What was wrong with this man, that he couldn’t comport himself in polite society? His cousin was a viscount. Surely he’d been raised a gentleman, too.
She caught up to him on the green, only mildly winded. “Spindle Cove is a holiday village, Lord Rycliff. Visitors journey great distances to enjoy fine, sunny weather and a restorative atmosphere. If you take a deep breath and a good look around you, perhaps you’ll find the place doing you some good. Because forgive me for saying it, but the presence of a dour, brooding lordship doesn’t fit with the advertising.”
“I’d imagine it doesn’t.” Rycliff took his horse’s reins from Rufus Bright. He nodded toward the Blushing Pansy. “I didn’t belong in that place. I knew it well. The question is, Miss Finch . . . what are you doing in this village?”
“I’ve been trying to explain it to you. We have a community of ladies here in Spindle Cove, and we support one another with friendship, intellectual stimulation, and healthful living.”
“No, no. I can see how this might appeal to a mousy, awkward chit with no prospects for something better. But what are you doing here?”
Perplexed, she turned her gloved hands palms-up. “Living happily.”
“Really,” he said, giving her a skeptical look. Even his horse snorted in seeming disbelief. “A woman like you.”
She bristled. Just what kind of woman did he think she was?
“If you think yourself content with no man in your life, Miss Finch, that only proves one thing.” In a swift motion, he pulled himself into the saddle. His next words were spoken down at her, making her feel small and patronized. “You’ve been meeting all the wrong men.”
He nudged his gelding into a canter and rode away, leaving her affronted and sputtering. She whirled on her heel, only to come nose-to-epaulet with Corporal Thorne.
She swallowed hard. From across a room, Thorne was an intimidating presence. Up close, he was terrifying. But Susanna’s anger and curiosity were too greatly piqued. Together, they overrode all sense of etiquette or caution.
“What’s the matter with that man?” she asked the corporal.
His eyes hardened.
“That man.” She gestured down the lane. “Rycliff. Bramwell. Your superior.”
His jaw hardened.
“You must know him quite well. You’ve probably worked alongside him for several years, his closest confidant. Tell me, then. Did it start in childhood? Was he neglected by his parents, mistreated by a governess? Locked away in an attic?”
Now the man’s entire face turned to stone. A stone etched with unfriendly frown lines and a ruthless slash where the mouth should be.
“Or was it the war? He’s haunted by memories of battle, perhaps. Was his regiment ambushed, at great loss of life? Was he captured and held prisoner behind enemy lines? I do hope he has some excuse.”
She waited, watched. The corporal’s face surrendered no clues whatsoever.
“He has a paralyzing fear of tea,” she blurted out. “Or enclosed spaces. Spiders, that’s my final guess. Blink once for yes, twice for no.”
He didn’t blink at all.
“Never mind,” she said, exasperated. “I’ll just have to drag it from him myself.”
Some thirty huffing, panting minutes later, Susanna reached the top of the bluffs and the perimeter of Rycliff Castle. Naturally Lord Rycliff had arrived well ahead of her. She found his mount already unsaddled and grazing in the bailey.
“Lord Rycliff?” she called. Her shout echoed off the stones.
No answer.
She tried again, cupping her hands around her mouth. “Lord Rycliff, may I have a word?”
“Only one, Miss Finch?” The faint answer came from the direction of the keep. “I couldn’t be that lucky.”
She advanced toward the collection of stone towers, training her ears for his voice. “Where are you?”
“The armory.”
The armory?
Following the sound of his reply, she made for the keep’s arched entryway. Once inside, Susanna turned left and entered the hollow stone turret on the northeast corner. Now the armory, it would seem. She supposed it did make a suitable place to store powder and weaponry. Cool, dark, enclosed by stone. The crunch of dry gravel beneath her feet indicated the tower’s roof was sufficiently intact to keep out the rain.
She stood in the entry, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the dim light. Slowly, the scene came into focus, and as it did, her heart sank.
She’d been half hoping—fully hoping, she supposed—that he would take this militia task lightly, limit his efforts to the bare minimum. The occasion required only a bit of show, she’d reasoned. Rycliff couldn’t earnestly mean to scrape together a true fighting force in Spindle Cove.
But looking on this scene, she couldn’t deny the truth. The man was serious about this militia. This was a serious amount of weaponry.