Honor's Players - By Holly Newman Page 0,12

this holding of mine?”

Atheridge blinked rapidly. “Of course, your lordship. This way, please,” he said, gesturing his hand forward.

Atheridge, his pasty complexion as gray as the dust on all surfaces, quavered and shook like a leaf in the wind as he conducted St. Ryne around. Mae Atheridge followed silently behind save for the swish of her long black skirts. Wringing his hands nervously, Atheridge begged pardon for the condition of the house, saying they received money only for their wages from Mr. Tunning, the estate manager. The lines around Mae’s mouth deepened, her brows sinking over deep-set eyes.

St. Ryne merely laughed. “This place is splendid! Better than I had hoped to find.”

Atheridge looked at him bemused. “B-beg pardon, your lordship?” he stammered.

“Do not change a thing. Do not clean anything. I dare swear the chimneys will smoke if lit. Best have the master bedroom chimney swept. The estate agent, what did you say his name was? Tonning?”

“Tunning, my lord.”

“Yes, tell this Tunning fellow I said to have it done and he’s to see it’s paid for. Oh, best have the library done, too. No other rooms mind you. I want it just as it is,” the Viscount said, grinning broadly as he looked about him. He began to laugh. “Yes, just as it is.”

The Viscount hurriedly declined their offer to ready a room for him, saying he would stay at the inn in the village and left, still grinning as he wiped a trace of cobweb off his coat sleeve.

“Well, that’s done it for us,” Atheridge said heavily to his wife.

“Hush, Tom Tunning will cover for us or it’s his neck, too,” Mae said sternly, her mouth set in a straight line and her hands clasped primly before her ample form. Silently they stood together on the front steps and watched the Viscount bowl down the avenue, turn the corner, and disappear from sight behind wildly overgrown hedges at the front gate.

St. Ryne returned to London early the next day and immediately began a round of meetings with his solicitors and bankers. These worthies had served the Earl of Seaverness’s family for many years and had heard many an unusual request. Though they were delighted to receive news of St. Ryne’s planned nuptials, they were aghast at his settlement requests; yet they drew up the paperwork and opened the accounts as he requested, each silently bemoaning their tasks and wondering, as others had before them, if the tropical sun hadn’t indeed affected his lordship.

St. Ryne’s friends quizzed him unmercifully concerning his week long absence, coming as it did hard on the heels of his encounter with Lady Elizabeth Monweithe. He only laughed but admitted the events were not unrelated; more they could not wrest from him.

“Pray, cease!” he implored when he was particularly besieged one afternoon at White’s.

“Well, old fellow,” Freddy said laying a companionable hand on his shoulder, “what is the story?”

“Freddy, Freddy, not you too?” St. Ryne asked looking over his shoulder. “All right, though I find this sudden interest amusing,” he said turning back to take in all those gathered around. “I tell you all, I merely went on a tour of my holdings. I have been away a year and I need hardly tell you the necessity of looking after my own.”

“Particularly if one has specific goals they wish to achieve,” Sir Branstoke drawled.

St. Ryne turned to look quizzically at him, but Branstoke only smiled as he bowed his way out of the group. Watching that enigmatic peer withdraw, St. Ryne’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully. Shrugging slightly, he turned back to the group before him and suggested a game of faro in order to bend their inquisitive minds elsewhere.

One crisp bright morning shortly thereafter, Freddy Shiperton paid a morning call on his friend to request his company on an excursion to Tattersall’s. There was a good looking gray there that he had his eye on and wanted St. Ryne’s opinion for he was a known connoisseur of good horseflesh. He arrived at St. Ryne’s home to learn from his butler that the Viscount was still dressing and had not yet descended. Freddy’s brows rose. It was not like St. Ryne to be so late about. Entrusting his hat and greatcoat to the footman, he informed Predmore he would announce himself.

He loped easily up the staircase taking two steps at a time before Predmore had an opportunity to object. He found St. Ryne in a distracted mood, yet dressed very elegantly in a jacket of blue Bath superfine