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“Lady Lydia.” He bowed, then addressed the countess. “I trust your journey was comfortable.”

“Quite comfortable, thank you. We made excellent time.”

“The roads were better than we expected,” Pembroke added.

Tristan acknowledged this. Beside him, his mother waited. “Mrs. Bell has your rooms ready,” he said.

Lydia shifted her sketchbook from one hand to the other. Its cloth cover was worn at the corners; a narrow slip of paper protruded from the pages, and she tucked it back with the quick precision of someone protecting her work. Tristan waited for the family to pass him. His mother lingered. “You might at least look pleased.”

“You have given me very little reason to.”

“They will hear you.”

“Then you ought not to have asked.” He followed the guests inside. The hall smelled of lilies and beeswax. Two footmen stood beside a table stranded beneath the staircase during the preparations, neither certain it would be permitted to remain. Mrs. Bell approached from the passage with a ring of keys in her hand.

“Your Grace. Welcome home.”

“Mrs. Bell.”

Mrs. Bell greeted the Pembrokes without any sign that their arrival had added to her difficulties. “The east rooms are prepared, Your Grace.”

“Excellent,” his mother said. “Lady Pembroke, you have the room overlooking the lawn. Lady Lydia, yours faces the morning light. I thought you would appreciate it.”

“That was kind of you.” Her fingers tightened on the sketchbook.

“For your drawing. Your mother tells me you are quite devoted to it.”

“Plants, chiefly.”

“Scientific illustration,” the countess said. “She takes considerable trouble over the details.”

Lydia glanced at her mother. “They are rather the point.”

“Edmund recently found fault with a foxglove. We have heard a great deal about its details since,” the countess continued.

“I said the flowers looked wilted,” Edmund replied.

“They hang downward,” Lydia explained.

“Yes, and you explained it repeatedly,” Henry added as he bent to retrieve a glove his mother had dropped.

Lydia settled the sketchbook against her side and let the subject rest. His mother waited for Tristan to join the conversation. He gave her no assistance.

“There is a great deal here to interest you,” she told Lydia. “The gardens are beautiful, and the greenhouse has many interesting specimens. You must have someone show you.”

“I would like that very much.”

“Tristan knows the grounds better than anyone.”

“Samuel can tell Lady Lydia what is growing in them.”

“Your gardener is a busy man.”

“So am I.”

The countess adjusted the clasp of her reticule. Pembroke turned toward Mrs. Bell, who stepped forward. “If you would care to follow me, my lady.”

Tristan moved out of their way. Lydia passed close enough for him to see charcoal ground into the edge of her sketchbook and a corresponding gray mark on one glove. Her gaze met his briefly. “Thank you, Your Grace.”