Then, as if by magic, people seemed to appear from every direction. Even those who were very old and had to be helped managed somehow to reach the chaise.
The Earl climbed out and started shaking hands as Raina explained who each person was.
“This is Mrs. Perkins,” she said. “She has been so brave. Her eldest son was killed in the first month of the war and her second son at Waterloo. But she has managed to look after three other children who are orphans and they have all squeezed into her tiny cottage.”
“It be terrible when it rains, my Lord,” Mrs. Perkins said. “It comes straight in and, if we be sittin’ in front of the fire, if we ’as one, we ’as to put an umbrella up. The place be often swamped with water.”
There seemed to be a long silence before the Earl spoke and then he said,
