Had he perhaps invested his money…but, no. The moment that thought entered Andrew’s mind, he dashed it away. If Mr. Hatcher did have some stake in a shipping business, surely his daughter would be none the wiser.
What young gentlewoman took the least interest in her father’s business dealings? The cause for her concern must be rooted elsewhere.
“The ships?” she prompted.
“Right,” he said, scanning the article for pertinent information. “Fortescue Shipping ran into a hurricane outside of the Caribbean and lost two cargo ships to the sea.”
Mary visibly relaxed, her finger slipping from the pages of the book and losing her place.
Andrew fixed his gaze on her careless finger, then watched her face for any discernible emotion. “Is there a shipping company you have a particular interest in, Miss Hatcher?”
She glanced up sharply. “Oh, of course you wouldn’t know,” she said, almost to herself. “Forgive me. I must have appeared quite the ninny. Mr. Lockhart owns a shipping company. He is presently returning to England on one of his ships.”
A cool, thin band wrapped around Andrew’s chest and tightened, but he did his best not to show his surprise on his face. Mr. Lockhart was a man of business? Andrew forced himself to meet her gaze, and the blush on her round cheeks struck him. Was she embarrassed about marrying into trade? Or merely because she had betrayed her sudden fear?
“You must forgive me,” Andrew said. “I would never have mentioned the loss of a ship so casually had I known what the significance might be to you.”
“You couldn’t have known.” She offered a kind smile. Sighing, she leaned her head back against the wingback chair. “And while Mr. Lockhart is safe, I can’t help but mourn the loss of someone’s ships. What a terrible blow that must have been.”
Of course she would mourn the loss of a stranger’s ships. It was a sad thing for someone’s household, for someone’s business, of course. But Andrew would not have thought twice of Fortescue Shipping without any personal stake in the outcome. No, had he been in Mary’s situation, he would have felt merely relieved.
Mary reminded Andrew of his own father in that way. Father would have worried over a stranger’s company. He was always asking after the needs of others, often staying late at church to discuss parishioners and how he might assist the vicar’s efforts to relieve suffering for their people.
Andrew frowned. He’d never once stayed after church to see to the welfare of his people. He merely supplied the funds for others to do as much.
“Shall we play bullet pudding?” Caroline asked, skipping across the room with a wide grin on her face.
Mary sat up. “I am willing. It has been ages since I’ve played.”
Andrew eyed his sister, shaking off the gloom which had settled upon him. “So long as I don’t end up with a face full of flour, I will participate.”
Caroline scrunched her nose. “That is not something I can promise, Andrew. You know it is entirely up to you.”
“I was only teasing, Caro.”
Caroline flicked him an arch glance before flouncing toward the fireplace and tugging on the bell rope. “I’ll ask Finch to set it up straight away.”
“I want to set the coin on top, though,” Anne said, rising. “Mary, will you help me? We can go down to the kitchen and prepare the pudding ourselves.”
“I’d love to.” Mary rose and set the book carefully on the small table between their chairs. She looked up and caught Andrew’s gaze, her jade eyes warm.
“I will come, too,” Caroline said, joining the women near the door.
Andrew watched Mary follow his sisters from the room, her arm around Caroline as she leaned over to say something into the younger girl’s ear. Caroline’s laugh drifted from the stairwell as the women descended, and Andrew’s chest warmed. Seeing his sisters happy was one of his utmost joys in life.
Knowing Mary was the cause of some of that happiness only sweetened her further.
“Andrew?” Anne stood in the doorway. She must have turned back. “Are you coming?”
“Absolutely.”
Mary carefully lifted the overturned bowl from the wide plate, doing her best not to disturb the domed mound of flour left behind. She glanced at Lady Anne over the work-worn table. “Do you have the coin?”
Lady Anne produced a small halfpenny and placed it gently on top of the flour-cake, the King’s stamped face looking over at Mary. Lady Anne glanced up at her sister. “You begin, Caro.”
They all gathered around the end of the worktable, the chairs pushed to the side while the Brights’ cook and kitchen maids bustled around behind them in the kitchen. The domineering fire in the oversized hearth emitted waves of warmth, soothing away the chill seeping from the bare stone floor. Lord Sanders stood across from Mary, his sisters flanking him, their smiles easy.
Lady Caroline lifted a silver knife and sliced the edge of the cake as if being careful to avoid disturbing the coin sitting on top, though she was far from it. She handed the knife to her brother, and Lord Sanders did the same, cutting the very edge of the cake—so small a cut that it hardly warranted the name. A scrape would be more apt.
Mary had played this game a few times before but never had she seen such minuscule slices of the flour pudding. When the knife was passed her way, she took a thicker slice, though she was still far from the center of the mound, and in no danger of toppling the coin.
“You will lose quickly if you cut that way,” Lady Anne said, her golden eyebrows rising on her forehead. A sudden grin spread over her lips. “Though I suppose I ought to be glad if it means you’ll be digging in the flour with your nose.”
“We shall see. No one is in danger yet,” Mary said.
Lady Caroline took another turn, followed by Lord Sanders, then Lady Anne, all of them taking such tiny slices that Mary was uncertain they really could count. At this rate, they would be playing bullet pudding well into the evening.
As entertaining as this game could be, what she really wished to do was return to the comfortable chair beside the warm fire in the library and the novel awaiting her there. She needed to know what was going to happen to the Bennet sisters—to poor Jane and her beloved Mr. Bingley.
When the knife made it back to Mary, she poised it above the cake, then slid it closer to the coin before cutting her slice away.
Lady Caroline sucked in a gasp. “Are you trying to lose, Mary?”
“Of course not.”
“Miss Hatcher is daring, Caro,” Lord Sanders said, his voice dropping as though he feigned telling his sister a secret. “She wants to put us all to shame for our tiny slices.”
“You mean your tiny scrapes?” Mary asked, sending Lord Sanders an arch look. “I don’t believe those warrant being called a slice.”
His booming laugh was sudden and warm, reaching over the bullet pudding and wrapping around her heart. She flushed with satisfaction, unable to dim her answering smile even if she wanted to. Which, she found, she did not.
“I can be daring, too,” Lady Anne said, taking the knife from Mary and slicing the flour an inch wide. She offered her brother the knife with a smirk.
He took the knife, shaking his head. “I won’t let Miss Hatcher influence the way I play.”
“You will forever follow Father’s example?”
Lord Sanders’s eyes flashed. “He has not steered me wrong yet.”
Mary caught the emotion which passed over the earl’s face, quickly to be shuttered. “Was your father very cunning?”
“Oh, yes,” Lady Anne said, her eyes wide in admiration. “He was smart, but he was fair. And he never lost at parlor games.” Her nose scrunched up, her gaze seeking the ceiling in thought. “Well, he hardly ever lost.”
This revelation about the late earl’s nature was interesting, and Mary wanted to learn more about him, the man who had raised Lord Sanders and his delightful sisters. Lady Sanders was a good-natured, cheerful woman who didn’t appear to want for anything and never
had cause to exert herself in any manner. That her children grew up to be such playful creatures was likely due to her indulgent nature but could perhaps owe some credit to their father.
Lady Caroline took her turn and the flour that kept the halfpenny aloft slowly shrunk, each turn drawing the column thinner and thinner until Mary was left with a shaft of flour and no clear path to victory. She passed the knife between her hands, analyzing the flour from all angles.
“And here I assumed you did not care for winning,” Lord Sanders said.
She ignored his remark, moving around the table to search for a better angle. Lady Caroline stepped out of her way. She came upon the earl, but he would not budge, and she could see why. From his side of the table, there was a place to cut that would, potentially, keep the coin from toppling.
“Excuse me, my lord.”
“Yes?” he asked, as though he had no inkling that she was asking him to step aside.
His quizzical brow almost fooled her. She almost believed him to be in earnest. But his interest was too clear, his stance too solid.
“Would you mind stepping aside, my lord?”
“I am afraid I would mind, actually. Can you not cut from your own station?”
“I can if my intention is to lose.”
He shrugged, which only lit the fire under Mary’s desire to win. She stepped around Lord Sanders, but his arm flew to his sister, pulling Lady Anne tight against his side to create a larger barrier. Lady Anne giggled, remaining against her brother as Mary paused, hands on her hips, the dull knife clutched in her fingers.
She returned to Lord Sanders’s vacant side and pressed against the table, leaning as far over as she could to reach the bullet pudding.
“Is this allowed?” Lady Anne asked.
“I suppose there are no rules prohibiting such leaning,” Lord Sanders said, his voice low and amused.
Mary pressed against his side, steadying her arm as she positioned the knife. She brought it down on the flour carefully, doing her best to ignore Lord Sanders’s warm body against her.
“Do not let the coin fall,” Lord Sanders said suddenly, his voice sounding close to her ear.
Mary startled, feeling the earl’s voice rumble through her shoulder where she pressed against him. The knife flinched in her hand and dashed sideways into the flour, toppling the coin onto the fallen pudding in a silent plunk.
Lady Caroline laughed, clapping her hands. “You nearly made it!”
Mary straightened, putting space between herself and the grinning earl. He stepped back, gesturing to his place at the table, that she might step into it if she wished.
“How chivalrous, my lord,” she said wryly.
He dipped his head, accepting the compliment with a flourish.
Mary pulled the plate closer to her on the table. Tucking a brown curl behind her ear, she bent at the waist, closing her eyes and pushing her nose into the flour, searching for the coin.
Laughter from the Bright sisters echoed in the kitchen, and Mary dragged her nose around the flour until she nudged the cool, hard coin. Pressing her face further into the mound of white powder, she managed to get the coin between her lips and stood up triumphantly, blinking away the powder clinging to the fringes of her eyelashes.
Lady Anne laughed.
Lady Caroline stepped back. “You did it!”
Mary turned to Lord Sanders, but he stood back, the amusement absent from his face and replaced with warm admiration. Her heart stuttered, her pulse echoing loudly in her ears, and she turned back toward the plate, dropping the coin in the middle.
“Your face is white!” Lady Caroline said, laughing.
“Is it?” Mary asked, feigning confusion. “I wonder why. Perhaps it was this wretched flour.” She dipped her hand into the pile on the plate and flicked it at Lady Caroline, who shrieked and ran to the other side of the kitchen, dodging around a surprised kitchen maid.
Mary dipped her hand again, and Lady Anne giggled, running behind her brother and clutching his arms.
“Does no one wish to match me?” Mary asked, a wide smile spreading over her mouth. Powder fell from her cheeks, and she tasted the gritty substance on her tongue, her nose wrinkling.
“Not particularly, no,” Lord Sanders said.
Lady Anne peeked from around the earl’s shoulder, and Mary dipped her other hand. Approaching the siblings, she lunged forward, reaching toward each of them at the same time. But Lady Anne ran away, and Lord Sanders did not move as Mary expected him to. She fell into the earl, her flour-laden hands pressing against his chest, and the soft rumble of his laugh vibrating against her palms.
Mary disentangled herself from his arms and glanced up to find two white handprints on Lord Sanders’s coat over his chest. Her cheeks bloomed with heat—that was blessedly disguised by a white film—and she moved to wipe away the flour marks, only managing to smear the white powder further on his navy-blue coat.
“Don’t trouble yourself,” he said, gently grabbing her by the wrist and moving her hands away from his person.
“But your coat. I do hope I haven’t ruined—”
“It is merely flour, Miss Hatcher. It will come right out.”
His words were no balm against her embarrassment. Both of his sisters found the situation to be awfully funny, however, and their laughter filled the kitchen. The maids busied themselves behind them, one woman standing at the ready with a broom—likely to clean up after Mary’s childish antics.
“Perhaps we ought to remove ourselves from the room and allow Cook full use of her kitchen once more,” Lord Sanders said, sending the stout cook a wink. She grinned at him with patient indulgence, and his sisters obediently moved toward the stairs.
“I suppose it is nearly time to change for dinner,” Mary said.
“For you, perhaps,” Lady Anne called over her shoulder. “No one else changes quite as early as you do.”
Maybe they were unaware that she shared a maid with her mother, but Mary was not about to inform them of that fact. They all mounted the stairs to the main floor, and Mary turned to continue up toward her room, Lord Sanders directly behind her, as his sisters left toward the drawing room.
When she shot him a quizzical glance, he smiled and indicated his flour handprints. “I figured I ought to change for dinner a little early tonight.”
She laughed, hoping she appeared unrepentant. “It could have been avoided, had you not cheated, my lord.”
His scoff followed her up the stairs. “That is a bold accusation.”
“You don’t admit to your attempt to rattle me?”
Lord Sanders smiled but failed to say anything more. Mary couldn’t help the chuckle that began in her chest and rumbled forth as the earl walked away, leaving her standing in the corridor outside her door.
She watched his retreating form, his broad shoulders straight and proud. Mary slipped into her room and crossed to the looking glass, a grin spreading over her white powder-covered face. She laughed at the absurd picture she made. She hadn’t felt so free, so silly, in years.
And she loved it.
Chapter 11
The window coverings were pulled tight, shut against the night, but Mary could easily imagine how dark the world was beyond the thick, damask drapes. She shrugged her arms into her thin dressing gown, tying the sash at her waist and tugging at her frayed sleeves. Her plait had started to come undone, and she ran her fingers over the ribs and edges of her hair, contemplating taking the ribbon off the end and re-plaiting it, but a swift glance at the clock reminded her that it was well past two in the morning, and she would not see anyone about the house so late.
She shouldn’t be walking about the house so late, but she had just finished the second volume of Pride & Prejudice and she needed to get her hands on the third to learn what happened next. Elizabeth Bennet was on her way to an empty Pemberley, and Mary had a feeling she was going to love reading about the large house in Derbyshire.
She couldn’t imagine being so
rich. Swallowing against the thickness that built in her throat, she realized that in just a few short weeks she wouldn’t need to imagine it—she would be wealthy. Marriage into the Lockhart family with their multitude of successful investments and an enormous shipping company was going to completely change her circumstances and her life.
She knew this marriage was nothing more than a business arrangement. There was no affection between herself and Mr. Lockhart. Neither of them had ever pretended otherwise. But he was a handsome man with a sound mind and marrying him was going to save her family’s estate from ruin. Their arrangement already had.
Slipping into the corridor, Mary held her candle out and closed the door silently behind her. The quiet house felt empty, its lack of movement and noise equally eerie and comforting. She was glad not to see anyone while walking around in her nightclothes. The orange glow from her candle created a round halo of light, showing her enough of the stairs that she wouldn’t misstep, but leaving the rest of the house dark beyond it.
The library was dark, and she stepped quietly across the carpet, searching the multitude of bookshelves for the one containing the first and third volumes of Pride & Prejudice. Her eyes lit on the matching burgundy spines, and she slipped the second volume into the middle spot before retrieving the third. It was going to take quite a lot of self-control not to light an additional candle and stay awake all night to finish the book.
Perhaps only a chapter tonight. She could force herself to close the book and go to sleep after one chapter, surely…
A soft snore sounded in the room, and Mary paused halfway to the door, standing on the carpet in the center of the room. She felt no warmth from the banked fire behind her, but she clearly wasn’t alone. The hair on the back of her neck rose with the sound of another snore.
Someone was in this room, and they were sleeping.
Lifting the candle so she could better see, Mary turned around. Her eyes fell upon the earl, stretched out over the long sofa, his arm raised and forearm resting over his eyes. Lips parted, he breathed out another soft snore. She stood two paces away, watching the slow, steady rise and fall of his slumbering chest.
All is Mary and Bright: A Christmas Regency Romance (Belles of Christmas: Frost Fair Book 2) Page 9