Remember Love (Ravenswood #1)(22)

“I doubt it,” she said.

He was tall and darkish and really quite nice looking. Thomas, that was. And only six years or so older than she was. Was he planning to go away somewhere anytime soon? For long years before returning?

“Have you quarreled with Nick Ware?” he asked.

“Quarreled?” she said. It was not the first time today she had been asked that. “No, of course not. But we are just friends, you know, Thomas. We have been friends since childhood.”

“Well, that is the best news I have heard today,” he said, grinning at her. “Do you mind if I stand with you to watch?”



* * *



—

Everyone appeared to be enjoying themselves, Devlin thought as he looked around while making his slow way down toward the lake. Even his grandmothers, who were sitting on the lawn in the shade of an elm tree, chatting with each other while his grandfather nodded asleep in his chair. Devlin stopped to see if there was anything he could fetch them, and his grandfather jumped awake to remind him that they had just had their luncheon and could not possibly need anything else yet.

He stopped to talk with a group of the Ravenswood farm laborers who were standing below the hill on which the pavilion had been built. Their children were dashing up to the pavilion and rolling, shrieking, down the grassy slope, best clothes notwithstanding.

Was this really the best fete ever? Devlin wondered. Or did it just seem so to him because he had spent at least half an hour of it in company with Gwyneth? He resumed his walk to the lake, only to recoil in mock terror when three figures with the faces of monsters and the bodies of young boys jumped from the branches of a tree—one of them was Owen—and roared ferociously at him before roaring with laughter in most unmonsterlike fashion at his reaction.

He was not really sorry Gwyneth had decided against accompanying him to the lake—or so he told himself. It was his duty to mingle with everyone, after all, to make every guest feel welcome, to make sure all were enjoying themselves.

The judging of the needlework would not begin for another half hour, he discovered when he reached the lake. He filled in the time by rowing his great-aunts Enid and Beatrice on the lake. He listened appreciatively to their chatter as they reminisced about fetes long past—in the village rather than at Ravenswood—and beaux their very young selves had sighed over before they settled for their respective husbands.

“Settled?” he asked, waggling his eyebrows at them.

They looked at him, looked at each other, and laughed gleefully like girls.

A short while later he stood beside his mother, watching the judging of the lace.

“There are such skilled people living in our neighborhood, Devlin,” she said. “Both men and women. Have you seen the wood-carving items in the contest over there?” She pointed beyond the row of vendors’ booths.

“I took a quick look earlier, but they had not all been set out,” he said.

“They will be judged next,” she told him. “Come with me, if you will. I have not seen your father.”

“I daresay he is watching the archery,” he said. “I am very glad it is not a family duty actually to judge any of these contests. How would one decide? All this lace is perfect. At least to my man’s eyes it is.”

“It is to mine too,” she assured him.

They strolled along the line of stalls later, on their way to the wood-carving table, and he bought his mother a large false-pearl brooch, which was anything but perfect. It was eye-catching, however, and they both laughed over it. The vendors seemed to be doing a roaring business.

His mother, Devlin thought suddenly, was beautiful. He had always known that, of course, for surely every mother was beautiful to her children. What he had noticed today, however, as though for the first time, was that she was also young. One tended to see one’s mother as old. At least as a child one did. But his mother was only forty now—they had held a special birthday celebration for her a few months ago, while his father was still in London. Today she looked younger even than that. It was surprising to discover that one’s mother was still lovely and young and possibly desirable to any number of men. She was the perfect complement to his father. They were a dazzlingly good-looking couple.

“I believe Stephanie must have squandered all the spending money your papa gave her at this very stall,” his mother said. “Have you seen her?”

“Decked out in cheap, garish finery, is she?” he asked. “To go with her princess’s face?”

“One winces at the sight,” she said. “Has she learned nothing from me or Miss Field about good taste?”

They both laughed as she fingered the brooch he had pinned just below her shoulder.

“Pippa left the maypole earlier on, looking very pleased with herself,” he said. “She had two strings to her bow.”

“Ah.” His mother sighed. “I wish my children did not have to grow up. But two of you have already done so, not to mention Ben, and Pippa is not far behind. You were such an earnest little boy, Devlin. All big blue eyes and eagerness to please. And Nicholas was a bright-eyed mischief maker with hair that would never lie flat and teeth that were too big for his face until he grew into them a year or two ago. Owen is going to have a great growth spurt any day now and tower over me. And my baby is almost ten years old.”