Five

 

Laurence stopped by the stables the following afternoon to check on the foal’s condition. He’d developed a proprietary interest in the little creature. However, Rigel seemed to find his concern nearly as irksome as imprisonment in a loose box with his mother. “We’ll turn them back out into the paddock tomorrow,” Stanley told Laurence. “There are no ill effects that we can see.”

“That’s good.”

Rigel turned his back on them and applied to his mother for an early dinner.

“Huh,” said a groom behind them. He was looking out the stable doorway at some sight that apparently startled him. Another stableman joined him and began to snicker. Laurence exchanged a glance with Stanley. They went out to see.

The Duke of Tereford was approaching, riding an exceedingly incongruous mount. “What is that?” Laurence asked.

“It’s a mule,” Stanley replied.

He’d recognized its breed. The question had really been what the extremely fashionable duke was doing astride a broken-down mule.

“That’s Ridley’s old feller, that is,” said one of the grooms.

“I heard it died,” said the other.

“Naw. I wouldn’t have thought it’d take a saddle though.”

“Don’t seem exactly pleased.”

The second groom snorted.

Laurence noticed Miss Deeping on the other side of the stable yard. She’d stopped short to observe this unusual arrival. In the next moment, a side door opened in the house, and Henry Deeping came striding out. He was laughing.

The mule plodded up to the stable and stopped. The duke dismounted and held out the reins. “Perhaps you would take charge of this kindly but limited creature,” he said to the grooms.

They jumped to do so.

“What the deuce are you doing?” asked Henry Deeping as he came up.

“The best I can manage,” replied Tereford, showing no trace of embarrassment.

“How I wish I could draw,” Deeping continued. “That picture would entertain the ton for an age. You would never live it down.”

“I can only be thankful for your complete lack of artistic talent.” The duke nodded a greeting. “Glendarvon. And Mr. Deeping. I believe we have met in London.”

“Your Grace,” said Stanley.

“The nonpareil on a swaybacked slug,” said the elder brother. His eyes danced with unholy glee. “Oh, where is Rowlandson when you need him?”

“I’ve never been fond of satirical cartoons,” the duke replied. “I’m sure the mule would agree.” He addressed Stanley. “I am in need of transport. I sent my coach and team south as all the inns are full to the brim at this season.”

“We might have housed them for you, Your Grace.”

Tereford showed the first trace of chagrin. “I wish I had thought to ask you. Hello, Miss Deeping.”

She had joined them. “Where did you find a mule?” she asked, clearly fighting a smile.

The duke sighed. “Merlin has been reconnoitering the neighborhood. That is his word, you understand. He came across a fellow with a mount for hire and made the arrangements without examining the, ah, object of the transaction.”

“Your hermit rented you a mule.”

“You have a succinct way of putting things, Miss Deeping.”

Henry Deeping staggered about holding his midsection and laughing. Laurence thought the duke was taking this reaction better than he might have in his place.

“We can do rather better than that,” said Stanley.

“I hoped you might. I would be happy to purchase—”

“We’ll lend you something,” Stanley interrupted. “And then we can see. There’s a gig in the barn that’s hardly ever used. It’s a bit worn.”

“No matter,” said the duke.

“The Duke of Tereford in a shabby old gig,” said Henry. “How the mighty have fallen!”

“Oh, do be quiet, Henry,” said the duke.

The two men exchanged a look that spoke to Laurence of a long-standing friendship.

“And then some riding horses,” Stanley went on.

“I have only a shed at present. No proper place to keep them.”

“Ah yes. Just the gig, then. I’ll show you.” Stanley extended a hand to indicate the way.

The duke started to follow, then turned back. “Cecelia thanks you for the servants, Miss Deeping.”

“She is very welcome.”

The duke and the two Deeping brothers headed for the coach house. Laurence watched them go.

“Stanley will sell him twice as many horses in the end,” Miss Deeping said.

“He is very good at what he does.”

“He is, isn’t he?” She walked past Laurence.

He followed her into the loose box. “Stanley said Rigel seems all right.”

“He looks fine,” she replied. “He has a strong heritage. His sire was a champion. And Aspen’s as well.”

“Do you know all the horses’ bloodlines?”

Miss Deeping shook her head. “My father and Stanley and Bertram do. Aspen just happens to be a favorite of mine. She and my horse, Stelle, are sisters.”

Bertram walked by the open stable door, checked when he noticed them, and came to join them at the loose box. He said nothing.

“Have you thanked the marquess for saving Rigel’s life, Bertram?” asked his sister in an overly sweet tone.

“Eh?”

“It would have been a sad thing to lose him, would it not? Such a promising foal.”

Bertram nodded. “It was well done. Thank you.”

“I’m glad I happened by.”

“Happened,” repeated Bertram as if he didn’t trust the word.

“Which horses will Stanley show to the Duke of Tereford, do you think?” Laurence asked Miss Deeping.

Bertram went on the alert like a hound catching a scent. “Tereford’s here?”

“Looking for transport,” Laurence replied.

“I should help.” Bertram started out of the stable.

“Leaving me here on my own?” asked his sister, even more sweetly.

Bertram waved a dismissive hand without turning. The sound of his footsteps died away.

“Deft,” said Miss Deeping.

Laurence shrugged.

“You are fortunate not to have brothers.”

“It wouldn’t be the same in my case. Sisters, now, that might do it.”

***

Charlotte looked this large, all-too-attractive sportsman up and down. “You pretend to be bluff and only moderately intelligent. That is, you try to do so. But it doesn’t work, because you are neither of those things.”

“It usually does work,” he replied. “Nearly always, in fact.”

She was surprised he had admitted his deception. “Really?”

“Very few people are as discerning as you.”

Charlotte felt the blood rush to her face. Most compliments that young gentlemen offered were silly, even annoying. Like one of his earlier remarks, this was not.

“And I am many things that people expect me to be,” he added.

“Such as?”

“I’m fond of sport. I can’t make witty conversation. I do not have deep philosophical thoughts.”

“What would deep philosophical thoughts entail?”

“Well, I don’t know. Because I don’t have them.”

Catching the twinkle in his blue eyes, Charlotte burst out laughing. “I find your conversation satisfactory.”

“Not excellent?” he asked, pretending disappointment. “Merely satisfactory?”

“You have quite enough wit to be going on with.”

“With you. You’re different.”

Charlotte had long known that a handsome face was not enough to lure her. She now learned that when combined with a certain sort of mind, it was irresistible. She knew she should look away, but she couldn’t. Warmth suffused her from head to toe. “How am I different?” she murmured.

“I am…still learning that.”

She leaned toward him, drawn by a curiosity that was somehow softer than her usual inquisitions. “How do you intend…?”

Rigel began hopping around the loose box as if he was on springs. He bumped into his mother, bounced back, stumbled, then nipped at her tail and began to hop again. Aspen stepped forward and nudged Charlotte’s shoulder. Charlotte put a hand on the mare’s neck. “Yes, I know you would like to go outside,” she told her. “Stanley said tomorrow.”

Aspen looked back at her bumptious foal, then at Charlotte.

The marquess laughed. “Have pity,” he said.

Charlotte smiled as she shook her head. “Not until I consult Stanley. He makes the final judgment.”

The sound of hooves and rattle of harness heralded her brother’s return. They went out to find Stanley leading a single horse harnessed to their older gig. Tereford and Henry sat in it. Charlotte went to explain Aspen’s plight.

“I will go and see.” Stanley bade the duke farewell and entered the stable.

“He gave you Trace,” Charlotte said. This gelding had recently gone into retirement, though he was still hale and steady. He looked glad to be in harness again.

“And tempted me with some stunning hunters.” As Henry had predicted, the polished duke looked incongruous in a slightly shabby gig, but no less assured. Charlotte wondered what it would take to overset the man. And then he drove that question right out of her mind when he added, “I’ve remembered where I heard the name Glendarvon.”

He was looking past her to the marquess, who had come out in her wake.

“My father knew yours, I believe.”

Charlotte came alert as the marquess said, “Ah.”

“He was consulted on the matter of guardians,” Tereford went on. “I remember because he used the occasion to lecture me on a son’s proper attitude and behavior. He had a great many opinions on that score. If your caretakers took his advice, you have my sympathies.”

Glendarvon merely bowed in acknowledgment. The animation was gone from his expression.

Charlotte said nothing. But it did occur to her that carefully questioning the duke, at some later time, would not break her promise to her brother.

A groom brought out the mule and hitched its reins to the back of the gig. Henry climbed down. The duke nodded his farewells and drove off.

“Stanley has relented,” said Glendarvon.

She turned to see her brother leading Aspen from the stable toward the mares’ field. Rigel skipped along behind her, tossing his head and executing tiny leaps over tufts of grass. The foal’s frisking warmed Charlotte through and through. She was so glad this bright spirit had not lost his life in cold, smothering mud. She smiled even as she blinked back a tear. Glancing at the marquess, she saw the same emotions in his face—elated, grateful, tenderly amused.

For the first time in the course of her prickly romantic life, Charlotte felt a whiff of danger.

***

Charlotte went to visit Cecelia the following afternoon, riding over alone through a brisk wind that loosed the leaves from the trees and whirled them in spirals around her. The air crackled with energy, making her mare dance. The first fox hunt of the season was not far off.

Arriving at Lorne, she found the shed empty and realized she should have sent word ahead. But when a boy came trotting from the house to take charge of Stelle, he told her the duchess was at home.

“James has gone off in the gig to speak to a builder,” Cecelia said after Charlotte joined her. “He insisted on doing it himself.”

Charlotte wasn’t sure why her friend should think that worth mentioning. Cecelia’s smile said it was one of those secret jokes many married couples shared.

“I had a letter from Sarah,” she added. “She has found us a new tenant for our Cornish house.”

“How did she sound?” Charlotte and her other friends had been worried about Sarah, whose impulsive marriage had not begun well.

“Quite happy, actually. The family seems to have come to an understanding.”

“Oh good.” They were exchanging the latest news about Ada and Harriet as well when movement outside the window caught Charlotte’s eye. She turned to see a tall thin man striding across the far side of the garden. “Is that Merlin?”

Cecelia looked. “Yes.” She shrugged. “He patrols the boundaries.”

“Why?”

“For something to do, I think. He doesn’t seem to have much of an idea about that.”

“Does he make you uneasy?” Charlotte wondered.

“Not in the least. Perplexed and a little sad, perhaps. I don’t see what’s to be done with him.”

“Are you required to do something?”

Cecelia shook her head. “But we brought him up here. At his request. And now he has set himself up in a tumbledown cottage at the edge of the property. Not a proper house at all. He lurks around the kitchen door at mealtimes just as he did in Cornwall. Fortunately, the staff you found for us are all very sensible. They seem amused by him.”

“You want to help him,” Charlotte observed.

“He’s like…a task left undone.” The duchess made a gesture to show that she knew this was silly.

“There isn’t much call for a hermit.”

“He has been a tutor and schoolmaster.”

“I could ask if anyone in the neighborhood—”

“Both of which he hated, it seems,” Cecelia interrupted. “I don’t think teaching is his…talent.”

Outside, Merlin suddenly jumped behind a tree and crouched out of sight. Wondering what had set him off, Charlotte rose and went to peer out. The gig came into sight, heading for the shed. “Does he hide from the duke?” she asked.

“He says he prefers to remain ‘covert,’” Cecelia replied. “And no, I have no idea what that is about.”

Tereford came in to join them a few minutes later. “Ah, scones. We are grateful for the cook you found us, Miss Deeping.”

It had actually been their housekeeper, but Charlotte took the credit. She had questions for Tereford and was glad to see him in a good mood.

He sat and took the plate Cecelia handed him. “The builder can start reconstructing the stable next week,” he said. “He has the materials available.”

“He will have to clear out the cinders and ashes first,” Cecelia said.

“He was aware. The ruins have attracted a good many local visitors, apparently. He thought the foundations could be reused as they are stone.”

“Well done,” said Cecelia.

Charlotte didn’t understand her hearty tone. Nor the look they exchanged. It was another of those arcane marital signals. Charlotte let him finish the scone, well aware that hungry men were less amenable. Then, at last, she came to the point. “I was curious that your family knew Glendarvon’s,” she said to the duke. “Did you meet his parents before they were murdered?”

“What?”

She had managed to startle the most polished man in London. Charlotte almost felt she should take a bow. “You didn’t know? He told me they were killed when he was four years old.”

“Good lord,” he said.

Cecelia looked both shocked and bewildered.

“I mentioned them when I was there about the gig,” the duke told her. “My father was consulted about his guardianship.”

“After they were killed?” asked Cecelia.

“It seems so,” said Charlotte.

“Should I apologize?” wondered the duke. “I could tell him there were moments when I would have been happy to see my father murdered.”

“James! That isn’t funny.”

“It isn’t. I beg your pardon. Both your pardons.” Tereford turned to Charlotte. “He told you about this? How did it happen?”

“I thought you might have heard.” She didn’t feel it was right to share the details she’d gleaned so far.

Tereford shook his head. “I only remember that my father used the occasion to lecture me on my shortcomings as a son. And the importance of a proper guardian.” His lips turned down. “He did not see the irony in the fact that he was my preceptor. And yet I was everything he detested. So what did that say about his abilities?”

Cecelia reached over and squeezed his hand.

“The dead past,” said the duke with a nod. “But murdered!” He shook his head again.

“It must have been talked of,” said Charlotte.

“Undoubtedly. Twenty-odd years ago.”

She needed older informants, Charlotte decided.

“You’re interested in Glendarvon’s history?” Cecelia asked her. Her blue eyes were acute.

“It is a mystery,” Charlotte replied.

“And you find those fascinating.”

“Yes,” she said, which was true but incomplete.

“Well, I know nothing about it,” said the duke.

“I wonder if Lady Wilton might,” said Charlotte. The duke’s irascible grandmother was an expert on society scandals. And she was certainly old enough to remember a twenty-year-old tale. Or a half-century one, for that matter.

The Terefords were staring at her. “You are not fond of Lady Wilton,” said Cecelia.

“Well, no, but…I suppose you write to her now and then. Since she has become a relative.”

“Not very subtle, Miss Deeping,” said the duke.

“No,” said his wife. “Really, Charlotte, I would have expected a more devious approach from you.”

Charlotte saw that she’d amused them. “Harriet was always better at that,” she admitted.

“You miss them.”

Her friends’ absence was an acute pain suddenly. She nodded, throat tight.

Cecelia looked sympathetic. “I will mention Glendarvon in passing. When I write. But only once, mind. I’ll not rouse her…inquisitive impulses.”

Charlotte nodded, in complete agreement and very grateful.

***

Laurence rode back toward the Deeping house after an invigorating gallop down country lanes and a subsequent wander that looped through field and forest. The wind had blown the cobwebs from his mind and nearly stolen his hat. His horse had reveled in the movement as much as he did.

His thoughts had been just as active, circling around his last conversation with Miss Deeping. He sometimes pretended to be duller than he was. This was true. It was a useful ploy for avoiding conversations he didn’t wish to have. But the thing was, he didn’t admit it when challenged. He simply looked blank and waited until people gave up. Assumptions took over. Prejudices reigned. A large, bland, muscular gentleman who was fond of sport was not expected to have brains. His few good friends gradually learned he wasn’t a dunce, but they didn’t talk about it. Why would they? They weren’t silly tattlemongers. Yet when Miss Deeping had challenged him, he’d given up his ruse at once. He’d even been rather pleased that she saw through him. Pleased, Laurence thought. He examined the idea with wary curiosity. Yes, pleased.

He’d also told her things he hardly ever shared. He couldn’t recall when he’d last mentioned his parents’ murder, except to her. He’d made a fetish of keeping to himself, and he was comfortable that way. He always had been.

What was it about this particular young lady? He’d met prettier girls, a good many with sweeter dispositions, even some with more sprightly wit. Many had seemed determined to please him, whatever that might require. They’d hovered around him. Laurence had a flash of memory. At a certain London ball, he’d been surrounded by a bevy of debs, and they’d seemed to be vying to reflect his preferences. It had been an…assault of enthusiastic agreement.

Other men seemed to find this enjoyable. Right and proper, even. To Laurence it had seemed empty, perhaps because he was putting on a bit of an act himself. He hadn’t been intrigued at all.

And now, suddenly, he was. Because… He groped for a reason. Miss Deeping was pleasant to look at. She was intelligent. She was treasured by her family, which was telling. But none of that seemed enough.

She was wholly herself, Laurence realized. She didn’t hang back to see what he might want before she spoke. She didn’t hope to please him first and foremost. Quite the contrary! She didn’t give a fig. Laurence found he was smiling. Miss Deeping said what she liked. And she listened to the answers, hearing what lay behind the words. It was exhilarating and a relief.

More than that, she was brave. She navigated the bedlam of the Deeping dinner table without blinking an eye. She’d recovered in a moment when he’d nearly ridden her down, an actual brush with death. And look at how she’d gone after the mired foal. She was intrepid, he thought. Intrepid. The word vibrated in his mind. She was the sort of woman he could…more than admire. She offered the chance of a real connection.

With this thought came an unsettling surge of longing and fear. Connections broke, smashed by fate. Feelings overwhelmed, then turned to dust and ashes. The quiet life he’d created was…workable. He wasn’t ready to let that go.

As if a treacherous fairy had summoned her, the subject of his musings appeared around a clump of trees ahead, mounted on her charming mare. Miss Deeping saw him at the same moment. There was no avoiding her. If he jerked the reins and turned to flee, he would only encounter her over dinner later and have to explain his rudeness.

“Hello,” she said when they came closer. “Wandering about by yourself again?”

“As are you,” Laurence replied.

“I’ve been visiting my friend Cecelia. You didn’t care to join the shooting this morning?”

It wasn’t an accusation. He didn’t have to justify his choices. “I felt like a gallop.”

The path back to the Deeping stables turned right ahead. They both took it, riding side by side.

“It is good to get the kinks out,” Miss Deeping said.

“Yes.” Laurence began to compose another bland sentence—a comment about the weather—when a flicker of movement distracted him. “What the deuce is that?”

“What?”

“There’s someone in that tree.” He pointed.

Charlotte turned to look. A figure stood on a branch in the middle distance, one arm hooked around the trunk for balance. Not a boy playing pirates; this was a man. She squinted. “It’s Merlin.”

“Who?”

“The man staying at Lorne with the Terefords.”

“Ah, the one who talked of incendiaries at the gate.”

“Yes. I can’t recall his real name.” Sarah had put it in one of her letters, but Charlotte hadn’t paid attention.

“Oliver Welden,” the marquess responded. At Charlotte’s surprised look, he added, “The duke mentioned it.”

“And you remembered.”

“It’s no great feat. What is he doing in a tree?”

“Cecelia told me he patrols the boundaries of their land.”

“As well as guarding the gate. Why? Does he expect an attack?”

“She said he doesn’t know what to do with himself.”

“All right, but why do that?” The marquess gestured at the figure in the tree. Apparently seeing he was exposed, Merlin climbed down and disappeared.

“I wonder if he’s ‘touched in his upper works’ as Cecil would say.”

“You fear he’s a madman?”

“No. I imagine he needs a purpose, and he doesn’t know where to find one.” The words had popped out. And they’d sounded uncomfortably wistful.

“Up a tree seems an odd place to look.”

He was dismissive. The Marquess of Glendarvon had no idea what it was like to have no purpose. He had an estate to care for, an established place in the world, all manner of options spread before him like a banquet. “Where would you look?” Charlotte asked.

“I suppose the duke could find him a position.”

“Some place to shove him into and forget about him?”

Glendarvon raised his eyebrows. “Is this Merlin a friend of yours?”

She had sounded furious, Charlotte realized. And she hadn’t really been speaking of Merlin, whom she didn’t know at all. The point had hit much closer to home. “No.”

Mortified, Charlotte urged her mare forward. His mount responded to the change in speed, coming up to Stelle’s side just as the path narrowed between two stands of blackthorn.

The horses jostled like a crowd trying to push through a doorway. Charlotte and the marquess were pressed together—shoulders, upper arms. She felt the hard muscle of his thigh against her knee. His leg pressed hers where it was bent in the sidesaddle, as if urging it to open further. Charlotte gasped as a bolt of heat went through her body. Every inch of her was suddenly aware of him in an entirely different way, her body brought to tingling life. She looked up, startled, and met a searing blue gaze. Clearly, he felt it, too. Fire seemed to pass from his eyes to hers. She was leaning forward, drawn irresistibly, falling into inevitability. Mere inches, and they would be locked together in a…

Stelle nipped at his gelding, making her annoyance at this obstruction plain. Ranger’s head jerked away from her teeth, having no room to shy.

Glendarvon frowned. Not in anger. Charlotte knew that. Perplexity, frustration, anxiety? She thought she saw all those and more. One of his powerful hands brushed her cheek even as he reined in his horse with the other. “Ranger,” he said. “Get back.”

His gelding responded, sidling backward. His hand fell away. Charlotte’s mare walked forward.

And the moment passed. The pall of normality descended like a cloak to be swathed around her. She might have thought she’d imagined the whole thing, except that she was breathless. And the memory of his touch still filled her reeling senses. He was coming up beside her again. What did one say after a passage like that, when everything and nothing had happened? When the universe had swung out in a wild arc and back again?

“Awkward bit of path there,” he observed.

One pretended nothing had occurred, apparently. But he had sounded shaken, and he was looking everywhere but at her. “Yes, I’ll tell Bertram to see to it,” she replied. She realized where they were. “There’s also a hole. Careful.” His gelding was nearly on it. Charlotte leaned over and grabbed a rein to stop him. “The ground drops off just there,” she added. “The long grass makes it hard to see.” She let go of his rein.

“Ah yes.” He guided Ranger around the declivity.

“I’ll remind Bertram about that as well,” Charlotte said. “It was supposed to be filled in.”

“Thank you. Ranger might have had a fall.”

“You don’t mind that I stopped you?”

“Should I?” He looked at her finally. The fire had not gone out of his blue eyes. It was merely banked. She could still feel it.

“If you were a dull bluff sportsman, you would be quite annoyed at the interference. Of a female, at that.”

“Would I?”

“I think we both know you would.”

The brush of mutual understanding was a touch of another kind, as heady as the press of his knee. Perhaps even more so. Charlotte took a deep breath and strove to gather her disordered senses. She pulled Stelle to a stop. “You should go on ahead.”

He paused at her side. Not particularly close. And yet it felt as if he was.

“If we arrive back together, one of my brothers is likely to observe us,” Charlotte added. “Without a groom or any other chaperone.”

“Ah.”

“And I’m rather tired of their unsolicited opinions.”

The marquess touched the brim of his hat and, astonishingly, did as he was told.