Felton curled his fingers tighter around the leather reins. “Say what you have come to say, Mr. Haverfield.”
“I permitted a courtship out of my better judgment and was also so benevolent as to allow her a visit at your home, in the event she might be of some comfort to your ailing mother.”
“What should I do in return for such generosity?”
“Do not mock me, Mr. Northwood. I received a weeping and brokenhearted daughter back to my home, and I demand to know why. You have teased her and tempted her heart and persuaded both of us into giving you a chance. Was it so great a trophy to win my approval? And now that you possess it, are you so foolish as to no longer want her?”
“I owe you no explanations, with all due respect.”
“You do not know the meaning of the wordrespect. You or your family.” The squire leaned forward, forehead tightening. “To think thatyouwould dare rejectheris inconceivable to me. This only further proves what I have been warning her about all these years. You are no good, Northwood. You are of ill repute and reckless and your blood is tainted as black as your father’s. I want nothing to do with any of you.” He seized his reins and turned his buggy back onto the road. “One more thing, Mr. Northwood. My daughter, despite everything, is still fool enough to want you. She has invited you and that Gillingham girl to my home.” His lips pursed. “Do not come.”
Felton’s horse pranced as the squire cracked his whip and the buggy lunged forward. Hurt mixed with fury, and his fists itched for the satisfying crack of knuckles against cartilage.
“Sorry, Mr. Haverfield.” He spoke the words to the empty billow of dust. “You may expect the Northwoods whether you want them or not.”
The drawing room was quiet. She should have been afraid as she sat rigid on the scroll-end sofa, with Felton’s father in the wingback chair next to her. They’d taken dinner together in a rather uncomfortable quietness, little speaking, both eating sparsely.
He had insisted she join him in the drawing room, where he had settled into his chair and lit his pipe. The faint, spicy scent of tobacco filled the room, as pleasant to her now, somehow, as it had been when Captain had always smoked.
Without meaning to, she sank deeper into the sofa and sighed.
“I say, you see that painting?”
She glanced over to the profile of the older man’s face.
He wore a smile as he pointed with the stem of his pipe to a silver-framed painting above the hearth. “Aaron on the left, Hugh in the middle, Felton on the right with that rascally dog in his arms.”
Of the three children, only the eldest brother wore a skeleton suit. The other two wore loose white gowns, with bowl-shaped haircuts, hair curled and eyes babyish. A smirk curved Felton’s lips, as he held the speckled dog in his arms and leaned against his brother.
“How he loved that dog.” Another puff. Another smile. “Carried it with him wherever he went, he did, until the poor creature was injured by a handful of village ruffians, years later.”
“They …” She hesitated, licking her lips. “They killed his dog?”
“Yes. And Felton near killed them for it too. Likely would have had his brother Aaron not been there to drag him off.” Mr. Northwood shook his head. “Always the fighter, that one. Poor chap. He’ll be the …” He cleared his throat, yet tears still rang in his voice. “He’ll be the death of his mother yet, you know.”
“I am sorry.” Words she shouldn’t have spoken, shouldn’t have felt, but they came anyway. “For your wife. Her illness, I mean.”
Mr. Northwood looked at her. For the first time, his eyes did not hurry away, as if he were frightened or unnerved or ashamed. They stayed locked on hers, teary, more remorseful than threatening. “Dear girl.” Whispered. “Iam sorry.”
Sorry.The word echoed back.Sorry.For climbing through her nursery window and stealing her away? For pushing her mother through the window? For trying to kill her, even now?
When she didn’t answer, he nodded, as if he had expected the lack of response. Pressing the pipe back between his lips, he stood, muttered something about seeing to his wife, and ambled from the drawing room.
Stifling a yawn, Eliza curled deeper into the sofa and framed her face with her hands. She stared at the painting, into the young and happy faces, and wondered how the man who loved and nurtured his own children could kidnap and injure another.
But like all her questions, no answer was forthcoming.
She understood nothing at all.
“See, there she be. Just like I told you, Master Northwood—”
“Shhh.” From the doorway of the drawing room, Felton waved the maid away with his hand. “Go and see to Mamma.”
“But Mr. Northwood still be with her—”
“Well, go and murder that dashed mouse I’ve been hearing running about the halls at night. And if you cannot kill the mouse, find another duty to occupy you.”
“Yes, but—”
