Someone to Hold

by Mary Balogh

  Camille eyed the bag suspiciously, walked toward him, and took it. It contained brightly colored boiled sweets, one each for the children, she guessed.

  “Who paid for these?” she asked. She could not have sounded less gracious if she had tried.

  He grinned at her—and of course he had perfect teeth, which happened also to be white. Oh goodness, she thought crossly, she was going to have to revise her opinion of him and admit that Abby had been right in thinking him handsome.

  “I swear they were not pinched,” he said, raising his right hand, palm out, as though taking an oath. “A constable will not come bursting in here in the next couple of minutes to haul me off to jail and you too for being in possession of stolen goods.”

  “Every child will of course use one precious ha’penny to buy one of these tomorrow,” she said, still cross. “How am I to teach them that the little money they have ought to be spent upon necessities?”

  “Beads and ribbons and shoe leather?” He raised his eyebrows.

  “Beans and carrots and beef,” she said. “You are not the only one who teaches them to use their imagination, Mr. Cunningham.”

  “But how dull a life it would be,” he said, “if there were never the occasional luxury or treat or extravagance.”

  “That is easy for you to say,” she said. “You are a fashionable portrait painter, I have heard. You probably have pots of money and come from a moneyed background.” Despite his shabby appearance. She had heard all about eccentric artists. “As do I. But I at least am trying to behave responsibly toward these children, who have nothing, not even, in many cases, an identity.”

  She turned rather jerkily to make space for the sweets on the desktops and found a square of paper upon which to write the price as well as the information that shoppers were limited to the purchase of one item apiece. She thought he had gone away until he spoke again and she realized that he was perched on one corner of the teacher’s desk close by, one booted foot braced on the floor while the other swung idly. His arms were crossed over his chest.

  “This was my home,” he said quietly, “and the people here are my family. I grew up here, Miss Westcott, after being dropped off as a baby like so much unwanted rubbish. I have a name, which may or may not be my father’s or my mother’s. I had a decent upbringing here and never lacked for the necessities of life or for companionship and even affection. I was supported until I was fifteen by an anonymous benefactor, as most of the children here are. I left then, after employment and accommodation had been found for me. I also went to art school, since my benefactor was generous enough to pay the fees. The door here was not locked against me. Quite the contrary, in fact. But to all intents and purposes I was on my own to make my own way in life—with the full knowledge that though I will always call this place my home and the people here my family, in reality I am without home or family.

  “We orphans, Miss Westcott, know all about necessities and the fine line between surviving and starving. We are not likely to spend the little money we can earn upon nothing but ribbons and beads and sweets. But we know too the value, the necessity of the occasional treat. We know that life is not all or always gray, that there is color too. And we know that we are as much entitled to some color in our lives as the wealthiest of the more privileged elements of society. We are people. Persons.”

  Camille set the card down against the bag of sweets. “You are angry,” she said unnecessarily. And now she felt foolish. But she had had no way of knowing, had she? And she felt accused, despised, as though she had been looking down upon these children as inferiors and of no account. She had been trying to do just the opposite. She might have been one of them, instead of Anastasia.

  “Yes,” he said.

  “I am not one of the wealthy and privileged,” she told him.

  “Neither,” he said, “are you an orphan, Miss Westcott.”

  No. Only a bastard. She almost said it aloud. But he probably was one too. So surely were most of the children here—the offspring of two people who had not been married to each other. Why else would most of them have been brought here and supported in secret? He was telling her she could never understand. And perhaps he was right.

  “You knew Anastasia not just as a fellow teacher, then,” she said.

  “We grew up together,” he told her.

  Somehow his words depressed her and made her feel even more of an outsider. But an outsider to what? “You were friends?”

  “The best,” he said. She had the feeling he was going to say more, but he did not continue.

  She turned to look at him and thought unexpectedly of how different he was from Viscount Uxbury, to whom she would have been married by now if her father had not died when he had. Lord Uxbury was undeniably handsome, immaculately groomed, dignified, the epitome of gentility. No one would ever catch him perching on the edge of a desk, one foot swinging, his arms crossed, hands tucked under his armpits. No one would catch him with boots in which he could not see his own reflection. And no one would catch him with closely cropped hair that had not been styled in the newest fashion. It was strange, given the fact of his looks, that she had never really thought of Lord Uxbury as a man, only as the ideal husband for a lady of her rank and fortune. He had never kissed her, nor had she expected him to. She had never thought of the marriage bed except in the vaguest of ways as a duty that would be fulfilled when the time came. Yet she had thought of him as perfection itself, her perfect mate.

  She looked at Mr. Cunningham’s firm lips and chin and found herself thinking about kisses. Specifically his kisses. It was really quite alarming. His appearance offended her, yet it was perhaps the very absence of the veneer of gentility that made her so aware of his maleness. She was offended by that too, for there was something raw about it. A gentleman ought not to make a lady aware of his masculinity.

  He was not a gentleman, though, was he? And she was not a lady. She looked into his eyes and found them gazing directly back into her own. They were very dark eyes, as were his eyebrows and his hair. Even his complexion had a slightly olive hue, suggestive of some foreign blood in his ancestry. Italian? Spanish? Greek? Mediterranean men were said to be passionate, were they not? And wherever had she heard such a shocking thing?

  Passion was vulgar.

  He had known Anastasia, had grown up here with her, had been her friend—her best friend. He had taught in this schoolroom with her. Had he perhaps loved her? How had he felt when she went away, when the great dream had become reality for her while he had remained behind—with the full knowledge that though I will always call this place home and the people here my family, in reality I am without home or family.

  It disturbed her that he might have loved Anastasia. It almost hurt her. It reminded her of her own terrible loss.

  “Why are you here?” he asked abruptly, breaking a rather lengthy silence. He sounded as though he was feeling offended about something too.

  “Here at the orphanage school, do you mean?” she asked. He did not answer and she shrugged. “Why not here? I live in Bath with my grandmother, and I must do something. An idle existence is no longer appropriate to my station. And the salary, though a mere pittance, is at least all mine.”

  Her grandmother, true to her word, had insisted upon issuing a generous monthly allowance to both her and Abigail. It was larger than their father had given them. Camille had stuffed the money for this month into a little cubbyhole in the escritoire in her room, where she was determined it would remain. She had not accepted the quarter of a fortune Anastasia had offered, and she would not use what her grandmother gave, though of course she was accepting Grandmama’s hospitality every day she stayed at the house in the Royal Crescent. She did not know quite why she would not accept the money, just as she did not quite know why she had come here as soon as she heard of an opening at the school. But at least the salary she earned by her own efforts would give h
er some money to spend.

  It would give her some self-respect too, some sense of being in charge of her own life.

  “If you object to my being here,” she said, “you ought to have spoken up after I left last week. Perhaps Miss Ford would have written to cancel our agreement to a two-week trial.”

  He had been examining the boot on his swinging foot, perhaps noticing how disgracefully worn it was. But his eyes came snapping back to hers at her words.

  “Why would I have an objection?” he asked her.

  “Perhaps because I am not Anna Snow,” she said.

  She did not know where those words had come from. She was not . . . jealous, was she? How absurd. But the words had a noticeable effect. His foot was suddenly still, and they gazed steadily at each other for several uncomfortable moments.

  “Do you hate her?” he asked.

  “Do you love her?”

  His eyes turned hard. “I could tell you to mind your own business,” he said. “Instead, I will remind you that she is married and that it would be wrong of me to covet another man’s wife.”

  But he had not denied it, she noticed.

  “She married Avery, yes.” She watched him closely. “Does her choice of husband rankle? He is so very . . . elegant. Almost effete. And oh so indolent.” And somehow a bit dangerous, though she had never quite understood that impression she had always had of him. “And very rich. Have you met him?”

  “Yes,” he said. “I dined with them at the Royal York Hotel when they came through Bath shortly after their marriage. I believe Anna is happy. I believe the Duke of Netherby is too. Did you come here specifically to teach rather than to another school because of Anna? Out of curiosity perhaps to discover something about the sister you did not know you had until recently?”

  “Half sister,” she said. “I could tell you to mind your own business. Instead I will say that if I were curious about her, I would speak with her.”

  He got abruptly to his feet, crossed the room to remove the paintings from the easels and stand them against the wall, and began to fold and put away the easels while Camille watched him.

  “But you have not done so, have you?” he said after a minute or two of more silence.

  How did he know that? Did they communicate, he and Anastasia? Or had she told him when she was in Bath with Avery? “She is a duchess,” she said, “and I am nobody. It would not be appropriate for me to speak with her.” Her words sounded ridiculous as soon as she had spoken them, but they could not be recalled.

  He set one folded easel against another and turned his head to look at her over his shoulder. “Self-pity is not an attractive trait, Miss Westcott,” he said.

  “Self-pity?” She lifted her chin and glared back at him. “I thought it was a case of facing reality, Mr. Cunningham.”

  “Then you thought wrong,” he said. “It is self-pity, pure and simple. Anna would have opened her arms—would still do so—to welcome you as a sister, and never mind the half relationship. She would share her fortune with you and your brother and sister with the greatest gladness. But you would not condescend to have any dealings with someone who grew up in an orphanage, would you? And you would not be condescended to either. You would rather starve. Yet you seem to feel this need to step into her shoes to discover whether they will fit or pinch your toes.”

  She glared at him in shock and dislike, nostrils flared. “You presume to know a great deal about me, Mr. Cunningham,” she said, “and about my dealings with Anastasia— or lack of dealings. She has obviously been remarkably loose-lipped.” It was mortifying, to say the least, that he knew so much.

  “I am her family,” he said. He grabbed another easel and folded it none too gently. “Family members confide in one another, especially when they are hurt or rejected by those to whom they have reached out in friendship. But I apologize for poking my nose in where it does not belong. You have every right to be annoyed. I will finish putting things away here. You must be wishing to be on your way home.”

  She was sorry he had apologized. The hurt remained and she did not want to forgive. Self-pity is not an attractive trait.

  “What makes you think, Mr. Cunningham,” she said to his back, “that I want to be attractive to you?”

  He paused, the easel still in his hands, and turned his head again. At first he looked blank, and then he grinned slowly and something uncomfortable happened to her knees.

  “I am quite sure it is the very last thing you wish to be,” he said.

  Or can be, his words seemed to imply. But he was perfectly correct. She did not want to be attractive to any man. The very idea! Least of all did she want to attract the art teacher with his slovenly appearance and wicked, insolent grin and his dark, bold eyes, which seemed to see through to the back of her skull and the depths of her soul. He somehow represented chaos, and her life had always been characterized by order.

  And where had that got her, pray?

  She turned, drew on her bonnet and gloves, took up her reticule, and cast one last despairing look at the mess she was leaving behind in the form of a pretend shop. He did not rush to open the door for her—but why should he? When she had opened it herself and was passing through it, however, his voice detained her.

  “For what it is worth,” he said, “I believe it was maybe a fortunate day for the children when you decided to come here, Miss Westcott. You are a gifted teacher. Your ideas for today and tomorrow are little short of brilliant. They teach a number of skills at a number of levels, yet the children believe they are having nothing but fun.”

  Camille did not look back. She did not thank him either—she was not even sure for a moment that he was not making fun of her. She closed the door quietly behind her and set off on the long, steep trek up to her grandmother’s house. She felt a bit like weeping. But there were so many possible causes of such a strange feeling—she never wept, just as she never fainted—that she merely shrugged the whole thing off, pressed her lips together, and lengthened her stride.

  She just hoped the predominant cause of the tears she was holding back was not self-pity. How dared he accuse her of that—just when she had stepped out of her misery to do something?

  Had he loved Anastasia? Did he still?

  It was absolutely none of her business. Or of any interest to her.

  The very idea.

  And so she thought of little else all the way home.

  Four

  When Camille arrived home, hot and breathless and with a stitch in her side, her grandmother was in the drawing room sipping her tea while Abigail was on her feet, already pouring a cup for her sister and fairly bursting with news.

  Camille sank onto a chair and slipped off her shoes and ignored the disgrace of her hair, even worse now after being flattened by her bonnet. Did anyone ever get used to that hill? And would she ever grow accustomed to being a workingwoman? Or would she die of exhaustion before she had a chance to find out? Well, she would not die of exhaustion, and that was all about it. That would be far too mean-spirited of her. It would be the ultimate defeat. She took the cup and saucer from Abigail with a word of thanks and waved away the plate of cake and scones.

  “You ought to eat, Camille,” her grandmother said. “You will be losing weight.”

  “Later perhaps, Grandmama,” she said. “All I need now is a drink.” And she could probably do with losing at least half a stone. It would be less weight to lug up the hill every afternoon.

  “Oh, Cam, such wonderful news,” Abigail said, sinking down onto the sofa and clasping a cushion to her bosom. “You will never guess.”

  “Probably not,” Camille agreed after taking the first mouthful of hot tea and closing her eyes in sheer bliss. “But you will no doubt tell me.”

  “There was a letter from Aunt Louise this morning,” her sister said. “The whole family is coming, Cam, to celebrate Grandmama We
stcott’s seventieth birthday. I had forgotten all about it.”

  “Here?” Camille stared at her in dismay. “All of them?”

  “Here, yes,” Abigail said. “To Bath. And yes, everyone except Aunt Mildred’s three boys. It was Aunt Matilda’s idea, as she believes it will be good for Grandmama to take a course of the waters for a week or so as a restorative to her health, though Grandmama never seems to be ailing except in our aunt’s imagination, does she? But everyone likes the idea of coming anyway. The boys are going to a house party with friends from their school for a week or so, and Aunt Mildred apparently wrote Aunt Louise that she and Uncle Thomas will feel like fish out of water if they remain at home. So they are coming too. Aunt Louise says that Jessica is beside herself with excitement. The Reverend and Mrs. Snow are returning to their village near Bristol after spending about a month at Morland Abbey, and Anastasia and Avery are going to accompany them and then come here for the celebrations.”

  “The Reverend and Mrs. Snow?” their grandmother asked.

  “Anastasia’s grandparents, Grandmama,” Abigail explained. “Her mother’s parents, remember? Anastasia and Avery went to visit them after their wedding before calling here.”

  “Ah, yes,” Grandmama said. “Anastasia was called Anna Snow when you first encountered her, was she not?”

  Camille’s cup and saucer lay forgotten in her hand.

  “Oh, and Aunt Louise invited Cousin Alexander,” Abigail added, as though she had not already said more than enough, “and he and Cousin Elizabeth and their mama will be coming too. She has also written to Mama, but I do not expect she will come. Do you think she might?”

  Why here? Camille was asking herself. Why to Bath of all places? She could not remember their grandmother ever having come here before or any suggestion having been made that she take the waters. And the whole family? Even Althea Westcott, whose husband had been only a cousin of Grandpapa Westcott’s, and her children, Alexander and Elizabeth? They had been included, she supposed, because Alex was now the Earl of Riverdale. What was so very special about a seventieth birthday? But she had only to ask herself the question for the answer to be obvious. Grandmama’s birthday was just an excuse to allow them all to descend en masse upon the lost members of the family in order to reel them back in. She ought perhaps to be as excited about it as Abby. But she was not yet ready to be reeled in. She was not sure she ever would be. They were her blood relatives, but they were divided from her now by a great gulf of a barrier. Was she the only one who could see it?