Elise’s voice captured Miles’s attention immediately. Though she wasn’t speaking to him, she was speaking.
“Yes, Elise?”
“How is it we’re to reach Epsworth by tonight? The journey oughtta take several days.”
Epsworth? Elise thought they were headed to Epsworth?
“We are not going to Epsworth,” Beth answered.
“But—” She shook her head. “I was told we were goin’ home.”
She didn’t know. Good heavens! She didn’t know.
“Epsworth is no longer my home, Elise.” The admission proved more difficult than he could have anticipated. “My father’s debts were too great. I had to sell Epsworth four years ago.”
Elise grew perfectly still, her eyes not focused on any of them. The surprise frozen in her expression held the tiniest hint of sadness. Did she mourn the loss of Epsworth, empathize with him, even the smallest bit, for having to part with his family home? It was the first sign of anything other than anger that he’d seen in her.
She gave a tiny nod. “You were afraid you’d ’ave to sell.”
“I held out as long as I could.” For some reason, it was important that she understood he hadn’t simply given up.
She made no response.
“Beth,” Langley said. “Come sit with me, love.”
If Beth was surprised by the request, it didn’t show. Miles took the opportunity he very much suspected Langley had purposely provided and swapped seats with his sister, finding himself beside Elise. She immediately turned her gaze to the window.
“I’m sorry about Epsworth, Elise. I did try. The last thing I wanted was to sell our home. Especially with—” With you still missing. But he wasn’t ready to discuss that yet. “I’m sorry.”
A moment passed. No one spoke. Miles wasn’t sure anyone even breathed. Somehow, he had to breach the wall she’d erected between them. He took one of her hands in his as he’d once done almost daily. She yanked her hand free and scooted as far into the corner of the carriage as she could get, slipping Anne onto her lap. His hand hovered a moment as his mind attempted to wrap around her rejection. He took a breath and laid his hand back on his lap.
Miles looked to Beth, wondering what her impression was. Beth shrugged and shook her head. Langley seemed equally perplexed. Anne watched Miles without her gaze wavering.
Well, little one, what do I do now? Your mother detests me, and I don’t know why.
“Where do you live?” Elise asked quietly after a moment had passed.
“At Tafford, in Derbyshire.” If only she would let him hold her hand. Before, it had made whatever either of them had been dealing with that much easier to face. There had been many times in the last four years he’d longed for his friend, even closed his eyes and pretended she was with him. He’d needed her presence. “I inherited it from a cousin of my father’s almost a year ago.”
She looked up at him, and for a split second, she looked more intrigued than provoked. It wasn’t exactly an invitation to be her friend again, but it was a step in the right direction.
“You said y’ sold Epsworth four years ago.”
He understood her question even though she hadn’t asked it. “I have been in the West Indies. Father left me a property there, the only Linwood property I did not have to sell to pay his debts.”
Elise nodded. She seemed to sigh, though she made no noise and hardly moved. “Your father an’ mine left behind an enormous mess.”
That was one of many things that had bothered him after their deaths. Neither his father nor Mr. Furlong were spendthrifts or risk takers. They hadn’t seemed so, at least. Their estates had appeared solvent. Yet there were debts and bad investments dating back several years in both men’s accounts. Miles couldn’t deny his father’s signature and very recognizable hand on the paperwork. The debts had been both legitimate and devastating.
The carriage shifted precariously beneath them as it traversed the rutted and muddy road. A tiny intake of breath was the only audible sign of distress, but Elise’s fists were tightly balled on her lap once more. What little he could make out of her face from around the wide brim of her very serviceable bonnet showed barely restrained panic. A second shifting of the wheels seemed to force Elise’s eyes closed, as if she couldn’t bear the sight of the carriage interior any longer.
Anne sensed her mother’s distress. She turned and looked up into Elise’s face with concern before leaning against her and putting her tiny arms around Elise’s neck. With a shaky breath, Elise embraced her daughter, though she still looked entirely unsettled.
Miles thought of how their two families had often traveled together to local dinners and entertainments, even to church on Sundays. She’d never been uneasy in a carriage then. But there was no mistaking her strain as she sat beside him, traveling the ill-maintained road south into Derbyshire.
“Do we need to stop?” he asked quietly, concerned for her.
Elise shook her head. “I’d rather it be over and done with.” She closed her eyes tightly.
“Several hours yet remain before we will stop for lunch,” Miles gently warned.
Elise only nodded.
Miles rubbed his mouth and chin, feeling completely at a loss. For a moment, he’d seen a tiny glimmer of Elise as she’d once been. It wasn’t joy or laughter or even grief he’d glimpsed in her, but longing. She missed her home. She had treated him with astounding coldness, but that fleeting moment of warmth gave him hope.
Miles glanced in her direction. She wasn’t looking at him, but Anne was. Anne tentatively lifted her hand and stretched it out toward him. He gently wrapped his fingers around her tiny hand. She didn’t smile, but neither did she pull away. Every moment of connection between them felt like a plea. She needed something from him but was too young to tell him what. Perhaps she didn’t even know herself.
Every jolt of the well-sprung carriage brought the slightest, briefest tensing of Elise’s frame. She didn’t turn her face away from the window to look at any of them. She likely didn’t even know her daughter had reached out to him. Miles held Anne’s hand as the minutes passed. Her eyelids grew heavy, though she didn’t sleep.
He hazarded a look at Beth, who sat opposite him. She watched Anne and Elise with a worry that matched his own. This was a family in such need, in such pain, and as long as Elise continued locking him out of her life, he was helpless to do anything about it.
* * *
Elise managed to survive the first leg of their trip without succumbing to her sense of panic, though it had been a harder battle to keep herself from crumbling at the news that Epsworth had been lost. Epsworth had been a second home to her. It seemed there was nothing left of the life she’d once lived.
Their midday meal eaten and all the necessities seen to, the group gathered at the front door of a small inn, awaiting the calling up of their carriage. Elise had strengthened her resolve once more, fortified herself against both the coming carriage ride and the emotions she struggled to keep under control.
“Mail comes through ’bout now,” a groom told Miles. “Any minute now, ’spect. We’ll bring up yer coach soon as it passes by. Mail don’t slow easy and don’t stop for no one’s pleasure.”
Miles nodded his understanding.
Elise remembered with heart-thumping awe how fast a mail coach moved, all but flying. Anne would enjoy the spectacle.
Where was Anne? It was not like her to wander off. Ever since the girl had begun walking, however, Elise had worried that she would do just that.
A rumble of wheels and thundering of hooves sounded from just out of sight of the inn yard. The mail, no doubt, was moments from arriving, and Anne was nowhere to be found. A horn announced the arrival of the mail just as Elise spied her daughter walking toward the inn’s front gate, which stood open in anticipation of the imminent arrival of the enormous mail coach.
“Oh, merciful Father, help me,” Elise pled in a strangled whisper as she began a frantic dash toward Ann
e, running as swiftly as her legs and skirts would allow. The rumbling approach of the coach that stopped for “no one’s pleasure” positively shook the ground, and for the first time, Anne seemed aware of its arrival. She turned and stared in wide-eyed curiosity.
Elise reached the tiny girl just as the mail coach crossed through the gates. She spun around, running from the oncoming vehicle. Her heart thudded painfully in her chest.
A powerful arm snaked around her waist and pulled both of them away in one swift, smooth motion. The air around her swished wildly as the coach flew past. Elise held Anne in a grip likely tighter than necessary, and she shook uncontrollably, her breath coming in gasps. We’re safe. We’re safe.
“Are you hurt?” Miles’s deep, rumbling voice asked.
Miles. Of course it was Miles.
“You’re shaking.” Miles’s arms closed more tightly around them.
“Anne was nearly run down by the mail coach. I’ll admit that’s shaken me a bit.” Elise slowly got to her feet. Her legs weren’t entirely steady. She kept Anne in her arms but stepped out of Miles’s.
He didn’t seem offended by the distance she put between them. Perhaps he’d begun to realize she wasn’t the vulnerable girl she’d once been. That would be safer in the long run.
“Anne, are you hurt?” Miles pressed.
Did he not realize?
“Anne? Is she hurt? Why won’t she answer?”
“She can’t hear you, Miles,” Elise whispered, hoping no one else had overheard. Anne’s condition had caused no end of difficulties with those not inclined toward compassion.
“She is deaf?” Miles asked, his voice equally as low.
“Not entirely. She can hear but not very well.”
Most of the population of Stanton had seen Anne’s near deafness as a sign that she was somehow less than a person.
“We should be goin’,” Elise muttered, walking away. She shook from deep inside. The near miss with the mail and her forced admission of Anne’s situation were taking a toll. Her emotions were in turmoil.
For just a moment, she’d found a degree of comfort in Miles’s arms that she hadn’t known in years. The little girl she’d once been cried out for that, wanted to believe he could be trusted, but she knew the harm he was capable of, and it terrified her.
Chapter Seven
Scarlet fever, Miles thought to himself as the carriage rumbled southward. He thought he’d heard that scarlet fever could cause hearing loss. Other illnesses were often associated with deafness as well.
He looked across at Elise and Anne, both sleeping. They’d sat tense and quiet for the first hour after resuming the trip to Tafford, as had Miles. Seeing them nearly run down by the mail coach had rattled him. Elise may have changed during their separation; she may have become distant and unwelcoming, but underneath it all, she was still his very best friend. And she, along with Anne, could have been killed.
His heart had finally ceased its racing, and his mind had settled once more on the question of Anne. He’d noticed Elise speaking to her, but Anne didn’t seem to comprehend everything she was being told. Her low hearing explained her constant silence and, perhaps, her tendency to stare at him. On the other hand, Anne didn’t stare at Langley or Beth the way she did at him. Miles rubbed the back of his neck, shifting on the carriage seat.
Elise had obviously had little or no money these past years. Had Anne ever seen a doctor, an apothecary, even? Was there perhaps something that could be done?
“How fortunate that Elise is able to sleep,” Beth whispered loudly enough to be heard from the opposite corner of the carriage. “She was so panicked during the ride this morning I had my doubts she would be able to endure this afternoon.”
“Do you remember her being so unnerved by a carriage ride?” Miles asked, looking once more at Elise.
Her face was noticeably softer in her sleep, younger even. For the first time since he had found her the day before, she looked her age. She was barely twenty; he knew that for a fact. But her solemnity aged her far beyond that.
“Do you not?” Beth asked, obvious surprise in her voice. “It was never as pronounced as it seems to be now, but during those last few weeks before she disappeared, Elise was very much afraid—no, uneasy would be a better word—of being inside a closed carriage.”
“I do not remember that.”
“It was a very difficult time, Miles. You were struggling with burdens beyond your years, not to mention our father’s death and her father’s. I daresay there is a lot about those weeks that you do not remember very clearly.”
“On the contrary, there are things about those weeks I remember far too clearly.”
“Then try to extract this from your memory.” Beth offered a small, sad smile. “The first Sunday after Father died, you and I and Langley were to drive Elise to church. Do you remember?”
“I seem to recall that she didn’t want to go.”
“She wanted to go,” Beth corrected. “But not in the carriage.”
“That’s right. She was so quiet and uneasy during the drive to and from.” Miles watched Elise as she slept with Anne under her arm.
“Even I was nervous about traveling after . . .” Beth let the sentence dangle unfinished. They hadn’t discussed Father’s death above a dozen times.
“I hadn’t thought of that,” Miles muttered. He’d spent a lot of time trying not to think about Father and Mr. Furlong and Elise traveling the road leading to Epsworth late at night. He worked hard not to remember that he was supposed to have gone with them to the Gibsons’ dinner party but had stayed at Epsworth. The carriage had never arrived home. Miles had missed the last night of his father’s life.
* * *
Elise awoke with a start. It was dark, and the carriage she rode in was coming to a stop.
“We’ve arrived,” Beth whispered beside her.
“At Tafford?” Elise pulled Anne closer to her.
“You, Anne, and Miles were all sleeping, so Langley thought it would be best to simply push on.” Beth smiled at her husband across the carriage. “We sent word ahead when we last changed horses. Dinner should be ready for us.”
Elise nodded. She was famished. She’d skipped dinner the night before and had hardly touched breakfast. Lunch was the only meal of significance she’d had in more than twenty-four hours. But the thought of Tafford, the grand estate of a peer, overwhelmed her. She’d lived as a member of the lower class for years. She had no place in a magnificent home.
Mr. Langley stepped out of the carriage first. He turned back and handed Beth out. Miles followed, turning to assist Anne, who stared at him as she always did. Elise hadn’t yet decided why that was. Anne was far too young to be fascinated by a handsome face, though Miles had certainly grown into a fine-looking man. The girl was usually quite shy, but she watched Miles unabashedly.
“Elise?” Miles held his hand out to her.
She took a breath. Was she ready for this? The estate wasn’t Epsworth, something she found both comforting and disappointing.
She laid her hand in Miles’s and found the contact even more uncomfortable than the last time. When they were children, he’d held her hand regularly. It had simply been their way. But she couldn’t let it be that way now. Elise carefully took the carriage steps, determinedly keeping her eyes lowered. She very much feared if she glanced up at Tafford, which she felt certain was magnificent beyond anything she’d ever seen, she would falter and stumble.
Feet firmly on the ground, she turned back and reached for Anne. A question pulled at Anne’s brow. “Ma?”
Miles appeared completely flummoxed by her speech. The odd timbre of her voice grated on most people.
“She can hear a little,” Elise reminded him.
“And speak a little too, it seems.” Miles watched Anne.
Elise turned her full attention to her daughter, kneeling in front of Anne with her back to Miles. Anne balled her right hand into a fist and rubbed a circle against her belly. Th
at was her way of indicating she was hungry.
“We will eat in a moment,” Elise told her as she nodded and made the motion of spooning food into her mouth.
Anne looked over Elise’s shoulder, no doubt at Miles. It hadn’t taken the girl long to realize where their meals were now coming from.
“Let us get you settled,” Miles said.
Elise stood and took a deep breath, releasing what tension she could. Anne took firm hold of Elise’s skirts, and they stepped forward.
For the first time, Elise glanced up at Miles’s home. Her mind remained full of visions of Epsworth and its Tudor facade. Tafford was quite different: a mishmash of styles and eras, no doubt the result of generations of extensions and improvements. The house was enormous, but its haphazard assembly was oddly inviting, as if it were a friendly mutt completely unaware of its dubious appearance.
“This is your home?” Elise didn’t know why she was whispering.
“This is Tafford, the home of the Marquess of Grenton for some three hundred years,” Miles answered.
That stopped Elise in her tracks. “You’re a marquess?” This was more than a mere rise in standing. Other than dukes and the royal family, Miles now outranked the entire kingdom.
Miles raised an auburn eyebrow as if he found the situation quite ironic. It was ironic in an awful way. They’d been separated for more than four years. They’d both lost their fathers, their homes, and their fortunes. Miles had inherited an old and prestigious title, fortune beyond anything they could have hoped for in their previous situations, and a fine home. Elise, on the other hand, had more than once gone a full day without food, had clothed her daughter in dresses made from remnants begged from the draper’s, and had no home or money to her name.
What am I even doing here? I am as far beneath him now as the dirt under our feet.
“Humphrey,” Miles greeted an austere individual who absolutely had to be the butler. His expression was far too starchy to be anyone else.
Elise instinctively pulled back. The top-lofty butler would not approve of a widow of obviously straitened circumstances entering the house of a peer to whom she was not related. Would he assume the worst of her?
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