Chapter 15
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The dew had risen. Alice’s anxiety had risen with it, which ought not to have been possible when she was already as tense as a fiddle string, but still, the baron made no appearance in the herb garden.
He was not rude by nature. Blunt sometimes, or direct, but he would never keep her waiting where half the staff could see.
Alice gathered up her courage and entered the Hall through the conservatory door. She put her bouquet of lavender into a crock of water, pinched a blooming purple stalk, and fortified herself with the aroma.
At this hour, his lordship would be in the library, muttering over his letters and ledgers.
Except that he wasn’t. The library was not only devoid of handsome barons, no correspondence sat stacked on the desk. The blotter was bare, and neither wax jack, nor pen tray, nor ink was in view. Even the abacus on the windowsill had been removed.
He would not do this. Would not leave without a word, would not abandon Alice without a farewell.
“Miss Singleton.” Mr. St. Didier had entered the library without making a sound. “Might I be of assistance?”
“I was to meet… That is… I have an appointment with his lordship.”
Something annoyed flickered in St. Didier’s eyes. “You’ll find him in the baron’s suite. Shall I escort you up?”
“I know the way, thank you.”
If Mr. St. Didier thought it scandalous that Alice would seek his lordship out in his private apartment, he kept that to himself. He remained by the door, looking severe and unreadable.
“Miss Singleton, are you sure I cannot be of assistance?”
Whatever could that possibly mean? “I will keep my appointment with his lordship, thank you.”
St. Didier gestured toward the door and made no move to follow Alice up the steps. She ascended, pausing on the landing to settle her nerves, or try to. The baron had not left. Had not fled in the night. Had not waved wistfully and promised to write.
Not yet.
And neither had Alice, though she intended to be on the afternoon express to York.
She rapped on the baron’s sitting room door in the same rhythm as the tattoo of her heartbeat.
“Enter.”
A singularly cheerless command. Alice lifted the latch and walked in on a scene of brewing chaos.
Through the bedroom door, she spied the first footman packing a sizable trunk.
In the sitting room, stacks of letters were arranged on the sofa and chairs.
The escritoire by the window held more documents and an open lap desk even larger than the one at the vicarage.
Cam occupied the chair at the desk and paused halfway through sorting a stack of papers. “What time…? Damn. Excuse my language.” He rose. “Chapman, go pester Cook for a cup of tea, please. I’ll ring when you can resume packing.”
Chapman, who’d known Alice since she’d joined Grandpapa’s household, bowed to the baron, nodded to her, and exited through the sitting room door.
He’d report the morning’s developments belowstairs, and somebody would carry the tale straight to the vicarage.
For once, Alice did not care who told Lady Josephine what.
“I’m sorry,” Cam said. “I lost track of the time, which is no excuse. Please have a…” He moved several piles of paper to the windowsill. “A seat. Might I close the door?”
What did yet another breach of propriety matter? He was leaving, just as Alice had assured Lady Josephine he would.
“You may close the door,” Alice said.
“This isn’t… Well, it is what you think it is. I must return to London posthaste. I’ve had disturbing news from the solicitors.”
Alice took a seat on the sofa. She had spent many an hour in this room reading, playing chess, and otherwise entertaining the late baron.
The décor hadn’t changed to speak of—more correspondence, some hydrangeas on the sideboard instead of roses, no pipe trays or pipe smoke—but the feel of the room was awake and lively rather than moribund.
“Disturbing news about your business?” What else would inspire him to a hasty departure?
“Indirectly. Alice, I am sorry, but it’s a situation only I can address. I would have informed you in person of my plans before I absented myself from the Hall.”
He took the place beside her without asking permission, which Alice assumed was evidence of genuine upset. Ironic, that he should be leaving now when Alice had been sure he’d linger at the Hall.
“Is the business in difficulties?”
He ran a hand through his hair. “The business is always in difficulties. I seem to prefer it that way, or I did. Now…” He glanced at the clock. “I’m sorry you had to come looking for me. Badly done.”
“You are upset.” Not in the same way Alice was, but his disquiet was palpable. In the normal course, the new Lord Lorne did not forget assignations in the garden any more than he forgot the price he’d offered for weaving services.
“I am upset, for all manner of reasons. Trouble in London is part of it, but also… I have created a business that only I can run, and that’s not prudent. It’s not smart. Why do that?”
“Because then you are always needed. Nobody can throw you off the property or force you to join the military against your better judgment. You were right to leave Lorne Hall all those years ago, but I doubt the army was a good fit for you.”
He stared at the carpet, a fading Axminster chosen by his grandmother and woven to depict a profusion of summer flowers bordering a green wood.
“Leaving was the only thing I could think to do. To remain was… I would have lost my wits or run afoul of the law sooner rather than later.”
Alice wanted to take his hand, to anchor him to her somehow. She smoothed her skirts. “I have run afoul of Lady Josephine, and I must leave here.” For the space of two ticks of the mantel clock, Alice wished the words back.
“Explain. Rather, might you please explain?”
“You are right that Lady Josephine has become more troublesome of late. I cannot marry you, because she will use me to invade the Hall in the very fashion you’ve described. She will make us both miserable.”
“We’ll live in Town.”
“She is free to travel to London. She is an earl’s daughter and has connections everywhere.”
“Not in York, none to speak of. I asked St. Didier to nose around, and except for a few church acquaintances and some of the better shops, her ladyship avoids York.”
He ran his hand through his hair again, and Alice realized that for all his apparent calm, the baron was truly distraught.
“Her ladyship is too busy wrecking lives here in the shires, I suppose, and she is set upon wrecking mine—and, by extension, yours—so I am determined to leave. I should have left years ago.”
Alice braced herself for rage, derision, a coldly polite dismissal… or worse, a pointless negotiation intent on ripping apart her logic. Her reasoning was sound, but based on evidence the baron hadn’t seen and hopefully never would.
“I know that feeling, Alice, the compulsion to go, to be anywhere but where one is expected to dwell. To choose homelessness over bodily safety. I wouldn’t wish it on you.”
He was thinking, moving chess pieces in his head. Alice could hear the slight distracted note in his tone that suggested strategies in development. She did not want him embarking on any sort of bargaining. That time had long since passed.
“I have created a problem,” Alice said slowly, “and I must solve it. I’ve let every other problem in my life be solved by others.
What to do when my parents died, how to keep a roof over my head, how to go on here…
I respect my elders and my betters and my neighbors, but I have forgotten to respect myself. ”
His lordship frowned at the carpet. “Lack of respect figured in my own departure from Lorne Hall, but I hadn’t the words for it then. I respect you, Alice Singleton.”
How much easier if he’d said she meant nothing to him. “I know, and that has been wonderful and exhilarating, and now I cannot accept anything less from myself.”
He aimed that frown at her. “So wonderful that I am about to lose you?”
Logic. Blast him for the logic. “I’ve said enough. I should have told you earlier that I have long been considering a remove from my grandfather’s house. You distracted me.”
“You knocked me witless, and you are a bad liar, Alice.”
If he knew all the lies she’d told. I’m fine, Grandpapa. No trouble at all, your ladyship. A lovely sermon, Vicar. Your advice is always appreciated, Lady Josephine.
“I’m telling you the truth when I say I must go.”
The frown had turned into a perplexed scowl. “And you won’t come back?”
“Not if I can help it.”
He rose and prowled to the desk. To the casual eye, he might have looked annoyed or preoccupied. To Alice, he seemed intently focused on thoughts she could not divine.
“Will you at least let me provide you some funds, Alice?”
She rose as well, wanting both to flee and to wrap her arms around him and never let him go. “You are supposed to berate me for waving false colors, to be wroth and dismissive.”
“I spent most of my minority angry because others were dismissive toward me. My ire solved nothing, but I suspect you have yielded to the sin of wrath too. It’s a good sin, very passionate. What puzzles me is, why is Lady Josephine so angry?”
Alice wanted to ignore the question, but couldn’t. “She is angry. She can go on tirades with the vicarage staff that would shock you. She is certainly mean.”
He sat at the escritoire and opened a drawer.
“My lord, you cannot give me money.” Too late, Alice recalled that telling this man what to do generally resulted in the opposite outcome. He was as contrary as she was submissive—as she had been submissive.
“I will be most unhappy with you, Alice, once I locate my missing wits. I will be furious, though, if you expect me to send you out into the world, I know not where, with just the pin money you’ve saved while drudging for your grandpapa. The very thought…”