All trace of pleasure vanished, leaving his features hard, his lips thinned. “Is that what you think of me? I’ve given you no cause to question the merits of my character.”

Aware she’d gone too far, Natalie said stiffly, “I didn’t mean to impugn your honor. But as a duke, surely you must have been raised with all manner of affluence and extravagance.”

“My childhood wasn’t like that at all.”

“Oh? I suppose a duke played with sticks and leaves as Leo did in America. Or with a handful of wooden animals carved by one of the settlers. No, you had that vast army of tin soldiers up in the nursery, along with a host of other expensive toys. And a pony, no doubt.”

Hadrian clenched his jaw, his brow furrowed, as if he were wrestling with an inner demon. “If you must know, those soldiers belonged to Richard—Lord Wymark. So did most of the other things in the cupboards. When I was Leo’s age, Godwin was a skinflint who didn’t approve of an excess of toys. He seized most of the ones given to me by my mother. It was only when he married the second time that he relented and indulged their two children—Richard and Ellen. But by that time, I was already living most of the year at boarding school.” Hadrian’s piercing gaze bored into her. “When I came here at the age of five, I had to make do with very little. So did Audrey. Perhaps that’s why she was able to adapt so well to living on your American frontier. Being the same age, we were raised together, and I doubt you’d have called her spoiled.”

His tirade left her somewhat chastened. His posture was rigid, as if she’d struck a nerve. Maybe his childhood hadn’t been quite the bed of roses that she’d presumed. He had, after all, made a good point about Audrey, who had never behaved as one born to privilege.

As her anger ebbed, Natalie found herself curious about Hadrian. It seemed there was more to him than initially met the eye. “Forgive me, I oughtn’t have made assumptions. But … if your mother was alive, why did you have to come here to Oak Knoll? Why couldn’t you have remained with her?”

“Godwin was my legal guardian. My father naturally made provisions for his successor to be raised by someone who could be trusted to oversee my education and my inheritance.”

“Couldn’t the earl have done that without separating you from your mother? It seems unnecessarily harsh for you to lose both parents when one was still capable of seeing to your care.”

His mouth twisted ironically. “You don’t know my mother.”

“Then tell me about her, please. Was she unfit in some way? Negligent, perhaps? Uncaring?”

“None of that—she’s very devoted to me, in fact.” He gazed into the distance for a moment as if struggling to find the right description. “The duchess is … frivolous, blithe, sentimental, someone who can fuss over a maid with a sore tooth or weep copiously at the death of a fictional character in one of the novels she likes to read. She’s impulsive and extravagant, too, without the slightest notion of the value of money. As a child, I used to visit her for a week twice a year, and she would buy everything in the toy shop that caught my fancy.”