At first it had been easy to dismiss her mother’s dying words as delirium but then as her situation grew more and more desperate, they had begun to haunt her. “Go to Allingham…go to the Hall,” her mother had whispered. Then, tortured breaths later, “Rich, powerful—will look after you.” Allingham she could find easily enough but who was rich and powerful? Who would look after her and why? For days she had pondered that question. Whoever it was, Grainne had trusted him to save her daughter from the poor house, else she would not have willed Elinor to make this journey. But why, then, had there been such long years of silence between them? Perhaps he was elderly, she’d speculated, unable to travel or reclusive, wanting no communication. Or perhaps—and the thought caught at her—he had some connection to the dead father of whom her mother refused to speak. Whatever she’d imagined had proved a mirage. There was no elderly gentleman in need of company, no recluse to be won over. The owner of this rambling pile was a duke, a man not yet thirty, who entertained the premier prince of the land.
****
At last the day came to its close. Exhausted by the unfamiliar hard labor, Elinor trudged back along the path which led to the servants’ quarters. The light was already fading and she had to pick her way carefully along the narrow track. She was just rounding the last bend, her mind empty with fatigue, when she found herself walking straight into the duke. It seemed he had been riding for he was dressed still in breeches and top boots and carried a whip. But what was he doing here? The stables lay at the other side of the house and this path led only to the dairy.
She stepped hastily to one side to allow him to pass. “I beg pardon, Your Grace, I did not see you.” Already she was beginning to adopt a servant’s cringe, she thought.
“Nor I you, Mistress Milford. Dusk has come early tonight.”
They stood for a moment, caught in each other’s gaze, unable or unwilling to move forward.
Then he glanced back along the path he had come. “I must not keep you. You will be wishing to rest.”
That was her cue. She should have scurried away but something stayed her footsteps. “Do you wish to see Martha? You should catch her if you go now, for I left her only minutes ago putting away the last of the jugs.”
For a moment he seemed discomfited. “Then I should not interrupt her. It is a long day in the dairy, is it not?”
“It is, Your Grace, particularly if you are unused to the work—though I’m sure I shall soon become accustomed.”
“I imagine you will, but what was your former occupation?”
He was interesting himself beyond the call of duty but it was for courtesy’s sake only, she told herself.
“I sold goods.” She was deliberately vague. “And that was certainly less tiring than making butter and cream.”
“So why do you no longer sell goods?”
“There is a simple answer, Your Grace. In these difficult times, there are fewer people to buy.”
She hoped that would put a stop to further questions, but she had underestimated him.
“But why choose a dairy?”
“I have had some experience,” she was quick to say, “and if I satisfy, it will be secure work.”
“I’m sure you will—satisfy, I mean.” He was standing very close to her, as close as he had been this morning, and there was the same imperious tone to his voice. Imperious but with a hint of devilry. The apologetic duke had vanished; this was one to be wary of again. Had he in fact been going to the dairy to see her, she wondered, rather than Martha? She turned pink at the notion. The sooner this uncomfortable interview ended, the better.
“I must not keep you, sir,” she prompted.
“I think you mean that I must not keep you,” he returned. “Go then, Nell Milford, go.”
She gave a swift curtsy and hurried along the path, aware of his gaze following her. This morning he had looked at her in the same intense fashion and her skin had prickled beneath his gaze. No doubt that was a duke’s privilege, to look his fill at female servants. She dreaded to think what other privileges he might claim if he liked what he saw. But his interest in her was simple curiosity, she was sure, for she was not to the duke’s taste. Most definitely she was not to his taste. She had earlier caught a glimpse of several of his women guests. One in particular—Lady Letitia Vine, Martha had told her with a snort of contempt—wore a painted face and the most outrageously revealing dress. She could never rival such a woman and she thanked heaven it was so.
Chapter Two
“I dunno where they found yer, but it weren’t from no dairy.”
Elinor had hoped to make a better impression on her second day but Martha was standing watching her, arms akimbo and brow creased with suspicion, while the younger woman clumsily squeezed excess buttermilk from the mixture.
She picked up the heavy wooden pats and with difficulty began wielding them to shape the butter. Martha’s frown deepened.
“I’m not used to these particular pats,” Elinor excused herself.
She had been at work several hours and already her limbs were screaming with pain. She was discovering that making the occasional block of butter for two was a very different prospect to supplying a vast household.
“And my arms are still tired from carrying a heavy valise from Steyning. The stage put me down at the White Horse and it is a good five mile walk from there.”
Her mentor merely snorted and bid her work more quickly.
It was not until they were scouring pails, pats and molds some hours later that Elinor ventured to speak again. “The duke is very young to have succeeded to his title.”
The head dairymaid had been at Allingham her entire working life and it was possible, Elinor thought, that she rather than the duke might hold the answers she sought.
“Put more salt in the water,” was all Martha would offer. “Else we’ll ’ave the butter stickin’.”
“I’ve always thought of dukes as old men,” she pursued, hoping her obvious stupidity would unleash her companion’s tongue. It did.
“Dukes is young, old, ugly, ’ansome. This ’un is young and ’ansome. And reckliss.” A rough noise escaped Martha which Elinor took to be a laugh.
“Aren’t all young men reckless?” she asked guilelessly.
“Mebbe, but this ’un has the devil ridin’ ’im and that’s a fact.”
“In what way?” Martha’s willingness to talk was unusual and Elinor seized the moment.
“Drinkin’ and gamblin’ and carousin’ with that no good crowd.” The older woman shook her head irritably. “It ain’t right, not for a duke it ain’t.”
“How long has he been duke?”
“Two year—that were when ’is uncle took a toss. Tried to jump too ’igh and broke ’is neck,” she finished in answer to Elinor’s unspoken question.
“That must have been felt a great tragedy on the estate.”
“Nah. A bit of a tartar ’e were, though my mum allus said ’e were different as a boy.”
“Your mother worked here?”
“Nigh on thirty year,” Martha said proudly, “right ’ere in this dairy. Taught me everythin’ I know’d. She ’ad the sharpest pair of ’ands, fair box yer ears if yer didn’t mind ’er, but she were the neatest butter maker in all Sussex.”
“The old duke sounds very different from his nephew.”
“Mebbe, mebbe not. ’E weren’t none too pure as a young ’un either.”
Elinor looked questioningly at her mentor. “Stories,” Martha said in a harsh whisper.
“There’s always gossip.”
“Not gossip,” she said firmly. “Scandal. Big scandal—a woman, o’course. Some furriner or other. But it were ’ushed up. So don’t you go talkin’.”
“I won’t,” Elinor made haste to reassure her.
“Yer better not. It’d be more than me job’s worth. Claremonts own most o’ the county and nobody tangles with ’em.”
It was the longest conversation Elinor had had with her fellow s
ervant and the effort seemed temporarily to exhaust them both. Silence spread except for the clattering of pans and pails. Martha’s testimony raised more questions than it answered but the wall of silence she’d painted was intriguing—Allingham appeared to be a place of secrets. The reference to a foreign woman hung tantalizingly in the air for though she knew little of her mother’s past, Grainne had once confided that as a young girl she had fled her family in Ireland. Would not an Irish woman seem foreign to one who had never ventured further than her birth place?
She was clinging to straws. She knew nothing of her family’s history and Grainne, who had kept silent for so long, could not now fill the gaps. She must try to fill them for herself. She must withstand whatever mocking insolence these so-called noblemen could fling until she had searched for some trace of herself, of her mother, in this place. She had no idea where to start and thought it unlikely she would succeed. But she must try. Tonight, though, she was bone weary. Two long days in the dairy had succeeded the hardships of a difficult journey; tonight she would seek her bed the minute she had eaten.
****
Supper was over and she made for the small bedroom she shared with the kitchen maid. Once out of the servants’ hall, she took a right turn, imagining she was walking towards the back staircase which led directly to the top floor of the house. But she was mistaken and instead found herself in the Great Hall. It was immense. Dark oak paneling might have given it a somber look but for a cupola of colored glass at the very top of the building, three floors up, which allowed the evening light to flood the space, glinting off the suits of armor stationed around its walls and creating pools of golden light here and there on the flagstones. She was entranced and instead of turning back, she walked slowly around the enormous space. Portraits lined the walls, dead Claremonts, she assumed. She came to rest at the two largest paintings. They were of a Charles and Louisa Claremont and the severity of the faces startled her. From out of a dark backdrop two pairs of black eyes stared coldly beneath two pairs of black brows. The white curls of their wigs, oddly old-fashioned now, seemed the sole relief from the portrait’s unremitting gloom. Even their rich clothes were muted in hue. She looked at the line of writing beneath their names: Painted on the occasion of their marriage, November 1794. If that was how they looked on their wedding day, how did their marriage ever prosper?
She should have left then and scuttled back to the safety of the servants’ area. Charles and Louisa had just one message for her and it was that she didn’t belong where she stood. But an enormous spiral staircase at the end of the hall was too tempting. It wound its sinuous pathway in a double helix through the whole height of the building. Would it not be helpful to know something of the layout of the house? She tiptoed up the staircase to the first floor and was met by a battalion of doors. The first three or four proved to be cupboards or led to unused spaces, but further along the corridor a door stood open. From a brief glimpse, she could see it was a drawing room. The next door displayed a helpful label which told her it was the Music Room. The final door was shut and unlabeled.
Very slowly she opened it just a few inches but she could see immediately from the wall nearest her that the room was a library—a very large library—and as far she could see, empty of inhabitants. She was about to slip into the room when a noise from the hall below made her jump back and flatten herself against the corridor’s wood paneling, but it was only Mr. Jarvis chivvying an idle footman. She let out her breath; she had been so gripped by her exploration she hadn’t known she was holding it. The scare had been a reminder, though, that she needed to proceed a deal more cautiously. Swiftly she retraced her path, intent on regaining the servants’ hall as quickly as possible.
“Are you lost, Nell?” It was the butler who materialized at her side as she regained the bottom stair.
She tried to keep her voice calm. “I must have taken a wrong turning, Mr. Jarvis.”
“This part of the house is out of bounds to any but house servants and then only between certain hours.” His voice was coldly severe, punishment if not dismissal lurking in every syllable. She waited to hear her fate but rescue was to come from an unexpected quarter.
“Jarvis, where are those damn deeds? They need to be with the lawyers—now!”
Gabriel Claremont erupted into the hall from a room at its furthest end, his hand combing an agitated path through already rumpled hair. Close fitting fawn breeches and glossy top boots were his sole concession to formality. A waistcoat of blue embroidered silk was left unbuttoned to reveal the frilled white shirt loosely cloaking his powerful frame. In his half-dressed state, he looked little more than a boy, she thought. A small jolt disturbed the measured rhythm of her heart.
The butler’s severity vanished and harassment took its place. “Hannah took them to the study, Your Grace, and placed them on your desk. She found them in the library while dusting.”
“Dusting!” Gabriel’s voice bounced off the flagstones. “Important legal papers—and they are to be at the mercy of a housemaid’s cloth!”
“The documents were found beneath the family bible, Your Grace. There is a deal of paper stored in the room and the book had been used as a weight.”
Gabriel strode furiously towards him. “A deal of paper which that rascally bailiff was supposed to organize months ago. Where is the villain?”
“Mr. Joffey is visiting Hurstwood to oversee renovations, I believe.” If the butler was trying to soothe the situation, it did not appear to be working. Gabriel’s expression was unrelenting. “The property your late uncle left to Mr. Roland?” Jarvis added hopefully.
“I know what Hurstwood is, dammit, and I’ve no interest. Meanwhile I’m left poking around this mausoleum trying to find deeds which will allow Pargiter to buy the fields his family has been renting for centuries. It’s not good enough.”
“No, Your Grace. I quite see that. Allow me to search your study.”
“You’ll be wasting your time.”
“A minute only, Your Grace.”
Gabriel shrugged his shoulders in irritation and began to retrace his steps when he became aware of Elinor standing silently beneath the portraits of Charles and Louisa.
“Nell? Nell Milford? Are you not a little far from home? Or were you intending to set up a dairy in my hall?” He moved closer and she felt the warmth of his body filling the space between them.
He looked up at the portraits hanging above her head and grimaced. “Or is it perhaps that you are transfixed by my family history?” He made an expansive gesture with his right arm, “Allow me to introduce you, Nell. I give you Uncle Charles and Aunt Louisa.”
She followed his glance and a shudder traced its way down her spine.
“Terrifying, aren’t they?” he asked genially. “But not half as terrifying as they were alive.”
She did not know how to reply since her menial position made it impossible to express her true feelings. “They are…uncompromising,” she managed at last.
“And you are a diplomat, Nell. But be honest. How would you like that pair hanging in your house? You should be thankful you have no hall in which to hang your ancestors.”
“I have no ancestors either,” she replied composedly, “at least none I know of.”
“No ancestors? You have no family?” Once more, he seemed genuinely interested. His blue eyes, almost sapphire in color, were fixed on her face and she felt another uncomfortable jolt. What was he doing talking to her like this? It was unfair. She was the dairymaid and should not be mixing with a duke—or with his attractions.
“I have no family living that I know of,” she amended.
“Then we are in the same case.”
Should she remind him he had a cousin and an aunt, housed just yards away? She thought not. It was as though Roland and his mother did not exist for him.
With barely a pause, he spoke again. “Do you consider it a blessing, Nell, or a sadness? Not having a family, I mean.”
“A sadness, Your G
race, an infinite sadness.”
His expression softened at her words and she was emboldened to ask, “And you?”
He looked back at the portraits once more and then gazed past them as though he would bore through the oak paneling to a world beyond. When he spoke, his tone was dull with weariness. “One cannot choose one’s family. On balance I would say it’s a blessing.”
“Your Grace, I have the papers here.” Jarvis bustled importantly towards them. “Hannah placed them underneath the blotter, foolish girl. I will arrange for them to be dispatched to the lawyers in Brighton without delay.”
Then, noticing that Elinor was still where she should not be, the butler made haste to excuse the lapse. “Please forgive this intrusion, Your Grace. The girl is new and does not know her way around. Leaving the servants’ hall, she inadvertently took the wrong turning.”
Gabriel smiled faintly. “Don’t we all at some time or another?”
He turned back towards his study and Jarvis shooed Elinor through the door into the servants’ passageway.
****
As the week wore on, she began to find the work less onerous. Martha might have a sharp tongue but she was good hearted and with her help Elinor was becoming skilled enough to earn her mentor’s qualified praise.
“I’ll give it yer. Yer may not be as fast as Letty but yer neater. And yer don’t waste time flirtin’ with them that’s above yer touch.”
It was fortunate, Elinor reflected, that she was used to domestic work. Fortunate, too, that the girl whose job she had taken had never arrived. From a young age Nell had been given charge of the Bath household, spending her days cooking and cleaning, helping Grainne to mix paints, buy supplies and spread the word to bring in new customers for her mother’s delicately painted miniatures. She had given little thought to the future—not, that is, until that desperate January day when Grainne had returned from delivering her latest commission, soaked and shivering. There had been no money for a doctor, no money for nourishing food or even for warmth during what had been the bitterest winter for years, and a severe chill had quickly turned to pneumonia. But she must not allow herself to drown in sadness; she was here for a purpose, to carry out Grainne’s last wish.
Love's Tangle Page 2