Page 55 of The Muse of Maiden Lane

“I’ve missed you, too,” she said. “But I’m back now. I shan’t leave you again for a long while. Not if I can help it.”

Turvey emerged from the feed room with a bucket of mash. An unflappable older man with a shock of white hair, he’d been Locket’s groom since Stella had purchased her, and could be relied on to remain steady when the temperamental mare was at her worst.

“Welcome home, miss,” he said.

“I’m happy to be home, Turvey. How has she been keeping? Not giving you too much trouble, I hope.”

“She’s much herself.” Turvey let himself into the loosebox. He set down the bucket in the corner. Locket wasted no time in abandoning Stella in favor of the hot mash.

“She looks in fine trim.”

“Aye. She’s eating well enough, though there’s been less sugar in her diet with you away.”

Stella smiled. “I shall soon remedy that.”

Locket loved lumps of sugar. Stella kept them in the pocket of her habit so she could give them to the mare while she was on her back as a reward for good behavior. Locket was adept at bending her neck to retrieve them from Stella’s outstretched hand.

“She was off a hair on her left front Christmas morning,” Turvey said, exiting the loosebox.

“Was she?” Stella eyed her mare with concern. Locket sometimes strained her legs after indiscriminate running and jumping in her paddock. Stella was accustomed to treating such strains herself, massaging the mare’s legs and rubbing them down with liniment. “Did you—?”

“Aye,” Turvey said, answering the question before she’d asked it. “I rubbed her legs down morning and evening. She was well recovered by the next day.”

“I’ll rub them down again before I retire,” Stella said. “Just as a precaution.”

With one last fond glance at her mare, and a few final words with Turvey, Stella took her leave.

Their housekeeper, Mrs. Waltham, awaited her at the front door of the vicarage. “Your brother has been asking after you every five minutes. I told him you’d have gone to the stable first.”

Stella divested herself of her bonnet and cloak. She handed them to the housekeeper along with her gloves. “Is he in his book room?”

“Yes, miss.”

“And Lady Arundell’s manservant? I trust he found his way to the kitchen.”

“Cook has given him tea and biscuits, and the squire’s coachman has promised to run him back to Fairhook directly after he’s refreshed himself.” Mrs. Waltham followed Stella down the hall. “Shall I bring a pot of tea in for you, miss? And some bread and butter?”

“That would be lovely,” Stella said. She smoothed her wool traveling dress before going to her brother.

The book room was Daniel’s private domain. He spent hours inside alone, working on his treatise. Stella had often assisted him there, head bent over the small secretary desk in the corner, silently transcribing his dour words on the subject of original sin as he pontificated from in front of the fire.

He was there now, seated in his favorite armchair, in the half circle of dwindling firelight. A threadbare banyan worn over his plain shirt and trousers was his only concession to comfort.

Stella quietly entered, shutting the door softly behind her.

Daniel glanced up from his book with a perturbed frown. With his prematurely balding pate and his severe expression, he bore no resemblance to Stella, except for a slight similarity about the eyes. In every other respect, they differed. Where her hair was gray, Daniel’s was brown. Where her lips were soft, his were thin. And where her figure was robust from exercise, his was hollow from self-imposed deprivation.

He looked far older than his thirty years. Stella blamed herself. He’d had the charge of her from too young an age. It was a burden he hadn’t wanted. One that had served to alter both his appearance and his disposition.

“I expected you this afternoon,” he said, rising.

“I sent you a wire.” She crossed the room to press a swift kiss to his cheek in greeting. “You must have received it, else Squire Smalljoy’s carriage wouldn’t have been waiting for me at the station.”

“The squire was generous enough to offer it.”

“You shouldn’t have accepted. I don’t wish to be under an obligation to the man.”

“Why shouldn’t I accept? Squire Smalljoy is a decent, God-fearing gentleman. If he professes an interest in you, I won’t discourage him.”