don’t live there any more. I’m housekeeper at The Grange.”
“Got a letter for you here,” he said, looking in his bag. “And one for The Grange.”
She took them both and set off for The Grange. It was a lovely morning, fresh and spring like, and there was a skip in her step.
She found John in the kitchen, triumphant because Clara had laid two eggs.
“One each,” he said.
“Two for His Lordship,” she replied firmly.
“Fiddlesticks.”
“Here’s a letter for you.” She handed it to him and went in to the dining room to give him privacy while he read it. As she had half expected it was a letter from the bishop, informing her that the Reverend Steven Daykers would soon be arriving to take up his position as vicar at Fardale, and he trusted that she would etc. etc.
“Oh Lord!”
She looked around to see that John had followed her into the dining room, a letter in his hand and a look of dismay on his face.
“What’s the matter?”
“We have visitors coming this afternoon. I hope they will only stay for tea, but they might want to spend the night here.”
Rena gave a cry.
“That’s impossible. You can’t let them come!” she exclaimed. “The bedrooms are terrible! Your room is the best of the bunch, but even that needs a wash and a great deal doing to it.”
“I shut my eyes when I am undressing, and look out of the window when I am dressing,” the Earl said drolly.
“Very ingenious, but we couldn’t count on your visitors to do the same. You really must not let them stay.”
There was silence for a moment, and she wondered if she’d offended him.
Then he said slowly, “I think I should be honest and tell you that the man who is coming here is exceedingly rich. I met him when I was in India and when he heard – I suppose from the newspapers – that I had come into the Earldom, he looked me up and told me that he was very anxious to see my ancestral home.”
“To see your – ancestral – home?” she echoed in a stunned voice.
In silence they both looked around them. They looked up at the grimy ceilings, around at the peeling walls, and down at the shabby furniture.
“He’s going to get a shock, isn’t he?” she said at last.
“A considerable shock,” John said grimly. “I only wish I thought it would scare him off.”
“Why do you want to scare him off?”
“Because I have a horrid feeling I know what he wants of me. We met when I was a penniless sailor and he asked me to a dance he was giving for his daughter, to make up the numbers, I believe. Well, I’m still penniless, but now I have a title.”
“You mean – ?”
“What this man really wants – and I am quite certain it is what he will say when he gets here, is for me to marry his daughter!”
Rena gave a little gasp. “Why should you do that,” she asked, “unless you have fallen in love with her?”
He was silent for a moment, and she felt a strange chill come over her heart.
“No, I’m not in love with her,” he said. “But if her father’s money can restore The Grange and make the people here prosperous again, it couldn’t possibly be my duty, could it? No!”
He checked himself, turned sharply and strode back into the kitchen. Rena stayed where she was for a moment. She was glad that he hadn’t waited for her reply to that question, because she was not sure that she would have known how to answer.
After a minute she followed him into the kitchen, and began making his breakfast.
“Why was I even thinking like that?” he asked. “Of course I shan’t marry where I do not love. If I marry, it will be to a woman I love, who will make me happy, even if we are not particularly rich.”
“I think you’re right,” she said, concentrating on what she was doing, and not looking at him.
“But you don’t think I’ll keep to my resolution?” he asked, shooting her a look.
“I think it could be hard for you if he says he’ll restore The Grange. Suppose he gives you enough money to repair it and bring the estate to life again. You could spend your life, in future, as a country gentleman, with of course, horses and dogs to verify it.”
There was silence for a moment. Then the Earl walked to the window in the kitchen and stood looking out. Rena thought he was looking at the part of the kitchen garden which was desperately untidy.
There were a few cabbages and onions, but for each one of them, there were at least a dozen weeds.
“I suppose,” she mused, “if she loved you, you would perhaps, in time, come to love her.”
She wanted to add ‘and her money’, but thought that sounded rude.
John turned from the window and said in a very positive tone, which seemed somehow to echo round the kitchen:
“I will not sell myself for what they call in the Bible, ‘a mess of pottage.’ Although it might now be thousands of pounds.”
“Well done.”
“I would rather starve than find myself married to a woman for whom I have no feelings, and be subservient to a man with whom I have nothing in common.”
He spoke almost violently.
“But what else can you do?” Rena asked.
“What did you say?”
“Perhaps you should think hard before saying no.” She didn’t know why she was urging him to a course of action that she would hate, but there seemed to be a little demon inside her playing Devil’s Advocate.
“You must remember how dilapidated the house is already. The villagers thought the roof would fall in last Christmas when we had a great deal of snow. By a miracle, it survived, but I doubt if it will next winter.”
He gave her a strange smile.
“Rena, are you urging me to marry for money?”
“No, not exactly, but – are you wise to make a grand gesture, if you might regret it afterwards? This place already means a lot to you. Maybe it will come to mean everything. If you turn down the chance to restore this estate, maybe one day you will regret it.”
She found she was holding her breath for his answer. And for some reason it was desperately important.
“The only thing I will regret,” he said at last, “is putting
