Chapter Six
“Whatever is thematter, Danny?” someone asked.
Looking up from the book in her lap, Danny became aware she’d not onlynotread a single word of her book since coming out to the lake but had been here for an alarming amount of time if the darkening sky was any indication. Her lengthy visit to the lake the only reason her brother, Lord Donald Herbert Deime, would dare leave his rooms before sundown.
She smiled at her brother’s overly long hair—the same shade and texture all the Deime siblings shared—and unshaven cheeks. At least he’d remembered to put on a vest underneath his buckskin coat, though the lime green color meant he’d dressed in the dark once again. “Are the bats out already, Don?”
He paused on the hill and pointed to the treeline beyond the lake, where Danny could make out small shadows gliding back and forth between the spruces.
He hadn’t come out here for her. “Oh.”
He finished his descent from the hill and sat beside her on the grass. “I saw you from the window. I grew concerned when it had been over an hour, and you hadn’t turned a single page. What are you reading?”
Don was always one for details.
“Savage Animals of the Jungle,” she said, finding the title more telling about the author’s ignorance than the actual temperament of most animals.
“Boring book?” Don asked, sounding scandalized. “Or did you receive and declineanotherproposal that will have us all fending off Mama’s attempts to drag us to church?”
Danny ducked her head at her brother’s assumption. Though her mama’s merciless natter picking had nothing to do with her wandering thoughts. She’d forgotten about the earl’s visit earlier in the day. “I’m merely lost in thought.” The day had been a whirlwind. “Papa and I visited Fellow Hall this afternoon.”
Don looked out at the lake, the first stars visible in the sky reflecting in its placid surface. “How is Father?”
She smiled at his tone, the same reserved concern their father had when asking about his son. “You’d know if you spoke with him.”
Don leaned back on his elbows and considered the sky. “He only wants to discuss how I am duty bound to take up his seat and draft bills of institution and charity.”
“Or pass laws on animal habitats and integration of understanding into the schools.”
He glanced her way and quirked a brow. “Always the peacekeeper.”
She nudged him with her shoulder. “I’ll have you and Papa reconciling over one of your revolutionary vegetable dinners before Michaelmas.”
He laughed.
“Who’s reconciling now?” Lady Denise Eloise Deime, their younger sister, appeared beside the reigning willow tree, her slippered feet hidden in the ankle length grass. She glanced around, her mass of curls on her head dangling dangerously to one side. “Has Mama prepared one of her sermons? If so, I can arrange for bedrolls and a lantern, and we can stay out here indefinitely.”
“You, stay outside?” Don glanced Danny’s way. “Did we get a new sister while I was working in my study?”
“Working?” Denise glowered. “You mean sleeping all day and lurking through the dark woods at night like some creature from a gothic novel?”
“Creature?” Don quirked his head to one side, clearly intrigued. “What kind of creature?Canis?Catus?Aves?” He paused and considered. “That’s Latin for—”
“I know the Latin terms for dogs and cats.” Denise frowned at Danny. “What was the last one?”
“Birds.”
Denise nodded, as if she’d known the answer all along. “And birds, of course.”
Don clapped his hands together. “That’s marvelous! If you’ve taken an interest in species, you can help me with my research.”
Denise snorted. “I’ll take Mama’s sermons, thank you.”
Danny hid her smile behind her hand. While the three siblings had always found a way to co-exist with minimal bloodshed, recent changes—Don’s grant to study nocturnal habits from Cambridge, Denise’s forthcoming debut into society with all the fittings and instruction, and Danny’s ever-persistent suitors—kept them far busier than any of them liked.
Denise sat on Danny’s other side, leaving the three in ascending order from youngest to oldest. “If we aren’t hiding from Mama, then is it another suitor? I tell you, Danny, I can instigate an innocent ‘accident’ the minute the next one walks through the front door: Releasing the hounds inside, a chamber pot’s contents thrown over the banister, a pie to the face.”
Danny laughed but quickly added, “No, thank you. There’s no need to go that far.” With Denise, one should never assume threats were idle.
