Free Amanda Scott by Lady Escapade Page B

life, a fine, and the loss of his property. Undaunted by the setback to his fortune, he had recouped his losses, including the abbey, in what Diana, for one, thought to be a disgracefully short period of time. He then returned to his home, wealthier than ever, as the first Earl of Andover, and had lived to enjoy a ripe old age.
    His grandson, another enterprising gentleman, whose portrait graced the library just off the great hall, was created first Marquess of Marimorse some forty-five years later by Henry’s younger daughter, Elizabeth, for services which were not, so far as anyone had yet discovered, documented by anything in writing among those endless records in the muniments room, Since that time, the Warrington family had continued to prosper, each succeeding generation displaying, when necessary, that same gift as their ancestor had shown for eluding disaster at royal whim.
    Diana glanced at Simon as the chaise rolled to a halt before the impressive east entrance to the abbey. He was certainly involved in a good many political affairs, not all of which met with royal or, for that matter, family approval. But times were safer now. She had no fear that he would be clapped up in the Tower for his efforts, or that he would lose his head as a result of any disagreement he might have with the King.
    The footman, Fairburn, opened the chaise door just then and let down the steps. Diana accepted his hand and stepped gracefully to the ground. By the time Simon had followed her, the front doors had been opened and flunkies appeared to deal with the trunk strapped onto the chaise. Mounting the lefthand side of the broad, split stairway leading to the entrance, Simon and Diana stepped into the great hall to be greeted by Figmore, my lord’s elderly butler.
    The great hall, with its magnificent grand, winged staircase, still bore such reminders of its ancient origins as a stone floor and iron wall sconces that had once held torches but which had been adapted to contain branches of candles. To the left of the entrance was a pair of double doors leading to the large book-lined library. To the right was a matching pair of doors, and it was to these that Simon and Diana were directed by the butler. An obsequious footman leapt forward to open the doors.
    The gothic chamber thus revealed, having served a number of Warringtons as a grand saloon, had been redesigned some fifty years earlier for the eighth marquess by Sanderson Miller, the Warwickshire squire who carried a taste for architecture so far as to become an amateur architect, providing designs for friends and friends’ friends. The so-called “new hall” at Alderwood was considered by many to have been his greatest contribution to the Gothic movement, comparable to some of the gaudier highlights of Horace Walpole’s Strawberry Hill.
    Miller had been greatly influenced by the Kent school, but the hall showed evidence of his own tremendous originality of thought, including such minor touches as the pierced parapet and the rose window at the southern end, and more noticeably, the walls plastered to imitate stone and provided with many ornate niches filled with amusing Rococo terra-cotta statues by an Austrian sculptor whose name Diana could never remember. The ceiling was painted with the coats of arms of many of the eighth marquess’s friends (all of whom, according to his detailed diary, had been invited to a great dinner in the hall when it was completed). With a crackling fire in the huge marble fireplace, the cheerful furnishings, and the bright red Turkey carpets dotting the marble floor, the new hall provided a cozy place which had long been the family’s favorite place to assemble.
    The persons in the room when Diana and Simon were announced numbered three—a plump, gray-haired dame swathed in an awe-inspiring gown of purple satin, who sat comfortably ensconced in a wing chair near the fire with her feet propped up on a gros-point footstool; a thin, elderly gentleman