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There was the smile. She was glad of his company. Daniel smiled back.
A footman appeared as they were about to enter the estate offices. “Callers for you, my lord.”
The look on the young man’s face told Daniel that these were the visitors he’d been dreading. He had left instructions about them. “I’ll see who it is.”
Penelope turned. “If we have visitors, I should come.”
“They seem to want me.”
“I want to be a good hostess to the neighborhood.”
“I’ll send word if you’re needed.”
With a nod, she went on. Daniel closed the door of the estate office behind her and turned to the footman. “Is it the two men I told you about?”
“Yes, my lord. I put them in the front parlor as you ordered.”
This was the least welcoming of Frithgerd’s reception rooms, right off the front door. “Good. Now you may go and tell them that no one is available to receive them. Take Joseph with you. They won’t be pleased.”
“I can handle them, my lord.”
“I don’t doubt you, Ned, but it will be better to have two large footmen ready to show them out.”
“Yes, my lord.”
“Their horses were left outside?”
“No one took them to the stables.”
“Very good.” Daniel let the footman go, then slipped upstairs to watch from a window. He kept well out of sight behind the draperies.
A few minutes later, the two Foreign Office men appeared in the drive. They were obviously annoyed, particularly the blond one with the side-whiskers, who was gesticulating angrily. His companion tried to calm him, but he turned and stared up at the house. Though he knew he was invisible in the shadows, Daniel felt an urge to step back in the face of the fellow’s glare. He resisted, and after a moment, the two men mounted up and rode away.
Penelope sat at the desk in the estate office with a pile of papers before her. She was looking into space rather than at the records, however. She’d suspected the identity of the visitors from Daniel’s manner and a sidelong glance. And of course she’d known they’d come. Men like her interrogator didn’t give up. She felt a little guilty leaving them to Daniel, but she didn’t want to see them. After all, they were here about the notebooks, not her.Not her, she repeated silently. It was time to put those fears behind her. Still, she couldn’t concentrate until Daniel came back, after a surprisingly short time. Perhaps she was wrong about the callers, Penelope thought. “Who was it?”
“No one important.”
Should she ask, or not? “I thought it might be those men from the Foreign Office.”
Daniel looked at her as if he was unsure what to say.
“I prefer the truth to protection,” Penelope added. The latter was an illusion. And reality was worse than ever when it was torn away.
“They called, but I didn’t see them. I turned them away.”
“That will only make them more determined.” Such people relished breaking down resistance. They preferred a battle and acted as if every word was a stratagem. Penelope had decided, after weeks of bewilderment, that this made them feel useful.
Daniel sat down beside her. “Don’t worry. I will see to this.”
Appreciating the sentiment, even if she couldn’t quite believe in it, Penelope smiled at him.
“What are we looking at today?” He picked up a document and ran his eyes down it.
“The top layer from trunk number two. Mostly tradesmen’s bills so far.”
“Good God, this one is dated 1693. Are they all so ancient?”
“These are. What is it for?” She leaned over to look. “A tester bed with carved posts and an embroidered tapestry canopy. Very grand. There are others for expensive furniture. And yards of cloth. I think one of your ancestors was redecorating.”
