“You will want to talk with mama, of course,” Philippa said sweetly, curtseying.
“Aye, I do, but first, lassie, come and greet your brothers. They will nae remember you, for Johnnie was just three when you went away, and Alex still in leading strings, and our Jamie not even born. Here, lads! Here is your oldest sister, Philippa. Show her that you all remember the manners your mam has taught you.”
John Hepburn marched up to Philippa, took her hand, and kissed it with all the grace of a courtier even as he bowed. “I can just remember you, sister, but barely. I will not forget you now, however. You are much like our mam.”
“And you, like the mother who birthed you, Johnnie Hepburn,” Philippa said. “I remember Jeannie Logan, and she was most fair, and kind too.”
“I do not remember her at all, but I thank you for your words,” John Hepburn said. Then he pulled his two younger siblings forward. “This is Alexander, and this Jamie. He cries a lot when he does not get his own way.”
“Do not!” Jamie Hepburn yelled, and he hit his eldest brother with a small hard fist. “Take it back, Johnnie!”
“Greet our sister, you little buffoon,” his elder said.
“I do not think you a buffoon, Jamie Hepburn,” Philippa said. “You would appear to be a brave lad to attack one larger than you.”
The little boy looked up at her. He had his father’s dark hair, but his mother’s amber eyes. “You’re pretty,” he said.
“ ’Tis all the greeting you’ll get from him,” Alexander Hepburn told Philippa. “I do not remember you, but I am happy to have such a pretty sister.” His father’s blue eyes met Philippa’s hazel eyes. “I’m Alexander Hepburn.”
“Do not Banon and Bessie make you happy too?” Philippa mischievously baited him with a grin.
“Sometimes, and sometimes not,” the lad told her plainly, and he grinned back.
Philippa curtseyed again. “I will leave you and mama to your reunion, Logan. Brothers, you must go to the kitchen where cook has a treat for you after your long ride. I must go and speak with Uncle Thomas.” She shooed her brothers in the direction of the kitchen stairs, and then moved gracefully across the hall to where Lord Cambridge awaited her return, seated in a tapestry-backed chair, a goblet of wine held in his elegant beringed hand. Philippa sat down opposite him, and looked questioningly at him.
“How can you help me so I may escape the tedium of this glorified sheep farm?” she demanded of him.
“You are so impatient, dear girl,” he said in an amused tone. The jewels on his fingers twinkled as he raised the goblet to his lips to drink.
“Uncle, I am bored. I have been home these six weeks now. August is coming to an end. I want to go back to court.”
“And so you shall, my pet, for I can see quite clearly that Friarsgate is not the place for you. How diverting I find that, remembering your mother in her youth. There she was in the midst of the center of the earth, as you so succinctly put it. And what did she want? Nothing more than to return to Friarsgate while you, her eldest child, want nothing more than to escape it.” He chuckled, and then he grew serious. “Now tell me, Philippa, do you mean it when you tell Rosamund that you do not want Friarsgate? Do you mean it truly, or is it just that you are having an attack of exasperation over the disappointment Giles FitzHugh visited upon you? I want the truth, Philippa. What I do to help you will depend upon what you tell me now.”
“I do not want Friarsgate, uncle. I do not!” Philippa said.
“It is a great inheritance, dear girl. Are you sure you would give it up?” he queried her further.
“Aye, I would give it up! What good is it to me? It is far too far from the king and the court. I prefer living at the court. But if Friarsgate becomes my responsibility I cannot live at court. I know the obligations involved in being the heiress of an estate like this, uncle. I do not want those duties. I prefer to serve the queen.”
He was silent and thoughtful for a long few minutes. To his surprise Philippa remained quiet as well. Finally Lord Cambridge said, “If you do not want Friarsgate, my darling girl, then what do you want other than to live at court, and serve the queen?”
“Oh, uncle, I know that you and my mother have made a success of your cloth trade. Could you not spare some of your combined wealth for me? A respectable dower and a small income would suit me well. And it is all I need to live at court, and to pay my servant her yearly wage.”
“What of a husband, Philippa?” he asked her.
She shook her head. “I have spoken enough with my mother over these last weeks to know that I have never really been in love with anyone, least of all Giles FitzHugh. If he had come home to wed me I should have done so, and thought myself happy. Perhaps for a few years, but perhaps forever. Who can say, uncle? But while I have been considered an heiress, a northern estate is of no use to me. So I will content myself with a smaller portion. If one day there is a man who will love me, and I him, then at least I may offer that man a respectable dower portion. There are plenty like me at court, uncle, as you would certainly know from your own time there. My father was such. His marriage to mama took him from loyal obscurity to the rank of a landowner. Perhaps there is a man at court with a small home who would be happy to have a wife like me. I do not scorn marriage.”
“But you are a proud girl, Philippa,” Lord Cambridge reminded her. “Would simplicity truly suit you, I wonder.”
“What other choices do I have, uncle?” she asked him frankly.
“We shall see, darling girl,” he told her. “Now, promise me, Philippa, that you will trust me to aid you. That you will cease quarreling with your two sisters, for Banon is my heiress, and I will have no one gainsay her. And Bessie is your stepfather’s especial pet, being the only girl at Claven’s Carn. If you wish to have your own way in this matter then you must allow me to resolve it.”
“And I will go back to court, uncle?” she asked him anxiously.
“You will go back, and in time for the Christmas revels, I promise you, darling girl,” he said. “Now tender me your pledge, Philippa Meredith, and give me your hand in token of that pledge.” He offered his own hand, and she put her small one in it.
“I will trust you, uncle, and I will try not to be so difficult,” she promised him.
