His smile faded.
Lindsey Hall could accommodate a vast number of guests and had done so on several occasions since Christine married the Duke of Bewcastle. Wulfric’s three brothers and two sisters were here with their spouses and growing families. So was all of Christine’s family. And there were several other guests, relatives, and friends. She had invited the Earl of Staunton, Christine explained to Eleanor and Hazel and their mother while they were sitting over their coffee in the cozy sitting room next to Mrs. Thompson’s bedchamber the following morning, because he had kind eyes and she had heard he brought his children with him to London each spring and devoted much of his free time to them, taking them to places that would interest and entertain them.
“But it sounded to me,” she said, “as though the children were not often in the company of others, and that made me sad. Sad for them and sad for him, for I believe he dotes on them. I have been told he doted on his late wife too, though I never knew her.”
“Poor gentleman,” their mother said.
Christine had not planned activities for every moment of the two weeks. Everyone must feel free to relax and enjoy the summer in good company, she had explained at dinner last evening. Everyone must come and go as they pleased and not feel obliged to do anything they would rather avoid.
They did tend to move about in crowds, however. On the first afternoon, which was hot and sunny with not a cloud in the sky, someone—Christine? The Marchioness of Hallmere, the former Lady Freyja Bedwyn, Wulfric’s sister?—had suggested going out to the hill that descended in a long, wide slope from the wilderness walk almost to the bank of the lake, and children and adults flocked there in the most exuberant of spirits though no one had explained what was so delightful about a long, steep hill.
Eleanor doubted Wulfric had opened his home to many house parties before he met her sister, and she had never observed him either to romp or to frolic since then, or even to bend sufficiently to smile and relax and look as though he were enjoying himself. But, observing him as she walked from the house to discover what the excitement was all about, it seemed to her that he was happy. He was standing at the foot of the hill, his hands clasped behind his back, his booted feet slightly apart, an austere expression on his face, watching excited, shrieking children, including two of his own, rolling down the hill from the very top.
The person he was really watching, though, Eleanor saw as she came up to him, was Christine, who was hurtling downward, her body straight, her arms stretched above her head, her dress bunched up about her knees, shrieking. She was not the only adult thus engaged. Freyja and two of her brothers, Lord Alleyne Bedwyn and Lord Rannulf Bedwyn, were also part of the action, to the huge amusement of their own children and other people’s.
“Why could I not have married one of the respectable Thompson sisters?” Wulfric asked without turning his head.
Eleanor laughed. “Because Hazel was already married and I would not have had you even if you had asked,” she said.
“That is very deflating to my self-esteem,” he told her.
“That even if you had asked is a key point, Wulfric,” she said. “Only Christine would do for you. Admit it. And it was because she is as she is.”
Robert Benning, she was delighted see, was leading the younger, red-haired child with whom he had been playing in the nursery yesterday up the hill by the hand. He was bent slightly toward him, like a parent protecting his chick. And, interestingly, another infant caught up to them up as Eleanor watched—he was Jules, the Earl of Rosthorn’s son, Wulfric’s nephew—and took Robert’s other hand, no doubt seeing in him an older boy who was a rock of stability. Georgette too was trudging up the hill with Lizzie and the girl’s father and talking animatedly to both of them.
“Quite so,” Wulfric said, watching as Christine caught a little girl at the bottom of the hill and swung her about in a high circle, laughing and whooping up at her. The Countess of Rosthorn, the former Lady Morgan Bedwyn, Wulfric’s youngest sibling, was doing much the same thing a short distance away with young Miranda Bedwyn, Lord Rannulf’s daughter. “You are looking...subdued, Eleanor.”
Oh, gracious. Was she? But those unblinking silver eyes of his, so disconcerting to many people, did not miss much. He turned them upon her now—appropriately enough, his eyes were like a wolf’s.
“Because I am not risking life and limb by rolling down the hill?” she asked, laughing again.
He was not to be deterred, “What is troubling you?” he asked.
“Absolutely nothing at all,” she said, “beyond a little weariness after a busy term.”
All about them in the warm sunshine house guests of all ages were at play. Even those who were not laboring up the hill in order to tumble down it were watching those who were and calling out comments and encouragement and laughing and whistling and applauding and, in a few cases, tending bumps and bruises and soothing tears. But the Duke of Bewcastle’s austere attention was focused fully upon his sister-in-law.
“You are not as happy,” he said, “as you expected to be.” It was not a question.
“Oh, I love my school,” she protested, quite truthfully, “and I love my fellow teachers, every one of whom has both the skill and the enthusiasm and understanding I expect of them. I love my girls, from the haughtiest and most obnoxious of the wealthy ones to the cattiest and most belligerent of the charity cases. I love what I do. It matters.”
“But?” He raised one eloquent eyebrow.
She sighed. “But—”
“Bewcastle,” a strident voice said, and Lady Connaught sailed up beside them, dressed in all the splendor she might have worn on Bond Street in London or on a drive in Hyde Park at the fashionable hour of the afternoon. Plumes nodded above the flower-trimmed brim of her large bonnet. Her daughter was with her, dressed as though for a garden party in Richmond, her arm drawn through the Earl of Staunton’s. “How delightful it is to see all the dear children enjoying themselves, though I am surprised you would allow them to expose themselves to such danger. I am surprised too that the mothers of the girls would allow them to behave more like ill-bred hoydens than the young ladies they must aspire to be when they grow older. I am surprised you did not send them with their nurses somewhere not quite so close to the house. Their shrieks were audible as soon as we stepped out of doors.”
Wulfric was suddenly all cool hauteur. His quizzing glass was in his hand and raised halfway to his eye.
“Are you surprised, ma’am?” he asked. “If there is indeed danger, it is slight and there are many doting parents on hand to deal with scraped knees and bumped noses. In my experience, exuberant girls often grow up to be perfectly delightful and well-bred ladies. My sisters are a case in point, as is Her Grace. And why, on a summer day, when the children are having a great deal of fun, should the pleasure of watching them and listening to them and even, in some cases, of joining in their games be reserved for their nurses? It would not seem quite fair.”
What was also not quite fair, Eleanor thought with the greatest satisfaction, was that no one could ever argue with Wulfric—except Christine. Lady Connaught retreated into a dignified silence.
Eleanor’s eyes met the Earl of Staunton’s. She had recognized Miss Everly’s name as soon as she had heard it yesterday, and Lady Connaught’s too. The impression she had gained at the inn during dinner that he was courting Miss Everly had been quite correct. She was exquisitely lovely, and she seemed to be all sweetness and dimpled good nature. Eleanor had not warmed to her. There was something about her sweetness and something about her smile... Could it be that she was just a little jealous, Eleanor had asked herself yesterday and asked herself again now. How very ridiculous of her. She felt more than ever ashamed of that near-sleepless night while she relived a kiss that had not been a real kiss at all.
He looked back at her with expressionless eyes.
“Perhaps, ma’am,” Wulfric was saying, “I may escort you back to the house and have tea and scones brought out onto the terrace. It will be quieter there. I believe my mother-in-law plans to sit there in the shade with a few of my other guests.”
