The Daughter of the Manor Read online

  “And you will lunch with me, Leonora?” Dr. Galbraith asked.

  “It is the least I can do to make amends for spoiling your quiet day,” Dr. Galbraith continued. “Besides, you’re badly in need of a wash and brush-up.”

  It was hardly a flattering reason for being asked to lunch. Leonora had half a mind to refuse, but curiosity to see his house and find out something about him got the better of her resentment, and then common sense came to the rescue and she laughed. He was offering practical help and she was hungry and, as he had pointed out, badly in need of a good wash.

  “Thank you—that would be nice,” she told him coolly.

  Romance readers around the world were sad to note the passing of Betty Neels in June 2001. Her career spanned thirty years, and she continued to write into her ninetieth year. To her millions of fans, Betty epitomized the romance writer, and yet she began writing almost by accident. She had retired from nursing, but her inquiring mind still sought stimulation. Her new career was born when she heard a lady in her local library bemoaning the lack of good romance novels. Betty’s first book, Sister Peters in Amsterdam, was published in 1969, and she eventually completed 134 books. Her novels offer a reassuring warmth that was very much a part of her own personality. She was a wonderful writer, and she will be greatly missed. Her spirit and genuine talent will live on in all her stories.

  THE BEST OF BETTY NEELS

  THE DAUGHTER OF THE MANOR

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER ONE

  THE village of Pont Magna, tucked into a fold of the Mendip Hills, was having its share of February weather. Sleet, icy rain, a biting wind and a sharp frost had culminated in lanes and roads like skating rinks, so that the girl making her way to the village trod with care.

  She was a tall girl with a pretty face, quantities of dark hair bundled into a woolly cap, her splendid proportions hidden under an elderly tweed coat, and she was wearing stout wellies—suitable wear for the weather but hardly glamorous.

  The lane curved ahead of her and she looked up sharply as a car rounded it, so that she didn’t see the ridge of frozen earth underfoot, stumbled, lost her footing and sat down with undignified suddenness.

  The car slowed, came to a halt and the driver got out, heaved her onto her feet without effort and remarked mildly, ‘You should look where you’re going.’

  ‘Of course I was looking where I was going.’ The girl pulled her cap straight. ‘You had no business coming round that corner so quietly…’

  She tugged at her coat, frowning as various painful areas about her person made themselves felt.

  ‘Can I give you a lift?’

  She sensed his amusement and pointed out coldly, ‘You’re going the opposite way.’ She added, ‘You’re a stranger here?’

  ‘Er-yes.’

  Although she waited he had no more to say; he only stood there looking down at her, so she said matter-of-factly, ‘Well, thank you for stopping. Goodbye.’

  When he didn’t answer she looked at him and found him smiling. He was good-looking—more than that, handsome—with a splendid nose, a firm mouth and very blue eyes. She found their gaze disconcerting.

  ‘I’m sorry if I was rude. I was taken by surprise.’

  ‘Just as I have been,’ he replied.

  An apt remark, she reflected as she walked away from him, but somehow it sounded as though he had meant something quite different. When she reached the bend in the lane she looked back. He was still standing there, watching her.

  Pont Magna wasn’t a large village; it had a green, a church much too big for it, a main street wherein was the Village Stores and post office, pleasant cottages facing each other, a by-lane or two leading to other cottages and half a dozen larger houses—the vicarage, old Captain Morris’s house at the far end of the street, and several comfortable dwellings belonging to retired couples. A quiet place in quiet countryside, with Wells to the south and Frome to the east and Bath to the north.

  Its rural surroundings were dotted by farms and wide fields. Since the village was off a main road tourists seldom found their way there, and at this time of the year the village might just as well have been a hundred miles from anywhere. It had a cheerful life of its own; people were sociable, titbits of gossip were shared, and, since it was the only place to meet, they were shared in Mrs Pike’s shop.

  There were several ladies there now, standing with their baskets over their arms, listening to that lady—a stout, cheerful body with a great deal of frizzy grey hair and small, shrewd eyes.

  ‘Took bad, sudden, like!’ she exclaimed. ‘Well, we all knew he was going to retire, didn’t we, and there’d be a new doctor? All arranged, wasn’t it? I seen ’im when ’e came to look the place over. ’Andsome too.’ She gave a chuckle. ‘There’ll be a lot of lady patients for ’im, wanting to take a look. Lovely motor car too.’

  She beamed round her audience. ‘Would never ’ave seen ’im myself if I ’adn’t been coming back from Wells and stopped off to get me pills at Dr Fleming’s. There ’e was, a great chap. I reckon ’e’ll be taking over smartish, like, now Dr Fleming’s took bad and gone to ’ospital.’

  This interesting bit of news was mulled over while various purchases were made, but finally the last customer went, leaving Mrs Pike to stack tins of baked beans and rearrange packets of biscuits. She turned from this boring job as the door opened.

  ‘Miss Leonora—walked, ’ave you? And it’s real nasty underfoot. You could ’ave phoned and Jim could ’ave fetched whatever you wanted up to the house later.’

  The girl pulled off her cap and allowed a tangle of curly hair to escape. ‘Morning, Mrs Pike. I felt like a walk even though it’s beastly weather. Mother wants one or two things—an excuse to get out…’

  I’m not surprised, thought Mrs Pike; poor young lady stuck up there in that great gloomy house with her mum and dad, and that young man of hers hardly ever there. She ought to be out dancing.

  She said out loud, ‘Let me have your list, miss, and I’ll put it together. Try one of them apples while you’re waiting. Let’s hope this weather gives over so’s we can get out and about. That Mr Beamish of yours coming for the weekend, is ’e?’

  ‘Well, I shouldn’t think so unless the roads get better.’ The girl twiddled the solitaire diamond on her finger and just for a moment looked unhappy. But only for a moment. ‘I dare say we shall have a glorious spring…’

  Mrs Pike, weighing cheese, glanced up. ‘Getting wed then?’ she wanted to know.

  Leonora smiled. Mrs Pike was the village gossip but she wasn’t malicious, and although she passed on any titbits she might have gleaned she never embellished them. She was a nice old thing and Leonora had known her for almost all of her life.

  ‘We haven’t decided, Mrs Pike.’

  ‘I like a nice Easter wedding meself,’ said Mrs Pike. ‘Married on Easter Monday, we were—lovely day it was too.’ She gave a chuckle. ‘Poor as church mice we were too. Not that that matters.’

  It would matter to Tony, reflected Leonora; he was something in the City, making money and intent on making still more. To Leonora, who had been brought up surrounded by valuable but shabby things in an old house rapidly falling into disrepair, and who was in the habit of counting every penny twice, this seemed both clever and rather daunting, for it seemed to take up so much of Tony’s life. Even on his rare visits to her home he brought a briefcase with him and was constantly interrupted by his phone.

  She
had protested mildly from time to time and he had told her not to fuss, that he needed to keep in touch with the markets. ‘I’ll be a millionaire—a multimillionare,’ he told her. ‘You should be grateful, darling—think of all the lovely clothes you’ll be able to buy.’

  Looking down at her tweed skirt and wellies, she supposed that her lack of pretty clothes sometimes irked him and she wondered what he saw in her to love enough to want to marry her. The family name, perhaps—they had no hereditary title but the name was old and respected—and there was still the house and the land around it. Her father would never part with either.

  It was a thought which scared her but which she quickly dismissed as nonsense. Tony loved her, she wore his ring, they would marry and set up house together. It was a bit vague at present but she hoped they wouldn’t have to live in London; he had a flat there which she had never seen but which he assured her he would give up when they married. And he had told her that when they were married he would put her home back on its original footing.

  When she had protested that her father might not allow that, he had explained patiently that he would be one of the family and surely her father would permit him to see to it that the house and land were kept as their home should be. ‘After all,’ he had pointed out to her, ‘it will eventually be the home of our son—your parents’ grandson…’

  She had never mentioned that to either her mother or her father. How like Tony, she thought lovingly—so generous and caring, ready to spend his money on restoring her home…

  Mrs Pike’s voice interrupted her thoughts. ‘Pink salmon or the red, Miss Leonora?’

  ‘Oh, the pink, Mrs Pike—fishcakes, you know.’

  Mrs Pike nodded. ‘Very tasty they are too.’ Like the rest of the village she knew how hard up the Crosby family were. There never had been much money and Sir William had lost almost all of what had been left in some City financial disaster. A crying shame, but what a good thing that Miss Leonora’s young man had plenty of money.

  She put the groceries into a carrier bag and watched Leonora make her way down the icy street. She had pushed her hair back under her cap and really, from the back, she looked like a tramp. Only when you could see her face, thought Mrs Pike, did you know she wasn’t anything of the sort.

  Leonora went into the house through one of the side doors. There were several of these; the house, its oldest part very old indeed, had been added to in more prosperous times and, although from the front it presented a solid Georgian fade with imposing doors and large windows, round the back, where succeeding generations had added a room here, a passage there, a flight of unnecessary stairs, windows of all shapes and sizes, there were additional doors through which these various places could be reached.

  The door Leonora entered led through to a gloomy, rather damp passage to the kitchen—a vast room housing a dresser of gigantic proportions, a scrubbed table capable of seating a dozen persons, an assortment of cupboards, and rows of shelves carrying pots and pans. There was a dog snoozing before the Aga stove but he got up, shook himself and came to meet her as she put her bag on the table.

  She bent to fondle him, assuring him that no doubt the butcher’s van would be round and there would be a bone for him. ‘And as soon as it’s a bit warmer we’ll go for a real walk,’ she promised him. He was an old dog, a Labrador, and a quick walk in the small park at the back of the house was all that he could manage in bad weather.

  The door on the other side of the kitchen opened and a short, stout woman came in, followed by a tabby cat, and Leonora turned to smile at her.

  ‘It’s beastly out, Nanny. I’ll take Wilkins into the garden for a quick run.’ She glanced at the clock. ‘I’ll see to lunch when I get back.’

  Nanny nodded. She had a nice cosy face, pink-cheeked and wrinkled, and grey hair in a tidy bun. ‘I’ll finish upstairs. I’ve taken in the coffee—it’s hot on the Aga when you get in.’

  Wilkins didn’t much care for the weather but he trotted obediently down one of the paths to where a door in the brick wall opened onto the park—quite a modest park with a small stream running along its boundary and clumps of trees here and there. They went as far as the stream and then turned thankfully for home.

  The house was a hotchpotch of uneven roofs and unmatched windows at the back but it had a certain charm, even in winter months. Of course many of its rooms were shut up now, but Leonora conceded that if you didn’t look too closely at peeled paint and cracks it was quite imposing. She loved it, every crack and broken tile, every damp wall and creaking floorboard.

  Back in the kitchen once more, Wilkins, paws wiped and his elderly person towelled warm, subsided before the Aga again, and Leonora hung her coat on a hook near the door, exchanged her wellies for a pair of scuffed slippers and set about getting lunch—soup, already simmering on the stove, a cheese soufflé and cheese and biscuits.

  Carrying a tray of china and silver to the dining room, she shivered as she went along the passage from the kitchen. It would be sensible to have their meals in the kitchen, but her mother and father wouldn’t hear of it even though the dining room was as cold as the passage, if not colder.

  ‘Mustn’t lower our standards,’ her father had said when she had suggested it. So presently they sat down to lunch at an elegantly laid table, supping soup which had already been cooling by the time it got to the dining room. As for the soufflé, Leonora ran from the oven to the table, remembering to slow down at the dining-room door, and set it gently on the table for her mother to serve, thankful that it hadn’t sunk in its dish.

  ‘Delicious,’ pronounced Lady Crosby. ‘You are such a good cook, darling.’ She sighed faintly, remembering the days when there had been a cook in the kitchen and a manservant to wait at table. What a blessing it was that Leonora was so splendid at organising the household and keeping things running smoothly.

  Lady Crosby, a charming and sweet-tempered woman who managed to avoid doing anything as long as there was someone else to do it, reflected comfortably that her daughter would make a good wife for Tony—such a good man, who had already hinted that once they were married he would see to it that there would be someone to take Leonora’s place in the house. She was a lucky girl.

  She glanced at her daughter and frowned; it was unfortunate, but Leonora was looking shabby.

  ‘Haven’t you got anything else to wear other than that skirt and sweater, dear?’ she asked.

  ‘Well, Mother, it’s awful outside—no weather to dress up. Besides, I promised Nanny I’d help her with the kitchen cupboards this afternoon.’

  Her father looked up. ‘Why can’t that woman who comes up from the village see to them?’

  Leonora forbore from telling him that Mrs Pinch hadn’t been coming for a month or more. Her wages had been a constant if small drain on the household purse, and when her husband had broken an arm at work she had decided to give up her charring and Leonora had seen the chance to save a pound or two by working a bit harder herself.

  She said now, ‘Well, Father, I like to go through the stores myself once in a while.’ A remark which dispelled any faint doubts her parents might have had.

  ‘Do wear gloves, dear,’ observed her mother. ‘Remember it’s the Willoughbys’ dinner party this evening—your hands, you know!’

  The Willoughbys lived just outside the village in a small Georgian house in beautiful grounds, and since they had plenty of money it was beautifully maintained. They were elderly, good-natured and hospitable and Leonora enjoyed going there.

  The cupboards dealt with, she got tea with Nanny and carried the tray through to the drawing room. Even on a cold winter’s day it looked beautiful, with its tall windows, plaster ceiling and vast fireplace in which burned a log fire that was quite inadequate to warm the room. The furniture was beautiful too, polished lovingly, the shabby upholstery brushed and repaired.

  Her mother was playing patience and her father was sitting at a table by the window, writing. She set the tray down on a small
table near her mother’s chair and went to put more logs on the fire.

  ‘I thought we might give a small dinner party quite soon,’ observed Lady Crosby. ‘We owe several, don’t we? You might start planning a menu, darling.’

  ‘How many?’ asked Leonora, humouring her parent, wondering where the money was to come from. Dinner parties cost money. They could pawn the silver, she supposed with an inward chuckle; on the other hand she could make an enormous cottage pie and offer it to their guests…

  ‘Oh, eight, I think, don’t you? No, it would have to be seven or nine, wouldn’t it? We can’t have odd numbers.’

  Lady Crosby sipped her tea. ‘What shall you wear this evening?’

  ‘Oh, the blue…’

  ‘Very nice, dear, such a pretty colour; I have always liked that dress.’

  So did I, reflected Leonora, when I first had it several years ago.

  Getting into it later that evening, she decided that she hated it. Indeed, it was no longer the height of fashion, but it was well cut and fitted her splendid shape exactly where it should. She added the gold chain she had had for her twenty-first birthday, slipped Tony’s ring on her finger and took a last dissatisfied look at her person, wrapped herself in a velvet coat she had worn to her twenty-first-birthday dance, and went downstairs to join her parents.

  Sir William was impatiently stomping up and down the hall. ‘Your mother has no idea of time,’ he complained. ‘Go and hurry her up, will you, Leonora? I’ll get the car round.’

  Lady Crosby was fluttering around her bedroom looking for things—her evening bag, the special hanky which went with it, her earrings…

  Leonora found the bag and the hanky, assured her mother that she was wearing the earrings and urged her down to the hall and out into the cold dark evening, while Nanny went to open the car door.