Chapter 21
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
“Do you know Oxford well?” Evelyn asked, her throat tight.
She knew she ought to make her excuses and head back into the shop, for she did not want to speak to the baron, or ‘Miles’ as he had insisted on being called, any longer.
But she could not muster the strength to be discourteous, not with her father’s voice in her head, telling her that she would finally be of some use if she would just get married.
“Alas not,” Miles replied.
He was amiable enough in a distant sort of way, and he was polite enough to try and make conversation with her.
“Are you enjoying it?” Evelyn willed the ground to open up and swallow her, so she would not have to endure another moment of this tedious chat.
Miles nodded. “Yes, very much so. It is very… diverting. Ashcroft Manor is delightful, but one can tire of places rather easily, especially in the countryside.”
“You do not care for the countryside?”
Perhaps there was a glimmer of hope. He had alluded to the fact that he did not care for London, but maybe he favored another city where she might find entertainment and community.
“Oh no, I do, but I do not care for other… um… countrysides,” he replied, grimacing. “I like nothing more than to be in my own home, my family seat, though work often calls me away.”
“I see…”
So I will be left alone, far from friends and civilization.
“How is your ankle?” he asked, fidgeting with the cuffs of his tailcoat.
Evelyn forced a smile. “Oh, much better.”
It was the truth. After all the dedicated hours of care from Joan and Laurence’s household staff, there was just some minor swelling, the yellowed bloom of a healing bruise, and some manageable pain. More of a dull ache, really, which she did not notice unless she thought about it.
“I am pleased to hear it.” He nodded as if she had answered him correctly. “I should hate for anything bad to happen to you.”
“That is… kind of you to say,” she replied, wondering why she could not find the nerve to tell him what she had told Selina: that he was only concerned because he was worried about losing the dowry she would bring to the union.
Instead, she made herself pretend that she was the least bit grateful for his pretense, acting as if she could not see straight through him.
An uncomfortable silence settled between them, so unbearable that she could practically hear the cogs turning in his head as he sought another topic of conversation. Or, perhaps, those were the cogs in her own head, desperately trying to think of something to say.
Is this how it will be? Silence? Discomfort?
Two strangers sharing a residence, and not all that often?
The latter should have felt like a blessing, but all Evelyn could envision was endless hours of the unpleasant kind of solitude, where loneliness becomes an all-consuming monster.
She would surely go mad if she had to endure such a marriage, isolated and alone, but not at all eager for her husband’s return: a lonely contradiction.
Just then, the bell of the modiste’s shop jingled. Hugo, Octavia, and Selina stepped out onto the street, granting Evelyn a longed-for reprieve.
“Excuse me,” Miles said abruptly, and dipped his head before turning and hurrying up the street, toward the public house where the rest of the gentlemen had gone.
In his absence, Evelyn unleashed a relieved breath, her body trembling all of a sudden. She had not realized the tension she had been holding in her muscles, her entire being seized up, but the unconscious effort now made itself known.
“Are you well?” Hugo asked, frowning at her.
Octavia seemed to notice at the same moment. “Evelyn, what is the matter? Did he say something unkind to you?” She took hold of Evelyn’s arm. “Goodness, you are shaking!”
“He was… perfectly cordial,” Evelyn replied, her voice catching. “I fear that I have… tried to do too much, too soon. It must be some… lingering effect of my ankle.”
Selina appeared on the other side of her. “I told you that you should be resting. Should we take you to a physician?”
“No, no, that will not be necessary,” Evelyn gasped, her blurry eyes seeking out the carriage. “I shall just… um… sit in the carriage for a while, so that I do not ruin the rest of your afternoon.”
“Nonsense,” Octavia said firmly. “I have bought what I needed to. We can return to the manor. All of us, together.”
Selina chewed her lip, as if that was not quite the outcome she had hoped for, but there was true concern in her eyes.
“I agree,” she said. “We should all return so that you can recuperate properly. A good cup of tea and the comfort of a bedchamber will serve you well. Besides, I did not see anything I wanted. Not really.”
She cast a sly look at Hugo, whose attention was entirely and intensely fixed upon Evelyn.
“Can you walk to the carriage?” he asked.
For a fleeting instant, Evelyn wanted to tell him that she could not and would need to be carried again, but then she remembered herself.
To be carried in his arms when it was necessary was one thing, but to be carried when she was perfectly capable of hobbling a short distance was quite another.
Not to mention the fact that Selina had staked her claim to him; Evelyn would not lose a friend over an odd, inexplicable feeling that she was sure would soon pass.
It is just because he has been kind to me, that is all.
“I can,” she said, and duly set off in the direction of the carriage, flanked on either side by Octavia and Selina.
“Back so soon?” Matthew’s voice greeted Evelyn’s return to the manor, grating on her last fiber of patience.
She limped further into the entrance hall with Octavia’s aid, Selina following close behind, and cast her brother a cool look.
He was leaning up against the newel post of the grand staircase as if he had been waiting there for some time, deliberately placing himself where he would be prominently seen. By Selina, most likely.
“Her ankle was troubling her,” Octavia said curtly, before Evelyn could. “You could assist us, or you could keep standing there, as useless as the very post you are leaning against.”
Matthew’s jaw dropped. He was not accustomed to being spoken to like that by anyone, much less a woman. But Octavia was Hugo’s sister; she was protected in a way that Evelyn was not.
“I only meant that I did not expect everyone to return so soon,” he said awkwardly, pushing away from the staircase to offer his help.
“I am quite all right,” Evelyn insisted, ignoring the hand that Matthew held out. “I shall grip the banister if I need additional support.”
He furrowed his brow and took Evelyn’s arm anyway. “I will not be accused of standing by while you hurt yourself again, if you should fall down the stairs,” he mumbled. “Do not protest.”
“I did not,” Evelyn said, secretly grateful to have him to rest against as she peered up at the stairs.
Were there always so many of them? Why did her guest chamber have to be so high up and far away?
She took a breath and was about to take her first step when Hugo ushered his sister aside and took Evelyn’s other arm.
He said nothing, did not even cast her a sideways glance, but when she moved, he moved with her.
And, for once, Matthew also held his tongue, his face a picture of concentration as he helped his sister up the seemingly endless staircase.
I have never had so many people tend to me, she realized with a sad smile, for both Octavia and Selina were coming up the stairs behind her, providing extra safety in case the gentlemen could not manage the task.
After an arduous twenty minutes, the odd party made it to the door of Evelyn’s guest chambers.
Hugo stepped back, though he remained in the doorway as Matthew led Evelyn the last stretch to her bed. There, Octavia and Selina took over, fussing over the patient while Matthew retreated, tail tucked, slinking past Hugo with a fear that provided a great deal of satisfaction to Evelyn.
“He scolded them during the hunt,” Octavia whispered, flashing a wink.
Evelyn shuffled back against a stack of pillows. “What?”
“My brother told me,” Octavia replied. “Said he scolded your brothers during the hunt.”
“It is true,” Selina interjected. “They were both helping me to untangle my reins after I got caught, and His Grace was… rather cross with them both for showing no concern about your whereabouts. It was thrilling, in truth, to see him show such authority, and to see your brothers so flustered.”
Evelyn’s gaze darted back toward the door, but Hugo had vanished from sight. He had said nothing about such a scolding when they had encountered one another in the woods. Had he thought it might hurt her to discover that her brothers did not care about her? Did he think that was new information?
“Luke turned bright red,” Selina continued. “I did not know if he was going to bow his head to the duke or punch him. Truly, for a while, I thought there might be a fight.”
“How did I not know about any of this?” Evelyn asked.
Selina shrugged. “With your injury, it did not seem important. I do wish you could have been there to see it, though.”
Evelyn sat back against the pillows, utterly astounded.
It was one thing for Hugo to spring to her defense in public, where it would be helpful to his reputation, but to defend her when she was not even there?
She did not know what to make of that… only that it further muddied the waters of her fraught mind and wayward heart.