Trenton Lord of Loss (Lonely Lords) (7 page)

“My papa was a viscount. Soon Uncle Drew will have the title.” 

“Coriander Brown, you are not usually so oblique. What is going on in that pretty head of yours?” 

“What’s oblique?” 

“Indirect. Hard to read. Subtle.” 

“I’m being polite,” Andy said, glancing over her shoulder at the stables, where Mr. Spencer was leading their cart-horse around to the carriage house. 

“Polite doesn’t preclude friendly, Andy,” Ellie chided. “Mr. Spencer might be a servant, but a stable master holds an important position, and he should be respected.” 

“Is Viscount Amherst important?” A nimble dodge, suggesting Ellie had made her point. 

“His is still a courtesy title. Your papa was a viscount in truth because your grandpapa died before we married.” Exactly one year before, and Ellie had been flattered that Dane hadn’t wanted to wait one week longer for the wedding. 

“So Viscount Amherst’s papa is an earl, and he’s still alive?” 

“Right on both counts.” This devolved into a discussion, not the first, of precedence, courtesy titles, and rank. By the time Ellie had led the child to the back terraces, Andy was arguing that churchmen shouldn’t figure into an earthly hierarchy because God hadn’t chimed in on the matter. 

“But God handed down stone tablets when He wanted to,” Andy insisted. “He makes bushes burn, and so forth, so it isn’t that God can’t speak up, it’s that He doesn’t view the matter as worth comment.” 

Ellie let the topic drop, because no illegitimate child wanted to dwell long on matters of succession and consequence. 

“Ladies.” Viscount Amherst rose to his considerable height from the same shaded table at which Ellie had eaten strawberries.

And cried.

And fallen asleep on the man’s shoulder. 

“This must be Miss Andy.” Amherst bowed over Ellie’s hand, then did the same for the child. “We’ve another pretty morning, but I thought we’d start with breakfast today, then wander it off in the gardens.” 

“I like breakfast,” Andy volunteered. 

“Just a nibble, Andy,” Ellie warned. “You’ve had your porridge.” 

Amherst held Ellie’s chair for her, then Andy’s, something Ellie could not recall the girl’s father ever doing for her.

Amherst took the chair next to Ellie. “Why, when we’re young and spending our days racketing about at a dead gallop, are we to subsist on porridge, pudding and toast, but then, when we’re old and gouty and sitting about all day, we’re to stuff ourselves with steak and kidney pie, crème tarts, and port? What do you think, Miss Andy?” 

“I think I like scones with butter and jam even if it’s breakfast. Mama does, too.”

“A woman of taste and refinement, your mama.” He shared a look with Andy that Ellie didn’t entirely understand. “My gardens are on her agenda, lucky me.” 

“You are lucky,” Andy assured him earnestly. “Mama is a dab hand with the flowers, and her scent garden is the envy of the shire.” 

With every appearance of rapt attention, Amherst set about buttering Andy a scone. “Why is that?” 

While Ellie munched her fresh, flaky scone, his lordship and Andy discoursed vigorously on the appeal of spicy versus floral scents, about which Ellie would not have guessed either of them had knowledge or opinion. Amherst had the knack of appealing to the girl’s quick sense of humor without shading into adult innuendo, and for the first time—the first time
ever
—Ellie could see that Andy had the potential for considerable feminine beauty. 

“What of you, Lady Rammel?” Amherst sat back, chilled glass of lemonade garnished with strawberries in his hand. “Which is your favorite scent for indoors?” 

“On my person or about a room?”

“A room. Let’s say, a family parlor.” 

He looked as if he expected her to answer, as if her answer mattered, and not simply so a pair of adults could demonstrate the art of small talk for an attentive child. “Choosing a scent for a family parlor is a challenge.” 

“You put roses in our family parlor if they’re in season,” Andy reminded her.

“I do,” Ellie said, pleased Andy would notice. “That’s in part for their color and appearance. If I had one fragrance to grace my family parlor, it would likely be something brisk and friendly—balsam maybe, or mint. Lavender is a favorite, and rosemary is pleasant.” 

“She makes lists,” Andy confided to their host. “Mama can go on like this, so don’t ask her what her favorite dessert is, or who was the best monarch, or the worst, and so forth. Don’t ask her who her favorite cat is, either.”

“I appreciate the warning. I’d appreciate a jaunt through the gardens, too.” 

“I’m for that.” Andy was on her feet, her chair scraping back loudly against the flagstones. 

Amherst rose more slowly. “Now, Miss Andy, you’ve deprived me of the chance to hold your chair and show off my manners to your mama.” 

Andy grinned, unaware that her manners had just been corrected. “You can show off your pony for me when we’re through with the gardens.” 

“She bargains like a female,” Amherst observed, holding Ellie’s chair then offering her his arm. While Andy gamboled ahead, his lordship tucked Ellie’s hand over his arm. “I would have thought Cato might have introduced Miss Andy to Zephyr already.” 

“Andy is shy of some people. Where are you taking me, sir? I have a plan for how these gardens will be rescued.” 

“I’m taking you to the scent garden, or what remains of it. Miss Andy is delightful, and she’ll be breaking hearts in very short order.” 

He didn’t have to say that, but his observation pleased Ellie inordinately. “I don’t know if she’ll capture many hearts. Dane didn’t leave her much of a settlement.” 

“Her dowry is her quick wit, her charm, and her integrity. My sister, Leah, snagged a formidable earl with less, and Nicholas wasn’t looking to marry for love.” 

“Your sister had no dowry?” This did not comport with Ellie’s idea of how an earl’s daughter would be treated.

“My mother set funds aside for her, but my father pilfered them, for which transgression he now rusticates at Wilton Acres over in Hampshire.” 

“Good heavens. How unfortunate for your sister.” But how lovely for Ellie that she’d be deemed worthy of such a confidence. To be reminded that the rest of the world had problems, in an odd way also made grief less powerful.

“Not well done of me,” Amherst said, “airing the family linen like that. As for Miss Andy, she has you. You have time to see to her funds, and for now that will be enough.” 

“I’m not sure,” Ellie said, while Andy sniffed at a rose. “Drew is coming down later today to look over the horses, and I’m concerned he might start throwing the title around to insist Andy be sent off somewhere.” 

“Drew’s prospective title is unavailing.” Amherst sounded very sure of his point. “Unless Dane left him some sort of guardianship, Drew can strut and paw and make noise, but all he has is a gentlemanly concern for the child, not a legal right.” 

Ellie was nearly certain Dane had left
her
some sort of legal authority in the will, but what did a will matter when a wealthy man sought relief from the courts? 

“Drew can get legal authority over Andy, can’t he?” she asked. 

“Why would he?” 

Ellie considered the question while Andy bent a tall rose cane down within sniffing range. “I’m not sure. I don’t know the man well, and neither did Dane, which is odd, because they’re both only children—that is, Dane
was
an only child and Drew his heir.” 

Amherst came to a halt, their arms still linked. “This concerns you? This visit from your cousin-in-law?” 

“Yes. Maybe I hadn’t admitted it to myself, but it does. Deerhaven is safe, Papa saw to that, but it never occurred to me Andy might not be.”

Grief could make a woman stupid, could make her spend entire days staring out windows or wandering her house and seeing only draped mirrors and an empty chair in her late husband’s estate office. 

“Invite me over for dinner tonight,” Amherst said slowly, as if the notion had only now occurred to him. “I’ll pry Dane’s agenda from him over the port.” 

“You’ll pry…?” Ellie fell silent, knowing exactly what Amherst offered. She was in mourning, but the condolence calls had started, and Amherst was her closest neighbor. 

“You’re in the country,” he pointed out, as if reading her mind. “A neighbor popping over to greet the prospective title holder is not a two-week house party.” 

The relief she felt at his suggestion made the decision for her. “We dine at eight and do not dress.” 

“Thank God for that, and here we are, in the garden of not-quite-paradise.” 

“He has loads and loads of spices and flowers here, Mama.” Andy was making her way nose-first from one plant to the next. “And loads of weeds.” 

Ellie’s basket of tools had already been brought out from her dog cart, a sign of Mr. Spencer’s attentiveness. 

“If you send your head gardener by, my lord, I’ll discuss the plan of attack with him, and we can devise a schedule to amuse the gods of weather.” 

“My gardener’s name is Abel. He’s on good terms with those weather gods. Ladies, my thanks. You’ve only to send to the house if you need anything. Miss Andy, a pleasure making your acquaintance, and if you need a break, you might consider introducing yourself to the pony in the corner stall with the low door.” 

Andy left off inventorying the garden long enough to bob a curtsy and flash a grin, and then Ellie was alone with her daughter and the riot-in-progress of Lord Amherst’s scent garden. The state of the flowers nicely complemented the riot-in-progress that was her interior landscape as she watched Amherst striding back to the house. 

He’d been in the sun, and unlike the fair, Nordic variety of Englishman—unlike Dane—Amherst tanned, making his dark eyes more luminous and giving his dark hair faint, red highlights. 

And again, unlike Dane, Amherst was comfortable with a girl child. He was a papa, after all, a papa to a daughter and easy with it. How Ellie envied Amherst’s wife—who must be off visiting his sister with the children—to have a man like that as her partner in life. Lady Amherst, Ellie concluded as she pulled on her gloves, must be so busy enjoying her marriage and raising her daughter, she had no time to see to the gardens here at Crossbridge.

***

Catullus Sandringham Spencer had experience with all kinds of women: wealthy, poor, exalted, humble, just out of the schoolroom and approaching their dotage. For the most part, females made sense to him. He flirted and flattered or sparred with them until he understood what they were about, then he gave them enough of what
they
wanted to get what
he
wanted. Bless their hearts, the ladies understood the game and enjoyed playing it with him—usually. 

This type of female, however—small, of tender years and solemn eyes—flummoxed him. As Andy leaned over the half-door to stroke her hand down Zephyr’s nose, Cato mentally sorted through his tools and tricks, discarding them one by one. Flattery, flummery, flirting, none of them would work. 

In desperation, he seized upon his most rusty and unpredictable strategy: Unvarnished Truth. 

“Don’t go running off,” he said quietly. The child whirled, spooking the pony to the back of her stall. “Ah, you see? You and Zephyr were having a fine, friendly visit, and now she’s misplaced her composure.”

Miss Coriander Brown, by contrast, had not misplaced her composure, though she was clearly scared and damned if she’d let it show. 

He hunkered next to her. “Blasted saints, child. Do you think I’ll sell you to the tinkers?” 

She turned away and stretched out her hand to the pony. “Mama would fetch Lord Amherst if you did. You shouldn’t use bad language.” 

And here he’d moderated his language in deference to her youth. “My apologies, but bad language is fun.” 

The girl regarded him through eyes very like her papa’s, clearly unimpressed by Cato’s honesty. 

Time for some charm. 

Cato fished in his pocket and came up with half a carrot. He broke it in two pieces and laid one flat on his palm, holding it out to the gray pony. 

“You keep your hand level, and the pony will lip the treat from your hand without biting.” 

“I know how to feed treats.” The child took the other half of the carrot without touching Cato’s palm. She fed the greedy little beast easily then speared him with another look. 

“I’ll not bite you, either,” Cato said, turning and squatting against the door of the stall. “You and I need to talk.” 

“You want to talk about what I saw.” 

Cato ran a hand through his hair, mentally reciting a quick Glory Be. “What you saw was…a mistake. A harmless mistake.”

On everybody’s part. 

“You hit my papa.” She said it with such a frown, Cato had the sense she was fishing, looking for verification, as if she couldn’t fathom that anybody would strike her dear, departed papa. 

“I slapped him once.” He’d backhanded the man. “That was the end of it.” 

She stroked small fingers over the pony’s velvety nose. “Papa died that morning. He was riding the horse you lent him.” 

“Bla—blessed saints.” Cato rose, paced off and turned, because hearing the loss in the child’s tone made him toweringly uncomfortable, as did the conclusion she’d so easily reached. Dane Hampton had been a self-indulgent, overgrown boy, and he hadn’t been worth the girl’s sorrow. Telling the child so would be pointless—and mean. Cato could be mean, though only to full-grown men, intransigent mules or others he considered his equal.