Elspeth Ashbury

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Tea with Ruth, Countess of Ashbury

The new Countess of Ashbury was the Duchess of Haverford’s only guest today. She was shown out to the terrace where her grace sat taking the sunshine while looking over the gardens that sloped to the river. Her curtsey was gracefulness incarnate, and her looks not at all in the common way, but stunning.

“Your Grace, thank you for your invitation,” she said.

Eleanor waved to the chair that had been placed next to her own, and at an angle to it so that she could keep her eyes on her visitor’s face. “My goddaughter Sophia encouraged me to do so, Lady Ashbury. She tells me you have a charitable project that I might be interested in supporting. But first, let us have tea and talk about our families and the weather.”

Lady Ashbury’s amused smile flashed. “I shall feel very English,” she said.

She stated her preferences—black, with a slice of lemon and one lump of sugar–and accepted the cup Eleanor poured. “I have not thanked you in person for your influence in the matter of my sister-in-law, and the scandal she tried to raise,” she said.

Eleanor never did anything so crass as shrugging her shoulders, but she allowed her eyebrows to do so. “You blunted the worst of the rumours when you married Lord Ashbury,” she pointed out. “You are happy, I hope? Sophia tells me it is a love match.”

The glow in Lady Ashbury’s eyes, the softening of her voice, all confirmed the diagnosis. “Yes, Your Grace. I love Val, and I love his–our daughters. We would have come to it in the end, I believe. Elspeth Ashbury did us a favour by forcing us to decide sooner, rather than later.”

“Tell me about your daughters,” Eleanor encouraged. “Lady Mirabelle and Lady Genevieve, are they not?”

Ruth needed no further encouragement, extolling the talents and characters of her girls while they drank their tea. However, when Eleanor put her cup aside, she brought her current anecdote to a close, and commented, “But I have been rattling on about my family, which is hardly good manners, Your Grace. Will you further extend your kindness to me by allowing me to rattle on about my cottage hospital instead?”

“A cottage hospital! How interesting. Please tell me more.”

***

Ruth is the heroine of To Mend the Broken Hearted. She meets the Earl of Ashbury when she delivers his two daughters to him after they are sent home from school during a smallpox epidemic. By To Claim the Long-Lost Lover, she is running the cottage hospital mentioned above.

 

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Tea without a scandalmonger

I have an excerpt post for you today–and no, I haven’t made a mistake in the title. In the new novel, To Mend the Broken Hearted, Eleanor Haverford does not have tea with Lady Ashbury, although she pours herself a cup after the widow leaves.

The widow was not one of Eleanor Haverford’s usual circle. She was too young to be one of the titled ladies with whom the duchess had ruled Society for more than thirty years, and too old to be one of their daughters.

That was not the real reason Eleanor barely knew her, of course, as Eleanor admitted to herself. The real reason was that Eleanor liked cats only when they had whiskers and four paws. Lady Ashbury was a cat of the human kind: one for whom the less influential members of Society were mice to hunt and torment.

If an innocent action could be given a vicious interpretation, Lady Ashbury would find it and the sycophants who clustered around her would spread it. And woe betide the person, lady or gentleman, who made a misstep in negotiating the silly rules that governed the lives of the ton. It would be magnified a thousandfold if Eleanor and her own allies were not in time to mitigate the damage.

Lady Ashbury sat in Eleanor’s formal drawing room, a striking beauty still, though she was in her late thirties. She should look colourless in her light blue walking dress and white spencer, with white-blonde hair drawn into fashionable ringlets that did not dare to do anything so indecorous as bounce, delicately darkened brows arching over ice-blue eyes. Instead, in the sumptuous splendour of the room, she drew the eye, like a diamond centrepiece that outshone the splendour of an ornate collar of gold and gems.

“How kind of you to invite me, Your Grace,” she purred. “I have long wished to be better acquainted. I admire you so much, and feel for you. I understand what it is like to be married to a man who is persistently unfaithful. My husband, too…” She trailed off.

Eleanor smiled, a baring of teeth containing little amusement. If this upstart thought the Duchess of Haverford was going to be manipulated to play her game of insinuation and scandal, she could think again.

“You were invited for one reason only, Lady Ashbury. I understand you are taking some notice of Lady Ruth Winderfield, the daughter of the Duke of Winshire.”

Lady Ashbury dropped her lashes to veil her eyes. “You have an interest in the matter, of course. The feud between Winshire and Haverford is well known to me, Your Grace.”

Eleanor allowed none of her disgust to show. “Your motivation, of course, is your brother-in-law, whose name you have chosen to couple with that of Lady Ruth.”

The woman looked up, a flash of spite in her eyes. “They connected their own names, Your Grace, when she stayed with him, unchaperoned.”

Eleanor could argue that Ruth had her companion with her, as well as a bevy of armed retainers, a maid, and six children; that she was taking refuge during a smallpox epidemic; that she was providing medical care for several people, including Lady Ashbury’s own daughter. But Lady Ashbury was not interested in facts, but in fixing her claws into the weak. This time, she had chosen the wrong targets.

Eleanor showed her own claws. “I would take it amiss, Lady Ashbury, if these rumours continue to circulate. Very amiss.”

An expression at last. Alarm, quickly concealed. Lady Ashbury’s tinkling laugh was unamused. “You jest, duchess. Haverford hates the chit’s father.”

Eleanor raised a brow. “I have not invited you to address me as an intimate, young woman. Nor will I.”

Colour flooded Lady Ashbury’s face. “Your Grace. My apologies, Your Grace.”

“You have miscalculated, Lady Ashbury. His Grace of Haverford cannot abide scandal-mongering women.” A slight exaggeration, but his pride, which would see an insult to his wife as an insult to him, would ensure that he supported Eleanor, at least in public, which was all that mattered.

“In addition, I am dearest friends with Lady Ruth’s aunt. I must thank you, however, for drawing my attention to the Earl of Ashbury. I had not noticed his absence from society since his brother’s death. I intend to amend that oversight. Your brother-in-law shall be presented to the Regent under my sponsorship and that of His Grace, the Duke of Haverford. I suggest you make yourself least in sight for the remainder of the little season. A sojourn in the country might be good for your health, Lady Ashbury.”

Lady Ashbury sat, as pale as her spencer, her mouth open.

Her Grace stood and pulled the bell chain. “My footman shall show you out,” she said.