She stood beside the long table beneath the mirror, as if she had been prepared to hold the house hostage until he passed through her line of fire.
“Where are you going?” she asked.
Owen stopped at the foot of the stairs. “Out.”
“I had gathered as much.”
He crossed toward the door. “Then your curiosity is satisfied.”
“It is not,” she replied crisply. “Are you intending to see that woman again?”
Owen’s hand tightened on his gloves. “Miss Finch has a name.”
She stepped closer. “Owen, this must stop before it goes further.”
“It has already gone farther than I wished it to.”
“You cannot be serious.”
“I am entirely serious.”
She stared at him, and in her face he saw not only displeasure but also disbelief, as though the son she had successfully managed through rank, duty, and expectation had suddenly become someone less governable.
“You may choose to ignore it,” she told him, “but the Finch scandal still carries weight. There are people who remember it very well. A military man in particular ought to have the sense not to entangle himself with that family.”
Something in Owen hardened. Perhaps it was the word entangle. Perhaps it was hearing Aurelia reduced to the old public wound that had already cost her family so much. Or perhaps it was only that he had read, not ten minutes earlier, the quiet dignity with which she wrote of her mother’s suffering and her own concern for everyone but herself.
Whatever the cause, when he answered, his voice was colder than before. “You will have to grow accustomed to it.”
His mother blinked heavily. “To what?”
“To the courtship.”
She stared at him. “Owen—”
“All the women you have pressed upon me,” he said, cutting cleanly across her protest, “may have been suitable in rank and fortune, but they have been entirely unsuitable in character.”
Color rose in her face.
He went on before she could interrupt. “I have no wish to marry a pedigree. If I pay attention to anyone, she will be whom I choose.”
“That is a very fine sentiment,” she spoke in annoyance, “until you remember you do not belong only to yourself.”
“I belong sufficiently to myself when it comes to whom I visit.”
The hall seemed suddenly very still. Even the servants at a distance had the tact to make themselves scarce. His mother’s expression changed again, sliding from affront into cold disappointment.
“You have returned from the Continent with a most unfortunate tendency to imagine yourself answerable to no one.”
“No,” Owen corrected her, reaching for his hat. “I returned from war with a most unfortunate tendency to value substance over display.”
Her silence at that was not consent, only fury too restrained to speak at once.
He bowed slightly, more from old habit than present inclination. “Good morning, Mother.”
“Owen.”
He paused, though he did not turn back.
