Faith, her hand still over her face, stepped farther back and tripped over the corner of one of the boulders she’d been admiring. At last the horse put its hooves on the ground and in the next second the rider slid off and ran toward Faith.
“Are you all right?” asked a small voice.
She moved her arm to look up at a pretty young woman, no more than sixteen, wearing a riding habit that was so tight it looked painted on. She had on a perky little hat that nearly obscured her right eye.
“I’m fine,” Faith said, smiling and standing up. “I was more startled than hurt.” When she stood she saw that the girl was shorter than she was, only about five feet. She was small and exquisitely beautiful.
“I think you must be one of Amy’s Americans. Your accent…I’ve never heard such a way of speaking except for Amy. Do you also have wondrous stories about your country?”
Faith smiled. The girl had a sweetness about her that made Faith like her instantly. “I’m sure I do. How do you know Amy so well?”
“She’s been here nearly a year. Did you not know that?”
“No,” Faith said slowly. “Are you…?” She didn’t know what to call an earl. “His sister?”
“Oh yes,” Beth said. “I’m Tristan’s sister, but as he says, I am young enough to be his daughter. Oh my!” she said when the horse, which had been standing still, suddenly turned and galloped away through the trees. “Someone must have filled his food bin.”
Faith laughed. “I was admiring your park.”
“Oh, it is lovely, isn’t it? Now that Sheba—that’s my mare—has run home I’m afraid we’ll have to walk back to the house. Do you mind?”
“No, I love it here.” They started walking back toward the house, Faith feeling much taller and bigger than the tiny young woman. “Everything looks so new.”
“It is. Did Amy not tell you about us?”
“Not much,” Faith said. Except that her brother is very soon to be murdered in his sleep, she thought. “I’d love to hear everything.”
“Amy does not tell us much about herself either,” Beth said, looking at Faith as though she hoped she would elaborate. When Faith said nothing, Beth went on. “My brother built all this for his wife, Jane.”
“I didn’t know he was married.”
Beth took a moment before answering. “She died less than a year after they were married.”
“I’m so sorry,” Faith said.
“My brother and she were deeply in love. They had been since they were children.”
“Like Amy,” Faith said under her breath.
“Yes,” Beth said enthusiastically. “We do know that about her. She’s told us about her husband, Stephen, and their two children.”
“Did she tell you what happened to him?” Faith asked, curious to know what lies Amy had concocted.
“That he’s waiting for her in America, but she can’t go bec
ause of the war they’re having there.”
“I thought this was 1797. Isn’t the American Revolutionary War over?”
Beth looked at Faith oddly. “Yes, but there is still great anger at us English,” she said. “You should ask Amy what her friend Thomas Jefferson writes to her.”
Faith had to cough to cover the choking sound she made at that lie. “Tell me more about your brother.”
“When our father died, Tristan was just twenty-one and what he wanted most in the world was to marry Jane. But he didn’t want to ask her to live in the house our family had lived in since…Well, my brother says we’d lived in it since the dawn of time but I think that’s an exaggeration. He spent four years building this estate.”
Dawn of time, Faith thought. That meant the house was at least medieval. “Where is this house?” she asked and tried to keep the excitement out of her voice.
“Back that way,” Beth said, turning toward the stables. “I can take you to see it if you’d like, but I warn you that it’s awful. Tristan keeps cows in it now.”