Joan Wolf Read Free

and built Templeton Hall. I assure you, Maria, his manners are as gentlemanly as anyone we know. He himself never had any connection with the City. He is, like us, a landowner—only, unlike us, he is very wealthy. I have no fears for Laura.”
    Lady Maria wondered. It seemed to her that in their eagerness to acquire the Templeton money, the Dalwoods had not inquired too carefully into the man’s background. If he were interested in setting up as a rich landowner, why on earth had he chosen Sydenham Damerel—an obscure section of Devon that looked over the river Tamar into Cornwall? Lady Maria considered herself a great deal more worldly than her friend, who had spent the last thirty years buried in Sydenham Damerel. To Lady Dalwood, Sydenham Damerel was the center of the world. To Lady Maria it was rather an outpost of civilization. She was a little concerned about Laura, but at this point there was really nothing she could do.
     

Chapter Three
     
    Lady Maria had a house of her own in Bath, where she spent the greater part of the year, going up to London for a month or so every Season. When in London, she always stayed at Cheney House in Berkeley Square, which her brother the Earl was kind enough to staff for her visits. He himself rarely visited London anymore.
    She was staying in Berkeley Square during May of 1815 when Mark also came up to town for a few days. Lady Maria had not seen him since his wedding; it was at Christmastime last year that Robert had died, and the Earl had had no heart for festivities this year. Consequently, she was delighted to hear from Robertson, the butler, that her nephew had arrived while she was out at a reception.
    “Commander Cheney said you were not to wait up for him, my lady. He went to Watier’s for the evening and said he would see you in the morning.”
    Lady Maria went to bed in a happy frame of mind, looking forward to a reunion with the boy she had always loved as well as if he had been her own son. She had been disappointed not to see him at Christmas, and had tried to tell herself that his new duties and responsibilities made his coming up to Bath to see her an impossibility. Her brother was not well. And Caroline—happy, happy news—Caroline was expecting a baby. Mark was needed at home.
    He was not at Cheney House when she arose in the morning, either. He had gone off to the Admiralty, Robertson informed her. It was not until almost noon that he returned, looking in on her as she sat in the morning parlor answering her mail.
    “Good morning, Aunt,” he said from the door, and came across the room to kiss her, tossing his hat on a sofa as he passed it.
    “Mark!” Her strongly featured face was alight with pleasure. “How lovely to see you, my dear. And how splendid you look. William is right— you ought not to resign your commission. It would be a pity to give up that marvelous uniform.”
    He smiled a little. “As it happens, I am not resigning, Aunt Maria. I am on leave at the moment.”
    She took his hand and drew him over to a pair of chairs positioned near a sunny window. “Sit down and tell me about yourself. How is Caroline? My congratulations. I hear you are to be a father.”
    There was not a flicker of expression on his face. “Yes,” he said coolly. “Papa is beside himself with delight.”
    “And you?” she asked, disturbed by the look of him.
    “Of course.”
    There was a brief pause, and then she said, “What were you doing at the Admiralty this morning?”
    “I went up to see Lord Melville, the First Lord, and Mr. Dalrymple from the Hydrography Office. They wanted to know if I would undertake a survey of the coast of Ireland.”
    “And will you?”
    The sun from the window gleamed on his thick light brown hair, flecking it with gold. He shook his head, and the lights in his hair danced. “No. What is needed first, I told them, is a land survey of Ireland. And I cannot leave Castle Dartmouth at the moment. Papa is not well. I do not think