The party reached Lyme Regis without incident, stopping first at Mr. Thomas's modest house, where Felix, whose blindness was no bar to his mastery of the pianoforte, was persuaded to play for the musician's pupils, and then at the boys' school, from which the twins shot like arrows from a drawn bow.

Jane was heartened to see that the masters of the school had not, as her aunt had prophesied, beaten and starved the twins into decorum, but as the morning progressed she began to wonder if a little beating and starvation might not be called for. Given the princely sum of a shilling apiece to spend as they willed, the two made shambles of shop after sweet shop through the steep streets of the town.

She and Meriden and Felix caught up with the twins finally at a shop that purveyed licorice whips. Arthur stood inside in earnest conference with the proprietor, but they found his brother, disconsolate, on the step.

"How now, Horatio?" Jane said in rallying tones.

He looked up and, catching sight of Meriden, brightened. "I say, sir, could I have tuppence? They make the most splendid whips."

Meriden regarded him sadly. "Pockets to let already?"

The boy nodded.

"Thrift, thrift, Horatio," said Jane and Meriden in one breath.

Felix gave a crow of startled laughter. "l know that one. It's from--"

"Very good," Meriden interrupted, "but this is a grave matter, Felix. Do not be laughing at your brother's plight. Now, Horatio, consider. Arty has tuppence to squander on whips. You don't. What have you that your brother has not?"

Horatio fumbled in his pockets and drew forth a number of grubby objects which he told over with great earnestness. "This and this . . . and this. No, we both . . . oh!" His face lit, and he pulled a deadly-looking sling from the recesses of his chocolate-besmeared jacket. "Isn't it famous, sir?"

"Worth at least a dozen licorice whips," Meriden agreed gravely.

Horatio looked wistful. "I daresay Arty will give me a chew. I say, sir, there are terrific cliffs with swallows and seagull nests." Arthur came out with a fistful of plunder and added his raptures to his twin's.

"Yes, I know," Meriden replied. "Just now, however, we are bound for the Anchor. Thorpe is waiting there for us with the carriage and a small hamper . . ."

No further words were needed. The twins dashed off shouting, "Thorpe! Thorpe!" and left their elders to follow at a more sedate pace.

Drusilla and Maria being discovered at the circulating library, nothing remained but to find a pleasant spot for the nuncheon. A green knob of field near the famous cliffs and overlooking the strand was pronounced suitable. The cloth was no sooner spread for Cook's basket than the twins fell on the roast chicken and boiled eggs and pasties and cakes and apples as if they had never seen a sweet shop.

"Can they truly be starved at their school?" Jane surveyed the broken remains ruefully.

Meriden laughed. "I'll warrant they think they are. All schoolboys do. Felix, the lemonade is perched by your left elbow. Don't move."

He rescued the sticky vessel and set it up at a safe distance. "Here, you two!" he called to the twins, who were pelting other with fistsful of pebbles. "Take something to Thorpe. He can't follow you up the cliff if he's faint with hunger."

The guilt-stricken twins gathered up a cloth full of sustaining viands and darted off to their idol who was standing by the equipage smoking a pipe.

Thereafter peace reigned. The girls drifted off to look for pretty stones. Felix and Meriden talked, or rather Felix, his face alert to every breeze, asked countless questions, and Meriden answered equably as he helped Jane tidy the food away. Some half an hour later, however, the twins roared back with Thorpe following at a leisured pace that suggested they were more eager to climb the cliffs than he was.

"Sir. He says we may not scramble down for eggs."

"May we, sir?"

"By no means. You are to obey Thorpe in all things. The edges of the cliffs sometimes crumble."

Their faces fell. "Thorpe says we may see as far Portland, but I daresay it is all a hum." This from Arty.

Horatio punched him. "Stupid. Probably we shall see as far as France."

"With a glass you may see the ships in the Channel," Meriden interposed, "and the Chesil Bank and possibly Portland Bill. Here." He pulled a small spyglass from his pocket.

"Famous!" The boys rushed to the edge of the strand and began testing out the device's capabilities.

"You've left a boy with the horses?" Meriden cocked an eye brow at his resigned groom.

Thorpe grunted. "T'lad'll walk un." He belched. "Beggin' your pardon, miss."

Jane smiled. "Cook surpassed herself, did she not? It is kind in you, Thorpe, to be chasing after my cousins."

"No trouble." He looked rather dour. Meriden grinned heartlessly.

"I'm sure they'll obey you sooner than anyone," Jane said warmly, indignant at his lordship's callousness.

Thorpe's scarred eyelid twitched. "Knacky lads, ain't they? Never tha mind, miss. Us'll see they hellions down safe as houses."

Arthur and Horatio dashed back.

"It's splendid, sir. I saw old Davorel chasing his dog on the Cobb."

"Did you, Arty? I take it Davorel is a schoolmate. See that you keep that glass clean."

Arthur began rubbing the lens vigorously with his shirtfrill.

"Thank you for the glass," said Horatio, remembering his manners belatedly. "I wish you will come, too, sir."

"Oh, yes! Famous!" Arthur piped. "I daresay you could shew us everything. Do come, sir."

Meriden laughed. "No. Run along. I believe Thorpe is sufficiently recovered to join you."

"Please, sir."

"No. Thorpe knows far more than I do about ships of all kinds, including runners. And besides I've promised Felix a game of chess."

The twins groaned but were finally persuaded that their elder brother was set on this tame pursuit. They scampered off, and Thorpe followed stolidly.

"If you'd liefer climb the cliff, sir, I can wait for my game," Felix said, rather white-faced.

Jane stared at Felix. It was probably the first unselfish remark of his life.

"No." Meriden was looking at his brother, a slight frown between his brows. "Thank you. I prefer chess. Shall I set up the board now?"

"Really, Ju . . . Julian, it must be a splendid view."

Meriden took a breath. He did not look at Jane. "Felix, " he said gently, "I could not climb the cliff, even if I wished to, which I don't."

"What do you mean?"

"Do you recall the battle that was fought in Belgium last summer?"

"Waterloo? Of course."

"I was wounded. In both legs. I walk and ride tolerably, but I don't caper up mountains like a goat. In fact, I found the streets of Lyme Regis rather steep going. If I tried to scramble up that precipice, I'd be brought down on a hurdle."

"0h." Felix digested that. "Does my mother know?"

"No, and I'll thank you not to go blabbing to her," Meriden snapped, incautious.

"Why not? She don't like you above half, but I daresay if she knew it'd bring her round in a trice."

Meriden was silent.

Jane wondered how he would extricate himself. Felix had been using his mama's easy pity to advantage for years. Jane would not have intervened for the world, for Felix had forgot her presence entirely. That Meriden had not she knew very well. She gazed hard at the cliff. The twins were mere specks.

Meriden said slowly, "Your mother is a good sort of woman, and I should like to be on easy terms with her. However, she is a little inclined to make a fuss. I believe you understand me."

Felix pondered.

"I don't know how it is," Meriden added, "but I find excesses of sympathy more tiresome than honest dislike."

"Oh."

Deft, my lord, very deft, Jane thought. She began to be a little amused. Felix was not by any means stupid, and he took Meriden's judgements very much to heart. She wondered if, in the next days, they would be edified by the spectacle of a new, stoical Felix.

His lordship did not pursue the matter. "Shall I fetch the board?"

"What? Oh, yes. I say, I'm sorry you was hurt, Julian," Felix said shyly.

Meriden let out his breath in a whoosh. "So am I, but it can't be helped. I'll be back directly." He got up, indeed rather stiffly, and went to fetch the chess set from the carriage.

When the twins finally pelted down the cliff, full of thrilling descriptions of the perilous ascent and the nesting seagulls which had screeched at them and the hundreds of swallows they had bagged with Horatio's sling and the hundreds of smugglers and ships of war they had seen, Felix listened with fair humour to their chatter. Tiring of it at last, he announced in world-weary tones that Julian had trounced him again and that he meant to go for a walk on the Cobb with his brother.

"Tame," Arthur snorted.

"Oh, who cares about a lot of dashed seagulls?" Unfortunately a gull at that moment flapped by quite close to Felix's head. He started wildly. "What was that?"

The twins convulsed in mirth. Jane gave them a repelling stare. "Where have you put the glass?"

"Thorpe has it," Horatio said carelessly. "Come on, Arty. Let's go hunt shells." They raced off again.

"Shall we go, Fellx?" Meriden pulled the boy to his feet. "There's a tolerably smooth path here, and if you'll just lend me your arm . . ." He threw Jane an apologetic grin. She smiled back and shook her head. She would not have intruded for any consideration.

Felix went off, flushed with pleasure and importance, to examine the historical seawall.

When Thorpe draggled down and sat on a nearby tuft, Jane regarded him with deep sympathy. He looked as she felt--exhausted.

"Should you care for this bottle of hock, Thorpe? It's quite untouched, and I daresay you are worn to bits."

"Thank you, miss. I'm that thirsty."

Jane began to laugh softly, and Thorpe's eyelid twitched. "Reet wearing, that lot."

A look of complete understanding passed between them.

Read the first chapter of A Cousinly Connexion.