by Darcy Burke
He wished it would not have been unpardonably rude to ask why she had been so in want of beauty. He could not imagine her as lonely or lifeless. She had won over the entire household in short order, transforming Waldegrave Abbey from a place of shadows into a place of smiles. They were all indebted to her. He stepped forward and took the canvases from her arms. “Lillian has no idea you’ve done this for her?”
She shook her head self-consciously. “Not yet. I wanted to surprise her. I want her to wake up in the middle of a garden, surrounded by birds and flowers and the morning sun. I thought she might like it.”
“She’ll adore it.” He lifted his candle to illuminate the passageway. “Who wouldn’t wish to awaken to all this beauty?”
“I just want her to be happy. To escape.” She flicked an unreadable gaze at the art lining the walls. “This morning, I realized Waldegrave Abbey really is a sanctuary. For me, I mean.” Her dark gaze returned to his. “I just want her to feel the same way.”
“That is my dearest wish as well. How can I help?”
Her answering smile warmed his soul. “Bring your muscles. Just take care not to wake her—I’d like it to be a surprise.”
“Lillian will be thrilled.” He started after her as she bent to unlock the sanctuary door, and found himself admiring more than just the paintings.
Miss Smythe was a lovely person, inside and out. Dangerously lovely. He could not risk opening his heart to her. He had yet to be in a position to have earned his own daughter’s love, much less be worthy of another woman’s.
Good Lord, how was he even thinking these thoughts? He would not allow this ... this absurd infatuation with his daughter’s governess to distract him from his goals.
Managing the upcoming thinkers’ retreat, for one. Wherein he would hopefully make real progress toward curing Lillian once and for all. Until then, Miss Smythe was absolutely correct: Lillian was badly in want of cheering. In fact, he could not have dreamed of a better plan himself. The paintings were transcendent. As they placed the vivid canvases edge to edge about the room, he could not help but marvel at the trompe l’oeil of a seamless horizon unfolding around them.
It was as if she had captured a life-size landscape and then cut it up into smaller pieces to carry from one room to another. And yet, despite its verisimilitude to the Shropshire Hills, he swore he could discern bits of Miss Smythe herself in the way the breeze danced among the flowers or the engaging mischief of playful kittens alongside a river. He was astonished to realize that she had poured bits of herself into each brushstroke.
This was not the gift of mere paintings. This was a gift of herself.
No wonder she had looked so disarmingly anxious. She could have no doubt that the paintings themselves were good, but she was hardly concerned about a reaction to her mechanics. Seeing Lillian’s delight in the paintings would be the same as seeing Lillian delight in Miss Smythe herself.
He felt the beginnings of a smile. Miss Smythe needn’t worry in the least. And how blessed was he, to be here to bear witness to the first exclamations of joy when his daughter awoke? If anything, he would have to control stirrings of jealousy when Miss Smythe’s oil paints managed to accomplish what innumerable gifts over nine joyless Christmases had not. And to think, from this day forward—
“Papa?”
Miss Smythe jumped, startled. “Lily! You’re awake!”
He spun toward his daughter’s voice, his insides already warming happily in anticipation of finally having contributed, however circumstantially, to her pleasure.
“Good morning, daughter.”
“What are you doing?”
Lillian’s head was just visible between the parted curtains of her bed, her overlarge eyes dark and glittering from her pale face.
He stepped forward. “Sweetling. We—”
“What are you doing?”
“Tiger Lily, look around you,” came Miss Smythe’s warm honey voice. “Do you know what this is? It’s the outside world.”
Too late, Alistair realized his daughter’s eyes were wild with suppressed fury, not excitement.
Lillian clawed the curtains away from her face to better peer about the room. “Why is it here?”
He gentled his voice. “So that you could experience—”
“They’re not real! Take them away,” Lillian commanded, her tone flat.
Miss Smythe paused. Hurt and confusion lined her brow. “Oh, Lily, I had so hoped you would like—”
“Remove them at once! All of them!”
Miss Smythe’s gaze dropped. Her features slipped into blank expressionlessness, as if the true Miss Smythe was hidden behind an emotionless papier-mâché mask. “I meant only to please you.”
“Well, you have not.” Lillian’s voice rose in pitch and volume with each carefully enunciated word. Eyes blazing, she scrambled from her bed to glare about the room. “Why should I pretend to be like you when I can only ever be me? Why should I wish to gaze upon copies of what I will never see? I hate them. They’re awful and they’re fake. I won’t have it.”
“Lillian.” Alistair stepped between them, although whether he was sheltering his daughter from Miss Smythe or Miss Smythe from his daughter, he couldn’t say.
“Get rid of them! I hate it all!” Lillian darted past her desk and kicked over the painting with the kittens, then the one with blue jays, then the one with hyacinth. “I hate both of you for trying to make me want make-believe instead of a real life!”
Black rain splattered across lily pads, slanting over hummingbirds and snow-white swans, sprinkling across the canvas with the rainbow as well as the one with the storm clouds before Alistair’s addled brain comprehended that the insidious black raindrops were not figments of his imagination but rather the spray of India ink from the full bottle Lillian had snatched from atop her desk.
He raced to grab her, to stop her. But even as he lifted his twisting, writhing daughter away from the paintings, she flung the contents of the inkbottle over his shoulders in poisonous arcs, destroying another row of beautiful landscapes in the process. He fumbled behind him to grab the inkwell from Lillian’s hands. Blindly, she threw the bottle over his shoulder, narrowly missing the top of Miss Smythe’s head. The inkwell shattered against the brittle boards covering the sanctuary windows, raining ceramic shards and black mist over the last of the paintings.
Miss Smythe remained where she stood. Had been as deathly still as a piece of petrified wood from the moment Lillian had erupted from her bed. And now, as he was wrestling Lillian onto her chair, Miss Smythe remained as stoic and unmoving as a corpse. As if she, too, was merely brushstrokes upon a canvas, and not a woman whose selfless gift of the heart had just been destroyed.
He pinned his squirming daughter to the chair. He understood her pain, but he would not allow her to wreak any more destruction. Lillian had already damaged far more than could be repaired.
“Apologize,” he demanded.
Lillian jerked her head away.
“There is no need for apology,” Miss Smythe interrupted. “Lillian seeks the real world and all I can provide is an imitation.” Her voice was no longer warm molasses, but thin and brittle as if iron will alone was keeping it from cracking. “I am a poor substitute for what she really wants.”
Alarmed, Lillian’s arms went slack beneath his grip. Her head lifted degree by slow degree, as if the realization that she had hurt more than just the paintings was only now dawning. At last, her gaze sought out her governess.
Making neither comment nor eye contact, Miss Smythe picked up ruined canvas after ruined canvas. The one with the kittens smudged to nothingness as it banged quietly against her hip, leaving bits of ink and specks of color along the creases of her skirt.
Alistair’s heart clenched. A still-wet canvas could only mean Miss Smythe had been up through the night, carefully painting each stroke of the kitten’s fur for his daughter. And now their paws and playful faces were little more than muddy splotches. Miss Smythe sta
red at the oily mess without blinking, as if she and the ruined canvas were alone in the room.
Lillian’s shoulders trembled beneath Alistair’s fingers. He glanced down at her lest she be poised to strike again, but this time, Lillian’s dark eyes were full of shock at her own handiwork.
“M-Miss Smythe ... ”
“Lessons are canceled for today, Lillian.” Miss Smythe’s voice was as devoid of life as the systematic way her tireless arms piled the carefully planned canvases atop one another. “It seems we could both use a holiday.”
Wispy strands of black hair stuck to Lillian’s wet cheeks as she desperately shook her head.
But Miss Smythe was not watching for a reaction. Her empty eyes remained unfocused on the paintings before her, as if she were hoping to rid the room of evidence before the moment engraved itself upon her memory forever. Methodically, she staked one atop the other. Each step, each faint clatter of painting upon painting seemed to echo in the cavernous chamber until at last, the stack reached her shoulders. She gathered up as many canvases as would fit in her arms and, without taking her leave, removed both them and herself from the room. The mechanical lock clicked home behind her.
“I didn’t mean it,” Lillian shouted at the closed door. “I don’t hate you!”
A long moment passed. The door remained closed. Miss Smythe did not return.
Lillian twisted to pin her anguished gaze up at him.
“I don’t hate her.” Silent tears slid down her pale cheeks. “I didn’t mean it. I swear.”
Alistair knelt before his daughter and looked her in the eyes. “She just wanted to do something nice.”
“I know,” Lillian whispered.
“You hurt her very much,” he said gravely.
“I know.”
“Then why did you do it?”
Lillian’s hands curled into tiny fists. “She’s trying to fix things that can’t be fixed. I can’t be fixed!”
“I will cure you,” he said fiercely. “I will cure you or die trying.”
“I don’t want to try. I want to be normal.” Her eyes filled. “I hate being broken.”
Alistair pulled her into his arms and hugged her tight.
He hated her being broken, too. He was tired of his entire family being broken, of his whole life being broken. But how could he possibly fix any of it, when the only remedy was a cure for Lillian?
His daughter clung to him for a long moment before she pushed away in sudden panic. “Will Miss Smythe come back?”
“Not today, I think. She’s right—you both need a day of rest.” He ran the back of his knuckles down his daughter’s damp cheek.
Lillian blinked at him as if he were being purposefully obtuse. She grabbed his arms, digging her little fingers into the muscles. “I mean, will she be back? Or did I chase her away forever, like ... like Mama?”
He hesitated, shoulders tense. Was there a danger of Miss Smythe resigning her post? In her shoes, would he stay shuttered in with the mad Waldegraves? Or would he walk out of the catacombs and on out the front door without a backward glance?
“You don’t know,” Lillian choked out, her distress verging on hysteria. She pushed at his chest, shoved him. “Go find her! Go get her! Don’t let her leave us!”
“All right, all right. But first, listen to me.” He might be a failure at curing his daughter, but surely he could promise her this. “You didn’t chase away your mother. No, look at me. You didn’t. Sometimes people die, even when they shouldn’t. It’s horrible and terribly unfair, but it is nobody’s fault, least of all yours. God is the only one who can decide when our time on this earth is through.”
Lillian’s lower lip trembled. “But if Miss Smythe leaves, it will be my fault. I was beastly to her. I don’t want her to go.”
Alistair slowly rose to his feet. “It’s too late for anyone to go anywhere tonight, sweetling. Besides, Miss Smythe adores you. She would not leave without saying goodbye. She just wanted a moment alone, that’s all. We should at least grant her that courtesy. Tomorrow, once we’ve all had an opportunity to think and to rest, I’ll speak to her. I’ll offer whatever it takes to extend her contract. Will that do?”
“No.” Lillian dug her fingers into his arm, eyes serious. “I want her for always. Make sure she never leaves us. Ever.”
Grimly, Alistair’s fingers tightened about his keys. “Never ever.”
CHAPTER TEN
Unable to face the Waldegraves after the morning fiasco, Violet weathered the remainder of the day and all the long evening alone in her velvet-and-gilt cell.
She couldn’t eat. She couldn’t sleep. She just stared up at the tester canopy, imagining Lily doing exactly the same. Day after day. Year after year. Violet might have spoken out of turn, but she’d meant what she said. No matter how hard she tried, she could never be more than a poor substitute. A copy. A fake. And very foolish for ever having dreamt of more.
After dawn the next day, she was scarcely up and dressed before a soft knock sounded upon her door. She sighed. That would be Mrs. Tumsen, ready to drag Violet down to breakfast by her ear, if need be. She hadn’t eaten the day before.
“Yes?”
“Miss Smythe? It’s me. Alistair Waldegrave.”
She shot a surprised glance at the door. Mr. Waldegrave at half-seven in the morning. Knocking at her bedchamber. She mustn’t let him catch her in the doldrums. He’d suffered enough.
She shook a few wrinkles from her morning gown and ran her hands over her hair to smooth any wayward curls—there was no time to muck about with hairpins. Inhaling deeply, she straightened her shoulders and her spine, and swung open the door.
He stood not ten inches from her. Pale. Unsmiling. Tense. His hands were gloved. His dark eyes, impenetrable. As usual, he was impeccably groomed—his cravat rigidly white, his black hair just so, his lithe body clothed in the elegant fashion of yesteryear. The juxtaposition always unsettled Violet’s nerves, as if the man she knew as Mr. Waldegrave was an impostor, a handsome predator disguised as a reclusive widower for reasons she could not begin to fathom. A shiver touched her spine.
And then he smiled. Hesitant, cautious, but soul-wrenchingly earnest. “Good morn, Miss Smythe. I hope you’ve slept well, although I can’t be at all surprised if you have not. I do beg your forgiveness.”
Just like that, the foolish sense of impending danger vanished. Violet released the door handle. She clasped her damp fingers behind her back and regarded him anew. How was it that a kind word and a few crinkles about the eyes managed to transform him from a potential threat to a gracious host? She had learned to trust her instincts long ago, but never before had her gut and her heart been so conflicted.
With what she hoped was a pleasant smile, she dipped a belated curtsy. “Good morning, Mr. Waldegrave. And please, you have done nothing which requires forgiveness.”
“You are too kind. I am on my way to breakfast.” He offered his arm. “Might you join me?”
“I ... Thank you.”
She curled her fingers above the crook of his elbow. The muscle buried beneath was warm and firm. The hem of her gown brushed against the black leather of his boot with every step. Although they did not otherwise touch, his body seemed too close to hers. Inches apart, side by side, as if they were two lovers recovering abed rather than two strangers en route to toast and jam.
She did not for a second believe that her bedchamber was anywhere near the route from his quarters to the main dining room. But as they traversed the sparsely lit abbey in silence, Violet felt herself growing less, rather than more, anxious. If anything, Mr. Waldegrave seemed just as tense as she. The realization that she discomfited him in equal measure was oddly empowering. His manners remained gallant and his step did not falter, but his eyes darted infrequent glances in her direction as if he half-expected her to spring at any moment.
In the breakfast room, it was Mr. Waldegrave, and not a footman, who held her chair and got her seated. It was also he who poured tea,
and served generous helpings of scones and poached eggs—a far cry from the Livingston School’s unglamorous bubble and squeak, and further yet from the years when a “good” breakfast meant brushing dirt from a scrap of stale bread. Seated at such a fine table laid with silver and china, she could almost imagine herself a lady born, rather than a street urchin in governess’s clothing.
Perhaps therein lay the true danger.
Once Mr. Waldegrave had offered sugar cubes for her tea and discussed the advantages of marmalade to blackberry preserves, a crushing silence engulfed the room. Each soft clang of fork to plate rang with the force of a church bell. The whispering candle flames rustled like a thousand autumn leaves, the crunch of her apple deafening.
She could stand the silence no more. She sat up straight and looked him right in the eyes and said, “The apples are delicious.”
Aargh. She could’ve sworn she had aimed for something a bit more interesting on the witty banter scale.
His startled gaze met hers. No, not startled. Relieved. As if he, too, had been battling the oppressive quiet and had been praying for her to break it.
“I am glad. They are not in season, but ... apples are Lillian’s favorite fruit.”
“Mine, too.”
There. They were speaking. Or had spoken, anyway. He had done an admirable job of keeping his end of the topic afloat, but the subject of apples and favorite fruits could not continue indefinitely. It was her turn to continue the conversation.
What else might one discuss at the breakfast table? She slowly sipped at her tea. When inspiration failed to strike, she settled for the classics. “Did you sleep well?”
“Yes, thank you. I ... ” Mr. Waldegrave shook his head and set down his silver. He gazed at her fully, his expression frank and open. “No. I didn’t. I haven’t slept well in years. I imagine you didn’t fare much better, and for that, I apologize.”
“It was nothing,” she said quickly, cursing her tongue for having led back to the one topic she most wished to avoid. “You need not apologize.”
“Someone must, and Lillian ... ” He took a deep breath, but the pain in his eyes did not diminish. He placed his hands upon the table, his voice low but intense. “I swear to you, Miss Smythe. She did not mean it.”