Sword to the Heart (Bantam Series No. 13) by Barbara Cartland Page A

Natalia said in a low voice, “the story of His Lordship’s first marriage.”
    “Has he not spoken of it?” Nanny asked.
    “His Lordship has said only that it was disastrous and there was no reason for me to know the details. But you will understand that I must know them! I cannot help him unless I know what happened.”
    “Help him?”
    Natalia nodded.
    “He needs help as you well know, but I did not realise it until this evening.”
    “I hoped that you would bring him happiness,” Nanny said. “I hoped things would be different once you were married.”
    “Perhaps they will be in the future,” Natalia answered, “but not until I can understand why he is ... as he is.”
    “He should not have let you marry him without your knowing the truth,” Nanny said.
    Natalia shook her head.
    “It is too late now for regrets. All I want is your help. Was he very much in love with his first wife?”
    “He was crazy about her,” Nanny replied. “She bewitched him as she bewitched every other young man in the neighbourhood. And she was wicked, really wicked!”
    “I know nothing about her except her Christian name,” Natalia said. “Tell me who she was.”
    “She was Lady Claris Kempsey, daughter of the Earl of Powick, whose home is on the other side of the Malvern Hills.”
    “So His Lordship and Lady Claris had been brought up together?”
    Nanny shook her head.
    “Nothing like that. Her Ladyship was five years older than Master Ranulf.”
    “Five years older!” Natalia ejaculated in astonishment.
    This was something she had not expected.
    “Yes, indeed,” Nanny said, “with all the tricks and wiles of a sophisticated Society lady—and he as innocent as a new-born babe.”
    “Tell me what happened,” Natalia asked breathlessly.
    It was not difficult with a little imagination to paint in a picture of which Nanny gave the outline.
    Lady Claris Kempsey had been beautiful, wild and completely unprincipled where men were concerned.
    She had set the whole neighbourhood by the ears with her behaviour and went to London to gain a reputation which was looked at askance even in the licentious days of the Prince Regent.
    She had returned to the country and met Lord Colwall, as he had recently become, when he was home from Oxford before his last term.
    It was not surprising he had fallen madly in love with her. She tantalised him, teased him, humiliated him, and gave him half promises of surrender which merely increased his infatuation.
    Then strangely, unexpectedly she had told him she would marry him!
    He was as surprised as everyone else, and although Lord Colwall’s friends and relations begged him to do nothing so rash, and take a wife who could bring him nothing but unhappiness, he had laughed at their fears.
    He was in love as only a very young and very vulnerable young man could be for the first time in his life and they were married only three weeks after the engagement was announced, in Worcester Cathedral.
    Lady Claris made a very gay and very lovely Bride but, to everyone who knew them, they were an ill-assorted couple. Not only in age but in temperament, from the moment they walked down the aisle as man and wife.
    They came back to the Castle after a short honeymoon, and Lady Claris immediately complained of it being dull.
    It was not the right Season to be in London, so Lord Colwall had invited large numbers of guests to the Castle and there were entertainments from dawn to dusk.
    Late one afternoon a month after their marriage, the guests from a luncheon party had left, when Lady Claris walked across the Salon to the window.
    She wore the long, narrow, high-waisted Empire-style gown which was still fashionable and under which no lady wore corsets, and the sophisticates like Lady Claris no underclothes.
    Her figure was silhouetted against the sunshine, and looking at her Lord Colwall exclaimed half-jokingly:
    “You are getting very fat, Claris. You will have to be more careful of what you eat.”
    She