"Oh, about three or four perhaps."
Edward smirked as his suspicions were confirmed. There was something going on.
"It is odd, is it not Mother, that we would be invited to stay with Ranford six years after Father died, and for no real reason?"
"Of course not," Lady Catherine answered brusquely. "He and your Father were terribly close, and I have always maintained a correspondence with Lady Ranford. I expressed a wish for a change of scenery and she was kind enough to invite me to stay for some weeks before the Season. Would you have me travel here alone at my age?"
Edward looked at his mother and raised another eyebrow. His mother was far from in her dotage. At 54, she was neither old nor incapable of travelling without her son. She was fit, healthy and had retained much of the beauty of her youth.
She had aged some six years ago when his father had passed away suddenly in a riding accident but, being good ton, had recovered remarkably well and was happy to become the dowager at a relatively young age. Now she could sit back, relax, and pressure her only son into marriage and the production of grandchildren. Besides which, she wasn't alone, never going anywhere without her lady's maid, Annie.
Edward knew his mother well enough to know that something was going on. And he'd be damned if he'd walk into the situation, whatever it may be, blind.
He turned to question the other occupant of the carriage, his cousin Tom. Tom and he had always been close, more brothers than cousins he supposed. The son of a second son, he was very comfortable being a gentleman of means but little in the way of occupation. He had half-heartedly studied the law before settling himself in a small estate outside of London. He lived comfortably and well. His wealth could not be compared to Hartridge's but there were few men who could boast of that. His father was, by all accounts, a cruel and bitter man whose jealousy of Edward's own father had caused a lifelong estrangement. Tom had been taken under wing by the dowager and her late husband, saving him from his father's cruelty and allowing him to develop into a happy and pleasant young man without being poisoned by his father's moods. He was also very likely to be privy to whatever it was Edward was missing in this scheme.
"Well, Tom," he questioned, "are you going to tell me what's going on?"
"Your grace?" asked Tom, politely.
"Come now Tom, do not play the innocent with me. I've known you far too long for that to wash. What am I doing in an Irish backwater?"
"I am sure I do not know what you mean, Edward. Your mother wanted to visit with her very dear friends. It is only fitting that her son should come too." He blinked a few times, which was always a sure sign that he was nervous, but his face remained a cool mask of innocence.
Biting back a growl of frustration, Edward changed tact.
"You know, it is terribly irresponsible of me to take myself out of the country when there is work to be done. Our investments and properties will not take care of themselves."
"No, they will not," his mother agreed, "which is why you employ the most efficient and capable stewards for when you cannot be there. You are one man, my dear. It would be quite impossible for you to shoulder all of that responsibility yourself."
Too late, Edward realised his mistake. There'd be no stopping Mother now.
"If only you had a wife to unburden yourself with," she began. Predictably. "Someone who could help ease your worries, talk through your problems and–"
"And what Mother?" he interrupted, sounding sharper than he intended but annoyed by the same lecture yet again. "And spend all of my money, gossip with her dim-witted friends, and parade me around Town like a circus act?" he asked, unable to hide the distaste in his voice.
"Edward," his mother admonished, a little shocked at the bitterness in her son's tone, "you cannot believe that I would want anything less than a suitable wife for you."
"Our ideas of suitable are vastly different, Mother," he commented dryly, "you would have me marry a cow if it was from good stock."
The bark of laughter from the other side of the carriage brought Edward's attention to Tom.
"You," he snapped, his tone accusing, "should know better than to go along with Mother's schemes, Tom."
"It is no scheme, Edward. It is just a visit."
Edward turned away from them both to stare moodily out the window once more. They'd closed ranks and neither would tell him anything.
Well, maybe it was genuinely just a visit. It would be terribly awkward, and unorthodox to say the least. But if he hadn't agreed, his Mother would have gone on about it until the Season, with all its distractions, started and he really did not want to have to deal with that.