The Homecoming Read Online Free PDF Page B

him to find someone for me. He should have asked me.”
    “I think he only meant to be kind.”
    “And I think Miss Trumble asked him to find me someone.”
    Peter looked surprised. “Estimable governess as she obviously is, a governess cannot ask a duke to do such a thing.”
    “No, I suppose not, Peter,” said Lizzie quickly. “Tell me about yourself. Are you happy in your employ?”
    “I should be.”
    “So what is amiss?”
    “I would like to tell you, Lizzie, for we are friends, but in my home village, there is a certain lady…”
    He blushed and looked down.
    “What is her name?” asked Lizzie gently.
    “Sarah. Miss Sarah Walters.”
    “And is she very fair?”
    “Miss Walters has great vivacity and charm. She is Squire Walters’s daughter. The family hope for better for her than a mere secretary, even the secretary to a duke. I could not declare myself.”
    “How sad.”
    “Yes, it is sad. I cannot even write to her.”
    Lizzie nodded wisely. It was a world in which one’s parents opened and read one’s letters first.
    “Perhaps,” she said tentatively, “you might broach the subject to the duke. Who knows? He owns so much property, he might allow you to have a house of your own and sufficient to wed your Sarah.”
    Peter gave a mirthless laugh. “Servants do not marry, as you know very well.”
    “I wish there was something I could do for you, Peter.”
    He put a hand over hers where it lay on the table and gave it a little squeeze.
    The duke, entering the garden, saw what he believed was his secretary holding the hand of Lizzie Beverley in a fond and amorous clasp.
    He went straight to the house. The door stood open. “Miss Trumble!” he called.
    Miss Trumble came down the stairs.
    “How good of you to call.”
    “Come into the parlour,” he said grimly.
    Now what? thought Miss Trumble, as he held open the door for her and then shut it firmly behind them.
    She sat down, but the duke began to pace up and down. “Do stand still and tell me what the matter is,” said Miss Trumble.
    He ceased his pacing and looked down at her.
    “When I arrived, my secretary was sitting in the garden holding hands with Lizzie.”
    “Are you sure?”
    “Yes, very sure, Aunt. There is something badly wrong when a young miss allows such familiarity and on such short acquaintance.”
    “It is all very simple, Gervase. Lizzie, despite her unruly tongue, is not a flirt. We shall go together to the garden and simply ask them what they are about.”
    This was the most sensible course and the duke followed her reluctantly out, feeling all the same like a middle-aged gossip.
    Peter rose to his feet when he saw his master. Lizzie rose and curtsied. Both young faces were polite blanks and yet the duke sensed he had interrupted something important and that they wished him at the devil.
    “We shall all sit down,” said Miss Trumble. “Lizzie, His Grace was startled, on entering the garden, to see you holding hands with his secretary.”
    Peter blushed miserably. “It was not what you think. There was something troubling me. I told Miss Lizzie and she was so concerned and so understanding that I was moved to cover her hand with my own. Pray accept my apologies.”
    “If such be the case,” said Miss Trumble, “you need not apologize.”
    “No, indeed,” said Lizzie. “But I think you should tell the duke what it was about. He may be able to help you.”
    Peter hung his head.
    “Is it something so very dreadful that you fear you might lose your employ?” asked Miss Trumble.
    “Oh, no.”
    “Tell me about it,” commanded the duke, noticing however the silky sheen of Lizzie Beverley’s red hair in the sunlight.
    “I am in love,” said Peter wretchedly.
    The duke raised his thin eyebrows but said nothing. He simply waited patiently.
    “Her name is Sarah Walters,” went on Peter in a low voice. “She is the daughter of Squire Walters in the village of Syderham, where I grew up. I could not declare my