Lady Marchwell’s sixteenth-century mansion drew nearer by the second. It was a modest but beautiful imitation of Hampton Court, with the same red Tudor brickwork, courtyards, towers and cupolas, but it was only a third the size of its palatial forerunner. All of a sudden he felt that the hopes he’d nursed for so long were about to be dashed. He looked away from the mansion, and in doing so turned his attention in the direction of the Thames. There weren’t any lights glimmering between the great willows that grew along the riverbank. Wasn’t anyone staying at the Retreat? A shadow fell softly over his hopes, for a light would definitely have signified Juliet’s presence.
Other memories now rushed back. During the four years he and Juliet had been together as a married couple they had always spent Christmas at Lady Marchwell’s delightful fishing lodge, which stood on a four-acre island that divided the river into two channels. The Retreat was a thatched cottage orné that had been built in 1790, and the island was called Magpie Eyot because of the flocks of the handsome birds that were always to be found in its tall trees.
“Oh, Charles, it is pronounced ‘eight.’ Eeyots are Bedlamites!” he murmured, remembering Juliet’s infectious laughter as she teased him for mispronouncing the old Anglo-Saxon word for island. Her deliberate corruption of idiot into eeyot had become one of their silly sayings after that. Anyone whose common sense was called into question was always an eeyot. “As I was an eeyot for destroying my marriage,” he said to himself.
The postilion’s shout wrenched him from his reverie as the chaise drew to a halt beneath the porte cochere at the front of the house. Sprays of festive conifer shuddered on the porch pillars, and a woven circle of ivy shook against an arched door that would not have looked out of place on a church. The stone griffins guarding the steps had red ribbon necklets, but the bright splashes of color looked forlorn as the wind moaned and whined past the chaise.
Through the windows of the nearby great parlor, which blazed with candlelight, Charles could see Lady Marchwell’s many guests dancing Christmas Eve away beneath festoons of holly, mistletoe, bay, myrtle, and ivy. Gold and silver apples shone amid evergreen arrangements on walls and mantels, and ribbons moved gently in the heat from the roaring fire in the immense stone fireplace. Everyone wore Tudor costume, and he could just hear that the tune they danced to was “Greensleeves.” Hopefully he raked the scene for Juliet, but she wasn’t there.
Another beam of bright light struck suddenly into the darkness as two of Lady Marchwell’s footmen hastened out to attend the new arrival. “Now to face up to things,” Charles breathed, steeling himself for the coming minutes.
The footmen descended the shallow flight of steps, and the senior of the two opened the chaise door and lowered the iron rung. Only when he straightened and saw the gentleman who climbed down did his manner change to one of dismayed uncertainty. Would her ladyship wish Sir Charles Neville to be readmitted after all this time?
Charles gave a wry smile. “Don’t fret, James. Should there be a problem I will assume full responsibility.”
The man was taken aback. “You remember me, sir?”
“As you remember me, for as I recall you were among those who bundled me unceremoniously into my carriage when I last departed these hallowed walls.”
The man went red. “Er, yes, sir, I fear so. I also fear that her ladyship may not wish you to—”
“Indeed she may not, but there is only one way to find out, is there not?” Charles interrupted. Shivering in the cold, he flexed his hands in his gloves as he began to ascend the shallow flight of steps toward the open door.
James stood there indecisively, then ran after the awkward arrival, which prompted the postilion to quickly shout, “Hey! What about the rest of my fare?”
Charles halted and turned, shoving a fat purse into James’s hand. “I agreed to pay the fellow half the fare on leaving Portsmouth and the remainder on arrival, but I may yet need the chaise if Lady Marchwell sends me packing. Take this and inform the fellow that he will be paid when my fate is known, otherwise he will be obliged to take me on to Windsor before he sees another farthing. Do not unload so much as a single valise in the meantime.”
Again James hesitated, feeling uncomfortably sure that Lady Marchwell would indeed send Sir Charles packing. Maybe, in the interest of staying in employment at Marchwell Park, the wisest thing for any footman to do would be to send him off without her ladyship even knowing he’d been here . . .
Charles guessed the man’s thoughts. “Don’t even entertain the thought of manhandling me, James, for this time I’d have the better of you in seconds. I learned a trick or two in the East which would leave you turned inside out, and no mistake.”