Chapter Thirteen #2
She had been so afraid of hoping. So certain that whatever existed between them could not lead anywhere good. So determined to be practical, sensible, resigned to the limitations of her circumstances.
But Daniel was not being practical. He was not being sensible. He was being reckless in the most careful way imaginable; pouring resources and attention and care into her family's crisis while asking for nothing in return.
That was not the behavior of a man who felt nothing. That was not the behavior of a man protecting himself from emotion.
That was the behavior of a man in love.
***
The following morning, Lillian discovered that the physician was not the only gift.
She had risen early, intending to review the household accounts before her mother woke, when she heard the sound of hammering from outside. Frowning, she went to the window.
A crew of workmen had arrived at Hartfield. Six men, perhaps eight, with ladders and tools and stacks of fresh timber. They were already on the roof, her roof, the roof that had caused her father's fall, working with efficient purpose.
Lillian threw on a shawl and hurried outside.
"What is this?" she demanded of the nearest workman. "Who authorized this work?"
The man paused, hammer in hand, and touched his cap respectfully. "Morning, miss. We're here to fix the roof. Orders came yesterday."
"Orders from whom?"
"I couldn't say, miss. The foreman arranged it." He nodded toward a man standing near the ladder, consulting a sheaf of papers. "You'd have to ask him."
Lillian approached the foreman with the determined stride of a woman who intended to get answers.
"Excuse me. I am Lillian Whitcombe. This is my family's home. I would like to know who sent you and who is paying for this work."
The foreman looked up from his papers, his expression politely blank. "I can't rightly say, miss. The arrangements were made through an intermediary. We were told the work was needed urgently, and that payment had already been settled."
"Already settled. By whom?"
"I couldn't tell you, miss. The money came through a solicitor in London. All very proper, all very discreet." He shrugged. "It happens sometimes. They don't always want their names attached to their good deeds."
Lillian stared at him, her mind racing. A solicitor in London. Anonymous payment. The same pattern as the physician.
"How long will the repairs take?"
"Two days, three at most. We'll have her watertight by week's end, miss. You can count on that."
Lillian thanked him mechanically and returned to the house. Her mother was in the entrance hall, having been roused by the commotion, her expression a mirror of Lillian's own bewilderment.
"The roof," Mrs. Whitcombe said. "They are fixing the roof."
"Yes."
"Who..."
"I do not know." But the words felt like a lie even as she spoke them. She knew. Of course she knew. There was only one person who would do this, who could do this, without revealing himself.
"Lillian." Her mother's voice was quiet, serious. "What is happening? First the physician, now this. Someone is helping us. Someone with considerable resources. Why?"
Lillian could not answer. Her throat was too tight, her eyes too bright with tears she refused to shed.
"It is the duke," Mrs. Whitcombe said. It was not a question. "The Duke of Wyntham. He is doing this."
"I believe so."
"Why?"
Lillian thought of the folly. The kiss. The way Daniel had looked at her when he said you have systematically dismantled every defence I have ever constructed.
"Because he cares," she said quietly. "And because this is the only way he knows how to show it."
Mrs. Whitcombe was silent for a long moment. When she spoke again, her voice was gentle.
"He loves you."
"I do not know if he would call it that."
"Perhaps not. But that does not change what it is." Her mother reached out and took Lillian's hand. "The question is, what do you feel for him?"
Lillian could not answer. Not because she did not know, but because the knowing was too enormous, too overwhelming to put into words.
"Go to him," Mrs. Whitcombe said. "Your father is stable. The household is managed. Go to the duke, and speak with him, and discover what this means for both of you."
"Mama..."
"I am not a fool, Lillian. I have seen how you look when you speak of him.
I have seen the way you light up when you return from your visits to Wynthorpe Hall.
" She squeezed Lillian's hand. "You have spent your whole life being practical and sensible and resigned to whatever fate offers you.
Perhaps it is time to want something for yourself. "
Lillian felt the tears spill over at last; hot tracks down her cheeks that she did not bother to wipe away.
"What if I am wrong?" she whispered. "What if this is not what I think it is?"
"Then you will know. And knowing, even painful knowing, is better than uncertainty." Her mother smiled, a complicated expression that held both sorrow and hope. "Go, Lillian. Find your duke. And discover what is possible."
***
There was one more discovery to be made before Lillian could leave for Wynthorpe Hall.
She was in her room, changing into clothes suitable for calling on a duke, when a servant knocked with the day's post. Among the usual correspondence, a letter from a distant cousin, a bill from the apothecary, was an envelope addressed to her mother in an unfamiliar hand.
Lillian brought it downstairs and handed it to Mrs. Whitcombe, who opened it with trembling fingers.
Inside was a single sheet of paper. Mrs. Whitcombe read it once, then again, her face draining of color.
"Mama? What is it?"
Mrs. Whitcombe looked up, her expression dazed. "The debt. The debt to Mr. Harrison; the one we have been struggling to pay for the past year. He writes to inform us that it has been settled."
"Settled?"
"Paid in full. By an anonymous benefactor." She held out the letter with hands that shook. "We owe him nothing, Lillian. The debt is gone."
Lillian took the letter and read it herself. The words swam before her eyes: pleased to inform you... balance cleared... generous patron who wishes to remain unnamed...
The physician. The roof. The debt.
Three gifts, each one anonymous, each one precisely targeted at the pressures that had been crushing her family. It was too thorough, too deliberate, too perfectly calibrated to be coincidence.
Daniel had not simply sent help. He had studied their situation, identified their needs, and systematically addressed every one of them; all while maintaining the fiction of anonymity, all while asking for nothing in return.
Lillian folded the letter carefully and tucked it into her pocket alongside the physician's card and the foreman's receipt.
"I am going to Wynthorpe Hall," she said.
"Yes." Mrs. Whitcombe's voice was steady now, her composure regained. "I rather thought you might."
***
The ride to Wynthorpe Hall felt longer than usual.
Lillian had borrowed the elderly mare that was all that remained of the family's stable, and the animal's pace was sedate at best. It gave her time to think—too much time, perhaps. Her mind churned with questions she did not know how to answer, with feelings she did not know how to name.
She was going to confront a duke. She was going to demand an explanation for his generosity, to understand why he had done what he had done, to discover what it meant for both of them.
And she was terrified.
Not of Daniel; she had long since stopped being intimidated by his title and his coldness. But of what she might learn. Of what he might say. Of the possibility that she had misread everything, that his assistance was merely kindness, that his feelings did not run as deep as she had begun to hope.
Or worse—that they did. That he loved her, and she loved him, and none of it mattered because the world would not allow a duke to marry a woman of her station.
The gates of Wynthorpe Hall appeared before her, and Lillian urged the mare forward with a determination she did not entirely feel.
She would find Daniel. She would speak with him. And whatever happened next, she would face it with the same practical courage that had carried her through every other crisis of her life.
She only hoped it would be enough.
***
The butler admitted her with an expression of carefully concealed surprise.
"Miss Whitcombe. We were not expecting you today. Lady Rosanne is in the drawing room, if you wish..."
"I am not here to see Lady Rosanne." Lillian's voice was steadier than she felt. "I am here to see His Grace. Is he at home?"
"His Grace is in his study. I am not certain he is receiving..."
"Please tell him I am here. Tell him it is important."
The butler hesitated, his professional composure flickering for just a moment. Then he nodded and disappeared into the depths of the house, leaving Lillian to wait in the entrance hall with her heart pounding against her ribs.
The minutes stretched like hours. Lillian counted the tiles on the floor, examined the paintings on the walls, did everything she could to avoid thinking about what she was about to do.
And then the butler returned.
"His Grace will see you, Miss Whitcombe. If you will follow me."
She followed him through corridors she now knew well, past rooms where she had taken tea with Rosanne, past the library where she had read Daniel's books, past the green sitting room where they had stood so close and spoken so openly just days before.
The study door stood open.
Daniel was behind his desk, papers spread before him, a quill pen in his hand that he did not seem to be using. He looked up as she entered, and Lillian saw something flash across his face; surprise, hope, fear, all tangled together in an expression that was gone before she could fully register it.
"Miss Whitcombe." He rose, setting down the pen with careful precision. "I did not expect to see you so soon. How is your father?"