‘Oh, how lovely.’
The mare wandered over to greet them. Alistair blew softly in her nose and she shook her head and pawed at the ground. ‘I know, Princess,’ he said. ‘You want to be let out.’
‘Princess? Is that her name?’
‘Her name and her nature,’ a voice with a faint Scottish burr said. The owner of the voice walked down the aisle towards them. He was a handsome man of about thirty, with sandy-coloured hair and bright blue eyes. He wore a homespun jacket and trousers of an indeterminate brown and a startlingly blue kerchief at his throat. ‘Welcome home, Your Grace.’
‘Jaimie, you rogue. Let me introduce you to my wife. Duchess, this is James McPherson, head lad here at Sackfield.’
‘Your Grace.’ Jaimie bowed with a little twirl of his wrist. ‘Welcome to my domain.’
There was something oddly familiar about the man, though Julia knew she had never met him before. Perhaps it was the intensity of his piercing blue gaze. ‘Thank you, Mr McPherson.’
‘Call him Jaimie,’ Alistair said. ‘Everyone else does, from the land steward to the scullery maid. Jaimie charms them all.’
Clearly her husband liked this man. His expression was less chilly than usual. Julia smiled. ‘It is a pleasure to meet you, Jaimie.’
Jaimie grinned back, then turned his gaze on Alistair. ‘So... Here you are for another summer visit.’
‘How is everything?’
The stable master began a report full of horses’ names and various ailments and other needs. While the two men communed, Julia wandered further along the row of stalls. The stables were a wonder of cleanliness and care. Jaimie McPherson clearly knew his business.
‘Bella!’ she exclaimed as the little mare hung her head over her stall door.
‘Found her, did you?’ Alistair said, coming up beside her.
McPherson must have left, for all of a sudden there was no sign of him.
‘When did she arrive?’
‘I sent her down a few days ago. I assumed you would want to ride during your stay here.’ He frowned. ‘Perhaps being unwell you would prefer going about by carriage.’
‘Oh, no. I am sure this will not continue. I would love to ride out with...on Bella.’ She had been about to say with you, but after their one ride he had not asked her to go with him again. She had no wish to put him on the spot, either force him to go with her when he did not want to, or have him tell her she was not welcome.
He rubbed Bella’s nose. ‘Good. Why don’t we hack out tomorrow morning, if you are sufficiently recovered by then? I have to look in on all my tenants over the next few weeks and it will be a good way for you to get to know the countryside and the people hereabouts.’
It seemed her fears were groundless. A lightness entered her chest. ‘I would love to. We also have to pay a call on the Marquess, once we are settled.’
‘I will send a note over and enquire when it might be convenient to call.’
She smiled up at him and he actually smiled back. A rather fleeting affair, but still a smile. Who was this charming man? And what had he done with her dark and dangerous dissolute duke?
* * *
The next morning, Alistair, at the sideboard, filled his plate with fluffy scrambled eggs and several rashers of bacon, his ears alert for the sound of his wife, who had promised to join him at breakfast. He had suggested she retire right after dinner and had been wishing ever since that she had objected to leaving him by himself.
He shook his head at the irritating thought and the resultant restless night. Theirs was a marriage of convenience. Even had she not been unwell, he would not have joined her in bed. No matter what. Of that he was certain. Practically certain.
He turned the moment she walked in.
The dreadful pallor of her skin of the previous day had been replaced by a healthy glow. She was dressed in the habit she had worn in Hyde Park. Ready to ride out. Gladness washed through him. Because she looked well, nothing else. Oddly the feeling was far stronger than circumstances warranted, likely brought on by how attractive she looked. And that was not a good thing.
‘Good morning, Your Grace,’ he said, taking his plate to his usual place at the head of the table. ‘It looks like a good day for hacking out.’
She smiled at him and his stomach lurched. He must be hungry. For food. He’d been up at first light. And not only because he hadn’t slept well. In Lewis’s absence, he’d been forced to attend to all of his correspondence rather than only the important items. After that he’d met with Jaimie and given him his orders for the day, or at least agreed on a plan of action. Giving Jaimie orders was like trying to instruct the tide when to turn.
He forked up a mouthful of eggs.
‘I am looking forward to seeing more of Sackfield,’ she said, browsing the platters of food.
‘I can recommend the eggs and the bacon if your digestion is up to it. Both come from the home farm.’
‘Thank you.’
Covertly, he watched her take a small amount of each and then add several strawberries and a slice of toast. It didn’t look like enough to keep a bird alive. No wonder she was so slender. He pondered encouraging her to take more, but did not want that wary look back in her eyes.
A look he’d put there with his deliberate coldness.
She sent him a curious glance. A pretty pink washed across her face. A blush. Hell, he was staring at her like a besotted schoolboy.
Or a newlywed husband.
He forced his attention to his newspaper, an article on horticulture, a comparison of the benefits of pig manure versus cow manure. Something that would cool any man’s ardour.
Or should. It did not blunt his awareness of Julia at his right hand, close enough for him to touch. His fingers twitched as if they might reach out and stroke her hand of their own volition. Abandoning the pretence of reading, he folded the newspaper and gestured to the teapot. ‘May I pour you a cup of tea?’
‘Thank you.’
He did so and watched as she added a generous dollop of cream and a mere sprinkle of sugar. She sipped it and sighed.
He raised a brow. ‘Is something the matter?’
‘Oh. No.’ She gave him a hesitant glance. ‘Why do you ask?’
‘You sighed.’
She blinked. ‘Did I? Oh, I suppose it was a sigh of gratitude. Robins insists I take chocolate in the morning and I really do not like it.’
‘Then tell her no.’
She pursed her lips, but her eyes sparkled with amusement. ‘I did mention it. She is determined I shall be all that is fashionable. Apparently, only dowds and dowagers take tea upon awakening. I fear I am a sad disappointment.’
She certainly was nothing of the sort. ‘She sounds more like a governess than a dresser.’
‘A very attentive governess.’
‘It is your decision, of course.’
‘Yes. It is.’ She shot him a conspiratorial smile. ‘This morning I tipped it out of the window into the flower beds while she was off fetching my bonnet.’
Confidences were a wonderful start to the day. ‘Hardly a satisfactory solution.’
Her smile faltered and he felt as if he’d kicked a puppy. ‘You are sure you feel well enough to ride this morning?’
‘I do.’ A puzzled frown creased her forehead. ‘I cannot think what came over me on the journey.’
Intending comfort, he took her hand in his, small and fine boned and so very breakable. ‘Travel sickness. It can affect the best of us at times.’
To his pleasure, she did not pull away. He brought her hand to his lips before reluctantly releasing her fingers. She was his wife, not his lover. ‘We will not overdo things today. I have only one call I must make.’
She gazed at him, her amber eyes strangely soft. ‘Did you re
member to send a note round to Beauworth? We should not be remiss in answering his invitation.’
‘As promised. I will let you know his response.’ He glanced at her barely touched plate with a sense of unease. Was she not well and simply afraid to tell him? ‘Jaimie said he thought it might rain later.’
She pushed the eggs on her plate around with her fork. ‘Do Jaimie’s predictions usually prove true?’
‘About half the time.’
A small smile played about her lips. ‘Good to know.’
Something painful tugged at his chest. Why, because he’d made her smile? Such nonsense. He picked up his cup and sipped at his tea. ‘Eat.’
For a moment he thought she might take issue with his request, or rather his order. Apparently his wife was another one who did not respond well to orders and nor did he usually find himself dishing them out to the females of the species. He preferred to get his way by more subtle means, but seeing her pick at her food when she had eaten so very little these past two days was concerning in the extreme. He offered her a mollifying smile as she glanced at him from beneath lowered brows.
To his relief, she resumed eating and, while he pretended to read his newspaper, she finished everything on her plate.
He rose to help her with her chair, enjoying the scent of jasmine as she stood. ‘Are you ready?’
‘But for my hat and riding gloves.’
He walked her out to the hall. ‘I will meet you outside.’
He paused in the hall to watch her mount the stairs, the sway of her hips in the full riding gown a delight to behold. He caught Grindle eyeing him with an indulgent expression and frowned. ‘Something wrong, Grindle?’
The man flushed. ‘No, Your Grace.’
Puzzled by his embarrassment, Alistair strode out the front door where Jaimie was waiting with Bella and Thor.
As he’d requested on the spur of the moment, a blanket had been tied on behind Thor’s cantle. Another impulse brought on by his wife’s company. He pressed his lips together to stop himself from requesting its removal. He was, after all, on his honeymoon in a sense.
Jaimie touched his cap and looked expectantly towards the front door.
Alistair narrowed his eyes. Apparently his duchess was fast becoming a favourite with the staff. As she had in London. He quelled a sudden welling of pride. Such emotions would be his undoing.
‘How is Bella this morning?’ he asked Jaimie.
‘In fine fettle. Well rested after her journey, but not in the fidgets.’
‘Good. Her Grace is an excellent horsewoman, but the terrain is unfamiliar.’
‘Bella will stay close to Thor.’
True.
When Julia joined them, she smiled at the stable master. ‘Good morning, Jaimie.’
The man gave her a shameless grin. ‘Your Grace.’
Alistair boosted her up on to Bella, handed her the reins and swung up on to Thor.
‘Where are we going?’ Julia asked as they trotted down the drive.
‘First to the home farm as we’ve some new arrivals, and then I thought I would show you one of the local villages and some of the park.’
Chapter Six
The home farm was a mile from the main house, outside the park and along a narrow lane. A middle-aged man with a ruddy face and greying-brown curly hair met them at the gate opening on to the lane.
‘Your Grace,’ Alistair said, ‘this is John Bestmore. He and his wife are in charge of the home farm.’
Mr Bestmore bowed and opened the gate. ‘Welcome to Manor Farm, Your Grace.’
Julia inclined her head. ‘Thank you.’
They passed through. The Duke dismounted. ‘All going well, John?’
‘Yes, Your Grace.’ They walked up the drive leading to a brick farmhouse and several outbuildings at the top of a hill.
‘As I reported last month, the lambing went very well. The wheat should give us a fair crop if the weather holds fine and Queenie has outdone herself.’
‘How many, John?’ Alistair asked.
‘Twelve, Your Grace, all healthy.’
‘Twelve what?’ Julia asked, thinking it would likely be puppies or kittens.
‘Piglets, Your Grace,’ Bestmore said. ‘Our Queenie is a prizewinner, she is. Best litters at the local fair three years running. Would you like to see them?’
Alistair raised a quizzical brow. ‘Smelly things, pigs.’
But even as he offered her the choice, she could see very well he intended to visit the lady in question.
‘I would love to see them.’
Alistair mounted up. ‘We keep the sty a little distance from the farmhouse,’ he said as the horses followed Bestmore up a fork in the lane, ‘at Mrs Bestmore’s request.’
The sty proved to be a brick-built three-sided affair with a tiled roof and a large enclosure. And while there was a certain earthy pungency about it, it wasn’t too unpleasant. Alistair helped her down and they looked over a gate leading into the covered portion of the sty. An enormous sow lay on her side on a stone floor spread with straw with her infants nestled against her, some suckling, others fast asleep. Queenie, a reddish-brown animal with black spots, opened an eye, grunted and closed it again.
‘Oh, they are so sweet,’ Julia said. ‘I love their little flat snouts and curly tails.’ They also made her feel a little sad. A reminder that she would never have a baby of her own. She swallowed down the lump in her throat. Wishing for what could not be was foolish.
‘They look fine, John,’ Alistair said, his attention focused on the scene before him. ‘Thank Mrs Bestmore. I know Queenie falls under her special care when it comes to table scraps and so forth.’
‘That I will, Your Grace. She would have been here to greet Her Grace, but she went to visit our daughter for a few days.’
‘Her Grace is sorry to have missed her. I’ll have Lewis set up a time for you and me to go over the accounts when he is back.’ He looked at Julia. ‘Do you wish to continue on to the village? I told Grindle we would pick up the post since we were out. We can circle around and see a bit more of the park that way.’
A question about her health without making her feel like a nuisance. A kindness. Here in the country, he seemed different from his cynical man-about-town persona. He cared about this estate and his people. And today it seemed as if he was including her in their ranks. ‘I’m game. We did not pass through a village yesterday.’
‘No. Boxted lies further along the post road than we needed to go.’ He helped her up on to Bella and, after a couple of quiet words with Mr Bestmore, mounted up.
They headed back past the farmhouse to the lane and a bare fifteen minutes later they entered a village with a triangular green bordered on one of its sides by a wide paved road. An inn bearing the sign of the Wheatsheaf dominated the other businesses around the green’s perimeter. A smithy, a baker and a haberdasher, Julia saw.
Alistair left her with Thor and entered the latter establishment. He returned a few moments later with a bundle of letters which he tucked into his saddlebag.
Her husband glanced at her as if assessing how she was holding up. ‘I hope I am right, that you are feeling quite well?’
‘I have never felt better.’ The queasiness that had beset her for the past two days had quite disappeared. It must have been something she ate. And yet there remained the odd sense of familiarity in her illness. Something she could not quite put her finger on.
‘Excellent,’ Alistair said. ‘I would like to show you our orchards. Our fruit trees are among the best in the county.’
They took the post road for a short distance and then turned up another lane that wound between well-kept hedges. ‘Is it your land on both sides?’ she asked.
‘No. Beauworth is over there.’ He waved a hand
.
‘So your estates adjoin.’
‘Here they do. For a short distance only. Further that way we run up against common land.’
She smiled at him. ‘So, we are to visit an orchard.’
‘I thought we might,’ he muttered.
‘I should like that.’
‘We have to pass it, anyway.’
Why was he sounding so defensive? Or as if he was attempting to convince himself of the wisdom of showing her a bunch of trees?
A short way along the lane, the fields gave way to the distinctive shape of fruit trees. He dismounted and opened a gate in the hedge. He walked the horses through and closed it again. Trees stretched in neat rows as far as the eye could see. It would be a grand place for children to play. Trees to climb and hide amongst. She decided not to mention those particular thoughts.
‘This must be a sight to behold when the blossoms are out.’
His expression softened. ‘It is. It smells glorious.’
‘What do you do with all the apples?’ She grinned at him. ‘You couldn’t possibly eat them all.’
‘We make some of the finest cider in the country.’ His voice held pride. ‘Sackfield has no trouble getting and keeping labourers once they have tasted our home brew.’
‘That is bribery, sir.’
He quirked a brow. ‘Simply good management.’
She laughed. ‘These trees are not the same as those back there. The bark looks different as does the shape and the apples are not as far along.’
‘You are right. Those we saw first were Nonpareil. Here we have Golden Harveys and down that way Lemon Pippins for cooking. There are also pears and peaches against the wall at the south end.’
The horses wandered along the gap between the hedge and the first tree in each row. Alistair drew Thor to a halt and leaped down. ‘There is something I want to show you.’ The note in his voice was different. Darker, sensual. It touched her like a stroke across her shoulders. A little thrill ran down her spine.
Unhesitating, she put her hands on his shoulders when he came around to her side of Bella. Grey eyes met her gaze, molten with silver. Heat rippled through her at the feel of his large hands on her waist. The slow sensual slide down his body, with his gaze locked her hers, left her knees weak. When he finally set her on her feet, he held her steady for a moment or two, giving her time to catch her weight.
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