Page 51 of Nothing But a Rakehell
“I never realized, never thought of it . . . but Kes didn’t talk about Saoirse after that first summer holiday. I do know he never went home again, either. He stayed in Windsor over holidays, or sometimes he went home with one of us.”
She cleared her throat. “When I asked him, he said that he loves horses—and that is why he doesn’t keep them.”
Tensford said nothing.
“What do you think happened?”
“I couldn’t say, with any certainty.” He sighed. “I love Kes like a brother, but there are things he keeps to himself. He has . . . moods, occasionally. And sometimes he goes off and no one sees him for a few weeks at a time.”
Her brother in law set down his blade. He left his fossil and went to look out of the open door. Glory held her silence. Tensford looked out over the stable yard for several long minutes, then turned back to regard her with solemnity, his lips pursed. “Glory, I’m going to tell you something I likely should not.”
She nodded and sank down onto a stool.
“I just want you to understand . . . and not to get any of the wrong sort of ideas. And I want you to promise not to share the tale, or tell anyone I’ve told it to you.”
“I promise.”
Tensford heaved a sigh and sat back down at his worktable, his fingers moving idly over his prize. “In our third year, a set of vile rumors spread about school.”
“About Keswick?”
“Yes. They seemed almost . . . designed . . . to goad us, his closest friends, into despising him. To break our confidence in him.” His gaze looked beyond her, as if into the past. “Even as young as we were, we felt the wrongness of it. Not one of us believed the lies. We stuck by him. And we worked together to track down the whoreson who was spilling such filth.”
“Who was it?”
“A young man none of us knew, not beyond sight. He was in the year ahead of us. We beat the truth out of him, but still, all he could reveal was that he’d been paid to do it—and told exactly what to say.” Tensford shook his head. “The whole incident eventually blew over, but now, looking back as an adult . . .”
He blinked and looked at her, his expression still shadowed. “The next year, our last year, we returned from summer holiday as usual. Kes had spent the time with Chester, I believe, and they showed up in the house just as the rest of us did. But Kes was called in to the headmaster. One of the Fellows was there as well. They informed him that he was no longer enrolled. His father had declined to pay the tuition for his last year.”
“What? Why?”
Tensford shrugged. “Back at the house, there was a letter waiting. It informed him he could transfer to another school—one we’d never even heard of—or he could leave school altogether and come home.”
“Which did he choose?”
“Neither. We all pooled our resources. We used allowances, called in debts and begged or borrowed everything we could. We paid for his last two halves ourselves.”
Both hands covered her mouth. “How wonderful you all were. How kind. And how lucky Keswick is to have you all.”
He hunched a shoulder. “You know how it was with me. You can imagine I did not have much to give, but my sister had only just married. I borrowed a sum from her new husband to contribute.”
She knew how hard it must have been for him—and how much Keswick must have meant to him for him to even consider such a thing.
“Kes paid us all back, of course, as soon as he was able.” He sighed. “There was no reason for it. Nothing financial. No family trouble. No reason at all, that we could discern. It seemed like such random cruelty. We couldn’t let it stand.”
“Of course not.”
“And as you can imagine, we all grew that much closer. Our bond has only tightened and it still stands to this day, but . . . Kes does not trust easily.”
Suddenly Keswick’s words were ringing in her head. “He told me that he had no more room for constants in his life.”
“Then you should believe him,” Tensford said earnestly. “Be kind to him. He deserves that much. Treat him well, if only for my sake. But don’t make the mistake of expecting anything . . . substantial from him. He won’t allow himself to give it to you. You’ll only be disappointed.” He gave her a sad smile. “I wouldn’t see you hurt, Glory.”
She wouldn’t care for it either. “Thank you, Tensford. I’ll keep your confidence, you may rely upon it. And you have given me much to think upon.”
She left the workshop behind and made her slow way back to the house. Entering through the servant’s entrance, she passed by the merry-making and headed to her rooms for a good, long brood.
Chapter 11
