Chapter Fifteen
Cedric disembarked as soon as it was possible, then found some of his old friends. If nothing else, he was rich in old friends. Better yet, though it was barely three in the morning, they were awake and in their cups.
They fed him good English food that wasn’t damp and had excellent meat. They plied him with brandy that went straight to his head. And as soon as it was light, he borrowed his friend’s horse and headed to his family estate.
Maybe Lucy was right. Maybe his family’s fortunes had recovered on their own. Maybe…
He stopped when the manor came into view. Of all the things he had imagined—both good and ill—none came close to what he saw now.
First and most disturbing, the roof was still in pieces. Fortunately, it was only one section of a very large house, so there was room for his sisters on the other side. But the damage was extensive, and he flinched every time he got past a tree and saw the whole of the mess again.
His second look showed him children, lots of children everywhere. Every urchin in the county was somewhere in front of the house. His mother had hated noisy children, so their homehad been a silent tomb. But now it teemed with life. Noisy, arguing, giggling, singing and running about life!
Eventually, he spotted his two sisters. The youngest, Lilianna, sat under a tree, telling a story to several children while she painted in a book. Lilianna had always had a pencil at hand. Right now she seemed to be adding watercolour to the book while entertaining several little ones.
His middle sister, Rose, was standing at a large table sorting…vegetables? As he neared, he could see that she was giving a mathematics lesson using cabbages, watercress and peas. Several of the children had a slate and chalk, showing their answers to her in turn while she began to chop up the cabbage.
Good God, when had his frail sister developed muscles? He remembered her as an elfin child, but all of a sudden, she dropped the knife to lift up two fighting boys—one in each hand—as she gave them a stern talking to. Rose! The girl who spent most of her childhood with her head in the clouds as she sang to the fairies. She was scolding two boys while she held them aloft in her two fists.
That alone was shocking enough, but then he saw his oldest sister, Cora. She was the most level-headed of all of them. Responsible and always calm in a crisis. He was just rounding the corner when she stepped out the front door. It wasn’t so much the way she walked, but what she did when she stood still.
She looked fondly out at the sea of children and let her hand drift slowly over her belly. Over her rounded belly.
It was possible that she had simply gained weight from an abundance of food, but given the thin size of his other sisters, he doubted it. It was possible that some ailment had filled out her lower half, but again, she didn’t look ill. What she looked like was a woman who was increasing.
Cora was pregnant.
He spurred his horse forwards, no longer content to watch from the road. He was tired and had a sore head, but this…this was not something he could take quietly. Had he missed a wedding announcement? Surely one of his friends would have mentioned it to him. A pang hit him hard that he had not been here for her nuptials.
He dismounted as soon as he got close, walking his horse forwards when he really wanted to run. With all these children around, someone might get trampled. So he took care while he tried to see his sister’s hand. Was she wearing a wedding ring? Who could she have married?
He knew—or thought he knew—all the local gentlemen. Not a one was good enough for her. This is what came of not having a Season! Had she settled on someone who was unworthy of her? And who could blame her with no dowry and no relief in sight?
Thoughts spun uselessly in his head as his sisters finally noticed him. All three cried out in their particular ways. Lilianna looked up with a small start of surprise. Rose giggled in the way he remembered, the sound more like bells than laughter. But it was Cora who held his attention. She flushed red and slowly lifted her hand from her belly.
Dread settled deep in his gut. She looked guilty rather than happy. And while the children fell into chaos around him, he smiled grimly at her.
‘I came as soon as I docked,’ he said by way of greeting. ‘And I can tell that there is a great deal that has happened while I was away.’
Cora shrugged. ‘We had to do something, Cedric. We couldn’t just sit around and starve.’
He looked at her face. She didn’t look on the verge of starvation. None of them did. But none of them had the full blush of health either. Not the way the daughters of an earl should. He could already see that their hands were rough,their bodies unfashionably strong and of course, there was the pregnancy. He would be an uncle soon.
The thought wasn’t displeasing. Just the circumstances which, truthfully, he didn’t know yet. So he shouldn’t judge. And he shouldn’t be afraid.
And yet, as he greeted each of his sisters in turn, he could see guilt written in their downcast faces and hear it echo in their overly loud greetings.
Good God, what had happened here?
It took a while to get everyone sorted. The children’s lessons had to be finished, the vegetables collected and set to cooking and he had to groom his horse. There were no servants, not that he’d expected any. But it was still a shock to see that his sisters had no help whatsoever. His mother had always insisted on a full staff.
All of that took a couple hours. And though he tried to talk to his sisters along the way—when he came out of the stable, when he entered the kitchen to find some water to wash and on the way to and from the well with two heavy buckets—all three women pushed him off with one excuse or another.
‘At dinner,’ they said. ‘We’ll explain everything at dinner.’
So he took matters into his own hands and went to inspect the collapsed roof. He needed to know if the house was about to crumble into dust.
‘It needs repair,’ Cora said. ‘Immediately.’