Free Nicola Cornick by The Larkswood Legacy

Taunton house, watching with no little satisfaction as Annabella scrubbed the floor. ‘There, girl—no, not there, you booby—the stain is over on this side—’ and Lady St Auby deliberately smeared the mud over the piece of floor which Annabella had just cleaned.
    Two days had passed since Annabella had met theViscount and his guests in town and in that time she had heard nothing further from them. Her excitement and confidence in the future, severely dented by the encounter, had waned further as time had passed and the inescapable facts became clear. They had dropped her. She had bored them with her awkwardness and lack of sophistication. Lady St Auby, quick to see Annabella’s unhappiness, had been delighted.
    ‘It’s as I would have thought,’ she continued spitefully now. ‘You have no graces to recommend you to the Quality. Why, they could see you for the little nobody you are! A man of Mundell’s distinction is not going to want his guests imposed upon by a fortune-hunting adventuress!’
    Annabella sighed, biting back the intemperate retort which rose to her lips. Once, long ago, she had answered Lady St Auby in kind when her mother-in-law had indulged in one of her vituperative attacks. The response had been swift. She had not been given any food for several days. The same thing had happened when she had refused to perform the demeaning household tasks which Lady St Auby had demanded. Whilst her mother-in-law did not resort to physical violence as her son had sometimes done, her retribution was just as difficult to bear. And now she was angry and frustrated by the attention that had been shown to Annabella. It was there in her eyes as she looked at her daughter-in-law, a savagery that was just waiting for an opportunity to explode into life.
    Annabella wrung out the dirty cloth and reached for the pail of water. At the same time, Lady St Auby leant forward and calmly tipped the bucket over sothe dirty dregs soaked Annabella’s skirt where she knelt on the rough floor.
    It was too late for Annabella to avoid the tide of filthy liquid. She leapt to her feet, feeling the water soaking through her kerseymere skirt and the apron she wore on top of it. She lost her balance, stumbling and falling. Lady St Auby cackled with laughter.
    The front door opened, although nobody had rung the bell. Lady St Auby froze. All Annabella could see, from her position on the floor in the retreating suds, was a pair of highly polished topboots.
    Then: ‘You appear to be in some discomfort, ma’am,’ Sir William Weston said, carefully expressionless. ‘Allow me to help you.’
    Her elbow was taken in a very firm grip. As she stumbled to her feet, her skirt dripping and sticking to her legs, Annabella could smell the faint scent of his cologne mingled with the aroma of fresh air that she had always loved. Her gaze fixed itself on his green waistcoat and stayed there. She did not dare to look up into his face. Of all the desperately undignified situations in which to be found…She discovered that she was shaking with mortification. There was no possible way to explain…
    ‘Sir William…’ Lady St Auby had at least the grace to appear a little abashed. ‘How do you do, sir. We were just—’
    She was silenced by one searing flash of those blue eyes. ‘There is no need to say anything, madam. The facts speak for themselves. Mrs St Auby…’ his cold tone softened ‘…I was calling to see if you would be attending the subscription ball this evening—’ He broke off. Annabella had still not been able to lookhim in the eye. Now she did look up as his grip tightened on her hand. He was standing, head bent, studying the raw, chapped skin of her fingers where the brush had scoured it. Then he let her go abruptly.
    ‘Will you come for a drive with me, ma’am?’
    ‘If you can wait whilst I change, sir—’ Annabella gestured clumsily towards her drenched skirt.
    ‘Of course…’
     
    They were well clear of the town