The Old Maids' Club 02 - Pariah Page 6

  “Why did he leave you?”

  “Inwood’s mother fell ill,” she said on a sigh. “He took a position closer to her so he could care for her. He worked for my aunt for more than twenty years before that happened.”

  Lord Roman let out a harrumphing sort of sound and took two more swings at the fence post. “And why has your uncle not found a replacement for your manservant yet?”

  Of all the impertinent, irrelevant questions. “It is my responsibility to find someone to fill the post, not my uncle’s. I have taken over the care of my aunt and her household.”

  “And yet you find yourself in a position in which the men in town—those who might, perchance, be able to fill the position—treat you as either a strumpet or a leper. I wonder how you intend to find someone who can assume the responsibility.”

  A racket sounded from the house. Bethanne looked over her shoulder. Aunt Rosaline was trying to get past Joyce and Mrs. Temple and outside, dressed in nothing but her gown.

  She sighed and then leveled Lord Roman with a stare—no small feat, considering he stood more than a head taller than her. “I must apologize, my lord. I must take my leave of you.”

  Lord Roman’s gaze followed hers, stalwart and expressionless. “Perhaps you should see to your aunt, ma’am.” Without another glance in her direction, he checked the stability of the newest fence post before returning to the cart to retrieve new supplies.

  “Indeed,” she replied. “And a good day to you.” Bethanne smoothed her skirts and dipped her head briefly in his direction, then turned and hurried down the walkway help the servants with her aunt. Only when she was halfway to the cottage did she realize Lord Roman had essentially dismissed her—on her property, at her home—and not the other way around.

  By mid-afternoon, Roman had finished with his fence mending for the day. He’d done more than half of the repairs and would take care of the rest tomorrow. He could have finished with it today…but he’d promised Lady Rosaline he’d join her for tea, and he’d be damned if he wouldn’t follow through with his promise.

  The lady had clearly been disappointed greatly once before. Roman wouldn’t disappoint her now.

  But he was not so base as to join the ladies for tea smelling like he’d been in battle for weeks without a bath. So after he’d cleaned and organized his remaining supplies, stacking the posts and pickets neatly out of the way near the mews, he knocked at the servants’ door to the kitchens with the intention of informing them he’d return in time for tea.

  The pert cook opened the door for him with a wide smile, wiping her hands on a well-used apron. Before he could say anything, she was taking his coat and hat from him whilst thrusting a teacup into one hand and a scone into the other. “You’ve been working so hard, and without a break at all in that snow. Eat that so I won’t worry about you any more than I already am.” Then she turned to the stove and ladled a bowl of steaming lentil soup. After setting it on the table, she lifted a brow, gesturing for him to sit. “Well? I’ll not let you go hungry while you’re out fixing our fence.”

  He sat. And he ate. Within minutes, he realized how cold he must have become, because of the tingles shooting through his limbs from the warmth of the soup. The cook kept fussing about the kitchen, kneading dough for bread and occasionally refilling his teacup or adding another ladle of soup to his bowl.

  A door flew open, and the boy pranced inside with his nurse trailing behind him somewhere in the distance. “Master Finn!” she called out. “I said you should wait for me, and we’d ask Joyce together.”

  Finn ignored his nurse, though. “Biscuit?” he said, holding up a grubby hand to the cook. He wore a sheepish grin with a sly look in his little eyes. This child was obviously a master at getting what he wanted, when he wanted it.

  “Biscuit?” Joyce repeated with mock indignation. After cleaning her hands on her apron, she moved to another counter and uncovered a plate filled with biscuits. “So am I to understand that you think you can come into my kitchens and demand what you want at any time?”

  The boy just giggled, still holding out his hand.

  His nurse came in behind him, finally, closing the door. When she turned around, her eyes landed on Roman at the table. “Oh, gracious heavens! Master Finn, we shouldn’t have come now. I apologize, Lord Roman. If we’d known you were here…”

  Roman wanted to respond, but he hadn’t stopped spooning soup into his mouth. Indeed, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten with such poor manners.

  “Finn can come into my kitchens for a biscuit any time he wants,” Joyce said, saving him the trouble of reassuring the nurse. “I don’t care who’s eating in here, Mrs. Wyatt. And that boy knows it, too. I wouldn’t deny him even if the King of England was sitting there instead of Lord Roman.” She placed the two biscuits she’d selected on a saucer and placed them at the opposite end of the table from Roman. Then she poured a glass of milk for the boy and set it beside the saucer.

  Finn didn’t sit where she wanted him to, though. He climbed up into the chair directly beside Roman, still giggling.

  “Now, young master,” Mrs. Wyatt started in a warning tone.

  “He’s fine,” Roman said. Over the years, he’d been seated next to a wide variety of people as he ate. Never a young boy, though. He lifted another spoonful of lentil soup to his mouth and continued eating.

  The two servants nodded. Joyce moved Finn’s saucer and glass before him. The boy selected one of his biscuits and held it up for all to see. “Biscuit,” he said, with a tone as gleeful and innocent as Roman had ever heard. Then he took a bite, with crumbs spilling down over his dressing gown and the table.

  It didn’t matter. A little mess never hurt anyone.

  When his nurse looked ready to dart forward and clean it immediately, Roman gave her a slight shake of his head. Instead, she took a seat across from them.

  “Would you like anything, Mrs. Wyatt?” Joyce asked as she went back to her dough kneading and batter mixing.

  Roman stopped paying attention to the two women, though, as Finn grew infinitely more fascinating to him by the moment. The big eyes the boy looked up with matched those of Miss Shelton and Lady Rosaline, a vivid sea of green that carried waves of emotion with each crest. The likeness was so profound, if Finn somehow wasn’t Miss Shelton’s son, Roman would eat his own arm.

  Roman watched the child as he ate, murmuring in response to the single word questions or comments the boy made. That was all the answer that seemed to be required. When Finn finished with his first biscuit, he held up the other to Roman, as though in offering. “Biscuit?”

  He chuckled. “No, Finn. You can have your other biscuit. I’ll keep eating my soup.”

  The boy nodded and took a big, grinning bite of the treat. When finally he was finished with his snack, Mrs. Wyatt bustled him away and Joyce hastily cleaned up the mess he’d created. “I hope you don’t mind his intrusion overmuch.”

  “Not at all,” Roman reassured her. And he hadn’t. Quite the opposite, in fact. One of his many questions had been answered, merely by the boy’s presence. He kept eating, and she continued cleaning and baking, both in silence.

  Finally, he came to a stop. “Thank you. I hardly recognized my own need. I was merely stopping in to inform you I’d be back in time for tea with Lady Rosaline after I’ve made myself more presentable.”

  “Mm hmm,” she murmured. The cook looked up from a bowl where she was mixing a concoction that could be almost anything, winked at him, then added a few more ingredients. “Well, from my experience, you’ll still have plenty of appetite when you return. I don’t know where men put it all.”

  He let out a bark of a laugh at that. “Quite right, ma’am—”

  “Joyce,” she interrupted with a twinkling grin. “And I know I am.”

  “Right?”

  She nodded.

  Roman chuckled.

  “It would do you well to remember that I’m almost always right, my lord.”

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nbsp; “Duly noted.” Before he could make an embarrassment of himself by devouring another bowlful of her soup, Roman pushed away from the small table. “Thank you, Joyce, for the meal. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it.”

  “About as much as we appreciate all you’ve done for us, I’m sure.”

  All he’d done? “I’ve only begun to repair your fence,” he said, bewildered.

  With that, Joyce set down her implements and looked him in the eye, with a deadpanned and utterly serious shake of her head. “No, Lord Roman. You’ve already done far more for us than that.”

  Before he could take the time to sort out what she meant by that statement, she was brushing her hands over her apron and hurrying over to him.

  “Off with you now, so you won’t keep Lady Rosaline waiting.” Joyce took his hat and coat from the rack by the door and pressed them into his hands. “We’ll be looking for you at tea time, my lord.”

  And now, he wasn’t just being dismissed by the little slip of a woman, but also by her servants. What a muddle.

  Red silk satin, today. For the second time in only three days, Aunt Rosaline was wearing red. And again, for the second time in three days, Lord Roman had been able to convince her that Christopher Jackson had merely been delayed.

  It was nothing short of miraculous.

  The increase in these incidents, however, was more than just slightly alarming to Bethanne. She tried to hide her discomfiture by taking a sip of tea.

  “You’ve been to the colonies, then,” Aunt Rosaline said determinedly, looking expectantly across at their guest. “Are there truly savages there, sir? I can’t imagine why those rebels want to be there in the first place.”

  Before he responded, Lord Roman passed a brief glance over to Bethanne. He’d finished repairing the fence yesterday, and today had not arrived at the cottage until teatime.

  Bethanne had felt his delay to be a welcome reprieve, and yet she’d also felt an inexplicable sense of loss at his absence. She shifted uncomfortably on the divan and gave him a tiny nod of encouragement. It felt odd to encourage the man to lie to her aunt, but the truth caused more harm than good.

  “Yes,” he said after her gesture. “I fought in the colonies alongside your Lieutenant Jackson. And the savages you speak of are called Indians by the locals. Some of them are quite civilized, however.”

  “Civilized? They run around barely clothed in animal skins, shooting bows and arrows. Christopher has told me all of that and more in his letters. How is that civilized?” Aunt Rosaline picked up the quill from the writing table beside her. Not to write—her vision was too poor for such a task—but to fiddle with it. She drew it through her fingers the way she always would with a cheroot. Her nerves had to be nearing the fraying point for her to be thinking about smoking.

  Bethanne’s nerves had passed that point more than a year ago.

  Indeed, her entire life of late had been a lie, so why not allow yet one more person to become complicit in one of them with her? This lie, at least—allowing Aunt Rosaline to believe Lord Roman had been in the colonies with Lieutenant Jackson—was harmless. No one would be hurt by it one way or another. The same could not necessarily be said for the other lies she’d told or the secrets she’d kept. She hoped no one would be hurt, but…

  Lord Roman smiled at Aunt Rosaline. “Is that truly more savage than a society which would treat an unmarried mother as a leper?”

  Bethanne flushed, a rush of heat racing over her cheeks. She wanted to leave. She wanted to stand up, escort him out and bid him never to return, and then bury herself beneath a mound of pillows for an hour or two until she could think clearly again.

  Instead, she changed the subject. “Lord Roman, will your father and mother be returning to Hassop House soon? I assume you’ve been sent ahead to prepare the house for their arrival. Perhaps they will Christmas here?”

  He eyed her curiously, taking a long moment before he responded. “No, ma’am. My family will not be joining me in Derbyshire.”

  “Oh,” Bethanne said for lack of anything better to say. She took another sandwich from the tray and popped a bite of it into her mouth in order to refrain from asking any more personal, intrusive questions.

  His lips quirked upward in a rueful sort of half-smile. “I’ve taken over the stewardship of my father’s estate. After selling my commission, I needed something with which to occupy my time.” He fell silent then. For quite a long while.

  Bethanne chewed and swallowed, then chased her bite of sandwich with a lukewarm mouthful of tea, and still he had not said anything else.

  “Would Lord Herringdon not allow you to find your footing with the rest of the family after your service?” Bethanne blurted out. “Surely you have been gone from them for far too long.” He was hardly a young man any more, after all. She imagined he was at least five or six years beyond her almost nine-and-twenty, if the fine lines around his eyes and the silvery bits sprinkled in his dark hair were a true indication.

  Lord Roman regarded her for some time with an unfathomable expression. “My family remains in London most of the year. I am unfit to live in London.” Then he turned to Aunt Rosaline, who was still fidgeting with her quill, effectively grinding that line of conversation to a thorough and complete halt. “Tell me, Lady Rosaline, other than talking over tea, how do you like to spend your days? What things do you hope to do with your Lieutenant Jackson when he returns to you?”

  Bethanne shouldn’t begrudge the man his privacy and secrecy. After all, she carried more secrets than she knew what to do with, and she had long been loath to allow any but a select few to learn more than she wished to share.

  Yet it niggled at her that he’d answered her question so vaguely and then brushed it aside, no matter how impertinent it had been of her to ask in the first place.

  But then Aunt Rosaline was going on and on, fair to bursting with the need to tell this man all of the things she longed to do once again with her long-gone beau. “And then he’s promised to take me riding, my lord. Please don’t tell my brother this, but Christopher doesn’t force me to ride on one of those blasted sidesaddles. They always drive me batty, even if they are more proper for a lady.”

  Was that where Aunt Rosaline had begun riding a traditional saddle? With Christopher Jackson? Bethanne snapped her jaw closed. All these years, and she’d always thought her aunt was simply a rebellious hoyden. Which she was, to be sure, but perhaps there was a bit more.

  The clatter of a carriage sounded on the road outside, and Bethanne’s eyes shot wide. They couldn’t be here already, could they? With all of the snow on the roads, she’d been sure her cousins would hardly arrive before suppertime, if then.

  She’d wanted Lord Roman to be well and truly gone before they arrived. It would be easier to explain about him if he wasn’t present, after all. And she wanted her cousins to help her sort out a way to keep him from prying into her business. How could she do that with him sitting on the other side of the room?

  Bother it all.

  “Are you expecting guests, Miss Shelton?” he asked, rising to look out the window. “There’s a carriage pulling into your drive.”

  “Yes,” she muttered. “My cousins are due to arrive for a visit today.” Perhaps he would do the polite thing and excuse himself.

  “You must excuse me,” Lord Roman said, as though in answer to her unasked prayer.

  Bethanne almost smiled in victory. Almost. But instead of taking his leave of them for the day, he merely took his coat from the stand next to the parlor door and made his way out to the drive, standing there as though to greet them.

  Of all the nerve.

  Bethanne drew on her redingote as she raced out after him, fighting to get her arms into the sleeves without tripping over her own feet as she went. “What could you possibly think you’re doing?” she hissed out when she got close enough he could hear.

  He spared her a glance over his shoulder, seemingly fighting a losing battle to hide his smile from her
, with his lips twisting into rather uncommon shapes. Drat the man for laughing at her. “I intend to greet your guests and assist in moving their trunks inside,” he said, as though it were the most obvious thing in the world he could be doing at that precise moment in time. Lord Obvious had made his return.

  Indeed, why would she have thought he would do anything else? “And what do you think gives you the right to do so?” By this point, she’d caught up with him, taking two to three strides for every lumbering one of his.

  “The right? Miss Shelton, surely even you can see that this is a necessity.” He waved toward the carriage, which only had a driver and one outrider for the three occupants.

  Oh, she hated him for being correct on that score.

  Lord Devonport stepped down from inside the carriage and then turned to assist Tabitha and Jo in their descent. Lord Roman came to a stop a few paces away from them with a pleasant expression upon his face. Bethanne nearly fell over from the abruptness of the change in his pace.

  “Bethie, what in God’s name is going on here?” Jo demanded, her strawberry-blonde curls nearly flying free from her pins with the force of her displeasure. She planted her hands on her hips in that oh-so-familiar haughty gesture, and glared at Lord Roman with disdain the likes of which Bethanne hadn’t experienced in a great many years. “Who is he, and what is he bloody well doing here? Have you gone mad?”

  “Jo!” Bethanne chastised, glancing at Lord Roman to see how he’d reacted to this. He seemed to be stifling yet another laugh, but still. She faced her cousin again. “Not out here.”

  Lord Devonport chuckled, which was no help at all. He’d known the family for long enough to know what a handful Josephine Faulkner could be. Therefore, he ought to know he shouldn’t encourage her.

  Not that Jo had ever needed any encouragement.

  Then Tabitha shook her head and held up her hands with a shrug. “I think,” she said definitively, “Bethanne has the right of it, and it would be best if we take this conversation inside. Don’t you all agree?” She didn’t wait for their response, but scurried away from the carriage toward the cottage, fiddling with her chignon as she went.