“Miss Anwen suggested I might prevail upon you for some assistance.” Colin liked how that had come out. Not a question, not a demand. A statement. He liked the look of Lord Rosecroft’s stable too, tidy and utilitarian. Horses contentedly munched hay in their loose boxes, a cat napped in a heap of straw at the end of the aisle.
No piles of horse droppings left about to draw flies, but no engraved brass name plates on the stall doors either.
The rhythm of Rosecroft’s currycomb on the gelding’s quarters was the steady, unhurried touch of a man who knew his way around the equine.
“You are granted permission to court a woman one day, and you’re importuning her cousins for favors the next? Fast work, MacHugh.”
After the encounter with Anwen the day before yesterday, Colin had wasted no time scheduling an interview with Moreland. The discussion had been brief, jovial on Moreland’s part, and terrifying as hell for Colin. Moreland had cheerfully promised to call him out if he broke Anwen’s heart.
The duke had not been jesting.
“I had a private interview with His Grace yesterday, and Anwen’s personal business is being discussed by her cousin in the mews today?”
Rosecroft paused in his currying and banged the brush against the sole of his boot. Horse hair, dander, and dust cascaded to the raked floor of the stable.
“What sort of assistance do you seek, MacHugh? I refuse to come within fifty yards of that orphanage. By June, my womenfolk and I are for Yorkshire.”
Tactical retreat, both in the conversation and the travel. Rosecroft’s reputation in the army had been effective prosecution of any task he’d been given. He’d delivered orders against long odds, fought ferociously and often, and had been well liked by his subordinates.
He’d also been more than fair to Hamish when Colin’s brother had been courting Miss Megan.
“I need ponies,” Colin said. “Four healthy, sane, well-trained ponies who will mind their manners in traffic and for outings in the park.”
Rosecroft kept a hand on the horse’s quarters and walked around to the beast’s other side. “You’ll look damned silly on a pony, MacHugh.”
“As would you. The ponies aren’t for me, they’re for the orphanage.”
Rosecroft leaned over the horse, one arm draped across the animal’s croup, the other across the withers.
“You love her, don’t you?” The question was rendered with sympathy rather than menace.
“Hamish warned me that the Windhams are very much in each other’s pockets.” Colin prevaricated not only because his sentiments toward Anwen were private, but also because they were hard to describe.
Complicated, which was unnerving.
“If you don’t love Anwen, you’re an idiot,” Rosecroft said as the horse cocked a hip and sighed. “Because if she wants you for a husband, you’re as good as married, MacHugh. I don’t care if your brother is a duke and your mother plays whist with the archangel Gabriel. Anwen deserves to be happy.”
“We are agreed on that priority. About the ponies.”
“Ponies are the equine equivalent of fairies,” Rosecroft said, giving the horse a scratch about the withers. “Not to be trusted, always busy about their own ends, and deceptively adorable. I much prefer horses when there’s a choice.”
The gelding was a big, raw-boned chestnut, its musculature not yet caught up to its size. For a young animal, it was calm and patient with the grooming routine, and its conformation promised smooth, ridable gaits.
“I’d put this fellow at about five,” Colin said. “Possibly six, if he was started late. Needs hill work to strengthen the quarters, which is hard to accomplish in London.”
“That is the bloody damned truth,” Rosecroft said. “I have plans for this one that will have to wait until summer. Until then, boredom is his greatest foe. What do you have planned for four ponies?”
Rosecroft wouldn’t deal well with boredom either.
“The orphanage has one pony to pull Cook’s trap when she goes to market, and a team for when Hitchings takes the coach about town, a pair of bays who are mostly idle. When they’re in the traces, they’re cross and Hitchings requires a coachman to harness them and drive them. Keeping those horses costs a small fortune, and around ill-tempered equines of that size, boys just learning to groom won’t be safe.”
If a pony stepped on a boy’s toes, the boy could shove the wee beast off. A coach horse might break the boy’s foot and still not be inclined to move away.
“Ponies bite,” Rosecroft said. “They kick, rear, strike.”
“And are more manageable than coach horses when they do. These boys have weathered London winters without shelter, lost their families, and endured hours of detention day after day. They need to learn useful activities through which to support themselves or they’ll revert to lives of crime and chaos when they weary of the orphanage’s rules.”
Rosecroft exchanged the curry for a soft brush and started at the top of the horse’s neck. “They need to be boys, but if the orphanage is in want of funds, why take on four more mouths to feed?”
And stalls to bed, feet to trim? Hitchings had asked the same question.
“We’ll get rid of the coach horses and the coach. The pony trap has a bonnet, and Hitchings can time his few errands for fair weather. The boys can learn to groom, maintain harness, hitch and unhitch, and even ride and drive while the House of Urchins saves money.”
The chestnut’s coat glowed as Rosecroft worked his way all over the horse. Rosecroft knew what he was doing too, knew where the horse was more sensitive, and where a firmer touch was in order.
“You’re daft, replacing a proper team with demon ponies,” Rosecroft said. “What will you do if the orphanage has to haul something substantial? Say, a lot of desks donated by a patron? A piano or two?”
“I’ll borrow a team from my brother’s London brewery,” Colin said. “I’ll prevail on MacHugh the publisher to lend me his team. MacHugh the saddle maker could probably oblige me as well, and MacHugh the fishmonger has a huge wagon, though it reeks of fish. You know what it costs to maintain a coaching team.”
“That I do,” Rosecroft said, taking a comb to the horse’s mane. “What about when the boys outgrow these ponies?”
“Then the boys will be old enough to start in some fine gent’s stables, and younger boys can take their places. If you’re not interested in helping, Anwen suggested Lord Westhaven can be relied upon—”
Rosecroft glowered across the horse’s neck. “Don’t be bothering his lordship. His youngest is teething. The man gets no peace, and I suspect he’s to be a papa again. Don’t tell him I said that. Your idea is unconventional.”
Rosecroft had the look of the duke about the chin and nose. He also had a green smear of horse slobber across his cravat.
“Adhering to convention has left the orphanage facing penury. The four oldest boys all slept in one bed last winter because it was the only way to keep warm. They heaped all their blankets together, dove under, and shivered until morning. They organized the smaller boys’ dormitory in the same fashion, else half the children would likely have perished of lung fever.”
Colin hated that the children had had to make shift for themselves, but he delighted in their ability to solve a serious problem on their own—and convention be damned.
“So you’ll give them ponies, the finest guilt offering any parent ever made. Four ponies, not just one or two. Heaven help you if your union with Anwen is fruitful. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
Did every Windham have this compulsion to argue? “Rosecroft, what are you doing?”
“Combing my horse’s mane. He likes it, and he’s a handsome lad when properly turned out, if a bit stiff to the right and lacking in courage.”
“You’re an earl in your own right. Your father is a duke, and here you are, your fingernails dirty, your boots in need of a serious shine. What are you doing?”
Every hair of the horse’s mane lay tidily against its neck. “I’m caring for my cattle.”
“Exactly. Even the son of an English duke is taught how to look after a horse, not because that boy will need employment someday, but because horsemanship builds character. Work in the stables also builds the physique, self-discipline, and organizational abilities.
“Ponies are a way for the orphanage to offer the boys all of that,” Colin went on, “while cutting costs. What’s unconventional is that I want those children to have access to at least one of the lessons considered indispensable for every gentleman’s son. Not Latin, not philosophy, not ancient history that they’ll never use, but simple horsemanship. Even an English earl ought to understand that much.”
“Half-English,” Rosecroft said, fishing a lump of carrot from his pocket. “My mother was an Irishwoman who had an irregular relationship with Moreland before he met his duchess.”
Colin knew that Rosecroft cared greatly for Anwen, that he admired her and wanted to protect her. When Colin had asked to court her, he hadn’t quite bargained on her bringing such a lot of family to the undertaking.
Hamish had married into the Windham family less than a month ago, and Colin was still not entirely sure where his brother had found the courage.
“Rosecroft, why would I give a pig’s fart about what Moreland got up to more than thirty years ago? You’re here, you’re part of Anwen’s family, and I need four good ponies.”
The earl unfasted the crossties on both sides of the horse’s headstall, and still the animal stood as if rooted.
“Glad to know Anwen is being courted by a man of sensible—though unconventional—priorities. If I catch you frequenting dark balconies with merry widows, though, you will learn the pleasure of flying headfirst into a bed of roses.”
“That must be the Irish half of you threatening violence, because I have it on good authority English gentlemen never stoop to acknowledging bad behavior.”
Rosecroft fed the horse another lump of carrot. “Good boy, Malcolm. Come along.”
Without Rosecroft touching the headstall, the horse followed as meekly as an elderly pug, straight into a stall at the end of the row. Rosecroft said a few more words to the horse, then slid the half door closed.
“You named your horse Malcolm?”
“My daughter names all the horses,” Rosecroft said. “Who told you English gentlemen don’t acknowledge bad behavior?”
“No less personage than Winthrop Montague assured me that if I remark ill usage by some of his associates, I’ll be considered ungentlemanly. The repercussions will be endless and severe.”
“What in the hell are you going on about?”
Hamish had said that of the three male cousins—Westhaven, Lord Valentine, and Rosecroft—Rosecroft was the one most sympathetic to an outsider. He was also the oldest of the ducal siblings, and Anwen liked him.
“I’ve been made the butt of a joke,” Colin said. “An expensive joke.”
He explained, and the retelling left him angry all over again. He’d arranged to borrow from Hamish’s brewery while funds were being transferred between Edinburgh and London because he wanted the debts paid in full immediately.
“I’m not to even the score,” he said, “but I can’t abide the notion that twenty years from now, these prancing ninnies will snicker into their port because Colin MacHugh was an easy mark. Then I tell myself, twenty years from now, I’ll have much better ways to occupy myself than with what a lot of overgrown English schoolboys think of me.”
He offered that bit of manly philosophizing while the barn cat stropped itself against his boots.
“Winthrop Montague is a philandering sot who can barely afford his tailor’s bills,” Rosecroft said. “Pay the trades, MacHugh. Not because you need Montague’s approval, but because he’s not worth your aggravation. You will join my brothers and me for cards on Tuesday, and let that be known among Montague’s little friends.”
Colin picked up the cat, a sleek tabby that had likely been the doom of many a mouse. “Montague fancies himself quite the arbiter of gentlemanly deportment, the heir apparent to Brummel.”
“The Beau is kicking his heels in Calais because he has no funds to go elsewhere. He’s a charity case. If Montague doesn’t marry very well and soon, he’ll end up likewise.”
Colin scratched the cat behind the ears. Hearing Rosecroft’s assessment of Win’s situation should have been unsettling rather than reassuring.
“You forgot to pick out the gelding’s hooves.” Even if a horse was put up without being groomed, a conscientious owner picked out the feet, lest a stone lodge against the sole and cause an abscess.
Rosecroft subsided onto a tack trunk. “I leave that to the lads, because nobody cares if they get dirt on their breeches. Montague is not your friend, MacHugh.”
Colin took the place beside him and let the cat go free. “I should tell you that Win Montague isn’t responsible for the behavior of a lot of drunken fools, and he means only to preserve me from more mischief.”
Except, Montague had been in on it, very likely an instigator, and he’d done nothing to monitor the situation or stop it, until Colin had been on the verge of calling somebody out.
Anwen had certainly been angry.
“A friend should have told you immediately what was afoot if he couldn’t prevent it,” Rosecroft countered. “I take it you will be in attendance at Anwen’s card party?”
The Windham family was like a Highland village. News traveled faster than pigeons, and in all directions at once.
And that was more unexpected reassurance.
“I am on the board of directors at the orphanage now, so yes. I’ll be in attendance at the card party, prepared to gracefully lose a decent sum. You?”
“Oh, of course. I can hardly contain my enthusiasm for hours of polite society pretending it gives a damn about the poor children it ignores starving in the streets.”
No wonder Rosecroft longed for his Yorkshire acres, if he was always plagued by such honesty.
“I can’t do anything for the whole of London’s poor,” Colin said, “but these children matter to Anwen. I’ll be at the damned card party.”
“You’re in love,” Rosecroft said, whacking him on the back. “If it’s a matter of first impression, sometimes a fellow isn’t sure. The proof is in the suffering. Wait until you’re reading Gulliver’s Travels to your children yet again, or forgoing the pleasures of the marriage bed because a thunderstorm descends in the same hour you find yourself private with your wife for the first time in a fortnight. Then there’s teething, and—”
“Rosecroft, are you daft?” Though if the earl was daft, he was cheerful with it.
“I am in love,” he said, rising. “Meet me at Tatts tomorrow at nine.”
Thank the winged cherubs. “It’s not a sale day.”
“Only dandiprats and nincompoops buy from Tatts exclusively on sale days. Those are the horses they want to get rid of. The very best stock never goes on the block. What have you heard from your brother the duke?”
Colin rose and dusted the cat hairs off his breeches. “Not much. He’s honeymooning with your cousin.”
“Marital bliss takes a toll on a fellow’s correspondence. You’ll never get that cat hair off your breeches.”
Colin flicked his lordship’s cravat. “You’re giving me fashion advice?”
Rosecroft peered at the green stain adorning his linen. “Malcolm’s still learning his manners. Join me for an ale, and I’ll tell you what I know about surviving a courtship. Takes strategy and stamina, but a man fixes his eye on the prize and endures. I suspect a woman does too.”
Colin could believe that. The other evening, he’d sent Anwen back to her sisters and locked the library door behind her, lest he go blind with thwarted desire. Five minutes later, he’d buttoned up, drained his flask, and rejoined the ladies in the parlor, though he’d taken care not to sit within six feet of Anwen.
Rosecroft was deep into an analysis of the benefits of a special license—and halfway through a tankard of very fine summer ale—when Colin realized that Rosecroft had been right.
Winthrop Montague was not Colin’s friend. Around Win, Colin had always felt subtly judged and wary of making a wrong move. Around Rosecroft, who shrugged at a stained cravat and admitted easily to being in love, Colin could relax.
His instincts had been trying to warn him that Win’s crowd wasn’t where he belonged. Why had he ignored his own instincts, and should he heed them when they prompted him to find some way to even the score?
* * *
Megan, Duchess of Murdoch, passed the whisky glass back to her husband without taking a drink.
“The scent is fruity,” she said, “in a good way. Oranges and limes, rather than lemons. An odd note of cedar too.” Her condition had made her palate and her nose extraordinarily sensitive, and her husband extraordinarily attentive.
She’d also become extraordinarily eager to reciprocate his attentiveness, even for a newlywed Windham.
“By God, you’re right,” Hamish muttered, taking a sip of the whisky. “I would have missed the cedar. Colin would have too.”
As the days since the wedding had turned into weeks, Hamish mentioned Colin more and more. The three youngest MacHugh brothers were off enjoying Edinburgh’s social season, but they’d never served in battle beside Hamish, hadn’t stood with him at the front of St. George’s, hadn’t been his second on the field of honor.
“Write to him,” Megan said. “Tell Colin you miss him, and that his business needs him.”
“Bloody correspondence,” Hamish muttered, setting the glass down. “I don’t suppose a wee note could hurt.” He took a seat at Megan’s escritoire, a delicate Louis Quinze item of fanciful inlays, tiny drawers, and shiny brass fittings.
Hamish should have made an incongruous picture seated there. He was tall, broad-shouldered, and far from handsome by London standards.
They weren’t in London, though. Megan and her spouse were lazing away a morning in her private parlor, which she’d chosen because it had both south- and east-facing windows. While London townhouses favored fleur-de-lis and gilt, Hamish’s Perthshire estate tended more to exposed beams, plaid wool, and comfort. This parlor, however, was Megan’s domain, and thus the wallpaper was flocked, the desk French, and the carpet a vivid red, gold, and blue Axminster.
The chair creaked as Hamish settled to his task. Megan took off her slippers, tucked her feet under her, and fought off a wave of drowsiness.
“Are you having a wee nap, Meggie mine?” Hamish asked sometime later.
She stretched and yawned, for indeed, she’d curled up on the sofa, and some considerate husband had draped his coat over her.
“Is this my second or third nap today?” Megan asked.
“Third, but it won’t be your last. May I read you this letter?”
Hamish read to her frequently. Her eyesight was poor, and he sought to spare her visual effort. Megan indulged him, mostly because she loved to hear his voice.
The note was chatty by Hamish’s standards, describing various weddings and birthings among the local gentry and tenants, and ending with a stern admonition to “mind the tailors don’t bankrupt you.”
“A very fraternal letter,” Megan said as Hamish sprinkled sand over the page. “Might I add a line or two?”
“I can write them for you, Meggie mine. Use wee words, though, for the sight of you asleep in the morning sun befuddles a mere Scottish duke. What would you like to say to our Colin?”
Very little befuddled Hamish MacHugh. “I had a letter from Anwen yesterday.”
Hamish stroked the goose quill with blunt fingers. Not a gentleman’s hands, but how Megan loved her husband’s touch.
“What did Anwen have to say?”
“She prosed on about her orphanage, which is in dire financial straits, and some card party that she hopes will rescue it. She mentioned that Colin has taken an interest in the orphanage.”
Hamish folded his arms. Without his coat, Megan could see his biceps bunching and flexing. Her next nap would be in the ducal bed and would involve her husband’s intimate company.
“Colin has about as much interest in orphans as I have in the quadrille, Meggie.”
“Anwen would have me believe Colin’s doing his gentlemanly bit for charity.”
Hamish rose and joined Megan on the sofa. He tucked a blanket over her lap and bare feet, which necessitated several near-caresses to her ankles.
“Colin does plenty for charity,” Hamish said, shrugging back into his coat, “though mostly he supports wounded veterans who reported to him. He can’t ignore a situation that needs fixing, which is why he served much of his time as an artificer. Tinkering with temperamental stills is apparently fine training for keeping an army in good repair.”
“My sister is not in want of repair.” Though Anwen was lonely, and as the youngest, she tended to be overlooked. Colin might notice that.
And Anwen had definitely noticed Colin.
“I think we should nudge Colin and Anwen in each other’s direction,” Megan said. “Encourage them.”
“Meddle, you mean? Are you trying to make a Windham duke of me, Meggie? Moreland is doubtless keeping watch. If there’s matchmaking to be done, he’s the fellow to do it.”
Hamish crossed to the desk and resumed writing without taking a seat.
“Are you warning Colin about Moreland’s tendency to matchmake?”
“I’m trying my hand at meddling. I’m a duke now, and mustn’t shirk my responsibilities.” He waved the paper gently and brought it to Megan along with one of her six pairs of spectacles.
At the bottom of the page Hamish had added a postscript. “Get your handsome arse home where you belong, and don’t forget to bring Ronnie and Eddie with you. If you’re not back by Mid-Summer’s Day, I’m tapping the ’01.”
“But I don’t want him hurrying home,” Megan said. “Anwen will never leave London if her orphans are imperiled, no matter how many times I invite her to visit.”
“Done a bit of meddling yourself, have you, Duchess?” Hamish removed her spectacles and tucked them into his pocket, for they were the spare pair he always carried for her. “I know my brother. If I order Colin home, he’ll remain in London out of sheer contrariness.”
Having been born a Windham, and having married a MacHugh, Megan had a fine appreciation for the contrary male.
“I suspect you have the right of it, Hamish.”
“Between the orphanage being in trouble, and a bit of high-handedness on my part, Colin will not budge from Mayfair until he’s good and ready to. Maybe by then, Anwen will have fixed whatever is ailing Colin.”
Hamish followed up that observation with a kiss.
As it happened, Megan’s fourth nap of the day did not take place in the ducal bedchamber, but rather in the duchess’s private parlor, after a thorough loving on the sofa.
Her second of the day, and not her last.
* * *
Anwen’s life had acquired a sense of direction that combined getting the orphanage on sound financial footing with marrying Colin MacHugh. In the three weeks since he’d asked to court her, the board of directors had met weekly, and on the one occasion when they’d had a quorum, Colin had pushed through motions to acquire ponies, sell the coach and team, get estimates for fitting out a wing of rooms as gentlemen’s quarters, and advertise for an assistant headmaster competent in French, music, and drawing.
Not to hire an assistant headmaster—Win Montague had bestirred himself to make that point—but to advertise and interview candidates.
“You want me to ask other ladies for their spare yarn?” Lady Rosalyn said, when the directors had left the meeting room. Two other ladies on the committee had pleaded various excuses, though Anwen couldn’t be bothered to care.
“Yes, I want you to ask your friends for their spare yarn.” Rosalyn had helped to teach the boys to knit, though Anwen detected a cooling of relations between Winthrop Montague and Colin. “Everybody has yarn they’ve set aside for a specific project, and then didn’t or couldn’t use. I want that yarn.”
Lady Rosalyn blinked slowly, twice. “Then shouldn’t you ask them for it?”
“I will ask my acquaintances, and you will ask yours, who are far more numerous than my own. Extra yarn just clutters up a workbasket, and the boys will put it to excellent use. And while you’re about it, please ask your friends to ask their friends, and I’ll do likewise.”
Her ladyship’s pretty chin acquired an unbecomingly stubborn angle. “We have only twelve boys here, Anwen. How many scarves do you think they can wear? Are they knitting scarves for their ponies?”
“Rosalyn, they are knitting the scarves to sell and to donate to other orphanages. The orphanage needs to earn money where it can, and even small hands can knit competently. Then too, the boys need to learn that giving ennobles the giver. Consider how something as minor as one of your smiles brightens a gentleman’s entire evening, and how you are gladdened to have cheered him.”
As flattery went, that should be sufficient to make the point.
Her ladyship wrinkled a nose about which poetry had been written, albeit bad poetry. “Charity is one thing, Anwen, but once coin is exchanged—you mentioned selling the scarves—the matter veers perilously close to trade.”
Joseph tapped on the door. He still didn’t say much, but he was more animated, and time in the garden agreed with him.
“Yes, Joseph?”
He passed Anwen a note. “The ladies are invited to join me for an inspection of the garden. Lord Colin MacHugh.”
“Is that a naughty note, Anwen Windham?” Rosalyn asked. “Your smile suggests you’ve received correspondence from a gentleman, and though I would never criticize a friend, even you must admit that certain lines, once crossed—”
Anwen passed over the scrap of paper. “We have received an invitation, nothing more. Joseph, thank you. We’ll be down in five minutes.”
Joseph bowed—the older boys were becoming quite mannerly—and withdrew.
“I must confess that child makes me uneasy,” Rosalyn said. “I’m never certain what he comprehends.”
“Joe is very bright.” Anwen rose and straightened the chairs around the table one by one. “I assume he understands anything said in plain English. I left my bonnet in the chairman’s office. Let’s fetch it and join his lordship in the garden.”
Lady Rosalyn had assembled her reticule, pelisse, and parasol, but didn’t move until her gloves were on and smoothed free of wrinkles, and the most elaborately embroidered side of her enormous reticule was showing.
“Am I presentable? One wishes a mirror were available, though encouraging the children in vanity would be unkind.”
“You are far beyond presentable. You’ll put the flowers to shame.” Assuming her ladyship arrived in the garden before autumn.
Lady Rosalyn moved at a decorous pace, as if giving all and sundry time to admire her. When she and Anwen arrived at the chairman’s office, she peered around, running her gloved fingers over the desk surface and lifting the lock on the strongbox.
“Is there anything inside, or is this for show?”
Anwen plunked her bonnet on her head—a comfy old straw hat that fit perfectly. “Colin says at least three months’ worth of coin should be on the premises at all times. Banks can be robbed, flooded, and burned to the ground, while Hitchings can haul that box out of the building in all but the most dire emergencies.”
Rosalyn twiddled the lock’s tumblers. “So the exchequer yet contains three months’ worth of funding?”
Barely. “It does. Has Win said something to the contrary?”
“How does one open this? It looks quite secure.”
“There’s a combination, probably under some candlestick or blotter. Win would know. Shall we be off?”
Rosalyn had started to lift the candlesticks on the mantel, one by one. She reminded Anwen of a small child in new surroundings.
“You referred to Lord Colin as Colin, Anwen. You seem quite friendly with him.”
“His brother is married to my sister. I should hope we’re friendly. Do you know not a single invitation to the card party has sent regrets so far?”
Rosalyn promenaded down the corridor, her arm linked with Anwen’s. “You fancy him, don’t you?”
The last three weeks had been the happiest of Anwen’s life. Colin called almost every day, danced with her at least once at each social gathering, and had twice sent her a note that purported to deal with business at the orphanage.
And on two magnificent occasions, they’d found the privacy to renew the intimacies Colin had introduced Anwen to in the library.
“Would it create awkwardness if I said yes, I do fancy him?” Anwen congratulated herself on a diplomatic understatement, not only because her friend’s sensibilities should be spared, but also because Rosalyn could pitch a fit of pique like no other.
Her ladyship stopped at the foot of the stairs. Beyond the doorway, the boys were lined up along the steps leading to the garden, and Anwen heard Colin holding forth about…slugs?
“I had considered Lord Colin,” Rosalyn said. “He’s modestly good-looking, and his brother is a duke. His lordship owns a distillery, but I understand that’s not unusual in Scotland, rather like owning a mill in more civilized environs.”
Rosalyn was serious, or as serious as she ever was.
“Are you still considering him?”
The moment became fraught as Anwen realized that she pitied Rosalyn. Her ladyship had no idea that Colin more or less tolerated her. True pity was not a comfortable emotion, including as it did the knowledge that nothing Rosalyn could do, promise, say, or become would render her more attractive to Anwen’s intended.
Colin could not be tempted by Rosalyn, because he was Anwen’s.
As Anwen was his.
And Lady Rosalyn Montague of the beautiful perfection was in some way pathetic.
“The red hair puts me off,” Rosalyn said, “meaning no insult to you, of course. If you married him, he couldn’t blame red-haired children exclusively on you.” She shot a glance toward the side door and leaned closer. “I think you should consider him. Your sister will bide in Scotland, and she might need the moral support. You’re inclined toward charity by nature, after all.”
She patted Anwen’s arm, clearly pleased with having found a solution to the problem of Anwen’s red hair.
“No need to thank me,” she said, swanning off toward the door. “I’m good at managing delicate subjects, and at least until your sister increases, you’ll be married to a duke’s heir. Let’s get this garden tour out of the way, shall we? Win is taking me to a musicale tonight, and one does want to dress carefully when most of the evening consists of sitting about, looking beautiful and gracious, hmm?”
And hiding one’s general lack of usefulness, and the anger that likely engendered. Anwen suspected Rosalyn hid the frustration of being ornamental even from herself.
“I’ll be along in a moment,” Anwen said. “I forgot my spare knitting needles.”
Lady Rosalyn snapped open her parasol. “Don’t tarry, please. I’ve no wish to hear about noxious weeds and burrowing rodents. The company of small boys is trial enough for a lady’s delicate sensibilities.”
As Rosalyn made her way out to the garden, Anwen scampered back up to the first landing, where she tried to decide whether she ought to laugh, ignore the entire exchange with Rosalyn, or say a prayer for the poor fellow her ladyship eventually married.
Anwen did laugh quietly, and was still trying to compose herself into a semblance of ladylike decorum when Mr. Hitchings passed her on the landing five minutes later.