Читать книгу Impetuous - Candace Camp, Candace Camp - Страница 10

Chapter Four

JOANNA ENTERED INTO her deception with such enthusiasm, applying white powder to her face for an interesting wanness and lying in her darkened room emitting effective groans and sighs, that it was all Cassandra could do not to slap her. Naturally, with Joanna “weak” in her bed, it fell to Cassandra to pack for both of them. She wondered darkly if her lazy cousin had taken that fact into consideration before she offered to play sick. It was the middle of the afternoon before Cassandra managed to get everything together and stowed away in their carriage, interrupted as she was by her aunt’s often contradictory orders.

However, finally Joanna, wrapped in a blanket, was carried down the stairs and out to the carriage by a burly, graying footman and carefully bestowed within, and Cassandra and her aunt climbed in after her. Lady Arrabeck’s daughter came out to graciously bid them farewell, and a few moments later they were wheeling at a smart pace down the drive and through the open iron gates of the estate.

“Whew!” Joanna pushed the carriage rug from her lap. “Get this thing off me. I’m sweating like a pig.”

Cassandra noted that perspiration was, indeed, making little rivulets through her cousin’s white powder. However, she said pacifically, “You put on a wonderful performance, Cousin.”

Joanna scowled. “Why did that awful old footman have to carry me down?” She was thoroughly disenchanted with the whole charade. “And no one was there to see us leave.”

“Lady Patricia,” her mother reminded her. “It was a very nice gesture, I thought.”

Joanna snorted. “She’s only the spinster daughter.”

“And so will you turn out to be, if you make many more mistakes like yesterday’s!” Aunt Ardis snapped.

“I! I made the mistake?” Joanna turned on her mother wrathfully. “It was you who came pounding on my door too early! You couldn’t wait, and it chased him away!”

“I came when we had agreed I would! He didn’t arrive on time, that’s what happened.”

“And that is my fault?”

“Yes. He wasn’t eager. You didn’t enchant him. He should have hurried to your room, and instead he dawdled.”

“I did everything I could think of! I smiled and flirted and pretended I was interested in those silly old writers he kept talking about, when I had never heard of them. I even left the lace fichu out of my afternoon dress.”

“Yes, and leaned over to pick up your fan several times,” Cassandra put in drily. “I noticed that.”

“You see. Even Cassandra saw what an effort I made,” Joanna said, oblivious to her cousin’s sarcastic tone. “The man was stone. I finally had to kiss him in the conservatory before he became at all amorous.”

“You were too fast and loose,” Aunt Ardis decided. “You made him suspicious. That is why he was lurking around, listening.”

Cassandra sighed and turned her face to look out the window, trying to ignore the bickering between her aunt and cousin and think about what she was going to do now. Despite her brave thoughts earlier, she was close to despair over Sir Philip’s rejection of her proposal. She had had such high hopes for him, had built all her schemes around his agreeing. She had been prepared for him to be difficult to deal with—he was, after all, a Neville—but she had counted on the Neville taste for accruing money to make him see the sense of their cooperating to find the dowry. It had never entered her mind that he would reject the story altogether, that he would term it a fabrication and dismiss her as a naive fool. And never in her wildest dreams would she have foreseen that he would be more interested in kissing her than in finding a treasure!

Her cheeks warmed a little even now at the thought of his mouth on hers. She had never dreamed that such kisses existed, let alone that she could turn to hot wax inside because a man did such unthinkable, immodest things to her.

Sternly she pulled her mind away from such thoughts. She ought to be working on a way to get the Spanish dowry without his help, not mooning around about him. Cassandra felt uncharacteristically like crying. Normally she was a very equable person; she liked to think of herself as calm, decisive and strong. But the thought of not being able to recapture the treasure that the Verreres had lost so long ago was almost too much for her. From the moment she had started reading Margaret Verrere’s diaries, she had realized that the dowry was the way out of her family’s problems. She had been counting on it to take her brothers and sister and herself out of her aunt’s house.

She had seen in Sir Philip’s eyes that he knew of the decline of the Verrere fortunes, but she doubted that he knew the full extent of it. Their father had died virtually penniless. She had had to sell off much of the furniture in the house to pay off his debts. She had even, heart breaking inside her chest, had to sell many of his precious books. Worst of all, she and her siblings had had to move out of Chesilworth, their ancestral home. It was a noble hall, but very old, and the years had not been kind to it. Repairs had been neglected, not only by her father, but also by his father and his grandfather before that. The west wing had been closed off ever since she could remember, because they had no money for the extensive repairs needed there. Even in the central and east wings, there were several areas where the roof badly needed to be replaced. Air leaked in around windows; floorboards were loose or bowed; almost all of the draperies were moth-eaten. Only people who loved it as much as her family did would have remained there.

But after her father’s death there was not enough money to pay even the skeleton crew of servants necessary to keep the great house running. Her family had had to leave Chesilworth and go to live with their aunt and uncle, only a few miles away in the village of Dunsleigh. The pain of leaving their home had been bad enough, but the humiliation of living on their aunt’s charity was a constant thorn in Cassandra’s side. Uncle Barlow, their mother’s brother, was a pleasant man whom they all liked, but he was rarely at home, spending as much of his time as he could in the village or in London or off hunting with his cronies. Cassandra was sure it was his wife’s shallow, venal nature that kept him away.

Aunt Ardis was a grasping woman who resented the presence of her husband’s impecunious nieces and nephews almost as much as she enjoyed lording it over them. She had never liked her husband’s sister, Delia, a vivacious butterfly of a woman who had outshone Ardis herself at every turn. Her aunt never ceased to complain about the extra expense and trouble Cassandra and her siblings entailed, just as she never hesitated to meddle in their affairs. She characterized Cassandra as a plain, mousy bluestocking of a girl, her sister Olivia as far too bold, and her brothers as young hellions badly in need of manners. She made sure that everyone, both inside and outside the home, was aware of the great sacrifice she had made in taking them in.

Joanna considered Cassandra’s quiet plainness an excellent foil for her own beauty, and she did not mind her being there as long as her own comfort was not disturbed. Crispin and Hart, Cassandra’s twelve-year-old brothers, however, were another matter. They were noisy, messy nuisances who teased her and disturbed her rest. But most of all she disliked Olivia, who at fourteen was already turning into a real beauty and a future threat to Joanna’s dominance of the small social scene in which they moved.

More than anything else in the world, Cassandra wanted to get her family out of that household and return to Chesilworth. Her uncle was the boys’ and Olivia’s guardian, and she was sure that she could talk him into letting her raise them on her own if only she had a proper house in which to live and enough money to feed and clothe them. The Spanish dowry, she knew, would provide that money. The dowry represented freedom for all four of them—and now Sir Philip had carelessly trampled all over her hopes of attaining that freedom.

“—not that great a catch, anyway.” Cassandra’s mind came back from her gloomy thoughts at the sound of her aunt’s voice mentioning Sir Philip Neville again. She looked at her aunt in some surprise.

“What do you mean? I thought you said he was one of the best catches in England,” she reminded her aunt innocently.

Aunt Ardis frowned, thinking that the girl had too good a memory. “Oh, he would be a feather in any girl’s cap,” she admitted. “But he doesn’t have a title, you know. In that respect, even Lord Benbroke surpasses him.”

“Lord Benbroke is almost sixty years old and suffers from gout.”

“Yes, Mama,” Joanna put in quickly. “Not Lord Benbroke. I just could not marry him.”

“I didn’t mean that you should marry him, only that he had a title and Neville doesn’t. And I am sure that there are those more wealthy than he.”

“I have heard that Richard Crettigan is quite the richest man in the country,” Cassandra offered.

Aunt Ardis looked shocked. “Richard Crettigan is a...a merchant!”

“Yes, and from Yorkshire, too. Can you imagine listening to that accent all your life?” Joanna shook her head in dismay.

“But it must be comforting to know that at least there are other options for Joanna.” Cassandra returned her aunt’s and cousin’s suspicious gazes blandly.

“I have heard,” Aunt Ardis said loftily, ignoring Cassandra’s comment, “that Sir Philip is a libertine.”

Cassandra’s stomach tightened. “A libertine? Who said so?”

“I heard it from Daphne Wentworth, who told me it was common knowledge all over London. Of course, that whey-faced Teresa of hers had made no bones about setting her cap for him, and Daphne no doubt wanted no competition. Still, Mrs. Carruthers was sitting right there when she said so, and she agreed that he had a certain reputation.”

“A reputation for what?” Cassandra pressed. She wasn’t sure why her aunt’s words irritated her so, but she found herself wanting to deny them hotly.

Aunt Ardis lowered her voice conspiratorially and said, “For seduction.”

“Oh, really, Aunt Ardis, how would they know?” But despite her words, Cassandra could not help thinking of Sir Philip’s kisses and the way they had made her melt inside. She had to admit that he had seemed incredibly expert at what he was doing. Besides, there was the fact that he had made advances toward her. Cassandra did not fool herself that she was any great beauty. It followed then that Sir Philip must be interested in kissing any woman who happened to come across his path. She squirmed a little inside at the thought. “It is all rumors.”

“It’s more than rumors. I’ve heard things...” her aunt hinted darkly.

“What things?”

“The sort of things that young ladies like you and Joanna should not hear.”

“Oh, Mama...” Joanna slumped back against her seat disgustedly. “You always say that.”

Cassandra thought privately that as Joanna had set out to seduce Sir Philip into a compromising position in her bedroom, she was hardly an innocent creature whose ears should not be sullied, but she managed to keep from saying so. There was no point in getting into a wrangle with her aunt over something as unimportant as Sir Philip Neville and his reputation.

The truth was, she told herself sourly, that he was probably exactly the sort of creature that gossip had painted him. It was absurd that she should be standing up for the man who had dashed her hopes.

She turned her head to look out the window, and they continued the ride in silence.

* * *

CASSANDRA’S HEAD JERKED up, and she blinked, looking around. She realized that she had been asleep, as were her aunt and cousin in the seat across from her. She pushed aside the window curtain and peered out. It had grown dark while she slept. Her stomach growled, giving her another reminder of how long they had been traveling.

She realized that what had awakened her must have been the carriage turning, for even in the pale moonlight she could recognize the narrow lane they traveled as the one branching off toward her aunt’s house. They were almost home. Her spirits lifted in anticipation. Everything would seem better, she knew, when she was with her family.

The carriage pulled up in front of a Georgian mansion a moment later, and the front door opened. A footman hurried down to open the carriage door.

“Mrs. Moulton.” He sketched a bow in the direction of Aunt Ardis and reached up to give her a hand down.

Aunt Ardis gave him a slight nod and swept on to the front door, Joanna trailing her. Cassandra came out of the carriage last, taking the footman’s proffered hand and smiling. “Hello, John.”

A smile broke the man’s usually impassive countenance, and he said warmly, “Hello, miss. It’s good to have you home.”

“Thank you. How is your sister? Has she had the little one yet?”

“No, miss. We’re all on pins and needles.” Like most of the servants of Moulton Hall, John Sommers felt that the place had been much improved by the arrival of the Verrere family. Unlike his mistress and her daughter, the Verrere children knew everyone’s names and were always ready with a smile or a word of thanks. There had been many times when a vase broken by one of the running boys had been swept up and thrown away with never a mention made of it, and a secret supper had often been sent up to the nursery when Olivia or the twins were in disgrace about some misdeed or other.

“Cassie!” A pair of towheaded boys tore out the front door and bounded down the front steps two at a time, followed not much more sedately by a girl in blond braids.

Cassandra threw her arms wide and swept all of her siblings in. “Crispin! Hart—what happened to your hand? Olivia—oh, I think you’ve grown even prettier while I was away.”

Olivia, whose braids and childishly shorter skirts could not hide the rapidly maturing body and face of a young woman, giggled at her sister’s words. “Pooh—you haven’t been gone but three days. What happened? Why are you home early?”

“Yeah!” Crispin added. “You should have seen Uncle Barlow’s face when he heard John announce that the carriage was home. He looked like a hare that had heard the hounds.”

Hart giggled. “He was looking all over like he thought there might be a hole he could bolt into.”

“He’s been home every night since Aunt Ardis left, and it’s been ever so nice. He lets us eat dinner with him, and we talk about all sorts of things. It wasn’t as good as being with Papa, but it reminded me of home, a little....” Olivia’s voice trailed off wistfully.

Cassandra felt tears spring into her eyes. “I know, Olivia. I miss him, too.”

“It was bang-up!” Hart, who had enjoyed his uncle’s discussion of his hunting dogs far more than his father’s scholarly ramblings, added, “He said he would take us hunting with him next time he went to Buckinghamshire, if Aunt Ardis will let him.”

“Hah! Let us have fun? Not likely.”

“Now, hush, Crispin. Aunt Ardis might be well pleased to have the two of you out of the house. I shall endeavor to point out the advantages in terms of dirt and noise of having two twelve-year-olds gone from here.”

“Would you?” The twins’ expressions brightened. In their experience, Cassandra was able to do anything she put her mind to. It had been she who had always made the household budget stretch to include entertaining outings or a pony to ride or a cricket bat to replace the broken one.

“Of course I will. I’m not promising, mind you....”

“I know.” Crispin nodded gravely. A more serious boy than his twin, he realized better than Hart that Cassandra’s ingenuity and intelligence were not always sufficient weapons against their aunt’s power.

“Forget the silly hunting!” Olivia said impatiently. “Tell us what happened at the house party, Cassandra.”

“Did you meet Sir Philip?” Hart stuck in eagerly. “Is he going to help us?”

“Just a minute. I shall tell you all about it later. Let’s go in now and let me say hello to Uncle Barlow.”

She did as she said, noticing with amusement that her poor uncle did indeed look like a trapped hare as he stood in the entryway listening to his wife’s strictures on the excessive number of candles that had been lit throughout the house.

“Why, I could see from the carriage that the nursery was lit up like Christmas,” Aunt Ardis was saying as the Verreres walked in. “There is no reason for that. The children ought to be in bed anyway.”

“It didn’t seem much light to me.” Uncle Barlow tried to defend himself. “There was Olivia trying to read by the light of one candle, and she mustn’t strain those pretty eyes, you know.” He smiled benignly at his niece, not realizing, even after years of living with Ardis, that he was saying exactly the wrong thing. “Those eyes will be her fortune.”

“What nonsense! Olivia shouldn’t be reading all those heathen books, anyway,” Aunt Ardis sniffed, frowning toward her younger niece. “Olivia, straighten your skirts, you look like a hoyden. And your hair is all everywhere.”

“Yes, Aunt Ardis,” Olivia answered in a carefully colorless voice. Her high spirits had gotten her into trouble with her aunt more than once, but once she had realized how much her battles with Aunt Ardis caused Cassandra to suffer, she had learned to curb her ready tongue.

Cassandra gave her uncle a quick hug and a peck on the cheek, and whisked her brothers and sister upstairs to the bedroom shared by the two girls. The boys flopped down on the rug, and Olivia hopped onto the bed, curling her legs beneath her.

“All right,” she told her older sister eagerly. “Now tell us all. Why did Aunt Ardis come home so early?”

“Who cares about that?” Crispin retorted scornfully. “I want to hear about Sir Philip and the treasure.”

“Aunt Ardis and Joanna met with a little setback,” Cassandra told her sister, eyes twinkling, and cast a significant look at her brothers. “I shall tell you about it later.” She did not add that her younger sister would receive a carefully edited version of Joanna’s escapade.

Olivia’s eyes widened, but she made no demur as Cassandra started on the story that the brothers wanted to hear. “I am afraid the news is not good. Sir Philip refused to help us.”

Crispin groaned, and Hart sneered. “I knew we couldn’t count on a Neville. Papa always said so. You shouldn’t have asked him.”

“I don’t know how else we’re supposed to find it,” Crispin reminded him. “The Nevilles have the rest of the clues or the map or whatever it is.”

“We don’t need it,” Hart said stoutly. “Do we, Cassie? We can find it by ourselves.”

“Of course we will.” Cassandra plastered a heartening smile on her lips. “It will merely take us longer. I don’t intend to give up.”

“But how are you going to do it?” Olivia questioned. Though she had as much faith in her older sister as the twins did, she had a more practical bent of mind.

“The first thing is to find the old letters. I shall keep going over to Chesilworth every chance I get to search the attics. Once I actually have the letter in my hands, I can prove to Sir Philip that the treasure really was hidden and can be found. Then he will surely agree to help us look for it.” It was the best plan that Cassandra had been able to come up with, and though it sounded rather flimsy to her ears, she hoped it would satisfy her siblings.

“You mean he didn’t believe in the treasure?” Hart looked shocked at such heresy.

“No. He thought the diaries were something someone made up just to get Papa to buy them. He’s a very stubborn, narrow-minded man. But once he sees the evidence with his own eyes, he will have to believe me.”

“We shall help you look,” Crispin told her gravely. Though he was as high-spirited as any lad his age, he was also aware that he was now Lord Chesilworth, and he took his responsibilities seriously. While Hart might look on the hunt for the dowry as a wonderful adventure, Crispin knew that it also meant the very future of Chesilworth.

“Of course,” Olivia agreed. “Whenever that old battle-ax isn’t looking, we’ll sneak over.”

“Olivia...manners,” Cassandra reminded her absently. She smiled at her siblings, tears lurking at the corners of her eyes. “I knew I could count on you.”

Olivia bounced off the bed to hug her, and even the boys followed suit. Cassandra hugged them tightly to her, promising herself that she would not let them down. Somehow, some way, she would find those letters, and she would make Sir Philip believe her.

* * *

AUNT ARDIS DID not approve of Cassandra and her siblings visiting their old home. In the time that Cassandra had been there, the older woman had become accustomed to Cassandra’s taking from her shoulders many of the dreary tasks of running a household. As long as Cassandra stayed within her tight budget, Aunt Ardis was pleased to see the quality of their meals and the work of the servants improve. Though she told herself that of course she could have accomplished the same things had she spent the time and effort, she much preferred to spend her time on her toilette or gossiping with one of the two or three ladies in the area whom she considered of a social standing equal enough to hers.

As a result, it was most inconvenient when Cassandra took time off from her household duties to spend a whole day at Chesilworth. “I cannot imagine what you find to do there all day,” she told her niece petulantly. “The place is falling into ruins.”

Cassandra had carefully kept hidden from her aunt any hint of what they were really doing at Chesilworth. She wasn’t sure how Aunt Ardis would feel about their hunting for treasure, but she was sure that the lady would at the very least dismiss the idea as nonsense and might even go so far as to forbid her nieces and nephews from going to Chesilworth. So she replied only, “I would like to stave off the ruin if I can. I clean up a little around the place, walk through it checking for leaks—things like that.”

Her aunt looked at her as if she had taken leave of her senses. “I would think your time would be better spent here. This is your home now.”

Cassandra curled her hands into her palms but forced her voice to remain even. “Of course, Aunt Ardis, but Chesilworth is still Crispin’s inheritance. I must try to make sure that there is something left for him when he gets older. It would be too much to ask that you and Uncle Barlow continue to bear the burden of upkeep for all four of us, even when the boys are grown.”

Aunt Ardis looked taken aback by this thought. “I—well—yes. I mean, if you must, I suppose you must. But this wanting to go every single day...”

“Only when you don’t need me, of course, Aunt Ardis.”

As it turned out, her aunt usually managed to find that she needed her three or four days a week, but the other times, Cassandra and her siblings hiked over to their old home and climbed up into the musty old attics, continuing their methodical exploration.

Cassandra did most of the work, for the boys, though eager, tended to become distracted by some odd object or other or fall into an argument over some prize they found, and Olivia, too, often grew tired and thirsty and decided to take a rest outside. Still, they did make progress, and as they worked, they found that they were moving into older and older periods of dress and furniture, which kept Cassandra’s hopes up. While Olivia whooped over the elaborate tall wigs and wide, almost-flat cages of hoops that had been worn under dresses in the 1700s, Cassandra continued doggedly to dig, thinking with determination that they were not that far away now.

She was particularly eager one morning to get over to the old mansion, but it seemed as if everything interfered with it. Her aunt wanted her to do first one thing, and then another until the morning was almost gone. Then there was a crisis belowstairs, which she was called upon to resolve. Finally, just as she was about to go upstairs and change into old clothes suitable for cleaning out the attics, the butler opened the door to the sitting room and announced that they had a visitor.

“Mr. David Miller, ma’am,” he told Aunt Ardis in a frosty accent that usually indicated he did not entirely approve of the visitor, and handed her the man’s card on a small salver.

“Who?” Aunt Ardis looked blank.

“An American, I believe, ma’am. He says—” his tone indicated his personal disbelief “—that he is related to Lord Chesilworth.”

“Lord Ch—you mean Crispin?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Aunt Ardis and Joanna turned to stare at Cassandra, who shrugged, as puzzled as they. “I have never heard of him, Aunt Ardis.”

“Well, hmm...I suppose we must see him, Soames.”

As soon as Soames was out the door, Aunt Ardis turned toward Cassandra. “An imposter?” she suggested. “An American claiming to be a relative of yours?”

“I suppose someone in the Verrere family could have emigrated,” Cassandra mused, frowning.

“No doubt he thinks that Chesilworth, just because he has a title, is a wealthy man. He’s hoping to get money out of you, mark my words.”

“He will be mightily disappointed, then,” Cassandra remarked cheerfully.

A moment later Soames reentered the room, intoning, “Mr. David Miller.”

A young man followed him into the room and paused, smiling tentatively at the three women who sat there. He was in his twenties, with sky blue eyes, a thick mop of blond hair and a rakish mustache, which Cassandra suspected he had cultivated to age his boyish countenance. He was dressed fashionably, but not glaringly so, and Cassandra judged him to be a respectably handsome man. Her opinion was confirmed by the sudden flare of interest in Joanna’s eyes.

Mr. Miller bowed to them. “Please pardon my intrusion. I know I should have written to introduce myself, but when I found myself in London with unexpected time on my hands, I was seized by the urge to meet my British cousins. I hope you will not think me overly bold.”

“Pray sit down. I am Miss Cassandra Verrere,” Cassandra introduced herself. “My brother is Lord Chesilworth, but I am afraid he is still only a lad. This is my aunt, Mrs. Moulton, and her daughter, Miss Joanna Moulton.”

The young man bowed over each of the ladies’ hands politely before taking his seat. “It is the Verreres to whom I am related—quite distantly, of course,” Mr. Miller explained eagerly. “One of my ancestors was a Verrere. She and her husband settled in Boston, oh, almost two hundred years ago.”

“What?” Cassandra stared. “But what—what was your ancestress’s name?”

“Margaret Verrere. Family legend has it that it was a most romantic affair—she eloped with a man of common birth, and they fled the wrath of her family to the colonies.”

“I cannot believe it.”

“Oh, ’tis true,” David Miller assured her earnestly.

“No, I did not mean that I don’t believe the story about Margaret Verrere. It is just that—well, it is so astonishing. You see, I have been reading her journals.”

He grinned. “Splendid. I hope you enjoyed them. I am the one who sold them to Mr. Simons. I am a merchant in Boston, and every once in a while I come to London to make purchases, see the latest things, you know. Last year I decided to bring Margaret Stone’s journals—that was her married name, you know—to London and sell them. I sold them to a bookseller named Simons. This year, when I went by to see him, just to renew the acquaintance and see whether he had sold the journals, he told me that Lord Chesilworth, a Verrere himself, had bought them. I was most pleased to hear that they had found their way back to their proper family. Of course, I realized that we must be distantly related, and, well, when I had some free time on my hands, I felt that I must make your acquaintance.”

“I am so glad that you did.”

Joanna, who had lost most of her interest in the handsome young man when she learned that he was a mere merchant from Boston, was even more bored by this talk of books and ancestors. Properly, this young man, whatever his reasons for coming to Dunsleigh, should have been so captivated by her beauty that he talked of her, not musty old journals and dull relations. She stirred restively in her seat.

“Wonderful.” Mr. Miller beamed. “I was afraid that you would find me too presumptuous. I find that the English often seem to find Americans so.”

“I am very glad to meet you. I find Margaret’s story fascinating, as did my Papa. It is he who was the Lord Chesilworth who bought them from Mr. Simons. But I am afraid that Papa passed away several months ago. He would have been so delighted to meet you. He would have had many questions about the journals.”

“Must we talk about books, Cassandra?” Joanna asked plaintively.

“I am sorry, Miss Moulton.” Miller favored her with a smile. “Indeed, no doubt you found it boring, hearing two people talk about their relatives. I take it that you are not a descendant of Margaret’s family.”

“I haven’t the faintest idea who Margaret is,” Joanna said with a little giggle that more than one swain had assured her was delightful.

“No, my cousin and aunt are not Verreres,” Cassandra explained. “We are related on my mother’s side.”

“I see.”

“But tell me, Mr. Miller, pray, how did you come upon the journals and why did you decide to sell them?” Cassandra wished that Sir Philip Neville were here now to hear the full story of the journals. He had been so certain that poor Mr. Simons had played them false—perhaps Mr. Miller could put his mind to rest about the journals’ authenticity.

“My mother died almost two years ago. It was through her that I was descended from Margaret Verrere Stone. My grandmother, her mother, had been very interested in the family history, and she had preserved many old family records—family Bibles, birth and death and wedding certificates. Anyway, she had several trunkfuls of such things, which my mother had merely stored in the attic. But then, when my mother departed this world, I was going through her things, and I came upon my grandmother’s trunks. They were stuffed with old family relics, most of which I decided to get rid of. Among those things were Margaret’s journals.”

Glassy-eyed by now, Joanna seized the opportunity of a pause in Mr. Miller’s recital to say, “Perhaps you could show Mr. Miller the garden, Cassandra. Americans are always interested in English gardens, aren’t they?”

“I am sorry, Miss Moulton. I fear I am boring you with such talk. It is just that I am so thrilled to be meeting a, well, a sort of cousin, I suppose.”

“You are right, Cousin Joanna.” For once, Cassandra thought, her cousin’s wishes and her own coincided. It was always difficult to carry on a serious conversation with Joanna around, flirting and simpering and determined to keep the conversation on the one thing that truly interested her, herself. “I would be pleased to show Mr. Miller the garden. Would you care to continue our conversation there, sir?”

He agreed with alacrity, and Cassandra led him out into the formal garden behind the house. He courteously admired the various roses, delphiniums and daisies, and then he and Cassandra settled down on the bench in the grape arbor.

“Tell me the rest of it,” Cassandra urged. “Did you read Margaret’s journals? Why did you decide to sell them?”

Miller’s blue eyes twinkled. “No doubt you will consider me a crass American, Miss Verrere, but the truth is, I have little interest in books or in searching out each twig of the family tree. I found it rather intriguing to learn that there were still Verreres here in England to whom I was distantly related, but as for studying the family history—well, I’m afraid I haven’t either the time or the inclination.” He gave her a small, self-deprecating smile.

“That is perfectly understandable. I don’t expect everyone to share my interests. So you did not read the journals?”

He shook his head. “Not really. Oh, I glanced through them, but I read very little. I didn’t know what to do with them at first. I hated to throw them away. I mean, they were so old, and I thought they must be valuable to someone. Finally one of my friends suggested that I sell them in England the next time I went. He pointed out that the English were, in general, more interested in history. He thought it would be a perfect market for old books, especially since Margaret came from here and doubtless left family behind. So I took his advice and brought them with me on my last trip to London. There, as I said, I sold them to Mr. Simons.” He smiled and added, “Actually, I tried to sell them to several book dealers, but Mr. Simons was the only one who wanted them.”

“I am so glad you did,” Cassandra told him warmly. She found herself liking Mr. Miller. He was open and direct in a way that most people never were. She wasn’t sure if it was simply an American quality or an attribute of this man. Whatever it was, she found that she could not keep from smiling back at him whenever he smiled. He was also, she thought, quite handsome—better looking, in fact, than Sir Philip Neville.

“My father was thrilled to actually get to read Margaret Verrere’s words,” she continued. “Her history—the elopement—had been a particular interest of his.”

They continued to talk for some time. He was interested in Margaret Verrere’s family, his relatives, and what had happened to them in the years since Margaret eloped. When Cassandra told him that the home in which Margaret had lived was still standing and had indeed been Cassandra’s own home until her father’s death, he was struck with awe and asked her if he might see it.

Cassandra was quite happy to show Chesilworth to him, and they went that afternoon, accompanied by the twins and Olivia, who always welcomed any excuse to get away from their aunt’s house. The twins, of course, peppered David with questions about the United States as well as the ship on which he had come to England, but he answered them all with great patience.

“Are you going to hunt for the treasure with us?” Hart asked with excitement when they reached Chesilworth.

“The what?” He looked down at the boy, startled, then over at Cassandra.

“The dowry,” Hart went on impatiently. “You know. Margaret’s dowry.”

“He’s talking about something in the journals,” Cassandra explained, adding to her brother, “Mr. Miller did not read the journals.”

“There is a treasure mentioned in them?” The American looked intrigued.

“It tells how to find it,” Crispin told him, and the two boys began to eagerly explain the existence of two maps. “One is in a letter. That’s what we are looking for in the house. The other belongs to Sir Philip, but he refuses to help us, so we are going to have to figure out how to do it ourselves.”

“A treasure hunt!” David Miller exclaimed. “How delightful. I am sorry that I cannot stay longer and help you with it.”

“Yes, that would be bang-up,” agreed Hart, who, along with Crispin had liked their American relation from the moment they met him.

“Why don’t you stay?” Crispin suggested. “Couldn’t he stay, Cassie?”

“He might not be able to, boys. Don’t plague Mr. Miller.” She turned to the man with a smile. “If you were able to stay, though, we would greatly enjoy it.”

“You tempt me.” He sighed. “But I do have business in London that I must get back for. And my ship home sails in a week.” He looked torn for a moment, then shrugged and said, “Well, perhaps I could stretch my stay to a second night.”

When they reached Chesilworth, Mr. Miller exclaimed aloud, impressed by its size and age, “Why, it’s a castle!”

“Hardly.” Cassandra laughed. “The Verreres were not great land barons during the Middle Ages, but the Elizabethan who built this tried his best to make it look like one.”

“You won’t find anything like this in the United States,” he told her, still in awe. “It’s a grand place. You must have hated to leave it.”

Cassandra nodded, though it wasn’t its grandeur that made her miss Chesilworth. It was its dear familiarity and its memories, the sense of family history that lived throughout it. They showed Mr. Miller through Chesilworth, even the damp and deteriorating west wing, and the next afternoon he returned to help them search the attics. In the end, he wound up stretching his visit to yet a third day, and it was with visible reluctance that he left them then.

After his departure, the days at Moulton House settled into their usual routine. Cassandra oversaw most of her aunt’s housekeeping, and whenever she could, she sneaked away to Chesilworth, sometimes with her siblings and sometimes without.

One afternoon, about a week after Mr. Miller departed, all four of the Verreres were in the attic at Chesilworth, though only Cassandra was still looking through the trunks. The heat of the day and boredom had prompted the twins to engage in a pretend sword fight with two canes they had found against the attic wall, and Olivia stood by an open window, trying to find any stray bit of breeze.

Cassandra finished loading all the objects back into a trunk that she had just emptied and closed the lid, sending another shower of dust all over her. She coughed and sat back on her heels, drawing her hand across her forehead and sighing. Her back hurt, and she badly wanted a drink of water. She coughed again and thought about quitting the search for the day.

To her amazement, there was a sound in the hall below the attic stairs. Then her cousin’s voice rang out cheerily, “Cassandra! Oh, Cassandra!”

Joanna? Whatever had possessed Joanna to come all the way over to Chesilworth? It was not like her cousin to move an inch out of her way, let alone visit their dilapidated house. There were footsteps on the stairs, and a man’s head and shoulders appeared through the hole in the floor. Cassandra understood now why Joanna had gone to the trouble of coming to Chesilworth. She rose to her feet, staring in silence as the rest of the man came into view.

“Good day, Miss Verrere,” said Sir Philip Neville cheerfully.