Chapter 3

Callum gazed out of the window at the garden below. He had travelled for a week from Sussex to his Midlands home, and during that time the light covering of snow over the landscape had melted. The leafless trees stood along the drive like sentinels and the sky was leaden over the dark landscape. It was barren and dark, like his mood. He tried to forget about the journey he had just made. It was too confusing, calling up questions he would rather not answer.

“Your Grace?” the butler called from the doorway.

“Yes?” Callum asked a little frostily. He did not like to be disturbed.

“Your Grace, your mother was asking for you. Her grace is downstairs in the dining room.”

Callum’s brow creased in a frown. He had avoided discussions with his mother since his return, but he could not avoid her eternally. She was planning for the house party—twenty guests staying for three weeks required rooms to be tidied, menus to be written, the ballroom to be cleaned and a host of other tasks. Mother oversaw all of the preparations, but even with all that work, she would certainly find time to argue with him about his choice of duchess.

“She requested that you await her in the drawing room, Your Grace.”

“I will wait here,” Callum said lightly. He thanked the fellow absently. The butler paused to tidy on the way out. The tray that he lifted from the table caught the firelight, flashing a rich bronzy gold. Callum winced as an image of Miss Rothwell flashed into his mind, conjured by the bronzed tones that matched, exactly, the colour of her hair.

Stop thinking about her, he told himself firmly. He recalled her tumbledown locks and that bright smile, as bright as sunshine on a frozen landscape. She had been disarming, and easy to talk to. That had been unexpected.

So, I will be able to tolerate her without escaping into the countryside on long rides too often, he told himself angrily. Why does that seem to have captured my thoughts so much?

He turned away, determined to stop wandering in a mire of thoughts of Miss Rothwell. It had been hard enough on the long ride back to focus—alone, his mind wandered to her far more often than he would like. It was uncomfortable and it bothered him.

“Son. There you are!” his mother greeted him as she glided in through the door from the hallway. “I need your opinion on a matter. Should I put Lord Bronham and his wife in the South suite? As an earl, I think the best view ought to go to him.”

“I think you have a far better idea of these matters than I do,” Callum ground out.

“Oh, son! Do pay some interest to this party! It’s Christmas!” His mother said crossly. “I have been working for weeks, and you barely even looked at the menu plans and the guest list. Must I do this all by myself?”

Callum sighed. He could not help feeling a little guilty. What his mother said was true, after all—she had been working hard.

“Mother, you have put a magnificent effort into the house party,” he said slowly. “Truly, you have. But I have other matters weighing on my shoulders. The horses need adequate feed to last the winter, and it is particularly cold. Seeing to their regular exercise is also difficult,” he explained, hoping that she would not guess he had other matters on his mind as well. Matters like the woman he had met in Sussex and who would be the new duchess in a matter of weeks.

"I did need to ask you something,” his mother began. “I was ordering some greenery to be cut for the house party. To decorate the ballroom and make the kissing boughs and so on. Have you any restrictions on where we can gather the branches in the woods adjoining the park?”

Callum frowned. “Not that I know of,” he replied blankly. The verderers who managed the estate woods had not told him that parts of it needed particular protecting during the winter. “But surely, we will not be hanging the green boughs now?” he asked. “That is for the day before Christmas.” That was a well-established tradition throughout the country. The house would be decorated the day before Christmas, and then the Christmas boughs would remain there until Epiphany the following year.

His mother stared at him. “We will be hanging the boughs in a week’s time,” she answered. “If enough greenery can be located and gathered by then.”

“Mother! Is that not a rather radical notion?” Callum exclaimed. The tradition dictated that the branches be hung the day before. Many people believed that flouting the custom would invite dreadful ill luck.

His mother shrugged. “We have a need for decoration. How is the party supposed to seem even a little bit festive, if we have nothing to show that it is Christmastide?”

Callum sighed. He knew better than to argue with his mother. He shrugged.

“As you wish,” he said, feeling drained. He turned to the butler. “Find whatever greenery you can for Her Grace’s decorations.”

“Yes, Your Grace.” He bowed and withdrew.

Callum looked at his mother tiredly. “When will we commence the ball this evening?” he asked.

“At eight of the clock. We will be hosting an early tea. Some of the guests will be arriving earlier and we will be expected to offer them refreshment.” She raised a brow, as though insisting that he be there on time.

Callum sighed again. “Yes, Mother.”

She was about to reply, when a voice called from the hallway.

“Brother? I needed to ask you something...”

“Harriet!” Callum called with some relief. “I am in the drawing room.”

“Oh, good,” Harriet replied, hurrying in through the door. She turned and looked at their mother and then looked back at Callum. “I can wait for you, if you are occupied...?” A thin line appeared on her brow.

“I believe we had discussed all the matters we needed to discuss,” Callum said swiftly. He gazed at their mother. She nodded.

“I think we have discussed all that we needed to,” she said tightly. Her eyes fixed on Callum as if to suggest that their discussion would continue, and would not be limited to decorations and tea-times. She turned and walked out of the room.

Harriet gazed up at Callum. “Brother, is aught the matter?”

“Nothing, sister,” Callum answered tiredly.

“Is Mama angry?” Harriet asked anxiously. “She was shouting. I heard her voice in the hallway.” She was always worried by raised voices and disruption, her gentle nature distressed by any sort of argument.

“It was not anything serious, sister,” Callum said gently. “She and I just have a difference of opinion. A few opinions. Like, whether or not cabbage should be served at Christmas dinner.” He chuckled. He did not like the taste of cabbage—a fact known by everyone in the house—while his mother insisted that it be served as a winter vegetable. Harriet smiled.

“You and your cabbage,” she said with a laugh. She was chuckling, the earlier worries forgotten, and that was all that Callum wanted.

“Have you been out to the stable?” Callum asked Harriet. She was a keen rider, and the horses helped her to ignore the rising tension in the house. She nodded.

“I was out yesterday. I took Buttercup for a ride. It was very cold. I did not want to overexercise her.”

“Quite correct,” Callum nodded, walking out into the hallway. He stopped, remembering something. Mother’s house party would be arriving later on in the day, and he had to plan what he was going to wear to the ball that night. He had not given it a thought.

“Brother? Will all the guests from Sussex also arrive today?” Harriet asked him, her blue eyes wide as she gazed up at him.

“Yes,” Callum replied. “Or, at least I presume so. Mother expects them,” he added, sounding purposely disinterested.

“I look forward to meeting them,” Harriet told him, her smile hesitant and shy as she gazed up at him.

“You are a dear sister,” Callum said fondly. He had reached his bedroom door, and he turned in the doorway, inclining his head. “I must plan my outfit for tonight before my manservant works himself into a state of frenzy.”

“Brother! The ball is tonight! Have you really no idea yet what you are going to wear to it?”

“None whatsoever,” he assured her. “I can only hope I settle on something that will not also give our mother a fit of apoplexy.”

Harriet giggled. Callum inclined his head in a slight bow and opened his bedroom door. Harriet was still laughing as he retreated inside and shut it behind him.

He stared blankly at his open wardrobe. Rows of neatly starched shirts appeared before his blank gaze, the collars high and the sleeves long. Beside them hung a few tailcoats—thick velvet, appropriate for winter. The colours ranged from sombre grey to deep blue to black. Trousers and knee breeches in similar shades hung beside them.

Callum sighed and reached for a pair of dark knee-breeches, holding them up to assess the colour in the brighter light afforded by the fireplace. It was dark grey.

“Those are sufficient,” Callum murmured to himself and selected a dark blue tailcoat at random, adding a high-necked shirt as he tossed the pile over the chair-back. He gazed at his selection. It was tasteful, restrained and nothing out of the ordinary. That was as he wished it to be. He wondered, briefly, at the door, what Miss Rothwell might think of his outfit. He pushed the thought away. She was hardly there to gawp at what he wore.

He was about to go out when a vivid recollection of Miss Rothwell cannoned into his mind. He remembered her slender hand reaching up to stroke her horse, the gentle way she spoke to the mare. He had been impressed by her handling of the horses, her easy confidence and unconcealed care. She will love our stable, he thought with a small grin.

“She doesn’t have to,” he told himself aloud. She was just there to bring her family connections and access to the stable.

He sighed. A sudden invasion of chattering, energetic guests was not something he liked. He looked out of the window and tensed, seeing a coach approaching.

His stomach knotted and he wondered briefly who it was. It could be the Rothwell coach. He stiffened, his body tensing in apprehension and some strange feeling he could not name. He turned from the window and went to the door. He had guests to greet.