she’d retained her bonnet, so that she could fan herself in the heat of the place.
Jeremiah Rigby bent his head close to hers. “I’m told the duke and duchess once traveled extensively and brought home reminders of their trips. Later you might want to apply to sonny boy if you’ve never seen a stuffed lemur.”
“Stuffed?” Thea looked at the nearest cage, relieved to see the pair of small birds—lovebirds of some sort?—were busily rubbing necks together. “These are all alive, aren’t they, not just a few of them?”
“They are, and with the parrots and such among them, many will probably outlive all of us. I can’t tell you how often my friend gushes to me about how thrilled he is by that news.”
“You’re being facetious, aren’t you?”
“Madly so. I fear all these lovely birds will be somewhere other than this grand hall once he’s in residence.”
“The air does smell rather sour. I knew the duchess badly desired to bring a pair of our local cranes to England with us, but my stepfather warned her the birds probably wouldn’t survive the voyage. I never imagined this.”
The duchess, who had been admiring her birds, must have overheard, for she came over to Thea to explain. “Basil is the genius behind it all, you know. Once he became duke, I complained to him about the sad, overcrowded state of the aviary, and this is the result. It was my dear cousin’s house in Virginia that helped spark the idea, as he’d thought it quite clever to place doors at both the front and the rear of the house, to encourage summer breezes, so Basil ordered the removal of a stuffy old den that once stood in the way and added a half-dozen French doors along the rear. We often open both sets of doors to the elements, during clement weather, of course. The peacocks tend to wander off, but they always return.”
Finally Gabriel Sinclair said something. “My aunt fails to mention that he only closed in the staircases after it became apparent that accidentally loosed birds tend to migrate. If we’ve seen enough?” He gestured toward a set of doors to his right.
“Yes, yes, let’s take ourselves upstairs,” the duchess agreed. “Although I should be going at once to Basil.”
“He’ll keep,” Gabriel said. “At least for another few months.”
The duchess playfully slapped his arm. “Naughty boy! He’s not going to die, no matter how much he’s talked himself into this silly idea of a curse. And if he is, well, I refuse to see him do it hiding here. And that’s what I want to talk about. Come along, dearest Thea—you’re a large part of this.”
Now the nephew was looking at her that way again, whatever that was. Perhaps he was working on developing a squint? Really, it was most disturbing. She didn’t need him. Not really. She would do what she would do and not request his help, no matter what the duchess thought.
Once more she allowed Sir Jeremiah to offer his arm to her. One of the footmen hastened to push open the double doors, and she found herself looking up at what had once probably been an impressive staircase, curving up and toward the great hall. She followed along dutifully to the top.
“To your left, Miss Neville, that door leads to the balcony that rides over the aviary and into the west wing and a matching staircase. To your right, the entrance to the grand salon. Aunt?”
“I know it looks terrible, Sunny, but it was necessary.”
“None of this was necessary.”
Thea had to agree with Gabriel Sinclair. If one wished to reside in a jungle, one could easily find a jungle and, well…reside. She actually began to feel pity for the man. Perhaps being heir to a dukedom wasn’t all one would suspect it to be.
She caught his eye once they’d adjourned to the grand salon and she’d taken up her seat beside the duchess on a quite lovely striped satin couch. When he returned her look, she smiled, hopefully sweetly, and then carefully removed her gloves and folded her hands in her lap. They would leave the past awkward minutes behind them and begin again.
“You had a pleasant voyage?” Gabriel asked, directing his question at her.
Ah, he was agreeing with her. They would begin again.
“It was delightful, sir, yes. We left Virginia well ahead of any thought of a late-summer tropical storm, and the entire crossing was blissfully uneventful.”
There. That was polite, informative, and if he seemed to be faintly surprised by her crisp, precise, cultured English, he only showed that reaction for a moment.
The duchess was already fussing with the tea tray one of the servants had carried into the room, pouring out tea and handing around thinly sliced cucumber sandwiches.
“How fortunate. And this is your first trip to England, Miss Neville?” Yes, he was definitely curious. Had he thought she’d drawl out every vowel, a laziness of speech her half sisters had fallen into, much to their mother’s despair?
“It is, yes.”
Sir Jeremiah looked at his friend, as if they’d come to some sort of conclusion. She wasn’t certain if it was a happy or sad conclusion, but they had decided something.
“I’d only ever sailed from England.”
Another exchange of glances. A decision possibly reconsidered.
Really. How rude of the two of them. She hoped the duchess would interject herself, explain, but she seemed to be engrossed in counting out sugar cubes to place in her tea.
“I was born an Englishwoman, sir. My brother and I both, although he was older than I, and since I’m two and twenty, that was a long time ago. He was taken off by a fever before I was born. In any case, we left England to settle in Virginia, where there were no sad memories facing my parents at every turn. Mama was horribly upset, fearing I’d never return for a London Season, but Papa promised he’d never do any such thing.” She looked down at her hands, mostly because she didn’t want Gabriel Sinclair to see something dangerously revealing in her eyes. “Unfortunately, he perished during his return voyage to England to settle the last of his affairs.”
“A family of tragedies,” Gabriel said, nodding. “My condolences.”
Thea squirmed slightly in her seat. She’d probably offered more information than either man needed, but the way they both kept looking at her was unnerving, and she had a tendency to babble when nervous. Her mother remarked on it all the time. She really was a sad disappointment to her mother, at least most of the time. The poor woman would have slid into a faint the moment her daughter had revealed her advanced age.
The duchess, at last done stirring her tea, said, “Thea’s mother became a bosom chum while I visited my cousin the first time Basil and I went to America, and we renewed our friendship during this last trip. Although I’ve never had a daughter, I could feel her pain when she spoke about her late husband’s sworn promise, and the disappointment of her beloved oldest daughter not being given the Season her father and she had so desired. There was nothing else for it, of course. In all charity, I couldn’t help but offer to bring Thea here with me.”
“And, um, that’s my surprise? I’m afraid I don’t understand,” Gabriel said.
“Not quite, Sunny. Your surprise is that you
