Page 17 of How to Cross a Marquess (The Way to a Lord's Heart 3)

The one who had died of a lung complaint after an ill-advised ride in the rain, Arthur remembered.

“Arabella was beautiful,” Helena said in an oddly flat voice. “Truly a ravishing creature. And her mother was—is—a very determined woman.” She glanced at Arthur. “I’m speaking as if you are a friend indeed.”

“Shall I give my word not to repeat anything you tell me?”

She waved this aside. “It’s nothing so dreadful. Roger was dazzled by the exquisite daughter. No one could blame him. And through the efforts of her mother, he wasbrought up to scratch, as they say. As a canny mother is meant to do. I don’t know the details, but I’m fairly certain he didn’t intend to marry right then. But he offered, and Arabella accepted.” She sighed again. “I was delighted actually. She had birth and breeding and wealth enough to satisfy my husband. I wanted Roger to be happy. We went down to London for the wedding. And as soon as I met her, I knew. Have you ever felt your spirits sink to the depths all in an instant?”

Arthur nodded encouragement. He sensed that she had needed to say this for a long time.

“It was too late of course. And I don’t know what I could have done. Well, I do know. Nothing. Raymond’s health was failing, and he was beyond pleased to see his son safely married. He thought Arabella a paragon.” She made a wry face. “Most men did.”

“Beauty can be compelling.”

“Oh yes. And so my son contracted an unhappy marriage. I could see that he knew it when they returned here from their wedding journey. But those were Raymond’s last days, you know, and I was distracted.”

“Of course you were.”

She met his eyes. “You know what it’s like to lose the person you’ve lived with, cared for, over many years.”

“I do.”

They shared a moment of silent communion.

“The first time Fenella and Roger met after she came home from Scotland, I saw what a mistake had been made.” She looked distressed.

Arthur waited. When she didn’t go on, he said, “Yes?” It seemed they had reached the crux of the matter.

“Never mind.” She stood up, tilting her parasol to hide her face again. “It’s very warm, isn’t it? We should go inside.”

Arthur had to be satisfied with this, and he rather thought he was.

* * *

“You have no family at all?” John asked Tom. He’d inquired before, but he never tired of hearing about Tom’s fortunate situation. It seemed to John that there could be nothing more liberating than being an orphan with no connections at all.

“Shh,” murmured Tom. The boys lay on a stream bank in the cool shadows of a willow. Tom’s bared right arm hung down into the water, very still. “Here comes a trout. Now watch.”

John leaned very carefully, so as not to alert the fish edging up the shallows, sheltering under the bank and beside rocks. He saw it slide out of sight near Tom’s hand, just the moving tail still visible. Tom’s hand, with fingers turned up, moved by imperceptible inches to that tail. Then it disappeared as he began tickling with his forefinger, gradually running his hand up the fish’s belly. John was nearly lulled himself when Tom suddenly tensed, twisted, and pulled the trout out of the water and onto the grass beside them.

John flinched. He couldn’t help it. “How did you do that?”

“Learnt it from a poacher,” Tom said. “The fish go into a trance, like, when you tickle them.” He threw the flapping, gasping trout back into the stream. “It ain’t legal to take fish though, unless it’s your own stream. You shouldn’t be trying it.” He dried his arm on the grass and rolled down his shirtsleeve.

“I could never.” John’s admiration of his new acquaintance, already vast, swelled further. “Where did you meet a poacher?”

“Just rambling, on the way south from Bristol. Fella nearly took my head off with his club before he saw I weren’t the gamekeeper.”

John was fascinated by Tom’s life history. “That was before you met Lord Macklin.”

“Yep.” Tom turned onto his back and gazed up at the sky through the willow branches. “’Twas the very next day I came across young Geoffrey thinking he was hid in a hollow log and took him back home.”

“To Lord Macklin’s son’s house.”

“His nephew.”

“Right.” John was consumed with envy for Tom’s rootless life. It seemed to him an ideal existence, to have no last name with its weight of expectations, to wander wherever you liked. “Are you still thinking of moving on?” he asked. “Just walking off one day in whatever direction feels interesting?” He’d been transfixed by this idea ever since Tom had mentioned it.

“I expect I will,” replied Tom idly. His attention had been caught by a pair of dragonflies darting over the surface of the water. “Look at the way their wings go,” he said.

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