Dan set off for Brighton the next morning and as a footman carried his valise to the waiting carriage his butler, Godlington, came up to him and said, ‘We trust all is well with you, my lord?’
Godlington had been with the family for decades. Like many of the staff here, he would still remember the night when the Countess had left, and Dan had not forgotten the various acts of kindness the servants had shown to the two abandoned young boys, not least those boxing lessons from a young footman.
He thought of the staff at his Brighton house, and how casually, rudely, even his former guests had treated them.My God,he said to himself,I certainly have plenty to be ashamed of.
He said to the butler, ‘Everything is fine, Godlington. My plans have changed, that’s all. I must thank you for keeping the household in such good order in my absence.’
‘It is our pleasure, my lord,’ said Godlington, which Dan considered was truly more than he deserved.
The journey to Brighton was swift, since the weather was clement and the roads were clear. He reached his house a little after four, and Oliver came out to meet him. Dan said, ‘Greetings, brother. There’s no need to glare at me like that. I had business to attend to.’
‘Business? Or Cecily?’
Now, how the hell did Oliver know that? Dan wanted to ask, but as it turned out Oliver was already giving him the answer.
‘The town is buzzing,’ his brother said, ‘with the rumour that you went to London to patch things up with Cecily. Is it true?’
Damn.Damn.‘No. It’s not true! I’ve been to see her, yes, but a reconciliation? Never. How the hell has this rumour started?’
‘You received a letter from her, didn’t you? Maybe the servants talked. If you want their loyalty, Dan, you need to treat them with a little more consideration.’
‘I’ve come to that conclusion myself,’ said Dan bitterly. ‘So, people are suspecting that I’m back with Cecily?’
‘That’s what they’re saying, and of course many are taking great delight in spreading the news around town. GeorgeMelling has been particularly persistent. I’ve heard that he called earlier on Miss Summerby.’
For a moment Dan could not speak. That rogue had been to see Kate?
Without stopping even to change out of his travelling clothes, Dan ordered his horse to be saddled and rode to Clematis Villa. Harriet answered the door, but she looked hesitant when she saw him. In fact, she almost looked as if she wished to shut the door in his face.
He said, ‘Is Miss Summerby at home?’
Harriet shook her head. ‘No, my lord. She’s gone down to the little beach she loves.’
‘Which one is that?’
‘It’s beyond the bathing cabins, on the way to the cliffs. She likes it because hardly anyone goes there and…’
Dan didn’t stop to hear any more. He remounted Domino to ride downhill and through the town, experiencing anger with Cecily, anger with that bastard Melling, but most of all anger with himself. He pulled up his horse when he reached the eastern shore and saw her near the water’s edge. She hadn’t seen him yet, but was examining something in her hand: a shell, he guessed.
She wore a yellow spencer over a frock of rose-sprigged muslin. Her wide-brimmed straw hat was adorned with yellow ribbons which fluttered in the breeze, and he guessed that the image of her standing there, so natural and unaffected, was engraving itself in his heart.
She was bending now to replace the shell amongst the pebbles, maybe so someone else could delight in it. Then she wandered on along the beach, seemingly unselfconscious of the slight irregularity of her gait. He remembered the old jibe—the debutante who couldn’t dance—and he felt a fresh surge of emotion. Quite what it was he couldn’t say, but if he was honestwith himself, the emotion had been lurking for some time now. It healed his bitter soul to witness her unaffected pleasure in the beauty of a single shell. It made him long to see her happy, always…
Always?
He looped his horse’s reins over a nearby railing and murmured, ‘Stay, Domino.’ Then he walked down to the beach and overtook her. ‘Hello.’
If she was surprised, she hid it well. ‘Hello yourself.’ She swept a stray lock of hair away from her forehead. ‘I didn’t expect you back from London so quickly. In fact, I wondered if you’d absconded for good.’
She said it lightly but he thought he heard uncertainty in her voice, as if she was unsure of what his arrival meant. He said, ‘Do you mind if I walk with you for a while? That is, if you’re not in a hurry?’
‘No hurry at all, my lord. As you’ve seen, I was just enjoying the sea air.’
Dan,he wanted to say.My name is Dan.
She had started slowly walking back towards the main beach, where the bathing cabins were lined up in gaudy rows and horses were waiting to pull bathers into the sea for their salt water cures. But he put his hand on her arm then pointed in the opposite direction. ‘Perhaps we should go the other way,’ he said. ‘Where it’s less busy.’
She nodded. ‘Whatever you wish.’
