Page 76 of Lord Hartwell’s Refuge

Tamsin looked toward her little brother, just outside the doorway, and raised her voice. “You told Charles about your school idea?”

Henry, crouched beside Apollo in an attempt to wrestle the ball from his slobbery mouth, shrugged. “He asked me how I was getting on. So I told him, and he actually listened.”

Charles gave the smallest shrug, evidently finding nothing remarkable in asking a child why he wanted to leave home.

Perhaps there wasn’t. But it was quite out of character for her older brother to take an interest in the Mayweather household affairs. He was always so silent when the family discussed anything bordering on the unpleasant, if he did not slip away entirely.

The thought of him paying enough attention to ask Henry anything about the boy’s state surprised her enough she had to clarify. “Did you ask him why he wanted to go?”

“Of course I did.” Charles’s brows drew together. “If a child wants to leave home, especially a boy of Henry’s good sense, there must be a reason, mustn’t there?” He nodded at Henry. “Do you want to tell her?”

Henry finally succeeded in pulling the ball from Apollo’s mouth and avoided looking at them both. “I want to go to school.”

“Yes, darling, we know that.” Tamsin kept her voice gentle. “What I do not know is why you wish to go now.”

Henry frowned at the ball. “Edward goes.”

“Yes, he does.” Edward was also thirteen years old, but her brother knew that.

The boy tossed the ball again. “He says he likes it.”

Was that all? Why was Henry being as evasive as everyone else of late? Why could no one simply explain themselves? Tamsin kept herself from sounding frustrated. Barely. “Yes, I know. But Henry⁠—”

The boy spoke quickly, “He has friends there.” He knelt to get the ball again, though he wiped his hand on his trousers after picking it up. “People to play with. And they do things besides classes, too.”

Charles gave her a smirk, plainly expecting her to understand his point.

Tamsin ignored him. It could not be so simple as that, surely. “What sorts of things?”

Henry shrugged. “Things.”

That brought a chuckle from Charles. “An extremely compelling argument. Go on, Henry. Give us the list.”

The boy frowned. “I don’t know all the things they do at school. He tells George about them, when he comes home. Cricket and races and games that happen in the dormitory.”

Was it simply a matter of Henry needing more to keep himself busy? That was not at all what she expected, and it still did not seem quite right. Tamsin did not need Charles’s raise of eyebrows to prompt more gentle probing. “And you would like to do those things too?”

“Yes.” He scratched Apollo behind the ears as the dog dropped the ball at his feet again.

Honestly, it was more difficult than pulling the most stubborn of weeds. The roots of Henry’s desire to leave home were more tangled than he let on. “Is that the only reason?”

Henry’s fingers tightened around the ball while Tamsin waited. He looked toward the garden, then at Charles, then at his sister again. “Daisy and George don’t let me play with them.”

Ah. There it was. Tamsin’s heart sank. It had been a rather persistent problem of the last few months. “Oh. I thought they were doing better at that.”

“Sometimes.” Henry shrugged. “But not often. Not most of the time. They have their own games. They say three is too many, because they have to tell me what to do. I’m…I’m not good at their games.”

The twins were rather prone to forget Henry craved to join their play. Daisy and George had entered the world together and seemed determined to continue through it in much the same fashion. Even when other children joined them, they remained a unit unto themselves.

And that would pose its own set of problems, in time…

“And when they have friends at the house,” Henry continued, “the twins don’t want me there because I’m too little.”

That made Tamsin huff. “You are not much younger than they are, only two years apart.”

“They say almost-eight isn’t the same as already ten.”

Charles shifted in his chair, bringing Tamsin’s attention back to him. He gave a slight nod. So that much, at least, he had already heard.