Page 51 of Miss Determined
“He liked school. I had to argue with his father that twelve was old enough to risk the rigors of public school, particularly when Trevor had already conquered the entire curriculum. He was bored at university, and—he never said this, he was too damned polite—disgusted by the debauchery he saw there. He called it boredom, but I used to know my step-son well. University boys reminded him too much of his father.”
“And he was unimpressed with London Society,” Rye observed. “But when word of Jerome’s death gets out, the matchmakers will swarm Tavistock like bees searching for a new hive.”
“Why couldn’t Jerome die after Tavistock has taken a bride?” Jeanette tried to find labels for her feelings. Sadness for Jerome’s sisters, who’d been fond of him, but who’d never crossed the Channel to visit him on the Continent. Worry for Trevor. Sadness for Jerome, though he apparently had not suffered and had died in the company of a woman who loved him.
Nowhere, though, among those feelings could she find shock or dismay. Jerome had always been a rascal and a wastrel. That he hadn’t been sent to his reward by frustrated creditors or some young lady’s furious family was the real surprise.
“Jerome is dead,” Rye said, “and I doubt you can keep the news quiet for long. Somebody should warn Tavistock—in person—that his cousin and heir has passed away. Don’t trust the information to the post. No black-banded epistles to get the staff talking or the posting inn taking notice.”
Rye had been a fine strategist and still was. “I’ll send Sycamore out to Berkshire. He had no excuse to linger in Crosspatch, but I can tell he’s itching to see how matters for Trevor are progressing.”
“You are itching to see how matters are progressing. More brandy?” Rye rose and collected her glass.
“No, thank you. The right marchioness could do much to brighten Trevor’s days. He was self-possessed, even solitary, at the age of eight. He was nine when I married his father, and in some ways, Trevor was already more adult than the marquess. It took me years to earn my step-son’s trust, and I never felt I had the whole of it.”
“The rightwife,” Rye said, finishing his drink and setting the glasses on the sideboard, “could do much to brighten his lordship’s days and nights. If he can find that wife among Society’s belles and diamonds, I will be surprised.”
“Sycamore says there’s hope, though the situation in Crosspatch is a tad complicated. Tavistock told nobody there of his title, and by doing the equivalent of listening at keyholes, he’s heard nothing but bad about himself.”
“According to Sycamore,” Rye said, “Trevor has made a complete shambles of his first attempt at wooing a lady. Perhaps I should go myself.”
Sycamore and Rye had a complicated relationship. Sometimes they were brothers-by-marriage, other times they were employer and agent. Occasionally, they were partners in mischief, and sometimes they were friends. Jeanette didn’t pry, and she didn’t take sides, and neither her brother nor her husband put her in a position where she had to.
“Sycamore,” Jeanette said, rising, “was amazingly adept at wooing me, and he counseled Tavistock to confess his duplicity at the first opportunity. His lordship is stubborn, though, and stubborn men seldom heed the best advice.”
“A hit,” Rye said, smiling the roguish smile he usually saved for Ann. “You haven’t lost your touch, sister mine. Send your loyal vassal, and we will somehow muddle on at the Coventry in Sycamore’s absence. If he leaves in the next hour and gets good horses at the changes, he can be in Crosspatch before sundown.”
ChapterTwelve
The past three days had been the realization of every ridiculous girlish fantasy Lissa had ever denied herself. Sweet hours with Trevor, sweet dreams of Trevor, sweet moments thinking of Trevor and when Lissa would next see him.
They’d taken to riding out at midmorning, trysting in the gatehouse, and picnicking by the river. Trevor had come for supper the previous evening, and Grandmama had most certainly not fallen asleep. Even Mama was losing some of the pinched, distracted quality that had haunted her for the past two years.
And yet, life went on too. As Lissa made her way along the bridle paths to Lark’s Nest, the Twid burbled by, the birds chattered, the sun brought a hint of warmth to the air.
“Spring is here,” Lissa murmured, patting Jacques’s neck. “Or as good as.”
She handed her mount off to a groom and rapped on Phillip’s door.
“No change,” Phillip said, stepping back and smiling. Lissa had only recently noticed how unrelentingly plain Phillip’s attire was. Unstarched cravat, creased boots, worn breeches. He was always tidy, always fastidious, but it was as if he’d decided to wear the same costume—contented country squire—for every scene.
“I went down to check on the mares at first light,” he said. “They toy with us, and when our backs are turned for an instant, we’ll have a pasture full of foals. Do come in. You can watch me finish my breakfast.”
“I’ll join you,” Lissa said. “I left Twidboro before my sisters came down to eat. Mr. Dorning joined us for supper last night, and Diana and Caroline outdid themselves trying to be grown up.” And they’d done that for Lissa’s sake, a touching display of support from an unexpected quarter.
“He’s bold, your Mr. Dorning.” Phillip ushered Lissa into his dining parlor and passed her a plate at the sideboard. Trevor would have filled that plate for her, which was neither here nor there.
Trevor absolutely wasLissa’sMr. Dorning. “Bold, because he accepted a dinner invitation? If I thought you’d accept, I’d send you one, but we can’t even get you to dance at the assemblies on the rare occasions when you attend them.”
Phillip gestured to the sliced ham, indicating that his guest should help herself first. “Not every lady would be enthusiastic about taking my hand, Lissa, and I’m not sure what a lot of linked arms and hands-held-high would do to my shoulder.”
“That’swhy you never dance?” She speared a slice of meat and felt like a fool. “You worry about your arm?” They never discussed a weakness that, as far as Lissa knew, had been present since Phillip’s birth. What else had Phillip been keeping to himself?
“I worry about my shoulder, but I also don’t know the steps. I’ve watched them enough times, but watching, or studying a diagram on a page, and capering about are different undertakings.”
Well, blast and botheration. “Phillip, you could have asked me to show you the movements.”
He became absorbed in heaping eggs onto his plate. “And then we would have needed an accompanist, and another couple to form a square, and somebody to call the tune, and soon half the shire is watching me fall on my arse.”
