Ashley smiled and touched his hat to several people he passed in the village. It was a pretty place. At the far end of the main street a humpbacked stone bridge crossed the river. At the far side of it was a cottage, somewhat larger than those in the village itself. And beyond that were the high gates leading into the park. They stood open.
But he paused beside the cottage. A young child was swinging on the gate leading into the well-kept garden. He stared at Ashley with large blue eyes. His dark hair was short and curly.
“Good day to you, lad,” Ashley said. “And who might you be?”
“I am Eric Smith,” the boy said. “Who are you?”
“Eric!” a voice called from behind him. A woman stood in the open doorway of the house. She was dressed plainly but decently. She was young and rather lovely. Ashley thought she must be the child’s mother, though her hair was lighter.
“Madam.” He touched the brim of his three-cornered hat. “Good day to you. May I present myself? Lord Ashley Kendrick of Penshurst.”
She half inclined her head to him, though she did not curtsy as he had expected she would. Her face, which had looked embarrassed when she first called out to her son, was now expressionless.
But before Ashley could ride on, someone else appeared in the doorway, an older man, who stepped around the woman and came walking down the path toward the gate. He was smiling, though he looked at Ashley with shrewd, perhaps wary eyes.
“You are expected at the house, my lord,” he said. “Ned Binchley at your service. My grandson, Eric.” He set his hands on the shoulders of the child and stopped his gate-swinging, then turned his head to look back at the doorway, which was now empty. “My daughter, Mrs. Katherine Smith.”
“I am pleased to make your acquaintance,” Ashley said. The man was dressed as a gentleman, even if his coat and breeches had seen better days. He also spoke as a gentleman.
“I was Sir Alexander Kersey’s steward for fifteen years,” Mr. Binchley explained. “I have an interest in the estate, my lord. If there is anything in which I can assist you, I am here.”
“But you are no longer the steward?” Ashley asked.
“I retired,” Mr. Binchley said, “almost five years ago, after young Mr. Kersey died.”
Ashley nodded, touched his hat again, winked at Eric, and rode on. The Kersey name had been mentioned. This was where they had belonged, where they had been known. This was where she had lived. She had ridden and walked along this driveway perhaps a thousand times. And she had lived in the house that was coming into view again. There would be signs of her inside. Unless decisions had been made after Alice’s death without his having been consulted, many of her possessions would remain in the house. He could almost feel her presence already.
He shivered.
13
LADYSterne and Emily had agreed between them during the carriage journey to London—though Lady Sterne did all the talking, of course—that for the first week they would stay at home preparing to launch themselves into all the busy activities of the Season.
And so Lady Sterne had all the delight of summoning her mantua maker and of spending two long days having Emily’s measurements taken and choosing patterns and fabrics with her and convincing her that she needed many more clothes than Emily had first thought.
She had the delight too of spreading the word that the sister of the Earl of Royce, the sister-in-law of the Duke of Harndon, was in town to take in the Season. She made a particular point of having it known that Lady Emily Marlowe was totally deaf and without speech but that she could read lips. And that her beauty surpassed even that of her sisters, who were remembered as great beauties. Had not one of them snared Harndon, the most handsome, the most discriminating, the most eligible bachelor of his time?
“Egad,but you are happy, Marj,” Lord Quinn said to her when the week was almost over. “I have not seen you so happy in a long while.”
“Of course I am happy,” she said, smiling sleepily at him. “’Tis the effect you always have on me, Theo. And it has been three whole weeks. An eternity. You were especially good today, dear.”
Discretion and the strictest of good manners had kept them apart at Bowden, but now that both had returned to London, they had resumed the weekly trysts that had brought them together for years. They were lying in each other’s arms, lazy after lovemaking.
Lord Quinn chuckled. “Only because you were happy and especially eager, Marj,” he said. “’Tis the gel. You are enjoying having her. How the devil you are to launch her when she is stone deaf and has none of the pretty conversation the bucks all enjoy, I do not know. But the very impossibility has you enjoying yourself immensely, by my life.” He kissed her lips.
“’Tis one last chance,” she said. “I thought ’twas lost, Theo, when she was to marry Lord Powell. And I was glad for Anna’s sake that all was settled. But I cannot pretend to be sorry that I could bring her with me. She is going to have all the young blades prostrate at her feet.”
Lord Quinn chuckled again. “I’ll not forget,” he said, “how we schemed to bring my nephy together with your goddaughter eight years ago, Marj. They were married within a week, and as I predicted then, she was brought to bed exactly nine months later.”
“With a daughter,” she said. “You said ’twould be a boy, Theo. But we did do rather well, did we not? Dear Anna. She is still happy with him. And the boy came later—boys. Three of them.” She sighed and wriggled a little closer to him.
“By my life, Marj,” Lord Quinn said, “I believe we should try it again.”
Her head went back and she looked into his face.
“With that scamp of a younger nephy of mine and your little gel,” Lord Quinn said.
Lady Sterne looked at him consideringly for a long time. “Why did it happen, Theo?” she asked at last. “’Twas not ravishment, I am happy to say for Lord Ashley’s sake. But why, then? She seemed fond enough of Lord Powell.”
