Love Conquers War

CHAPTER ONE 1818-1

CHAPTER ONE

1818Raina put her horse away in the stable, patting him because he had carried her so well.

Then she walked into the house.

It was a most attractive house with a profusion of flowers in the large garden that seemed almost blinding.

As Raina Locke neared the front door, she saw that a huge bowl of roses had been added to the table.

They were certainly beautiful and she smiled as she thought that Nanny, who still lived with her, enjoyed the flowers as much as she did. She insisted on their being in every room in the house whether they were using it or not.

She walked to the door of the kitchen, opened it and called out,

“Emily, I am back!”

The cook, who had been with the Vicar for nearly thirty years, came out of the pantry.

“I’ll ’ave your luncheon ready for you, Miss Raina, in two minutes,” she began. “I be sure you’d be punctual and I’ve been wantin’ to give you the news!”

“What news?” Raina asked.

She was wondering as she spoke whether it was a new baby who had been born in the village or else perhaps someone was near to death.

Her father, when he was alive, always insisted on being told the moment anything new happened locally and since he was no longer here, Raina had taken it on herself to visit the person afflicted.

“You’ll never believe it,” Emily continued, coming further out of the pantry, “but ’is Lordship’s arrived at The Hall.”

Raina stared at her.

“Are you saying that the Earl is back, Emily?”

“It’s the truth. The postman told me that ’e called with a letter ’e had for Mr. Munn, the secretary, and when ’e delivered it, ’e tell ’im ’is Lordship arrived last night.”

“I cannot believe it’s true!” Raina exclaimed.

It was many years since the Earl of Monthurst had been in residence at The Hall and the whole village was, of course, part of his extensive estate.

He had been a soldier during the war.

When the Duke of Wellington had won the Battle of Waterloo, he had stayed on in France with the Army of Occupation.

Since that too had come to an end, they had been expecting he would return home, but not in such a sudden and unexpected manner.

“They must have been in a flutter up at The Hall,” Raina remarked to Emily.

“That be true, miss, and the postman said they be practically standing on their ’eads rather than their ’eels, which be not surprisin’ as’ e’s been away so long.”

“He surely has and I look forward to seeing him.”

“You won’t be the only person a-doin’ that,” Emily smiled, as she went back to lift a saucepan off the stove.

Raina walked back into the hall and taking off the coat she had worn out riding, she walked into the dining room to wait for her luncheon.

It seemed incredible that after being away for five or six years the Earl should have come back apparently without notifying anyone of his intention – not until he was actually in his home.

They had been expecting him for so long that now he had appeared it seemed almost unbelievable and Raina wondered just how soon she would be able to get in touch with him.

Her father had died last year and there had been no other Vicar appointed to the village. They had a Service only every fortnight, when the Parson from a neighbouring village came to take Morning or Evening Prayer.

“You will have to wait,” Raina was told when she had made enquiries, “until the Earl returns. The Church is on his estate and he pays the Vicar’s stipend.”

The same thing was said about everything else that was needed in the village and Raina knew that her father had a long list of projects that needed to be undertaken.

And he had hoped the Earl would consider them all favourably now the war was over and the Vicar had looked forward so much to the Earl’s return.

Yet now her father was not here and Raina thought there was only her to inform the Earl of what was urgently required.

Everyone had suffered during the war and all the able-bodied men of the right age had been in the Army.

Although they had been pleased and excited to go, many of them had not returned and it had meant that there was a great shortage of hands to work on the estate.

The Vicar, who came from a large estate himself, had sighed as the crops were smaller and smaller each year and the weeds grew higher and higher.

The Very Reverend the Honourable Alfred Locke was the third son of a distinguished family who came from the North of England.

He had at first been granted a Living on his father’s estate as was usual with several sons in the family.

But he had not got on well with his elder brothers and because he had known the present Earl’s father when he was at Oxford, he had been delighted to accept a Living on his good friend’s estate.

When the Earl had died a few years after the Vicar moved in, he had been very friendly with his heir.

But Clive had joined the Army as soon as he was old enough to do so and had distinguished himself in the Peninsula War and at the Battle of Waterloo.

Raina could not help thinking how disappointed her father would be not to be able to talk to the Earl about that battle and he had also been very interested in the Army of Occupation.

‘Papa would have been so thrilled at the news’, she thought as she toyed with her luncheon, ‘but I am feeling rather apprehensive.’

The previous Earl had been very generous and kind to his people and he and the Vicar would never let anyone in the surrounding villages be in need or unhappy if they could help it.

Raina could not help wondering if the old Earl’s son would be like him. She had seen very little of Clive even when he was a boy.

When he came home from his school, he inevitably brought a number of his friends with him and they rode his father’s horses, taking part in steeplechases and Raina was far too young to ride out with them.

When she last saw Clive on what had been only a short visit before he went overseas, he had been nineteen.

Now he would be twenty-six and she was doubtful if he would even remember her.

When he was busy with his friends, they had no use for girls, especially for one like herself who was little more than a child.

She thought again about the long list of items that required attention on the estate and in the village as well as in the three other villages that were smaller, but they also belonged to the Earl.

If he refused to carry out the necessary repairs, the people would go on living in the discomfort and hardship they had had to suffer ever since the war started.

‘I am sure that he will listen to me,’ she reassured herself.

At the same time the reports from all over England were very bad and she felt it would be a miracle if they were any different here.

Raina had no idea whether the Earl could afford what was required of him and she could only pray that he would be able to help all those who were in desperate need.

When she had finished her luncheon, she went into her father’s study.

She wished that he was sitting, as he always had done, at his writing desk. He took a great deal of trouble over his sermons and wrote them all out carefully before he delivered them.

He also kept a detailed account of everyone who lived in the village and recorded what had happened year by year in their lives.

Only this past year since he had died had Raina not kept up his record of local events.

She was wondering now whether the Earl would be interested in reading all that her father had written and she knew that, if he was interested, she had been rather remiss in not recording all the details as she should have done.

Then she told herself that it would be a mistake to worry him unduly the moment he returned.

The main problem where she herself was concerned was that, if she asked, as she had to, the Earl to appoint a new Vicar, she would then have to leave the house that had been her adored home ever since she had been born.

It had not been the Vicarage before her father had occupied it, as the previous Earl had not thought the old Vicarage large or comfortable enough for his friend. He had therefore divided into two cottages what had been the previous Vicarage.

These were then occupied by people in the village and he gave his friend this much larger and pretty house at the far end of the village.

The garden had been a delight to Raina’s mother as it was very large and had already been well looked after by the previous occupants.

The house itself was very charming. It dated back to Elizabethan times, but had fortunately been modernised and now provided every possible comfort.

Raina had loved her home from the very moment she was born and the idea of leaving it not only frightened but depressed her.

There was that and so many other matters she had to discuss with the Earl and yet now that he was actually home, she was afraid of meeting him.

Supposing he would refuse to do anything that was needed in the village?

Suppose that he merely told her to find herself other accommodation as quickly as possible?

Suppose he would not listen to any of her pleas for those who were suffering?

Such thoughts passed swiftly through her mind and then she told herself that she was being absurd.

There was no reason to think the present Earl would be any different from his father, who had been a charming and generous man.

Yet there was another aspect that she had not really thought about. It was that so many landowners simply could not, now that the war had ended, afford to do anything at all for their estates.

There was one particular estate not more than four miles distant, where the owner, when the war ended, had found himself practically bankrupt and he had in fact been obliged to sell his horses and his farms to whoever could afford to buy them. His house, in his own words, ‘was falling to the ground’.

‘Suppose that happens here,’ Raina asked herself plaintively, ‘what can I do?’

Her father, as the third son, had of course not been a rich man, but he had had a small income of his own and her mother also had a little money and Raina knew that she was better off than a great number of people, even though their dividends had dwindled during the war.

Her father’s income had become much smaller than it had been previously and however she looked at it, unless the Earl was generous enough to give her a house, she most certainly could not afford to rent one.

Since her father had died, this had been worrying her and the subject was always at the back of her mind.

‘Why,’ she asked herself, ‘has he been so secretive about it? Surely he should have informed in advance his secretary who has looked after his affairs while he has been away?’

But she had seen Mr. Munn only three days ago and she was certain, if he had known anything of his Master’s movements, he would have told her.

‘What shall I do? Shall I just sit here and wait or shall I go and call on him?’

She asked the question as if she was expecting her father to answer it for her and somehow in a way she could not explain to herself, she found the answer.

She should go at once.

She should definitely go and see the Earl before he learnt from others all that had happened, what was needed and what was expected from him.

Because she possessed a quick brain and was quick in everything she did, she ran upstairs and changed from her riding habit into one of her prettiest dresses.

Then, carrying a small hat in her hand rather than wearing it, she walked through the garden to where, at the far end it adjoined the Park.

She loved the Park which belonged to the big house almost as much as she loved her own garden and she had been fascinated when she was small by the herd of stags.