Chapter 14
“Your Grace.” Briggs appeared in the doorway. “Lady Pembley and Miss Caroline Pembley have called. They ask whether Your Grace is receiving.”
Isadora looked up from her book. Then she looked at Violet asleep in her cradle, which was not a small thing.
Violet had spent the better part of the morning loudly opposing the concept of sleep. But she was asleep now, her small chest rising and falling, and the sitting room was quiet, and the fire was warm, and Isadora had found the chapter she had been attempting to read for three days.
She had read perhaps four pages when the door opened.
Of all the afternoons, she sighed inwardly.
She kept her expression pleasantly neutral, which took slightly more effort than usual.
“Please show them in,” she ordered. “And have tea sent.”
“Of course, Your Grace.”
She closed the book and set it on the side table with composure as if she had not been deeply invested in it thirty seconds ago, and turned to check on Violet. The baby had not stirred.
Small mercies.
She smoothed her skirts, folded her hands in her lap, and waited.
Lady Pembley entered first. She was a handsome woman in her late forties, immaculately dressed in dove grey silk. Her eyes scanned the sitting room in a single unhurried sweep across the books, the cradle, and Isadora.
Miss Caroline followed two steps behind. She was as beautiful as always, wearing pale blue. It suited her.
Of course it does.
Isadora rose. “Lady Pembley. Miss Caroline.” She smiled. “What a pleasant surprise. Please, do sit down.”
“Your Grace.” Lady Pembley’s voice was warm, smooth, not a single note out of place. She settled herself into the chair nearest the fire. “We have been meaning to call for days to see how you’re settling in. I hope we are not intruding.”
“Not at all.” Isadora resumed her own seat and indicated the sofa opposite. “I am glad of the company.”
Miss Caroline sat, glanced toward the cradle by the window, and looked away.
“What a charming room,” Lady Pembley remarked, assessing it with a sharp gaze. “Ashbourne has a particular architecture. The light is exceptional.”
“It is,” Isadora agreed. “I confess I had not expected it. The estate is larger than I imagined.”
“The park alone must take an age to walk,” Miss Caroline spoke up, smiling.
“It does.” Isadora nodded. “Though I find the east walk particularly good in the mornings.”
“James has always preferred the lake path in the marquess’s seat,” Miss Caroline said lightly, the way one mentioned a simple, unremarkable fact.
“He said the light was better there in the early hours. We spoke of it once when he was describing the estate. It was two Seasons ago, I think. Or was it three, Mama?”
“Three,” Lady Pembley replied serenely. “The winter we attended Lady Forsythe’s gathering.”
“That is right.” Caroline’s smile did not falter. Two or three Seasons ago. One of them cannot remember which. How odd that neither can quite pin it down, and yet both remember it perfectly.
“It is a beautiful place,” Isadora said pleasantly.
“Yes, it is rather magnificent.” Lady Pembley bobbed her head. “We have always thought so. My late husband and the former Duke were… not close friends, exactly, but well acquainted. We visited several times over the years.” A pause. “When the former Duke was alive, of course.”
Isadora received that with perfect tranquility.
“Of course,” she said. “You must find it much changed.”
“A little, though change is often an improvement.” Another pause, graciously delivered. “The household certainly seems to have found its footing.”
“Of course,” Isadora said with a smile.
Lady Pembley smiled back.
“You have settled in very quickly,” she observed, with every appearance of admiration. “One hears how demanding a large estate can be when one arrives suddenly. The household, the tenants, the obligations.” She tilted her head. “It is a great deal to take on at once.”
“It is,” Isadora agreed. “Though I find managing it more interesting than demanding. There is a great deal to learn.”
“You were always so capable.” Miss Caroline said it with such genuine warmth that Isadora spent a full second deciding whether it was a compliment or something else entirely.
“I remember thinking so at the Carlton’s soirée…
You and I spoke for a short while near the pianoforte. Though I imagine you do not recall it.”
“I recall it well,” Isadora said, though she filed that away. She had no recollection of the Carlton’s soirée whatsoever. “A very pleasant evening.”
“It was.” A pause. “I remember James arrived late and sat rather close to the door. He always disliked being too near the instrument. He said violins gave him a headache.”
Isadora thought of James attending a musicale and developing a headache, and decided that violins were probably the last cause of it.
“He has never mentioned it,” she said pleasantly.
Something flickered across Miss Caroline’s expression, though she recovered beautifully.
“Oh, one tends not to mention one’s musical opinions in polite company,” she said with a small laugh. “I only knew because we were seated together for the second half. He was very good company, even while suffering.” She smoothed one finger over her glove. “He always has been.”
Isadora looked at the fire for a moment.
She was not jealous. She was quite clear on that.
Whatever had occurred between James and Miss Caroline across two or possibly three Seasons of musicales and fond conversations about lake paths was none of her business, had never been her business, and she had absolutely no right to feel the emotion she was currently feeling, which she was not going to name.
It is not jealousy. It is simply the irritating awareness that another person knows things about my husband that I do not.
The tea arrived. Isadora presided over it with smooth efficiency.
“Milk, Lady Pembley?”
“Please. No sugar.”
“Miss Caroline?”
“Both,” Miss Caroline said. Then she glanced at the cradle again. She lowered her voice with a degree of care that somehow drew more attention to the cradle. “Is that—is that the child?”
“Yes,” Isadora replied pleasantly. “She is sleeping, and we are rather hoping she continues to.” She handed Miss Caroline her cup. “She has strong opinions about being woken.”
“Goodness.” Miss Caroline studied the cradle with the expression of someone encountering a sleeping animal of uncertain temperament. “How—how very small she is. How lovely.”
“She is one year old,” Isadora explained. “They tend to be at that age.”
Lady Pembley smiled at that. It was a genuine smile, which surprised her slightly. “You seem very comfortable with her already, Your Grace.”
“She is easy to be comfortable with,” Isadora said, meaning it. “She has a very decided character for someone with so little vocabulary.”
“Rather like her guardian,” Miss Caroline murmured, almost to herself. Then she seemed to remember where she was and looked up with a bright expression. “I only mean… James has always been—” She cleared her throat. “He has always been rather forthright.”
James…
Isadora lifted her teacup and took a measured sip. Though she very much wanted to hurl it at her.
The name sat in her chest like a rock, but she kept her expression serene.
“Indeed,” she agreed. “He is.”
“He always found his way to our box at the theatre,” Miss Caroline added pleasantly. “We had such delightful evenings at Covent Garden last spring. We even saw The School for Scoundrels together last spring at Haymarket.” She smiled fondly. “We laughed dreadfully throughout the second act.”
Isadora blinked.
It has been called The School for Scandal since Richard Brinsley Sheridan wrote it in 1777.
She pressed her lips together, itching to correct the woman. It was not the moment. “School for Scandal,” she muttered under her breath.
Miss Caroline paused. “I beg your pardon?”
“I only said that it was a wonderful play,” Isadora said smoothly. “Sheridan was very gifted.”
“Oh, tremendously.” Caroline nodded enthusiastically. “He has such a talent for comedy.”
He had. He died last year. But never mind.
A brief silence settled over the room.
Outside, a bird landed on the window ledge and then thought better of it. The fire popped once. Violet remained asleep.
Mercifully.
“I understand the Season ended rather abruptly for you as well,” Lady Pembley spoke up, with the manner of someone opening a door they had been planning to open for some time. “The news about the duchy must have been very sudden.”
“It was.” Isadora nodded.
“A great deal changed very quickly.” Lady Pembley gave her a technically sympathetic look. “For everyone.”
The last two words arrived with a weight disproportionate to their size.
Isadora looked at her steadily. “Change often does come quickly. As I said, I have found Ashbourne very welcoming.”
“I am sure of that,” Miss Caroline said. There was something careful in her voice now, something measured over feeling. She looked down at her gloves, then up again. “James is very capable of making people feel… settled. Comfortable.” She smiled briefly. “He has always been.”
There it was.
Not cruelty—Caroline Pembley was not cruel.
Isadora had concluded that within the first five minutes and had not revised her conclusion since.
She had merely expected something, had arranged her hopes around it with care and patience, and had arrived here today to see for herself what had replaced them.
There was genuine hurt in her eyes, and she was managing it with more dignity than Isadora would have given her credit for at the outset.
That does not make it easier to sit across from her.
“Yes,” Isadora murmured. “He is very good at that.”
“You know, my dear Caroline is so wonderful with children,” Lady Pembley was saying, drawing her attention. “I have always said it is a natural gift. She was helping at her cousin’s nursery only last month, and the children simply adored her. Didn’t they, Caroline?”
“They were very sweet.” Caroline looked modestly at her hands.
How convenient for everyone.