Holiday Duet: Two Previously Published Regency Novellas

by Grace Burrowes

  “Dash and blast,” she muttered, hands fisting at her sides. “I cannot even deliver a proper defense of my own good name.”

  Marcus knelt to help her gather up the pokers, pincers, broom, and ashpan. “Is your good name under attack, my lady? I certainly hope not.”

  This close, he could see the fine lines radiating from her eyes, the slight shadows beneath them. Her gaze gave away more than that, a sort of weary exasperation bordering on defeat.

  “I cannot bide here with you, my lord. Not if Charlotte were mortally ill, which she is not, could I tarry under this roof overnight unless a proper chaperone remained here as well.”

  “Come,” Marcus said, offering her his hand and leading her to the sofa. “I am remiss for not acknowledging the obvious. You are concerned for Charlotte, and she is in no condition to travel. I could lend you my coach, but even going a short distance on foot might be too much for Charlotte’s knee. You intended to be back here tomorrow morning in any case, so why not spend the night? I will fetch my sister, and propriety will be appeased.”

  Her ladyship settled slowly onto the cushions. “Fetch your sister?”

  “Lady Elizabeth Hennepin. She likes children, and I dare to hope Eliza sometimes likes me.” Marcus took the place beside Lady Margaret, and for reasons not entirely clear to him, he also kept her hand in his. “Whatever preparations you intended to make for tomorrow’s efforts, you can make them from here.”

  Lady Margaret hung her head, an alarming lapse of her usual dignified posture. Marcus was in no wise prepared to deal with tears, whatever the provocation.

  “I have much to do,” she said, turning to regard him. “Much. Shops I must visit, supplies to assemble, staff to notify. The longer I tarry here, the later I must work this evening.”

  Any fool could see she was already short of sleep. “How many estimates did you prepare last night?”

  “Three. I delivered one before coming here to present yours. I sent the third by post, because I could not drag that poor child halfway to Chelsea on such a day. I have two more to do tonight.”

  This degree of effort, this tenacious pursuit of every possible economy and client, did not portend a lady indulging a penchant for decorating in her ample free time. Something desperate was afoot. Perhaps Eliza would know exactly what.

  “Fortunately for all concerned,” Marcus said, “I have footmen idling below stairs, a secretary lazing about the premises somewhere, and grooms dicing away the day in the carriage house. While I call upon my sister, you shall give my staff something to do. Charlotte is already ensconced in the library, which you will find a commodious headquarters for the nonce.”

  Such a battle raged in her eyes. This woman would never take charity, never give quarter, and yet, she put Marcus in mind of his men when they’d endured one forced march, one winter storm, and one siege too many, all in the same fortnight.

  “If I do this,” she said slowly, “if I bide here, then I will decorate your father’s home without compensation for my time. You may reimburse me for materials, but not for my labor. That assumes your sister is willing to chaperone my visit.”

  The relief Marcus felt was out of all proportion to the situation, for it wasn’t as if he wanted houseguests underfoot. Not at all, much less at the tedium of putting up with Eliza at the same time.

  “We have a bargain, my lady. Now, as I am about to pay a call on Lady Elizabeth, and you are to take up your responsibilities in the library, I must complete your bank draft. If you endorse it, I can deposit the sum for you while I’m out and about.”

  She sat up straight, like Charlotte beholding the daunting prospect of a gleaming tea tray. “You are being kind.” Her ladyship’s tone suggested this offense surpassed felonies of any description.

  “I am being expedient,” Marcus said, rising and offering her ladyship his hand. “A commanding officer learns to delegate as much as possible, my lady. Footmen are supposed to hare about, secretaries are to attend to documents for us. Why deprive them of their appointed tasks and deprive yourself of sleep?”

  She rose, expression disgruntled. “That does not explain why you have promoted yourself to the ranks of my errand boys.”

  “I do so because your daughter needs her mama by her side this day, and that is not a role anybody else can fulfill, is it?”

  He’d meant that observation as a placatory generality, but it was apparently the right thing to say. Lady Margaret’s posture relaxed, and her expression acquired a hint of good humor.

  “You are correct, my lord. You are absolutely correct. I will see to the patient now, and you can stop by the library before you leave.”

  Then she did the most extraordinary, unexpected, indecorous thing: She kissed Marcus’s cheek, patted his lapel, and marched off, leaving him—scowling in utter consternation—amid the disarray of his office.

  “Will Grandfather Entwhistle send us a box at Christmas?” Charlotte asked from her perch on the library sofa. “He sent us a pudding last year.”

  Meg refused to look up, refused to put down her pencil. “I don’t know, Charlotte, but you could write to him wishing him the joy of the upcoming season.” Lord Marcus would not miss another sheet or two of paper, but Meg would soon go mad from Charlotte’s attempts to distract her.

  “I could ask Grandfather for a pudding,” Charlotte mused, smoothing her hand over an embroidered pillow. Two other pillows bolstered her ankle and knee, and she was swaddled in quilts as well. “If I find the sixpence again, I will be rich! I will have new boots and new mittens. I can have a kitten, and even my kitten can have mittens. I will be smitten with a kitten wearing mittens!”

  “That tears it.” Margaret gathered up her lists, instructions, and schedules, tapped her papers into a tidy stack and rose from the reading table. “What you do have is a mother who needs peace and quiet. Read your books, Charlotte. Make some sketches, draft a note to Grandpapa, write to your cousins at Webberly Hall. I shall accomplish nothing while you prattle without ceasing.”

  Meg suspected that Charlotte needed a nap. She’d roused Charlotte quite early, tramped with her across half of Mayfair, and subjected her to the excitement of Lord Marcus’s opulent library. Charlotte had been rubbing her eyes for the past half hour, a sure sign she was growing sleepy.

  “Where are you going, Mama?”

  “I will be right across the corridor in his lordship’s office. If you bellow, which I well know you are capable of doing, I will hear you. You could also ring the bell sitting immediately beside you, and a maid or a footman will fetch me. I will send a maid to sit with you, if you like.”

  “I am nearly grown up,” Charlotte said, abandoning the fidgety, whiny tone she’d been working up to. “I do not need a nursery maid.”

  “Very well, I will leave you to entertain yourself.”

  Meg did ask the butler to send a maid to the library to tidy up. The shattered globe had long since been dealt with, but Charlotte had a talent for creating disorder.

  “I could play a hand or two of cards with the child,” the butler said. “Old bones can use an excuse to sit in the middle of a chilly afternoon, my lady. His lordship specifically charged me with seeing to his guests’ every comfort.”

  The butler was older, balding, and quite dignified, but his eyes also held a twinkle.

  “Your offer is very kind, though one wouldn’t want to impose.”

  “Your ladyship, it’s no bother a’tall. I don’t join in the card games below stairs because it would reduce my consequence to lose to the boot-boy. I can, with no harm in the consequence of my exalted office, take pity on a bored child who has had a mishap, can’t I?”

  He winked and sauntered off, putting Meg in mind of the butler she’d known at Webberly Hall growing up. Mr. Holcomb had had the same subtle good cheer, the same self-possession. She missed him, missed her parents, missed the Hall itself, truth be known.

  “Which is neither here nor there,” she muttered, letting herself into Lord Marcus’
s study.

  This room broke the household pattern of spotless order, which—oddly—made Meg feel more comfortable. The office was organized—incoming correspondence here, pamphlets there, newspapers on the sideboard—but everything of immediate interest lay in plain sight. Meg worked well with such an approach, everything to hand, everything visible to remind her of what remained to be done and what tasks had been accomplished.

  “Like an officer’s tent.” Peter had made that observation about Meg’s private parlor on one of his rare leaves. “Set up for efficiency, rather than to impress.”

  She placed a pillow on the seat of his lordship’s capacious chair and took the place behind the desk.

  The view was intimate, not that Meg would snoop outright, but a man’s penmanship said a lot about him. Lord Marcus’s script was legible, confident, and free of unnecessary flourishes. He apparently composed his thoughts before putting pen to paper, for his penmanship was exceptionally neat. His pamphlets dealt with vice among the idle poor, temperance, the spiritual poverty of the merchant class, and other improving themes.

  Meg set them aside, more than a little disappointed at the sanctimonious tone. Lord Marcus was clearly a decent man, but then, Lucien was considered a paragon of rectitude, even if he was vain about his conveyances and his cattle.

  Also his tailoring.

  And his servants’ livery.

  “Get to work,” Meg murmured, fishing through her stack of papers to find tomorrow’s schedule. The swagging on the house’s exterior had to go up last, which meant finding tasks to keep her climbing boys out of mischief for the first part of the day. Phineas was a clever lad and happy to help with the indoor work, but his younger brother Caleb left a wake of chaos wherever he went.

  What to do with them? Meg was jotting down the words harness bells on the side of her schedule when a wave of fatigue landed on her like a load of snow cascading from a steep roof.

  “Nap,” she muttered, scooting on her pillow and turning the chair so she could put her feet up on a hassock. Lest she become chilly, she appropriated a jacket hung over the back of the chair, folded her arms, closed her eyes, and prepared to rest her eyes for ten short minutes.

  Marcus put off calling on Elizabeth by tarrying in three different toy shops, then chatting up his banker—who also happened to be Lady Margaret’s banker—and dropping by to have a word with Papa, though Papa had been out. By the time Marcus made his way to the Hennepin town house, Elizabeth was out as well—a bad moment, that—but Aunt Penny came to his rescue.

  The time Penelope Hennepin required to pack a bag would have been sufficient for a regiment to set up camp.

  As soon as Marcus and Aunt Penny arrived home, she left him at his own front door and bustled off to conspire with Nicholas about heaven knew what. Aunt’s favorite pastime was rearranging furniture in other people’s houses, which had occasioned more than one profanity as Marcus had gone top over tail late at night in his own library.

  The dictates of hospitality demanded that he stop by that library to look in on his guests, but the dictates of duty lay across the corridor, in his office. He’d let his correspondence slip the past few days, and no less authority than his father attributed the fall of Rome to slothful administration.

  To the office, Marcus did go, intent on reading two pamphlets, writing two letters, and at least sorting the morning post before allowing himself his one brandy for the evening. He lit a carrying candle from the sconce in the corridor and opened the door to his office. Darkness had fallen, and the only light in the room came from the hearth, where a low fire awaited another scoop of coal.

  The first indicator that his sanctum sanctorum was occupied came from the scent of the room. The usual leather, wool, and coal smoke were laced with… something pretty. Flowers of some sort. The only flower Marcus knew by scent was the rose, and this was not a rose.

  Then he spied the lady slouched in his chair, her chin sunk upon her chest, his natty old morning coat draped over her, her feet on a hassock.

  The Christmas angel has fallen. She slumbered on while Marcus debated his options.

  He could retreat, rap on the door, and pretend he always knocked on the door of his own office… which Lady Margaret would know to be untrue.

  He could have the housekeeper wake her, but he sensed that Lady Margaret would consider being caught in flagrante somnum by a servant a worse mortification than being found asleep by her host.

  Or, he could build up the fire and hope the noise woke her.

  He rattled a scoop of coal from the bucket. He poked at the embers on the grate. He let his cast-iron implement clatter against the bricks. He all but yodeled up the chimney, and her ladyship barely stirred.

  “Lady Margaret.”

  She snuggled deeper under his coat. “In a minute.”

  “Lady Margaret.”

  She opened her eyes, then closed them again. “Go away.”

  Soldiers on campaign had this ability to sleep through cannon fire and stampeding horses. The poor woman was exhausted, but she would not thank him for allowing her to slumber on.

  “My lady, you have appropriated my chair, at my desk, in my office. I beg you to vacate same that I might tend to my correspondence.” Marcus used his commanding-officer voice, and the result was a scowl worthy of a cat shoved out into a snowy backyard.

  “You needn’t shout, sir. I was merely resting my eyes.”

  “You were lost to the world, madam. Are you so enthusiastic about Christmas decorating that you neglect your rest?”

  She pushed herself upright and passed him his morning coat. “I am no great admirer of Christmas. I do like to pay my bills. Lord help me, I’ve napped away my afternoon.”

  Marcus draped the coat over the chair opposite the desk and took the seat. “The woman who prides herself on creating exquisite Christmas decorations has no affection for the season itself?” And she napped in chairs and appropriated a man’s old jacket too. Interesting.

  Her ladyship rose—stiffly, he thought—and took a taper from the spill jar on the mantel. “My mother died at Christmas, my favorite aunt as well. I became engaged at Christmas, and Charlotte was conceived immediately thereafter.” She lit the candelabrum on Marcus’s desk and moved on to the tapers on the mantel. “Her father was home on winter leave, and he was so dashing in his regimentals…”

  “You are sad, then, at this time of year.” Understandable, though she didn’t appear sad.

  She lit the candles on the mantel, which cast her profile in half shadow. Her features were angular now, though as a younger woman, she’d likely been stunning.

  “I am bitter, my lord. I was not married when Charlotte was conceived. You will hear the talk, if you haven’t already heard it from your sister.”

  Lady Margaret glanced at him over her shoulder, her expression half defiant, half uncertain. Marcus remained seated, which, strictly speaking, was poor manners on his part. He sensed that her ladyship would rather he stay in a fixed location, while she went about chasing off the darkness.

  His office, with its comfortable furniture and business clutter, was nonetheless a quiet room, and when its only illumination was candlelight, the space took on a confessional quality.

  Lady Margaret’s guarded, proud gaze put a question to him, about tolerance or appearances—he wasn’t sure exactly what—so he replied with a recitation of facts.

  “Lady Elizabeth was not at home,” he said. “Her aunt by marriage agreed to bide here tonight, and just because you anticipated your vows with the dashing major doesn’t mean you are a disgrace to your gender. Most couples do likewise. My parents certainly did.”

  She shook the spill, dousing the flame. “They did? A marquess’s heir anticipated his vows?”

  “With an earl’s daughter. Simon was born six months after the wedding. Papa and Mama joked about it frequently, always adding that Simon was a great strapping baby.”

  How ironic that the great strapping baby, who’d become a robus
t man, had been eventually felled by influenza, while the younger son had spent years at war and come home without a visible scratch.

  Her ladyship put the smoking spill back in the jar, an economy Marcus would never have thought to practice. “But your sainted brother was legitimate,” she said, watching the smoke rise in the gloom. “Charlotte is not.”

  She could have told Marcus that the Regent had been seen running naked through Hyde Park, and Marcus would have been less shocked.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “I’m supposed to beg yours, also God’s, Society’s, my brother’s… I became engaged when Peter was home on winter leave. We anticipated our vows, as you put it. Peter went back to soldiering, and some weeks later, I realized I was increasing. I wrote to him, I begged him, I wrote again, and finally wrote to his commanding officer, who informed me by return post that a man could not be granted leave he hadn’t asked for. By that time, the situation was impossible to hide.”

  She rearranged the tools in the hearth stand so they stood in order of height. “I wrote in desperation to Peter’s father, and he demanded that Peter get back to England to marry me. My best guess is that Mr. Entwhistle Senior was loath to incur the wrath of a titled family. He’s comfortably well-off, as many of the gentry are.”

  And where was Charlotte’s comfortably well-off grandfather when the girl had no proper governess? “Major Entwhistle returned to England,” Marcus said, “but Charlotte arrived before he did.”

  Lady Margaret might profess to be bitter, but Marcus had never seen a sadder smile.

  “Charlotte was six weeks old on my wedding day. We had her christened that afternoon. I expected that Peter would bide with us through the winter, but he was bound for Spain within a week. I kept busy that first Christmas by decorating Webberly Hall as if Father Christmas himself dwelled there.”

  Far too many men enlisted to escape the consequences of irresponsible procreation. In the army, the fellow had a wage, a uniform, food and drink for the most part, the hope of advancement and the occasional spoils of war.