“Tell me again, Gavin,” he said. “Tell me this could be temporary.”

The Scot grasped his shoulder. “Ye already know it, lad. Nou ye’ve got to wait.”

MILES SHAVED AND dressed him, fussing like Gavin but much the same as before.

In other matters—matters that Luc managed himself—he was clumsy. He spilled food from his plate and had to bear the footman cleaning it without a word. After that he began to take meals in his private chambers. He walked with his hand on the wall, slowly, carefully, like an old man with the gout. He had navigated oceans and now his landscape narrowed to the route between his bedchamber and the library.

He should leave his infant cousin’s house and take a house elsewhere. Lycombe House was not his; he did not have the right to live in it. But he could not go to his club and query friends for suitable residences to let. Even if he asked his man of business to hire a house for him, he would be obliged to learn it inch by inch. He could take Arabella to his house in the North where he had never lived, but there would be many more chambers to learn, and she would be isolated with him only.

He could not ride, read, play cards, or write correspondence. He could not drive a carriage. He could not sail even a yawl. He could not see his wife’s eyes.

Tony and Cam called. They talked and drank and tried to make him laugh until he wearied of idleness and sent them away like the surly boar Gavin had called him. He could drink himself into oblivion every day if he wished; the footmen were wonderfully prompt about refilling his glass before he asked. He supposed they preferred him insensible to surly. But after the first night of drunkenness to dull his remaining senses, when she announced that she was leaving the door open between their bedchambers so she could hear him if he needed help, he ordered all the brandy in the house locked up.

He needed her more than she understood. He needed her with a desperation that ate at him and made him sick now. He had nothing to give her. She had never wanted the title; she wanted a prince so she could find her parents. He had wealth, but she never coveted that either, not his little governess who had made a good name for herself on the edge of society entirely by her own merits.

But with his money, he might be able to find the one thing she did want. He could find her real family.

“My lord?” The butler’s voice came from the left—the library doorway. Luc sat by the window. He welcomed the pale warmth of the winter sun he could not see.

“Yes, Simpson?”

“Mr. Parsons has come from Combe. He has brought several persons with him. I have told him that you are not at home to callers. But he insists that you see—that is, that you allow these persons an audience.”

“Send them in.” As a trustee of the estate, he could hardly turn away the land steward. And soon enough the Surly Lord would acquire a reputation in town as a boar and a recluse. He might as well enjoy the company of callers now while they still came, and Parsons’s attention while Fletcher allowed it. Luc had no doubt the bishop would use his blindness as an excuse to rob him of what small power he had over the estate and his cousin’s future. Trapped, helpless, he wouldn’t be able to do a damn thing about it.

“My lord,” the steward said. “Good day.”

“What brings you to town, Parsons?”

“I have information to share with you, my lord.” The man sounded downright meek. It was the blindness. Everybody was tiptoeing around him now, using lowered voices and gentle words as if he were an invalid. Which he was.

“First, my lord, may I tell you of the profound horror and grief of everyone at Combe over the consequences of your unfortunate acci—”

“Yes, that’s fine, Parsons. Thank you.” Accident. Christos and Ravenna had come to him apologizing for their parts in Arabella’s visit to Fletcher’s house. He assured them she would have done it without their encouragement. No one else knew the truth. Christos had tried to tell him about the story they invented to explain both their disappearances from the wedding and his loss of sight, but he didn’t want to hear. It was done. He was blind. Society could believe what it wished. That was an end to it.

Fletcher knew, of course. He had not come to Lycombe House since. Probably busy burning all those files Arabella had seen.

“My lord, three of the tenant farmers from Combe are with me: Goode, Lambkin, and Post.”

Luc nodded and hoped he was looking in their direction. “What news from the land, gentlemen?”

“Milord, we’ve come to you with a petition.”

Subtly, he adjusted the angle of his head to face the voice. “A petition? That sounds downright revolutionary of you, Goode.” He guessed it was Goode who spoke. Arabella would know. He wished she were here with him to read these men, as he could no longer read anything. He should have called her. He needed her.

“Not at all, milord. It’s only that, you see . . . we’re afraid.”

“Afraid?”

“With the new little duke, God bless him, we’re— Well, we hoped with you as duke matters would be settled. But our wives and our boys are afraid now and we’ve got to do something for it.”

“Of what precisely are your families afraid, Goode?”

“Of who, milord.”

Luc drew a slow breath and nodded.

“We need your help, milord.” This came from another of the men. Lambkin? “We’re that desperate.”

“I do know a thing or two of desperation, Lambkin.”

They responded with silence to that.

“Tell me.”

“The bishop—that is, her ladyship’s brother—he came around last year telling us we had to give him our quarterlies. He told us to tell Mr. Parsons that the duke wanted it all to go to charity. Well, when we told him them rents weren’t anybody’s but ours and the duke’s and we’d only give them over to Mr. Parsons, he got all friendly and said he’d like to take our boys for a school he’d made for country folk. It’s a charity place, so the boys can learn their letters and arithmetic and be clerks in town someday. He said he needed some good farm boys to get the place going and he’d like ours as much as anybody’s.”

“He told you that, did he?” Luc said. “What did you think of it?”

“We didn’t trust him, milord. Never mind that he’s supposed to be a man of God.”

“Why not? Did you, perhaps, see the bishop’s generous offer a threat in response to your refusal to give him your rents?”

“Yes, milord.”

Silence. One of the men shifted his feet.

“You see, milord,” Lambkin finally said, “my youngest son—my Toby—he stayed after church one day when the bishop was preaching at the parish, to help with cleaning up as he does. He’s a good lad.” His voice crackled. “That day Toby came running home with a tale that made my missus weep for a fortnight.”

“I see.”

“Milord.” It was Goode again. “We’re asking you to help our boys. It’s them or Combe.”

AFTER THEY DEPARTED, Luc made his way—slowly, awkwardly—back to his bedchamber and penned a brief letter. He had no idea if it was legible, but he could not dictate it to another. He would be obliged to ask Miles to read the response. That was enough.

On the front he printed Fletcher’s name, and he gave it to the footman whom Arabella had assigned to sit outside his door—Claude, the same footman Luc had ordered to follow her about Combe. He told him to deliver it by hand and wait for a response.

The footman did not move away.

“What is the trouble, Claude?”

“Well, Cap’n . . . maybe you could tell me where you want it to go?”

“You cannot read the name and direction.”

“Nope, Cap’n.”

“Hm. I never realized quite how poor my penmanship was before.”

The footman smothered a guffaw.

He made Claude memorize the message and then threw the letter into the fire. The sailor had been midshipman for seven years on the Victory. He was quick-witted and loyal, the very reason he had brought him to Combe with Joseph to look after Arabella. He simply had to trust him now. He had no other choice.