Читать книгу Unveiled - Courtney Milan - Страница 11

MR. TURNER CONTINUED to be a nuisance as Margaret led him up the wide stairway towards her father’s sickroom. At first, he said nothing. Instead, he gawked about him with a sense of casual proprietorship, taking in the stone of the stairways, and then, as they entered the upper gallery, the portraits on the wall. It wasn’t greed she saw in his gaze; that she could have forgiven. But he was an interloper at Parford Manor, and he looked about him with the jaded eye of a purchaser—searching out the flaws, as if he didn’t want to say too much by way of compliment, lest he raise the price too high in subsequent rounds of bargaining.

He glanced out the leaded windows. “Pleasantly situated,” he remarked.

Pleasantly situated. Parford Manor was the center of a massive estate—fifty acres of parkland on the most beautiful rolling hills in all of England, surrounded by tenant farms. The gardens were the labor of her mother’s life, a living, breathing monument to a woman who was even now fading from common memory. And he thought it was merely pleasantly situated?

He was a boor.

“Beautifully maintained,” he said as they passed a tapestry in the stone stairs.

She rolled her eyes, which thankfully, as she walked ahead of him, he could not see.

“The manor needs a bit of updating, though.”

Margaret stopped dead, afraid to even look in his direction. He came abreast of her and turned to look at her.

“You don’t agree? All that dark wainscoting downstairs. Tear it down—get some bright papers on the wall.” He gestured above to the gallery’s ceiling. “New chandeliers—Lord, it must be dark in here, of a winter evening. Don’t you think?”

He was absolutely intolerable. “The gallery was last renovated by the duchess herself, a decade prior. I shouldn’t like to set my tastes against a sensibility as refined as hers.”

His brow furrowed. “Surely you have an opinion of your own.”

“I do. I believe I just expressed it.”

There was a bit too much asperity in her tone, and he looked at her in surprise. Of course; a nurse wouldn’t have been quite so bold in her speech. Not to a duke’s heir. Not even to a wealthy tradesman who held the power of her employment in his too-large hands.

But what he said was “So. I’m a lout to think of altering her choices. I suppose I am fouling up a great lot of tradition. But only to improve, Miss Lowell. Only to improve.”

Margaret’s life had hardly been improved when he’d made her a bastard. That, however, she couldn’t say. Instead, she sighed. “Are you always this chatty with servants?”

“Only the pretty ones.” He cast her another sidelong glance, and a grin. “The pretty, intelligent ones.”

A beat fluttered in her stomach and Margaret started walking again. Down the gallery, into the hall beyond. She stopped before a wide wood door. “We’re about to enter a sickroom, so consider restraining your flirtations. His Grace is not well.”

Mr. Turner shook his head, solemn again. “A shame. I’d prefer him in his study, hale and hearty. There’s little honor in vanquishing an invalid.”

Margaret gripped the brass handle of her father’s door. She couldn’t look back at him, for fear he’d read the truth in the rigidity of her features. Her mother’s locket hung heavy on its chain, a great weight around her neck. “Is that why you did this, then? Is that why you had the duke and the duchess’s marriage of thirty years voided for bigamy, their innocent children declared bastards and disinherited entirely?” Her voice was shaking. “You claim to have too much honor to importune a woman without family, but let a man have a dukedom, and you feel free to…to vanquish him?”

There was a long pause behind her. “Are you always this chatty with your employers? I should imagine the Dalrymples—and no, Miss Lowell, I would not describe your employer’s poisonous offspring as either ‘children’ or ‘innocent’—would have stamped that trait right out of you.”

Margaret closed her eyes. Poisonous, was she? She wondered what she had done to deserve that particular epithet from a man she had met only this day. “I served the duchess when she was ill.” True; she’d spent her waking hours in her mother’s sickroom. “She was never well, these last years, but when you announced to the world that her husband was a bigamist—that she herself had been nothing more than an adulteress for the last thirty years, you destroyed her. She simply lost her will to continue. She was dead a few months later. To hear you talk about the circumstances that led to her death in so easy a fashion is utterly repellant.”

He didn’t answer her, and she turned to look at him. He was watching her seriously, his lips pressed together. He looked as if he were actually listening to her, as if she had something important to say. Maybe that was why she continued.

“You weren’t the one who had to urge her to eat. You didn’t watch the light in her eyes wink out and die. You men never see the consequences of what you do. All you care about is that in the end, you collect the title and the estates. That’s not honorable.”

Another longer pause. “You’re perfectly right,” he finally said. “It wasn’t honorable. It was revenge. I doubt you understand the complexity of the family relationship. But, at least, I didn’t intend to cause the duchess’s death. Parford, on the other hand…” His fingers clenched at his side. “I doubt Parford could say the same of my sister, were you to query him on the matter. As for the worthless boys he called sons? Quite frankly, after what they did to my brothers at Eton, I’d have wished far worse upon him.”

“Richard and his friends must have been quite the terror, to justify having his title stripped.”

“Richard? You’re calling the former Marquess of Winchester Richard?”

Rather than answer that, Margaret swung the door open and pushed it inward. “His Grace is waiting.”

Mr. Turner gave her one last long, searching look. Her heart thumped as he perused her face. Surely he would know what her little slip of the tongue had meant. But he just shook his head and entered the room. She followed behind.

Over the past few months, Margaret had learned to hide how completely aghast the sight of her father left her. She knew, rationally, that he was ill. But between her visits—even if no more than an hour elapsed—this image of him, thin as a fence rail and swathed in bedclothes, never managed to lodge in her memory. She remembered him healthy and robust, larger and more incomprehensible than the sky itself. That memory had riveted itself in her imagination, unable to be dislodged by something so trivial as the passage of time. In her heart, he couldn’t change. Her father was bigger than her, stronger than her, more frightening than her.

Reality had been cruel. He’d shrunk into a glazed shell of a man, holding on to life with the same tenacity that held him upright in this perfect seated posture. He ought to have been lying down.

“Parford,” Mr. Turner said. He put his hands in his pockets and stood there, glowering, all his chatty conversation evaporated. He was as still as a tombstone, looking forwards. That rigid stance seemed entirely at odds with his easy manner to a servant.

Her father rolled his head lazily to regard him. “Turner.”

Mr. Turner stared at him for one long instant before swiveling away. He turned to a basin on a nearby table, and when that could not hold his interest any longer, his gaze moved to a jumble of medicines in brown apothecary’s bottles.

He picked up one and turned it over. “Well. My finely honed speech, saved all these years, seems too big for this room after all.”

“Oh, pull up your trousers and be a man. What in God’s wide world are you waiting for?” That whiplash crack of authority in her father’s voice set Margaret’s teeth on edge. “Just get it over with, Turner. Say your piece, and then let me sleep.”

“It seems unsporting to crow about my triumph to a linen-clad scarecrow.” Mr. Turner set down the laudanum and looked over. “But I suppose you wouldn’t have it any other way, would you?”

Her father let out another exasperated sigh. “Get on with it, Turner. I’m dying. I have no wish to spend my last days enduring your endless hand-wringing and shilly-shallying. We both know how this is supposed to go—eyes for eyes, and all that. Am I supposed to beg you, as you once begged me?”

Margaret had no idea what her father was speaking about.

But Turner must have, because he scowled. “You’re making a mockery of this.”

“That’s not your line,” Parford snapped. “You’re supposed to throw my own words back at me. What did I say to that smelly, bedraggled child who visited me? Oh, yes: ‘We have as much blood in common as the queen has with a pig farmer.’ I did say pig farmer, didn’t I?”

“Coal miner, actually. And at the time, George was king.”

“Damn. My memory is full of holes. Still, you’ve deviated from the script. Here you are, heir to the Duchy of Parford, despite everything I did. Aren’t you going to grind my nose in it? Will that satisfy your vengeance? Or would you prefer to drive a dagger through my chest and drink my blood?”

Mr. Turner set his jaw and reached sharply for a small sack at his waist. At that sudden movement, Margaret felt a small shock of fear go through her, and she darted forwards, her hand reaching out to stop him—

“Relax, girl,” her father grumbled. “What do you suppose he’s secreted in that tiny little pouch? The world’s smallest rapier?”

Mr. Turner merely glanced at her and pulled something from the pouch and threw it forwards. “Here. This is yours.”

It landed on the Duke of Parford’s lap, and for once, that harsh stream of words dried up. He stared at it and then closed his hand about it. “A sixpence? Oh, no! I’m feeling revenged upon.”

The entire conversation was opaque to Margaret. “The sixpence,” Mr. Turner said grimly. “When I came to you and begged for your intercession, you threw it in my face and told me the only thing you wanted me to get was a bath. My sister died, my brothers—” He shook his head. “I told you I would make you sorry. And now here I am.”

“Yes. Congratulations. You’ve stolen a dukedom. Am I supposed to care?”

“You stole it yourself. I didn’t make your children bastards. I didn’t steal their inheritance. It was you who did it, so certain your first wife would never come to light. And now you’re reaping your own punishment.”

Her father leaned back against the cushions. “Me? Punished? Hardly. I’m the duke—and I will be until I die, which hopefully will be soon.” He yawned widely. “Once I have passed on to the next world, I can hardly care what becomes of my pitiful bastard offspring in this one.” He leaned back.

Margaret’s spine felt tight with tension. Her hands flattened against the plasterwork behind her. Her father had never been demonstrative or affectionate. Still, she’d always believed that he cared for her, even if only in his high-handed fashion. At his words, she wanted to melt into the wall and simply disappear. The hair on her head, scraped into that awful bun, pulled against her scalp.

But her father didn’t glance her way. “You seem to be under the impression that I give a damn about those whelps I sired on that whey-faced chit I was forced to pretend was my bride. You’re wrong.”

That “whey-faced chit” was Margaret’s mother—sweet and soft-spoken, warm and gentle and loving. She was barely six months in the grave. Margaret stared straight ahead, her hands clenching.

“Now, if you’ve finished berating me, go away. I’m bored.” Her father leaned his head against the wall and closed his eyes.

Mr. Turner stared at him for a few moments, his jaw working. Finally, with one last look at Margaret, he left. Margaret closed the door behind him and turned to her father. He lay on the bed, his eyes shut as if he were sleeping. She doubted he was. She watched the ragged rise and fall of his chest, unsure what to think.

What on earth had Mr. Turner been alluding to? This was clearly not the first time her father had spoken with him. There was more to Mr. Turner than just a voided marriage and a grab for a dukedom, but if so, this was the first Margaret had heard of it. More important, had her father’s unkind words been an act, put on to convince Mr. Turner her father didn’t care about his children, and to thus shield them from revenge? Or had he spoken the simple truth?

As if sensing her questions, he opened his eyes. He must have seen the hurt on her face, because he expelled his breath in disgust. “Oh, Christ, Anna. You’re already a girl and a bastard. Don’t make yourself triply useless by crying.”

Margaret was beyond tears. She’d shed them all months ago, for all the good they’d done. But shame settled against her skin like a fine burning net. Over the past months, she’d had everything stripped from her: her name, when it was discovered that Lady Anna Margaret Dalrymple was a bastard. Her dowry, when Chancery decided that as illegitimate offspring, she wasn’t entitled to the funds settled upon her mother.

Margaret took a deep breath. She had been scoured clean of everything except the hard truth of herself. It coiled, deep inside her, like a spiked little ball.

“Would you like a glass of barley water?” she asked calmly.

Perhaps her father took that smooth inquiry as meekness, because his lip curled. He didn’t understand. It took every ounce of strength she had not to simply turn on her heel and walk out of the room. Because Mr. Turner had been right about one thing. It had been selfishness on her father’s part—pure, utter selfishness—to lie to her mother, to pretend to marry her, to beget offspring he’d known were legally unable to inherit.

“None of that tepid stuff, now,” he warned her.

The water was room temperature against her wrist, but she had no desire to send down to the icehouse. In fact, in her current guise as lowly nurse, she might have to go herself. She poured the liquid as it was, a tiny act of defiance, proof that inside she was still Lady Anna Margaret. She wasn’t some nameless bastard servant in a great house, to be ordered about at whim.

She leaned over the Duke of Parford and held the glass to his lips.

“Pfaw,” he protested, and water dribbled down his chin.

But he drank, and she raised a handkerchief to his face and dabbed away the excess moisture.

If some unknowing artist had glanced at this tableau, he might have titled it Father and Daughter. He might have captured the fine weave of the linen she used to dab excess moisture away, the comforting touch of her hand on his shoulder. Every perfunctory detail he might see, and render on his emotional palette as a gesture of love.

It wasn’t, not anymore. Margaret had loved her father once. Perhaps she still did. But at the moment, she could not find any trace of that emotion. What was left?

Duty. Honor. Obligation. Maybe just a perverse desire to demonstrate to her father: See? This is how you go about not betraying your family. She would show him. She didn’t need to be received as nobility to be noble.

If everything else had been stolen away, that much of her, at least, remained.

ASH EXITED PARFORD’S SICKROOM only to discover a procession lying in wait for him. The housekeeper, a Mrs. Benedict, introduced herself. She was accompanied by Smith, the majordomo, and a Mr. Dunridge, who was apparently the land steward. In the finest of old traditions, he was going to be Shown About and made to appreciate what he stood to inherit.

It wasn’t hard to show suitable enthusiasm. Parford Manor was a beautifully maintained house. It seemed lived in without being ragged. Even the parquet floors had an understated beauty, the sort of luminous glow that came from years of beeswax and care.

The manor was even older than that long-ago split between the Turners and the Dalrymples, he mused as he was led outside into the formal gardens. The grass was green and springy beneath his feet. No lawn a mere decade old could ever achieve that complacent health. It seemed not just a bit of turf, but an entire organism, spread before him.

His many times great-grandfather had once been lord here. The man had perhaps once walked upon this very path. He might have turned this selfsame corner, around the long, low holly, and seen the slow roll of the river beyond.

A bit daunting, that history. When he was a boy, his father had taught him about his noble relations, as if that ancient history somehow made him special, more interesting than other mill owners’ children. But that happy accident, that divergence from nobility all those great-grandfathers ago, hadn’t done any of the Turners much good. It hadn’t fed them or clothed them. Fortunes had come, and fortunes had been given away in mindless acts of insane charity.

Now, Ash stood on the cusp of the dukedom. He’d vowed he would care for his dependents—every one of them, from Mrs. Benedict, who continually stopped to reaffix her cap with pins that kept sliding from her gray hair, down to the last maid toiling over a copper kettle in the scullery.

Parford had, of course, got the matter completely backwards.

Yes, he’d thought of revenge. But thoughts of cold vengeance had given way to stark reality. There was no use trading eyes for eyes, when he’d been able to provide for his brothers by trading rubies instead.

Ancient history, indeed. The families had split, probably around the same time that the solid row of elms had been planted along the western drive. Ash’s fore-bearer, a younger son, had married a manufacturer’s daughter for wealth. He’d taken the name of Turner in exchange for a fortune—much to the fury of the rest of the Dalrymple family, who’d viewed the act as a mercenary betrayal. Time had passed. The elms reached halfway to the heavens now. The old Turner money had dwindled and disappeared before Ash had resurrected it. And yet the remnants of that bitter dispute still festered.

No; Ash didn’t just want revenge. He also wanted to take care of his own. Until this morning, however, he’d thought only of his brothers and his business. He hadn’t comprehended precisely how many responsibilities he was inheriting.

His responsibilities were not all unpleasant, though. There was, after all, Miss Lowell.

Miss Lowell was a surprising, delectable contradiction of a woman. She was intelligent, fierce and loyal. She looked soft in all the right places, but when it came to the ones she cared for, she was hard as flint. She seemed formidable, and Ash appreciated formidable women.

She was a mystery, and Ash was going to enjoy unraveling every delicious clue, until he’d stripped every last inch of her naked. In every sense of the word.

Their group made its way back to the manor by way of a path that hugged the river. When they reached the house once more, the steward and the majordomo took their leave. Mrs. Benedict opened the outside door to the glassed-in conservatory. It was littered with buckets of rose cuttings and potted plants, awaiting permanent placement. From there, she led him down a hall and into another parlor. Windows looked out over the gray river in the distance.

“There’s one last thing,” Mrs. Benedict said, coming to a halt. “I have standards for the conditions under which my girls must work.”

“In my London townhouse, I grant my servants a half day every week and a pair of full days each month.”

She let out a puff of air. “That’s not what I meant.” She squared her shoulders fiercely and then looked up. “I insist on this, Mr. Turner, as a condition of my employment. You and your brother are young, healthy males. I’ll not have you imposing on my girls. They’re from decent families. It’s not right to put them in a position where they can’t truly say no.”

Ah. Those sorts of working conditions. Ash had a feeling he was going to like Mrs. Benedict.

“You won’t have to worry about my brother,” Ash said. Unfortunately. “As for myself, I didn’t get where I was by indulging my wants indiscriminately. Besides, I had a sister, too. I couldn’t use any woman so cavalierly without her memory intruding.”

What he had planned for Miss Lowell could hardly be considered cavalier. He considered it more along the lines of a regular campaign.

But Mrs. Benedict must not have heard that unspoken caveat. She gave him a sharp nod. “You’re not what I expected, sir.”

“I’m not what I expected, either.”

She let loose a sharp chortle and reached into the pocket of her apron. With a metallic clink, she withdrew a chatelaine, heavy with keys, and unfastened the clasp of the ring. “I believe you.” She fished around and removed one. “Here.”

He held out his hand.

“It’s the master key.” She placed it into his waiting palm. “If you misuse it, I’ll have your ears, duke’s heir or no.”

The key she put into his hand was heavy iron, the bow fashioned into wrought curlicues. Interwoven amongst those was the stylized sword that was so prominent on the Parford coat of arms. Ash stared at it in bemusement before shoving it into a pocket. Mrs. Benedict, however, was already opening the door onto a long hallway, her interview of him concluded. She marched away as if she were the commanding general. Ash shrugged and followed after.

“Now,” she said as he came abreast of her once more, “tell me of your dining arrangements. Shall I manage the menus, or do you need to be consulted?”

“I trust you. But speaking of dining, it occurs to me that my brother and I make dreadfully uneven numbers. Once the rest of my men arrive from London, there will be no remedying that, not with any influx of women. But for this evening…” He trailed off invitingly.

Mrs. Benedict frowned as she walked. “Well, there’s the Misses Duprey, Amelia and Catherine, over north of Yeovil. They’d be delighted with an invitation. Further afield, we might think of Lady Harcourt’s daughters—a bit on the young side, fourteen and sixteen. Though Lady Harcourt wouldn’t mind in the least—she’s eager to marry them off.”

Ash choked. God. A fourteen-year-old child. He wouldn’t know what to say to such a creature.

“No,” he choked out. “Not Lady Harcourt. Definitely not her daughters.” Whoever they were. When he became the duke, he would have to know who these people were. He’d have to figure out the best way to accomplish that—after all, it wasn’t as if he would actually read a copy of Debrett’s. “Nor the Misses Duprey, whoever they might be. The lack of feminine conversation, you see, will be felt in a few hours’ time—and I doubt Lady Harcourt would forgive me if I sprung an invitation on her with no notice at all. No, Mrs. Benedict. I was thinking more along the lines of…you.”

This last line was delivered as they stepped from the hallway into the grand entryway.

“Me!” The housekeeper’s mouth dropped open. She stopped walking—right in the midst of the grand tiled hall—and clutched her skirts. She turned to him and peered into his face. Perhaps she was looking for telltale signs of madness. Finding neither rolling eyes nor froth at his lips, she shook her head.

“Me?” She managed to turn the syllable into a question. “I’m no lady to be taking my meals with the master. I’m a servant, sir, and a good one. I wouldn’t know—that is, I couldn’t carry on a conversation with a duke’s heir.”

“Nonsense,” Ash said. “You’ve done precisely that, this past half hour. You’ve watched the Dalrymples, haven’t you?”

At her faint nod, he smiled. She was already disposed to like him, however tentative that feeling was on her part. Now it was time to foster that delicate inclination.

He heard a noise from upstairs, as of a door closing. After a few moments, the quiet echo of footsteps in the upper gallery followed. The hairs on the back of his neck tingled.

“Can I tell you a secret? You must know the family history—that there was bad blood between the Turners and the Dalrymples, that my brothers and I grew up in near poverty.”

She sniffed and looked away. “This isn’t a household prone to gossip about its masters. I see to that. In fact, if you do hear any such talk, don’t you listen to it. Come to me, straight away, and I’ll set the culprit straight.”

“Oh, no. I’m not accusing you of gossip. But perhaps you might, from time to time, have heard about the masters’ less fortunate relations?” He gave her his most cajoling smile, and she softened.

“Perhaps,” she allowed.

“The truth is, I feel more comfortable conversing with servants than I sometimes do with my peers. This transition has been most sudden for me. A person like you could do a lot of good for someone like me. The way I see it, you’re barely a servant. You’re essentially the mistress of this house.”

“Well.” Mrs. Benedict preened just a bit under this praise. Ash gave her another smile, and she glanced back, faintly encouraged.

“Your manners are lovely, your speech precise. You’re not so different from a lady yourself—managing the household, seeing to it that everything is just right for the master’s convenience. The only difference between you and a lady is that you’re given a salary.” She looked at him with wide eyes and a half smile. He could almost feel her will bowing before his—and a housekeeper in a manor this large, with this many servants, had considerable strength of character.

It had always surprised him when he heard other merchants talk about the difficulties of keeping household servants in line, or the frustration of attempting to hire diligent accounting clerks. Ash had never had any problem getting people to do as he wished.

If you gave people compliments, they tended to like you. If you confided in them, they were likely to trust you. And if you then asked for their help, they were yours forever. Of course, it helped that Ash genuinely liked almost everyone. People could sense that; it was as good as a master key on a housekeeper’s ring, opening up the affections of even the most recalcitrant of individuals.

“A lady? Me?” She caught a stray curl of gray hair and twisted it around her finger. “Go on with you.” Her words said, stop this nonsense, but she was smiling. She didn’t really mean it.

The footsteps he’d heard traversing the gallery earlier began to descend the stairs. He felt her arrival, a prickle of awareness settling against his skin. He wouldn’t turn. He wouldn’t look at her.

“So,” Ash continued, looking straight at Mrs. Benedict, “it would help me and my brother immensely if you would sit at the dinner table and eat with us. You’ll rescue us from countless male arguments. By your simple presence, you’ll help teach me what I need to know in order to uphold my dignity as Duke of Parford.”

While he had no doubt that Mrs. Benedict would be a fine addition to the table, the woman he’d been waiting for was descending the stairs right now.

An appeal to Mrs. Benedict’s pride, her sensibilities and her service to the title. Was anything left to offer? Ah, yes. One last thing.

“And I can already tell that you know this neighborhood intimately. You know its people. You know who they are and what they need. If I’m to be duke—and I intend to be a good one—I need to know what you know. Please say you’ll do me the very great honor of dining with me.”

She stared up at him, her cap sliding askew once more, as if she were trying to decide what to think. “For a man who claims to need someone to teach him finesse,” she said dryly, “you are far too agreeable. Are you this talkative with all the servants?”

Miss Lowell came to stand behind them with that last word. He could feel the draft of air that presaged her arrival, could smell that faint, sweet scent that clung to her. He imagined her placing her hands on her hips in disapproval. He stifled a grin and pitched his voice to carry.

“No, Mrs. Benedict,” Ash said. “Only the pretty ones.”

“Go on with you!” Mrs. Benedict wagged her finger at him, as if he were a wayward child. “I’m fifty-five, if I’m a day, and I’ve watched every last hair on my head turn to gray.”

Ash frowned at her and peered at the unruly curls peeking out from under her cap. “Silver,” he said. “Like moonlight, I think.”

She burst into laughter then, and Ash knew he’d won. It wasn’t flirtation—no sense of awareness had passed between him and the housekeeper. It was something sweeter and friendlier. He’d seen her as a person, rather than as a servant, and she knew it.

“There,” Ash said. “It’s settled. You’ll dine with me.”

Mrs. Benedict acquiesced to Ash’s upsetting of a social order older than William the Conqueror with a nod.

Ash turned casually. As he did, he saw Miss Lowell. He started and consciously widened his eyes, pretending he’d been unaware of her standing two feet off. Her head was turned to regard him, her eyebrows drawn down, as if she were uncertain what he and Mrs. Benedict might have to laugh about. She didn’t know he’d already identified her by the faint hint of roses that trailed around her, filling the entryway with her subtle perfume. That, and he’d known no other house servant would have dared to come down the main staircase with the housekeeper watching.

“Ah,” Ash said, “and this solves the other half of our dilemma, Mrs. Benedict. Our numbers are still uneven. My brother and I couldn’t possibly sit down to table with just you. We’d overwhelm you with our idiotic masculinity.”

“Oh?”

“Oh,” Ash said, with great finality. And then he let out a great sigh. “There’s only one possible solution. I suppose Miss Lowell will have to join us, as well.”