Penrhyd? Ethan’s brother, no doubt. Flo tamped down her expectations. Would the butler have told us if Ethan had come here?
While the butler went in search of the viscount, a footman took their wraps, shaking the snow on the marble tiles of the foyer, while another showed them to a withdrawing room to wait.
Flo examined her surroundings, trying to see Ethan Alcott in this room. While not the most sumptuous house in London, his father’s home bespoke good taste and comfort, warmth of body and spirit.Why would anyone prefer to lie in the gutter than to live in this place?
“Chadbourn?” A deep voice interrupted her musing. Viscount Penhryd stood in the doorway. He shared his brother’s lean frame and black hair, but lacked his intensity. When his gaze swept over Flo, his puzzlement deepened. “What brings you here at this hour?” He gestured toward comfortable chairs near the fire.
Will glanced at Flo. They had hoped to find Ethan here and hadn’t discussed what to say if he wasn’t. Will obviously agonized over what to tell this young man, and how much.
“Lady Flora Landrum. May I present Viscount Penrhyd? Penrhyd, my sister, Lady Flora.”
“I’m honored,” the viscount said politely, with the trace of a bow; his eyes didn’t leave her brother.
“Lady Flora belongs to the Ladies’ Society for the relief of our soldiers and their families.”
“I am aware of the ladies’ efforts. Have you come for a contribution or to lobby for votes?” The man continued to look baffled.
Flo felt the same.Where is Will going with this?
Her brother cleared his throat uneasily. “In the process of providing relief to some particularly indigent veterans a few weeks ago—” He stopped and glanced at Flo, and back to the Viscount. “The thing is Penrhyd, have you heard from your brother?”
The Viscount went rigid. “What are you saying, Chadbourn? Ethan went missing over a year ago. My father is considering formal mourning. We’d have initiated it, but my mother won’t hear of it.”
“It is well, you haven’t my lord,” Flo said softly.
“Perhaps you best begin at the beginning,” the viscount told them, gripping the arms of the chair so tightly his knuckles appeared white.
“What my brother started to say is that a few weeks ago I happened upon some of the poorest, most wretched of our returning men.”
“I know they exist, Lady Flora. It is England’s shame, but what does it have to do with my brother?”
“One of them shocked me with his educated speech. He took offense at my presence in such a place.” She felt her face color and cast her brother a pleading glance.
“The man, quite rightly distressed by a lady’s presence in such a place, felt obliged to come to warn me about my sister’s foolish start endangering herself.” Flo dropped her eyes to her lap under Will’s ferocious frown before he glanced back at Penrhyd. “The thing is, it was Ethan.”
“You mean you found him visiting the poor veterans?” the viscount rasped hoarsely.”
“I mean he lay among them, as one of them.” Flo wondered frantically if she ought to describe the filth and the stench, the missing hand. She decided not.
“I don’t understand. Why would Ethan be there? If he’s home, why hasn’t he come to us?”
“None of us completely understands, Penrhyd. War does things to a man.” Will told the viscount everything up to the point his brother disappeared the previous night. “He won’t thank me for coming here,” he concluded. “This is the very thing he ran to avoid.”
The viscount sank his head to his hands, supported by his elbows on his chair’s arms. “We’ve been sick with grief and worry. How can he have done this to us?”
“You can’t be more miserable than Lord Ethan himself,” Flo chided.
He raised his eyes to hers. “You’re right, of course. What must he have been through to put him in such a state?” He turned to Will, “You say he woke up among the enlisted wounded on a ship with no one recognizing him?”
Will was saved answering by a scratch at the door.
“Enter,” the viscount said.
The butler bowed to his lordship. “I hope I’m correct to disturb you. There is a man huddled in the garden. Normally I would send him on his way, but I thought—” Will surged to his feet.
The old bounder listened at the door,Flo thought.Thank goodness. She rose as well, and passed her brother at a run.
It took the viscount a moment or two longer, but when he realized why she ran, he bounded for the door behind the Landrums.
