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Tom snorted. “Don’t go matchmaking for me, my lord.”
Arthur raised his eyebrows.
“It’s all very well to look sideways, but I’ve watched you at work, haven’t I? Getting your nephew leg-shackled.”
“That was all his idea.”
“Was it now?”
Arthur laughed. “Mostly. But I had no such idea about you and Kitty. Why, you’re barely fifteen.”
Tom nodded. “Long as we’re clear on that, I don’t mind. It’s odd, this legacy, ain’t it? Folks usually know why they’re left things.”
“They do.”
“I might go on over there now.”
“A splendid idea.”
Tom veered off, and Arthur continued his stroll. When he saw a curricle pull into the stable yard, he walked in that direction and observed the return of his host. Whitfield looked disgruntled.
Daniel made no remark when his houseguest fell into step with him as he headed for the house. “So you took Miss Pendleton some dogs?” Macklin said. His tone was bland.
“How did you know that?”
“Someone in the household told my valet,” the earl replied.
“Have they no better things to talk about?”
“Our dependents are interested in everything we do. For the goats, was it? Tom thought so.”
“The goats, yes,” Daniel said.
“And general protection, I suppose. For an unmarried young lady, living alone.”
He might as well have said that Daniel should take care about visiting her. Daniel fought down a spurt of anger. He’d heard bits of the gossip about Miss Pendleton. One neighbor had asked him smiling questions that had verged on the offensive. For her sake, he shouldn’t go walking alone with her. So he was to be deprived of that pleasure, as well as all else. Daniel frowned, wondering where that thought had come from.
“Have you found any earlier records about Rose Cottage?” the earl asked. “You were going to look.”
“I tried, but Frithgerd’s records are a jumble, to put it charitably. We appear to have no filing system beyond shoving estate documents into whatever cubbyhole is nearest to hand at the time.” Daniel’s anger, finding a convenient target, expanded to fill his chest. “I can’t answer half the questions I’m asked, because I can’t find the information I need. So, no, nothing about Rose Cottage.” Not to mention the fact that his father had never told him anything or lifted a finger to keep the place in order. “There are only so many hours in the day when I can be reading and sorting.” Without going stark mad from frustration and boredom, he thought. As they entered the house, Daniel turned toward the estate office. The weight of the task descended on him. “I should get back to it.”
“It sounds as if you need help.”
Did Macklin intend to offer his services? Daniel couldn’t imagine the earl delving into Frithgerd’s papers. It would be like having the Chancellor of the Exchequer overseeing his efforts. “I need a new estate agent. No one informed me when the last one left.”
“I could ask among my friends, if you like, see if anyone might be able to recommend a good agent.”
“Yes, all right.” He needed to get hold of himself, Daniel thought. “Thank you.”
“I’m happy to help.”
The earl’s benign tone and expression roused echoes of the dinner he’d arranged in London in the spring and the sympathetic talk that had unexpectedly followed. The occasion stood out in Daniel’s memory as one of the exceedingly rare times when people had spoken to each other with naked sincerity. He still didn’t understand how Macklin had managed that.
“It’s so very pleasant here,” Macklin went on. “I do wonder that your parents were forever leaving home.”
Those last three words shook Daniel like a sudden loss of footing. He found himself asking, “Do you have any idea why they traveled all the time?”
“Not specifically.”
