Holiday in Bath by Laura Matthews Page B

unusually subdued and started visibly when addressed by Cousin Filkins, who had come up behind the sofa on which she was seated. Cranford agreed with her assessment of her relation as ridiculous and found the evening in his father’s company a trying duty. It was not until he lay restlessly in bed that night that a possible explanation for Trelenny’s behavior occurred to him, and he set out for Sutton Hall directly after his breakfast the next morning.
    As it was Cousin Filkins’ habit to lie abed until an advanced hour of the morning, Trelenny escaped into the gardens as soon as she had finished her meal. If she rode now, she would not have an excuse for doing so when her father’s cousin descended and tried to corner her in the study or the drawing room for a discussion of “fashion.” She was pacing agitatedly along the gravel paths beside the hedges when the odious man himself appeared at her side.
    “You startled me, Cousin Filkins. We are not used to seeing you abroad at this hour,” she remarked as she tried to edge away from him into a more observable portion of the grounds.
    “I saw you from my room, my dear, and could not bear to think of you alone on such a delightful morning. Have you no suitors who come to rhapsodize on your. . . charms?” His bulky form blocked her way into the lawn which sloped from her father’s study, where they might have been under his watchful (though obviously benevolent) eye.
    “I have no suitors at all, sir.”
    “What? You are teasing me, you naughty puss. I will not believe that there is no young man whose eye—” his own eyes rested hungrily on her ample bosom “—is not drawn by your beauty. Someone who does not slip his arm about you and give you a little pat on that saucy bottom of yours."
    When he attempted to suit his action to the words, Trelenny smashed her elbow into his protruding stomach and dashed blindly away from him, only to run headlong into Cranford, who had witnessed the whole scene as he approached. “Steady, now. Stay right where you are. I won’t be a moment.”
    Shaking, she nodded miserably and watched as he approached the gasping Filkins. Although she could not hear the words which passed between them—or rather, which Cranford addressed to the older man, since Cousin Filkins apparently had nothing to say—she saw the pudgy dandy blanch and step back as though struck. Cranford turned on his heel and rejoined her, pressing her arm under his for support. “He won’t bother you again. Why did your father do nothing about this situation?”
    “He doesn’t know,” Trelenny whispered.
    “You should have told him.”
    “His heart…”
    “Then you should have told your mother.”
    “Why are you angry with me? It wasn’t my fault. I tried to stay away from him, to discourage him.”
    “But you didn’t bother to tell your mother.”
    “How could I tell her? He is my father’s cousin, for God’s sake, and they expect me to treat him with the respect due a relative. They were both annoyed with me for making fun of him before he came. And what could mama do if I told her? She would be very upset, but she would not dare tell Papa.”
    “Of course she would. She would have to. Trelenny, your parents are there to protect you. Do you think they would have wanted this situation to continue?”
    “No, but, Cranford, think how upsetting it would be to Papa. I could not do that.”
    “Then you should have spoken to me.”
    She darted a glance at his rigid face. “It never occurred me. I wouldn’t have thought you could do a thing about it.”
    Stung, he rasped, “Perhaps you like to have him ogle you."
    The toe, of her boot caught him sharply in the ankle. “How dare you say such a thing?”
    “I’m sorry,” he said stiffly. “I didn’t mean that. But you are young and perhaps proud of your…womanhood, and there are few people to admire you.”
    “That’s not admiration!” she exclaimed scornfully. "That's... and I never asked