She hadn’t a great knack for imitation like Charlie did, but Mr. Sarvol did not have any reason to be particularly acquainted with her voice. Whatever effort she could make at disguising it would likely be enough.
“Have you gray eyes?”
Inquiries regarding hair were a common tactic. One could notice hair characteristics even from a distance. This eye-color approach was a bit riskier. Had he taken note of and could recall the eye colors of everyone in the room? Perhaps he was depending more on his ability to recognize the voice than upon the actual answer.
“Oui,” she answered, but with her voice pitched low.
“Despite the pitch, I believe you are a lady. Three of the ladies present possess gray eyes. I’ve heard it remarked upon that the sisters O’Doyle have identical eyes of a silvery gray. Miss Phelps’s, I have noticed, are gray with the slightest hint of blue in certain lights.”
He knew her eye color from his own observations, which were detailed enough to know thatsometimesher eyes looked a little blue. The O’Doyle sisters’ eye color, which all of Society had noted and declared charmingly unique, he knew only from having heard commentary. Nia and Eve were not as strikingly beautiful as Artemis and Lisette, but their eyes certainly garnered them more notice than Gillian’s had ever earned her.How very curious that the situation in this moment was entirely the reverse.
“My next question for the gray-eyed lady is this,” Mr. Sarvol said. “Do you still think that if I were to be shot by the Duke of Kielder, my murder would be justified?”
She had to think for a moment to remember what he was referring to. Her answer was easy once she recalled the conversation. “Oui.”
His eyes were covered, but his smile was not hidden. “Miss Phelps,” he said with a dip of his head.
The room offered congratulations and applause.
For her part, Gillian was confused. He had remembered in detail a conversation she had needed to work to recall. He remembered the color of her eyes, even thesometimescolor. He was paying close attention to her. The last time a gentleman of thetonhad taken particular note of her, he had not been kind.
She didn’t overly like that life had taught her to be so untrusting. But it had, nonetheless. Mr. Scott Sarvol, in return, would need to be carefully watched. From a safe distance.
Chapter Seven
When he was sixteen, Scottacquired a traveling writing desk. He’d not been on a journey without it since. This current expedition was no different.
He sat on a bench in the walled garden with his desk on his lap, having intended to write a letter to Sarah. He wrote letters often and to many people. Some gentlemen found satisfaction and fulfillment in reading or in academic pursuits, some in fencing or pugilistic activities. For Scott, it was letter writing.
At the moment, though, his efforts were focused on yet another perusal of his estate ledger. That he’d been given houseroom at Brier Hill was saving him a bit of money, as he hadn’t needed to pay for lodgings. But he, as any considerate guest would, was providing funds enough to compensate Charlie and Artemis for the feed provided to his animals, which were being tended in the Brier Hill stable, as well as for the meals given to his coachman and the efforts of the stablehands and household staff on his behalf. It added up to less than what he would have paid at an inn but was still not an easy expenditure for a gentleman who had inherited both debt and assets that were, in many ways, liabilities.
The Sarvols have kept this estate profitable and respected for generations. You’ll sink it in only a few years. And no one will be surprised.
He was trying to keep himself afloat, and not merely financially. His uncle had declared Scott “a boy who will never belong.” For two years, that had felt painfully true. He’d had no visitors to Sarvol House; he couldn’t afford any. He’d not journeyed to London to make the acquaintance of anyone in Society; hedefinitelycouldn’t afford that.
Sarah was originally going to live with him at Sarvol House, they having assumed he would inherit almost immediately uponarrival. But their uncle’s cruelty had driven her away. She’d fallen in love with Harold and built a new life with him, leaving Scott on his own.
Father wasn’t there to give Scott a connection to this country and the corner of it that had been his and that now belonged to his grieving son. Years had passed since Father’s death, but at times, it still felt terribly fresh, painfully sharp. It had almost been easier grieving while in America, even though that was where Father had lived for all of Scott’s life. Here in England, Scott felt his loss in ways he’d not expected. He felt it in all the questions he had that his father could have answered. He felt it in the echoing memory of his uncle’s predictions of Scott’s failure, of the absolute surety Scott had that his uncle had literally hated him, though Father would have countered that belief in that loving way of his. Father would have known what to do about all of this, and he wouldn’t have left Scott to endure it alone.
Mother likely wouldn’t have had many words of wisdom for him regarding inheritances and debts and impossible situations, but Scott would have settled for any words at all. Two years they’d been apart. Scott had written to her dozens of times, and she’d not written him even once. It tore at him that he didn’t know why his own mother didn’t miss him now that he was gone.
If things went truly awry, would she write to him in debtors’ prison? Would anyone? His uncle had thought no one would be surprised should he land himself there, but surely someone would notice. Someone would care.
He closed his eyes, breathing through the weight in his chest that never fully went away. Mater would care. He knew she would. But that thought didn’t bring the comfort he longed for. How confidently he’d declared to Miss Phelps that Mater and the late earl’s influence in his life was proof that he was a fellowworthy of being known. How confident he’d been that they didn’t raise cads. He couldn’t stand the thought of them helping to raise a man destined for a prison cell.
Bringing his troubles to this garden that he knew the late earl had treasured was proving yet another misstep. It hadn’t brought peace or clarity. He only felt more guilty, realizing how his mounting failures would reflect on a gentleman who ought to be remembered with reverence and on his wife, who deserved to believe those she had helped raise were something other than complete and utter failures.
Scott set his weary eyes on his ledger once more, knowing perfectly well what he would see: stark reality staring back at him. If Thimbleby proved an estate in need of absolutely nothing, the last of his inheritance from his father would see him through, at most, one more year. But knowing his uncle’s neglect, the property was more likely to be in tremendous disrepair. He would be out of funds very soon indeed.
Oh, Father.He silently spoke to the gentleman he wished were nearby, wished were still with him.I don’t know what to do. I will soon have spent every penny you left me, and it won’t have done anything but delay the inevitable.He swallowed down the lump of emotion in his throat.Your family home, your family legacy . . . and I’m destroying it.
Father would have been so disappointed in him.The late earl would have been as well. Mater would be soon enough.
It was almost more than he could bear.
He looked up from the mocking numbers in his ledger and set his gaze on the far more pleasant sight of the distant mountain. Did snow fall on that mountain in the winter, he wondered. Did it look different in the spring than it did now at the approach of autumn? He didn’t consider himself an expert in nature, nor was he a studier of it, but it was more enjoyable to ponder than failure and disaster and prison.
The sound of ladies’ light laughter reached him in the moments before he heard footsteps on the pebbled path just beyond the garden. Two or three of the Huntresses were, it seemed, coming this direction. Sarvol House had been painfully quiet these past two years. Though his mind was heavy, he had enjoyed the people at Brier Hill.