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Three
The driver brought the carriage even with the pillared entrance and stopped. Kenver opened the carriage door, jumped down, and offered his hand. Sarah slowly alighted, her eyes on the ranks of uncommunicative windows. They seemed like lidded eyes that might open at any moment to condemn her.
Poldene’s heavy front door swung open without any visible hand. Then three huge dogs lunged through and loped toward them.
Kenver stepped in front of her. “They won’t hurt you,” he said. “Don’t run away though. They’ll chase you.”
As if she would. Sarah moved to his side and waited for the dogs to reach her. They raced up, bumped against their legs, and capered around in circles. They didn’t jump on her, which was fortunate since their russet-furred shoulders were at the level of Sarah’s hip. They could easily have knocked her over. The larger male probably outweighed her. “Friend,” said Kenver in a commanding voice. “Friend.”
The dogs seemed to recognize the word. They crouched playfully, tails wagging.
“Hello,” Sarah said, holding out her hand to be sniffed. She loved dogs, and these were magnificent. “How beautiful you are.” When they had satisfied themselves as to her scent, she set a hand on one’s shaggy, crimped fur. A few tendrils stood up straight on top of their heads and some fell over their eyes, giving them a jaunty look despite their size. “Are they deerhounds?” she asked, stroking the big animal.
“Yes,” Kenver replied, looking at her with raised brows. “Most people are frightened of them at first.”
“But they’re perfectly behaved. What are their names?”
“Fingal, Ranger, and Tess,” replied a cool, dry masculine voice above her.
Sarah raised her eyes to find a man and woman standing at the top of the three steps that led up to Poldene. They seemed very tall, but that might be the angle. Sarah had thought she was reconciled to being loomed over. At her height, it happened quite often. But their expressions added to the feeling—unsmiling, superior. They must be Kenver’s parents, the earl and countess, Peter and Alice Pendrennon. Sarah could see some resemblance to her new husband. Kenver had their dark hair and slender frame. He’d inherited his father’s square jaw and his mother’s hazel eyes. She’d never seen him look so stern, however.
The Pendrennons appeared to be older than Sarah’s parents—perhaps in their midfifties. Their hair showed touches of gray. The earl was spare; he didn’t seem to have an ounce of extra flesh anywhere on his frame, and his cheekbones were sharp as blades. He looked like a disgruntled hawk. His wife was more solidly built, in straight lines, not curves. No one, taking in their closed expressions, would have imagined that they were pleased to see Sarah.
“There was no need to send the dogs out,” said Kenver.
“They are a good test of character,” replied his father.
The female dog—Tess, it must be—licked Sarah’s hand, so she assumed she’d passed. That brought no sign of thawing in Kenver’s parents’ faces, however. “I suppose Fingal is the older one,” she said. It was the first thing that came into her head.
“How did you guess that?” asked Lord Trestan.
She’d surprised him. That was something anyway. Whether good or bad, Sarah couldn’t tell. “It’s a different sort of name, perhaps for a progenitor.”
“Progenitor,” murmured Kenver’s mother. The word seemed to have offended her even further.
“Shall we go in?” her son asked.
The earl and countess turned and walked away from them. Kenver went up the steps, the dogs at his heels. Sarah followed, passing through a small vestibule into a lofty chamber with a huge fireplace at one end and an oaken stair at the other. Darkness pooled in the corners of the high ceiling. Kenver performed the official introductions. His mother visibly winced at the wordsmy wife.
There was no invitation to a more comfortable room. This one was clearly an ancient showpiece, not a place one sat to get acquainted. They stood in an uneasy group on the flagstone floor while Sarah’s spirits sank lower and lower. Why hadn’t Kenver told her that his parents weren’t happy about their marriage? He hadn’t dropped a single hint. She glanced at him. He looked stiff and rather…blank.
Lady Trestan’s eyes bored into Sarah. Sarah couldn’t help but think she was searching for flaws. And finding them.
“Your father has some land down toward Padstow, I understand,” said Kenver’s father. He made it sound like a few paltry fields.
“Yes.”
“Has he been there long?” Lord Trestan asked with languid disdain.
Did he imagine they were parvenus? Sarah rallied in defense of her father. “All his life,” she replied. “My family has lived there for more than five hundred years.” It hadn’t been an estate for all that time. Indeed the holding had probably started out as some sort of hovel. But she didn’t see any need to mention that.
“Indeed?” The earl’s dark eyebrows could not have gone any higher. “I would have thought the name was Irish.”
“It is derived from the Anglo-Saxonmor ende,” Sarah said. A forebear of hers had traced their bloodline. His findings might even be accurate. “Later corrupted to the Irish usage,” she added.
The earl looked nonplussed. Sarah felt a thread of triumph, which died a quick death as she wondered if it would have been better not to answer back. But he’d hit at her father. She couldn’t just ignore that. She waited for Kenver to say something. He did not.
“Is your mother’s family also so…venerable?” asked the countess. Her tone was cold.
