Mrs. Cartwright, poring over a bound ledger, looked up as they approached the front desk. “My lord, my lady, I hope your meal was enjoyable.”
Supper with Penelope had been beyond enjoyable, dammit. Gill added making her ladyship laugh again to his list of goals for this journey.
“Everything was quite in order,” he said, “but I will need a room here at the inn for at least tonight.”
Mrs. Cartwright’s genial smile faded. “I’m sorry, my lord, that won’t be possible. We had several parties arrive without reservations, and we’re at our capacity. Over capacity, to be honest. By the end of the week, we should have some leeway.”
A party of four emerged from the dining room, a young couple and two older women. They moved toward the main staircase, but paused as if to admire the paintings hanging in the inn’s foyer.
“No matter,” Penelope said, twining her hand over Gill’s arm. “Please have breakfast for two delivered to the cottage at the usual hour.” She smiled up at Gill with desperate ferocity, and he realized he’d just been delivered his cue in some farcical stage play.
He smiled back, letting all the genuine tenderness and longing he felt for his wife show in his eyes. “Better make that breakfast for four,” he said. “Her ladyship and I find the sea air provokes powerful appetites.”
They goggled at each other as they sauntered past the gaping buffoons in the foyer, and Penelope did not turn loose of Gill’s arm even when they had gained the shadows of the elm grove.
As Summerton escorted Penelope through the shadowy woods, she wished she’d worn more than a light shawl to protect her from the bite of the seashore’s damp, salty air.
“I love that sound,” he said, steps slowing. “The whump-and-swoosh of the waves lapping at the shore after dark. The surf has moods, just as the sky does, and tonight all is at peace in Triton’s realm.”
All was not at peace with Penelope. She’d intended that a private meal aid a private, difficult conversation, but then Gill had started teasing her about the coiffure she’d worn on her wedding day. Mama-in-Law had sent her lady’s maid to fashion Penelope’s hair in the latest style, and undoing that monstrosity had taken an impatient bridegroom nearly an hour.
The bride had been impatient too. Penelope wanted to forget that, but she’d liked the person she’d married, as much as any girl could like any man whom she barely knew. Vergilius had gone out of his way to be endearing and made the whole wedding business very much a matter of bride and groom joining forces to endure the machinations of the meddling horde.
Penelope could still hear Bella warning her not to be too appalled by the wedding night, because, “You have no choice but to put up with it, sad to say. If he gets out of hand, just start crying, and he’ll finish quickly enough.”
By morning, Penelope hadn’t wanted to leave the marital bed. Vergilius had known what he was about, and some stubborn, honest part of Penelope could admit she’d miss his lovemaking.
She had missed his lovemaking, though he apparently had not missed hers.
“Pen?” Summerton asked as the path emerged from the woods.
“My lord?”
“What was all that in aid of, back at the inn?”
At first, she thought he was alluding to the private dining room, but no. She’d given him a reason for that—to avoid the gossips. The gossips had been out in full force, alas, by the time she and her husband had crossed the dining room at the conclusion of their meal.
“You did not recognize Amaryllis Piper?”
Summerton stopped where the trail enjoyed a view of the beach and the moonlit sea. The vista was peaceful and, to Penelope, a little sad. As a new bride, she’d been passionately kissed on nights like this and along this very trail. She and her groom had been prodigiously prone to kissing in any romantic spot, and with Vergilius, a dressing closet could be romantic.
Which made the present topic all the more painful.
“Who is Amaryllis Piper?”
The breeze was livelier here beyond the woods, and Penelope again regretted her lack of a heavy cloak.
“Amaryllis Piper is Marie Chalfont’s aunt.” Penelope kept her voice even, as she had long learned to do when discussing an awkward topic, but the urge to shout, to shove Vergilius hard on the arm, was strong.
“Marie… Horace Chalfont’s wife? Is that significant?” How innocent he sounded, how genuinely bewildered. “Didn’t they remove to Paris immediately after the war? I’m sure I haven’t seen Chalfont in the clubs for at least two years. I should look him up. We were good friends at university, to the extent a university scholar remains sober enough to be any sort of friend.”
“My lord, if you are trying to be discreet or considerate or any of the other lies men tell themselves for their own convenience, you need not make the effort. I know you and Marie were involved.”
Summerton stepped closer, and for a moment, Penelope was confused as to his motive. Did he think to kiss her? Here, in the midst of this discussion?
He unbuttoned his coat and draped it around her shoulders, provoking more useless, sweet memories. “How the hell did you get that idea?” His lordship sounded perplexed and a little annoyed.
“You were her escort for most of a Season, Summerton. She could not go anywhere without you, and she positively hung all over you. I had it on good, trustworthy authority that she wasn’t above sighing over your manly prowess, and she had to know such talk would get back to me.”
Summerton peered down at Penelope. “Is this why you have such a reputation for rebuking the gossips, Pen? You fear to hear gossip about me?”
If a cold, stinging wave had crashed over Penelope out of nowhere, that quiet question could not have been more shocking—or insightful.
“Of course not. Nobody should encourage slander masquerading as idle talk. I do not begrudge you your diversions, my lord, and they are of no concern to me.”
Summerton offered his arm, and Penelope took it out of habit—or something. She did not want to, not when she was so stupidly upset over ancient business.
“Penelope, listen to me. Horace was being a negligent husband. Marie asked me to do what I could to make him jealous. I explained to Horace what was afoot, because I had no wish to have my brains blown out over a silly marital spat. Horace confided in me that he was unwell and begged me to accommodate Marie’s need for a flirt until his malady passed. I suspect he contracted an ailment that he dreaded passing along to his wife, and that’s why the Chalfonts decamped for the Continent.”
“Oh dear.” The grim set to Amaryllis’s mouth had not been because she judged Lord Summerton for his frolicking, but because she feared Lady Summerton knew of Horace’s situation. “Poor Marie.”
“Precisely. One cannot help but feel compassion for a couple in such a situation. I encouraged Horace to tell his lady the truth, because I wasn’t comfortable playing the gallant for more than a few weeks. I did not want to cause precisely the sort of talk that reached you.”
“There wasn’t much talk. Most people know better than to spread nasty rumors in my direction.” Though Bella was always a font of tattle when she came up to Town. She had a network of correspondents that would make a banker envious.