The Heart's Companion - By Holly Newman Page 0,65

to her feet. "I shall meet you in the Great Hall then." She turned to leave. At the door she stopped, turning around to address Royce.

"I beg your pardon, my lord. I fear I’ve been rude. Will you forgive me?" She smiled sunnily, her confidence returning.

Royce, still on the couch, bowed at the waist in a parody of the formal action. Millicent, glowing as if she’d received some precious gift, hurried out the door.

The earl shook his head at the closed portal. "I know she is a relative of yours, but I cannot say I like the woman. She has the most grating manner I’ve encountered in years."

Jane laughed. "Ah, then be forewarned. She has her marital eye on you."

The earl feigned an abhorrent shudder. "Then I shall look to you to protect my good name, Miss Grantley," he said teasingly.

"Which name?" she countered, rising to go and change. "Royce, or the Devil’s Disciple?" She hunted around for her shoes.

The earl, finding her shoes under the settee, gently threw them at her as his answer. Jane’s laughter seemed to linger in the parlor long after she’d gone.

Though Jane disliked keeping company with Millicent, she owned it was a fine day for a drive. An alchemical haze hung low across the land, creating a golden, gemlike glow. Everywhere one looked, it was like looking at a different Turner landscape. There was a magical sense of beauty and unreality in the air, hardly the clouds of darkness Mrs. O'Rourke claimed to be gathering.

Harnessed in the traces, the old mare trotted smartly down the lane as if it, too, were infused with magic. With her hands light on the reins, Jane settled back to enjoy the drive. Tall, spreading trees provided shade, broken only by the occasional dappling of sunlight filtering past the dense, leafy growth.

A small, contented smile hovered at the corners of Jane’s lips, her thoughts cycling back repeatedly to the earl and their last conversation. Pink touched her cheeks. Did his manner hint at a measure of warm regard for her? Did she dare trust her feelings?

She was forced to admit to an elemental attraction for the man. But she could not let herself be so vulnerable as to show her feelings. That would leave her distressingly open for pain. She did not think she could take that from him. She feared she was in as much danger of mistranslating his actions as society was wont to do. How did one judge? How did one separate fact from fiction without visible evidence? Why was it taught from the cradle that open communication with a member of the opposite sex was impossible?

Her hands tightened on the reins, and the old horse broke into a canter.

"Jane!" protested Millicent, holding onto the carriage side, "what are you about? I thought you could drive!" she accused as Jane brought the horse under control.

"I’m sorry, cousin, my mind wandered. It won’t happen again."

"See that it doesn’t," her cousin snapped.

Jane thought it interesting to note that now Millicent had achieved her ends of getting Jane to go driving with her, she’d reverted back to form. The question that plagued Jane’s mind was why? But that seemed to be only one of several unanswerable questions that plagued everything she did and the actions of everyone she knew.

"Do you know where Royceland is?" Millicent asked a moment later while carefully smoothing her gown.

"Yes."

"Let’s drive by it. I should love to see it. Is it a dreadful old pile?"

"Not at all. I judge it to be no more than one hundred years old. Penwick Park is much older. I understand there was another house here at an earlier time, but it was torn down to build the current edifice."

Millicent nodded, as if she were filing away the information for further consideration.

"That turn up ahead would take us by the house," Jane added.

"Gracious, it is not far from Penwick Park, is it?" Millicent asked with a trace of annoyance.

"You’re right. Unless one is intimately familiar with the property boundaries, it is easy to stray from Penwick to Royceland, as the children do with distressing regularity," she said, laughing.

"There’s no fence or hedge between the two? That is one of the first things I should do."

Jane smoothly turned the horse down the lane that wound past Royceland. "Why? The families have been on agreeable terms for generations. What purpose would a fence through the wood serve? It’s not as if the boundary were going through a farmer’s field."

"Really Jane," groaned Millicent.