She looked like her mother.
“My father confronted Lady Whitleaf after the funeral,” Theodore said. “She denied that she had ever intended to act with such malicious intent as described in that letter by your hand. He had been presumptuous and familiar with her, she claimed, and she had been about to make a private complaint about him to my father—that was all. The matter was dropped, but there was a coolness between my parents and her ever after. My parents believed Osbourne’s version.”
Susanna spread her hands, palm up, and examined them closely.
“The third letter was sent on to your grandfather,” Theodore said, “even though you could not be sent with it. I believe he implemented his own search for you, but you were lost beyond a trace until Whitleaf found you this past summer.”
“I was not lost,” she said quietly as she drank her tea, thankful for the hot liquid, “and he did not find me.”
“In a manner of speaking,” he said, smiling. “May I take you to my mother and Edith in the morning room?”
“Yes,” she said with a sigh. “Theodore, perhaps I should leave tomorrow and return to Bath so that you may have a quiet family Christmas without feeling obliged to entertain me.”
“That would break Edith’s heart,” he said, “and hurt my mother. And I would not be happy about it either. We have other guests coming later today, remember.”
“All the more reason for me to leave,” she said, frowning.
“Not so.” He stood in front of the fire, lifted onto the balls of his feet, and then rocked back on his heels again. “I am expecting Colonel and Mrs. Osbourne and the Reverend Clapton from Gloucestershire—your two grandfathers and your paternal grandmother.”
Susanna stared mutely at him.
“My mother suggested it,” he said, “as soon as you wrote back to say you would come. I wrote to them the same day and they did not hesitate. They are coming to meet you.”
She swallowed and heard a gurgle in her throat. She pushed her cup and saucer aside and curled her fingers into her palms to find them clammy.
“My grandparents?” she half whispered.
“Lord,” he said, lifting onto the balls of his feet again, “I don’t know if I have done the right thing, Susanna. But I know my father would have done all he could for you, and my mother always loved you almost as if you were her own. I thought it only right to do more or less what your father wanted mine to do—except that I am bringing your grandparents to you rather than sending you to them.”
She was not all alone in the world. She had three grandparents and perhaps other relatives. She had read it in both her father’s letters, yet somehow the knowledge had not fully lodged itself in her brain until now.
She had relatives, and they were coming here to Fincham Manor.
Today.
Susanna lurched to her feet, pushing her chair away with the backs of her knees as she did so.
“I have to get out,” she said.
“Out?” Theodore’s rather bushy eyebrows drew together until they almost met over the bridge of his nose.
“Out of doors,” she said, feeling as if she were about to suffocate.
“You don’t mean home to Bath?” he said. “You are not going to leave, Susanna? Run away again?”
Whatdidshe mean? She scarcely knew. Her mind felt as if it were close to bursting with all it had been forced to take in during the past hour or so.
She drew a deep breath and released it slowly.
“I just need to walk outside for a while, Theodore,” she said. “I need fresh air. Will you mind? Will it seem terribly rude? I do not mean to run away.”
“I’ll come with you,” he said, still frowning. “Or perhaps Edith or my mother—”
But she held up a hand.
“No,” she said. “I would rather be alone. I need to sort out my thoughts.”
“Ah,” he said. “Take all the time you need, then, Susanna. And then come back and get warm and enjoy Christmas with us. We will do all in our power to see that you do.”
