the entrance and now Verity could count in her head. First, then second, then third, then second, then fourth, then fifth...
‘Help!’ That was Althea. They saw her the moment she spoke, standing with her back to them. ‘Oh, there you are.’ She turned as her sister called her name and fell in behind them with a sigh of relief. ‘Basil, the little wretch, has found the centre. He has been mocking me for five minutes at least.’
‘He’ll be sorry,’ Araminta assured her.
And four, then five, then six.
‘Here we are.’ They stepped out into a sunlit circle with a tiny thatched building in its centre.
Basil was perched on a bench on the miniature veranda, swinging his legs. ‘What took you so long?’
His sisters regarded him with loathing. ‘How did you get here so fast?’ Althea demanded.
‘Look at his knees. He crawled through the bottom of the hedges,’ his twin said. ‘You beast, that’s cheating.’
‘I got here first, that’s what counts,’ Basil said with a smirk. ‘I used my intelligence.’
‘And you appear to have ruined a pair of perfectly good pantaloons in the process,’ the Duke said sharply. ‘Besides abandoning your sisters and failing to stand up when ladies appear. The cost of the trousers will be taken from your allowance. You may now apologise to Miss Wingate for your poor manners and will escort your sisters safely back out of the maze by the conventional paths.’
‘I’m sorry, Miss Wingate. But I don’t know the way out.’ Basil was on his feet now, brushing ineffectually at his knees.
‘I marked it,’ Althea said. ‘I tore a scrap of paper from my notebook and dropped it at every turn.’
‘Very clever, Althea.’ The Duke gave her an approving nod and received a brilliant smile in return. ‘But pick up all the paper as you go.’
They filed out obediently, then there was a yelp from Basil and the sound of running feet.
Verity suppressed a snort of laughter and sat down on the bench. ‘I suspect your sisters are taking their revenge on Lord Basil. Shall we sit for a moment? That will allow them to get clear of the maze, then you will not have to see anything requiring a reproof.’
‘They must feel I spend my entire time reproving them.’ The Duke sat down heavily on the veranda steps.
‘You love them and want the best for them. And they know that.’
‘Do you believe so?’ For a moment she thought he was going to lean back against the supporting post, but he recollected himself in time. Doubtless sitting on the steps was quite casual enough for his dignity.
‘That you love them? That is obvious.’ And, surprisingly, she realised it was true. ‘That they know it I can tell from the way they respond to you. They do not sulk or send you unpleasant looks when your back is turned. Are the younger three as intelligent as these?’
‘They are bright,’ he agreed, as though reassuring himself. ‘And, yes, the others are as intelligent. They all were,’ the Duke added, his voice so soft that she thought he was speaking to himself.
Verity guessed she had not been intended to hear those last three words, but she answered the pain in his voice anyway. ‘There were others?’
‘Just one. My eldest half-sister, Arabella. She would be seventeen this year. She died just before my grandfather took me to live with him.’
‘An illness?’ He had fallen silent. Verity suspected he wanted to talk, but was simply unused to speaking to anyone about such an emotional subject. Or perhaps did not think such revelations proper.
‘It was a virulent fever. It is not something that we speak of in case it distresses the children.’
You cannot admit that it distresses you, of course.
‘You may be assured that I do not repeat confidences, Your Grace,’ she said as she got to her feet. ‘Perhaps we should be making our way back.’
‘Indeed. We should return to the sunshine or you will become chilled,’ he said as they began to wind their way back to the entrance.
The Duke seemed happier reverting to his starched-up self, she thought. A pity—she had almost liked the man who had confessed to his anxieties over his siblings, had allowed a little humour to touch him.
‘Is the Bishop fit enough to travel a short distance?’ he asked as they emerged into the sunshine and Verity waved across the garden to where her father sat with Mr Hoskins. ‘Might I hope he will be able to return my call? I would be pleased to entertain him at Stane Hall.’
‘On a good day, certainly. He usually drives to church every Sunday and the Hall is only a short distance beyond that. His health is not entirely predictable, however. I would not want to commit him to any specific day long in advance.’
‘You must be congratulated on your daughterly devotion in keeping house for your father. His indisposition, coming as it did, I believe, at a time when you must have been making your come-out, would have been most difficult for you.’
Verity opened her mouth and closed it again with a snap. Dukes, presumably, thought themselves as entitled as archbishops to make pompous personal observations. A lack of response, she hoped, would choke him off.
‘It is an uplifting example of daughterly duty and devotion to see you sacrificing your own hopes of marriage in this way,’ he continued, finally finding something about her he approved of, it seemed.
Apparently silence was not a strong enough hint. ‘I had no particular hopes, as you put it, at the time of my father’s seizure and I am most certainly not sacrificing anything.’ By the time her father had suffered his stroke her heart had been broken, her hopes betrayed. ‘So many women are yoked in marriage and lose all their freedoms by it. I fully intend to retain mine, Your Grace.’ Her head told her that marriage was too great a gamble and she had proved to herself that her judgement of men was so faulty that she could not trust her heart.
‘Do I understand that you do not approve of marriage?’ The Duke’s tone now was as frosty as she had made hers.
‘It seems to me an excellent way of perpetuating the human race in an orderly manner. It provides for the civilised upbringing of children and shelters the elderly. It certainly contributes greatly to the comfort of men. It is unfortunate that all of this is so often achieved by the sacrifices of the woman concerned.’
‘Sacrifices? A lady is protected and maintained by marriage. Her status is usually enhanced.’
‘And in return a woman loses all freedom, all control of her own money and lands, all autonomy. She becomes utterly subject to the wishes and whims of her husband. I love my father, and will always care for him, but beyond that, I live my life as an independent woman, Your Grace.’
‘None of us is independent, Miss Wingate. Freedom is an illusion. Ladies are restricted by their natural delicacy, gentlemen by their duties and obligations.’
‘Some of us have more freedom than others, it is true,’ she said.
Natural delicacy, my hat! The temptation to say something very indelicate indeed was great, but she controlled it.
‘A duke has a great deal, a married woman very little. I have the privilege of birth and prosperity and I am fully aware that if I were the daughter of an agricultural labourer or a weaver as disabled as my father is now, my life would hold very little freedom. My delicacy, as you put it, would have to be disregarded. I am fortunate and I do not intend to throw away that good fortune simply because social pressure dictates that I should be married.’
The words, And who would be foolish enough to ask you, with that attitude? were almost audible, she thought.
The Duke closed