Lettice led Mia over to the kitchen table and handed her a handkerchief that she found at the bottom of her apron pocket.
“It’s because of having nothing to do. It’s idle hands that let you go all forlorn. That’s what my mother says. And at my house, there’s a million things to do so you’ll be soon be as cheerful as a chirping wren. Shall I put the kettle on, then?”
Lettice waddled over to the stove and set the kettle on the burner with a thump.
“He’d be a hard one to resist though even if he did seem a bit unresponsive. I talk enough for two people, least that’s what John says, but I think you might need a man with the gift of gab. Think how silent the house would be otherwise. Your children would never learn how to talk at all since they’d never hear a voice! I’ll ask John if he knows a man with a bit of chatter in him. Perhaps an Irishman. They’re leaving Ireland in droves so there might be a few about. Even when they’re starving, they’ll talk an ear off.”
Mia sniffled in Lettice’s handkerchief and remained silent. Most women would be glad of Lettice’s offer…a clean, safe house with little work. Willie was a lovable child and John was a likable man, a combination that Mia had discovered over the years was rarer than not. And Lettice’s non-stop ramblings might get a little tiresome, but she was certainly better than every other employer Mia had met.
But the thought of remaining in the same little town with the same people for the remainder of her life seemed so depressing now. She would likely never meet another man who didn’t smell of manure or who would read her French books or threaten only to wear a helmet to bed. Well, most men probably would do the last if given any encouragement.
“Mia? Mia?” Lettice said with exasperation and Mia realized that Lettice had been rattling on while she had been lost in thought. “Honestly, Mia, I’m trying to help you here. Where are you going to go? What will you do? Even with Granny Newcomb’s money, you’re going to need a place to stay now and employment soon.” Lettice frowned at her, her cupid’s bow of a mouth turning just slightly down at the corners.
Mia knew she was being ungrateful, but it was so hard not to feel bitter looking at Lettice with her evidence of a supremely satisfactory life. Lettice had loving parents, a profitable farm, a devoted husband and, in all likelihood, two healthy children – all accomplished while being younger than Mia.
“Mia,” Lettice said gently, but with a tone that made Mia brace herself for words she wouldn’t want to hear. “For all our joking, you always knew a man like that would never be with a woman like…us.”
But Mia had heard the slight pause in Lettice’s voice. She knew that Lettice was going to say “you,” not “us.” Because Lettice, her only friend, still thought Mia was beneath her. She likely thought Mia was beneath everyone in the village...good enough to marry some desperate Irishman but never to do better than Lettice herself had.
“Now,” Lettice said briskly now that the unpleasantness had been said. “We need to make a plan for you. Are you finished here? Should I tell John you’re coming tonight? Though we don’t want to move your things in this unrelenting rain! He’d be in a rare gudgeon if I asked him to pull that barrel through the mud!”
The heavy oak barrel was now empty, waiting for another six months of ashes to fill it again. Randolph King had delivered the rapeseed oil just after Dominic had left. In an effort to stay busy, she’d finished the soap, the last of it curing the day before. She’d managed to negotiate with Mr. Guest to buy the lot of it, saving only a few bars for herself.
“Hey, yo!” A voice shouted from the road and Lettice walked to the door to check on the new arrival. Mia remained in her seat.
“It’s your father!” Lettice said in delight, waving at him from the open door. “He’s a fine- looking man. My father looks like the back end of a goat.”
Tom Tillman strode into the cottage, shaking his hat off at the door and sending raindrops scattering in every direction.
“Mia mine, I found you a position,” he announced after greeting a beaming Lettice.
“Already?” Lettice looked properly impressed while Mia’s eyes remained fixed on the table’s surface.
“Pack your bags and we’ll be off.”
“In this storm?” Lettice protested.
“Oh, it’s just mizzling now.” Tom winked at Lettice and grinned, his white teeth momentarily dazzling beneath his mustache. “It’s a fine position, Mia. I don’t want to let this opportunity slip from your fingers.”
Mia eyed him doubtfully for a moment but rose from her seat, her movements slow and careful like an old woman’s. She dully went to her bedroom and began to pack her few belongings in her trunk.
“You’re looking finer every hour, Mrs. Denning. That John knows he’s a lucky man. Let’s hope this baby is a girl and has at least half of her mother’s beauty.”
Mia glowered as she snapped open her trunk. She could hear Lettice protesting in the other room but knew that Lettice would be delighting in the flattery.
It only took minutes to pack. Everything else would remain in the cottage: the new washtub, the troublesome stove, the now sturdy table. Mia didn’t even think her memories would pass the front door – they didn’t belong in the world beyond the footbridge either.
“Oh! The rain is nearly over! How did you know, Mr. Tillman?” Lettice said with some surprise as Mia excited the bedroom, her trunk dragging behind her and her bonnet set on her head over her tightly wound bun.
“With age comes wisdom,” Tom quipped as he hurried forward to take the trunk handle from Mia and then lifting the entire thing off the floor. “Now, my dear Mrs. Denning, I hate to rush Mia out the door, but we want to make Colsterworth by dark and the days are getting shorter.”
“Where are we going?” Mia asked, though she hardly cared.
“South. We’ll escape the cold for a little while longer. We’ll make a few stops along the way, earn some pennies while we can, and be at your new abode in a week or two.” Tom grunted as the edge of the trunk struck the doorframe.
“Will they wait that long? Aren’t they expecting me?” Mia asked as Lettice yelped, “You expect her to sleep for weeks in that wagon?”
Continuing down the path towards the footbridge and the road, Tom didn’t bother to answer either of them. Mia started for the back of the cottage where she kept her lye barrel but then he called out to her.
“You won’t need that now! Can’t fit it in the wagon in any case. I’ll fetch it ‘round next time I see you.”
Mia trudged after him through the soggy yard, the ground squishing under her shoes. Hannibal, her father’s draft horse, stared sorrowfully as she approached, saddened that he too was standing in the cold drizzle.
But her father was right. The clouds were clearing. In only a few minutes, there’d likely only be gray clouds and muddy roads to weather.
“Mia!” a voice called from the top of the hill. Mia looked up and saw Reverend Martin hurrying toward them, his feet sliding once as he descended the hill, either from the now slippery dirt road or the scattered autumn leaves that had been littering paths for the past week.
“Hello, Reverend.” Mia watched him as he drew closer, the misting rain making his features indistinct in the gray light. The wagon’s garish yellow and scarlet flowers appeared even more startling next to Reverend Martin’s black cassock.
“Tom.” Reverend Martin nodded coldly at her father, but Tom Tillman flashed his usual cock-sure grin despite the luke-warm greeting as he opened the wagon’s door and hoisted the trunk inside. “I saw the wagon come by and knew its destination. Mia, you don’t have to go. We can find you work here. We could always use a few more hands to help clean the church and the rectory.”
“That would be charity and you know it,” Mia said, touched by the earnest expression on his craggy face. “You don’t need to drain the church coffer’s just to please me. Mrs. Liveret would be insulted if you even hinted that you would hire another to help her.”
“Alrea
dy have her a position lined up,” Tom informed the rector cheerfully as he shut and locked the wagon’s door. “We’re leaving now.”
“But this could be your home,” Reverend Martin told Mia, taking her hand in both of his gnarled ones.
“She’s already decided and packed,” Tom said as he rudely pushed past the rector. “Climb on up, Mia, girl.”
Rolling her eyes at her father’s sudden hurry – he’d never been one to move faster than a stroll his entire life, Mia patted Reverend Martin’s hands with her still free one. “Can you keep my funds safe for me until I ask for them? You’re the only one I trust.”
She wondered briefly if her father hadn’t heard her muttered words though she didn’t much care if he had. She’d never pretended that she thought he was financially savvy.
Reverend Martin gave a jerky nod. He was obviously unhappy with her decision, but he held out a hand to give her assistance into the wagon’s seat.
“Oh, and please take five pounds for the church expenses. And give five pounds to Mrs. Ingram.” Mia thought of Jean and all her siblings in that forlorn little house by the roadside. She wouldn’t be able to help Jean now but perhaps those five pounds would bring a bit more food and warmth to that miserable house and convince Jean not to run off with the first stranger who offered. At least for a few more months.
Reverend Martin scowled in confusion, his bushy black and gray eyebrows lowering over his bright eyes. “Mr. Attwood paid Mrs. Marwood to bring them supper every night until January. And he left a portion to give to Mrs. Ingram if she finally takes the notion of tossing that husband of hers out on his ear.”
“Oh.”
Dominic’s unexpected kindness should have made her happy but for some foolish reason, she felt like crying again. Mia gave a watery smile to the rector and pressed her hand into his again.
“Thank you, sir, for everything. You’ve made me feel very welcome. I shall miss you.”
“You’ll always have a home here, Mia,” Reverend Martin said earnestly.
“Oh! I should say goodbye to Lettice!” Mia hopped off the wagon seat, her shoes immediately squelching in the mud and dashed back towards the cottage where Lettice waited in the doorway. Lettice merely raised a dark blond eyebrow in mock annoyance at Mia nearly forgetting her. They both smiled through light tears and embraced, though Mia could hardly reach Lettice’s shoulders because of her friend’s enormous stomach.
“I’ll write once I’m settled,” Mia promised.
“And I’ll tell you all the gossip. And about the baby if it decides to come in the next month or two!” Lettice added with a chuckle. “Take care of yourself, Mia.”
Mia stepped back out into the drizzle, leaving Lettice in the protection of the cottage’s doorway. She knew Lettice wouldn’t want to return home in the rain and would enjoy an hour or two of solitude before again taking on the responsibilities of caring for husband and child and household.
She had nearly reached the wagon again when she could hear Reverend Martin and her father having an argument – Reverend Martin was whispering but the tension was impossible to ignore.
“I believe your kind say, ‘Trust in the father. He works in mysterious ways,’” Tom Tillman said cheerfully. “All set, Mia? Up you come, then.”
“We are referring to our Heavenly Father,” Reverend Martin nearly spat.
“Well, pray that He shall make our path straight. Or at least, that we don’t become stuck in a ditch,” Tom Tillman said, his own good mood impossible to quell. “Thank you for your words of wisdom. Pray for us on our journey. Do good deeds. Blessed be all who do the work of the Lord. And remember that miracles happen every day.”
He clicked his tongue once and Hannibal plodded forward, the wagon creaking and groaning in his wake. The drizzle ceased but an icy north wind whipped down the hill and pulled fiercely at Mia’s bonnet and the hem of her skirt. It seemed that summer had left with Dominic and now winter had arrived before autumn had even found a foothold.
The wagon continued down the road and when they reached a curve, Mia turned her head, intent on seeing the little cottage one last time and perhaps wave to Lettice and Reverend Martin if they were still in the doorway. As she turned her head, her father spoke, not unkindly but more firmly than she could ever recall.
“No need to look back. There’s nothing left for you there. Eyes forward, my girl.”
Chapter 16
London, early November
“Lord Swithun! Lord Swithun! Dominic!”
Dominic turned towards the voice with some irritation. He was steps away from his London residence only to be accosted on the street.
“Oh, it’s you,” Dominic said flatly. Lord Theodore Pritchard walked jauntily towards him, his mop of curly brown hair crammed under his tall top hat.
“I haven’t seen you at Gilchrist’s in ages.” Theo grinned charmingly despite Dominic’s glare. “Please don’t say you’re avoiding the club because of me.”
“You sent me to the ends of the earth.”
“And I expected you back in London months ago! I thought you would enjoy some air free of smog, give that monstrous gelding of yours a chance to stretch his legs, and return home within the week. Don’t tell me you’ve been stewing in Hampshire all these months.”
“I returned to Hampshire in August. I only arrived in London yesterday.” Dominic chose not to reveal that he had no intentions of visiting Gilchrist’s that day or any other. Lounging about in clubs an entire day before finding an event to pass the evening hours no longer appealed to him. Truthfully, it never had appealed to him; he just hadn’t realized it until recently.
“You returned home in August? You must have found Lincolnshire more charming than I would have thought. I found it delightful last year – or was it two now? – but I haven’t been brought up in your circle. Did Reverend Martin threaten to eat you alive?”
“I wouldn’t call him welcoming.” Despite his annoyance with Lord Pritchard, Dominic couldn’t help smiling ruefully. “He does speak highly of you still. I almost felt like it was a competition…who is the better lord? You undoubtedly won.”
“Finally!” Theo turned his face to the sky and shaking his head as if couldn’t believe his good fortune. “You may have taken all the awards at Harrow but…years later…after disarming intimidating rectors, I finally come in first. But, before I am quite overwhelmed, how did you find Lincolnshire. Bucolic? Pastoral?”
“I believe those are synonyms. And yes, the countryside could be referred to as both. Hardly surprising.”
“But you obviously enjoyed yourself. You rusticated for nearly two months! Did the Scott boys try to steal a pig again? That was the height of my experience.”
“I don’t believe…”
But Dominic was saved from finding a worthy anecdote by the arrival of his brother-in-law, Lord Burton Bingham. Burton’s eager demeanor always put Dominic in mind of a rather overzealous dog – loyal but with a devotion that could be off-putting to some.
“Dominic, I didn’t know you were in town!” Burton was dressed to impress, no doubt due to his wife, Venetia’s discerning eye. Most men, including Dominic, would have shuddered at the thought of wearing a purple paisley vest but Bingham managed to look at the height of fashion. “Venetia is already inside calling upon Lady Swithun and your sisters. I brought her some chocolates as a treat. Hello, I’m Lord Burton Bingham, Lord Swithun’s brother.”
His brother-in-law made a smart bow while avoiding crushing the bright bow that was carefully tied around the chocolate box he was carrying.
“Lord Theodore Pritchard. You may call me Theo.”
“Of course, I wouldn’t. My mother-in-law would breathe fire at the thought,” Burton returned cheerfully as he stepped around the two men to climb the townhouse’s front stairs. “If you don’t have another engagement, come along inside, Lord Pritchard. I’m sure all the ladies will be charmed by you. They love making new acquaintances, eh, Dominic?”
“Thank you, Lord Bingham. I’d be delighted.” Theo’s green eyes sparkled as he cast an amused look over his shoulder as he followed Lord Bingham up the stairs.
Irritated, Dominic trailed behind the unwelcome visitors as he entered his own home.
“Hello, everyone!” Burton declared exuberantly as led the way into the parlor.
“Good afternoon!” chimed Dominic’s sisters, Edith and Georgiana. Lady Swithun, Dominic’s mother, and Lady Venetia Bingham, his eldest sister, both gave gracious nods.
“And Dominic is joining us?” Edith exclaimed happily. “He so rarely graces us with his presence.”
Dominic ignored her and nodded curtly to their other guests. It appeared an intimate family tea was already out of the question – his mother’s dear friend, Lady Darwinkle, and her nephew, Lord Felling, already had cups in hand. Dominic wished he had merely continued up the stairs to his room after handing the butler his hat instead of joining them in the parlor.
“And I’ve invited Lord…I do apologize. I’ve already forgotten your name,” Burton Bingham confessed as he took a seat next to his wife. Dominic noticed she took the chocolate box from his hands and immediately tucked it out of sight while everyone else was looking expectantly at the newcomer.
“Lord Theodore Pritchard,” he introduced himself, his smile sweeping the room. “But you may call me Theo.”
“Certainly not,” Lady Swithun immediately replied as she reached for the teapot. “Lord Pritchard, how do take your tea?”
“Oh, uh, one sugar, please.” Theo quickly took an empty seat. Georgiana passed him the teacup, leaning, and giving an eyebrow-raising display of her cleavage. Dominic noticed Theo’s eyes dart twice towards his sister’s low-cut bodice and wondered vaguely if he should do something. On one hand, Dominic was her brother and the patriarch of the family. On the other, Georgiana was twenty-five years old and needed a husband. If she needed to chum the waters with a display of bosom, he could hardly protest. His mother had approved the gown at any rate, so it was effectively out of his hands.
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