Bronwyn Scott - The Secrets Of Lord Lynford

It wasn’t the same, though, Eaton thought. When grief closed in, Vennor would want a friend his own age, not his father’s compatriots. Yet how like Vennor to think of others first. They all had their gifts and that was Vennor’s. He understood people the way Inigo understood money: intuitively. But Vennor could not be allowed to win this argument.

Eaton was about to launch his rebuttal when Inigo settled it. ‘We’ll be here. Father and I have banking business. We would be staying regardless to see how Parliament handles some new investment legislation.’

‘Inigo can stay. I will allow that. Are you satisfied, Eaton?’ Vennor smiled his gratitude and the knot of worry in Eaton’s gut eased. Inigo would look after their friend with the same dedication with which he did everything else.

In the wake of the decision, silence claimed the group. Brandy glasses were nearly empty again and the business of helping Vennor take on his ducal responsibilities was settled. Eaton was aware of the mantel clock ticking, loud and insistent, a reminder that it was time to move on, that there was nothing more that could be done now. It was time for the four friends to say goodbye and go their separate ways. He and Cassian would leave early tomorrow for their journey home to Cornwall. Inigo would settle back into his London habits. Vennor would establish new routines.

Nothing would be the same.

Vennor would be invested as a duke the next time they met, with the accompanying ducal responsibilities. Vennor would marry soon and that would change the equation entirely. This was a last moment, the ending of a chapter. Part of the adventure of living, Eaton supposed, although it didn’t seem very adventurous at the moment. On the contrary, it seemed sad. Something was being mourned in this very room as they took another step deeper into adulthood, another step further away from their childhood. A piece of Eaton’s soul rebelled at the notion. Hadn’t he lost enough already? Need he lose that, too? But it was inevitable that he would. It was the way of life for dukes. His friends would marry in time, not only Vennor. Would they all still be close even when their affections were shared with another beyond their circle? When a wife and family claimed their attentions? Their fathers had managed it. But perhaps that was because they all had wives and family in common. Eaton would likely never marry. Would that decision make him an outsider? They would never intentionally exclude him, but it might happen accidentally.

Cassian shifted in his chair, casting a quizzing glance at Eaton. What next? They were all looking to him. He would have to be the one to do it. Among the four of them, he was the ringleader, the adventure master. A swift bolt of memory took him, of blue skies and rolling surf, of four boys who’d spent summers combing the Cornish beaches, playing at being smugglers, or pirates, sometimes soldiers fighting the French fleet, or treasure hunting. He remembered the summer he’d found the map, the last great summer before the trajectory and expectations of his life had subtly veered. Of course, the four of them had not known it would be their last, any more than Richard Penlerick had known when he’d sat down for breakfast a week ago that he’d not see his bed that night. It had been a good summer, full of real adventure, even if they’d never found the treasure. He must have led them through every tidal cave along the Porth Karrek beaches. There’d been bonfires and camp outs, nights of star gazing and the whispered secrets of newly minted adolescence. They had all looked to him then and they were looking to him now to take the next step, to help them say goodbye.

Eaton raised his glass, searching for words against the emotion crowding his throat. They needed hope right now, they needed to know that as much as things were about to change, the things that mattered would stay the same, a piece of constancy they could cling to in a world that only promised uncertainty. He was suddenly hungry to be home at Falmage Hill, home in Porth Karrek surrounded by the familiar: his new school, his orangery, his favourite paths in the Trevaylor Woods, his science experiments, his hound, Baldor. He’d been gone too long. ‘It’s time, gentlemen. A last drink for the road. If there’s one lesson this week has taught us, it’s that life is surprising and short. We are guaranteed nothing. We already drank to the past, let us now drink to the future. Here’s to our pursuits. May all of them be served through the best of our efforts in the time that we have. My friends, here’s to making every minute count.’ Especially when every minute was all one had.

Every minute mattered now that the school’s opening was upon them. Eaton pushed up his sleeves and gripped the oak table. At the other end, his headmaster, the renowned composer Cador Kitto, gave a nod and, with a mutual grunt, they lifted the heavy table. Around them, workmen painted and swept with feverish urgency. School began in three days and some students would arrive early to be on hand for the open house in two. The past few days it had been all hands on deck, even his— especially his. Eaton didn’t believe in leading idly. He refused to stand back, shouting orders to others, without lending his own efforts to the project. Besides, staying busy made it possible to forget other unpleasant realisations, albeit temporarily; that Richard Penlerick was dead, life was short and there was nothing he could do about either.

They manoeuvred the table into place at the front of the room and set it down with a relieved thud. Damn, but good oak was heavy. Eaton swiped at his brow and Cador laughed. Eaton groaned. ‘Did I just smear dirt across my forehead?’

‘Yes, but no matter. There are no ladies about to see you.’ Cador winked.

‘Just for that, you can unpack the books.’ Eaton chuckled.

‘Oh, no, I’ve got instruments to oversee.’ Cador wiped his hands and nodded towards the door at the arrival of Eaton’s secretary. ‘Looks like you’ve got business to attend to.’

Eaton turned, stifling a sigh. He far preferred physical labour to the never-ending tedium of paperwork, especially when there was so much to get done, so much to forget. It was too easy for his mind to wander into difficult territory when he was doing paperwork. He found a smile; it wasn’t the secretary’s fault. ‘What is it, Johns?’

‘There’s someone asking to see you, my lord.’ Johns was young, hired to help with the record-keeping and correspondence at the school, and today he looked every inch of his mere twenty years. Johns shifted from foot to foot, his cheeks tinged a fading pink which Eaton didn’t think was due to the exertion of the stairs. Whoever was waiting had been quite insistent.

‘Do they have an appointment?’ Eaton looked about for a rag to wipe his hands on. Johns would have to learn how to be a better gatekeeper.

‘No, my lord.’

‘Has one of the boys arrived early?’ Eaton gave up on a rag. His mind was already working through options. There were rooms ready on the third floor if needed and the cook could be called in to prepare food a day earlier than planned, although provisions weren’t expected to arrive until tomorrow...

Johns cleared his throat. ‘It’s one of the patrons, my lord. One of the widows.’ Johns’s tone was urgent now. Some of the insistence that had been pressed upon him by the unexpected visitor was now being relayed.

Eaton relaxed, although he did wonder what had upset his secretary. Two of the school’s patrons were wealthy widows and he couldn’t imagine either of them being the source of such angst. ‘Is it Mrs Penhaligon? Has she come to see that her piano is properly installed?’ Austol Penhaligon’s widow had donated her expensive Sébastien Érard double action keyboard piano, much to Cador’s delight. The other, a Mrs Blaxland, was an extraordinarily rich woman from Truro, whom Eaton had never met. He’d assumed her age, which must be considerable, had brought about an inability to travel. Her husband, Huntingdon Blaxland, had been sixty-five when he died and that had been five years ago. She likely let her money do the travelling for her these days. Thanks to her generous donations, the boys would have the finest music instructors Cador Kitto had been able to find, acquired from the Continent on his summer honeymoon.