Chapter Six Respectability Calls
CHAPTER SIX
Respectability Calls
By half past ten the following morning, Blackthorn Manor had acquired two entirely different kinds of mud.
The first lay across the north drive in honest brown ruts where Ambrose’s crew had hauled timber, pipe, and tools toward the failed retaining wall. The second arrived in a lacquered carriage with brass lamps, matched bays, and a footman who appeared personally offended by the condition of the road.
Mary Beth saw the carriage from the morning-room window.
She did not need the crest on the door to know who had come.
Lord Benedict Sablehurst never arrived anywhere by accident.
She set down the estate ledger she had been reading and watched the carriage avoid the worst rut with a careful sway.
The horses were handsome. The driver was immaculate.
Even the wheels seemed to understand that they belonged to a better class of transportation than the wagons currently grinding stone and timber into Blackthorn’s soil.
Behind her, rain tapped lightly against the glass.
The temporary bypass had been opened shortly after dawn.
If it held through the next two days, the cottages below the slope could remain occupied.
Ambrose had gone to the quarry with two men to test the old stone and had returned less than an hour ago with mud to his knees and satisfaction he had tried, unsuccessfully, to conceal.
Mary Beth had been avoiding him ever since their promised seven-thirty inspection, during which both of them had discussed quarry stone with absurd concentration. She refused to call it avoidance.
She could have blamed the kiss beneath the bridge.
In truth, it was everything he had said afterward that unsettled her.
A servant entered with a card on a silver tray.
Mary Beth glanced at it.
“His lordship is in the drawing room?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Of course he was. Benedict had never waited in a hall when there was a drawing room available.
Mary Beth rose.
She had dressed that morning for estate work in dark green wool rather than for callers. The gown was respectable enough, but practical: narrow sleeves, sturdy hem, no lace at the throat. She considered changing.
Then she considered Benedict.
He could survive green wool.
The drawing room looked brighter than the weather outside. A fire burned beneath the marble mantel, and Benedict stood near it with one gloved hand resting lightly on the back of a chair.
He turned when she entered.
He was, Mary Beth thought, exactly as handsome as a man ought to be when generations of his family had possessed the money to correct every inconvenience except death.
Fair hair, carefully cut and already silvering at the temples. Clear gray eyes. A face that could look kind without ever becoming vulnerable. His morning coat fit as if the tailor had constructed it while Benedict was still inside.
“Mary Beth.”
“Benedict.”
His smile warmed by a degree.
“I was beginning to think Blackthorn had been carried away by the rain.”
“Only part of it.”
“I heard about the wall.”
“I expected you would.”
“You make that sound like an accusation.”
“Only an observation about Yorkshire.”
He laughed softly and took her hand.
Benedict had been calling on her for nearly eight months. Long enough that the gesture should have felt familiar. It did.
That was part of the problem.
He bent over her knuckles without quite touching them with his mouth.
“I came as soon as I could.”
“The wall fell last Thursday.”
“I was in London.”
“Then I forgive the delay.”
He released her hand and studied her face.
“You look tired.”
“I have been busy.”
“So I see.” His gaze dropped to the practical gown. “You have been inspecting the work yourself?”
“Yes.”
“With Tavener?”
Mary Beth’s attention sharpened.
“You know his name.”
“I asked.”
“Of whom?”
“People who know such things.”
There were few answers more Benedict-like than that.
Mary Beth crossed to the tea table. “Will you have some?”
“Please.”
She poured. Benedict waited until she had seated herself before taking the chair opposite.
“I am told he is competent,” he said.
“He is.”
“A railway man originally.”
“Among other things.”
“And now he keeps his own company in Leeds.”
“Is this conversation meant to save me the trouble of introducing you?”
Benedict smiled over the rim of his cup.
“I was curious about the man living under your roof.”
Benedict had finally reached the question beneath the courtesy.
It was not an accusation; Benedict was too polished for that. He could place a knife on a table and make it look like silverware.
“Mr. Tavener is here because the lower bridge flooded and because I require him on the works early each morning.”
“Of course.”
“You sound relieved.”
“I sound understanding.”
“Much more dangerous.”
His mouth curved.
“Your wit is one of the reasons I continue to risk visiting you.”
“Only one?”
“The others are less suitable for morning conversation.”
Mary Beth ought to have enjoyed the flirtation.
A week earlier, she probably would have.
Instead she remembered Ambrose beneath the bridge, rainwater on his hair and anger in his voice when he told her he would not be another safe arrangement.
Benedict set down his cup.
“I do have a serious reason for coming.”
“I assumed so. Your horses are too fine for casual concern.”
“My mother is giving a dinner this Thursday.”
Mary Beth leaned back.
“No.”
“I have not invited you yet.”
“You were about to.”
“Yes.”
“Then I have saved us time.”
Benedict’s expression remained pleasant, but she saw the small pause before he answered.
“There will be people there who have not seen you socially in some time.”
“That is one of the dinner’s attractions.”
“For them or for you?”
“Both.”
“Mary Beth.”
He said her name gently, and this time the gentleness was real enough to trouble her.
“You cannot intend to spend the rest of your life allowing bored women and frightened husbands to decide where you may dine.”
“I dine very well here.”
“You know what I mean.”
She did.
Benedict had never openly condemned her reputation.
That distinguished him from most men of his rank.
He had escorted her across rooms after other women turned their shoulders.
He had danced with her at a county ball when a hostess had placed Mary Beth at the outer edge of the floor.
He had called at Blackthorn when other families had discovered permanent obligations on the afternoons she received visitors.
There had been courage in that.
Or perhaps simply confidence that his own name could survive proximity to hers.
“The stories are losing their appetite,” Benedict said. “People tire of every scandal eventually.”
“Do they?”
“Yes. Particularly when given something more interesting to discuss.”
“Such as?”
He held her gaze.
“Your return to society under the protection of people no one is willing to insult.”
Mary Beth’s fingers stilled around the handle of her cup.
“Protection.”
“A word, nothing more.”
“Words are rarely nothing.”
Benedict exhaled through his nose. “Very well. Support, then. Friendship. Position. Choose whichever noun offends you least.”
“And your mother has suddenly developed this charitable impulse?”
“My mother has developed the ability to be persuaded.”
“By you.”
“Yes.”
That interested Mary Beth more than she wanted it to.
Benedict leaned forward slightly.
“Come to dinner. Let people see you enter on my arm. Let them discover that the world has not ended because Benedict Sablehurst chose to sit beside Mary Beth Blackthorn.”
“You make yourself sound remarkably heroic.”
“I have always thought so.”
She laughed despite herself.
He smiled, and for a few seconds the old ease returned.
This was what Benedict offered: rooms in which she did not have to explain herself. Invitations that came without calculation. A man who could silence a table simply by choosing where to sit.
His world required neither mud nor quarry dust, and it asked no dangerous questions about whether desire mattered.
The drawing-room door opened after a discreet knock.
Mary Beth expected a servant.
Ambrose stood there instead.
He had removed his outer coat, but the rest of him still belonged outdoors. Damp dark hair. Mud on his boots. Shirt sleeves beneath an open work coat, one cuff rolled carelessly higher than the other. A folded sheet of measurements occupied his left hand.
His gaze found Mary Beth first.
Then Benedict.
Ambrose checked his step when he saw Benedict.
Only slightly, but enough for Mary Beth to catch it.
“Forgive me,” Ambrose said. “I was told you were in the morning room.”
“I was.”
“I can come back.”
Benedict rose.
“No need on my account.”
The two men regarded each other.
Mary Beth had seen dogs perform the same ritual with less clothing.
“Lord Sablehurst,” she said, “Mr. Ambrose Tavener.”
Benedict extended a hand.
“Tavener.”
Ambrose took it.
“My lord.”
The handshake lasted precisely as long as civility required.
Benedict glanced toward the plans in Ambrose’s hand.
“I understand you are rescuing Blackthorn from the weather.”
“Mostly from an old drainage repair.”
“Ah.” Benedict smiled. “Less romantic.”
“Water usually is when it gets behind stone.”
Mary Beth lowered her cup to hide the beginning of a smile.
Benedict noticed.
His attention moved from her to Ambrose again.
“My estate mason offered to come over,” he said. “Mrs. Blackthorn tells me she has everything in hand.”
“She does.”
The answer came without hesitation.
Mary Beth looked at Ambrose.
Benedict did too.
There had been no need for the pronoun to carry weight, but somehow it did.
Benedict returned his attention to Mary Beth.
“I will not keep you from business.”
“You have not had your second cup.”
“Another time.”
He crossed to her and took her hand again.
“Thursday.”
“I have not agreed.”
“You have not refused with conviction.”
“I refused before you invited me.”
“And yet we are still discussing it.”
He lifted her hand, his eyes remaining on hers.
“I will send the carriage at seven.”
Mary Beth should have told him not to.
Instead she said, “You may send it. Whether I am inside when it returns is another matter.”