A Knowing One: Sneak Peek
Chapter One of A Knowing One, Book 4 in the Branwell Chronicles
The view from the drawing room window of Wrenthorpe Grange was one usually certain to bring contentment to Tom Breckinridge’s breast, for it was of a tidy garden abutting the well-kept Home Wood. Even in this unseasonable June heat, the prospect was neat and refreshing—evidence of the diligent care of a thoughtful master. The same care by the same master, Sir Joshua Stiles, had changed the fortunes of the Breckinridge family the previous year, when Sir Joshua had married Tom’s mother, Genevieve, and provided her the happiness and security she deserved and had long been without. Such dutiful stewardship spoke to Tom’s soul, for he had spent his formative years also without security, and had vowed never to subject his dependents to anything approaching the neglect which he and his sister and mother had suffered at his profligate late father’s hands.
Unfortunately, the view this morning was unable to produce its usual soothing effect upon him, for it was marred by the presence in the room of Tom’s sister, Lenora, and her newly betrothed, Lord Helden. Tom had endured three weeks in their nauseating company, as well as in that of his still newlywed parents, and it had stretched his patience to the breaking point. Even now, as Tom gazed intently out the window trying to regain some part of his natural sangfroid, Lenora and Helden snuggled on the sofa, their billing and cooing continually grating on his pragmatic nerves. He was firmly of the opinion that such exhibitions ought to be restricted to more private hours, and not aired for the benefit of patently unappreciative relations.
Lenora, of all people, thought Tom, ought to be sensible that he would dislike overt displays of sentiment, having frequently observed his incomprehension of all things romantic. But if he was fair, he must admit that, until now, his habit had been generally good-natured toward such inclinations. Doubtless, to her mind, his usual carefree and quizzical manner had suddenly and inexplicably vanished upon his removal from London, leaving in its wake a cynical, stern figure whom she could not recognize. But though Tom acknowledged this, he would not address it, for he could not bring himself to admit the truth underlying the matter.
“And what, pray, has given you so sour a look, Tom Breckinridge?”
Whirling, Tom found himself alone with Lenora, Lord Helden having silently and mysteriously vanished. His sister gazed sardonically at him, her back straight and her eyebrows raised inquiringly.
“If you do not know by now, dear sister,” retorted Tom, returning her gaze with an imperious one of his own, “then you are even more of a ninnyhammer than I took you for.”
She blinked slowly, tipping her head to the side. “If you mean that your sensibilities are offended by the sight of your dear sister in love with an excellent man, then one cannot help but wonder at so unreasonable an irritation.”
“It is not only you and Helden, Nora, but also Mama and Sir Joshua,” replied Tom testily, avoiding her latent question. “The two pair of you are as revolting as any pack of heroes and heroines in those horrid romances you are forever reading.”
She tutted. “You cannot have been so foolish as to imagine that newlyweds such as Mama and Sir Joshua should not be at least somewhat silly, especially after having discovered that they are soon to welcome another child.”
“No, but need they be so silly in my presence?” retorted Tom.
Lenora raised her brows again. “You will forgive my saying that your tone smacks of selfishness, Tom. It is their home.”
Huffing, he turned back to the window, crossing his arms. “And what is your excuse, Nora? You are merely betrothed. May I expect your disgusting displays to increase upon your marriage? Perhaps I ought to avoid visiting you at Helden Hall altogether.”
There was a slight pause before she said, “I believe you are jealous.”
Tom swung about, opening his mouth to refute this ridiculous notion, but Lenora forestalled him with a shrewd look.
“You are jealous, sir,” she stated, rising and striding to him, “and you only are to blame, for Diana would have you the moment you offered for her. One is only left to wonder why you have not done it.”
“One need not wonder at it, Nora,” he said gruffly, a sneer marring his handsome features. “Any gudgeon can tell that it would be a gross presumption for me to do so.”
“Tom, how can you be so vexing?” cried Lenora, letting fall her dignified manner and scrutinizing his countenance with real concern. “You are acting so oddly!”
“Indeed he is,” put in another voice, and they turned to see their mother, Lady Genevieve Stiles, enter the room. She looked from one to the other of her children. “Does he deny it?”
“Yes, I do, Mama,” snapped Tom, but at her look of mild reproach his shoulders slumped and he ran an agitated hand through his already unruly dark hair. “I beg your pardon, Mama—and yours also, Lenora. I have been behaving badly, and there is no occasion for it.”
“Except perhaps this horrid heat, into which you will take yourself. It cannot be healthful to be always riding out in such weather, for it puts you in such a temper. Poor Helden and Sir Joshua are continually in a quake with wondering at what next you will say to them. Are we all so unpalatable that you prefer to go outside to be baked?”
“Yes,” was the blunt answer.
Lady Stiles took his hand, pulling him away from the window to sit with her on the sofa. “Forgive me, Tom. I have been too caught up in my own happiness to tend to those around me. I ought to have made your comfort more my concern. But I will make up for it now by owning that I think you are not well.”
“Certainly I am not well—I have a touch of the sun,” said Tom with forced lightness.
But Lady Stiles persisted. “No, no, my dear, do not dissemble. Lenora is not the only one to have remarked the stark alteration in your manner. Will you tell us what is the matter?”
In answer, he sat back against the cushions, pressing his fists into his eyes.
“He is envious of our situation, Mama,” said Lenora helpfully, “for he fancies himself unworthy to achieve it.”
Irritated anew, Tom stood from the sofa and stalked back to the window. “By all means, believe my hopes to be blighted. I daresay you will not be very far from the truth.”
As Lady Stiles regarded him with a furrowed brow, Lenora joined him again at the window. “What are you talking of, Tom? Scarcely a month ago you very nearly asked Diana to stand up with you a third time at the Colderbeck’s ball! You sent her flowers and trinkets and took her driving everywhere around Town, and she welcomed it all with delight! It is an understood thing that you will make her an offer. What has happened to make you despair? You—you did not have a falling-out?”
Tom chewed the inside of his lip. It was not his policy to bare his soul to anybody, but he also knew his mother and sister well enough to recognize when he had been cornered.
With a grimace, therefore, he said, “She has another beau, Nora.”
“She has any number of beaux, Tom. Don’t be a saphead. She has preferred you to all of them for months! Or are you blind?”
“I see more than you know, Nora,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. “It’s this Popplewell fellow that’s come out of nowhere. It’s as plain as day she cares for him more than me.”
Lady Stiles sat up. “Who is Popplewell?”
Lenora, who had been staring stunned at Tom, turned toward her mother with an incredulous laugh. “Good heavens! He is merely Diana’s childhood playmate, Mama, separated from her for some years. What a cawker you are, Tom! Diana is only glad to be reunited with him—nothing more, depend upon it.”
“I’m no cawker!” retorted Tom, nettled. “Diana adores him. Her eyes light when he comes into a room, and she delights in every trifling thing he says. She even admires his frippery clothes—for he’s a Bartholomew baby if ever there was one. It’s enough to make me itch to draw his claret!”
“Which you know well you ought not to do to Diana’s friend, or you will be in the suds,” Lenora said, joining her mother on the sofa.
“And he is heir to a viscountcy, which you can be sure Mr. Marshall is more keen on than my paltry portion,” added Tom belligerently.
“Especially when it attaches to such a disagreeable object as yourself,” replied Lenora.
Tom grumbled something about Job’s comforters and swung back to the window, while Lenora, at a look from her mama, begged his pardon and turned primly away.
Lady Stiles went to her son, laying a hand on his arm. “Perhaps it is not so very unaccountable of Mr. Marshall to prefer an intimate family friend to you, who have known Diana but two seasons, but it is shocking all the same. What a horrid inconvenience, to have this Mr. Popplewell come on the scene so suddenly. A future viscount! It is a daunting prospect, to be sure, but it is my belief that there is nothing in it to make you go off into the dumps.”
“Nothing? The heir to a viscountcy, and one to whom Diana is prodigiously attached!” ground out Tom. “If that is nothing, then I must beg your pardon for having overstated the case.”
Lady Stiles was undaunted. “I cannot believe that Miss Marshall has become cold to you, my dear. Are you certain that you are not refining too much upon a trifle?”
If Tom was at all uncertain of this, he was in no mood at present to own it to his mama. He was tired, hot, disillusioned and irritable, and he wanted to go home, to his estate at Branwell, where love was not an issue and romance was never in the air. He told his mother as much as he began pacing restlessly about the room.
She returned to sit beside Lenora on the sofa, sharing a look half-annoyed, half-laughing with her. “I wonder that your brother can have attached any young lady with such an unromantic disposition, Lenora. He has his looks, to be sure, but it is an unnatural young lady indeed who does not wish to be courted with some degree of romance.”
“I now perceive that has been my mistake, Mama,” Tom said sarcastically. “I have been at a loss to explain Miss Marshall’s sudden desertion, but you have hit upon a very cogent possibility. I have had it coming, I apprehend.”
“Now Tom!” Lenora said reproachfully. “Do not be provoking! It is not as though Diana has rejected you.”
“No, for I have not offered for her, but I might well save my breath, for if the last three weeks of our stay in London are anything to go on, she would rather have Mr. Popplewell.”
“Next you will say that we been deceived in her, for she is a mercenary and wishes to be a viscountess.”
“Never!” cried Tom furiously. His mother and sister gazed blandly back at him and he had the grace to blush, slumping into a wing chair. “Forgive me. This wretched heat! My head is aching fit to split.”
“I do not doubt it, my son,” said Lady Stiles gently. “Pardon us for teasing you; we should know better. Though I do not believe I have seen you so wound up since you were in shortcoats and your papa would not give you a pony. Do not eat me! I am very serious. You threw a dreadful tantrum and Badeley and Matthew both were obliged to carry you off to your room—after you kicked your papa in the shins. What a horrid little boy you were then—but never after, Tom. Never after that day did you provide me a single cause to believe you would not grow up to be just the fine gentleman you have done. I could not be more proud.”
Tom, still hanging his head, gave a grudging smile. “Even now, when I have enacted such a scene? Even though I have no sensibility, and am not romantic enough to attach a young lady?”
“Always, Tom!” said his mama with determination. “I beg you will forget what I said earlier. A gentleman need not be romantic, precisely, to attach a young lady—I have seen it often and often. There is much more that a lady looks to find in a husband, which you do possess! Steadiness is paramount, as are high principles.”
Tom made a face. “So I am a dull dog. Thank you, Mama.”
“Nonsense. I know whereof I speak, young man, for your father was all that was charming and romantic, but his unsteadiness nearly lost us our home, and all his principles went by the wayside as soon as a gaming table was in sight.” She nodded smartly. “A lady may wish for romance, but what she truly wants is security and companionship.”
“It is unfortunate that the lady in my eye wants them all.”
“Perhaps, but Miss Marshall is a rational young woman, and if she does desire a more romantic manner, she at least has not shown the least disinclination for your company—indeed, I am much mistaken if she has not sought you out, Popplewell or no Popplewell.” She paused, wrinkling her nose. “What a name. If she does marry him, it will serve her right.”
“I will not go so far, Mama,” said Tom, a bit of his native humor showing in his eyes, “but I will own that it beats me how anyone could wish to be allied to someone named Popplewell.”
“It certainly is not a very dignified sort of name,” giggled Lenora. “I must own that I should not like it. But more importantly, Tom, I assure you that Diana does not wish to take a name such as Popplewell.”
“It doesn’t much matter what she wishes if Mr. Marshall steers her toward his choice,” said Tom, his smile vanishing.
“Now Tom!” Lady Stiles remonstrated. “Do not go back into the sulks. You know as well as I that he could not force her to marry where she does not wish it. Indeed, he is a most indulgent father, and would not wish her to be made unhappy.”
“But Popplewell does not seem to make her unhappy,” pursued Tom doggedly.
Lenora would not allow this. “They are like brother and sister, Tom! Surely you must see it—if you have not, Mr. Marshall must have.”
Tom shook his head. “He shows it oddly, then, Nora. Diana has been at Brighton half the Season—”
“I am well aware of that, Tom. They have gone for her father’s health—Diana says they always have gone to Brighton when he is poorly, for it is not ten miles from their home, and he will go nowhere else. But I do not know what that has to say to anything.”
“It has everything to say to it,” said Tom, suddenly exhausted. He passed a hand over his eyes. “Her father’s health has never been better, or I’m a simpleton. He goes to Brighton, and carries his daughter with him, to follow Popplewell.”
Both Lenora and Lady Stiles regarded him keenly.
“But how can you be certain?” inquired Lenora. “Mr. Popplewell’s estate is near Brighton, to be sure, for they are neighbors. Are you sure he also has gone to Brighton?”
“Dead sure,” said Tom. “I was present when he announced his intention of removing thither a fortnight before we left Town. And not two days later, Mr. Marshall discovered his rheumatism had become so insupportable as to require the sea air and Indian Vapor Baths of Brighton.”
The ladies were silent for a moment, pondering this.
At last, Lady Stiles spoke. “Dear me. He is, then, either a great invalid or Mr. Popplewell has done something immense to gain his favor.”
Tom snorted. “You forget that he has done nothing less than become heir to a viscountcy, Mama, and to a very tidy fortune, if my information is good. Add that to his already snug estate and he becomes quite a million times more eligible than my humble self.”
“Oh, no, Tom!” cried Lenora. “I cannot believe Mr. Marshall to be so insensible as that. Your estate is nothing to scoff at, you know. That is, in a few years it will be excessively profitable, and surely he may judge that you are an excellent manager and will take very good care of Diana. Besides, it is how she judges that matters, and she does not want a title and a fortune, depend upon it! She has ten thousand pounds of her own, and she is just the sort of kind, generous-hearted person who would want to put it to good use, I am persuaded.”
“You comfort me exceedingly,” remarked Tom wryly. “I am now no better than a charity case.”
Dismayed, Lenora went to him and put her arm through his. “Come, now, Tom, no more of these blue devils. You must be calm and rational. Perhaps Diana has been distracted by Mr. Popplewell, but I can assure you that she thinks very highly of you—Do not look at me in that odiously cynical way! I had a letter from her only last week, and if she mentioned how well she liked Brighton it was only to urge me to visit her there, and to mourn the loss of her time with her friends—all her friends, Tom. She most specifically requested that I remember her to you, and I am much mistaken if she did not hint that she would be delighted if you were suddenly to appear there, or at Findon when they are returned home.”
Tom merely humphed.
“Well, my love,” Lady Stiles said briskly, sitting up and clapping her hands. “It seems to me that there are only two courses open to you. Either you love Diana or you do not. Which is it?”
“It is not that simple, Mama,” Tom muttered, rising and going once more to the window.
Lenora’s lips pursed in disgust. “I never fancied you to be so poor-spirited, Tom. You appear already to have given it up!”
At his stormy silence, his mother said soothingly, “Perhaps not, Tom, but you must own that your present manner is excessively inert, and does you no credit.”
Tom cast her a deprecating look. “I apprehend that I ought not to have sought your advice.”
“I beg your pardon,” she said, “but you must be brought to a sense of your own stupidity. It seems to me that you have allowed Mr. Marshall and his protégé* to intimidate you. Lenora is correct—it is unlike you, Tom, and you will pardon my also saying that if you continue to approach the situation with such lassitude, you will end very unhappily.”
Tom’s jaw tensed and he muttered, “It is not as though I wish to let Diana go, Mama.”
“Ah! A breakthrough!” cried his mother, taking him by the hands. “If you do not wish to let her go, then you must pursue her to the end.”
“But neither do I wish to make myself odious to her, if she prefers another.” He blew out a sigh. “It would be much simpler if I knew her sentiments.”
“My dear Tom,” said Lenora, taking his arm again, “as one of Diana’s fast friends and privileged to know her innermost thoughts, I am ready to swear that she continues to prefer you above anyone, even Mr. Popplewell. Do not hesitate to resume your pursuit!”
“I trust we shall have her here with you within the summer,” put in Lady Stiles, “acting in as nauseating a manner as either of us.”
Either from fatigue or relief that his anger had burnt out at last, Tom smiled weakly. “If Diana does choose me over Popplewell, then I suppose even that will be possible.”