Chapter 12
He supposed he knew, from the moment that Honoria returned home with the news, that it would only be a matter of time before Seraphina Vane’s card appeared on his side table. Still, when he saw her name, and a familiar script he had not seen in years, his heart skittered into his throat.
Might I have the favor of calling on an old friend, Lord Marwood? Unless you have forgotten the Miss Everett of your past.
He noticed that, though the card had arrived from Vane cottage, she had not included her new surname anywhere else on the missive.
He wondered if this was intentional and, if so, what purpose such an omission would serve.
Perhaps she thought he should overlook the painful parts of their past. If so, she was sorely mistaken.
Adrian considered for a moment, Rosalind’s advice running through his mind.
He knew she was right—it was the sensible thing to simply accept and put the past behind him.
In the end, however, he could not find such leniency in his own heart.
He wrote back, refusing to receive Seraphina, and sent the response with his personal footman.
As the servant strode away, Adrian caught sight of his friend walking up from the stables.
“Oliver!” he called out, striding down to meet him. “Did you know Honoria is staying on another week, at least? You were out last night, when we dined—she insisted she had seen you in the village, but that you did not have a chance to talk.”
“Yes,” Oliver smiled. “And, as fortune would have it, I am also planning on staying on another week. Unfortunately, I have had news that my cousin’s place is being papered, and a man cannot be expected to sleep among workmen.”
He started walking towards the house, concealing his expression rather transparently from Adrian, who strode to keep up with him.
“Of course,” Adrian nodded gravely. “The cousin in question has not previously been the sort of man to paper anything, much less his house. How very odd.”
“There is no accounting for taste, I am sure,” Oliver agreed wisely.
Adrian thought to himself how exquisitely well-timed these particular workmen must be, to line up with Honoria’s surprise visit home so perfectly. “Well,” he said, letting the matter go at present. “Your cousin’s loss is our gain. I am certain Honoria will feel the same.”
“About what?” Honoria asked brightly, coming into view as they climbed the stairs to the house. She was leaning against the doorframe, dressed head to toe in frilly blue silk, spinning a bonnet by the ribbon strings.
“About Oliver’s stay,” Adrian said.
“You are staying?” Honoria asked. Her tone was innocent enough, but Adrian thought he saw a flicker in her eyes. “You did not mention anything about it yesterday afternoon when we crossed paths in the village.”
“We hardly had a chance to speak,” Oliver said. Adrian saw a red flush reach his ears. “You were already quite engaged in conversation with another gentleman.”
“Oh, that was just Johnny Elliot,” Honoria said dismissively. “A friend from childhood.”
Ah. His jealousy is transparently endearing, Adrian thought, watching Oliver stumble through a response.
“Well,” his friend said. “He seemed a pleasant enough fellow.”
“How would you know?” Honoria asked archly. “You scurried away from our conversation with clearly more important things to do.”
Adrian sighed, wondering if his sister was intentionally blind to Oliver’s affections, or if she was torturing him on purpose. He turned to climb the steps inside, but his sister’s voice halted his steps before he did so.
“Are you going over to Thornefield Hall for the dinner tonight, brother?”
“Dinner?” he asked, turning. “I had not heard about it. Were you invited?”
“No,” she said, laughing, “but I thought, considering your recent attachment to the place, you might have been. There was gossip of it in the village. Some handsome stranger—a Mr. Edward Crewe, if the baker is to be believed—is dining at the hall.
He is apparently a member of the family, and there is great excitement among the servants about his presence.” She leaned slightly forward and whispered with mock conspiracy, “The baker had to send over her best loaves for the occasion.”
“No,” Adrian said slowly, “I was not invited. If it is a family matter, Miss Thorne would doubtless have thought it strange to include neighbors in the event.”
“But you are not just a neighbor, are you?” Honoria asked sweetly, tilting her head to one side.
“I am precisely that, and no more,” he said, turning on his heel and climbing the stairs two at a time. He had business to attend to, and a well-timed evening ride had just been added to the schedule.
***
The summer light had faded completely as Adrian rode out late that evening.
He dressed in a dark overcoat and a wide-brimmed hat to appear a bit more mysterious, saddled his stallion, and rode casually along the grounds.
He wanted it to look as though he was out on a casual evening ride, but in truth his intentions were more calculated.
He had guessed at how long a dinner would take to transpire, and meant to ride quietly in the trails around the estate until he caught sight of the visitor’s horse led around to the front door.
As he neared the estate, however, he saw that no subterfuge would be necessary.
The evening seemed to have come to an early close—the horse was already in place, a footman holding the reins, and Adrian caught a glimpse of Rosalind’s slim figure in the lamplight as her companion bowed and made his way quickly down the steps.
Adrian tugged at his own reins and cut across the yard at a light gallop, coming up to a halt part-way down the drive and tipping his hat to Rosalind as Mr. Crewe rode his direction.
In the gathering dark, the only light between them was a small lantern the other man held.
Adrian had ridden by the light of the silver moon alone.
Mr. Crewe stopped suddenly, drawing his horse up beside Adrian. Up close, he was not entirely as Adrian had expected. He bore a wide smile—too wide for meeting a stranger in a darkened courtyard—and had long hair pulled fashionably back at the base of his neck.
His clothes were fine and elegant, but as Adrian watched him he caught a cruel twist of the lips that fit more with his initial guess about the man’s appearance. Here was a person who looked the part of a gentleman but was, beneath it all, not to be trusted.
“Good evening,” Adrian said coldly, putting a finger up to the brim of his hat.
“Odd, to run into a gentleman on the road at this time of night,” Mr. Crewe said, mimicking the hat tap of greeting. “I am just leaving a very pleasant evening of conversation at Thornefield. Were you planning to take my place in their drawing room?”
Adrian shook his head casually. “I am a neighbor, out for an evening ride,” he said. “Nothing more. My lands border Miss Thorne’s.”
“Ah, but they are not Miss Thorne’s lands, are they?” Mr. Crewe corrected him, clucking in disapproval as though Adrian had answered a question wrong in a schoolroom. “They belong to young Harry—sweet chap that he is.”
Adrian did not stoop to engage with this volley, which seemed designed purely to discredit Rosalind.
Instead, he smiled quietly, and waited. In his experience, most men could not outwait a long silence, and in the end Mr. Crewe proved his point, shifting uncomfortably and adding, “You are Lord Marwood, are you not?”
Adrian nodded silently.
“I have heard of you, during my stay in the village. I am Mr. Crewe—Rosalind’s brother.” Adrian noted that the other man did not specify he was a stepbrother only. Crewe continued, “I hear that you spend quite a bit of time around Thornefield.”
“As I said, we are neighbors.”
“But you are here often enough, for a man who does not own the house.” There was a cold edge in Crewe’s voice, and in the lamplight his eyes flickered darkly.
“You are here often as well,” Adrian said, his own voice low and dangerous. “For a man who is not truly Miss Thorne’s brother.”
The other man grunted in frustration, dug his heels into his horse, and rode off into the night without another word. Adrian turned before leaving and caught sight of Rosalind still standing at the top of the steps.
He wondered how much—if any—of that conversation she had overheard, raised his hand again in greeting, and smiled to himself when she raised her hand in response. You are not alone, he thought, willing the truth to cross the distance between them and settle in her heart.
He turned his own mount back onto the main road, intending to cut around towards the woods and take a wider path homeward through the moonlight.
As he neared the road, however, he heard the rattle of carriage wheels coming towards him.
It was dark, and he had no lantern, so he pulled off into the weeds along the roadside to avoid a collision with the other vehicle.
As he did so, he noticed the elegance of the gig in question—trimmed with fine gold filigree and the most beautiful velvet curtains.
He would have recognized that carriage anywhere—it had borne, once upon a time, the aging figure of Mr. Vane during his courtship of Seraphina. It was evidence in the extreme of what the world had assumed was true of Mr. Vane at the time—affluence and elegance. In the end, neither had been true.
He raised his hand to the driver, and the carriage slowed.
“Good evening to you,” he ventured.
“And to you,” the driver responded, tipping his hat.
“From whence are you coming?” Adrian asked, eyeing the curtains of the carriage. They did not so much as breathe in the wind.
“The village.”
“I am an acquaintance of Mrs. Vane,” Adrian said, his heart suddenly in his throat. “Might I have a word?” He nodded towards the curtains.
The driver shrugged. “If so, you should ride to the village inn. She had a meeting there, and then a friend at a nearby estate was going to pick her up for a weekend stay. I shall not be returning to fetch her until Sunday afternoon.”
“Ah,” Adrian said, his heartbeat returning to normal. He felt a twinge of disappointment, and waved the driver on.
It was not that he longed to see Seraphina’s face again, or to make her acquaintance—his refusal of her attempt to visit had demonstrated as much, he hoped—but he was beginning to realize a terrible truth: until he did receive her, and face his past head-on, it had a terrible sort of hold over him.
When he first saw her carriage, he had been almost relieved. The moment of meeting promised to be imminent and, once overcome, behind him at last.
He watched the wheels recede and turned homeward. Nothing was behind him, it appeared. Even his past lurked, unresolved, just ahead.