Page 66 of The Lover's Eye
Isobel pretended that this was not a surprise to her, saying very little as she was dressed and had her hair styled for the day.
As she made her way to the breakfast room, she realized how unfamiliar Cambo House still was to her.Corridors and niches and rooms snaked around her in unexplored shadow—there were enough of them to make her nervous.
It was the grounds she was more motivated to explore.She had intended to ask Giles if he might walk with her after breakfast, but if Betsey was right, he would be preoccupied yet again—with Aurelia’s affairs.
The breakfast room was awash with sunlight, all remnants of the previous night’s storm blown away.Giles was reading a newspaper, but set it down at once when Isobel entered the room.
He rose and helped her into her seat, choosing the one nearest to him just as he’d done the previous day.“Good morning,” he said, his voice reserved.
“Good morning,” Isobel recited.She wondered how sleep weary and tear swollen her face appeared, and immediately wished she had spent more time before the looking glass.
“I was not sure what time you woke.I’ve not started without you.”
Dishes started coming in from the sideboard then, hot plates wafting steam and savory aromas of marmalade, toast, and bacon.As delicious as the spread was before her, Isobel had very little appetite, as if her stomach had been fitted into the long neck of a glass bottle and lodged there.
“Did you rest well?”
“Mm,” Isobel hummed vaguely.She did not wish to lie, but she also didn’t want to burden him with the reality she had slept but a few fruitless hours.“And you?”
“Not well, but that’s rather average for me, I’m afraid,” he said dryly.
Isobel felt his eyes drift to her plate several times throughout the meal, and she prayed he would not comment on the tiny morsels that actually made it to her mouth.He did not, but the energy between them had altered dramatically since yesterday.They seemed uncertain of everything about one another again.
“I came to you last night,” Giles said quietly, interrupting a long spell of silence.“But you were resting.I did not wish to disturb you.”
Isobel raised her eyes from the silver spoon making little waves in her teacup.“Mr.Finch had given me word that you would not be coming at all.”
His feathery black brows contracted.He had not yet shaven, and a prickly layer of black stubble shadowed his lower face.Most gentlemen’s whiskers greyed before their hair, but Giles seemed to be the opposite.It only enhanced the contrast of his features, intensified Isobel’s desire to touch him.She looked away.
“If that is the message he gave you, I am sure that’s what I said in the moment.However, it was not what I intended.I simply did not know how long I would be gone.”
“Gone?”
Isobel turned deeply inquisitive.She knew only that a body, presumed to be Aurelia’s, had washed up, and her husband had declined to spend his wedding night with her.But he had left home?
She lamented, not for the first time in the last day, that Giles had made her promise not to ask questions.She would be at an embarrassing disadvantage in her marriage, and in her home, if she was not kept abreast of the ensuing inquest by her husband or Betsey.
“Mr.Heppel, our local magistrate, called on me to participate in an inquest.It was a time-sensitive matter, and I’m afraid I must finish the business in the village this morning.”
Isobel marveled at his cool, collected tone.She had expected him to seem more perturbed by the whole affair.It should make her feel better that he had been forced to keep from her chambers, should it not?It had not been a decision purely of his own free will, as she had been thinking.
“I had been hoping to walk the grounds with you this morning,” she said, offering a little smile.“Perhaps tomorrow?”
“That would be lovely.”Giles mirrored her fond look and started to say more, but his gaze was broken by Mr.Finch’s entry.
“Pardon my interruption, my lord, but it is a quarter past,” said the old butler.His inky gaze stayed fixed upon Giles, even though Isobel sat nearer to him and well within his line of sight.It seemed he wanted to pretend she was not there at all.
“Very well, thank you, Finch,” Giles said, rising from his seat and patting his mouth with a napkin.His body seemed to incline toward Isobel, as if to touch her or kiss her head, but he straightened.She felt the lost opportunity of his touch like icy pricks in her skin.
“Travel safely,” she said softly.
“I will, thank you.I should be returned in time for dinner.”
♦
The Three Hens was a reputable establishment, but not any place Giles wished to be.That conviction fell upon him anew as he opened the old wooden door, faded and splintered by salt and wind.
The village tavern was much like any other.It’s true proportions remained elusive—the stone walls always felt close and encroaching, but the space managed to accommodate a dozen mismatched tables, which were usually under constant occupation by local men.
