I could give you the direction of an attorney who would be able to tell you more.”
“No,” I said abruptly. “There is no need.”
Mr Carswall’s seat, Monkshill-park, lay some ten or twelve miles south and west of Gloucester in the direction of Lydmouth. We made good time when we left the city because the first part of our journey lay along turnpike roads. The last few miles lay on smaller roads and lanes. Time dragged. Edgar fidgeted. My body ached with the undeserved weariness of the sedentary traveller.
By the time we swung off the road, the afternoon was turning to twilight. A grim-faced lodge-keeper opened the gates. We followed a winding, gradually ascending drive through parkland. Trees swayed like maenads against a gloomy sky. The wind threw drops of rain against the carriage windows.
The house burst into view, a great rectangular block with three storeys and five bays, faced with stone that gleamed coldly against the darkening landscape. We were clearly awaited, for as we drew up at the door, two footmen ran out with umbrellas and ushered us through the driving rain and up the steps into the hall. I recognised one of them as Pratt, the thin-faced sycophant whom Mr Carswall must have brought down with him from town. Charlie Frant flew to greet his friend, followed at a more sober pace by the two ladies, arm in arm.
“Edgar!” Charlie cried. “Let me show you our room. Oh, we shall have such larks.” His mother touched his shoulder and reminded him of my presence. Blushing, he turned to me. “Mr Shield, sir, how good of you to come.”
Mrs Frant shook my hand and gave me her gentle smile.
“My father is closeted with his agent on estate business,” Miss Carswall told me. “But you will meet him at dinner.” She glanced at the hovering footmen. “Pratt will show you to your room. I daresay you will want to rest after the fatigue of your journey. But not for long, I am afraid – we dine at half-past five o’clock. We keep country hours at Monkshill.”
I mounted the stairs in the wake of the footman. Far above me was an oval skylight which seemed less a means of admitting light than a way of emphasising the height of the house and the breadth of the stairwell. Monkshill was on the grand scale, a residence fit for giants. I was sensible of a stillness beneath me, as if the women in the hall below were holding their breath.
My room was large, a little shabby and very cold. I washed and changed as quickly as I could. Somewhere in the house a clock was striking five when I went in search of the drawing room. Lamps and candles lighted the landings and the stairs. But they failed to expel the darkness from the immense spaces of the mansion.
In the hall, I hesitated, wondering where the drawing room was. A figure detached itself from the shadows to my right.
“Good evening, sir.”
Startled, I swung round. “Why, Mrs Kerridge! I trust I find you well?”
“As well as can be expected.” She nodded towards the door on my right. “If you want the boys, they’re in the drawing room.”
She left as suddenly as she had arrived, the abruptness of her manner reminding me of my ambiguous status, neither gentleman nor servant. I knocked lightly on the door and went in. The drawing room was filled with the shifting, faded yellow light of a dozen candles. Mrs Frant was sitting almost in the grate, with a book in her hand. The boys were huddled on the sofa, engaged in a whispered conversation.
“I – I beg your pardon, ma’am,” I said. “Am I early?”
“Not at all, Mr Shield,” Mrs Frant said. “Pray sit down. And, on the way, I wonder if you would be so kind as to ring the bell. We need more coals for the fire.”
I did as she asked and then sat opposite her. It is curious the effect that widow’s weeds have on those that wear them. Some women drown in their dark folds; they become their mourning. Mrs Frant, however, belonged to the second category: the very simplicity of her plain black gown set off her beauty.
“My cousins will be here in a moment,” she said. “You are not cold, I hope?”
“Not at all,” I lied.
“This is a cold house, I’m afraid,” she said with a faint smile. “We have not been here long enough to warm it.”
The door opened and Miss Carswall came into the room. Her face broke into a smile.
I may have been mistaken, but I thought I heard Sophia Frant add in a whisper: “And an unlucky house, too.”
Five of us sat down to dinner – Mr Carswall, Miss Carswall, Mrs Frant, an elderly lady named Mrs Lee, and myself. Mrs Lee was the aunt of a local clergyman, and I understood she was paying a long visit to Monkshill-park. There was little conversation apart from that which emanated from Mr Carswall himself. He ate sparingly, but drank deeply, working his way through glass after glass of claret.
“I took it upon myself to investigate the state of Charlie’s Latinity,” he announced. “The Rector called the other morning, and I asked him to interrogate the boy on his knowledge of the Eton Latin Grammar. He was shocked – shocked, Mr Shield – when he plumbed the depths of the lad’s ignorance. Why, he could not even distinguish between a gerund and a gerundive. What does Mr Bransby teach them?”
“He has not had much opportunity of teaching Charlie anything, sir. Nor has any of us. Charlie attended the school for less than a term, and for much of it he was absent.”
Mrs Frant turned her face away.
“It has not been an easy time for him,” put in Miss Carswall.
Carswall shot his daughter a glance. “True enough, my dear,” he rumbled. “Still, that don’t alter the case. The boy wants instruction, and I daresay Edgar Allan does too. You had better stay for the rest of their holidays, Shield, and read with them in the mornings.”
I bowed.
“If the arrangement is quite convenient for Mr Shield?” Mrs Frant said, looking at me.
“Of course it is,” Carswall said. “Mr Bransby raised no objection when I put it to him, so why should he? Neither of them will be the loser.”
“And I’m sure Mr Shield will make himself useful in other ways,” Miss Carswall said. “He will be quite an addition to our little society. You like a game of chess in the evening, do you not, Papa, and I’m sure he can make a fourth at whist. If the weather is bad, one hardly ever sees anyone in the country, especially in winter.”
“People did not mind the weather when I was a boy,” Carswall grumbled. “We were more sociable then.”
“Why, Papa, we are sociable still. Or we try to be. Did not the Rector ride over the other day? And in the rain!”
The meal continued to its weary end. There was some hesitation about which lady should give the signal to withdraw. In the end, Miss Carswall was the first to rise. I held open the door for them. Mrs Lee and Mrs Frant hurried past, their faces averted, but Miss Carswall smiled up at me. The cloth was removed. Carswall beckoned me back to my seat and pushed the decanter towards me.
“You
