by Abby Ayles
Hadn’t he proved himself yet? Over a year, and the company had not burned to the ground. Far from it: he was keeping it afloat successfully, and had even made inroads towards expansion.
The trouble now was maintaining their income enough in order to finance it.
Edmund rubbed a hand over his forehead, sweeping a few loose curls back off his brow.
“Oh, Father,” he muttered, staring at Lord Kelverley’s seal on the note. “What would you think of me now?”
Even as he said it, a foolish, prideful voice in the back of his head told him that his father would be pleased. That he had made the best of a bad situation, and that he hadn’t floundered, despite being out of his depth.
All of that counted in his favour, and now that he knew what he was doing, he was sure he could allow the company to flourish.
The children were another matter. Edmund searched through the pile of papers for the advertisement he had seen, and read it over again.
Young lady from good family seeks a position as governess. Well-educated in French, pianoforte, deportment, drawing, history, use of the globes, and other areas.
It did not say much, but it had been enough to prompt him to contact the address held by the newspaper.
The arrangements had been made with Miss Warrick’s mother, who had been keen to reassure him that she was an accomplished and pleasant young lady – in spite of the fact that her family’s scandal had cost her the status she should have been granted.
Edmund closed his eyes for a brief moment, to think of his own parents.
It was still a wound that lingered in his chest. The family had fallen victim to a wasting illness that had grasped hold of both their parents and Samuel almost overnight.
Edmund, his second brother Christopher, Patience, and Amy had somehow been spared. Even one of their servants, a housemaid who had been with the family for many years, succumbed to it and died a few days after her master and mistress.
Edmund could only praise God that Samuel had survived. Though he was much weakened, and behind other boys of his age, he was at least alive.
The problem now, of course, was that Edmund had essentially become the head of the family in the space of only a few days, and now he was responsible for three children – and one adult in the form of Christopher, who needed perhaps the most supervision of all of them.
At last, the carriage entered through the gates of the Hardwicke grounds, and Edmund breathed a sigh of relief. It felt good to be home again, though he knew he had not completed all of the work he should have done during the ride.
He was simply too tired, and too worried about the children, to focus any longer.
He jumped down from the carriage without help, striding towards the door of his home with the sheaf of papers under his arm.
“Get the carriage cleaned up, Tom,” he called up to his driver. “I want those wheels clean for the morning. I’ve a feeling it will be drier, and we’ll need to press on.”
“Yes, my lord,” Tom replied, jumping down from his seat and moving to unhitch the horses.
“Jenkins, good,” Edmund continued, seeing his butler open the door as he approached. “Has the governess arrived?”
“Miss Warrick has been with the children since the afternoon, my lord. She was a little late to arrive.”
Edmund nodded thoughtfully. It was something to note, though not perhaps something to judge this new woman on too quickly.
“The roads were awful today. I’m sure she ran into the same problems as I did.”
“Very generous of you, sir,” Jenkins said.
Edmund gave him a direct look, and the man had the good grace to seem abashed.
“Send her to dine with me. I’ll take my meal shortly. I’ll simply change from my travel clothes and be down.”
“Yes, sir,” Jenkins replied, scurrying away down the corridor towards the kitchens as fast as his old frame could.
Chapter 3
“You’re to meet him downstairs for your supper,” Mary said.
Mary was a plain, mousey young housemaid, who had helped Joanna settle her things into her new, cramped quarters in the servants’ wing.
Her things, such as they were: only a few dresses, one or two of them nice enough to wear to a social occasion, a bonnet, and two pairs of shoes.
The rest were a few small trinkets from home, and some material that she had been sewing to keep her occupied for the journey south.
Such was the total and sum of her worldly possessions. It did not feel like much, from a childhood spent with everything she could have asked for.
“Tonight?” Joanna asked, feeling stupid.
“Right now,” Mary said, her eyes lighting up with near-panic. “You’re to get dressed and go down right away.”
Joanna considered that carefully, looking down at herself. Truth be told, she didn’t have many options.
The dress she wore now was fine for her day to day duties, and while she would normally wish to dress herself up for dinner, this was a rather different affair.
She had no desire to outshine her employer, and it might be construed as vanity or pompousness if she were to dress above her station now.
After all, wasn’t she just a servant? She might have been a lady once, but those days were done.
“Thank you, Mary,” Joanna said. “I’ll just fix my hair, and be down shortly.”
Mary nodded and rushed out, apparently to go and ensure the dining room was clean and neat for her master’s meal. Jenkins was already down there, laying out silverware and ordering the cooks about.
Joanna sighed, and examined herself in the small glass that stood propped on the windowsill of her room.
Her hair had been curled artfully overnight and placed into a neat chignon under her travelling hat.
Now, though, after a long day, the curls in front of her ears were straightening back out, and the chignon had come loose and messy.
She did her best to pin everything back into place, and twirled the front parts of her hair around her fingers repeatedly to try to make them curl.
Finally, they only looked a little worse for wear, and she had to accept that it was the best she would be able to achieve.
Joanna’s stomach leaped inside her as she stepped outside of her room. The path back towards the main body of the house, and the waiting dinner, seemed horribly short.
This was the first time that she was to meet her new employer – this seeming ogre of a man who had already dismissed ten governesses before her.
For a fleeting moment, she wondered whether unpacking had been unnecessary. Perhaps he would put her back in a carriage to her mother the next morning.
She approached the door, and saw Mary almost running down the corridor with a bundle of firewood in her arms.
“Mary!” Joanna called out in a half-whisper, causing the maid to pause and look her way. “Is he… of a pleasant mood?”
Mary shrugged, almost dropping her load. “He’s been out working and travelling all day,” she whispered back. “He was quite sour about my not having the fireplace ready. I must rush on!”
“Oh,” Joanna replied, standing still now in the corridor and watching Mary go into the room.
From this spot, she could not be seen by anyone inside sitting at the table, and for a long moment she debated the possibility of simply standing here forever and never having to face him.
But she knew it was inevitable, and besides, perhaps Mary’s work at the fire would distract Lord Kelt for long enough that her entrance need not be so much of a spectacle.
Joanna stepped through the open doorway, holding her breath, and almost immediately saw her new employer sitting at the head of his table.
She dipped into an ungainly, uncertain curtsey, almost tripping over her own feet.
“Miss Warrick, I presume?” Lord Kelt said.
Joanna could barely breathe. “Yes, Lord Kelt,” she said.
“Sit,” Lord Kelt said, his voice flat and sharp. �
��We have delayed dining for long enough already.”
Joanna fumbled for the chair, drawing it out and falling down gratefully onto its cushioned seat. She was glad of the support just then.
“Chestnut soup, sir,” Jenkins intoned, laying out a large bowl into the centre of the table. He began to ladle it out into individual portions for Joanna and Lord Kelt.
“You have met the children already,” Lord Kelt said. It did not sound like a question, though Joanna supposed that she was still expected to answer it.
“Yes, Your Lordship,” Joanna said. “I took some time to acquaint myself with their current learning. Tomorrow I shall be able to form a plan for their continued lessons.”
Lord Kelt grunted. “I trust you found them to be satisfactory.”
Joanna smiled shyly. “They are quite accomplished. Even Miss Amy is quite ahead of where I expected to find her.”
“Their education has not suffered since our parents left them in my care,” he said. There was a frown drawing down over his eyes that felt almost like an accusation.
Had she insulted him perhaps, by suggesting that they might not have been developed? Oh, but she had not meant that at all!
“Indeed, that is evident,” Joanna said quickly. “I only mean that they are intelligent children.”
Lord Kelt said nothing, but began to eat his soup. Joanna followed suit, glad at least of the break.
But the longer they went without saying a word, the more uncomfortable the atmosphere became.
Soon she was wishing he would say something, anything at all. It was almost unbearable to sit like this, sipping soup in silence.
The metallic clanging of their spoons seemed almost to bounce off the walls, and Joanna hardly dared to swallow for how loud it sounded in her ears.
The crackling of the fire was barely any consolation at all, and she even began to fancy that the room was too hot.
The second course, a roasted meat pie with carrots and parsnips, filled the space with a momentary flurry of activity.
Lord Kelt spoke briefly with Jenkins, and Joanna seized this as her chance to at least make some small conversation.
If she was not the first to break the silence, then it was not as difficult – though she still felt out of place to speak to him without his first addressing her. Still, it was better than that interminable nothing.
“Are you often at work in the city, Lord Kelt?” she asked.
“Quite often,” he replied. “Several days out of the week. It is necessary in order to ensure that the business stays running. My father kept a townhouse, but I do not care for the practice.
“I would rather travel daily. It means I can watch over the children’s education and the upkeep of the house at the same time.”
Joanna swallowed a piece of pie, harder than she had intended to. For an awful moment she believed she would choke.
The idea of him watching so closely over her work, when she knew already how exacting he could be, was not a comforting one.
“You care for them greatly,” she said, as soon as she had recovered.
“Of course I do. They are my siblings. Nothing is more important than family. Do you not believe that to be the case?”
Joanna looked up to find Lord Kelt staring directly at her, his gaze piercing through her.
She found she could not remember how to breathe for a moment. His dark eyes seemed to contain a world of meaning, and though she could not fathom what it might be, the pain that had marred him at his parents’ death was plain to see.
“I do,” she replied, simply and quietly. It was difficult to hold back her tears at that moment, and she blinked quickly, though she did not look away.
Something changed in his face, softening it and making it more pleasant. “Forgive me. I had quite forgotten that you, too, recently lost your father.”
Joanna looked down at her plate and forced herself to resume eating her pie. “Thank you. It is a difficult time, for all of us.”
“I have no doubt,” he replied, recommencing his own meal.
Joanna took a few opportunities to sneak glances in his direction as they ate. Now that she had met his eyes, she was not quite as afraid to look at him.
He had a noble nose and the same dark hair as his siblings, which curled effortlessly along his temples without appearing disorderly. His colouring suggested time spent outdoors, though not so much as to be rough or unsightly.
In short, he was quite a handsome man. He could be even more so if it were not for the frown that seemed almost permanently etched on his features, and the dark circles under his eyes that indicated a lack of sleep.
“It must keep you very busy,” Joanna said. “Your company, I mean.”
“Yes,” Lord Kelt said, looking even more tired for a moment, as if pointing it out only made him feel it the more.
“It has been a long day, today in particular. I wanted to be home earlier in order to ensure you were settling well with the children.”
“We were quite comfortable,” Joanna said. She felt a pity for him. It was obvious that the man needed rest, though he was not likely to get it with so much laying on his shoulders. She did not envy him.
With almost a start, though, she realised that her own position could be much the same: she had to work for her keep now, and could not spend her days in idle leisure or pleasurable pastimes as she had before.
“I hope you have enjoyed your dinner,” Lord Kelt said, laying down his knife and leaning back in his chair. He was quite evidently finished with eating.
“Yes, thank you, your Lordship,” Joanna said, dipping her head.
“It won’t be a regular affair. I wanted to meet you on your arrival in our home, but from henceforth you will take your meals with the servants,” he told her, wiping his mouth with a cloth napkin.
“Of course,” Joanna said, more out of reflex than any real sense – for the commandment stung.
All her life she had been the young lady of the house, and she had had servants to do her own bidding. Now to be relegated amongst them was hard to bear.
But she tried to remain humble. It was, after all, her place now.
She trained her eyes carefully on the table and offered no complaint. It was better this way than getting nothing to eat at an empty table in an empty house.
“From tomorrow, I expect the children to be kept to a strict schedule. They are to learn as much as you can possibly teach them. Samuel, in particular,” Lord Kelt said, getting up from his seat.
“You are to develop them, Miss Warrick, into the finest young people in the county. Are you able to accomplish that?”
Joanna thought of her three new charges as she stood: the kind Amy, weak but eager Samuel, and boisterous Patience.
Though she had little confidence in herself, it was true what she had said. The children were well-learned already, and if she had any skill at all in teaching them, they would develop further.
“Yes, Lord Kelt, I think I am.”
“Don’t think, Miss Warrick,” he said over his shoulder as he left the room. “Believe. For if you are to remain in this household, accomplish it you must.”
Chapter 4
Edmund shuffled the papers on his desk again, trying hard to concentrate.
It was no good. He rang a small bell by his side, and waited to hear the familiar footsteps outside his door.
“Yes, my lord?”
“Jenkins, where are the children?”
Jenkins glanced behind him, as if he were expecting to find them there. “They are with their new governess, sir.”
“And where is that?” Edmund asked, barely able to maintain his patience.
“Oh – they are in the schoolroom, sir,” Jenkins said. “Miss Warrick did express some thought of a trip outside, but said it would wait until warmer weather, sir.”
Edmund nodded. He pushed his papers into some semblance of order on his desk and handed Jenkins two sealed envelopes.
“See that these are deli
vered, will you?” he asked, standing up.
Jenkins took them with a bow and was soon gone from sight.
Edmund stretched his arms above his head, feeling a relief at the movement. He had been sitting before his desk for too many hours already. A few more, and it would be time to dine with the children.
There were pressing matters that needed to be dealt with amongst his papers, but nothing was more urgent to him than his siblings. It was past time to ensure the progress of their education.