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“Nothing,” he said. “My father had plans to rebuild, but he … never did.”

A moment passed. She gentled her grip. It was not indifference she heard in that clipped tone, but loss.

She let go of his wrist. He snipped the second button free and then the last and stepped back to look at his handiwork. It was over. She could breathe.

“Finished?” she asked. She held the little sack open to collect the buttons.

“Wait,” he said. “I can take a button from each of the sleeves, and then …” He reached out and lifted one of her lapels. “These must go.”

“What?” She tried to step back, but his grip on her collar held her in place, as if she were some rule-breaking schoolboy about to have his ears boxed.

“You are going to thank me for this. Lift your chin up and hold still.” He went to work with the scissors again, cutting away the two triangles of cloth that made the lapels, and snipping the decorative buttons from her sleeves. The bulky garment felt lighter. The collar made a deep V from her shoulders to her breastbone. The new neckline was not immodest. It was only that the sea air against her skin made her feel exposed. He offered her the pile of cloth remnants.

She stuffed them into the little sack, glad to be doing something, not looking at him. When she raised her eyes, he pulled off the dark-blue jumper.

“Ready to try the new arrangement?” he asked. He wore the boyish expression she sometimes saw in him. He wanted her approval. It would be churlish of her not to give it.

“One minute.” She put aside the sack, stuffed her hair into the wool cap, and looked at the sea. The water was a glassy pale green, shot through with the sun’s first rays. The tide was at ebb. “With this tide,” she said, “I usually swim east toward Mudeford.”

“East it is,” he said. He strode down the path, wheeling his arms, as she’d seen him do before, his shoulders gleaming smooth as marble in the light. Cordelia followed.

As soon as she took her first strokes, she felt the difference that Graymont’s alterations made. Her arms moved more freely. There were fewer points of resistance with each glide. She had been proud to contrive a swim costume out of her brother’s discarded boyhood suit, but she had stopped there, content with inconvenience, stubbornly sticking to her routine.

Accepting Graymont’s improvements was lowering to her pride, but she had no doubt that she would overcome the feeling. The more disturbing sensation was the awareness that she had permitted intimacies between them because of a wager, of all things. She should see him as an enemy to be fought, as Viola did. Instead, there was a sort of sparring between them, as between adversaries. The danger in a contest with an adversary was that one tried to know the other’s mind, to anticipate the other’s thought. One appreciated an adversary’s cleverness, and there was a pleasure in meeting an adversary’s challenge. It sharpened one’s own mind.

But she must not enjoy her encounters with him. Such enjoyment could only be justified if she persuaded him to allow the ball. Today. If her sisters could not send their invitations today, the ball would never happen. She had a mad desire to outswim him.

The sea was as she liked it best—still cold, not yet warmed by the summer sun, but calm and clear, light glinting off the ripples she set in motion. They fell almost at once into a steady rhythm. He appeared content to match her pace. In an easy time, they reached the tree that marked her turning point and began their return, with the tide. It was her moment. If she meant to beat him to the shore, she would have to swim hard and fast. He thought he was in control. He’d won their wager. He was in possession of their home. What satisfaction it would be to show him that she did not dance to his tune!

“Better?” His voice came on a gust of air from close beside her.

“Yes,” she admitted, treading water. “Thank you. I will keep the changes when you’re gone.”

He laughed. “A pointed reminder, Miss Staveley? You’ll not be rid of me so soon.” And he passed her with an effortless burst of speed.

She followed, reaching the shallows as he strode onto the beach. She took off her cap, shaking her head. “You said a month, did you not? Through the auction of our possessions.”

“It suits me to stay longer, for your ball.”

“Our canceled ball?” She held her breath.

“Are your invitations ready?” He went up the path to the place where they’d left their things, not waiting for her reply, and picked up his towel. “Best to send them today,” he called down to her. He toweled off his head and torso.

“I beg your pardon.” She crossed the sand and trudged up the slope. “You’re not playing some game with me, are you?”

“No game. Call me magnanimous. You may have your ball. The courtyard is yours. Let Winter know what you need. He’ll arrange everything.” He pulled the dark jumper over his head, slid his arms into it, turned his back on her, and started up the trail.

Cordelia watched him go. They would have their ball. She did not understand him, but clearly, she had nothing to fear from their strange intimacy. Their shared time was over. He was indifferent to her, except as a means to whatever he wished to do with Delamere. She shivered, picked up the coverlet, and drew it around her. She collected the little sack of remnants and scissors, a memento of sorts. She had news to share with her sisters.

Chapter Seventeen

As Cordelia passed through the lodge’s small garden, a rabbit stilled among the new lettuces, sitting on its hind legs, its ears straight up, body frozen. At the kitchen door she paused to slip the coverlet off her shoulders. When she opened the door, Hector burst out, barreling past her. The rabbit exploded into the field beyond the garden, and Hector dashed after it.

She concluded that Henry must have skipped the dog’s morning ramble, but there was no need to worry about Hector. He was both unlikely to catch the rabbit and sure to return wet and muddy later.

She slipped through the kitchen to the scullery and hurried through her usual routine of removing her swim costume, rinsing it, and hanging it to dry. Again, the changes Graymont made struck her. She saw, too, how she might further improve the garment. She put aside the sack with the remnants and the scissors. She would have to hem the ragged edges where he had snipped off the lapels.

She did not understand Graymont, one minute smiling and laughing, almost like a friend, and the next, cold and abrupt. He had been pleased with his handiwork, and she admitted, however reluctantly, that his changes were to her advantage. For a few moments as they swam, there had seemed to be an accord between them. Then he’d announced that she and her sisters could have their ball and stalked off up the beach. She knew only that she had to act while his offer of using the courtyard stood. She tied her wrapper around herself and went to wake her sisters. Invitations to the ball must be sent.