The Earl Most Likely

by Goodger, Jane

  “All today?” Harriet asked breathlessly, getting caught up in his enthusiasm and forgetting for a moment that she was uncomfortable around strangers.

  He looked back at her briefly. “I am anxious to get started, yes. Though today I will show you only the barn where the workers who destroyed my home threw nearly everything. They hadn’t any idea, I imagine, that they were destroying a piece of England’s history.”

  A half hour later, the two stood outside a large, stone barn so distant from the house Harriet could see only the very top of the largest tower. She felt a small stab of disappointment that she would not be able to see the house today. Though it had been years since she’d toured it, when she’d walked its halls, seen the grandeur, the sheer size of the rooms, the thickness of the walls, it seemed almost enchanted. She’d been just twelve years old when she’d toured the house the first time and had gotten lost in the idea of ladies and the chivalrous knights who loved them. The romance of Costille House had stayed with her, drawing her in a way she couldn’t explain—which was why she’d toured the house again when she was sixteen when it finally reopened to tours. She would have gone a third time, to be honest, had the house been opened again.

  Even the barn, a utilitarian building, was beautiful, with golden stones and mullioned windows that were kept meticulously clean. The door, as thick as her thigh, slid easily open, an engineering feat that was a marvel to see. Berkley grinned at her, obviously pleased with the mechanics. “There is nothing about this property that I do not love, Miss Anderson. I think you will better understand my urgency when you see the house, but for now, this should give you an idea of the task ahead of us.”

  He stepped into the barn, and Harriet was struck by the enormity of the building, its strong beams crisscrossing the ceiling, dark with age. The roof soared above them, the windows letting in sharp streams of light through the dust in the air, stirred by the opened door. While Harriet was looking up, her breath caught in her throat at the beauty of the place, Berkley was looking down at the mess spread out on the floor. Finally, Harriet realized Berkley was silent and stiff beside her, and her eyes were drawn to a jumble of metal, wood, and furniture, strewn upon the floor by the uncaring workmen. The massive pile peaked in the center, its contents unrecognizable, though when Harriet looked further she was able to make out certain items—a heavy wooden chair, thick rugs, various frames which no doubt held ruined paintings.

  “Oh,” she said.

  Beside her, Berkley spun about and strode from the barn as if seeing the wreckage before him was too painful to bear.

  At her feet was a small vase, perfect but for a tiny chip on the lip. She bent and picked it up, examining it more closely and running her thumb over the sharp edge of the chip. “This,” she said, walking toward him and holding the vase up, “was in a little alcove in the morning room.”

  He gave her another one of his long stares. “You are hired.”

  * * * *

  “Hired?”

  She looked at him as if he’d just asked her to help him rob a bank. It hadn’t occurred to him that he might be insulting her; she wasn’t a member of the aristocracy, after all, so being offered a position should not offend her sensibilities. At least he didn’t think so. “I’ve insulted you. I apologize.”

  “No, no.” She scrunched up her forehead a bit, ostensibly thinking about his proposal. “I might not be able to come every day. Most days, yes. And of course never on Sunday.”

  “Of course.” He found himself amused by her careful consideration.

  “I hadn’t expected to be paid,” she said hesitantly. Most women did not work, did not earn money, unless they were of the lower classes. Her mother would be horrified, for she espoused the notion that women should not work and if they did, only for charitable institutions on a volunteer basis. She neatly forgot that she, herself, as a young woman worked as a seamstress before marrying her father, who had been nothing more than a foreman at a local tin mine.

  “I certainly cannot ask you to spend your time working at Costille without some kind of compensation. Of course, I will have to speak with your father and ask his permission but—”

  Her lovely eyes narrowed, and he realized he truly had insulted her this time. “That is entirely unnecessary. I am of age to make my own decisions.” Then she smiled, almost impishly. “Besides, he might forbid it.”

  “Ah. I will pay you ten thousand pounds with a bonus if the final result of your labors meets my expectations. Does that sound fair?”

  Her mouth opened slightly, and his eyes were drawn to those pink, plush lips. He immediately looked away, mildly curious why he was noticing them at all. Harriet Anderson was as plain as a little wren with her ugly, ill-fitting clothes and wiry, straw-like hair. She hardly had a bosom to speak of, and Augustus had always preferred curvaceous women. She was reed thin, pale, and forgettable—which likely explained why he really couldn’t recall meeting her at the John Knill ball, even though he’d said he did. Still, those lips were enticing and he might as well look at them as at any other part of her.

  “Ten thousand,” she whispered. “Pounds?”

  He chuckled. “Yes. Pounds. I do realize that is a great sum of money, but your worth to me is far greater than a few thousand pounds. You have given me back hope that I might restore my home to its grandeur, that its destruction will not rest upon my shoulders. For centuries, the Lawton family has guarded her, kept her safe, and she was nearly destroyed by my wife. I am to blame and I must rectify what has been done.” The Andersons were noveau riche, that gauche class peculiar to modern times. Though he was far less snobbish than many of his set, it still irked him, the way some of these newly rich put on elaborate shows of wealth, which Augustus thought spoke more of insecurity than anything else. Miss Anderson’s parents, sadly, were such examples, pushing their lovely daughter Clara toward anyone with a position or a title. How could someone like this girl even begin to understand the heavy mantle of a title and the burden it carried? “I would pay ten times that amount if it meant fully restoring the family legacy.”

  She looked stunned. “Do you realize…No, you cannot. You cannot realize what such a sum could mean to me. My very own money, to do with as I please.” Her face was suddenly lit by a brilliant smile, and Augustus was taken aback at how it transformed her. This girl should smile more often, he thought, for if she did, she might even be considered pretty. “Yes, Lord Berkley, I agree to your terms. Of course, I do. I’d be mad not to. Oh, yes.” Beneath her dull, gray skirts, she gave a small hop of what could only be described as pure joy.

  “We shall begin in two days. Tomorrow, I want you to tour the house in your mind, writing down every detail you can remember. On Wednesday, I shall show you Costille, the rooms that have been altered, and we can begin to bring her back.”

  As they walked to his stables so he could order a carriage to bring her home, Augustus was lost in thought, mostly about the slim girl next to him. What would a girl such as she do with that money? Buy new dresses? Jewels? Perhaps set some aside for her wedding trousseau? His curiosity got the better of him and he finally asked.

  “I shall purchase my own house,” she said with quiet fierceness.

  “And what will this house look like?”

  A small blush tinged her cheeks. “Small and with a view of the sea. And it will have the most lovely little garden in back, one for the kitchen and one for just me, full of flowers that bloom all year long. I shall have a cook and a housekeeper, and perhaps a maid, so the house will have to be large enough to accommodate them. And a library to fit dozens of books.”

  Such a simple thing, that little house of hers, and yet Augustus found himself smiling at the image she presented. “And where will this little cottage be located?”

  “I haven’t thought that part out yet.”

  He realized this little house of hers had been something she’d been dreaming
of for quite some time. “Not St. Ives?”

  She shook her head, her brows furrowed. “Not St. Ives.”

  After Miss Anderson was securely placed in his carriage, Augustus stood in his drive and watched the conveyance take away his little miracle, feeling happier than he’d felt since he’d left America behind. Since his return to England, it seemed as if a dark cloud of gloom had followed him wherever he’d gone, and he’d contemplated more than once returning to the American West and taking up his anonymous life. No one knew who he was there, no one cared. He was just another man seeking his fortune or freedom in a place where one’s past was just that—the past. His father had never understood his need to escape, and he’d died before Augustus could explain it to him.

  All his life, his father had been a large figure, untouchable and certainly unapproachable. With his mother dead, he’d been raised by nannies, then packed off to school at seven years old, as soon as it was possible for him to be sent. Summers had been spent at St. Ives, and he might see his father once or twice, but more often, he was home with a house of servants to care for him. Indeed, he could hardly count on one hand the number of conversations he’d had with his father before he reached his majority. Then, he was expected to take his role of being a viscount seriously, slide into his father’s footsteps, get married, have an heir, and continue the cycle.

  Augustus hadn’t done what was expected of him; he’d gone adventuring. But while he was away from England, guilt nagged at him. It was not a constant companion, but it reared up frequently enough that it had become a nuisance. After three years in America, he returned home. His father had been pleased and immediately began working behind the scenes to find Augustus a wife. Too bad the old earl forgot to ask his son’s opinion.

  The fight over whom he should marry was the first time Augustus realized what a force his father was and how helpless he was against him. Unbeknownst to him, Lenore had loathed Augustus before she’d even met him, which wasn’t a particularly good foundation for a marriage. His father didn’t care.

  Theirs was a marriage built on his father’s ambition, and Augustus had never had the illusion that it was otherwise, though he hadn’t realized the depths of his father’s perfidy until after their vows were spoken. Lord Berkley wielded his power like a poisoned sword, and his power over nearly everyone—friends and enemies alike—was nearly absolute.

  Augustus had thought to marry Lady Josephine Wyatt for no other reason than that she was from a high-ranking family, seemed biddable, and was acceptably pretty. But his father’s political aspirations would not be satisfied with such a match and he set about making other arrangements for Lady Josephine. The old earl’s political ally had a son who was, to put it politely, madder than a hen. The son was deemed unmarriageable, until Lord Berkley got enough ammunition against poor Josephine’s father. Josephine would marry the madman or her father would face complete ruin. Augustus, hardly heartbroken, almost admired her choice; she was a sacrificial lamb on the altar of Lord Berkley’s need for power.

  Even now, all these years later, Augustus wasn’t completely certain whether his father had arranged the marriage to help his friend or to gain revenge on his only son for having had the audacity to spend those years in America. Like Josephine’s father, Lenore’s parent was another quiet victim of the Earl of Berkley. Augustus sympathized. He, too, knew what it meant to be outmaneuvered by Lord Berkley.

  Chapter 2

  Harriet had never had a secret before in her life, at least not one of this magnitude. Alone in her room, when she had time to think about what she had promised—and what had been promised to her—she was tempted to write a letter to Lord Berkley reneging on her agreement. If her parents found out, she had no idea what they would do. Her mother, especially, cared more than most about appearances, about what was proper behavior for a young woman and what was not, and this was decidedly not.

  It was improper in so many ways, but for some reason, this made Harriet’s resolve grow even stronger. The old resentment of being left behind, a small black seed she’d refused to allow to grow for so many years, was blooming to life inside her. If her parents had brought her along, she wouldn’t have gone to that luncheon, wouldn’t have played her memory game, wouldn’t have attracted the notice of Lord Berkley. She was twenty-two years old, not a child to be left behind. One could argue, given the fact her parents had left her alone, that anything that occurred in their absence could be blamed on them. That made her smile.

  Then there was the money, that tantalizing idea of real freedom, for an unmarried woman without funds was at the mercy of friends and relatives. Her parents, as long as she was beneath their roof, would never allow her to do something as gauche as get a job. What was she to do, then? Leave home and live on the streets until she found a position?

  They didn’t need to know, at least not until Harriet packed her bags and moved…somewhere. Somewhere far enough away so that her mother couldn’t come to visit without traveling a great distance—if she came at all. And that also made her smile.

  Harriet sat at a small desk in her sitting room and propped her chin on a fist, blowing a stray curl from her forehead. Earning money was, perhaps, the least improper thing about this arrangement. Being alone with a single gentleman without a chaperone, now that was beyond the pale. She wondered if it could be considered sinful? How many commandments was she breaking by sneaking off to work for Lord Berkley?

  She took out a piece of paper and dipped her pen in the inkwell, writing: Honor thy father and mother. She stared at those words, trying to think of the other nine commandments and decided none pertained to her willfully spending time alone with a man who was not her relative. Just the one, and it was, in Harriet’s opinion, the least important of all the commandments. Should she honor her mother and father when they did not honor her? When, at every turn, they made her feel small and ugly and stupid and worthless? Oh, that black seed of resentment was growing a bit larger, Harriet realized, mentally squashing it beneath her heel. It would do no good to go down that road to self-pity and bitterness.

  It did make her wonder why Lord Berkley did not consider her reputation when he made his proposal. Would he have made the same offer to Alice, whose grandfather was a duke? She thought not. To him, she was a nobody, a tool he could use to restore his house. A tool apparently worth the staggering sum of ten thousand pounds—enough for her to live quite comfortably for the rest of her life as long as she didn’t live extravagantly.

  She’d long since given up on the idea of marriage. Every man of eligible age in St. Ives knew her and none had thus far given her any notice. When she was sixteen years old, watching the men and women dancing at the John Knill ball, she had told her friends that she would meet her husband one day during that same ball. She’d believed that wholeheartedly, having not yet come out and experienced the humiliation of being referred to as “the homely Anderson girl,” a term used frequently to differentiate Harriet from Clara. At any rate, the John Knill celebration happened only once every five years, and this past year had come and gone without so much as a dance with a single gentleman. She’d spent the evening by her mother’s side, watching Clara dance again and again, with no one even noticing she’d not been asked. Not even by her own father.

  Harriet placed her hand on her stomach, pushing back that black seed that once again was stirring inside her. “Stop, you ninny,” she said aloud to herself. If she had her own home, her own servants, her own little garden, she would be happy.

  The following day, she wrote meticulous notes as she made the mental journey through Costille House, recalling its soaring ceilings, thick beams, white-washed walls that held a myriad of medieval objects. At the end of the day, she had several pages of meticulous notes, and she was exhausted but satisfied that the detail of her memory was extensive and true. Lord Berkley would be pleased.

  * * * *

  Augustus tapped on his thigh impatiently a
s he watched the progress of Miss Anderson down his drive. He leaned against the stone archway, his shoulder growing cold from the granite, studying her progress with ill-concealed irritation. It seemed every few feet something would catch her attention and off she would go to investigate. He realized, too late, that he should have sent a carriage for her; it was at least three miles from her home to Costille. She wore yet another gray dress, this one with black lace around the neck and sleeves, and sturdy boots on her feet that showed with every step she took. The grass was wet with dew, and though she was attempting to keep her hem dry by lifting up her skirts a few inches, her dress was darkened along the bottom edge. It was nine in the morning, a brisk October day, which no doubt accounted for Miss Anderson’s pink-tinged cheeks. The rest of her was unusually pale, even for a young English girl.

  When she finally reached him, he did try to mask his annoyance but feared he failed.

  “I’m sorry I am so late,” she said a bit breathlessly, as soon as she was close enough not to shout.

  “Tomorrow I shall send a carriage.”

  She looked startled by his suggestion. “I rather enjoy walking, sir. And it would be difficult to explain to my mother why the Earl of Berkley’s carriage was arriving daily to pick me up and drop me off. And this way I am telling the truth when I say I am going for a walk.”

  “Very clever.” While he approved of her efforts not to lie to her parents, she was deceiving them, which didn’t sit entirely comfortably on his shoulders. What would her parents do, he wondered, should they discover what their daughter had been up to? A frisson of what could only be fear spiked up his spine at the thought of the Andersons demanding he make things right with their daughter. He would get married in his own good time, thank you very much. Now that his father was dead, marrying and begetting an heir had become even more important—and marriage to this little wren of a woman was entirely out of the question. She was far below his station—something he might be able to overlook had she had other interesting assets. Not a charitable thought, he realized, but an honest one.