Page 7 of The Fortunes of Ashmore Castle

‘Please don’t rant at me. I’m only the messenger. Obviously he has anticipated your answer because he says if you don’t go home the consequences will be severe.’

Angus was silent. Rachel looked up at him and said, ‘What consequences?’

Giles answered for him. ‘Financial ones, I assume.’ What other power did a man have over a grown son?

‘Money doesn’t matter, does it?’ she said.

‘Of course it does,’ Giles said impatiently. ‘Don’t talk like an idiot.’

Rachel blushed. ‘You sound like Mama. All she cares about is how rich a person is. She wants to marry me to a Russian prince and talks about jewels and carriages and so on. But I love Angus, and he loves me. That’s what’s important.’

‘Next you’ll tell me you’d be happy to be poor and live in a hovel,’ Giles said. ‘You, who’ve never mended your own clothes or cooked your own food.’

‘I can sew,’ Rachel retorted. ‘And I could learn to cook,’ she added less certainly. ‘You’re just being disagreeable and trying to make me give him up. Well, I won’t!’

‘You wouldn’t have to live in a hovel,’ Angus said. ‘I’d look after you.’

‘That rather begs the question, doesn’t it?’ Giles said. ‘How exactly would you support a wife?’

‘I’d find something,’ Angus declared. ‘I’m not afraid of hard work. I’ve helped in my father’s business for years, I must have skills I can use.’

‘Hmm. I don’t think you have the least idea how expensive my sister would be. You’d need a pretty damn good position.’

Angus eyed Giles cautiously. ‘I suppose you wouldn’t—’

‘You suppose right,’ Giles interrupted grimly.

Rachel looked at him eagerly. ‘Oh, Giles, you could give Angus a job on the estate! Then we wouldn’t have to go far away from you all. A job and a little cottage. Angus is terribly clever. He’d be a tremendous help to you.’

‘No, Rachel.’ Giles stopped her, feeling like a wicked stepfather. ‘How can I help you, after I gave our mother my word that I’d keep you two apart? Even if I wanted to – and I don’t.’

‘You don’t?’ Rachel’s lip trembled.

‘Not as things stand.’ He noticed that they had instinctively moved a step closer to each other and gave an inward sigh. ‘I can’t order you to go home,’ he said to Angus, ‘but I strongly advise it. Talk to your father, see if you can’t find a way through.’

‘I have talked to him,’ Angus said. ‘He doesn’t listen. All he wants is his own way.’

‘I see a family resemblance,’ Giles said.

‘I won’t give him up,’ Rachel said. ‘And I won’t marry anyone else. Mama can’t make me.’

‘But she can separate you for another two years, and do you really think you’ll last that long?’

Rachel began to cry, but quietly. She and Angus were standing so close together now she was able to slip her hand into his.

‘You’d both do better to give up this nonsense,’ he concluded.

‘I’m afraid we can’t do that, sir,’ Angus said, a trifle glumly.

‘I see.’ Giles was standing by his desk, and picked up a pencil, put it down again, drummed his fingers briefly on the leather surface, picked up the pencil again, thinking. ‘Well, I can’t let you stay here,’ he said to Angus. ‘I gave my word, and I’ve stretched it already. You can remain for today, but you must leave tomorrow. I can’t do any more for you. Now I’m going downstairs and you can follow when you’re ready. Mind, if you haven’t appeared in ten minutes, I’ll come back up and chase you down.’

He walked out of the room, closing the door behind him. When he reached the stairs he realised he still had the pencil in his hands, and was surprised to find that it was snapped in two.

‘Cup of tea, Mr Afton?’

Afton, passing the open door to the housekeeper’s room, paused. ‘Thank you, Mrs Webster. That would be most agreeable.’

As he walked in, his sharp eyes noted that the table in front of her was already laid with two cups, so the invitation hadn’t been spur-of-the-moment. Brigid appeared almost instantly with the filled pot, and put it down in front of Mrs Webster without a word.