The hall, not unexpectedly, was large and square, the cream walls saved from bareness by several large landscapes of indifferent artistic merit set in matching gilded frames. A wide staircase ahead of them ascended to a landing before doubling back on itself in two branches to reach the upper floor. The housekeeper and her group took the right branch while Hugo and Gwen took the left. And then the others disappeared down a long corridor to the left while Hugo took Gwen to the right.
The architect, Gwen thought, must have had a problem drawing curves. And yet there was a certain splendor about the house. It gleamed with cleanliness and smelled faintly of polish. Paintings similar to those in the hall lined the walls. It was all somehow rather impersonal, like a superior hotel.
The sound of voices, some quiet, a few more animated, came from behind closed doors.
Hugo stopped and opened a door at the end of the corridor. He drew his arm free of hers and stood back for her to step inside. He had not spoken a word the whole way. He had not even inquired about her journey. He looked quite morose too.
“Thank you,” she said.
Then he surprised her by stepping into the room behind her and closing the door.
Did he not realize …?
No, probably not.
Besides, his being here with her was not so very improper. Another door, presumably leading into a dressing room, was slightly ajar, and she could hear her maid busy within.
“I hope you will like the room,” he said. “I chose it for you because of the view, but then I realized that really the view is quite dismal. There has been no chance to plant the flowers, and last year’s were all annuals and have not come up this year. I’ll put it right by next year, but that is not going to help while you are staying here. I ought to have put you somewhere else—with a view down over the drive, perhaps.”
He had crossed the room while he was speaking and was gazing out through the window.
Even now, Gwen thought as she set her bonnet and her gloves and reticule on the bed, she could be fooled into thinking that Hugo’s morose looks denoted a morose mood. Yet all the time, while the carriage had approached, while she had descended, while he had escorted her up here, he had probably been consumed by anxiety.
She went to stand beside him.
Her window looked down upon that huge square patch of bare earth she had seen from the driveway. From up here she could see that the soil had been turned over and weeded in the past few days. Beyond it there was bare lawn with trees farther out. She might have laughed if she had not feared hurting him.
“I thought you would not come,” he said. “I expected to open the carriage door to discover only Fiona and Constance and Philip within.”
“But I said I would come,” she said.
“I thought you would change your mind.”
“If I had done that,” she told him, “I would have let you know. I am a—”
Lady, she had been about to say. But he would have misinterpreted the word.
“Yes,” he said, “you are a lady.”
His fingertips were spread over the windowsill. He was looking out, not at her.
“Hugo,” she said, setting a hand lightly on his arm, “don’t make this a matter of class. If any of your family had changed their minds for some reason, they would have let you know. It is simple courtesy.”
“I thought you would not come,” he said. “I braced myself not to see you.”
What was he saying? Actually, it was pretty obvious what he was saying and Gwen slid her hand from his arm. Her heart seemed to be beating in her throat more than in her chest.
She looked back through the window.
“There is so much potentiality there,” she said.
“In the garden?” He turned his head briefly to look at her.
“The park is mainly flat as far as I could see when we were coming up the driveway,” she said. “But look, there is quite a dip beyond your flower patch. You could have a small lake down there if you wished. No, that would be too much. A large lily pond would be better, with tall ferns and reeds growing beyond it, between it and the trees. And the flower bed could be reshaped a little to curve down toward it with shrubs and taller flowers to the sides and shorter flowers and ground cover within and a path winding through it and a few seats to capture the view. There could be—”
She stopped abruptly and felt embarrassed.
“I do beg your pardon,” she said. “The flowers will be lovely when you have planted them. And the view is really not bad as it is. It is a country view. There is no sea in sight and no salt on the air. I far prefer the country inland. This is lovelier than Newbury.”
Strangely, she was not either lying or simply being polite.
“A lily pond,” he said, resting his elbows on the sill and gazing outward, eyes narrowed. “It would look grand. I have always thought of that dip in the land as an inconvenience. I have no imagination, you know. Not for things of the eye, anyway. I can enjoy them or criticize them when I see them, but I cannot imagine them. I can see all those paintings on the walls, for example, and know they are rubbish, but I cannot imagine the sorts of paintings with which I would replace them if I removed them all and consigned them to the rubbish heap. I would have to wander about galleries for the next ten years picking and choosing, and then perhaps nothing would match anything else, or else they would look all wrong in the rooms where I had decided to set them.”
“Sometimes,” she said, “having everything matching and symmetrical is no more pleasing to the eye or to the mind than barrenness. Sometimes you have to trust your intuition and go with what you like.”
“That is easy for you to say,” he said. “You can look out that window and see a lily pond and a curving flower garden and plants of different kinds and heights and seats from which to enjoy the view. All I see is a nice square patch of earth just waiting for flowers—if I just knew what flowers. And a troublesome dip of lawn beyond it and trees in the distance. I could not even think of a path on my own. Last year when all the flowers were blooming, I had to walk all around the edge of the bed to see them or else come up here to look down on them.”
“But what a glorious sight it must have been.” She set her hand on his arm again. “And sometimes one brief and glorious splash of color and beauty is enough for the soul, Hugo. Think of a fireworks display. There is nothing more brief and nothing more splendid.”
He turned his head at last and looked at her.
It was a long look, which she returned. She could not read his eyes.
“Welcome to my home, Gwendoline,” he said softly at last.
She swallowed and blinked several times. She smiled at him.
And wondrously, miraculously, he smiled back.
“I must go down,” he said, straightening up, “and meet everyone in the drawing room. You will come down when you are ready?”
“I will,” she said. “How will you explain my presence?”
“You have taken Constance under your wing,” he said, “and have enabled her to attend a few ton entertainments, as befits her status as my sister. My relatives are both amused by and impressed with my title, you know. But they are not unintelligent people. They will soon understand, if rumor has not already reached their ears, that you are here because I am courting you.”
“Are you?” she asked him. “The last time I saw you, you said quite definitely that you were not. I thought I was invited here to court you or at least to discover for myself why it is impossible for you to court me.”
He hesitated before answering.
“My relatives will conclude that I am courting you,” he said. “Everyone loves what appears to be a budding romance, especially when a family member is involved. Whether they are right or whether they are wrong remains to be seen.”