulia streaked across his mind.

This was his chance to atone. Poor Kitty had been alone with this knowledge for months.

She was his wife: he must make her happy.

He lifted her hands to his lips and kissed them, and smiled.

‘It’s wonderful news!’ he said. ‘But how are you? Are you well? Are you comfortable? You’re looking well – blooming and beautiful. ’

Her grateful look was his reward. He tucked her hand under his arm and turned to the room to say, ‘I’m going to be a father again!’

‘Yes, we know, dear,’ said Aunt Caroline. ‘It’s very good news.’

‘Especially as it means you can’t go off travelling again,’ Alice added.

‘I’m glad to be home,’ Giles said, and squeezed Kitty’s hand against his ribs.

Kitty felt the comfort of his presence, the strength of his arm under her hand and the warmth of his hand over hers.

Yes, she thought, for the moment his longing to wander was satisfied.

He would throw himself into home matters, and he would be good to her, kind, attentive.

And perhaps by the time the baby came it would have become enough of a habit.

Perhaps with two children in the nursery he would settle down, cease to see his home and family as chains, the Castle as a prison.

* * *

‘Vogel is cautiously in favour,’ Richard said, as he and Giles walked about Aunt Caroline’s rather gloomy, laurel-shaded garden, enjoying a cigar and the chance to get away from come-out talk. ‘Mr Cowling believes it can work—’

‘You’ve spoken to Cowling?’

‘I wanted to get as much done as I could before you came home. And, frankly, not knowing when you would come home, if you came at all, I saw no point in delaying. Why? Do you think I’ve gone beyond my remit?’

Giles hesitated. ‘I thought you were just keeping things going. This innovation . . . It would involve a considerable outlay of funds, and when would we see a return on the investment?’

‘Will, not would,’ Richard insisted. ‘ You ’ve talked about it before – the idea of going in for milk—’

‘Talked about it, but only in the vaguest terms.’

‘Well, it’s time to stop being vague. Bunce’s death gives us an opening and a spur. Adeane and Markham agree that we won’t get a decent tenant for Hundon’s as it is, so if we have to improve it, we might as well do it for ourselves: create a modern dairy farm and show the others the way.’

Giles shook his head. ‘The milk from one farm will hardly—’

‘Oh, I’ve got Shelloes and High Ashmore on board already.

The Bottoms will come in, I’m pretty sure, when they see others jump.

Topheath is mostly sheep, and Hillbrow may be too far from the road, but I think you should go and talk to Lord Shacklock.

He has a fine herd, and plenty of money, too.

Talk to him nicely and you might get him to invest in the scheme, as well as join it.

And that opens the way to other farms further up the valley.

This could be a very large scheme indeed. ’

Giles frowned. ‘Why must I talk to him? If you’ve included him in your incontinent planning, you might as well do it yourself. I’m sure you’re more eloquent than me.’

‘Yes, and much prettier, too,’ Richard said, with a grin. ‘But you’re the earl. He’d expect any approach to come from the boss.’

‘Hmm. And what has Cowling to do with it?’ Giles asked half resentfully. ‘He’s already got a finger in our jam.’

‘Disturbing image! I didn’t ask him to invest at this stage, but he’s finding things out for us, regarding the transportation and the distribution.’

‘And why would he do that?’ Giles said.

‘Because he’s a businessman and likes to encourage enterprise. And because he’s a good old boy and loves his wife, so he wants to help his wife’s bosom friend’s family.’

That was what Giles was afraid of. It was bad enough having Cowling as an investor in the family fortune. He didn’t want to be beholden to him for disinterested kindness – not the man who had married Nina.

It was a warm evening on the night of the ball, and the multitude of candles made it even warmer inside Pelham House.

That was very well for the women with their décolletage and bare shoulders, but for the male half, trussed up like turkeys in breeches and tight stockings, serge jackets, stocks and high collars, it was far less pleasant.

Giles stood as still as possible and suffered in silence.

The house was dazzling, everything sparkling clean, with fresh paintwork and gilding, and flowers everywhere.

Now London Society was making its way up the stairs to the reception line, to where the dowager glittered formidably in silver and purple with crystal beading, a pearl and diamond choker borrowed from Caroline, and a tiara hired from Garrard’s.

Giles stood beside his mother as the official host; Kitty was excused the line because of her condition.

Rachel, next to his mother, did not seem, he noted, at all nervous.

She had taken to it like a fish to water.

When he told her that she looked beautiful, she had accepted the compliment calmly, almost as her due.

She was in white, as a debutante should be, but it was ivory-white tulle over a pale pink silk under-dress, which better became her fairness.

Her hair was dressed with pink and ivory rosebuds and she wore only chaste pearls, but everything about her toilette was of the first quality, the most elegant taste.

Moss was plainly enjoying himself. His chest well out, his back rigid, his head up, eyelids grandly lowered, he announced the arrivals in sonorous tones, the emphasis finely graded to rank and importance.

He did not stumble over a single name or title, even when trickily foreign.

It was, Giles thought, his finest performance.

He might never top this moment; he would certainly never forget it.

Up the stairs they came, the beaded evening gowns, the black-and-white breeches and stockings, the pastel, hopeful girls, the young men eager or supercilious; names, titles, medals, jewels, faces.

A watered ribbon of order here; a coloured jacket of a foreign army there.

A bow of the head and a word of welcome from him and they were passed on.

Giles slipped into a sort of dream, until his mother jolted him out of it with a hiss of outrage.

‘Giles! Who are those people?’