“Sorry, your lordship,” he told the animal, gentling his efforts and running a hand across the horse’s neck to soothe him. “It isn’t your fault. Thank you for the ride. I wish it had helped more.” He leaned his forehead against Khadija’s neck for a moment, and the horse went still. “You are better company than most humans, and that’s the damned truth,” Rob said.
When he stepped out into the sunshine, the overdressed customer stood over Alfred, berating him to hurry while the boy struggled to adjust the loin strap on an overbred, high-strung horse, half of a team hitched to a frivolous high-flyer phaeton with thin yellow wheels that rocked with every movement. Rob stepped to the horse’s head and took hold of the bridle, whispering soothing words.
“You, there! Tell this bumbler to step away from my team and get someone more competent to care for it.” Rob cast a sidelong glance at the idiot who owned this rig, the temptation to plant him a facer very great. While that might feel good in his current mood, it wouldn’t enhance the inn’s reputation. He acted as if he didn’t hear the man while Alfred finished his work.
The boy stood up. “Thank you for your help, Sir Robert.” He shot a glance at the customer. “It ain’t your job, neither.”
At the sound of “Sir,” the idiot who owned the rig paled, ogled Rob’s rough trousers, worn boots, and rough shirt, thenrecovered enough to raise his chin and pretend not to hear. His high collar points and cravat prevented him from moving his head easily.
The fool can’t possibly drive properly dressed like that, Rob thought. He gave the young ostler a reassuring clap on the shoulder. “We all do what needs to be done, Alfred.”
The dandy climbed up to his high perch awkwardly, gave his team their head, and they sped out of the innyard, scattering a flock of ducks that chose a bad moment to land by the kitchen door, and narrowly missing the post where the road met the drive.
“How long do you give ’im?” Alfred asked.
“Ten miles, and he’ll be in a ditch,” Rob said. Alfred grinned and set about helping Ellis with the mail coach. Rob walked around it, side-stepped a large traveling carriage, gave the Benson’s scruffy mastiff a pat on the head, and went through the kitchen to the taproom, eager for a pint of ale.
Andy Thatcher stood by the bar, a glass of cider in his hand. Behind the bar, Old Robert filled a mug and slid it to him. “How’d you find the earl?” the old man asked, filling orders as he spoke.
“How do you think? Irritating, imperious, and a pain in my arse.” Rob drank deep.
“Y’ve got a message from Willowbrook.” The old man indicated the Thatcher boy with his head without pausing his work. He put used mugs in soapy water.
“Miss Whitaker says to tell you there’s been more damage at Willowbrook, and t’ask you to come and look,” the boy told him. “Irrigation dam weakened sometime this week. If it goes, the northeast meadow will flood, and we’ll have to move the sheep.”
“Damn.” Rob looked at the man behind the bar. “Where’s Morgan?”
“Went with Emma to clean up the assembly room and fix a broken door. Good sport, your friend Morgan,” Old Robert said over the din of the taproom. Clara bustled over with more orders.
Rob cursed under his breath. “Examining damage isn’t my job,” he muttered. “What do I know about it?”
The old man glanced over from his work. “Do you want me to take a look?”
Do I? The earl is on his way over to Willowbrook, and I’ve had a belly full of him and that place.
“You take over here, and I’ll go,” Old Robert went on. “Andy here brought the Willowbrook pony trap. Someone will see me home.”
Rob sighed and slid behind the counter. “Thanks,” he said as the old man rushed off with the Thatcher lad.
“Three more ales, Sir Robert,” a grinning Clara told him.
He drew three pints from the tap and handed them over.
“Looks like you’re low on clean mugs,” the girl said over her shoulder as she rushed away.
Rob pushed his hands in the sudsy water, pleased to find it warm, and began to clean glasses and mugs. “And this isn’t my job either,” he muttered to himself bitterly.
*
“Papa is homefor a whole week this time, Aunt Lucy,” Edward, the young viscount, gushed. “Marj wanted to come with us, but her pony went away, and Papa hasn’t gotten her a new one.”
Lucy looked over at David, perched on a settee in her private sitting room, and raised an inquiring brow. The girl’s pony died the previous autumn.
“I haven’t had the, ah, time to replace it,” David said.
Money, Lucy mentally substituted. She enjoyed her niece and nephew and saw them often at the dower house visiting the duchess, but they rarely came to Willowbrook, even when their father was home. She suspected David found the place too full of painful reminders. As it was, he stared into his tea with little to say while Lucy questioned Edward about his studies, the baby kittens in his Aunt Maddy’s kitchen, and his ongoing efforts to collect every interesting butterfly in the shire.
She glanced up at her brother-in-law. An awkward silence passed between them. David cleared his throat like a man searching for a way to broach an uncomfortable subject. “How has honey production been this year?” he asked at last.
