Dark Road to Darjeeling (Lady Julia Mystery #4)

“We are crossing the river and we shall do it now, even if I have to put the pair of you on my shoulder and walk across it.” His temper had risen faster than my own, but I could not entirely blame him. He had been ordered by our father, the Earl March, to accompany his sisters to India, and the experience had proven less than pleasant thus far.

Portia’s mouth curved into a smile. “Have you added walking on water to your talents, dearest?” she asked nastily. “I would have thought that beyond the scope of even your prodigious abilities.”

Plum rose to the bait and they began to scrap like a pair of feral cats, much to the amusement of our porters who began to wager quietly upon the outcome.

“Enough!” I cried, stopping my ears with my hands. I had listened to their quarrels since they had run me to ground in Egypt, and I was heartily sick of them both. I summoned my courage and strode to the nearest raft, determined to set an example of English rectitude for my siblings. “Come on then,” I ordered, a touch smugly. “It’s the merest child’s play.”

I turned to look, pleased to see they had left off their silly bickering.

“Julia—“ Portia began.

I held up a hand. “No more. Not another word from either of you.”

“But—“ Plum started.

I stared him down. “I am quite serious, Plum. You have been behaving like children, the pair of you, and I have had my fill of it. We are all of us above thirty years of age, and there is no call for us to quarrel like spoiled schoolmates. Now, let us get on with this journey like adults, shall we?”

"If Father wanted you to have an escort so badly, why didn't he come himself? He is always rabbiting on about wanting to travel to exotic places."

Portia pulled a face. "He would have but he was too busy quarrelling with his hermit."

I blinked at her and Brisbane snorted, covering it quickly with a cough. "His what?"

"His hermit. He has engaged a hermit. He thought it might be an interesting addition to the garden."

"Has he gone stark staring mad? Who ever heard of a hermit in Sussex?" I demanded, although I was not entirely surprised. Father loved nothing better than tinkering with his country estate, although his devotion to the place was such that he refused to modernise the Abbey with anything approaching suitable plumbing or electricity.

Portia sipped placidly at her soup. "Oh, no. The hermit isn't in Sussex. Father has put him in the garden of March House."

"In London? In the back garden of a townhouse?" I pounced on Plum. "Did no one try to talk him out of it? He'll be a laughingstock!"

Plum waved an airy hand. "As if that were something new for this family," he said lightly.

I ignored my husband who was having a difficult time controlling his mirth and turned again to my sister. "Where does the hermit live?"

"Father built him a pretty little hermitage. He could not be expected to live wild," she added reasonably.

"It isn't very well wild if it is in the middle of Mayfair, now is it?" I countered, my voice rising. I took a sip of my wine and counted to twenty. "So Father has built this hermitage in the back garden of March House. And installed a hermit. With whom he doesn't get on."

"Correct," Plum said. He reached for my plate and when I offered no resistance, helped himself to the remains of my fish.

"How does one even find a hermit these days? I thought they all became extinct after Capability Brown."

"He advertised," Plum said through a mouthful of trout grenobloise. "In the newspaper. Received quite a few responses, actually. Seems many men fancy the life of a hermit--and a few women. But Father settled on this fellow from the Hebrides, Auld Lachy. He thought having a Hebridean hermit would add a bit of glamour to the place."

"There are no words," Brisbane murmured.