Page 4 of Roseanna (The Shackleford Legacies #3)

Four

Besides Henrietta and Lilyanna, their other cousins Peter and James, were also enjoying the delightful weather under the beautifully decorated gazebo the Duchess had had erected, especially for the occasion.

At four and twenty, Peter was the oldest of the cousins and, as heir apparent to his father, the Duke of Blackmore, he was also the most senior. Next came Lilyanna’s older brother, James, who’d just turned twenty. As the oldest son of Temperance and Adam, he was destined to become the next Earl of Ravenstone.

Both Francesca and Roseanna were closest to their cousin, Henrietta, who was only eighteen months younger than they were. Since their mothers were twins, the three of them had been almost inseparable throughout much of their childhood.

The only other person present in the small gathering was Victoria Huxley. Although not a blood relative, she was Anthony’s wife, Georgiana’s twin sister. She was also the granddaughter of the recently deceased Earl of Ruteledge. At one and twenty, by an unusual quirk of fate, she was in the enviable position of being in charge of her own affairs.

‘So, this is the newest member of the Atwood family that Frankie’s been telling us about,’ James smiled, climbing to his feet as Roseanna approached the gazebo.

After bending his head in welcome, he wasted no time crouching down to say hello to Trixie, who was more than happy to play to the crowd as she rolled over onto her back.

‘I have to say she’s a little peculiar looking,’ Henrietta declared in her usual forthright manner. ‘Her ears stick out at right angles.’ Then she gave a rueful grin before adding, ‘Much like mine really.’

‘Your ears don’t stick out, Henri,’ Lilyanna retorted. ‘Well, not much anyway. And your hair covers them admirably.’

‘Unfortunately, none of us have been quite blessed with your looks, Lily,’ Francesca declared with a sigh.

‘Just be grateful you haven’t got her temperament,’ James snorted.

‘Thank you, brother dearest,’ Lily responded with a saccharine sweet smile that promised retribution later. ‘I happen to be very happy that I take after my mother.’ She stopped at the sudden peals of laughter. ‘What?’ she added crossly.

‘Well, given that Aunt Tempy’s temper tantrums are legendary,’ Peter chuckled, ‘my sympathies definitely lie with James.’

Lily stuck out her tongue before turning her back on the two men. ‘Have you heard from George, Tory?’ she asked Victoria.

After a quick glance towards Peter, which none of the female cousins missed, Victoria gave a diffident smile. ‘She was perfectly well when I left, as was little Henry. He’s walking now - I don’t know who’s giving Anthony the most trouble between the two of them. I think they’re waiting for Jenny and Brendon to arrive before coming down to Blackmore together.’

‘Have Aunt Chastity and Uncle Christian arrived yet?’ Rosie asked, sitting down in James’s vacated seat and lifting Trixie onto her lap.

‘You’d know if they had,’ Peter scoffed. ‘Olivia and Kate would already be causing mayhem. I feel so sorry for Kit.’

‘What about Aunt Charity and Uncle Jago?’

‘They’ve been staying at Cottesmore,’ Henrietta informed them. ‘I think Uncle Jago has been helping Nate with the renovations to Carlingford Hall.’

‘I assume that means they’ll all be arriving together en masse, then.’ James winced. ‘Poor Kit. I hope he gets to travel in Aunt Charity’s carriage with Arthur and Tris.’

‘I’d say poor Nate,’ retorted Peter. ‘There’s no doubt he and Mercy will get burdened with Elowan, Olivia, and Kate for the journey. The twins are Mercy’s shadows when she’s with them and I doubt Elowan will want to miss out.’

‘I’m looking forward to seeing Jenny and Mercy again,’ Victoria confessed. ‘It seems an age since the three of us were together.’

‘And now, they’re old married women,’ laughed Lily.

‘It’s so long since we’ve all been together,’ Francesca added. ‘I do wonder if Uncle Nicholas is regretting it yet.’

‘Oh, assuredly,’ Peter declared cheerfully. ‘And we haven’t even mentioned Aunt Patience and Aunt Prudence yet. I predict fun times ahead before we all have to mind our p’s and q’s when the important guests start arriving.’

‘Is Max coming?’ Roseanna asked. ‘Luke will be devastated if he doesn’t.’

‘I’m not sure, to be fair,’ Peter shrugged. ‘He hates gatherings like this more than you do, Rosie.’

‘I do not,’ Roseanna’s response was a little too indignant.

‘Me thinks the lady doth protest too much,’ laughed James. Roseanna pulled a face at him, just as the subject of their conversation walked out through the French doors.

‘Max!’ The chorus was so loud, the future Marquess of Guildford stopped dead in his tracks with a wince.

‘I was looking for Luke and Nick,’ he mumbled.

‘Lovely to see you too cousin,’ Peter grinned. ‘I think your partners in crime are currently down by the lake with Josh and Emma.’

With a nod and a shy smile, Max turned and hurried back inside.

‘So, do we know when Aunt Prudence and Uncle Jamie are due to arrive?’

‘Tonight,’ Rose answered without thinking. Then her face flamed at the enquiring looks and she stammered, ‘I overheard Malcolm telling one of the footmen.’

‘I didn’t know you’d already seen Malcolm.’ Francesca frowned. ‘Was Felicity with him?’

Roseanna heartily wished she’d kept her mouth closed. Her face was now the colour of a ripe tomato, and worse, she could tell that her cousins were almost certainly suspecting there was a little more to the story than she was letting on.

She gave a small, self-conscious cough. ‘Err, no she wasn’t, and err… Malcolm didn’t see me, I just happened to be passing…’ She stumbled to a halt.

Fortunately, Mrs Tenner chose that moment to appear with three maids in tow, all carrying trays of lemonade. As the drinks and Mrs Higgins’ homemade shortbread were passed around, the discussion was forgotten by everyone apart from Rosie.

She’d instinctively chosen not to share what she’d overheard – but only partly because she was embarrassed to admit she’d been eavesdropping. In truth, the main reason was the worry she’d clearly seen in the normally unruffled Scot’s eyes.

Dinner that evening was a predictably lively affair. The members of the family that had already arrived congregated in the small, informal dining room, with even the younger children taking their meal with the adults and older siblings. This would continue until the rest of the guests began arriving, at which time the evening dinner would be switched to the large, formal dining room and the younger cousins relegated to the nursery for their evening meal. As she took her seat, Rosie wondered where her grandfather was. In her experience, he never missed out on a free meal, but then she supposed he wouldn’t usually have to share it with quite so many.

To her consternation, however, Tristan, whatever-his-name-was , was one of the footmen waiting on the table. Though, on this occasion, his behaviour was impeccable. There was no sign of any belligerence at all, and he smiled and bowed graciously as he delivered the food and collected the plates. If he was still planning to make a cake of himself, as Malcolm had suggested, he was running out of time to do it during dinner. Perhaps he believed their earlier collision would be enough. Her mind abruptly conjured up a picture of their encounter in the passageway and the odd look in his eyes as she’d smiled. For some reason, the memory of that look did strange things to her stomach.

Although she tried hard to hide it, there was no denying that her eyes strayed to the handsome retainer far too much during dinner. He, on the other hand, did not look at her once. She told herself she was relieved, but when she caught him smiling at Lilyanna, she felt an entirely unexpected annoyance. What the deuce was wrong with her, for goodness’ sake?

Gritting her teeth, Rosie stared down at her plate, her usual robust appetite completely gone. A sudden commotion at the other end of the table had her lifting her head in time to see Tristin inadvertently tip a dish of custard into the Duchess’s lap. Here, obviously, was the indiscretion that would get him supposedly hauled over the coals on the morrow.

Roseanna watched Grace carefully as she rose to her feet, waving away the footman’s apologies and holding her skirt up to prevent the liquid seeping onto the floor. Abruptly, Rosie realised that her aunt had been waiting for the blunder. Whatever was going on, the Duchess was aware of it too.

As Grace walked swiftly down the length of the table, naturally, everyone’s attention was drawn to her. Rosie, however, kept her focus on Nicholas. Even so, she caught very little of his low-voiced reprimand - aside from a time. Eleven a.m. Evidently, that was when the miscreant would be reporting to the Duke’s study.

By the time the Duchess reappeared twenty minutes later, the dessert course had been cleared away and her grace smoothly suggested that the ladies retire to the drawing room, leaving the men to their port.

As Roseanna trailed behind, she looked around to see if there was somewhere she might loiter to listen to the gentlemen’s conversation. Then she recalled that Malcolm had mentioned her Uncle Jamie. He and Aunt Pru had not yet arrived, and she doubted the Duke would discuss something that was clearly sensitive without the magistrate’s presence.

Of course, she knew fully that it wasn’t polite to eavesdrop, but her curiosity had been piqued, and wrong or no, she intended to do her utmost to listen in to the conversation taking place in the Duke’s study the next morning…

Under normal circumstances, Augustus Shackleford would actually be contemplating Dougal Galbraith’s visit to Blackmore with a little more enthusiasm, even though they’d only parted a matter of months ago. However, on this occasion, the very idea was playing havoc with his gout and giving him sleepless nights.

It wasn’t just the thought of the potential trouble Dougal could cause - ordinarily he’d be relishing the thought of keeping the temperamental Scot out of mischief. The Reverend wasn’t exactly sure what had changed, or when. Indeed, he spent the better part of an hour in the Red Lion as he waited for Percy to finish Evensong, contemplating just that.

Eventually, just as the curate appeared at the door, the Reverend finally concluded that the difference on this particular occasion was Finn. The thought of the irascible Scot leading the lad astray filled him with a sense of foreboding he’d never before experienced – not throughout three marriages, nine children and twenty-three grandchildren. Why that should be so, the clergyman had absolutely no idea, but he had to assume that the Almighty had something to do with it.

As Percy came over to the table with two tankards of ale, Reverend Shackleford couldn’t decide whether to share the news of Dougal’s impending visit, or simply fudge it. But since he couldn’t shake the belief that his Heavenly Master had taken an interest in Finn’s welfare for an important reason, the Reverend knew that telling a bit of a plumper wasn’t an option. Unfortunately, pitching the gammon wasn’t the only option that was inexplicably no longer available to him. For some reason, he felt an unexpected reluctance to share his concerns about Dougal’s questionable morals with his curate.

Unfortunately, Percy clearly didn’t appear to have the same presentiment of doom at the thought of Dougal’s visit. Indeed, the curate was quite enthusiastic, declaring how much he was looking forward to making Mr Galbraith’s acquaintance. ‘Any friend of yours, Sir, is a friend of mine,’ he enthused. ‘It’ll be nice for the lad to see someone from Caerlaverock.’

Stalling for time, Augustus Shackleford took a sip of his ale, while his mind tried in vain to devise a foolproof plan to avoid just that. After five whole minutes, he’d only managed to come up with one idea, but unfortunately, he didn’t think fabricating an outbreak of smallpox up at the house would be on the Almighty’s list of approved options.

That was when Percy added, ‘Perhaps Mr Galbraith would like to come for dinner.’

As the younger children were finally taken up to bed, Roseanna too excused herself on the pretext of taking Trixie out for a brief turn in the garden before bed. She was aware of her mother’s anxious look, but on this occasion, it wasn’t simply an excuse to disappear. In fact, Rosie had enjoyed her extended family’s company. But it was a lovely evening, still light outside, and she felt that Trixie had been left for long enough.

That said, although the evening had been surprisingly agreeable, she breathed a sigh of relief that the game of charades they were all playing as she slipped away meant that no one offered to accompany her.

Five minutes later, she was attaching the lead to Trixie’s collar - already minus the pink bow, which was now a scrap of satin on the bed. The little dog was ecstatic to see her and spent the next couple of minutes dashing excitedly backwards and forwards to the door while Rosie threw on her shawl.

Taking the now familiar route to the kitchen garden, and then on towards the less formal areas, Roseanna didn’t yet dare let her new furry companion off the lead, since the grass was dotted with rabbits all coming out to feed in the dusk. Idly, she wondered how Mrs Higgins prevented the rascals from eating all her greens. She hoped they didn’t resort to traps.

Enjoying the deepening twilight, she wasn’t paying attention to where she was going - which was when she discovered that Rabbits weren’t the only obstacles to avoid in the greensward. It appeared that a number of moles too were enjoying Blackmore’s lush bounty. In the dusk, she didn’t see the small pile of soil and inadvertently stepped directly into a mole hole.

Fortunately, the perpetrator was not in said hole as her foot plunged down, so didn’t end up flattened. However, that was the only good thing about the sorry situation. As she went down with an unladylike, ‘Woomph,’ for the second time that day, Rosie abruptly found herself sprawled backwards, her skirts round her knees, scandalously revealing her petticoats. Dazed for a full second, she didn’t immediately register the deep, vexingly familiar male voice.

‘I must say, my lady, that you appear to have a singular talent for tripping over your own feet. Perhaps you should consider keeping to more well-lighted areas.’

Lifting her head, Rosie stared in incredulous dismay at Tristan, the almost footman, standing not two feet away. As her disbelieving eyes travelled down from his face to his feet, thence onto her own bare legs, she uttered a small, mortified groan and struggled into a sitting position.

‘What are you doing, sneaking about in the dark?’ she demanded, frantically pulling at her skirts to cover her legs. ‘Are you following me?’ The question came out far more shrilly than she’d intended, and for one awful second, she had to fight the urge to burst into tears.

Fortunately, she still had hold of Trixie’s lead, and the little dog didn’t appear to have suffered any ill effects from her mistress’s second unexpected contact with the ground in less than twenty-four hours. Without looking up at her tormentor, she swapped the lead into her other hand and endeavoured to lift her foot out of the hole.

Unfortunately, that was easier said than done. Despite tugging, her foot remained firmly wedged. ‘Damnation,’ she muttered under her breath, hardly listening to his assertion that he was neither sneaking nor following her but had been asked by the Duke to attend the main gates in readiness for the arrival of Mr and Mrs Fitzroy.

‘Pru and Jamie have arrived?’ she asked, pausing her tugging and looking up at him.

‘I believe they are expected presently,’ he returned shortly, staring down at her in what could only be described as amused exasperation. Roseanna narrowed her eyes. Was the arrogant coxcomb laughing at her?

‘I might well be a trifle clumsy on occasion,’ she snapped, ‘but clearly your manners remain as woeful as ever. Mayhap I shall inform his grace of your ungentlemanly conduct. That will give him another excuse to drag you into his study on the morrow.’

He stared down at her without answering, and a second later she realised what she’d said and could have bitten out her tongue. It was obvious he was wondering at her use of the word excuse . Gritting her teeth, she broke their eye contact and resumed her efforts to draw her foot out of the hole.

After another moment, he sighed and stepped forward. ‘Give me your hand … my lady.’ She didn’t immediately look back up. His pause before using her correct address seemed somehow deliberate. She knew nothing about this man, but even so, a goodly portion of her suspected he was actually enjoying her discomfiture.

Glaring up at him, she pursed her lips and held up her hand. For some reason, the feel of his large, warm fingers surrounding hers felt ridiculously intimate, and she was glad that the encroaching darkness hid her blush. His pull was surprisingly gentle as he instructed her to be careful as she eased out her foot. Seconds later, she was standing beside him, and he abruptly let go of her hand as though scalded.

‘Does it hurt?’ he asked gruffly, stepping away from her.

Roseanna rotated her foot experimentally and shook her head. ‘I think it’s bruised, but nothing more,’ she declared with relief.

‘And you’re able to walk on it?’ he continued. The huskiness had disappeared, replaced by polite but distant concern. At her nod, he gave a slight bow, ‘Then, if it pleases you, my lady, I’ll bid you good night and continue on my errand.’ She nodded, equally frostily, in return, then watched as he strode off into the gathering darkness, remaining still until his retreating figure finally disappeared into the gloom.

Of all the people to witness her foolishness, it would have to be him. ‘Conceited muttonhead,’ she muttered crossly. Feeling a little better, she looked down at Trixie, who was now busy rooting around the mound of soil surrounding the hole she’d stumbled into. Then, gathering the little dog’s lead, she headed as quickly as her sore ankle would allow back towards the house before the light was lost entirely.