Could he so selfishly ignore his responsibilities?
'I'll speak with Miss Palmer,' he said. 'And we will talk another time of what is best for Prue. But now, to our list. We have ten names on it so far. I believe we need a few more if we are to outnumber the members of the orchestra.'
Constance laughed.
'An orchestra?' Chastity asked, her eyes shining again. 'Really, Joshua? How magical this ball is going to be.'
Some time later Joshua made his way up the steep path behind the house, the sun warm on his body, though he knew it would feel cooler when he reached the top and was no longer sheltered from the wind. For the first time in seven months he really felt like the Marquess of Hallmere. He felt weighted down by responsibility. The really alarming thing, though, was that it did not feel like an oppressive weight. His cousins needed him here even if everything else could be managed by a steward, and he was fond of them. Now he had the power to do something positive to make their lives happier-and the power not to do so. He could go away and leave them to his aunt's care, or he could stay and assert his guardianship.
Strangely, he had spared scarcely a thought all afternoon for the murder charge that still hung over his head. It was difficult to take it seriously.
The path brought him up out of the valley, and, as expected, a gust of wind assaulted him. He looked back down toward the house and gardens, to the river and the bridge below them, to the village just visible beyond the headland on the other side of the valley. And he turned to look at the land swelling slightly to his left, rough with stone outcroppings and coarse grass and gorse bushes and wildflowers. The sheep of the home farm were dotted about the land, grazing. To his right the land sloped downward and leveled off into a neat patchwork of fields separated by stone walls and a few hedges. The main road came up out of the valley not far away and snaked its way between the fields and stretched ahead as far as the eye could see, on its way to Land's End.
His land. His farms. And the farms of his tenants.
A totally unexpected love for it all hit him like a low blow to the stomach. Good Lord, had he taken leave of his senses?
He shook his head and turned left to stride in the direction of the cliffs. The Bedwyns were an energetic lot, as he had discovered at Lindsey Hall. The ride into Lydmere during the morning and the romp on the beach had not been enough for them. They had come up here at his direction to see the view. He had promised to join them as soon as he had finished drawing up the guest list for the ball.
Soon he could see them in the distance. The children and Prue were dashing about, a safe distance from the cliff top. It looked as if they were chasing sheep-a favorite childhood pastime of his own. But the sheep-sensible creatures-showed no signs of real panic but merely bobbed off a safe distance just before they could be caught, and then returned to the serious business of grazing. Eve was sitting on a flat rock, her arms clasped about her knees while Aidan sprawled on the ground beside her. Morgan and Alleyne were strolling along the headland some distance away. There was no sign of Freyja.
Prue spotted him first and came lumbering toward him in her characteristic ungainly manner, her elbows clamped to her sides, her hands flapping in the air. She was laughing and excited, and he opened his arms and braced himself as she hurtled into them and took her usual death grip on his neck.
'Josh!' she cried. 'Josh, Josh, Josh. I am having such fun. I like Becky and I like Davy. I love Eve and I love you and-'
He released himself gently from her hold, set an arm about her shoulders, and hugged her to his side.
'You love everyone, Prue,' he said. 'You should save your breath and just tell me that you love everyone. Are you chasing sheep?'
'Ye-e-es.' She laughed. 'Eve said we could if we did not hurt them. Davy does not want to hurt them. Becky does not want to hurt them. I do not want to hurt them. I love sheep.' She beamed up at him.
'Where is Freyja?' he asked.
'Looking at the sea,' she said. 'She likes it. She likes me. She let me hold her hand and pull her up the path.'
Freyja had done that? he thought in some astonishment.
'I held her hand because she is lonely,' Prue said. 'I made her feel a bit better. You will make her all better, Josh.'
Freyja lonely? Now that was a strange notion, but very possibly deadly accurate. Prue sometimes had unexpectedly sharp perceptions, which were quite unhampered by expectations that had been processed through thought and intellect. It was a novel thought, though. Freyja lonely?
'Joshua,' Eve said as he came up to them, 'this is all quite breathtakingly lovely. I am so glad we came here instead of going to the Lake District. After you are married to Freyja, we are going to be angling for invitations all the time. Are we not, Aidan?' Her eyes were dancing with laughter.
Aidan reached up with a blade of grass and tickled her behind the ear with it. She laughed out loud as she batted it away.
'I am going to have to teach you some manners, my lady,' Aidan said, poker-faced.
Joshua felt a curious lurching sensation low in his abdomen. He tended to think of marriage as an outlet for passion, the sort of sexual passion one might find elsewhere without having to make a lifetime commitment. But here was an aspect of marriage that was altogether more enticing-strangely so, perhaps, when there was no overt sign of the passion that he guessed must flare when the two of them were alone and private together. They were relaxing together, laughing together-Aidan was laughing despite the deliberately severe expression-and teasing each other.
'Might I say,' Aidan said as Prue skipped off to join the children in their play, 'that your handling of that ridiculous situation at breakfast this morning quite won my admiration, Joshua? Bringing the whole thing out into the open as you did was clearly the very best thing to do.'
'I learned early,' Joshua said, 'not to play my aunt's games her way.'
