Hen became all business. “I daresay the only way to find a fit one now is if the household that employs her is of the highest reputation and station.”
Easterbrook stared at his knife.
“We will have to live here, of course. Nothing less will quickly attract a governess of suitable accomplishment and references.”
Easterbrook set down his breakfast implements. “Would it not be simpler to appease the governess you still have?”
“How can I appease her? I do not even know why she is throwing us over.”
“I am very sure Hayden can discover why and speak reason with her.” Those dark, all-knowing eyes locked on Hayden. “Can’t you, Hayden?”
The carriage rolled to a stop in front of the handsome house in Oxfordshire. Alexia alighted and tucked her basket over her arm.
“The village is a mile down the road,” she explained to the coachman. “You can see to the horses there and refresh yourself. Come for me in three hours.”
She walked up the stone path between strips of dormant garden plantings. The house was a good-size square of stone situated on twenty acres outside the village of Watlington. It appeared the property of a prosperous gentry family. Two generations ago that was exactly what it had been, and miles of the surrounding farmland had been attached to it.
The door opened. Roselyn rushed out, arms wide, laughing with excitement. They embraced closely.
Alexia had carried considerable guilt with her on this little journey, but it disappeared in Roselyn’s warmth.
“I thank God you were able to come, but your letter spoke of next week,” Rose said.
“I unexpectedly had a free day and decided not to delay the visit. I hope you do not mind the surprise.”
“Do these tears look like I mind?” She tightened her hold in a final squeeze, then stepped back. She grinned at the carriage. “Whenever I think of how you managed to obtain use of it, I enjoy a deliciously naughty pleasure.”
“You are looking well, Rose.” She did look well. She wore a fashionable dress of Esterhazy wool, preserved when much of her wardrobe was sold. Her bright eyes and good color indicated that rationing fuel and food had not yet taken a toll on her health.
“Anticipating your visit gave me heart and good cheer, Alexia. For the first time in weeks I began feeling my old self again after I received your letter this morning.”
They strolled arm in arm up to the house. “Tim is above, and I regret to say that he is too indisposed to see you. He is unwell.” Rose’s voice flattened on the last word. “Irene is visiting the Mortensons at Burberry Grange. The family has been generous to her, despite our situation, which, of course, everyone knows.”
Alexia was sorry she would not see Irene, but she did not regret she would miss the unwell Timothy. “Your brother’s persistent illness is unbecoming. I expected him to show more fortitude.”
“He does nothing but mourn his past and curse his fate. Perhaps with time he will address the present and the future.”
Rose had handled the present with a shrewd eye and practicality. Alexia had visited this property frequently with the family while they all lived in town, and now she noticed the furniture that was missing. Rose had selected carefully, selling off a few pieces of good quality that would not leave the chambers stripped.
They retreated to the library. Many books were missing but not enough to make the shelves appear stark. Alexia wondered how long the sale of bits and pieces could be sustained before the house was reduced to bare necessities.
She set her basket beside her on the sofa. “I have brought you a few things. I stopped at the shops before coming here.” She pulled aside the cloth atop the basket. The gifts inside now seemed silly to her. Impractical things, bought on an impulse to bring joy to her cousins. Better she should have brought meat.
Rose plucked out the little gifts, unwrapping each with great care. “Tea! I was distressed I would have none to offer you. And scented soap.” She held it to her nose and closed her eyes dreamily. “Such a luxury now.” She poked more, discovering the new ribbons and pretty hairpins, exclaiming over each one.
“I have something else for you. I must give it now, lest Tim decide to grace us with his presence.” She opened her reticule and produced the ten-pound note.
Rose’s face fell. “You cannot afford that. I dare not accept.”
“You can and must. It does not come from my wages or from my income. I have found a way to earn some money.” She described her overture to Mrs. Bramble and the hat she had crafted in her room. “This morning I brought it to her. She paid me well for it.” Not ten pounds, but Rose did not need to know that.
“You are making hats for a shop?” An unpleasant reaction shimmered over Rose’s face.
“Secretly.” Alexia laid the banknote on Rose’s lap. “We must be selective in our pride, Rose.”
“That is true. Every week I select more things over which to no longer be prideful.” A serious expression replaced her mirth. “You are fortunate to have such a skill with hats, Alexia. I regret I do not possess any practical abilities, besides knowing which chest or chair might be sold without much notice.”
Sounds above their heads indicated someone moved in the chamber there. “Let us walk. It is not too cold, and if he is about, I would rather—We argue too much, and today—”
“A walk would be delightful.”
Rose left to get a wrap. She took the basket and money—to hide, no doubt. Once outside, they strolled down the lane that led to the village. Alexia asked after Irene.
“She chafes at our diminished circumstances,” Rose said. “Such injustice cannot be countenanced by youth. She complains about helping clean the house and runs to the Mortensons’ whenever they invite her. She builds castles in the air over their son, who will never have her now, of course.” She pulled her cloak a bit tighter against the damp.
Rose glanced back at the house, now just a dot down the lane. “Tim speaks of selling it. He has lost all hope, all fight. Our family’s home, he would sell. When things were bad the last time, Benjamin found a way to make them better, but Tim can only contemplate selling and selling until there is nothing more to sell. Where will that leave us when all is gone?”
“I will continue sending you some money. With the hats—I can always send a little. Enough so that Tim does not sell. If he does, most will go to debts anyway.”
“So I tell him. At least we have a roof.”
A nice roof. A nice home, and a place in their old world. The property was the last anchor to who and what they were supposed to be. Alexia knew all about that, all about hanging on to one’s place and dignity with one’s fingernails.
She linked her arm through Rose’s. Her cousin had just opened a door that led to the past with Benjamin. Alexia had thought about him a lot last night. As the hours stretched toward dawn, her mind had swung between accommodating what had happened with Hayden and the shock that had led to her abandon. Discovering those letters had put Ben’s memory in a new light, and she had studied the altered image with curiosity. Not with hate, though. Perhaps with time the hurt would encourage that much distance, but it had not yet.
“Rose, I have been thinking of late about our happy time in Cheapside.”
“I wish we had never left that cozy home. The fall would not have been so far from there. Tim spent money as if the well would never go dry.”
“But Benjamin did not. Yet that bank was doing very well earlier. For years, I expect. If all that money was available for Tim, much the same would have been there for Ben.”
“We had those debts. The ones inherited from Father. I thought all was clear right after the war. However, Ben said there was one more debt, a big one, that he still had to repay. It was one reason I could not have a season.”
That made sense, but then again it did not. It would be very coincidental if a big debt suddenly was paid at the same time Ben died. Tim had begun spending freely almost at once.
Alexia took
some comfort in the bare facts, however. Hayden’s allusions to Ben’s melancholy and to the Longworths’ finances had nudged at her for days now. She hated thinking that some dire predicament had waited for Ben in England. She resisted the notion that perhaps, due to that, he had become so drunk he fell off that ship. Or maybe did not fall at all.
Rose’s story relieved her of that nagging suspicion. The debt had been an old one, not new. It would not cause a sudden despondency. They did not live in luxury in Cheapside, but it had been comfortable. The hard times had been conquered, even if a good deal of Ben’s success was still going to pay for his father’s bad judgments.
“I expect there might be something in his trunks about all of it,” Rose said.
A chill shivered through Alexia at mention of the trunks. If they contained information regarding this debt, she did not see it. She had ceased looking once she found those letters.
The image of those letters invaded her head. The hand, the love, the scent—glimpses assaulted her, bringing back a taste of her shock. The memories poked and poked, demanding her attention and misery.
“I will be earning enough from the hats to pay my own keep, Rose. I will be leaving my situation soon.” The brick buildings of the village could be seen through trees and brush, waiting ahead around a bend in the road.
“You have sold one hat, Alexia. Do not be rash. I hate the idea of your being in service at all, and for that man’s family even more, but it is a home and some security and—”
“I am confident I can maintain myself. However, this may be the last time I have use of a carriage.”
Rose’s face fell. “Then it may be a long time before we see each other again.”
“It will not be this convenient, but I will find a way.”
“Maybe I will be the one to find a way.”
Alexia stopped walking. “What do you mean?”
Rose faced her. “I cannot live like this forever. With Tim’s behavior, it will only get worse. The house may eventually have to be sold after all. Perhaps it is time that I make some hats too, so to speak.”
“You said you had no skill to sell.”
“Nature gave every woman something to sell, Alexia.”
They looked at each other. Rose adopted a solemn, determined expression, one that dared Alexia to scold and lecture.
There would be no admonishments. She had lost all rights to preach yesterday, when she gave herself to a man on an attic floor. Rose merely speculated anyway. It was nothing more than a calculation by a woman facing a bleak future. Alexia knew all about that, and where it sometimes led one’s thoughts.
They began walking toward the village again. After a few footfalls the silence broke. A thunder of horses poured toward them, growing louder like a fast-approaching storm.
A large equipage rounded the bend and aimed right at them. They moved off the lane and the coach blurred past. Alexia noticed the crest on its door.
Rose’s expression hardened. “It appears that Easterbrook is finally gracing the county with his presence. I should not blame the man for his brother’s failings, but my respect for the entire family has been compromised, and I wish he had stayed in town. Thank heavens he never entertains, or Irene would be unbearable.”
Alexia made the most of her few hours with Rose. They strolled the village and visited shops, then returned home for some tea and confidences.
Not the biggest confidence, of course. Rose must never learn about what had transpired with Hayden. The memory of that spoiled the visit somewhat. Being back with the family he had wronged, noticing the details of precarious finances, added to Alexia’s embarrassment at her weakness. How could she have forgotten what Hayden had done to this family? How could she have treated him as anything other than the enemy?
She took her leave in early afternoon, soon after the carriage returned.
“I will see you again soon, Rose.” She kissed her cousin. “I will visit again as soon as I can.”
“Once you are resettled, write and tell me where. Perhaps I will visit you and see what I am worth.”
Alexia wished Rose did not allude again to the chance she might come to town to sell herself. It made the suggestion more than a groundless threat spoken in a fit of pique. She should not have let the last reference pass but received some reassurance that Rose did not truly consider such a thing.
As the carriage began its journey back to town, she debated the ways that she could help her cousins. Mrs. Bramble had paid two pounds for the hat and indicated she would charge five on any orders. If they could be made by day and not only by night, if the designs she invented drew enough orders, if she obtained this year’s income and bought enough supplies…would it be sufficient when all was done to support herself and also the Longworths?
Not in style, but they were all past that. She had forgone such dreams long ago, and surely Rose would see that virtuous frugality was preferable to luxurious sin.
She gazed at the countryside winding past her window. Her heart thickened with quiet dread. She saw again the hard lights in Rose’s eyes as they faced each other on the lane.
There was an alternative. For reasons she could not fathom, she suspected that Hayden would offer her a special situation if she gave him the slightest encouragement. He had come close in the attic, but she had not wanted to hear the proposition that would damn forever what had just occurred.
She was already soiled, however. Ruined, if any of the servants had heard them. The security provided by a brief liaison with Hayden would far exceed any she could ever provide herself. She possessed neither Rose’s exquisite beauty nor Phaedra’s dramatic style. She was the most ordinary of women, yet Lord Hayden Rothwell had fixed his attention on her.
She weighed the choice. If she became his mistress, Rose and Irene might still salvage some kind of life. She would not be able to stand beside them in society, but she could obtain enough money to return them there for a while. They were both lovely, and perhaps that alone would bring marriage offers.
If one wanted to be practical, if one set sentiment aside and assessed who had the better chances to make an honorable and virtuous future, of the three she was the least likely to do so.
Nor would it be horrible to become Hayden’s mistress. He had already proven that. If she allowed the pleasure to have its way, she might be able to ignore that she bartered her body with a man she would never love.
The carriage turned, rocking her out of her thoughts. She noted the crossroads through her window. It was the one where the lane met the road to London. The carriage had not turned south, however. They were heading north.
She opened the trapdoor and called for the coachman’s attention. He stopped the equipage and turned to face her through the opening.
“The road is clearly marked, good sir. We are now going the wrong way,” she said.
“M’lord said to bring you to Aylesbury Abbey once you were done with your cousin.”
“You misunderstood, I am sure.”
He shook his head. “They made a stop in Watlington and he saw the carriage. Told me to bring you along.”
“I do not choose to visit with Easterbrook today. Turn this carriage around and—”
“Not the marquess who spoke with me. Lord Hayden, it was.”
She saw the coach speed past and the blur of a profile within. Of all the days for Hayden to decide to come down from London, she could have done without his choosing this one.
“I refuse to accommodate Lord Hayden’s whims. Take me back to London or it will be nothing less than an abduction.”
“Well, now, you can explain all that to whoever wants to listen. You serve his family and eat at their board. You stepped into their carriage and sit there now. For a woman abducted, you have been most accepting.”
He turned away and cracked the reins. All thoughts of the Longworths left Alexia’s mind. It filled instead with the strong words she intended to shower on Hayden’s head very soon.
Beneath her i
ndignation, a quiet voice whispered. It was a sad voice, from the soul that understood the world all too well. Why not? it said. You have nothing of value left to lose.
CHAPTER
ELEVEN
Alexia judged Aylesbury Abbey to have over a hundred chambers. The ancient monastery was long gone from the property, replaced by a massive stone building.
Her eyes took in the Palladian raised portico and sprawling wings. She refused to be awed.
One of Aylesbury’s servants handed her down. She addressed her coachman. “Do not go to the stable. I will be back very soon, and we will return to town in good time.”
She and the servant marched up the stairs, entered, and began winding through the public rooms. Restrained luxury and saturated hues enclosed her like so many tastefully embellished jewel boxes. Perfect proportions marked each chamber, and superb craftsmanship enhanced every detail.
Hayden waited in the library, a chamber twice as long as it was wide and tall. Although furnished for comfort with sofas and reading chairs, the mahogany wainscot and carved moldings, the perfect bindings, the grand fireplace, the landscape oils—all of it identified the room as part of a great country house.
“You are delaying my return to town,” she said. “It was an unfortunate coincidence that you decided to visit the family seat today and learned I was here.”
“It was no coincidence. I followed you here. The coachman spoke of your plans to the groom, and—”
“And you inquired? And followed? What reason could compel you to make such a journey when I would be back tonight?”
“A conversation compelled me. One that is long overdue.”
“Believe me, you do not want any conversation with me today. I have just come from my cousin.”
He exhaled audibly. When he spoke again, his tone was almost gentle, but firmness sounded too. “I accept that you will never forgive me for their change in fortune. However, the Longworths are not part of the conversation I had in mind.”
To be sure, this was going to be the conversation she anticipated.
The Rules of Seduction Page 14