The girls both agreed they’d better. The gents were less than willing to trust his grandfather’s instincts.
Oliver had already weighed in on Tas-gwyn’s side, and he didn’t imagine any further argument from him would achieve anything, so he’d gotten up to stretch his legs and come to see how his fuchsias were faring. Though instead of checking their leaves, he found himself just watching the four across the garden.
All right, mostly the one. His gaze kept returning over and again to Libby, as it always did and certainly had been doing all evening. They’d dressed for dinner—though he rather enjoyed the more casual meals he and Mamm-wynn had been having in Beth’s absence—which meant that for only the second time, he was beholding Libby in something other than a simple skirt and blouse. And while he appreciated her practical choices and loved that she fit so well with all his neighbors, he had to admit that seeing her in soft color that draped her form, her hair swept up, pretty much guaranteed that he couldn’t think of much other than her.
She was as lovely as the blossoms that surrounded her.
She looked his way, a soft smile curling her lips, and murmured something that he couldn’t hear from here. No one paid her any mind anyway as they continued to debate whether the drawn map matched the sketch of the castle’s layout that his grandfather had unearthed. Libby slipped from her chair and meandered in his general direction, though she paused at the rosebush for a long moment until her brother turned back to Beth and Sheridan.
Oliver met her in front of the thatch anchor and had to clasp his hands behind his back to keep from reaching for hers. “You’ve proven yourself quite the heroine of the day with your microscope discoveries.”
She waved that away, though her eyes still smiled. “We’ll see tomorrow if it was any help at all, I suppose. Do you think we’ll be able to obtain permission to search the castle grounds?”
He tamped down a grin. “The general wisdom is that what the Lord Proprietor doesn’t know about, he can’t refuse permission for.”
She chuckled. “A fine philosophy for exploring children or tourists—though I’m not so certain it’s the best one for the vicar and the headmaster to ascribe to.”
“Even so, the Lord Proprietor and I are on good terms. As long as we don’t destroy anything, I can’t imagine he’ll mind. And unless we mean to send a telegram asking for permission or wait for him to get home next month . . .”
“That would suit me fine.” She grinned up at him. “If I could convince Bram to let me stay until we saw it through to completion.”
If he thought they could keep Lorne and Scofield at bay, he might agree. But he had a knot in his spirit that just wouldn’t loosen whenever he thought of them. They wouldn’t sit around much longer, waiting for someone else to deliver them what they were after. Not with a second buyer promising Scofield money and the rivalry spurring Lorne on. Oliver had met men like these before—men who would stop at nothing to get the upper hand in whatever they were doing. Men who took the kind of petty tension he’d always had with Casek and magnified it more powerfully than Libby’s microscope could do.
Thoughts of Casek brought other thoughts, ones that made that knot cinch tighter. “Lorne hired a local lad before. I suspect he’d do it again—and we can’t let anyone else get tangled up in this.” The people of Tresco, of all the Scillies, were his responsibility. In part, anyway. And he didn’t want to be officiating any more funerals because of this.
“I know.” She rested warm fingers on his arm.
She did know. Libby wasn’t the sort who would ever put her own desires above another’s well-being. Just another reason he couldn’t stop looking at her. He smiled down into her eyes, wishing and praying. They hadn’t had nearly enough time together to make it seem reasonable to do something like propose. Especially not when she still had a few questions to answer for herself about the Lord—never mind the brother.
“Libby, hadn’t you better go in and sit with Mrs. Tremayne for a bit so I can walk you home at a decent hour?”
Or perhaps not never mind the brother. He seemed set on making himself a problem. They broke their gazes away from each other to look up at the shadowed face of Lord Telford.
Oliver’s gaze darted past him, and he frowned. “Where are my sister and Lord Sheridan?”
“On their way to the library in the hopes of settling an argument with the help of a book.” Not that Telford so much as met his gaze when he answered. He kept his eyes trained on his sister, and it was no wonder she’d always found the weight of it intimidating. “Go on. She’s your reason for wanting to stay, isn’t she? And you need to collect your cat from her bedside, regardless.”
Her shoulders rolled back, making Oliver think for a moment that she meant to argue. But then she sighed. “I do want to spend some time with her this evening—and Mabena took far too long on my hair to allow me to slip in before supper.”
“Go on, then.” Telford’s voice had gentled, and he even gave her a smile. “Take your time.”
She hesitated a second more and then sighed again. “Good night, Oliver.”
“Good night.” He watched her until she had the door open, though he knew what came next wouldn’t bode well for him.
Shockingly, when he turned back to Telford, he found his face absent of the mask of thunder. It was instead open. Frank. And far too worried. “I don’t mean to be an ogre,” he said in what must be his normal voice, rather than the one set on intimidating him. “It’s just—you’re a vicar. And she doesn’t even have any use for God.”
A perfectly reasonable objection, really. If it were true. Oliver drew in a long breath. “I don’t think I’d have any use for the version of God she’s been taught either.”
Telford frowned. “Pardon?”
“A god who supposedly created a world we cannot understand, yet who himself can be handily put in a little box and tucked into my pocket?” Oliver shook his head. “Our Lord is the opposite of that. He has created a universe of order and rules—but He himself is so much bigger. So full of mystery. Your sister is coming to understand that, I think. And when she does, I have a feeling she’ll realize she not only has a use for God, but the greatest need of Him.”
The fact that Telford didn’t immediately respond told him he was letting the words sink in. Still, he sighed. “Even so. Forgive me for having pried, but I know your family spent their fortune on your brother’s physicians. I’m not judging you for it.” He lifted his hands as if to ward off Oliver’s defense—not that he’d intended to make one. “I would have done the same. I’d have paid anything to keep my father with us longer. But still, I have to consider it. Consider what’s best for her.”
Oliver respected that. But . . . He swallowed, though it did nothing to relieve his tight throat. “And you think that’s Lord Sheridan? Despite the fact that they don’t even like each other?”
“I think they respect each other, which is frankly more than I can say for any other acquaintance she’s made. He wouldn’t try to change her. He wouldn’t forbid her from being who she is or take her microscope away or grow angry when she resists going to London.”