‘What is it that you fear I do not understand?’
‘That note,’ he said, surprising her greatly.
‘Oh? And which note would that be, Mr Lomax?’
‘The one Dick left for Catherine.’
For a moment Dido was at a loss. Then she remembered Catherine telling her that Mr Montague’s last note had been conveyed by Tom Lomax. She met his gaze with a level stare. ‘But,’ she said, ‘you can know very little about that note. It was, after all, addressed to my niece and, since I am sure she did not show it to you, your part was only to hand it over, and you can know nothing of its contents.’
‘As to that,’ he said with a wave of his hand, ‘if Dick had cared about me reading it, he would have sealed it.’
‘So, you read what was not addressed to you?’
‘Yes, yes. The point is—’
‘The point,’ said Dido, rising from her seat and taking up her letter, ‘is that I am not willing to discuss with you information which an honourable man would not possess.’ She crossed the room with what she hoped was dignity and he watched her scornfully.
‘The point,’ he said mockingly, ‘is that that note is a complete lie. It’s plain that Dick is tired of the engagement and wants to end it. So he has made up this story about being disinherited.’
Dido opened the door and stood for a moment with the brass door-knob in her hand. Sunlight from the hall streamed into the gloomy room and with it came a lovely rippling melody from the pianoforte across in the drawing room. ‘Of that,’ she said coldly, ‘you can have no proof at all.’
‘Oh, I have proof! Proof that would be plain to any man. Only a woman could be blind enough to believe what was in that note.’
Dido hesitated in the doorway. Her pride and her anger urged her to walk on and yet her curiosity was all for staying. To ask a question now would have all the appearance of inconsistency – and yet she could not prevent herself.
‘What then,’ she said quietly, her back still turned to him, ‘is this proof?’
He did not answer. She turned back and saw him lounging still in the chair, his hands folded behind his head and his long legs stretched across the Turkey carpet. He smiled at her. ‘Dick can’t be disinherited,’ he said. ‘The old man might want to do it, but he can’t.’
‘I beg your pardon?’ She took hold of the back of a chair to steady herself. ‘I do not understand you.’
‘No, women never do understand inheritance. But you don’t need to believe me, Miss Kent. Ask any man in the house. Ask Harris. Or ask my father. They will all tell you the same. The whole of the Belsfield estate is entailed on the next male heir. It
‘But…’ Dido struggled for both understanding and dignity. ‘If there was a serious disagreement between Mr Montague and Sir Edgar…’
‘It would make no manner of difference. My dear Miss Kent, Dick could spit in the old man’s face at dinner and he’d still inherit everything.’
‘Perhaps he would inherit on his father’s death. But in the meantime, without his father’s goodwill, he would be penniless.’
‘Again, you are arguing like a woman. A man with Dick’s prospects is
For a moment confusion threatened to overwhelm her and it was nothing but her determination not to show weakness in front of him that kept her on her feet. He was watching her, cruelly eager for any sign of pain on her face.
‘So you see,’ he said. ‘All this “I have nothing to offer you and it is only right that I should release you from our engagement” is nothing but hog-wash. The truth is, he’s tired of the girl and wants rid of her. In fact, I don’t believe he was ever wholeheartedly in favour of the match at all. It’s the old man that’s got his heart set on it.’
Hot blood ran to Dido’s cheeks at the insult. ‘I wonder,’ she said, ‘what your motive can be, Mr Lomax, in telling me this?’
He rose slowly from his chair and bowed to her. ‘I merely wish to be of service to you, Miss Kent. I mean to put you on your guard. It is very unwise of you to keep asking questions which can only result in the truth coming out and dear Catherine being very badly hurt by it.’
And with that he strode past her and crossed the hall to the billiard room, whistling as he went.
Left alone, Dido sank down into a chair as if the life-force had been drained out of her. It was impossible to know exactly what to think; but every possible thought was unpleasant and the clearest of them all was that if Tom had spoken the truth about the settlement of the estate, then it changed everything.
Chapter Twelve
Dido was miserable.
She had struggled for some time over Tom Lomax’s assertion that the Belsfield estate was entailed, reasoning that it could not be true. She would not believe that Catherine could have been so deceived. Surely she had properly understood the expectations of the young man before the engagement was formed.
But she could not comfort herself with that thought for very long before honesty forced her to admit it as all too possible that Catherine’s exaggerated notions of disinterested love had prevented her from even asking about such things.
However, she did continue to cherish a hope that Tom might be lying – for she had very little reason to suppose him honourable or truthful – until she made enquiries, in roundabout terms, of his father one evening as they were sitting together by the fire. And he confirmed Tom’s account exactly.
Her disappointment must have shown on her face, for he immediately asked what was amiss. ‘I am sorry if I have said anything to make you uncomfortable.’
‘Oh no,’ she said quickly. ‘I am quite comfortable, thank you.’
And, despite her worry over the entail, that was true. At that moment she was comfortable. She and William Lomax had by now fallen quite into the habit of conversing companionably by the hearth while the others played at cards. It had come to be Dido’s favourite part of every day. He was a very pleasant companion: clever and full of information and yet always ready to listen in his turn, and so quick in understanding her strange comments and observations as to make her feel that she too was clever – which is always the greatest recommendation in a companion.
She felt quite resentful of Sir Edgar when business of his took Mr Lomax away to the library after tea and left her to spend her time reading – or rather sitting with a volume open before her while she stared blankly at the page and listened for the opening of the library door.
And then, on the very evening that he explained the entail to her, Mr Lomax informed her – with a very pleasing degree of regret – that he would be leaving early on business the next morning and expected to be away from Belsfield for several days.
Dido was very miserable. There was no one else in the house whose society afforded her so much pleasure. And her enquiries into Mr Montague’s disappearance had, after a rather promising beginning, come to nothing and left her surrounded by questions which she could not answer.
And there was, in addition to all this, a suspicion that she was being excessively foolish; a suspicion that there were truths, not only staring her in the face, but actually crying out at her to notice them, shrieking at her – and laughing at her behind her back for her stupidity.
She was sitting in the gallery one morning, meditating upon all this and attempting to establish exactly what she knew and what she could surmise. The sum total was not very promising.
If Tom Lomax was to be believed then the scene in the ballroom was nothing but a pretence, a kind of elaborate charade enacted to deceive Catherine. But if that was so, she could not understand why the charade
