“Will Your Grace be going out this morning?” Mrs. Alcott stood near the sideboard, hands folded, her posture suggesting she had been waiting for exactly this question to occur naturally in the silence.
“Yes. I shall call on my sister. Lady Barton, in Kensington.”
“Very good, Your Grace. Shall I send word ahead?”
“That won’t be necessary. Caroline does not stand on ceremony.”
Mrs. Alcott nodded. A beat passed. The housekeeper’s gaze drifted, with studied casualness, to the untouched eggs. The untouched toast. The tea growing cold in its cup.
“Mrs. Alcott.”
“Your Grace?”
“The table.” Penelope’s fingers tightened around the handle of the teacup. “Tomorrow, please lay it for one. There is no need for—” She gestured at the expanse of white linen, the second place setting opposite her, the empty chair that faced hers across a distance of polished oak. “All of this.”
The housekeeper’s expression did not change. “Of course, Your Grace. I had assumed, given that the household was established for two?—”
“One will be sufficient.”
“Very good.”
Mrs. Alcott retreated. The door closed. Penelope sat alone at the table set for two and stared at the empty chair opposite—the one where he would have sat, one leg crossed over the other, his shirtsleeves rolled to the elbow despite it being breakfast, his grey eyes tracking her over the rim of his cup with that maddening half-attention that saw everything and admitted nothing.
You look as if you haven’t slept, Duchess.
I slept perfectly well, thank you.
Liar. You’ve been awake since four. I heard you pacing.
You could not possibly have heard me pacing. Your rooms are two floors?—
I hear everything in this house, Penelope. It is a talent and a curse.
She reached for the toast. Bit into it. It tasted like sawdust. She chewed, swallowed, and took another bite, because not eating was a luxury she could not afford—Caroline would notice, and Caroline’s noticing led to questions, and questions led to answers Penelope had no intention of giving.
She managed to eat the toast and drink the tea. She left the eggs.
She still did not have an appetite.
Penelope had no idea how long she’d sat like that—refusing to see anyone. All she knew was that it took quite some time before she was willing to go to the drawing room again.
Longer still until she was willing to see someone—anyone.
“Aunt Penny! Aunt Penny,look!”
George Barton, aged two and three-quarters, launched himself at Penelope’s knees the moment the drawing room door opened. He was brandishing a wooden horse with one ear missing and a tail that had been chewed into submission, and his face bore the fierce, uncomplicated pride of a child presenting his most treasured possession to someone whose approval mattered enormously.
“What a magnificent horse.” Penelope crouched—an act that placed her at eye level with her nephew and also, conveniently, hid the way her breath had stuttered when she’d walked through Caroline’s front door and heard the sound of a child’s laughter floating down from the upper floor. “Does he have a name?”
“Captain.” George thrust the horse closer. “He’s brave.”
“He looks very brave.”
“He fights dragons.”
“Naturally.”
“And he eats cake.”