Page 16 of The Raven’s Lady

Her gaze flashed up to his. “When do you expect to occupy the hall?”

“First, you want to be settled in the dower house. I can have people begin work on it by Tuesday next.”

“And the papers?”

“Will tomorrow suit?”

“So soon?”

“You need funds, don’t you?”

She nodded, her eyes searching his. He supposed his impatience made no sense. Maybe she’d never been in love. He looked out over the garden, already seeing Amabel there.

“Tomorrow then.” He bowed and offered his arm.

“You needn’t, you know. We’re not … friends.”

“Perhaps, but I won’t be browbeaten out of gentlemanly behavior by your grandmother.”

She turned to the table and wrapped a piece of cake in a bit of linen. “Have some cake then, a first taste of Verwood.”

Chapter Six

There was a day’s delay before Her Grace the Dowager Duchess of Verwood signed Sir Adrian’s lease agreement. Further issues had arisen regarding which furnishings were to remain in the house and precisely which stalls in the stables were to be available for Sir Adrian’s horses. In the end the ladies were to leave the public rooms furnished and to take only the items most personal to them to the dower house along with her grandmother’s prized paintings of her horses.

Mr. Trimley, a notary, Cassie, and the duchess gathered in the red drawing room at noon. There was no sign of Sir Adrian, though his bold signature appeared on the document. The duchess took a seat at the console table and asked to see the clauses about renovation, the use of her stables, and her right to terminate the lease.

When she had reviewed those items, she said to Trimley, “Let’s get on with it then.”

As Trimley pointed out the places where she was to sign, the duchess batted away his hand, but she signed.

Cassie, who had spent the morning reading the document in all its legal detail, did not know whether she felt more relieved or more anxious about the move. There was a great deal to do in a short time, for which she was grateful. With cataloging what was to remain and packing what was to go, and with determining where things from the hall would find a place in the dower house, she would have little time to feel any sadness over leaving what had been her only home. It might be hard to see that home in the hands of another, but she supposed that in time she would become accustomed to the change. One could become accustomed to difficult things.

When Trimley indicated that the signing was complete, the duchess put aside the pen, and stood. “We’re done, are we?” she asked.

Trimley grinned broadly. “I assure you, ma’am, you could not entrust Verwood into more capable hands than Sir Adrian’s. Everything will be preserved and looked after with scrupulous care.”

*

On the morning after the signing of the lease, the first carts rumbled up the drive and turned down the lane to the dower house. A boy came running to the hall for the key, and handed Cassie a note from Sir Adrian. The note laid out a brief plan for cleaning the dower house and asked if she had color preferences for the rooms.

Cassie put aside the list she was making, took up the keys, and put on her cloak. Sir Adrian was not going to paint her house without her approval. She sent the boy ahead to say she was coming, and a quick walk took her to the lane. At the dower house, a group of workmen unloaded ladders, brooms, and buckets from one of the carts, and a man with a scythe was at work on the grass. Sir Adrian stood at the back of another cart conferring over some papers with George Dawes, the building surveyor who had supervised the repairs to the roof of the village church.

No one observed her approach until the boy came to a stop before Sir Adrian. All heads turned her way as she sank into the low point of her uneven stride. She halted and straightened, and Sir Adrian stepped forward. He had changed from the polished London gentleman she’d first met to a man more comfortably attired for the country in brown wool and a plain cotton waistcoat.

“I didn’t mean to interrupt your morning,” he said.

“Didn’t you? With such provocation as this?” She held up the little note. “What woman does not have an opinion about the color of her walls?”

He laughed. “I had to ask.”

“The ink is hardly dry on the lease,” she said, looking at the bustle of activity around her. He must have believed all along that he’d gain the lease for he could not have organized such a work party in a day.

“As I told you, I am impatient.” His gaze did not meet hers.

“For the joys of discovering dust and damp?”

“If you’ll open the house for them, these fellows will begin.”