CHAPTER THREE
Gabe leaned across the library table on his palms and raked his gaze over the plans for the new village bridge.
But he couldn’t concentrate on the drawings in front of him or on what Caleb Parker, the former Royal Engineer and long-time friend he’d hired for the project, was telling him about costs and timelines.
His pert-nosed, hazel-eyed distraction in sprigged muslin and honey-brown curls was upstairs at that very moment in her new bedroom, unpacking her trunks and moving into Grangely Park. Permanently. With him.
Gabe frowned in irritation, but only partially at the drawing. “How long until it’s completed?”
From the other side of the table, Caleb gave him an odd look. He began to answer, then stopped and asked instead, “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine.” Gabe narrowed his gaze on the detailed sketch of the bridge’s wide central arch. “Why do you ask?”
“No reason.” Caleb gestured at the drawings. “Only that you’ve asked that same question three times in the past ten minutes.”
Damnation. He pushed back from the table and rubbed at the knot of tension lodged in his nape. “Perhaps I keep hoping for a different answer.”
“Unfortunately, I can’t oblige. Mathematics is a stubborn mistress who allows no man to bend her to his will.” He shrugged with a thoughtful lift of his brow. “Except perhaps for Isaac Newton, and he got bopped on the head with an apple for his trouble.”
“Let that be a lesson to you, then,” Gabe warned sardonically. “Never mix your fruits and fractions.”
Caleb’s answering smile sobered as he tapped his finger on the penciled drawing. “It’s a good plan, Gabe. I’ve gone over all the numbers multiple times, including the costs and labor estimates. It’s going to be a fine bridge that will serve the village well.”
Gabe didn’t doubt that. But a lot more rested on this bridge than just a river crossing. “Are you certain it’s big enough?”
“We’re spanning a village river, not bridging to Ireland.
” Caleb softened that tease with a friendly twist of his lips, just as he had since they were boys together at Eton.
“You have no reason to worry. This bridge will last until our grandchildren’s grandchildren need to cross it. I stake my reputation on it.”
A more solid reputation Gabe would be hard-pressed to find, which was part of the reason why he’d asked Caleb to take on the project when it became clear that the old village bridge needed to be replaced.
A former Royal Engineer who had studied under Thomas Telford, Caleb had made his reputation in the final years of the wars against Napoleon by both constructing buildings and blowing them apart.
That reputation had only grown with every canal, viaduct, and road he’d planned across England in the years since Waterloo.
The other part of the reason was that Caleb was one of the few men Gabe considered a true friend.
He trusted Caleb to do the best job possible rather than flatter and fawn, the way so many men did simply because he was a duke.
He didn’t need a sycophant. He needed someone to tell him the bitter truth, no matter how hard to swallow, and only a few people in his life dared to do that. Caleb was one.
Helena, God help him, was another.
“I know this bridge is important to you,” Caleb called after him as Gabe crossed the room to the globe-shaped tantalus in the corner to pour both of them glasses of cognac. “You want it to be the locus of the village, and it will be.”
“It’s more than that.” He splashed the golden liquid into two crystal tumblers, then topped the bottle and put it back inside the tantalus. “It’s going to be the foundation of many more projects I have planned to improve all the tenants’ lives.”
He took his ducal responsibilities seriously, which included providing for his tenants and villagers, from the country squires and business owners right down to the pensioned widows and scullery maids.
He wanted a safe, clean, and prosperous village, not only because a successful village increased the fortunes of the manor house but also because it was morally just. Everyone deserved a foot up in life, especially the poorest and neediest, and it was ludicrous to think that they could better their lives themselves without help.
After all, a man couldn’t pull himself up with his bootstraps if he didn’t have a pair of boots to begin with.
Gabe would make certain the village had what it needed, both now and for generations to come. It would all start with this bridge.
“Once the bridge is finished, we’re going to build stone embankments along the river to keep the village from flooding in the spring.
New raised footpaths, too, resurfaced roads, and better drainage.
” Gabe handed the second glass to Caleb and looked down at the plans as he took a sip of brandy.
“I want to shore up the foundations on all the buildings, replace roofs, put down new wells, repair the stone walls in the fields—put back a common pasture for those in the village who want to keep their own cows or pigs to supplement their larders. We’ll need to build a new rectory for the vicar and his family, as well as a house for the physician I plan to hire so the estate will have its own dedicated doctor instead of having to send all the way into Canterbury every time one’s needed.
” His gaze scoured over the drawings even as he saw all the improvements coming together in his mind’s eye.
“New cottages on the other side of the west meadow, a roofed building in the center of the village for the market…”
Caleb muttered, “I think it might be easier to tear the village down and build a new one.”
Gabe smiled wryly at his old friend. “Do you know that’s exactly what Lord Cobham did at Stowe—moved three entire villages simply because they ruined his view from the main house?
” He contemplated the plans. “But at least he moved them. Lord Milton simply tore his estate’s village down and replaced it with ten miles of roads and pine plantations, leaving the villagers to scatter across the countryside wherever they could find a place to shelter. ”
“My argument, exactly.” Caleb pointed his glass at Gabe to punctuate his sarcasm. “This whole project would be so much easier if you were a selfish bastard.”
Gabe grinned and flopped down in a nearby reading chair. Thank God for friends like Caleb Parker. They would never let him forget he was just a man beneath his ducal robes.
Caleb set down his glass and rolled up the sheet of drawings. He asked casually but didn’t raise his gaze to look directly at Gabe, “And what does the future duchess think of your plans?”
“That doesn’t matter.” He dismissed the idea with a healthy swallow of cognac.
“It might. If you plan on upsetting the villagers’ lives for a decade or more with your projects, then you’re going to need her on your side to keep their feathers from being ruffled.” He arched a brow. “Or keep you from being completely plucked.”
Gabe wisely ignored his friend’s entendre. “I was clear with her this morning. Her concerns will focus on the house, not the village and tenancies.”
Laughter burst from Caleb. Letting the drawings fall back onto the table, he dropped into the chair opposite Gabe and struggled to catch back his breath. “Good Lord… Your meeting with at the solicitor’s went that badly, did it?”
Badly would have been a grandly optimistic description. “As well as expected.”
Caleb blew out a low whistle at that obvious dodge and asked bluntly, “What did you do wrong?”
Gabe’s eyes narrowed. “What makes you think it was my fault?”
“Because I know you.” Caleb’s teasing amusement sobered, and he added quietly, “And I know the hell you’ve been through in the last few years because of your late wife.”
Hell…another grand understatement. Being cast into hellfire would have been a reprieve compared to life with Clarissa. “I’ve put all that behind me.”
“Have you? That’s not what I gathered from Putnam’s nervous arrival in the tavern after you’d sent him scurrying out of his own office. He kept mumbling into his ale about marriage banns and wedding dresses, and none of it seemed to be in your favor.”
Gabe shoved himself out of the chair and muttered, “Damnable village is too small.”
He strode to the tall windows overlooking the south lawn. The late afternoon sun still lit the home park, but on the distant horizon, gray clouds gathered like a portent of an oncoming storm.
Of course they did.
He rubbed at the hard knot in his nape. “No, the meeting did not go well,” he admitted.
The look he’d seen on Helena’s face… Christ. Yet he would never allow himself to be put into a position of weakness again, certainly not by his wife, whomever she was.
“In my defense, I never expected her to actually accept the marriage offer in the first place.”
“What did you expect, then?”
“I don’t know… That she’d simply say the whole thing was a joke? That she would ask for money to make amends for the last time she agreed to marry me and then go back home?” He blew out a long breath and confessed, “That she might have been looking for revenge and a chance to jilt me in return?”
“She’s not Clarissa,” Caleb reminded him quietly.
“No, she’s not,” he said, as much to himself as Caleb, yet it didn’t bring any comfort.
In many ways, Helena possessed the power to wound him even more deeply than his late wife.
For God’s sake, if Clarissa had managed to destroy his faith in marriage and love, what might Helena be capable of doing to him, a woman who truly knew him and had once possessed his heart?