Longing for Home: A Proper Romance

by Eden, Sarah M.

  Joseph looked up at her. “I’m told you are my missing housekeeper. I expected you over a week ago.”

  Tavish bristled a bit on her behalf at the scolding tone Joseph had used.

  “I know I’m late, sir, but it’s not my fault. I missed a train back a piece, and that threw off the whole schedule. Before I knew what I was about, I found myself later and later and standing quite alone in a station a full week after I might have expected to be retrieved.” She took a quick breath and finished her explanation. “I have managed to get myself here, though, and I hope you’ll not be holding it against me that I did so a week after my time.”

  Joseph’s face shifted from neutrality to surprise to near annoyance as she spoke. He looked over at Ian. “She’s Irish.”

  Ah. There was the reason for Joseph’s obvious disapproval.

  “As a shamrock,” Ian replied.

  Joseph shook his head adamantly. “She can’t stay. You’ll have to take her back.”

  “What?” Katie’s eyes pulled open wide. Even her mouth went slack.

  “I’m sorry.” He didn’t look particularly sorry. “But you cannot stay here.” He turned away.

  “He is serious?” Katie asked Tavish.

  “I’d imagine so.” While he knew Joseph wouldn’t like the idea of another Irish employee, he’d not have thought the man would turn her away out of hand. “We told you your arrival was likely to cause a stir. Looks like it’s starting here.”

  A look of alarm flitted through her eyes. This seemingly unflappable woman had been dealt a hard blow. She sat mute, staring at Joseph Archer’s retreating back.

  A woman alone with no employment and no family and no place to go would be well within her rights to panic. He’d been amused by her stubbornness, intrigued by the contradictions he saw in her. But watching her defensive wall crumble, even for the briefest moment, and seeing the frightened person she hid there, tugged at his heart almost alarmingly.

  “Do you want me to talk to him?” He couldn’t guarantee he’d succeed, but the woman ought to at least know she had an ally in this unfamiliar town.

  Katie shook her head, and the blanket of fierce determination she’d wrapped herself in throughout their journey made a tenacious reappearance. “I learned long ago how to fight my own battles, Tavish O’Connor. That man promised me a job, and I mean to see that he gives it to me.”

  Chapter Three

  Katie climbed down from the wagon with absolutely no grace to speak of. Speed was more essential than elegance. She pushed her hatpin back through her bonnet, needing both her hands free.

  “Hand down my things, please.”

  Tavish eyed her with curiosity even as he complied with her request. “You mean to confront him, do you?”

  “I mean to keep my job,” she said crisply.

  She hadn’t the slightest idea how to accomplish that. This was hardly the fiercest storm she’d weathered. Knocking on door after door in Derry looking for a job at eight years of age came to mind. She’d not once been without work since that time. Today would not be the day she failed in that.

  She squared her shoulders, set her eyes firmly on Mr. Archer’s retreating back, and marched in his direction. She’d think of something, so help her.

  Mr. Archer had just reached the barn doors when she caught up with him. He glanced at her only briefly.

  “If you’ll be telling me where my room is, sir, I’ll put down my things and set straight to my work.” Her first approach would be to call his bluff. If he weren’t firmly set on sending her off, he just might back down.

  Mr. Archer stopped and turned to face her. His was a stern and unyielding expression. This was a man accustomed to getting his way. “I told you that you would have to go.”

  “No. What you told me was that I had a job keeping house for you here. What you told me was I’d get room and board and pay.” She emphasized each declaration with a pointing of her finger. “What you can tell me next is where to set my things as I’m a week behind on my duties.” She hoped her frustration made her seem more confident than she felt. In truth, her knees were knocking beneath her skirts.

  Mr. Archer only shook his head. “I am not hiring Irish.”

  He most certainly was, whether the man had admitted it to himself or not. She needed a job. “That’s your policy, is it? You’d have done well to have said something before you offered me the position, before I dragged myself across this continent on the strength of your word of honor.”

  “I didn’t realize you were Irish.”

  “Macauley is not exactly an Italian name.”

  “It sounds far more Irish when you say it than it did in my mind when I read it.”

  Ian stepped up near them, his posture reluctant but his expression thoroughly amused. “Can Finbarr come along home now?”

  Mr. Archer nodded. “He’s done for the day.” He called into the dim depths of the barn. “Finbarr. Your brothers are going to take you home now.”

  The lad emerged a brief moment later. He nodded to Mr. Archer, gave Katie a curious look, and moved to join the others by the wagon.

  “I’ll see you in the morning,” Mr. Archer said.

  The O’Connors piled into their wagon. Ian set the team in motion.

  “We’re down the road just a piece,” Tavish called out to her. “If you need anything, you come find us, Sweet Katie.”

  She was in no mood for Tavish O’Connor’s teasing. No matter that he was fine looking and smiled more handsomely than any man had a right to. She’d had quite enough of him. “I told you not to call me that,” she called back after him.

  Tavish only grinned. Impossible man!

  He could simply take his cheekiness and his offer of hospitality and hie himself on home. She meant to stay and keep her job.

  She set her things on the ground, then planted her fists firmly on her hips. “Finbarr O’Connor? You cannot tell me you didn’t realize that name belonged to an Irish lad.” She glared him down in much the way the first housekeeper she’d worked under used to do to her. She’d found it most effective. A person couldn’t help feeling at least a bit abashed having their judgment shot through so neatly by someone eyeing them in just that way.

  Mr. Archer didn’t so much as flinch. “I don’t have general objections to hiring Irish. I don’t have objections to Irish at all.”

  “But that’s the reason you’re intending to turn me off.” He’d give over even if she had to talk him around for hours. “Sounds like an objection to me.”

  “My personal feelings have nothing to do with not keeping you here.” His tone had grown more tense. Even his posture spoke of irritation. Clearly Mr. Archer was not accustomed to being argued with.

  “Then what is your reason, sir?” She held herself still, unwilling to appear intimidated. Her livelihood stood on the line and with it every dream she’d clung to since childhood. “I crossed this country on the promise of a job, and now you’re meaning to take it away from me. I believe you owe me an explanation at the very least, sir.”

  He raised a single questioning eyebrow at that. For a fraction of a moment they stood, each watching the other, neither giving an inch. She hoped her gaze looked half as sure and challenging as his did.

  “An explanation, Miss Macauley?”

  She winced at his horrid pronunciation of her name. ’Twas no wonder he hadn’t realized her name was Irish. His version of it might have hailed from anywhere at all.

  “Very well,” he said. “Come.” Without waiting to see if she followed, he strode to the front of his house.

  Katie followed close on his heels, moving swiftly to keep up with his much longer strides. Joseph Archer was a tall man, one who moved with more confidence than any man ought. He stopped but a few paces from the road that ran past his property. Katie could see he was annoyed. How could he possibly think she’d simply hang her head and walk away after his dismissal?

  She ignored his angry posture, refusing to be cowed by it. He would be m
ade to give over, one way or another.

  “Tell me what you see,” he said.

  “I see a great many things, sir. You’ll have to give me some indication of just what it is you’re wanting me to see.”

  He motioned to the very road they stood beside.

  “A road, sir?”

  “More specifically,” he said, “a fork in the road. Half the town lives down that branch.” He pointed to their right, where the road continued far off into the distance. “Everyone in that direction despises the Irish.” He shifted and pointed to the left, the other side of the road running up to and past a bridge. “Over the river is the other half of the town. Everyone who lives down that road is Irish.” His piercing gaze settled once more on her. “Now, where does that put me?”

  She glanced down each road in turn and back to where the two met directly in front of them. His property sat on neither branch but exactly at the meeting of the two. “That rather puts you in the middle, I’d say.”

  “Which is exactly where I do not wish to be. The people of each side of the town have been ready to strangle each other for years, and all they need is an excuse to do it.” He gave her a pointed look that clearly meant he saw her as that excuse. “They argued enough about my loyalties when I hired Finbarr. If I take on another Irish employee, they’ll all come down on me. The Irish will want me joining their side of the argument. The others will insist I publicly declare my agreement with them.” He stepped back and shook his head. “I have no intention of becoming part of their feud.”

  His words sobered her a great deal. She’d encountered Irish hatred in Baltimore. Heavens, she’d encountered it in Ireland—the English hated the Irish and the Irish hated the English, the wealthy hated the poor and the poor hated the wealthy—but never had she lived in a town as sharply divided as this seemed to be.

  “And that, Miss Macauley, is the reason you cannot stay.” Mr. Archer spoke with finality. He left her standing there and made his way back to the barn.

  She sympathized with him, could fully understand his wish to be left alone. Heavens, she herself craved peace and quiet and knew well the frustration of not finding it. But she couldn’t allow him to send her off. Years of saving every penny possible had left her but one hundred dollars from her goal. After earning enough for train fare back, she’d have that last one hundred in only a half-year at this job. Then she could go home, back to Ireland, back to her tiny home in Cornagillah. She could be with her family again.

  “You promised me a job, Mr. Archer,” she called after him. “I have your written word on that.” She hoped he wouldn’t demand she produce the telegram in which he’d made the offer. She had all three of the wires he sent but, not knowing how to read, could not have pinpointed the right one. “I may be small and poor and Irish and female and a thousand other things that count against me in this world, but those aren’t reason enough for you to lie to me.”

  Mr. Archer stopped, though he didn’t turn back. The sound of the wind rustling the leaves on the nearby tree filled the silence between them. He didn’t move and neither did she.

  Katie hardly dared breathe. Suppose she couldn’t talk him around? Without a job and the salary he’d promised her, she was in deep water indeed.

  She stepped closer to him so she could lower her voice. She took a moment to calm her nerves.

  “You’re needing a housekeeper, sir, and I’m needing a job. Makes no sense for us both not to get what we need.”

  He yet stood with his back to her, his hat in his hand. If his rigid shoulders were any indication, he hadn’t softened.

  “What I need more than anything,” he finally said, “is to be left in peace.”

  “Believe me, Mr. Archer, I appreciate that, likely more than you realize. I’m not the sort to pry into others’ concerns. You’ve assumed since I’m Irish-born that I must be inclined to fight on the Irish side of this town’s disagreement. I assure you that isn’t the case.”

  He looked at her, though he barely turned in her direction. “You plan to side against your own people?” Clearly he didn’t believe her.

  “You say their feud isn’t yours—it’s even less mine. I know not a single person here. I’ve no family, no friends, no associates. Indeed, I consider myself only passing through. I’ve come for no other reason than to work. Once I’ve enough to return to Ireland, I mean to go back. I’m no threat to anyone.”

  Mr. Archer shook his head. “They won’t accept that.”

  “They will soon enough. I keep to myself as a rule, one I’ve not broken from the time I was a little thing. You’ll find me quiet and more likely to blend in with the walls than to stir up a hornet’s nest.” She’d found that approach by far the best. Leave people alone, and they’ll do the same.

  “I won’t have my land or home become a battlefield.” ’Twas as much a warning as a statement.

  Katie nodded. “I understand, sir. I’d not like living in such a place myself, no matter how short or long the stay.”

  Perhaps it was her own wishful thinking, but Katie thought she saw him waver. The tiniest hint of uncertainty lurked deep in his eyes.

  “Give me a chance, sir.”

  He watched her but didn’t give any indication that he agreed or disagreed.

  “Let me do the work, and you can see if I make trouble for you.”

  “And if you do?”

  “Then I’d say you have every right to send me off. I’d be going back on my sworn word to you, and that’s always reason to dismiss an employee.” It wouldn’t come to that, though, she vowed. Katie had not given anyone a hint of trouble since that horrible day eighteen years earlier. She’d caused enough people pain and heartache and loss in that single night to fill a lifetime and more.

  “I suppose that’s only fair,” he said. “But if you start a war, you’ll have to go.”

  “Yes, Mr. Archer, sir.”

  He slammed his hat on his head, likely hoping to wedge it on tightly enough to keep it there despite the wind that was picking up quick and fierce. He pushed the barn door open with a heave. She could see he was not entirely happy with the decision he’d made.

  Katie wasn’t convinced herself. ’Twas hardly the quiet situation she’d prefer.

  “You need only stay a year,” she told herself. “In a year you’ll have enough saved to go home, and all will be well again.”

  Chapter Four

  “An Irishwoman,” Joseph muttered to himself.

  How had he managed to hire an Irishwoman? Any other nationality, any other, would have been fine. She could have spoken not a word of English and known only how to cook dishes that were hardly recognizable, and he would have simply shrugged and accepted it. But having a second Irish employee would cause him no end of trouble.

  I should have sent her away. The O’Connors would have taken her in. He still didn't understand what had made him change his mind.

  “Yes, you do,” he said to himself as he stepped inside the barn. “She accused you of lying to her.”

  He couldn’t entirely refute her accusation. He’d promised her a job without asking her nationality. Firing her for her Irish roots when he hadn’t stated that as a requirement was not honest. He had failings like any other man, but he was not a liar.

  Joseph looked back, watching her step onto the back porch and go inside the house. He should have asked far more questions in those telegrams than he had. Besides her nationality, he should have made entirely certain she was the grandmotherly type he wanted.

  When he’d read in her first response that she’d worked nearly twenty years as a servant in various households, he had assumed she was older than he was by quite a few years. That thick brown hair of hers showed not a single strand of gray. Her face was not lined with age, her posture not stooped and weary with time. She was likely not much more than twenty-five years old.

  A young, attractive, unmarried woman living under the same roof as a young, widowed man. That would likely cause as many whispers as her
nationality.

  He muttered a few choice words under his breath. She was going to be trouble, he could sense it. But Miss Macauley had his back against the wall, and she knew it. He had to have a housekeeper. Six months of attempting to do the cooking and cleaning, along with all the work required to maintain a farm, had all but knocked his feet out from under him.

  He took up his pitchfork again and set himself to the task of mucking out the stall he’d been working on when Miss Macauley arrived. He’d gone to the station a week earlier to fetch her, but she hadn’t been on any train in the twenty-four hours he’d waited. Five days he’d spent in getting there, waiting, and getting back. He believed the story she’d told about missing one train and its ruining her schedule. The fair part of his brain knew he couldn’t hold that against her, but he still felt frustration bubbling deep inside. Nothing about hiring this new housekeeper had gone as it should.

  As he flung dirty straw into the waiting wheelbarrow, his mind churned over the aggravation of it all. His late wife would have known all the questions to ask. She would have found the perfect housekeeper. He had managed to hire himself a sharp-tongued, demanding, stern-faced bundle of difficulty. The passage of nearly four years had lessened a great deal of his pain over Vivian’s death, but in moments like this, he missed her acutely. Their marriage had not been perfect but neither had life without her.

  He led his black gelding back into its newly cleaned stall, speaking to it reassuringly. A little attention and some affectionate rubbing of its nose and the animal seemed to forgive him for the disruption to its otherwise peaceful afternoon.

  “I have made a mess of things, Copperfield.” He hung a bucket of oats on its peg inside the stall. “There’s a woman in my kitchen. A young Irish woman, with a tongue capable of filleting a man with little effort. But one I cannot, in good conscience, send off.” He pushed out a weary breath. “I have a feeling I should prepare for a disaster.”

  Copperfield whinnied appreciatively as he swallowed a mouthful of oats.

  Joseph smiled a bit at that. “I know. She’ll feed us edible food for the first time in half a year. That is definitely worth something.”