Instead of easing the situation, which was surely what he intended, a hysterical laugh filled Belle's throat. She tried to swallow it. Bad enough to be thought a clumsy fool; she wasn’t going to guffaw like a madwoman. Despite her efforts, a mewling sound slipped past her restraining fingers.
Pity softened his expression. Reaching up, he caught her by the elbow and drew her a step closer to the wagon’s end.
“Just say you're glad to be here, my lady,” he whispered.
His words worked like a key turning in a lock. Belle’s tangled emotions eased. Air again filled her lungs. She looked down at him, something deeper than gratitude curling through her heart for him this time. Against that subtle sensation, the words she'd sought for and couldn’t find a moment ago now sprang to her lips.
“My thanks for your kind welcome, Master Wyatt. My thanks, as well, to all of you who took time to come and greet me,” she said, proud that not a single quiver marred her voice. “I am very glad to be at Graceton Castle.”
Peg was right. This wasn’t going to be as horrid as she'd imagined, not as long as she had Master Wyatt as her protector.
Jamie stared at Nick's wife. Her hat was askew. Dust streaked her face and tired rings clung beneath her eyes. Wispy strands of hair escaped her braid to waft along the slim column of her neck. As she offered him a tremulous smile, gratitude nigh on pulsing from her, he thought he’d never seen a more beautiful woman.
Catching her by the waist, he lifted her from the wagon. A nod to Watt and John sent them leaping to help the remaining women to dismount. Jamie sighed, never so grateful to see men do as he commanded, especially since Graceton’s folk had been muttering about driving the lady’s party back out the gate only a moment ago.
“Mama!” Mistress Lucy came dashing toward them. Beneath the brim of her hat, her pretty face was reddened. Jamie guessed her head covering had been off more than on while she rode.
Lady Purfoy caught her daughter by the hand. “What are you to say?” she whispered.
“Oh.” The child’s brows pinched as if in concentration. Spreading her skirt wide, she curtsied. It was sloppily done, for she nearly toppled. When she was again steady, she raised her head to smile up at him.
“I am very glad to be at Graceton Castle, Master Wyatt.” This obviously rehearsed speech was followed by a sweet shrug of her shoulders. “I forgot to say that earlier,” she explained, then her smile widened. “Was I not riding well?”
Lord, but she was a cheeky thing. Aye, and with her face, a few more years would see men aplenty ready to tell her whatever she wished to hear. For today, he would happily fulfill her demand for a compliment.
“You were indeed,” he replied.
As she squealed in pleasure Lady Purfoy turned her child. “Run to Brigit, love,” she murmured.
Truly, the lady’s lack of formality was stunning. It was more than passing strange to hear a child's tutor referred to by her Christian name.
“Oh aye!” Mistress Lucy cried, her eyes widening in new excitement. “She'll be waiting to know about my ride.” Tiny arms pumping, she dashed to the wagon's end.
Her keeper was watching Watt and the lady's footman pull a heavy chest from the wagon’s bed. As the governess caught the child’s hand and leaned down to listen, the two men paused in their task. Their heads lifted as they looked out into the yard.
It was Sir Edward coming toward them with Tom following miserably in his wake. The knight was enraged, or so said the way he strode across the yard. Jamie sighed. Really, he was too tired for this.
The knight stormed past the servants and came to a halt before him. Jamie caught the flicker of movement behind him as Lady Purfoy sidled a little nearer. Without thought, he shifted, placing his body between knight and lady, only to flinch inwardly at the meaning in that motion. Aye, but once done, he wasn’t about to make a fool of himself by undoing it. Instead, sweeping his cap from his head, Jamie offered the bow due the knight's rank.
“Welcome to Graceton Castle, Sir Edward.” Despite his efforts, his tone was no friendlier than the greeting the lady had received from the castle folk.
“What sort of insult is this?” Sir Edward snarled in response. “You dare to quarter the queen's proxy in a gatehouse?”
“Pardon Sir Edward, if my servant didn’t explain,” he replied, knowing full well Tom had, or had at least attempted it. “The gatehouse contains our best rooms. It was refitted for the squire's father. He was a scholarly man in need of privacy for his studies.” It was an oblique way of saying Nick's sire had abandoned his wife and children for his books.
“Indeed, yon oriels,” he pointed to the gatehouse's inner face where two fine bay windows let light and air into what had once been the castle's barracks, “are the most expensive windows in the castle. Of course,” he continued, brows lifted, “if you prefer to stay within the house we can accommodate you with a lesser suite.”
Trapped, Sir Edward could but glare silently. Enjoyment at this brief advantage emboldened Jamie to take a final jab. “Moreover, in the gatehouse you can come and go as you please, or receive messengers in private, something I thought you might appreciate.” It never hurt to let a schemer know his cloak of secrecy was opaque.
Sir Edward's eyes narrowed to vicious slits. “I require a bath.”
“Already awaiting you there,” Jamie replied briskly, “as is a warm meal.”
“Inform the squire that I'll meet with him presently as regards this wedding.”
Jamie forced himself to relax before he ground his own teeth to dust. “The squire cannot see you until this evening.” There was nothing gracious in his refusal.
“He dares deny the queen's proxy?” Beneath the knight’s outrage, threat hung heavy in every word.
“He denies nothing,” Jamie replied evenly. “He sleeps. Given the fragile state of his health, all audiences must wait until he awakens this evening.” The fact of Nick’s health merely lent sincerity to what was otherwise a half-truth.
Sir Edward glared a moment longer then turned on his heel. He collided with Lady Purfoy’s footman, who was coming toward them holding one end of his mistress’s trunk in his arms. The knight stumbled to the side, caught his footing and stormed away; the footman reeled, feet sliding out from under him. Watt shouted as he lost his grip on the chest's other end. Lady Purfoy's footman collapsed.
The chest hit the ground beside him with a weighty thud, bounced to the side, then slammed atop him.
With a quiet shriek Lady Purfoy shot out from behind Jamie. Thinking she went to rescue her belongings, Jamie started after her to tend the servant. To his surprise she was there before him.
“Richard,” she cried, kneeling at her man's side.
In an instant, the other two women in her party were at her back, while her daughter completed the vignette, squatting at the footman's head to pat his face. Not one of them thought to set a hand to the trunk and free the man. Nay, all they could do was murmur like a flock of agitated doves.
“I'm not hurt, my lady,” Richard said, shoving at the chest atop him.
As Jamie took one handle, Watt caught the other. Together, they lifted the trunk off the man and set it to one side. Jamie looked down at the fallen servant.
His hat under his lady's knee and his hair mussed, Richard returned Jamie’s look with one of healthy and hale chagrin. It seemed he didn’t much like the fuss being made over him. Being that sort of man himself, Jamie held out his hand. With a fleeting smile of thanks the servant let his new steward pull him to his feet.
“You’re certain you're well?” his mistress demanded, brushing at the clots of grass that clung to her servant's doublet.
“I am, my lady,' Richard said, backing away from her, then bending to retrieve his cap. “I beg your pardon, I didn’t see the knight. I hope your trunk isn’t damaged.”
She didn’t spare a glance for the chest. “If it is, I daresay it can be mended,” she replied with a smile. “Better it than you.”
From the watching servants at the kitchen there rose a new wave of whispering. Jamie glanced at the servants. They were watching their squire's new wife with consideration. Even Will Prentiss's mouth was pursed in thought, Nick's cook being the most vehement Catholic among them, next to the housekeeper.
Jamie’s hope for Nick's title’s restoration doubled, as did the possibility the lady might survive past her wedding day. Lady Purfoy appeared to have no idea she’d just wrought a miracle as she watched Richard and Watt again pick up the trunk. Only when they’d carried it past her toward the hall door did she sigh as if finally assured her servant was uninjured. When she rejoined Jamie, she stepped a shade closer than he had expected.
Startled, he took a backward step. “My lady?”
A worried frown touched Lady Purfoy’s smooth brow. She shot a nervous glance across the yard at the retreating knight. “I know you’ve no reason to trust me or my words but I feel I must tell you. I’ve refused to aid Sir Edward as he seeks to use your squire to his own advantage,” she whispered. She stared at him, nothing but honesty shining in her clear gray eyes.
Jamie went breathless in surprise. Artifice, mimicry! his mind tried to shout but ten days of observation refused him that dodge. She was what she appeared, the pawn Percy named her.
Jamie offered her his arm. “If I could escort you to the hall, my lady?”
“Thank you, Master Wyatt,” she said, peering up at him from beneath her hat brim. A sudden, shy smile flitted across her sultry lips.
Jamie’s head took to throbbing. The desire to lock himself into his bedchamber, to carve out a few hours’ peace away from this woman, Sir Edward, Nick’s plot to escape marriage, hostile servants and everything else that had gone wrong these past weeks rose until he’d never wanted anything more.
There was a tug on his doublet's hem. Mistress Lucy stepped out in front of him. “May I have your arm, too?”
“You may have my hand,” her mother replied for him, offering her free hand to her child.
Disappointment flashed through the lass’s eyes, just deep enough to stir Jamie from his self-pity. He put out a hand. “I would be honored, Mistress Purfoy.”
A glorious smile bloomed on the child's face. Before her mother had a chance to remind her, she offered him a far steadier bob this time. “Thank you Master Wyatt,” she said politely, then curled her tiny fingers into his palm.
He smiled down at her, ignoring the throbbing of his head. Despite her strange rearing, Lucy Purfoy was a well-behaved and likeable child. Together, the three of them started toward the hall door, with the lady's servants following.
After a few steps, the lass lifted her heels into a skip, needing the extra bounce to keep pace with the longer-legged adults. “I'm to meet my stepfather soon,” she said between hops.
“You are?” Jamie asked in surprise. He'd no intention of introducing her to Nick.
“Aye, and I'll like him,” she replied.
“You will?” he asked again, even more startled now.
“Aye.” The child released his hand to race up the porch's three steps. The door at the top was ajar. Prying it open a stitch farther, she stepped into the opening then turned to smile back at him. “I must like him, for he'll climb trees with me and teach me to ride his horse.”
Jamie watched her disappear inside then shot a sharp look at the lass's mother. “You promised her the squire would do these things?'
The lady gave an apologetic shake of her head and released his arm to lift her skirts and start up the steps after her child. “Nay, I fear Sir William Purfoy did, daring to speak for an unknown man before he died. The worst of it is,” she said as she went, “I don't know how to tell her the squire isn’t well enough to do any of what her father promised.”
The pounding in Jamie's head worsened. Nick was easily charmed. If he were to hear of the child's expectations, he'd seek out someone to do for the child what he couldn’t. Jamie's jaw tightened as he watched Lady Purfoy step into the hall. Well, it wouldn’t be him. He was Nicholas Hollier's proxy only in his legal matters, not in the raising of his stepchild.
The need to escape grew far beyond merely retreating to his apartments. Unfortunately, his loyalty and his love for Nick had him trapped here. He'd simply have to come to terms with the fact that he’d lost the uncomplicated life he’d once enjoyed at Graceton.
Belle entered Graceton Castle's hall feeling more confident now that she’d warned Master Wyatt about Sir Edward. The door let her into a passageway, created between the hall's stone wall and a long wooden panel at her right. This was the hall's screen, meant to shield the greater room from door-drawn drafts. It was especially necessary here, where there was yet another door at the passage’s end, no doubt giving access to the kitchen yard.
Belle stepped through the opening to the hall and caught her breath. Warm light flowed through the tall windows, gilding everything it touched until the brick floor glowed rusty red and the oak paneling gleamed golden.
And the ceiling! Truss and hammerbeams did far more than keep the roof over their heads. Every inch of exposed wood was covered with carved tracery. Where the beams lifted away from the wall wooden flowers nestled in their spread leaves. At the intersections of the rafters pendants of wood descended, the trefoils decorating those lantern-like projections looking for all the world like sprigs of clover. A ceiling vent as ornate as the rest opened above the hearthstone at the room's center.
As the steward came to a stop beside Belle, she glanced at him. “This chamber is truly amazing.”
“If you say so,” he replied with an impatient snort. “I fear all I can see is evidence of the last Lord Graceton's spendthrift ways. Every stone and piece of wood in the hall is imported. When the old lord tired of throwing away his coins in building, he finished emptying of the family’s treasury by housing hundreds of dispossessed monks and nuns. The result was near penury for his children and grandchildren, and abeyance for their title.”
“Do you intend to stand at the door all day?” An old woman’s querulous voice rang in the hall.
The speaker stood like a sentinel at the hall’s rear. Her back bent and a walking stick to brace her, the ancient woman had a nose that jutted out over the pucker of a nearly toothless mouth, while what little hair she had left beneath her coif made a minuscule knot at her nape. Like all the other servants, she was dressed in maroon and gray. The only difference was the white high-necked partlet she wore atop her bodice. The nasty set of the woman’s jaw said she held power here and had no intention of ceding it to a newcomer.
A hiss of irritation escaped Master Wyatt. “That, my lady, is Mistress Miller, our housekeeper,” he said in a low voice. “The only reason she remains our housekeeper at her age is because the squire refuses to force her out or put another woman in her place. She’s got a vicious tongue. Although I've warned her to be civil, there's little chance she'll heed me. She never has before,” he finished, speaking more to himself than her, then again offered Belle his arm.
Together they crossed the room, stopping before the old woman. “Lady Purfoy, this is Mistress Miller, our housekeeper,” Master Wyatt said in introduction.
“I am pleased to make your acquaintance,” Belle said, putting as much enthusiasm as she could manage in the statement, even adding a smile.
The old woman gave an indignant sniff. “Lady Purfoy,” she replied, investing more than a little distaste in the two words. The promise that she'd never allow this interloper to rule her hall glowed in the rheumy depths of her eyes.
“What an insolent creature!” Peg’s irate whisper rang around them.
“Peg,” Belle warned quietly, tossing a look at her maid from over her shoulder. She didn’t want this battle now, not before she’d bathed.
Mistress Miller gave a dismissing jerk of her hairy chin toward Peg then brought her attention back on her new lady. “Your furnishings arrived,” she growled. “We’ve already paid the teamsters then sent those outsiders back where
they belong. We'd no choice but to put your things in a storeroom whilst we awaited you.” Her tone left no doubt of how extreme she considered this imposition.
Belle blinked in surprise, having been certain she’d wait another week before her belongings arrived. “I appreciate the care you've given what is mine,” she told the old woman, doing her best to pacify. “And of course I shall repay the cost of my property’s transport.”
“You will not,” Master Wyatt snapped.
Startled, Belle looked up at him. He was staring daggers at the housekeeper. Just as he'd warned, the old woman showed not a whit of respect as she glared boldly back at him.
“You, my lady, are the squire's betrothed wife.” The way his voice lingered on the word was clearly for the housekeeper's benefit. “Squire Hollier will not demean himself or his station by asking his new wife to bear the cost of her dowry’s movement into his household.”
The housekeeper gave an indignant sniff then looked at Watt. “We go upstairs to choose the lady a chamber,” she called to the footman. “Stir that puny useless man,” she pointed to Richard, who stood near the hearth, “from his sloth and bring the lady's trunk above.” Without waiting for a dismissal, the old woman turned her back on her betters and started across the hall.
Anger flickered to life in Belle at this slight to her man but she caught back her words of protest. The only servants she could take with her into the safety of her new chambers were her women. Richard would be left to fend for himself among Graceton's menservants.
“She doesn’t like you, Mama,” Lucy said, frowning after the housekeeper. Confusion and surprise filled her expression, as if it were inconceivable that anyone might dislike her mother.
“She doesn’t know me yet, does she?” Belle replied, catching her daughter’s hand and following the old woman into the chamber behind the hall.
The room was small, its walls wainscoted with a pretty paneling. A thick rush mat covered the floor. Except for a long bench that stood before the fireplace in the far wall, it was empty. Indeed, it had the feel of a room that hadn’t seen use in years. Still, Belle knew it for a solar, her parlor, the place where she could eat in private and entertain visitors.
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