Yorkshire by Lynne Connolly Page A

Richard that I could look attractive when in the right clothes, but I seemed to live exclusively in old clothes these days.
    I stepped into a small hoop that wouldn’t get in the way of the furniture. For formal wear and Court appearances side hoops were de rigeur , but thankfully, except for Court, much smaller than they’d been ten years ago. Briefly, I wondered if I would have to wear finery every day if I married a nobleman. Miss Cartwright certainly did.
    Downstairs, I found quite a crowd in the Great Hall. Martha, James, the two Misses Cartwright, Lizzie, Steven, Richard, Mr. Kerre and a female servant. Quite a crowd.
    “This is Mrs. Peters,” Martha said. “She was promoted from head parlourmaid and retained as housekeeper after the third earl died.”
    The woman curtseyed. Like the manor’s other inhabitants, she was half starved and thin. Her gaunt face showed unhappiness, stoicism, lines graven deeply, making it impossible to guess her age.
    Mrs. Peters took a deep breath, turned to us in a businesslike manner, and began the tour, just as she might have done to visitors, had there been any. She pointed out the treasures of the Great Hall; the life sized statues that had been brought back by the third earl from the Grand Tour. We went upstairs and into the State Rooms.
    They must have been magnificent once. “Goodness,” Lizzie said.
    The first room was a drawing room. Huge satin upholstered sofas stood against the tapestry hung walls, enormous gilded pier glasses set over half moon tables between the windows, silent portraits of ancestors hung on the walls.
    Everything had been shockingly abandoned. This was the realisation of Sleeping Beauty’s Palace, and it looked as though it had been abandoned for the legendary hundred years instead of the actual ten.
    “It’s been like this since the third earl’s death, my lady,” Mrs. Peters said.
    “Ten years?” Martha dragged her gaze away from the murky magnificence before us to stare incredulously at the housekeeper.
    I looked around, hardly daring to draw breath. Who would kill for all this, who would cut the traces of a battered old coach? Someone pained to see treasures like this left to rot, or someone who wanted to get their hands on it all? Even in this condition it was worth a lot of money and the contents of the house wouldn’t be included in the entail, so didn’t have to go to the heir. Perhaps it was for gain, after all. Or to cover something up. It would be easy to steal treasures from these rooms. I studied the rooms with more purpose, looking for where the dust was less thick, revealing the absence of a treasure, but I could see none.
    Miss Cartwright repeatedly moved her gleaming lilac satin skirts away from the dust-encrusted furniture. Her supercilious expression showed what she thought of such a ramshackle place—she didn’t bother to hide her disdain. The expression marred her pretty, round face. She would do well to hide it. I chided myself for ill wishing her. She had done me no wrong, not yet. I just didn’t like her.
    Her betrothed didn’t look at me beyond an initial cold bow, but joined his brother. They walked around the room, and examined the treasures there. Mr. Kerre seemed very knowledgeable, and pointed out several items of distinction in the cold, unlived in room.
    Martha carried a cloth, and from time to time, she wiped away a part of the dirt to see what lay underneath. She seemed satisfied with her investigations, and occasionally made a comment about the quality of the things on display, all of it fine. I joined her, glad of the opportunity to stay by her side.
    Steven moved closer to me but I tried not to look at him. I wanted to hold my happy secret to myself, just for this day, and not face any problems until tomorrow.
    The interior decoration in the room wasn’t particularly distinguished, like a plain wooden box that held diamonds inside it. The treasures in the rooms indicated collectors of rare and beautiful