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“Up hills and down dales,” he said. “It will be an invigorating slog.”

“Sharpen up on your Welsh,” Owen said. “And steer clear of Mount Snowdon. It is said to be a killer.”

“Admire it from afar,” Bertrand said.

“And you, Bert?” Peter asked. “What are you going to do?”

Bertrand had no clear answer. When he came here, he had had nothing on his mind beyond the fact that Stephanie was coming too for a few weeks and it might very well be his only chance to persuade her that he was no super-mortal and quite unattainable to a vulnerable mortal such as she. He had not thought beyond that challenge.

“I will stay here for a while, probably,” he said. Estelle and Justin would be staying. Abby and Gil too. Probably Uncle André. They would be just immediate family after everyone else left. He was not sure about Maria’s plans.

There was something very seductive about the thought of immediate family—the close ties that bind. For perhaps the first time since he was seventeen, he wanted to be close to his father, to be comfortable with him, to see him daily. He loved his father as much now as he had during all the childhood years when he had yearned for him. More so, perhaps, for now he was finding that he liked his father too. Redcliffe was beginning to seem like home to him.

It was a startling realization, given his strong attachment to Elm Court—his cocoon of escape, the place where he could hide all his unacknowledged pain and fear. Where the devil had that thought come from?

“I am enjoying being at Redcliffe,” he said. “I lived here for several years as a boy, after all, and I know almost all these people. I want to spend a bit of time getting to know them again before I go back home. I have friends here.”

Going back home. Was that what he would be doing when he returned to Elm Court? He had spent many years there too. He had friends there. He belonged there.

“And back to London next spring to resume the bride search, Bert?” Owen said. “Second year lucky, maybe?”

Bertrand looked steadily at him.

“He is provoking you, Bert,” Adrian said. “We all see which way the wind is blowing. But it is definitely not a topic for male talk.”

But God, Bertrand thought, please, please not that. Not back to London to seek out another Miss Easton and her mama.

Owen grinned at him and changed the subject.

It was still raining outside.

Chapter Twenty

Almost every inhabitant of the village and surrounding countryside, including the family from Redcliffe and all their guests, attended a special church service to honor the eightieth birthday of the retired vicar one afternoon. The Reverend Powell was as beloved now as he had ever been before his retirement. Perhaps more so, for, saintly though he was, it had sometimes been a bit of a struggle not to doze off during his Sunday sermons. Today, however, there was nothing but affection for him and happy reminiscences, for how many people lived to such a ripe old age—and with their health and mental faculties and kindly good nature more or less intact?

A sumptuous tea in the church hall followed the service. It included the inevitable speeches and the presentation of gifts, among them a woolen lap blanket, made entirely from local wool, carded, dyed, woven, fringed, and embroidered across one corner with the old vicar’s name and a record of the date and occasion by several local artisans.

“One would almost imagine,” the old man had said during his speech of thanks while he ran one hand over the folded blanket and patted it lovingly, “that I am old.” He had beamed happily about him at the laughter his words provoked.

Now a number of people were standing outside the hall, reluctant to leave one another to return to the quiet routine of their own homes.

Stephanie was among them. She was with a group of young people who were buzzing eagerly over the village assembly coming up very soon now. All were agreed that the rooms above the inn were bound to be packed to near bursting with the guests from Redcliffe to add to all the usual local attendees. There would be scarcely enough room for all who wanted to dance, not to mention those who would choose to watch instead.

“Or simply to breathe,” one wag added.

But the potential problem seemed only to increase their delight. They could not imagine anything more blissful. The youngest Miss Linford, assuring everyone who asked and a few who did not that her heel was hardly sore at all any longer, nevertheless leaned upon the arm Peter Wayne had offered her. Mr. Melvin Linford, her brother, was telling Maria that he had been informed when taking dancing lessons a few years ago that he had been born with two left feet and there was no remedy for his affliction. He believed, however, that he would acquit himself well enough on the night of the assembly not to embarrass his partners. Mr. Harold Goring, the earnest young student of medieval history, was making his determined way toward Stephanie but was stopped in his tracks when Owen asked him, with a perfectly straight face, what he knew about men’s undergarments in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. A few young ladies in the group blushed and tittered, while Stephanie, catching her brother’s eye, almost laughed out loud. Where on earth had he come up with such a ridiculous, not to mention indelicate, impulsive question? She wondered how soon he would be able to extricate himself from the history lesson he was being given.

“Are you ready to leave?” Bertrand said quietly into Stephanie’s ear. It was not a general question for everyone.

“I am,” she said, and they moved away from the crowd onto the village street. “What a delightful gathering that was. There is always the threat of boredom when one lives in a rural area, is there not? But I love the way small communities celebrate happy occasions together. I used to think Boscombe and the neighborhood surrounding it was unique in that way and was very thankful it was where I belonged. But other places are much the same, I have discovered—the neighborhood about Penallen, where Ben and Jennifer live, for example, and the village in which Nicholas and Winifred have settled. Pippa and Lucas’s home too. Now here.”

“And Elm Court,” he said.

“Do you prefer the village life there?” she asked.

“No,” he said. “Nor do I prefer it here. I have good neighbors and friends in both places.”

He had offered her his arm, but he did not turn in the direction of the driveway back to Redcliffe. They were walking instead in the opposite direction, along the village street and out in open countryside beyond.