He smiled a slow, obnoxious smile. “Loretta is only one of my friends. It’s Lady Rosalind Simmons who’ll be taking you shopping. I think you’ll like her.”
Maggie doubted that, but there didn’t seem to be any other choice than to let this Lady Simmons oversee the shopping expedition. She’d taken this position and now, since Mr. McKenna had reclaimed her emigration papers, she was going to have to make the best of things. “I’ll be ready when Lady Simmons arrives,” she said evenly.
“Excellent,” said Mr. Kirk with a slight nod of his head.
Maggie turned away without being excused and swept as far as the doorway before pausing to look back at her employer. She expected to see anger in his face; instead, she found amusement. And that made her furious. “I trust,” she said in bitingly polite tones, “that there will, at some point, be time for teaching your sons, Mr. Kirk?”
He laughed. “I promise you, Miss Chamberlin—you’ll have more time with the boys than you could possibly want.”
Having no way to respond to that outlandish statement, Maggie turned in a whirl and stormed out of the study and up the staircase to the third floor. In the nursery both Jeremy and Tad were sleeping soundly on their beds.
Mechanically, Maggie covered Tad as she had covered Jeremy earlier, then went into her tiny room. There, she flung herself down onto the narrow bed and pounded at the pillow with her fists.
The telephone on Duncan’s desk gave a jangling ring; not an uncommon occurrence, of course, though he had hoped for a few minutes to relish the spark in Maggie Chamberlin’s gray eyes when he’d told her what was what.
Annoyed, Duncan grabbed up the cumbersome receiver and demanded, “Yes?”
There was a low male laugh at the other end of the line, a laugh Duncan recognized all too well. “Hello, Kirk,” said Reeve McKenna.
Duncan considered slamming down the receiver, and then thought better of the motion. Here was a chance, after all, to get under McKenna’s skin. “How are things in Sydney?” he asked as companionably as if he had been speaking to a friend and not a man he’d just as soon see dead.
Again, that familiar laugh sounded. “Sydney? You only wish I were in Sydney, old friend. I’m in Melbourne, as it happens.”
Duncan yearned to sit down, and then remembered that he was already sitting. He rubbed his eyes with a thumb and forefinger while he tried to assemble himself. “Melbourne,” he echoed stupidly, hating himself the moment the word was out of his mouth.
“Loretta couldn’t wait to tell me that you were planning a trip,” Reeve said smoothly. “That’s the trouble with Loretta, her loyalties are flexible.”
Duncan let out a long breath but said nothing. When he got his hands on Miss Craig’s pretty neck, he vowed to himself, he was going to wring it.
“Of course,” Reeve went on in that dangerously affable way of his, “we’re going to have to discuss this situation. In person.”
Duncan sighed. “Yes.”
“Where?”
“Anywhere but here,” Duncan responded.
“The club?”
Duncan nodded distractedly, then realized that Reeve couldn’t see him. “Yes. Five o’clock?” He made the words sound cordial.
“Now,” Reeve argued, and with a click the call was disconnected.
Seething, Duncan left his study to order a carriage brought around.
Lady Simmons was neither a dour old matron nor a doxy. By turns, Maggie had expected her to be both. Instead, she was a pretty young woman with fashionably styled black hair and a quick, ingenuous smile.
“I know where all the best shops are,” she told Maggie warmly as they rode away from the Kirk house in an elegant carriage. “And Harry says that there’s nobody better at spending money than I am.”
In spite of the situation, Maggie found herself liking Lady Simmons, who insisted on being addressed as Rosalind. She was, Maggie quickly learned, a duchess; she and her titled husband had decided to spend several years in Australia as an adventure. They had two children, several English estates, and four dogs, of whom Rosalind spoke almost as fondly as she did of the future Duke of Devonshire and his younger sister, Polly.
“Have you and Duncan been friends for a long time?” Maggie asked when there was an opening to speak.
“I do love your American accent!” Rosalind trilled, beaming. “And yes, Harry and I have known Duncan for some years. We have shares in several of his opal mines.”
Maggie nodded numbly. Even though she’d spent some time in England, she had never been within touching distance of a bona fide member of the gentry, and she was a little overwhelmed.
“You’ll enjoy dining at Government House,” Rosalind went on after taking a breath. “And or course there are the boat races in the harbor and there will be quite a celebration in June, when Her Majesty’s Jubilee—”
Maggie found her voice. “I’m really only a governess,” she pointed out, meaning to imply that she would probably not be included in events the gentry would be enjoying.
Rosalind peered at Maggie with narrowed blue eyes, looking honestly puzzled. “A governess? Why, Harry and I both had the impression that—oh, never mind.”
Maggie stiffened in her seat, her hands clasped together in her lap. “What impression did you have, please?” she asked with quiet insistence.
“Well, since you’re so pretty, and you’re an American and everything—well, we did think that Duncan might be planning to—to marry you.”
Maggie drew in such a quick breath that she nearly choked on it. “I’m a governess,” she repeated when she could trust herself to speak. “And I’m also to serve as a hostess of some sort.”
Rosalind assessed Maggie with wry friendliness. “Well, well, well. A hostess, is it? I thought Duncan was buying you a trousseau.”
Maggie leaned forward slightly in her seat, keeping her voice to a whisper even though she knew that no one could possibly overhear. “It is—well—proper, isn’t it? My serving as Mr. Kirk’s hostess?”
Rosalind giggled. “Of course it’s proper. That clever Duncan—if you were anything besides a hostess or a governess, he’d have to have a chaperon in the house!”
Maggie was hardly comforted by this remark. “You don’t mean that Mr. Kirk might have—have designs on me, do you?”
Rosalind’s pretty blue eyes danced. “My dear, Duncan has designs on all of us,” she said.
Maggie groaned and sank back in her seat, her eyes closed, and Rosalind reached over to give her hand a pat that was undoubtedly meant to be reassuring.
“Duncan is a gentleman,” she said.
Maggie remembered the green fire in Duncan Kirk’s eyes when he’d laid down the law in his study only a few hours before, and she wondered whether Rosalind Simmons knew what she was talking about.
For the rest of the afternoon she followed the energetic young duchess from one shop to another. Several gowns were bought ready-made, while dozens more were ordered. Shoes were selected, as well as handbags for both daytime and evening; parasols and perfumes were bought. Maggie estimated the cost of this expedition and developed yet another headache.
By the time she and Rosalind returned to the Kirk residence, which was within a stone’s throw of Government House, Maggie was exhausted. Burdened with as many packages as she could carry, she hurried to her small room off the nursery, only to find a maid there, stripping the blankets and sheets from the bed.
Her mind spinning with the implications of that, Maggie let her parcels fall to the floor with a series of loud clumps. The only thing worse than having to stay under Duncan Kirk’s roof for a full year would be having to leave it, that very day, in disgrace.
“What are you doing?” Maggie croaked.
The maid was already kneeling on the floor, reaching for the boxes Maggie had dropped. “Why, I’m pickin’ up your things, miss. Anyone could see that!”
If it hadn’t been for the rigors of the day, Maggie would have laughed. “I meant, why were you s
tripping the bed?”
The young maid looked up, her eyes bright. One work-roughened hand caressed a silver dress box in a gesture of wonder. “The master wants you to sleep on the second floor, miss,” she said, cocking her head to one side. She had a mop of tightly curled brown hair that seemed determined to swallow up her mobcap, and her nose turned up at the end. “You just go on down there now—Cook’s sending up your supper—and I’ll bring your things along later.”
Maggie opened her mouth to protest, then closed it again. She’d no strength left for doing battle with “the master” and his arbitrary decisions. For now, for tonight, he’d won.
“Which room is mine?” Maggie asked in a defeated tone.
“The one at the far end of the hallway, miss. Away from the stairs.”
Maggie left the small room that had been good enough for other governesses and distractedly smoothed the beds Jeremy and Tad had left rumpled from their naps. She wondered where they were and if she’d ever get a chance to teach them. Or were they simply an excuse, as the title “hostess” might be, for Duncan to keep Maggie under his roof, ordering her about and dressing her up like an expensive doll.
Maggie cursed Philip Briggs for bringing her to this place so far from the rest of the world, and there were tears of anger, weariness, and frustration in her eyes when she made her way down the stairs and along the second floor hallway.
This room, like its counterpart in Sydney, was entirely too sumptuous for a governess; at the windows it had soft blue velvet draperies trimmed with gold tassels. The spread on the massive mahogany bed was of some gauzy white fabric, and plush pillows of all shapes and sizes and colors gave it the dissolutely luxurious look of a harem couch.
Maggie stopped cold in the doorway. She could not turn to the streets, of course, but she did wonder if it would really be so terrible to be Reeve McKenna’s mistress. Sure, one day he might tire of her and cast her aside, but in the meantime she would have food to eat and clothes to wear, not to mention long nights of ecstasy almost too keen to be borne….
“Do you like the room?” inquired a low voice, directly behind her.
Maggie whirled to find herself standing within inches of Mr. Kirk. He smelled of bay rum and good whiskey, and his green eyes were not threatening or angry, but full of laughter.
“It does seem—well—a little fancy—” Maggie managed to say.
Duncan laughed softly and his hands rested on Maggie’s upper arms for a moment before falling away as he remembered his manners. “You’re worried about what I might expect in return—is that it? I should have guessed that Rosalind would fill your head with all kinds of silly ideas about my predatory nature.”
Maggie swallowed and took a step in retreat, thus putting herself inside the too-luxurious room. “She did say that you have designs on all women,” she confessed, her eyes wide.
Duncan laughed again, this time throwing his head back, and his eyes shone as they assessed Maggie’s flushed face and poised-to-flee stance. “She exaggerates.”
Maggie didn’t know what to say to that, so she took another step backward and just watched Mr. Kirk’s face. She saw the amusement drain away, leaving sadness in its wake.
“I loved my wife very much, Miss Chamberlin,” he said quietly, and then, with that statement hanging in the air behind him, he turned and left Maggie’s room.
Chapter 12
FIRST THING THE NEXT MORNING, MAGGIE SUMMONED Jeremy and Tad to the schoolroom on the third floor and began their lessons. She was not surprised to find that both boys were very bright, though Tad, the older of the two, was less than enthusiastic about staying in and doing sums when there was a whole world outside just waiting to be explored.
When Maggie had gauged the mathematical abilities of both boys, she ferreted out a few materials from a cupboard at one end of the long room and set them to drawing maps of Australia.
“Papa has houses here, here, and here,” Jeremy said, stabbing at widely separated places on the map with the point of his pencil.
“And here,” Tad added, making an unwanted mark on Jeremy’s map and getting a glowering look for his trouble. “Mum liked this one best. She said Queensland was like paradise.”
Maggie was very curious about the late Mrs. Kirk, but of course she didn’t want to pry, so she simply said, “I imagine your mother was very beautiful.”
Both boys nodded solemnly.
“Her name was Elena and she died giving birth to our third child,” put in an icy male voice from the doorway behind Maggie. “Is there anything else you’d like to know, Miss Chamberlin?”
Maggie whirled to face Mr. Kirk, and she was shocked at the rigid fury she saw in every line of his body. “I’m sorry,” she said softly, though she wasn’t exactly sure what she’d done wrong.
In the space of a second or so Duncan relaxed. “No, Miss Chamberlin,” he said sheepishly. “I’m the one who should apologize. I guess I’m still a little sensitive where Elena is concerned.”
Maggie nodded, not knowing what to say. She was no stranger to grief herself, having lost both her parents in one tragic accident, and she knew that it made people do and say very odd things at times.
“Come and see our maps, Papa,” Jeremy entreated his father. “We’ve made Australia.”
Maggie was pleased with the attention Mr. Kirk paid to each map, carefully studying every line and place name and mountain range. When he had quietly lauded both boys’ efforts, he sent them downstairs to have their lunch.
After the children had raced out of the schoolroom, Duncan lingered over one of the maps, his hands braced against the low tabletop. In the sunlight streaming in through the windows, his hair gleamed a golden red. “Elena was very beautiful,” he said without looking at Maggie. “Would you like to see her portrait?”
“Very much,” Maggie said quietly. In many ways Duncan Kirk frightened her, but now she found herself feeling real compassion for him. She had expected to be led to some other room; instead, Mr. Kirk took a small golden item, much like a watchcase, from his vest pocket and opened it.
Maggie looked inside and saw a miniature of a woman with very dark eyes and pale hair almost the color of her own. Elena was smiling in the portrait, something that was unusual given the seriousness of having one’s likeness done, and she was, indeed, beautiful.
“She passed away two years ago,” Duncan said quietly, as though he were still baffled by the unfairness of her passing. “Our infant daughter perished with her.”
Maggie didn’t know what to say in the face of such a tragic loss, so she remained silent, trying to convey her sympathy by the expression in her eyes.
Mr. Kirk’s pensive look was gone in an instant; almost briskly, he snapped the small portrait case closed and dropped it back into his pocket. His green eyes were clear as he took in Maggie’s prim shirtwaist and skirt, and he smiled. “I’d like to see what you plan to wear to Government House tonight,” he said.
The reminder of the evening ahead both excited and unnerved Maggie. How was she to show Mr. Kirk the gown Rosalind had recommended without asking him to her room? That, of course, would be unthinkable. “It’s blue silk,” she said, “trimmed with millions of tiny crystal beads—”
Duncan smiled at Maggie’s emphasis on the word millions and folded his arms. “I want to see the dress,” he repeated.
Maggie opened her mouth to argue that she still planned to give the boys a lesson in botany and have them practice their penmanship, but Mr. Kirk cut her off a second time.
“Put on the gown, please, Miss Chamberlin. I’ll be in my study.” With that Mr. Kirk was striding out of the schoolroom, leaving Maggie behind to simmer. The man was utterly imperious, demanding that she model a dress for him in the middle of the school day!
Nonetheless, Maggie went down to the second floor bedroom where she had slept so fitfully the night before, took the glitteringly beautiful gown from its place in the armoire, and put it on.
The garment was, beyond a
doubt, the loveliest thing Maggie had ever seen, let alone owned. Its midnight-blue skirts whispered as she walked, and the crystal beads, spread liberally over the low-cut bodice as well as the skirt, sparkled like diamonds in the light.
Maggie tugged at the bodice, wanting it to show less of her natural endowments, but it resisted, reaching no higher than two scant inches above her nipples. With a sigh she left her room and hurried toward the study. Best to get this over with and return to botany and penmanship.
The doors to the study stood slightly ajar, and Maggie stepped through them after one short knock. Mr. Kirk, working at his desk, looked up at her in amazement, his mouth open, his eyes burning.
“You wanted to see the dress,” Maggie said, her patience wearing thin.
Mr. Kirk dropped his pen, heedless of the ink that splattered from its point over his papers, and stood up. “My God,” he breathed
Maggie couldn’t help being flattered, though she did her best to hide it. She harbored a secret wish that Reeve McKenna could see her in that magnificent, twinkling gown. “May I go now?” she asked coolly, her chin at an obstinate angle.
“You may not,” Duncan breathed, and then he gave his head a slight shake, as if to clear it, and sank back into his leather chair.
Maggie sighed. Perhaps she was to be a “hostess” at night, but it was daytime and, as far as she was concerned, she was still a governess. “The boys’ lessons are waiting—”
“The boys are eating,” Mr. Kirk broke in, and there was just the hint of a smile at his lips and in his eyes. “They’ve had enough schoolwork for one day, anyway. I want them to get some fresh air.”
Maggie didn’t see how she could be expected to educate Jeremy and Tad if they were allowed only half days for their schoolwork, but something in Mr. Kirk’s manner made her hesitant to argue. He was behaving rather oddly, though not, she had to admit, any more so than usual. “I’ll take the boys to the park then, or perhaps to the menagerie.”
“You will rest,” Mr. Kirk corrected her, as he was forever doing. “Tonight’s festivities will go on until the early hours of the morning.”
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