She blushed. “My housekeeper will prepare a private meal for you, Lord Rushborough. We will talk as soon as I am free.”
“My poor Lady Eden,” he murmured, looking into her eyes. “How dreadfully dull for you, to waste your many talents on unappreciative farmers. I am very glad I came.”
Hartley could feel all that they left unsaid, messages shared from a past in which Hartley had no part. But he understood well enough that Lord Rushborough had come with a purpose, and that was Eden herself.
“Shaw,” she said, “please see to Lord Rushborough’s horse.”
Now, indeed, he had been put in his place. He turned on his heel and went to fetch the dandy’s overbred hack. Rushborough offered Eden his arm, and the two of them strolled into the house.
Hartley tended the horse, whose mind was too weary to offer more than a sigh of thanks, and returned to the park to wait for Eden, every muscle in his body rigid with anger.
When she emerged, her smile was fixed like that of a painted figurine. Mr. Appleyard promptly intercepted her.
“My lady,” the curate said, “what a privilege it is that Lord Rushborough should visit our humble parish. We are blessed with an abundance of riches this day.”
“Yes,” Eden said, her mind clearly elsewhere.
“An honor. A very great honor. Is it not as I predicted, my lady? Your feast has been a success.”
“So it has.” Suddenly she noticed Hartley. “I thank you for all your help.”
Appleyard was not so oblivious as to mistake a dismissal. He glanced incuriously at Hartley and bowed himself away.
“Hartley,” she said, avoiding his eyes. “Thank you for looking after Lord Rushborough’s horse.”
She was trying to keep him at a distance, and he knew why. “You did not expect this Rushborough, did you?”
“No.”
“But you know him.”
“Yes. In London. We were… friends.”
Oh, no. They were much more than that. The definition of friendship among men did not include such glances as the marquess had given Eden.
Yet she had been married until a few months ago. Had she betrayed her husband with this haughty mortal lord?
“Why did he come?” Hartley asked, unable to keep the coldness from his voice.
“I had no idea that he had even left London until Lady Claudia…” Hidden memories played behind her eyes. “I am still in mourning, and Rushborough hates the country as much as I—” She stopped.
“As much as you do?” He curled his lip. “Are you glad he came?”
“I have known him for many years, and he is welcome here. He is also a peer of the realm, and you will treat him with respect.”
With a few sentences she demolished the closeness that had grown between them and set them back to where they had begun.
“I will treat him as he deserves,” he said.
“And have I deserved to be mocked and subjected to such disrespect?” she asked, matching his coldness. “If you disapprove of my guests, you are free to leave at any time.” She picked up her skirts and strode purposefully toward the troupe of musicians who had arrived from Ambleside to accompany the dancing.
Hartley did not follow. His thoughts slowed to match the dull, leaden pace of his heartbeat. Even when the music began and Eden called her guests to the first dance, he could not bring himself to walk away. He watched her preside over the first set and the next and the next.
He left the gathering just as the dancing ended and Eden announced the judging for prizes. She, Mr. Rumbold, and Mr. Appleyard consulted, and the crowd waited in a hush of expectation.
Hartley missed the outcome. He strode to the back of the house, unremarked, and entered through the servant’s door. He took the stairs two at a time until he reached the nursery.
Had Miss Waterson been there, he would have walked right past her. She was not. Donal lay in his trundle bed in the adjoining room, curled up on the sheets with the blanket tossed aside. In sleep he seemed far younger than his five years.
For a moment Hartley gazed down at his son. It would be easy to leave now and take the boy to the forest. When the searchers looked in that direction, as they eventually must, he and the boy would be through the gate to Tir-na-nog.