The butler opened the double doors of the drawing room with a flourish, as if he were about to announce the Prince of Wales himself—and then paused.
Susanna Osbourne was rising from a window seat. The large room was otherwise empty.
“Oh, Mr. Smothers,” she said, “the earl and countess went downstairs to the library. Did you not see them?”
The butler turned an almost comically mortified face to the guest, but Peter spoke up before him.
“But it was Miss Osbourne I came particularly to see, Smothers,” he said. “If she will receive me, that is.”
The butler looked back to the lone occupant of the room.
“But of course,” she said, walking halfway across the room before stopping. “It is quite all right, Mr. Smothers. How do you do, my lord?”
He was not doing very well at all actually. He had been assaulted again by the rather foolish panic he had felt when he awoke. This was the last time he would see her. Tomorrow morning she would be gone. The day after so would he. It was no comfort at the moment to try telling himself that by this time next week he would probably have forgotten her.
He smiled and advanced into the room, and the butler closed the door behind him.
“Frances received an invitation this morning to sing at a series of concerts in London later in the autumn,” she explained. “She and the earl have gone down to the library to check on dates and make some plans. But they will not be long.”
They would not be long.Suddenly their absence seemed to him like a gift he had avoided but longed for.
She was looking rather pale, he thought, until he looked more closely and realized that actually her face was slightly bronzed from exposure to the sun. But there was something…It was in her eyes even though they smiled. No, the rest of her face smiled. Her eyes surely did not. Like him, he thought, she was not unaware that this was the last time they would be alone together, the last time they would see each other.
Of courseshe was not unaware of it. Over the course of ten days or so they had developed a friendship that was rare in its warmth. How foolish of him to have deprived them both of two days.
“I came to say good-bye,” he said.
“Yes.” She spoke softly.
“It has been a pleasure knowing you,” he said, though it struck him that there was so much knowing yet to do—if only they had more time.
“Yes,” she said. “It has. Been a pleasure.”
“Yesterday’s excursion was enjoyable,” he said.
“Yes,” she agreed. “I have never been to Taunton before.”
“Nor I,” he said.
He saw her swallow, and she turned her head away for a moment before looking back at him.
“I hope you have a pleasant journey the day after tomorrow,” she said.
“Yes. Thank you.” He clasped his hands at his back.
“Shall I—”
“Will you—”
They spoke together and stopped together, and she gestured for him to proceed.
“Will you come out for a stroll with me?” he asked her, abandoning without a thought his careful plan for a fifteen-minute formal call. “It has turned into a beautiful day out there.”
“I will fetch my bonnet,” she said.
She left him on the landing while she ran up to the next floor, and panic returned. What if they could not get out of the house and out of sight before Edgecombe and his lady emerged from the library? There was thisoneafternoon left. This was it—his last chance. This time tomorrow…
His last chance forwhat,for God’s sake?
