Sir Gerald turned his horse and trotted away a few steps.
“What do you mean?” Cecilia called after him in a louder, more strident voice.
Sir Gerald stopped and looked back over his shoulder.
“Precisely what I said,Your Grace,” he put scorn into the title that left Cecilia in no doubt about his opinion of her rank. “If you would like to discuss it in private, then you can find me at Thorpe Manor where I am a guest of my good friend, Gordon Locke, or Lord Thorpe as he is to you.”
With that, he spurred his horse away, only to swing around and gallop towards them once more. Cecilia was forced to leap from his path, pushing Peggy ahead of her. She heard Sir Gerald laughing as his horse thundered past to leap the brook once more.
“He is mad! A gentleman shouldn’t behave so!” Peggy spluttered as she and Cecilia picked themselves up.
“He is a wicked man,” Cecilia agreed. “He is responsible for my marriage to Lionel.”
Peggy frowned in confusion and Cecilia wished she had not spoken.
“Did you and the other staff not think it odd that the marriage took place so quickly, with no courtship? Or that it was such a small, private affair?”
“It is His Grace’s business. I thought that he had decided to marry, and once decided on a course of action, he has always been one to brook no delay,” Peggy said, “though I did wonder at him isolating himself from you once married. We all did.”
Cecilia sighed. “Because a scandal was engineered by Sir Gerald. Or possibly Lord Thorpe. Or both. Marrying me was the only way out of it.”
“Good grief,” Peggy exclaimed, “I had no idea. So, the two of you do not wish to be married at all?”
“At first… it was not our choice,” Cecilia admitted, “but that did not last. When we came together, we fit like pieces of a puzzle. It was all meant to be.”
She watched Sir Gerald ride until he was hidden by the trees. Then she looked up towards Thorpe Manor. It now seemed to loom over them like a storm cloud on the horizon.
Penrose, the house, was no more, gutted by fire. But the property, the land around the house, why would the grasping mercenary Sinclairs sell it? Was the fire set deliberately? If so, why?
“He talked about your home, didn’t he?” Peggy asked. “Penrose?”
“Yes, where I grew up and where I lived with my brother Arthur after our parents were lost at sea.”
“But how could it be his? Why is it not yours?” Peggy asked innocently.
“Unfortunately, I do not have the answer to those questions, Peggy,” Cecilia sighed. “Something is afoot. And, it seems, Sir Gerald has answers. But to obtain them, I must go to Thorpe Manor.”
“You mustn’t!” Peggy cried. “His Grace would not hear of it. He would be angry!”
Cecilia could not deny it. Nor could she convince herself that Lionel would agree to go with her. Even hearing what Sir Gerald had said, he would assume it a lie, part of some grand scheme of manipulation.
“Come along, Peggy. It is high time we were returning to Thornhill,” Cecilia ushered.
She and Peggy began to gather up the picnic things, only then discovering that a number of plates had been shattered by the hooves of Sir Gerald’s horse.
“My mother will be the one angry now,” Peggy murmured, “she hates to lose good crockery.”
“I don’t suppose she would fail to notice if we simply discard these pieces into the brook?” Cecilia said hopefully.
“She will notice from the difference in weight of the baskets, I swear it. She knows the contents of her kitchen to the teaspoon.”
“Then I will take the blame. Say that the basket slipped from my hand and I dropped it,” Cecilia reassured. “I would rather that Blackwood did not get wind of our encounter. It would certainly be reported back to the Duke. And I do not want that.”
“You would keep secrets from him?” Peggy asked, voice piquing.
From the tone of her voice, it was something she did not understand and, possibly, did not approve of. Cecilia did not like it herself but could see nothing good coming from relaying their meeting with Sir Gerald. At worst, it might incense Lionel enough for him to challenge Sir Gerald to a duel. After her sparring session with Lionel, she had no doubt who would come out the victor of that duel, but still, she would not risk harm coming to her husband, nor risk dragging the Grisham name through more scandal than she already had done. Not for someone as petty as a bully like that odious man.
As they finished their packing, with the broken crockery wrapped safely in one of the blankets, she thought about her next steps. The sensible thing to do would be to ignore Sir Gerald, dismiss it as taunting. After all, Penrose was no more, a shell of a house. She was now Duchess and mistress of Thornhill. Penrose was a chapter of her life now closed. What did it matter who owned what was left of it?
