Chapter Five
Alden froze in place, but then the doors to the garden burst open, and a horde of people swarmed around him.
Only seven, he realized after a startled moment. Clara, two young women he knew were her sisters—one of them had been the screamer—the earl and Lady Duxford, and two maids, who were beaming along with the family.
“Is that Harvey?” the young woman who’d screamed demanded. “Oh, he’s adorable.”
“Manners, Emily,” Lady Duxford chided her. “Good morning, Lord Alden. Shall you join us? We’ll bring out a bowl for Harvey.”
“Let me not put you out,” Alden said quickly. “Harvey has eaten plenty already today.”
“But he needs fattening up.” Lady Duxford eyed Alden as though he did as well. “And it would be rude to eat in front of him. Come in. There’s plenty of room at the table.”
Emily had already fallen to her knees to embrace Harvey. The youngest sister—Alden remembered her name was Anne—came to pat him as well. The dog happily leaned into them.
Clara seized Alden’s coat sleeve and pulled him into the dining room. “Sit there.” She pointed to a chair near the head of the table, where a place setting awaited. “We began without you, though I assured the rest you’d come.”
“I was as grubby as Harvey,” Alden said, letting Clara tow him to his place. Any touch of her hand was welcome. “Took a while to remove the mud.”
“So was I.” Clara grinned up at him. “But here we all are, right as rain. Harvey is a handsome lad, isn’t he?”
With the sunlight gleaming on the dog’s golden-brown coat, Alden had to agree. He again wondered who’d lost or abandoned him, but regardless, Harvey had a home now.
A manservant hustled into the garden with a large bowl for Harvey, who thrust his head inside it and began to eat with gusto.
The rest of the family trailed back into the dining room, resuming places at the table. One of the maids shoved a plate of eggs, potatoes, meat pie, and sausage in front of Alden. The food steamed, and his stomach rumbled.
The rest returned to their half-eaten breakfast as though rushing outside in the middle of it was commonplace.
“We are so pleased to see you out and about, Lord Alden,” Lady Duxford said from the foot of the table. “You shouldn’t shut yourself away so much, or confine yourself to clubs. Take more brisk tramps about the Heath. Just the thing.”
“Mama sets a store by brisk tramps, Lord Alden,” Emily confided. “Be warned. Clara told us all about how you helped her rescue Harvey. In the middle of the night, no less. I grew so worried about her that I nearly summoned all the constables to begin a search.”
“Constables Harrison and James needed their sleep more than they needed to hunt for me,” Clara returned with amusement. “I came home as soon as Harvey was settled with Alden.”
She sat in the middle of the table on the opposite side from Alden, too far away for his liking.
Then again, he could look his fill of her from here.
Clara had changed her worn and muddy garb for a fetching cream-colored frock trimmed with dark blue, which brought out her eyes.
Her light-red hair, dressed in a simple knot, glistened whenever she turned her head.
Lord Duxford, on Alden’s left, leaned to him. “I will speak to you later, young man.”
Alden started, dragging his gaze from Clara to find her father watching him with a knowing look.
“Everything aboveboard, I assure you, sir,” Alden said hastily and quietly.
“Even so.” Lord Duxford returned to his morning tea.
The fellow reminded Alden strongly of his own father, a quiet man who let his talkative wife rule the table, but a man with hidden depths.
Alden hungrily dug into his breakfast. Around him, chatter flowed. The three daughters and their mother discussed everything under the sun, punctuated by the occasional wry comment from Lord Duxford.
Meals with Alden’s parents were much more formal.
While the marquess and marchioness had never been standoffish with their son, they were quiet spoken, his mother stately.
Lady Ravensmoor filled her house with very correct servants, who went about their duties efficiently and noiselessly.
She’d never have maids serving at the table—only footmen and the butler ought to do that.
The two maids were local young women whose parents ran a shop and a pub, respectively. They smiled good-naturedly at the younger daughters’ requests and added their opinions on whatever topic was at hand when asked.
Alden’s mother would hardly approve.
But then, Alden’s mother liked Clara. At one of the stiff suppers at the Ravensmoor house in Town a few months ago, the marchioness had remarked: “That oldest Griffin girl has turned out rather well, do you not think, Morty? Had her debut last year, I believe.”
Montmorency Carlisle, Lord Ravensmoor, who’d been addressed as Morty since his nursery days, had nodded. “Sound family. A trifle eccentric. You know them, Alden. Live in that rambling cottage a few doors down from you in Hampstead.”
Alden, sunk in his own misery, had answered with something noncommittal, paying scant attention.
Now, he agreed with his mother. Clara had turned out rather well, indeed.
“Can we take Harvey for a walk?” Emily asked, breaking his train of thought. “I think he needs a walk.”
The family had completed their breakfasts, and plates had been pushed aside, while the younger daughters rested their elbows on the table.
Emily gazed longingly out the back window. Harvey, finished with his own meal, had lain down by the door and stared inside with as much hope as Emily peered out.
Clara, on the other hand, kept her gaze on Alden, her eyes unreadable.
“Patience, Emily,” Lady Duxford said. “Lord Alden hasn’t finished.”
“Please, do not stand on ceremony with me,” Alden said quickly. “Do go on. Harvey must be tired of being confined to a garden.”
“Hurrah!” Emily leapt from her seat. “Come along, Anne. Come along, Clara. Bring the lead.”
Lady Duxford lifted her hands and shook her head, but Emily didn’t notice her disapprobation. Clara sent Alden an apologetic smile but readily followed her sisters out of the dining room. In a few moments, the three appeared in the garden in coats and hats.
Harvey, who knew his fortunes had taken a turn for the better, greeted them with enthusiasm, letting Clara hook the lead to his collar without fuss.
Lady Duxford watched fondly as the three young ladies took Harvey out the garden gate. She returned her gaze to her husband and Alden, took a sip of tea, and then rose. “I must see to …”
She glided out, not bothering to finish the sentence.
Lord Duxford waved for Alden to continue his meal. One of the maids refilled Lord Duxford’s cup of tea and then Alden’s, then both of the women bustled out of the room.
As soon they’d gone, Lord Duxford turned to Alden. “Do not choke on your toast, sir,” he said with good humor. “But are you planning a proposal? Or will you let my daughter’s reputation be ruined when the tale of her running about with you in the night leaks out?”
Alden laid down the piece of toast he’d taken up, unsurprised at Lord Duxford’s question. His body heated at the thought of waking up to Clara every morning, her hair mussed on his pillow, her eyes warm with what they’d done the night before.
Alden’s heart had lightened for the first time in many months when he’d encountered Clara at the cemetery yesterday afternoon, and he’d joined in her arguments with renewed spirit. He liked the thought of arguing with Clara for a long time to come—and making up afterward, of course.
He strove to keep these thoughts from his expression.
“I would propose. Gladly.” Alden infused the last word with fervor. He lifted his teacup with a sigh. “But I know she will refuse me.”
What woman wouldn’t say no to linking herself to an ill-tempered man whose friends couldn’t speak without crudeness, and to shutting herself in a dark house with a flowerless garden?
Lord Duxford’s eyes twinkled. “That is likely so. My advice to you is to give her time, and don’t give up. Now tell me, Lord Alden, how is your father? Been donkey’s years since I had a good chinwag with him.”
*
Weeks flew by. Drab October gave way to an even drearier November, with gray skies and plenty of rain.
Alden couldn’t remember when he’d been happier. He woke every morning with anticipation instead of the grim weight of despondency, dressed himself with only a little assistance from Milford, collected Harvey, and walked with him the short distance to the Griffin home.
He’d be invited into the morning meal, the family always professing delight to see him.
His place at the table became permanent, a setting and cup waiting for him each day.
The same manservant would dart out into the garden with a bowl for Harvey, who’d nearly knock the good-natured man down in his joy.
After breakfast, Alden and Clara, with or without her sisters, would take Harvey for his walk on the Heath. They’d roam the large park, from the gates of Kenwood House to the hill with its fine view over London.
Sometimes they’d head for Highgate, where Clara would continue taking rubbings from the markers for her aunt who collected them—apparently the woman was researching notable people who’d been buried there.
Alden grew to make peace with Highgate, a place he’d resented for the past year.
He never visited his friend’s grave while they were there, not wanting to experience sadness when he was with Clara.
Besides, the air there always grew so confoundedly cold around him that Alden was ever glad to quit the place.
He and Clara continued to argue about anything and everything, she not afraid to make her opinions known. One thing they did not argue about was Harvey. He was their dog now, spending the nights in Alden’s garden and his days with Clara and her family.
Rather like Alden himself, Alden reflected, though he’d retire to his own bedchamber these days. He had, in fact, slept in the shed with Harvey for the first week.