Out of long custom Nathaniel sat at the head of the table, Robert at his right hand. The staff had spent years supporting the pretense that Nathaniel was the duke, and they had done so at Robert’s insistence. As far as polite society knew, Robert had only recently returned to Rothhaven Hall, when in fact, Nathaniel had brought him home more than five years ago.

The man reclaimed from the asylum had been the furthest thing from a duke. Robert wasn’t convinced the years at Rothhaven Hall had seen all that much progress in a ducal direction either.

“What difference does the date make?” Nathaniel spread a pat of butter on his bread and took a second pat. “You aren’t the lucky fellow looking forward to your wedding night.”

In all the time Robert had been at Rothhaven Hall, he and his brother had never once quarreled. They discussed, they even debated in a theoretical sense, and one of them occasionally made an abrupt change of subject, but they’d avoided a true difference of opinion.

That feat was doubtless a testament to fraternal guilt on both sides.

“I am not looking forward to a wedding night, true,” Robert said, selecting the next smallest mushroom from among those on his plate. “I am instead facing responsibilities you have shouldered for years. I must meet with tenants who have long presumed me dead. I must deal with the awkward moments when somebody asks where I’ve been all these years. I must at all times present myself to be of sound mind, despite a lamentable tendency to stare off into space when I’m not twitching and shaking on the floor.”

Nathaniel put down his bread. “You are angry. I am sorry. I know that taking up the reins here will be a challenge, but you are ready for it.”

Whether Robert was ready or not, Nathaniel was too deserving of happiness to be denied a future with Lady Althea.

“I need a plan.” Lady Constance’s words had not left Robert’s mind since she’d uttered them. “Five years ago, you devised a plan to give me the time I needed to heal from that place, and I thank you most sincerely. I need another plan now, one that frees you to jaunt down to London and take your new wife shopping. Have you considered where you and Lady Althea will live?”

Nathaniel stabbed a third pat of butter, then beheld his bread and set the knife down, the butter still on it.

“I had assumed we’d dwell at Lynley Vale. Althea’s property is well appointed and shares a boundary with Rothhaven Hall.”

“I suggest you bide at Crofton Ford for at least part of the year.” Robert had given the matter much thought, and though the words were painful, Nathaniel looked intrigued.

“Crofton Ford is a good twenty miles from here,” Nathaniel said.