He rose with the unhurried composure of a man concluding a meeting rather than retreating from one—the distinction was deliberate, and she knew it—and looked at his sisters with an expression that was, in its own way, genuinely fond beneath the scolding.
“Your lessons begin at nine,” he said. “Miss Aldwell will not wait.” He glanced at Isadora. “If you mean to read on the Peninsular campaign, avoid the circulating accounts. They improve the story at the expense of the truth.” A pause—brief, almost imperceptible. “I’ll have something more reliable sent up.”
Isadora looked up at him, her face lighting up. “Thank you, William.”
He nodded once. Then he looked at Letitia, who was still studying her plate with great philosophical attention. “The east paddock has been extended to include the lower path as far as the second gate. Mrs. Eldridge is mistaken about the boundaries. You may ride there this afternoon.”
Letitia’s head snapped up. She opened her mouth.
“With a groom present,” he added, before she could speak. “And at a pace I would not be embarrassed to hear described.”
Letitia’s expression completed the full journey from surprise to delight to particular calculation, deciding whether to press her advantage, and wisely settled on simple gratitude. “Yes. Thank you.”
William left without another glance at Cecily.
The door closed behind him with quiet finality.
For a moment, the three of them sat in the particular silence of a room that had just been vacated by a significant presence.
It was Letitia who broke it first, because of course it was.
“He extended the paddock,” she said to no one in particular, in the tone of someone reporting a geological event.
“He extended the paddock,” Isadora echoed, in the same tone.
Cecily looked at the door, then at her teacup, then back at the door.
He loves them.Every rule he has set is a wall he has built, and inside the wall he has put everything he cares about. He does not know how to let them out without also letting in what he is afraid of.
She poured herself more tea.
“Letitia,” she requested, “finish the story about the cat.”
Letitia needed no further encouragement.
By the time Miss Aldwell arrived at five minutes to nine, the cream had been knocked over once—by Letitia, inevitably—Isadora had smiled three times in a way that reached her eyes, and Cecily had decided, quietly and without ceremony, that she was going to do something about the atmosphere of this house.
She did not yet know how, but she was going to.
CHAPTER 11
“If we go left past the elm,” Letitia said, gesturing with the confidence of presenting a well-researched proposal, “there’s a path that runs all the way to the ridge. The ground is perfectly flat for at least the first half mile, and the view from the top is–”
“The answer is no, Letitia.”
All three of them turned.
William had come from the direction of the house, still in his riding coat, which meant he had either been out already or had been intending to go and had found them first. He fell into step beside Cecily without particular ceremony, his eyes fixed on the path ahead.
Letitia, who had the instinct of someone accustomed to identifying exactly when an argument had closed, looked at her sister instead.
“I wasn’t asking you, Brother,” she said, rallying. “I was telling Cecily.”
“And now I’m telling you.” He glanced at her briefly. “The ridge path past the elm has a drainage ditch that isn’t visible until you’re on top of it. The ground on the far side has been soft since the rain last week.”
“I’ve ridden that path before.”
“Not since the rain.”
