Andrew Lord of Despair(70)

Possibly.

Andrew was lethal with a sword, and a good shot, but he wasn’t the kind of marksman the Allen men were. With his dying breath, Andrew would know he’d left Astrid unprotected and widowed again.

“What are you scowling about now?” Gwen asked, coming down the stairs with Rose at her side.

“I can scowl too,” Rose said, frowning with exaggerated ill humor. Andrew scooped the child off the stairs onto his hip.

“You will scare me, Rosebud, if you don’t stop looking so ferocious. I am scowling because it is nearly luncheon, and I am quite hungry.”

“I am hungry too,” Rose said. “Where is Cousin Astrid?”

“She was here a minute ago,” Andrew hedged, but he caught Gwen’s eye, and the rare compassion he saw suggested she’d overheard, or even seen, some of his exchange with Astrid.

“Cousin Astrid is sad,” Rose said. “I wish she would be happy.”

Gwen’s expression went carefully impassive, but she retrieved Rose from Andrew and set the child back on her own two feet.

“We will go find Cousin Astrid and cheer her up,” Gwen said. “There is nothing worthwhile for her to be sad about.”

They turned their backs on Andrew and went off to enjoy their meal, while he… sat down, pulled on his muddy boots, and returned to the stables, there to muck stalls until the ache in his chest subsided and his hunger was nearly forgotten.

***

Arabella Antoinette Hollister Alexander, Lady Heathgate to the tedious nincompoops of Polite Society, hated autumn, for it was the season of her failures. Thirteen years ago, she’d failed to talk her husband into ignoring a summons from his papa, the marquess, to attend a doomed family gathering in Scotland.

Who in their right mind traveled north as winter approached?

Six years ago, she had taken until autumn to realize her niece Guinevere’s abrupt withdrawal from her first social Season had been a harbinger of disaster, though Rose herself had been more of a salvation than a disaster.

Andrew had departed for the Continent in autumn, and now, autumn found not only Andrew, but his entire household lost at sea.

A lady could tolerate just so much of failure, however, and now that the anniversary of the accident had come and gone—remarked by nothing more than a short, determinedly cheerful call from her older son—it was time to set Andrew’s household to rights.

“My son is due for a review of his domestic accounts,” Arabella remarked after Rose had said the blessing over another meal from which Andrew had absented himself.

Astrid and Gwen looked askance at her, then at each other, suggesting Arabella’s efforts to foster an alliance between the young ladies had borne some fruit, at least.

“What are ’mestic accounts?” Rose asked from around a mouthful of bread, jam, and butter.

“A discussion of his expenditures and assets in the marital realm,” Arabella explained. “Astrid, you are letting Andrew get away with poor manners and all varieties of inconsideration. He walked right past me this morning, not so much as a ‘good day’ to his own mother. He has no conversation anymore, much less any wit, and his gallantries are all wasted on those horses of his. What will you do about this?”

For Arabella’s notions of how to go on with the boy—stern lectures and dire warnings delivered in the privacy of his study—had had no effect.

Gwen busied herself arranging a serviette as a bib for Rose, while Astrid considered a slice of pear.

“I quite frankly don’t know what to do,” Astrid said. She set the pear down without taking a bite, and fired off something like a glower at her mama-in-law. “The two of you leave me nothing meaningful to see to under my own roof, and if my husband has no use for me, I can hardly take exception to his behavior without taking the two of you to task as well. Rudeness and inconsideration are not such unusual behavior in this household.”

Clearly the girl had surprised herself with her honesty, and she had relieved Arabella, for those dreadful Allens had nearly crushed Astrid’s spirit. Now this spark of forthrightness must be fanned to a flame that might illuminate the shadows still clouding Andrew’s eyes.

“Sweet heavens!” Arabella exclaimed in her best Offended Dowager tones. “Andrew’s foul humor is contagious. This, my dear, will never do.”

A tense silence spread, with even Rose apparently comprehending something had gone amiss.

“Astrid is right,” Gwen said, pushing her spoon around in her soup. “And I am at least partly to blame.”

Guinevere was brave to a fault. Of course she would join this affray and try to protect Astrid from a scolding. As Gwen set her spoon aside, Arabella noticed a hint of her own late father about Gwen’s chin and jaw.