help wondering why Dominic had not at least sent a message. Good taste would keep him from coming himself; that was simple to explain. Since he loved Alicia, it would be a little brazen to turn up yet again to an interment, but it would have been so easy to have sent a small message, just a sympathy.
A coldness jarred through Alicia which had nothing to do with the wind and the drafty carriage. Perhaps she had read too much into his flatteries, the soft looks, the seeking after her company? She would have sworn, a few days ago, that he loved her, and she loved him with all the excitement, the laughter ready to burst open at the silliest things, the sharing of very private thoughts and sudden understandings. But maybe it was only she who felt like that and had put her own joy into his heart quite falsely? After all, he had not actually said as much-she had assumed out of delicacy for her position’, first as a married woman, then as a very recent widow. Maybe he had not said so quite simply because it was not true? Many people loved to flirt; it was a kind of game, an exercise of skills, a vanity.
But surely Dominic was not like that? His face swam before her memory, the dark eyes, the fine brows, the curve of his mouth, the quick smile. The tears welled up and slid down her cheeks. At any other time she would have been mortified, but she was sitting in a dark carriage on a wet, bitter day, on the way to bury her husband. No one would remark her weeping, and anyway, under her veil it would take a careful eye even to notice it.
The carriage lurched to a stop, and the footman opened the door, letting in a blast of icy air. The old lady got out first, holding her stick across their legs so they could not precede her. The footman helped Alicia. It was raining even harder, and the water ran round the brim of her hat and fell off the front, blowing into her face.
The vicar spoke to the old lady, then held out his hand to Alicia. He was never a cheerful man, but he looked unusually wretched today. Far inside herself she half smiled, but it would not reach her lips. She could hardly blame the man, even though she did not like him. After all, it was an occasion for which he probably had no precedent, and he was at a loss to know what to say. He had stock phrases of piety for all the foreseeable events-baptisms, deaths, marriages, even scandals-but who could expect to bury the same man three times in as many weeks?
She could have laughed, albeit a little hysterically, but she saw in the distance the slim, elegant figure of a man, and for a moment her heart lurched. Dominic? Then she realized it was not; the shoulders were squarer, leaner, and there was something different about the way he stood. It was Somerset Carlisle.
He turned as she picked her way through the puddles on the path and offered her his arm.
“Good morning, Lady Fitzroy-Hammond,” he said gently. “I’m so sorry this should be necessary. Let us hope they get it over with as quickly as possible. Perhaps the rain will cut the vicar’s desire to expound.” He smiled very slightly. “He’s going to be as wet as a fish if he stands out here for long!”
It was a pleasing thought; to remain here by the grave while the vicar droned on imperviously would be the final wretchedness. The old woman looked like a sodden black bird, feathers ruffled, her whole stance bristling with anger. Verity stood with her head down and her eyes lowered so no one could read her face; whether it was out of grief for her father or because in mind she was not attending at all, Alicia could only guess, but she imagined the latter.
Lady Cumming-Gould, of all people, had also elected to attend. Her dignity was as superb as always. Indeed, but for her deep lavender mourning, she might have been at a garden party, rather than standing by a yawning grave in a winter churchyard in the rain.
Major Rodney was there, shifting unhappily from foot to foot, blowing water off his moustache, obviously acutely embarrassed by the whole business. Only knowledge of duty could have brought him. He kept darting furious glances at his sisters, who had presumably nagged him into coming. They huddled together, round-eyed, like little animals woken from hibernation and longing to return home.
The only other person was Virgil Smith, enormous in a heavy coat and bareheaded. She could not help noticing how thick his hair was and how it had been cut level at the bottom of his ears. Really, someone should find him a decent barber!
The vicar began to speak, then became increasingly unhappy with what he was saying, stopped, and began again quite differently. There was no other sound but the rain, swirling in blusters, and the far rattle of branches in the wind. No one else spoke.
Finally he became desperate and finished at a positive shout: “-commit the body of our brother-Augustus Albert William Fitzroy-Hammond-to the ground”-he took a deep breath, and his voice rose to a shriek-“until he come forth at the resurrection of the just, when the earth yields up her dead. And may the Lord have mercy on his soul!”
“Amen!” came the response with infinite relief.
They all turned and made with indecent haste for the shelter of the lychgate.
When they were crammed together underneath it, the old lady suddenly made a startling announcement. “There will be a funeral breakfast for anyone who cares to come.” She issued it rather as a challenge, a defiance to them to dare not to.
There was a moment’s silence, then a murmur of thanks. Hastily they stepped out into the rain again and splashed through the water now running down the paths and climbed into their respective carriages, sitting wrapped in wet clothes, trouser legs and skirt hems sodden, while the horses clopped back through the Park. On any other occasion they would have trotted, but it would be unthinkable for one to hurry leaving a funeral.
Back at home again, Alicia found the servants prepared to receive, although she had given no such instructions. Once, in the hall, she caught Nisbett’s eye and saw in it a gleam of satisfaction. It explained a great deal. One day she would deal with Nisbett; that was a promise.
In the meantime she must force herself to behave as was expected of her. The old lady might have invited them, but she was the hostess because this had been Augustus’s house, so now it was hers. She welcomed them in and thanked them for coming, ordered the footmen to bank up the fires and dry out as much clothing as possible, and then led the way into the dining room where the cook had prepared an array of suitable dishes. It was hardly the day for cold food, even as rich as game pies and salmon, but at least someone had thought to provide hot, mulled wine. She doubted it was the old lady; probably Milne, the butler. She must remember to thank him.
Conversation was stilted; no one knew what to say. All the sympathies had already been expressed; to say they were sorry yet again would be so jarring as to be offensive. Major Rodney made some mumbled remark about the weather, but since it was midwinter, it was hardly a subject for surprise. He began on some reminiscences about how many men had frozen to death on the heights Sevastopol, then trailed off into clearing his throat as everybody looked at him.
Miss Priscilla Rodney commented on the excellence of the chutney that was served with one of the pies but blushed when Verity thanked her, because they both knew that Priscilla made infinitely better herself. It was not the cook’s strength; she was far more skilled with soups and sauces. She always put too much pepper in pickles, and they bit like a cornered rat.
Lady Cumming-Gould seemed satisfied merely to observe. It was Virgil Smith who rescued them with the only viable conversation. He was staring at a portrait of Alicia over the fireplace, a large, rather formal study set against a brown background which did not flatter her. It was one of a long succession of family portraits going back over two hundred years. The old lady’s hung in the hallway, looking very young, like a memory from a history book, in an empire dress from the days just after Napoleon’s fall.
“I surely like that picture, ma’am,” he said, staring up at it. “It’s a good likeness, but I guess it don’t flatter you with that color behind it. I sort of see you inside, with all green and the like behind you, trees and grass, and maybe flowers.”
“You cannot expect Alicia to trail out to some countryside to sit for a portrait!” the old lady snapped. “You may spend your days in the wilderness where you come from, Mr. Smith, but we do not do so here!”
“I didn’t exactly have the wilderness in mind, ma’am.” He smiled at her, completely ignoring her tone. “I was thinking more of a garden, an English country garden, with willow trees with all of those long, lacy leaves blowing in the wind.”
“You cannot paint something blowing!” she said tartly.
“I reckon a real good artist could.” He was not to be cowed. “Or he could paint it so as you could feel as though it was.”
“Have you ever tried to paint?” She glared at him. It would have been more effective had she not been forced to stare upwards, but she was nearly a foot shorter than he, and even her voluminous bulk could not make up for the difference.
“No, ma’am.” He shook his head. “Do you paint, yourself?”
