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He shook his head. The cruelest cut of all would be to leave matters between them unresolved—cruel to them both. He could not offer to be her friend, not now.
“Good day, my lady, and my thanks for your many kindnesses.”
She looked up the path, which led around the walled garden and onto the portico off the estate office. She looked down the path, where the last of the mist was drifting away from the fields and pastures.
Then she turned without another word and walked away. Nathaniel ducked back into the garden and stood alone until long after her footsteps had faded.
“Well, here I am,” Mrs. Millicent McCormack said, bustling into Althea’s informal parlor with a workbasket over her arm, “and I don’t mind telling you, my lady, I was relieved to get your letter.”
Althea had summoned her companion home, but she hadn’t expected her back quite so soon. “Relieved, Milly?” She remained seated at her desk, Milly having established early in their relationship that they needn’t stand on ceremony.
Millicent McCormack was that perennial social conundrum, the wellborn widow fallen on hard times. Althea had met her at a meeting of the York Charitable Association, liked her humor and candor, and liked even more that a woman with limited means would still try to better the lot of others. Althea had offered Milly a post as her paid companion and had never had cause to regret that decision.
“Sister is a dear,” Milly said, settling on the cushions with as much grace as a heifer flopping into fresh straw, “but she’s set in her ways. Every other word out of her mouth is ‘When Harold was alive…’ or ‘Harold used to say.’ Harold was my brother-in-law for nearly twenty-five years. I well recall his opinions and pronouncements, though he wasn’t a bad sort. How have you been keeping?”
Difficult question. Since leaving Rothhaven outside his walled garden three mornings ago, Althea had been unable to focus on much of anything.
Except his kiss. The sheer fire and sweetness of Rothhaven’s kiss had haunted her waking and sleeping imagination. She’d sensed hidden depths in him, and a moment in his arms had attested to hiddenuniverses. He was passionate, tender, subtle, bold…
And he was determined to remain beyond her reach.
“I am well, thank you,” Althea said, marveling at how smoothly the lie came out, “and I am happy to report that we are to dine with Lady Phoebe Philpot on Thursday.”
Millicent was past fifty and had been widowed nearly ten years ago. She dressed in quarter-mourning, as Rothhaven had called it, and sat with the wallflowers and dowagers at any gathering. She was pretty in a plump, genial way, and as the daughter of a baronet, she was acquainted with good society in all its tedium.
“Lady Phoebe is having us to snack on,” Milly said, threading her needle with red silk. “She must have run out of gossip now that the truly prominent families have flown south. She’ll want to know why you didn’t go to London this spring.”
Whether from experience or native wit, Milly had a sense of strategy that Althea lacked. Such a question from Lady Phoebe, for example, would have caught Althea unaware.
“If she asks, I will reply that I expect to follow my sister south.…” Well, no. Althea did not expect to follow Constance south. Possibly not ever again. “London has quite honestly grown tiresome.”
Milly took up an embroidery hoop that held a pillowcase. “You’dsaythat to her?”
How would Rothhaven reply to such a rude inquiry? “I will ignore the question. Why doesn’tshego south to London each year?”
Milly stabbed the linen with her needle. “My guess is, she lacks the connections. Her husband is a wealthy solicitor, but only a solicitor. He must work for his bread, and some say his methods are not always above reproach. What will you wear?”
That was easy. “The blue velvet with my pearl choker and opal earrings. Ivory gloves, my peacock shawl, and the fan that matches it.”
“Not the sapphires? The sapphires are exquisite, my lady.”
“If I wear the sapphires, Lady Phoebe will intimate that I’m trying to outshine my neighbors and that I have no taste.”
Milly held up her hoop, which was abloom with bright red roses and satiny green foliage. “I hadn’t considered that. Excellent point. The sapphires are a bit much for rural Yorkshire. Any news from your family?”
“None—yet.”
Althea had sorted each day’s post with a mixture of dread and hope. Nobody had written to scold her for hiding away in the north, and nobody had applauded that decision either. Perhaps Constance had led the family to believe Althea would journey south later in the year.
Constance was an adept liar, when needs must, and even more skilled at serving up difficult truths. “What would you think of having some of our neighbors to dine at Lynley Vale, Milly?”
Milly’s needle paused. “That’s starting small, never a bad idea, but you might be criticized by those not invited to your first entertainment.”
“What if I hired the assembly rooms in the village?”
“The local folk have their four assemblies a year, my lady. What would you hire the assembly rooms for?”
“I am the ranking hostess in the parish. I have an obligation to socialize.” The words didn’t feel as outlandish as they might have a fortnight ago. Besides, how was a woman to meet eligible parties if she never entertained? Titles might not litter northern shires in abundance, but Yorkshire had its share of venerable lineages and substantial fortunes.
