“We both know that, having grown up with servants. But as an officer, I’d often be ordered to oversee soldiers doing the simplest tasks around the encampment, as if they were incapable of digging holes by themselves.”
“But they knew you were watching, Robert. It’s different here, because I can’tseethem. But I can comprehend the results. And the other thing that’s difficult to reconcile is how helpful they all were when Molly was at her worst. It was like we put aside our problems to assist her. We took turns in the sickroom. The Sanfords are the only reason I slept. So let me deal with them and discover what’s going on.”
“Then how can I help you?” he asked.
“Well, I just happen to have a list of my tenants and where they live. I’d like to visit them, but I need a driver. Can I trust you with my life on these country roads?”
He rubbed his hands together. “Now this I can do. I even drove a wagon through the Afghan mountains once, when there weren’t enough healthy soldiers.”
“I’m hardly a lumbering wagon, but I am useless cargo.”
“Useless?” He shook his head. “These tenants owe their livelihood to you.”
“To my dead husband’s estate, you mean.”
“To you. After all, you could turn them all out and convert their farms to sheep pasture, if youreallywanted to make a profit.”
She gasped. “I would never!”
“I know that, but they don’t. Let’s go introduce you.”
11
Robert drove the little curricle, hood down, and the autumn sun shone down on them. Audrey wore a bonnet to shield her face, but he was glad to see color return to her pale cheeks.
“So what does it look like?” she asked with quiet excitement. “This estate of mine?”
He grinned. “Very well-maintained and picturesque.”
“You mean quaint and countrified compared to your noble castle,” she said dryly.
“Now don’t say that. I own a manor, too.”
“Amanor?”
“Very well, I own several, some of which are in Scotland, and I haven’t seen them.”
She winced. “My, how above it all you are.”
“That is unfair,” he said mildly. “I did leave England at the age of twenty-one. Before I was twenty, I was at the mercy of my father’s schedule. He believed in delegating only when he absolutely had to.”
“I imagine people think I should be doing the same,” she mused. “I do have a land agent.”
“And you’re letting him complete his duties. You’re simply overseeing him.”
“Is that what you do?”
“Not exactly. My steward and lawyers have been overseeing the various land agents of all of my properties. To be honest, I don’t even know how many I have. That is what I’m home to rectify,” he added. “In India, it was too difficult to make day-to-day decisions when the mail roundtrip takes at least twelve weeks.”
“Your steward must be happy you’re home.”
“I’m not so certain of that. Remember I told you my father needed to be in control at all times? And I showed those tendencies before I left. I imagine all my servants and men of business are waiting to see what I’ll do now that I’m home.”
“We’re in the same situation, you know.”
“It’s good to have someone who understands how awkward all of this is.”
She smiled and lifted her face to the sun again.
