“Dispute.” Miller’s jaw worked. “That is a genteel word for Carter’s accusations, my lord. He claims my boy has stolen his land, when Tom did nothing but follow the agreement Lord Redmond—your brother, rest his soul—established himself.”
“Perhaps,” Amelia interjected gently, “we might walk the boundary together? I confess I should like to see precisely where the agreement placed the division.”
Miller’s expression softened at her request. Tobias supposed that people all softened at her. “As you wish, my lady. Though I warn you, Carter will likely appear the moment he sees us. Man’s got eyes like a hawk.”
Indeed, they had progressed barely ten paces along the fence line when Samuel Carter materialized from the adjacent holding. He was slighter than Miller, with the keen gaze of one who missed little, and his expression upon seeing them was equally complex.
“Lord Redmond. Lady Amelia.” Carter bowed quickly. “I assume Miller has been filling your ears with his version of events.”
“We have only just arrived, Mr. Carter,” Tobias said. “Perhaps you might explain your understanding of the situation?”
What followed was a detailed accounting of grievances that would have been comical had both men not been so genuinely distressed. Tobias couldn’t help but look at Amelia, who seemed to listen with great attention.
“Gentlemen,” she said, when both men settled down. “I wonder if I might propose a solution?”
Both farmers turned to her with expressions of wary hope, and Tobias felt an absurd surge of pride in her composure.
“The fence young Tom has built,” she said, “stands precisely where the shared grazing arrangement established by my late husband dictated. Is that not correct, Mr. Miller?”
“Aye, my lady. The boy followed the markers exactly as his father instructed.”
“And yet,” she turned to Carter, “the fence prevents you from accessing what you understood to be shared grazing land during your allocated seasons. Is that the root of your objection, Mr. Carter?”
“Aye, my lady. A fence makes the land his, not shared. How am I to graze my sheep on land I cannot access?”
“Am I to understand that the issue is not the placement of the fence, but rather its existence at all? The agreement required trust between neighbors—trust that each would respect the other’s seasonal rights if I am not mistaken?”
Both men shifted uncomfortably, as though she had pressed her finger exactly in the core of the wound.
“Mr. Miller,” Tobias said now, “what if the fence were modified? Gates installed at regular intervals, with both families holding keys?”
Miller merely frowned at this solution. “Gates cost money, my lord.”
“The estate shall bear that expense,” Tobias heard himself say, wondering if Pemberton would blanch at the commitment. “Consider it an investment in good relations between valued tenants.”
“And what’s to stop Miller from locking the gates when it suits him?” Carter demanded now.
“The same thing that has prevented boundary disputes on every other holding,” Amelia said. “Your own integrity and neighbourly respect. Both of you have farmed these lands for decades. Your fathers farmed them before you. Are you truly willing to sacrifice that legacy over three feet of grazing land?”
The silence that followed was profound. Both men studied the ground, the sky, the offending fence—anywhere but at each other. Then Miller extended his hand toward Carter.
“Reckon we’ve been fools, Sam.”
Carter gripped the offered hand. “Reckon we have, John.”
Tobias watched with a growing grin as the tension drained from both men’s shoulders. They were already discussing gate placement as he and Amelia remounted, their voices carrying the easy camaraderie of old friends.
“Thank you, my lord, my lady,” Miller called as they prepared to depart. “For your wisdom and your patience with a pair of stubborn old men.”
“The wisdom was entirely Lady Amelia’s,” Tobias replied honestly. “I merely served as witness to her excellent judgement.”
They rode back toward Redmond Park in silence. Tobias kept glancing at Amelia.
“You were remarkable with them,” he said at last. “The way you understood not merely the facts of the dispute but the emotions driving it. How did you learn such things?”
“I have always… understood people,” she said simply. “Edward… listened to my ideas sometimes. He… never gave me… I mean, you did not have to tell them it was me. You would have won more authority had you taken the idea for yourself.”
“It wouldn’t have been right.”
