Page 14 of Reforming Lord Neil

It would be easier to be amused than irritated at this point, and it would take less energy. Neil sighed and then gestured to the two empty chairs at his table. “Please, sit. I’ll buy you both something to drink.”

They exchanged a glance, full of a silent conversation only the oldest of friends might have without a word actually spoken, then they sat.

“Tell us,” Mr. Putnam said. “What brings you out here? You hoping to find the lost city of Dunwich?”

Neil widened his eyes and looked about. “Isn’t this Dunwich? If it is lost, it appears I have already found it.”

“This is the village what’s left,” Billy said. He jerked his head toward the door. “And the ruins of the church, too. But there used to be a whole city here, back before even the Normans invaded. Rivaled London, the stories say. It fell into the sea, with all its riches.”

Rubbing at the bridge of his nose, Neil answered with barely concealed impatience. “If it’s in the sea, no one is getting to it. No, Mr. Higgins. I am not looking for any lost city.”

“Oh.” The white-haired man appeared disappointed. “Then what are you doing in these parts?”

“I went too far down the road. I ought to have turned west some time ago, I suppose. I found myself without food or shelter last night, when I was kindly taken in and given both at a farm just north of here.”

“Sounds like you came across some good-hearted people.” Mr. Putnam’s expression went from concern to a knowing smile. He scratched at his whiskered chin. “Was it the ladies up at Bramble Cottage?”

Neil recalled the hedges along the road. Might they have been blackberry bushes? “A grandmother, mother, and daughter?” When the old men nodded, Neil relaxed. “Are they known for sheltering strangers, then?”

“They’re hardly known at all,” Higgins said, his shoulders drooping. “Good lasses, though, all of them. If I was twenty years younger, I’d marry Mrs. Godwin and take care of the lot. Isn’t right for them to be all alone out there.”

Putnam sighed and rested his forearms against the table. “How were they after that rain we had a few days back? I told my no-good son-in-law to go up and check on them. The thatch in these parts needs doing up again. We’ve got a leak in our’n. Are the ladies staying dry?”

“They seemed perfectly dry when I saw them.” Neil thought of the thatched cottage roof and could not think how one could tell, merely by glancing at it, that it needed replacing. But these men knew his hostesses well, it would seem. Interesting. “How long have they lived at the cottage? Did they lose their men to some illness or accident?”

“No, nothing like that.” Higgins tapped at the table with his fingers, looking to his friend before adding, “They showed up without any men, last year just before winter. Bless them. They were about done in.”

“Paid for help, though, right off.” Putnam shrugged. “Though I get the sense that was most of their money. They’re mighty careful with their pennies on market days.”

“Always genteel, though.” Higgins met Neil’s gaze and smiled, showing that he had more gums than teeth. “They treat everyone with respect. Kindness. It’s a real shame they’re out there alone.”

“They’re close enough to town.” Putnam waved off that sentiment. “It’s good they took you in, but makes me worry for them.”

Neil’s mind started turning over the new information he had gleaned. The women had come with enough money to settle, and pay to make the house and land livable, but were no longer spending as much on help. They had a roof that possibly leaked. He had seen the fence in need of repair. They had been willing to feed and shelter him, without asking questions.

A idea formed in his mind, but Neil cast it away. Then drew it out again. No, it was far too ridiculous. Better to forget it and keep trying his luck elsewhere. But he could make his ride about the countryside more pleasant. “Do either of you know where a man might purchase clothing?”

Chapter Six

Never in Neil’s life had he found himself in doubt of his path. As the son of a wealthy noblemen, people generally made his way easy with their smiles and willingness to indulge his whims. But no more. He had made it to Saxmundham, to the acquaintance who had somehow already learned of Neil’s disgrace. The butler of that house, upon Neil giving his name, had puffed up like a peacock.

“My master bids me tell you that he cannot harbor the disgraced son of Lord Alderton. He wishes you well. Good day.” Then the door snapped shut before Neil had said another word.

He went back the way he had come, in search of an inn. The first he passed was an establishment he would not allow one of his favorite dogs to rest in, let alone himself. One could tell merely from looking upon the black thatch and filthy yard that bedbugs and fleas abounded inside the walls.

Neil pressed on. He had some money left in his pocket, even after spending coin for meals that were worth far less than he paid.

A road sign told him Walberswick was but five miles away. That woman he had met at her cottage, Mrs. Clapham, had suggested the inn of that town to him. Even that slight recommendation was better than wandering about until he settled upon another plan.

A plan. How laughable. He had thought he might sit in a friend’s billiard room or library and pass the hours as comfortably as ever. But with each rejection, a cold feeling had grown inside Neil’s gut. It was with all the weight of lead that the certainty rested within him that no one he knew would offer him shelter. No one would brave the irritation of a marquess. No one liked Neil well enough to do so.

A strange clatter, clomp, and the horse stumbling jerked Neil out of his thoughts and nearly out of the saddle. Muttering a string of curses to himself, Neil dismounted. The horse pawed at the ground with a foreleg, and the sound of metal against stone grated against Neil’s ears.

The cursed horse had lost a shoe.

“You had to make matters worse, didn’t you?” Neil gave the horse a pat on the neck despite his displeasure. It was not the animal’s fault he was improperly shoed. Neil lifted the horse’s foot as he had seen blacksmiths do, holding himself over the hoof to examine the problem. The shoe had vanished. The horse would go lame if Neil continued to ride the gelding. The village was still several miles off.

Neil glared at the hoof, then lowered it back to the ground. As he had not the funds to purchase another animal, Neil walked. The horse seemed to understand the gravity of the situation enough to keep his head low and ears back.