Chapter 4

Count Damien glared at the wall of his coach. He was in a bad mood. He'd been having way too much trouble holding his lands together lately. It seemed that no one cared that the men he executed "so regularly" were criminals. Only that there were so many of them...
His thoughts were interrupted by Duncan, (who as his eldest son was) his favorite child. "What Dun-" a new voice interrupted and Phillip his youngest and most spoiled child said
"Ugh Father! Don't pretend that you do not know that we've arrived!" Damien turned an icy glare on his 19 year old son and through gritted teeth he said "Phillip, if you embarrass me here tonight no matter what your mother says I will tan your freckled hide!"
At this his daughter Claudia (who was getting married) cut in and said "Oh father, please don't be too hard on Phillip! You know how immature little children tend to be." Phillip almost pouted but instead gave his older sister a murderous glare. Duncan snickered but just then the carriage creaked to a stop and Phillip shot out the door like a wild animal from a cage, "Probably to see the stables as always," Count Damien thought as he assisted Claudia out. Then he went to greet Baron Jonathan and Lady Elizabeth.
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Susie was walking back to the house from fetching Quentin out of the woods for Lady Elizabeth when she saw a strange carriage pull up in front of the house. She realized that it must be Quentin's fiance and then she decided that since the company was being greeted she should probably go past the stable to the back door.
She was almost to the back door when she heard a boy with flaming red hair saying something that made her stop in her tracks. "Well" the boy was saying "Baron Jon found bossy old Claudia for his bookworm girly boy of a son, so maybe there's hope for his hair brained, scrawny, freckle faced little girl Alice."
Susie was so indignant that momentarily her bashfulness deserted her and she walked over to him and drawing herself up she said "how dare you, a stable boy to speak about a Baron's children that way!" At that he whirled around and said "What?" For a second Susie almost quailed as he was a full head taller than herself, then she remembered how rudely he had spoken about Quentin and Alice and she merely stepped back. He on the other hand was obviously surprised and said "What did you just say to me?"
Susie again drew herself up and said "I said how dare you speak that way about Baron Jonathan's children? Besides being rude it's also cowardly to say such things behind their backs!" He seemed to have recovered from his shock and he said, "Would you rather that I say it to their faces? Besides, I wasn't talking about you." This he said in such a tone that before Susie knew what was happening something flared up inside of her and she hit him right across the mouth!
Shocked at herself for being so angry and exteremely embarassed for her boldness, she then turned and ran into the house not stopping until she reached the bedroom that she shared with Alice.