Page 10 of The Labours of Lord Perry Cavendish
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Zander was finishing his breakfast when Perry entered the breakfast room.
“You’re up early,” Zander said.
Perry sighed and trudged to the sideboard. “You know me,” he said. “I can’t get back to sleep once I’m awake.” He filled a plate, not stinting himself. Zander and Adam’s cook was excellent.
“WishIcould’ve stayed in bed,” Zander said as Perry settled down opposite him and began to eat. “I barely got any sleep last night.”
“No?” Perry said. “Couldn’t you drop off after we went up to bed?”
Zander raised his brows. “Adam just got home,” he reminded Perry, chuckling when Perry felt the inevitable rush of heat in his cheeks.
“Oh,” Perry said. “I see.”
Zander gave a jaw-cracking yawn. “Unfortunately, I need to go to Millerwick Farm this morning.” He sighed. “I like Will Harrison a great deal—he’s a hard worker—but he’s our least experienced tenant, and this is only his second harvest.”
“What’s the problem?” Perry asked.
“He didn’t hire enough labour,” Zander said. “I told him he needed more hands, but he didn’t listen, and now he’s behind, and old Joe Warren swears there’s heavy rain coming soon. He can feel it in his bones. So Harrison needs to get that crop in now.”
“Old Joe Warren feels it in his bones?” Perry echoed. “I thought you said estate managers shouldn’t listen to countrymen’s superstitions?”
Zander chuckled. “Maybe, occasionally, they should. I swear that man can predict rain like no one I’ve ever met. Says it’s his rheumatism.”
Perry chuckled. “So, what will you do about this tenant of yours?”
Zander shrugged. “I’ll have to see how things lie this morning. I should be able to spare a few of our hands soon—our own crop will be fully in by tomorrow, all going well—but I need to find out how far behind he is first. The man’s too proud for his own good.”
Perry was just about to ask if he could go along with Zander, just for the ride, when Zander suddenly snapped his fingers and said, “I almost forgot, you’ve got a letter. From your mother, I think.” He jumped up and went to the sideboard, lifting a letter from a silver tray and handing it to Perry.
Perry’s heart sank when he saw it. It was indeed from the marchioness. He recognised her small, cramped handwriting, which somehow always reminded him of the way she talked.
“I only wish you children had the slightest appreciation for the sacrifices to my health I have made for you all.”
Perry regarded the letter glumly for a moment. Then he sighed and cracked the seal, opening it out and squinting self-consciously at the closely written lines. It always took him ages to read anything, but especially any letter from his mother. He was glad the only other occupant of the breakfast room was Zander, who knew, and didn’t care, that Perry was a shamefully slow reader.
“Any news?” Zander asked when he finally set the letter down.
“Bella’s increasing,” Perry said. “Mama says Edmund’s bursting with pride and won’t let her set a foot on the ground.”
Bella, Perry’s hoydenish sister, had snared the rakish Sir Edmund Hunt at the Christmas party at Winterbourne Abbey last year—in circumstances that Perry still blushed to remember.
If he could cleanse his mind of any of his memories, it would definitely be the one of his sister being spanked, bare-arsed, over the back of a rocking-horse by the man who was now, thankfully, her husband.
“That’s good news,” Zander said, smiling. “At least it should take your mother’s attention off you for a while. She can fuss over Bella’s health to her heart’s content.”
“Oh no,” Perry said, shaking his head, “There’s only one invalid in our house, and that’s Mama.”
Zander chuckled at that, and after a moment, Perry did too, though it was a rueful sort of laugh. His mother’s obsessive belief that her health was failing—a belief which appeared to be entirely without merit, at least according to all the doctors she had consulted—had governed their family all his life. Her preferences dictated how the household was run, where they went, and what they did. His mother had little time for her children, sending Perry and his brother off to school as soon as she possibly could, and handing off her responsibilities for bringing out Bella to her sister-in-law, their Aunt Agatha.
It was no wonder Bella had got herself into so much mischief.
These days, Lady Cavendish spent much of her time congratulating herself on having secured advantageous marriages for all but one of her children—Perry—despite having played very little part in those events. Now, it seemed, she wanted to get Perry married off too.
“It is time we got you settled,”she'd written.“Once that is done, I can finally rest and perhaps pay a little attention to my own needs in my declining years.”
“She’s decided she needs to marry me off,” Perry told Lysander glumly. “She wants me to head back to town and‘make an effort to meet some young ladies’.” Perry made a face that signalled his thoughts on this suggestion.