A Rumored Fortune

by Joanna Davidson Politano

  Ellen moved her attention to me. “I suppose you will accompany your mother, Tressa. Perhaps Neville and I will remain behind. Someone must monitor these servants with slick fingers or you shall return to an empty house.”

  Smiling over clamped teeth, I looked toward my cousin-in-law. “I wouldn’t hear of it, Ellen. It’s dear of you to offer, but I insist you go with us. Where else will you be able to wear that creation of yours with the peacock feathers sprouting from it?”

  Finally we all rose to retire in the drawing room. I lingered just inside the doors, finding to my surprise that I desired the company of Donegan in that moment more than anyone else in the room. Perhaps if I’d been surrounded by a more likable crowd of people, he would not be the best company afforded me.

  “You really ought to start telling the truth.” Donegan’s words immediately threw a chill on my brief moment of warmth toward him.

  “When have I been dishonest?”

  “You need to tell Ellen plainly that she isn’t entitled to your money. It’s the only method that will work with her.”

  I stepped close to keep my words private. “Spend one day in the society I keep and you’ll see why I speak as I do.”

  “I doubt it.”

  “Plain speaking is for the villagers and working men.”

  “Well-bred society is too good for the truth.”

  I grimaced. “Stop twisting my words.”

  “I’m merely interpreting.”

  “Badly.” I cast him a steady look. “Good night, Mr. Vance.” I turned away and left the lingering party for the library, wondering why I even bothered talking to the man.

  With sure steps, he followed me into the room of walnut paneling and perfectly kept books and touched my arm. “Truth isn’t as dangerous as you think. Doesn’t it say in Scripture that the truth will set you free? Well, maybe it will for you.”

  “It also says to speak the truth in love, which you seem to find impossible to do.”

  “So the way you speak to your cousin, that’s loving?”

  I hesitated, biting my lip as I recalled the jabs draped in silk. “No, it isn’t.”

  “It would serve everyone far better if you spoke plainly. Once the sting of truth is dealt, it can begin to heal, but an unspoken truth festers for a long time.”

  “I see. Being cruel to be kind.” I wandered along the wall covered in paintings, running my finger along the intricately carved frames. “There are so many colors and brushstrokes at our disposal, and each combination can paint the same scene in a different way.” I paused before the recent addition I’d convinced Mother to bring home from France, a plein air painting of a seaside hill covered with wildflowers and people. It had been ridiculously inexpensive because it so departed from the classic style. “There are many ways to convey the same thing, and there’s value in softening the harsher messages with love.”

  “You’ll not convince me to speak anything but truth.”

  “Just like you did to Mrs. Campbell, that woman we visited in the village who offered you a share in the labor of her heart, which I believe you in turn said was terrible.”

  He looked across the rows of books, his forehead creased in a sudden frown. “I never said that.”

  “More or less.”

  The hardness melted rapidly from his features, leaving a broken despair in its place. He turned, looking directly at the intricately patterned rug. “You’re right. That was foolish. It must have hurt her.”

  I gripped the edge of the desk and leaned against it. Could it truly be that easy to reach this man? The shell of callousness around his heart seemed to be paper-thin, with an abundance of tenderness just below the surface. Perhaps there was hope for him.

  The look of desolation seared across his face drew my instant pity. With a sigh, I leaned over the desk and wrote a verse onto an empty page of the log book. It was one I’d been made to memorize when I was in the schoolroom with my tutors and had not yet learned to control my tongue.

  He that keepeth his mouth keepeth his life: but he that openeth wide his lips shall have destruction.

  I tore the paper from the book and extended it to him with a smile of encouragement. “Perhaps this will offer you guidance when you need it.”

  He read it with a grim expression, then turned back to me with a troubled look and stumbled over his sincere question. “How should I soften the words, then? How do I speak gently and still . . . ?”

  “There’s always something you can find to compliment, no matter the food before you.”

  “Not at some of the tables I’ve shared.”

  “Then tell them kindly that you didn’t care for it. Say it is not to your taste.”

  “Not to my taste. I can do that.” He gave a firm nod.

  Then his gaze roamed the paintings on the high walls. “Are any of these yours?”

  Mine. As if my paintings were official and important.

  “I’ve not painted a single one of these, if that’s what you mean.”

  “You should display yours. You communicate a great deal through your work, simply by arranging colors so brilliantly. I don’t believe I’d ever tire of staring into them, and I’m certain others would feel the same.”

  Jarred by the matter-of-fact compliment that carried no trace of false flattery, I closed my mouth and fingered the edge of the desk.

  Amos rapped lightly on the doorframe and entered with a bow. “Tea is set out in the gallery, miss. The others are taking part already.”

  “Thank you, Amos. I’ll be along presently.”

  With another bow he backed out of the room, again leaving me alone with Donegan. The man stepped forward and offered me his arm to escort me back to the waiting party.

  We rounded the corner into the front hall with a swish of my skirts. “Will you be joining us for tea, Mr. Vance?”

  His jaw flinched before he answered. “Thank you, but tea is not to my taste, Miss Harlowe. I prefer to fill my insides with solid food.” He bowed over our clasped hands.

  With a crooked smile I sank into a brief curtsy and departed into the gallery with the others, heart still simmering with amusement from the brief encounter. Tea and gossip seemed insufferably boring after the authentic, thought-provoking conversation I’d just left. My mind wandered and I glanced around the room and out the window.

  It lingered there idly until a flash of movement caught my attention and drew me back to full awareness. As my mind filled with thoughts of treasure hunters and forgotten heirs, I excused myself from the waning gathering, leaving the room with a candle. I ran to a side door and pushed out into the night to look about.

  A soft, pathetic whimper drew my gaze to the left. A scrap of a girl leaned against the kitchen tower’s stone buttress, sobbing as if her very life flowed down her cheeks and onto the grass beneath her. I studied the unfamiliar child in tatters, wondering which servant was her parent.

  As I neared, I felt as if I watched my childhood self crying. The suffering I saw in her bent posture, in the forward fall of her little shoulders, climbed through me with a familiar dull ache. Silently I strode toward her and placed a hand on the wild mass of red curls. She did not push me away, so I smoothed the curls with all the tenderness of empathy and understanding. She turned her face to me, those red-rimmed eyes studying mine, but she said nothing.

  “Life can be a hard burden, especially with shoulders as small as those.”

  She sniffed, smearing her sleeve across her nose. “I’m older than I look.”

  Even the defiant thrust of her chin resembled my own years ago. Too often adults had made the mistake of speaking to me as a child when my heart had been far older. I knelt before her, leaning my shoulder against the buttress, and smiled at her. “Perhaps you only looked small because you were standing next to this gigantic tower. I can see in your eyes that you have the mind of a grown person. Has Mrs. Hodgson in the kitchen been cross with you? She used to scare the life out of me at times.”

  Her expressi
ve eyebrows lifted and then turned down in a frown as she mulled over her answer. “I only wanted to smell the tarts. I wouldn’t ’ave snitched any.”

  “That’s unkind of her not to let you smell them. Perhaps she didn’t know that’s all you wanted.”

  In the moments of silence that followed, the little form under the cloak trembled slightly. I ached to take this little one and wrap her in an embrace, but I settled for rubbing small circles on her back. This simple touch unleashed a fresh flood of tears that pooled under her red-rimmed eyes, then rolled down her freckled face. “She ain’t like me mum, that nasty old cook. Mum used to make tarts for my birthday and leave them in the windowsill.” Her head drooped until her chin hit her chest.

  “Is it your birthday?”

  The lowered head nodded.

  I squeezed her shoulder and rose. “Wait here.”

  I hurried into the kitchen where a startled Mrs. Hodgson spun to greet me. “Miss Harlowe. We weren’t expecting the likes of ye down here. Was something the matter with your meal?”

  “Dinner was lovely, but that isn’t why I’m here. I’m afraid I’ll be commandeering one of your wonderful tarts. And please fetch me a small candle.”

  I accepted the plate from the confused woman and lit the candle after pushing it firmly into the little delicacy. Backing out the door, I smiled my thanks and cupped my hand around the tiny flame. When I rounded the tower’s buttress where the little girl remained, those shadowed brown eyes widened in surprise at the sight of the platter.

  I knelt before her and smiled warmly, bittersweet feelings pumping through my veins. “And now, you have to make a wish before you blow out the candle.” I righted the candle that insisted on tilting sideways and extended the plate to her.

  As I watched her, eyes shining in the candle’s light, my mind was drawn back to a morning in the vineyard with Father. “It’s a wishbone, Tressa girl. For making wishes.” He held the dried V-shaped bone up before us. “You pull one end and I pull the other. Whoever gets the stem on top gets his wish.”

  He’d caught me staring at the sunrise from the kitchen and pulled me out into the vineyard for what he called a “front row seat.” We sat against posts in the field, the soil rich and cool below us. I couldn’t have been much older than six, yet I recalled every vivid detail of the rare glimpse into this tender side of Father. We had taken turns naming the various colors streaking across the sky when we felt a simple “pink” or “orange” would not suffice, then we sat in silence and simply delighted in the canvas of the sky. I thought it a most perfect morning. So when he pulled out the bone in that misty dawn hour and coaxed me to make a wish, I quickly said, “I already know what I’ll wish for, Father. I want—”

  “You can’t tell me what it is, girl. But whatever you wish, make sure to ask for an abundance of it. If you take my advice, you’ll wish for a good husband with plenty of love for you.”

  But at that time I cared nothing for a husband, good or bad. Pursing my lips, I silently stated the most ardent wish of my heart in one short phrase. I wish for an abundance of this.

  Almost two decades later, I had nearly the same wish. Looking into the dewy eyes of the flame-haired girl before me, I smiled warmly and stirred the little flicker of hope that had smoldered quietly within me for days.

  Please, Lord. Let that wish come true one day.

  19

  No one but the vintner can walk among his dead-looking crop at winter and know just how much abundant life is lying below the surface, just waiting for the spring to wake it up to vibrant life and glory in its season.

  —Notebook of a viticulturist

  Donegan planted his shoulder solidly against a beech tree as he watched the little scene unfold near the house. Her entire posture like a gentle caress, the princess of the castle knelt before his tiny niece and spoke words that, judging by the woman’s expression, could only be the kindest sort. Watching her thus, bent in service to a small child so reduced in station, sparked waves of admiration that engulfed him. Despite who Miss Harlowe was, in this moment her loveliness deepened and intensified until he saw nothing but the beauty of a woman who would stoop to the level of a hurting child.

  And in that soft twilight, with moonbeams casting down on them all, he began to yearn. Fervently, eagerly, and without the restraint of reason. The girl who had at once intrigued and drawn him had now burrowed so deeply into his heart with these newly revealed layers of beauty, that she would not easily be removed.

  “For all your talk about being the manager, you don’t spend much time gazing out at the fields.” Lucy stepped near to him in the shadow of the great tree. “Leastwise, not the same way you gaze at other things.”

  Donegan crossed his arms and turned to smile at the maid. “Have you left your duties just to hassle me?”

  Her plain little face grew serious. “You told me to come to you if I ever heard anything you should know.”

  “Something about the treasure?”

  “No, it’s that horrid cousin of hers, Mr. Vance.” She hesitated, looking away. “Amos and I overheard him making plans. He’s going to that painting show, and he told his wife he had a plan to keep the family away from Trevelyan.”

  Donegan glanced toward the massive structure that contained so many vile people, as well as a fortune that made them all even viler. “Did he say what it was?”

  “No, sir. Only that his wife wasn’t to fret about having to leave the castle with them. He said they’d be back alone to look about for the fortune soon enough. I’m afraid they won’t let off until they’ve ruined her, or worse.”

  “Thank you, Lucy. I suppose I better go along, then. I can take my horse.”

  Her breath whooshed out in a sigh of relief. “I’m that glad to hear it, Mr. Donegan. She needs someone to protect her, even if she don’t think so.”

  The moon lighted Lucy’s lopsided mop cap as she followed Donegan’s gaze to Miss Harlowe and Ginny.

  “An odd sight, is it not?” Donegan kept his voice low.

  “I’ll say. I’ve not seen anything like that hair outside of a glowing hearth.”

  “I meant her. Miss Harlowe. Being so gentle and kind to a girl like that.” He still couldn’t wrap his mind around the many conflicting parts of her. “I’ve heard she isn’t one to speak with common people.”

  Lucy folded her arms across her chest. “It’s not as strange as you’d think, Mr. Vance. That girl always had a heart the size of the ocean. Only, she poured it out on one person at a time. Now look at her, learning to spread it out a bit, since her father’s gone. I do pity her, losing him that way, but look what good it’s done her.”

  He pictured the closed-off, bitter man that was her father. “She certainly chooses the hardest people to attach herself to.”

  “It’s not because they are so great, Mr. Vance, but because she is. An uncommon love makes her uncommonly beautiful.”

  He couldn’t help but agree.

  A door opened near the pair kneeling over the plate, casting a square of light over the grass behind them, and Andrew Carrington stepped out into the night. Donegan squinted at the finely tailored black suit moving about, perfectly complementing the dusky blue of Tressa’s gown that reflected the moon’s light.

  How foolish were those dreams of his. He must pull them out by the roots so they would never surface and unfurl their leaves. Miss Harlowe and the gentleman stood together, their long shadows joining into one. “What of that one? Won’t he protect her? They seem so perfectly suited.”

  “What makes you say such a thing? Doesn’t my lady deserve better than him?”

  “What, is he a rung below her on the social ladder? Maybe not as wealthy or titled?”

  “She isn’t titled, Mr. Vance. And he’s about six hundred rungs below her in every way. Got no character or backbone, that one.”

  Donegan squinted at the silhouette of the couple, at her sweet upturned face looking at his, and pictured those green prism eyes radiating with hope an
d tenderness. All of it was to be wasted on that stuffed suit, and no jewels as rare as emeralds should be wasted.

  But reality chased his desire and smote it down—he was not the hero, either. Awareness of his massive secret hidden on that island, the big deception, turned in his gut like a snowball gathering weight as it rolled. If only circumstances had been different.

  “I know he’ll hurt her again, even if he does marry her this time. Mark my words, it will not end well.”

  Those words ricocheted through Donegan’s mind and he glanced up at them again. Carrington had hurt her? Some primal instinct urged him to bound toward them to yank her away and shield her from him.

  That was the exact minute that, despite everything, he decided to fight for her. What did Andrew have that he did not, anyway? Heartily shoving aside a growing awareness of all that stood between them, a plan took shape and blossomed in his mind and emboldened him. “Perhaps someone else should come and steal her from him, then.” The demands of Carin Green and the people waiting for him there niggled at his mind, but for the moment he was contractually obligated to remain on this estate. And in that contracted time, he would not deny himself the pleasure of her presence or the desire to pursue this girl he could not ignore.

  A smile budded on the maid’s tiny pink lips and spread over her face with sunny gladness and relief. “Well, it’s about time you stepped up, Mr. Vance. I thought you’d never set aside that massive pride and—” She clamped a hand over her mouth as the last words escaped.

  He merely smiled at her. “Lucy, what does that man have that I don’t?”

  “A lot of growing up to do.”

  “No, it’s the clothes. Fine clothes, Lucy.”

  “That isn’t much.”

  “So I assume you’re prepared to assist me?”