LITMIR.BIZ

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voice steady. ‘I doubt the usual domestic agencies would be of any use. Perhaps an advertisement in the newspapers?’

      ‘What kind of hermit had you in mind, Father?’ Lucas was apparently fully behind the scheme. ‘As it is a Gothic chapel then a Druid would be unsuitable.’

      ‘I envisage a reclusive scholar,’ their father declared. ‘Once a monk, then expelled from the monastery by King Henry, now living alone in the ruins with the books and manuscripts he has saved from the Dissolution.’

      ‘You intend him to actually live there, Papa? That way of life might be too rigorous for a modern applicant to accept,’ Caroline ventured.

      ‘Of course I have considered that. The chapel exterior will disguise a one-roomed cottage, just as I built accommodation for the gamekeepers into the folly tower.’

      ‘And his duties?’ What did a hermit do anyway? Herm, perhaps. Somehow she managed not to give way to her feelings. It would be all too easy to collapse into hysterical laughter this evening.

      ‘I will want him simply to be there when anyone passes by. He must keep the hermitage in good order and maintain the area around it. I have no objection to him carrying on his own work—studying, writing and so forth—if he is a genuine scholar.’

      ‘Will we be returning to Knighton Park soon, Papa?’ Headlong flight down the hallway to the Earl of Edenbridge’s front door was not enough, it seemed. Headlong flight out of London was beginning to feel much safer. ‘The Season is drawing to its end in a few weeks.’

      It had been the familiar round of socialising, of eligible young men who flirted and danced and then sheered off as soon as they encountered her father. Her looks were passable, her breeding acceptable, her dowry reasonable but her parent was the kind of father-in-law that bachelors were warned about. If she had ever met anyone who had wanted her for herself, loved her, then that would not have mattered, she supposed. But that had never happened and she was well aware of the whispers that Lady Caroline Holm was perilously close to being on the shelf. Such a pity, the old cats gossiped, such a charming girl. But... And then she had seen Gabriel Stone.

      ‘We will stay in London for June,’ her father said, jolting her out of her reverie. ‘That will give the builders time to finish the hermitage while Lucas and I select the ornamental details and find the hermit.’

      No escape then. Unfortunately it was not Lord Edenbridge from whom she felt she needed to escape, it was her own absolutely irrational desire to see more of him. Playing with fire, Caroline thought. He is dangerously attractive and he is not for me. The man is downright wicked. As well as beautiful in that wild gypsy manner.

      Her food was becoming cold. Caroline applied herself to it and told herself she was suffering from an attraction that was as ridiculous as any schoolgirl’s tendre for the music master. Only that was usually a hopeless passion, quickly forgotten. This was something that was going to lead her into the man’s bed and might, if she was not very careful, end in scandal.

      * * *

      ‘The post, my lord.’ Hampshire proffered the salver with so much silent emphasis that Gabriel picked up the pile of letters immediately, intrigued to see what had interested the butler.

      The letter on top, of course. Sealed with a plain wafer, posted in London and addressed in an elegant feminine hand. He lifted it to his nose. Unscented and good quality paper.

      The note inside was to the point. The package has been received. I am most obliged for your prompt attention to the matter. There was not even an initial.

      ‘My prompt attention, indeed.’ Gabriel tapped the note on the table. Lady Caroline would have done better to have written begging him to reconsider their agreement. He was in half a mind to stop playing with her, tear up her IOU and send it back to her via her obliging pianoforte teacher. He would never act on it.

      Would I?

      As a gentleman he most certainly should not, but part of him admired her outrageous logic. It was certainly one sure way to hit back at her father’s schemes to marry her off advantageously whatever her own inclinations. Not that losing her virginity was going to save her from marriage, not unless she was prepared to inform her hopeful suitors in advance of the ceremony.

      Yes, he should tear up the note and forget her and she would spend her entire married life giving thanks for a narrow escape. On the other hand he was bored, the situation was novel and a little internal devil prompted him to see just how this game played out a little longer.

      He opened the next letter in the pile, noticing that it was from his old friend Crispin de Feaux and that the wax was impressed, not with the Marquess of Avenmore’s usual seal, but with the discreet abbreviated version. Cris was up to something.

      Not only that, he discovered, but requiring Gabriel to get himself involved as well. ‘Collect information about Lord Chelford’s debts...obtain a sedan chair and bearers...send to Stibworthy, North Devon... North Devon?’ What the blazes was Cris up to now?

      The study bookshelves returned no answer to his questions. This was too intriguing to deal with by post. Gabriel tugged the bell pull. ‘Hampshire, I am going into Devon by way of Bath. I will want my travelling coach.’ He glanced at Cris’s letter again and smiled. ‘Tell Corbridge to pack for action rather than amusement, I think.’

      By the time he got back from whatever was brewing on the wilder western shores of England he would have located his better nature. He would do the right thing by the innocent Lady Caroline immediately and he would not yield to the temptation to discover just what the delicate skin at the base of her throat tasted like. Strawberries, perhaps...

      * * *

      June was drawing towards July, complete with sunshine, roses in bloom, a flurry of fashionable parasols—and no indication from her father that he would be leaving for the country for at least another week. Caroline could only be grateful because she had just realised the great flaw in her scheme, the gaping black hole in the centre.

      She had the deeds, so Anthony’s future was assured, she had told herself. Then, when she was locking them away in the base of her jewellery box, she realised that in solving one problem she had created another—or two, if she counted the looming shadow of Lord Edenbridge and her promise to him.

      Anthony’s estate was safe, but estates had to be managed. Plans must be made, orders must be given, wages paid, staff supervised, income banked and invested. Somehow Springbourne had to function for five years until her brother reached his majority and could take control. Meanwhile, she had no resources, no experience and no legal standing in the matter. Anthony was a minor, so neither did he. And if either of them tried to employ a solicitor or a land agent to act on their own behalf the first thing the man would do was consult their father.

      Lord Edenbridge. Papa thought the earl was about to take over Springbourne and doubtless he had already notified all concerned. If Lord Edenbridge took nominal control it would solve everything. Would it be a huge imposition? Perhaps she could offer him a percentage of the income, or might he be offended by that? She needed to ask his advice.

      It was the day she realised that she must speak to him that Lord Edenbridge disappeared from London. She looked for him in vain at balls and parties, she heard no gossip about him and, when she contrived to have the barouche drive along Mount Street, she saw the knocker was off his front door.

      There was nothing for it, she would have to write to him. Caroline sat in the little room optimistically referred to as her boudoir, chewed the end of her pen and racked her brains for a tactful way of phrasing a request that a virtual stranger take on the supervision of an estate she had extracted from him in return for the dubious value of her own virtue.

      The knock on the door was almost a relief.

      ‘Yes, Thomas?’

      ‘His lordship requests that you join him in his study, my lady.’ The footman had doubtless translated a grunted command to fetch my daughter into a courteous message, so she smiled at him, even though he had thrown what little she had managed to compose

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