“Oh, definitely a ball, Julia,” Mrs. Herriott said. “Everyone loves to dance.”
“You simply must come up to the hall and help with ideas and plans, Cousin Imogen,” Mrs. Hayes said.
“I am going to steal your cook, Cousin Imogen,” Mrs. Herriott told her. “These are surely the best scones I have ever tasted.”
They left after a correct half hour or so, hugging Imogen again as they went and kissing her cheek and hoping they would see her at the hall again during the evening. She could only laugh softly to herself after they had gone. She felt rather as though she were emerging from a whirlwind.
She had scarcely finished her luncheon a couple of hours later when her home was invaded again, this time by the Eldridge twin sisters—was it possible to tell them apart?—and the two Herriott brothers and Mr. Cyril Eldridge. They were all first cousins of the earl, Imogen remembered from last evening. Today they were out for a walk and had called to beg Imogen to go with them.
“You simply must come, Cousin,” one of the Eldridge sisters pleaded. “Our numbers are uneven.”
“Percy says there is a way down onto the beach from close to here,” Mr. Eldridge said, “and that you would be able to show it to us, Lady Barclay. Will you be so kind? Or are you busy with something else?”
“I would be delighted,” she said, and was surprised to discover that she meant it. Four of the cousins were very young—all of them below the age of twenty, she guessed. The twins were probably fifteen or sixteen. The young men had a tendency to guffaw at the slightest provocation and the young ladies to giggle. But there was no guile in them, she had noticed last evening. They were merely acting their age. She was rather touched that they had thought of asking her to join them when she must appear quite elderly in their eyes. But of course, Mr. Eldridge was probably far closer to her in age than he was to them. Perhaps they had considered that.
“Beth went visiting with my mother and my aunts and Lady Lavinia,” Mr. Eldridge explained as they set out along the cliff path. “They must have been horribly squashed in the carriage. Meredith stayed back to play with young Geoffrey when he wakes from his afternoon nap. My father and my uncles went off with Percy to look at sheep. He was actually soliciting their advice. It scarcely bears thinking of, Lady Barclay. Percy interested in farming? Next he will be talking about settling here. Oh, I beg your pardon.”
“Because I might be offended that the very notion of someone’s wanting to settle here appalls you, Mr. Eldridge?” she said. “I am not offended.”
“It is only,” he said, “that I cannot imagine Percy being contented here for long. He only came because he said he would when he was colossally bored and colossally drunk on his birthday, and Percy never likes to go back on his word. I’ll wager he was already planning to leave here when Aunt Julia decided to come and bring us lot with her. I’ll wager he just about had an apoplexy.”
He was not far wrong, Imogen thought with an inward smile. But—colossally bored. And colossally drunk. And this was the man she had kissed voluntarily and with some pleasure last night? The man she had come to like? And the man with whom she was still half considering having an affair?
It was nothing she did not already know or guess about him, though. He was also a very intelligent, well-educated man, and a man who had somehow lost direction about ten years ago and not found it since. Would he find it? Ever? Here, perhaps? She hoped not here. Please not here. She might perhaps allow herself a little reprieve in company with him, but it could not be prolonged.
“Is this it?” one of the Herriott brothers—Leonard?—was calling from a little way ahead along the path.
“It is,” Imogen called back. “The path looks a bit daunting, but you will see that it zigzags to minimize the steepness of the descent, and it is really quite wide and firm underfoot.”
“I claim Gregory,” one of the twins said. “He has a sturdier arm.”
“Meaning I am fat, Alma?” Gregory Herriott said.
“Meaning that you have a sturdy arm,” she said—and giggled. “And I am Eva.”
“No, you are dashed well not,” he said. “Not unless you changed frocks with your sister after luncheon.”
There was a burst of laughter from the other three.
Imogen stepped forward to lead the way down.
If he had not been colossally drunk on his birthday, perhaps it would not have occurred to him to come to Cornwall—ever. He had neglected it quite happily for two years. All this might not be happening if he had not got drunk. But if he had not, then she would still be at the hall herself now, waiting for the roof to be replaced on the dower house.
She would not go up to the hall this evening, she decided. She could not be expected to go there every night, after all.
May I escort you home every night? he had asked last evening after their kiss. He had asked it to make her laugh—and he had succeeded.