as to obscure anything like a horizon. The thicker the fog, the better he liked it.
A world where he could see only a dozen feet ahead—and could not be seen himself beyond those dozen feet—had suited him splendidly. This sunny spring day, with damned birds chirping and an arrogant hare loping off toward the river, had no appeal at all.
“Come,” Lady Constance said, extending her hand. “We will speak of the project you invited me here to discuss.”
Robert winged his elbow at her—that was the conventional gesture offering escort, if memory served—but she instead took his hand in hers, her grip warm and firm.
“We have missed the cherry blossoms,” she said. “But the plums should be in their glory. Tell me of your project.”
Constance was humoring him, jollying him into taking the first few steps on the path to the walled orchard. Robert knew it, she knew it. He went with her anyway, because he had at least as much right to be on that path as the wretched hare did.
Make small talk. Distract yourself. “I would rather return to the garden. We can discuss the project there.”
“I would rather wear breeches. I often do, when I paint. Skirts get in the way.”
Picturing Constance Wentworth in breeches was, indeed, a distraction. “I have decided that if I’m to be the Duke of Rothhaven, I must behave as a duke. I must look like a duke, speak like a duke.”
“Quack like a duke?”
“Don’t be impertinent.” He failed utterly to suppress a smile. “I can no longer indulge my eccentricities, confident in the knowledge that my brother will carry on as head of the family in my stead. A duke sits for the occasional portrait.”
The path angled up slightly, which slowed Constance not one bit. “You’d like me to recommend a portraitist for you? Somebody who will mind his own business and not turn your nose purple?”
“No, thank you. I do not need a recommendation.”
“Then you’d like me to confirm the choice of portraitist you’ve already made. Offer reassurances that he—for only the male gender is suited to rendering portraits, of course—is passably competent.”
Constance picked up the pace as they climbed, and Robert had the sense she was annoyed. He did not turn loose of her hand, but rather, lengthened his stride to keep pace with her. She was by no means a tall woman.
“Passably competent will not do. This portrait must convey to the world that I am in every way appropriate to execute the duties of my station.” The traveling coach had been sent into York for a complete refurbishment for the same reason.
Appearances mattered.
“You are competent to execute the duties of your station,” her ladyship retorted. “Let us not belabor the obvious. That you have handsome features, a compelling gaze, and a fine masculine figure means any half-skilled apprentice could fashion a decent likeness of you.”
“Do you mean that?”
“Perhaps not an apprentice, but anybody half skilled. You’ll probably let him talk you into painting you wearing coronation robes, the usual castles and churning seas in the background. He’ll try to suggest you have blue eyes instead of green, but you must stand firm. Eye color is not a detail and your eyes are lovely.”
They had reached the orchard gate, which her ladyship yanked open and charged through.
Robert stood for a moment outside the walls.
“Well?” Constance said, holding the gate open. Her question, a single syllable, demanded something—an explanation or justification of some sort, for the human condition, for the evils of the day, for the imponderable mysteries of life itself.
Robert knew he ought to dash through the gate, slam it closed behind him, and refuse to budge until the comfort of darkness descended. Instead he marveled at the view of the Hall amid the fields below. The dread and resentment and whatnot were still lurking in his mind, but they slept like winded hounds, and let him look on his home—his home—from a distance for the first time since he’d been sent away.
“Rothhaven is not so dreadful when seen from this perspective.” The Hall looked peaceful, in fact, mellow old stone settled on a quilt of green. “Not so bleak.”
Constance re-joined him just outside the gate. “It’s a fine old place. Perhaps whoever does your portrait would be willing to paint a few landscapes. The portraitists are a snobby lot, generally, but we all pass through a landscape phase, once we leave the still lifes behind.”
He took her hand this time, a very bold overture on his part. She was not terrified of the out-of-doors, after all.
Though at the moment, neither was he. Uneasy, a bit anxious, possibly even agitated, but not terrified.
“I would like to leave my still-life phase behind,” he said. “What could I offer you that would induce you to paint my portrait?”
Constance studied him in that serious way of hers. “Do you mean that? You want me to paint your portrait?”
“I’m told as subjects go, I’m not hideous. I want no strangers under my roof strutting about and acting artistic. You are beyond half skilled, and I know you won’t turn my nose purple. I am offering you a commission to paint the portrait of the present Duke of Rothhaven.”
In Robert’s mind, until that moment, the Duke of Rothhaven had been his father, or a role inhabited by Nathaniel. He, himself, had been Robbie, or to old familiars, Master Robbie. Soames had called him Robert, for last names were discouraged at such an establishment.
Watching Constance inventory his features, her gaze roaming from his brow to his nose, to his mouth, to his hair, he felt himself becoming the Duke of Rothhaven. Standing a little taller, adopting a slight air of hauteur the better to withstand her perusal.
“Sitting for a portrait is boring,” she said, brushing his hair back from his temple. “You will grow testy.” She eased a finger under his cravat and ran it around his neck. “I will grow testy.” She gently steered his chin a half inch to the left, then a half inch to the right. “We will disagree.”
“I trust your judgment.” He would somehow trust himself to withstand her touch too.
She smoothed his lapels, fluffed his cravat, and made another adjustment to his hair. Her smile said she knew his compliment extended beyond her ability with paints and brushes.
“Let’s have a look at the trees,” she said, leading him through the gate. “I adore the scent of plum blossoms.”
She prattled on, about light and seasons, how many different types of green could shine forth from a single tree branch, and why coronation robes were too trite to be endured. Then she shook a branch and showered herself with petals, and Robert knew himself for a doomed duke.
She adored the scent of plum blossoms, and he adored her.