Jacob rose. ‘You are very kind, sir.’ He held out a hand then noticed it was still a little bloody under the nails. He made to lower it, but Lord Furness seized the hand and gave him a firm shake.
‘Good day, sir.’ Furness marched off, calling for his servants to ready his carriage.
* * *
Jacob came out of a guest room where he had changed into a borrowed shirt and washed off all traces of his unplanned surgery to find Lady Alice waiting for him in the hallway. Prepared for a journey, she was already wearing her pelisse and hat, her heart-shaped face set off to perfection by the burgundy lining of the rim.
‘You are heading home, Lady Alice?’
‘On your orders, I understand,’ she said with a flick of annoyance. ‘I comprehend why it is necessary, but I refuse to treat it as a defeat.’
‘I imagine you rarely let anything defeat you.’ He bowed over her hand. ‘I wish you a safe journey. I must check on my brother.’ He turned to go.
‘Miss Fitz-Pennington said she had no claim on you,’ Lady Alice called after him. ‘She gave me her blessing to attempt to engage your affections.’
For a moment he felt a swoop of alarm at this sign that Dora wouldn’t fight for him, but then common sense returned. Of course she had said that. Dora would never stand in his way if he was leaving, which she seemed to half expect even after all they’d shared. Dora’s problem, he realised, was not believing that he fully intended to stick. He faced Lady Alice.
‘My lady, I beg you not to waste your time on me. You have so many attractions for a man of good sense, for someone who would love you and look forward to a life together with you.’
‘But you are a man of good sense.’
‘You don’t want me; you want the idea of a husband that you think I could be. But you’re wrong– you don’t know me if you think that. I’m the worst possible choice for you.’
‘Not the worst,’ she said with a humourless smile.
‘Well, maybe not,’ he conceded. ‘But I’m not the best– and you deserve the best.’ He nodded his head in a polite farewell and turned into the sickroom.
‘I’ll see you in London then?’ she called after him.
He closed the door and leaned against it.
Lady Alice was not defeated, merely deterred for the present. And that made him wonder. The tumblers in this lock revolved into place as he saw the key to open it. He and Dora had not considered love as a motive. If Lady Alice didn’t take a refusal well, perhaps there was someone else who was not deterred by being told ‘no’? There was someone who had a personal grudge against the Furness family, one who hoped to be more closely allied than fobbed off with a parsonage– and that wasn’t Knotte, was it?
ChapterTwenty-Eight
Chapel Holm
Following Hartley, Dora pushed her way through the undergrowth to the ruins at the centre of the little island. It wasn’t a new path. There were signs that others had come this way before, though not very often. The nettles had sprung up, deterring all but the most determined. The stings poked through her stockings, making her regret the decision to leave behind her skirt.
Hartley stopped at a mound of fallen stones.
‘This is what’s left of the outer wall.’ He boosted himself up on top. ‘Oh, someone’s camping in there.’
Dora scrambled up beside him, Derwent on their heels. A little tent, the kind used by the military on manoeuvres, had been pitched on the grass of what had once been the chapel interior. The blackened circle of a campfire a few paces from the entrance still smoked, a kettle placed on a stone to one side. Someone was in occupation.
‘Do you think Mr Knotte has come back and is in there now?’ whispered Derwent.
Dora realised that the boys might have witnessed Knotte doing nothing more suspicious than taking supplies to his own camp. ‘Only one way to find out.’
She jumped down and picked up a stout branch, a makeshift weapon should she need to keep him at a distance. Startling him would not be a good idea. It would be better to allow him to pretend nothing was the matter and that they had called in as friends.
‘Mr Knotte, are you prepared for visitors? The boys and I are exploring.’
No reply.
‘I don’t think he’s here– wait!’ She held up a hand as she could hear a faint groaning. It sounded like it was coming from inside the tent.
Derwent rushed forward. ‘There’s someone in there!’
