Not when he didn't know what had happened. How could he defend himself when he didn't know exactly what had happened?

Gerard had said he was on his way with reinforcements… that he hadn't delayed. But, goddammit, if there'd been no delay, how the hell had he been cut off so completely? He'd been hanging on for support as his men fell around him… He could remember thinking…

Sylvester pressed his fingers into his temples, feeling the ominous tightening in the skin. Thinking what? He could remember nothing clearly of that afternoon, and yet something was there, a shadow of knowledge.

"Is something wrong, Lord Stoneridge?"

Elinor's soft voice broke into the spiraling confusion of his thoughts. He looked up, his expression dazed, his fingers still massaging his temples.

"You don't look well," she said, coming swiftly toward him. She reached up to lay a cool hand on his brow. His skin was clammy, and he was as pale as a ghost, his eyes no longer cool and penetrating, but shadowed with that pain she'd sensed in him from the beginning.

He shook his head, trying to calm his rioting thoughts and the desperate struggle for memory. Elinor's concerned expression penetrated the confusion, and her hand was cool on his brow. Mercifully, he felt the tension behind his temples ease, and he knew that this time he was going to be spared the agony.

"I'm quite well, thank you, ma'am," he said, forcing a smile. "A troublesome memory, that's all."

Elinor didn't press it. "Has Theo introduced you to Mr. Beaumont, the bailiff, as yet?"

"Your daughter, ma'am, has not seen fit to address a civil word to me in the last three days," he said caustically. "Let alone offer me any assistance in learning about the estate. I should tell you that I begin to lose patience."

"Well, perhaps that's for the best," Elinor said in a musing tone. "Something needs to shock her out of her present frame of mind." She bent down and pulled an errant weed from between the flagstones.

"I don't think I understand you, Lady Belmont."

Elinor straightened, examining the weed with a frowning concentration that it hardly warranted. "Theo hasn't grieved properly for her grandfather yet, Lord Stoneridge. I suspect she won't be herself again until she's able to do so. Perhaps we've indulged her sufficiently and it's time to provoke that grieving."

"I'm still not sure I understand you." Sylvester knew he was being given some valuable advice but wasn't quite sure what he was to do with it.

Elinor smiled slightly. "Follow your instincts, Lord Stoneridge, and see where they take you."

"Mama, the seamstress is here." Emily appeared round the corner of the terrace. "She has the samples for the new curtains, and there's one I particularly… Oh, good morning, Lord Stoneridge. I beg your pardon for interrupting." Her tone lost much of its exuberance as she offered him a small bow. "I didn't realize you were talking with Mama."

"Please don't apologize, cousin," he said, returning her bow. "Your mother and I were simply passing the time of day."

Elinor linked her arm in her daughter's, offering his lordship a half smile and a little nod, as if to say, You know what to do now. "We'll meet at nuncheon, Lord Stoneridge."

Sylvester watched them go off arm in arm. Lady Belmont seemed to think she'd been perfectly clear, but for the life of him, he couldn't interpret her words.

He strolled across the lawn, intending to walk to the cliff top, hoping that the sea air and fresh breeze would bring enlightenment. He hadn't gone more than twenty feet before he tripped over a pair of sturdy stockinged legs sticking out from beneath a bush.

"Ouch! You made me drop it!" An indignant Rosie crawled backward out of the bush and glared up at him, the sun glinting off her lenses. "You made me drop it," she repeated.

"Drop what?"

"A grasshopper. It was sawing its back legs together… that's how they make that noise. I most particularly wanted it for my museum. Theo was going to help me mount it."

Sylvester frowned at this other member of the Belmont family who held him in scant regard. "Well, I beg your pardon, but your feet were sticking out like a booby trap."

"Well, only a booby wouldn't have been looking where he was going," the child said, diving headlong back beneath the bush.

Sylvester raised his eyes heavenward. How was it that two daughters had tongues like razors and the other two were apparently as sweet-natured and malleable as a man could wish? And why, oh why, couldn't fate have offered him one of the sweet ones?

"There's no call to be uncivil," he said to the stockinged legs.

"I wasn't," came the muffled response. "But booby traps catch boobies, don't they? Otherwise they wouldn't be called that, would they?"

"There is a certain inexorable logic in that," he said with a twitch of his lips. "Nevertheless, child, you could find a more courteous way to make your point."

Shaking his head, Sylvester continued on his way.

Theo didn't appear at nuncheon, but no one seemed troubled by her absence. "I expect she's been offered hospitality with one of the tenant farmers, my lord," Clarissa said in answer to the earl's question. Her voice was a little cool, as if he had no right to question her sister's whereabouts. They had a way of closing ranks, these Belmonts.

"Theo's at home in every kitchen on the estate, sir," Emily said. "She always has been… since she was a little girl."

"I see." Frowning, Sylvester turned his attention to the ham in front of him. "May I carve you some ham, Lady Belmont?"

While he was sitting around the table making polite small talk and carving ham like some ancient paterfamilias, his energetic, managing young cousin was dealing with the business that kept the establishment going. It wasn't to be tolerated another day.

Elinor accepted a wafer-thin slice of ham, noticing the tautness of his mouth, the jumping muscle in his drawn cheek. She could guess the direction of his thoughts. Whether Theo agreed to marry the Earl of Stoneridge or not, Stoneridge Manor was no longer hers, and Elinor suspected that its lord was soon going to make that clear to her daughter in no uncertain terms.

Theo hadn't returned when it was time to dress for dinner, and Elinor felt the first stirrings of anxiety. "Did Lady Theo mention where she was going this morning, Foster?" she asked as she crossed the hall on her way upstairs.

"I don't believe so, my lady." Foster lit the branched candelabra on the long table by the front door.

"Are you concerned, ma'am?" Sylvester had overheard the question as he left the library, a ledger under his arm.

"No… no, of course not." Elinor spoke with an assurance that didn't convince Sylvester, or the butler. "Theo often goes out all day. It's just that usually…" She shook her head. "She does usually send a message if she's going to be particularly late." Sylvester waited until she was out of earshot on the first landing; then he said, "Is there cause for concern, Foster? Should we send some people in search?"

"I don't believe so, my lord. Everyone knows Lady Theo." If an accident had befallen her, someone would have sent word." "But she could have had a fall in a field somewhere," he suggested.

"Possibly, my lord, but unlikely." Foster turned toward the baize door leading to the kitchen regions. Sylvester sighed. The message had been clear: The butler didn't share his family concerns with an outsider.

The butler didn't, the bailiff didn't, the housekeeper didn't. And as for the tenants and villagers, he might as well be a fly-by-night visitor for all the attention they paid him.

He stalked upstairs to his own room, where Henry was laying out his clothes for the evening.

Henry cast his lordship a quick glance and decided this was not a good evening for chat. When Major Gilbraith wore that particular look, a wise man kept a low profile. He poured hot water into the basin and busied himself brushing down a dark-blue coat and cream pantaloons while the earl washed the day's dust from face and hands and put on a clean shirt.