A Return of Devotion

by Kristi Ann Hunter

  William started to say yes, but something stopped him. A memory. One that had occurred a time or two over the past few weeks. He still remembered the odd choices Daphne had made selecting books. He’d noticed that same basket in the corner by the door a couple of times since then.

  The library might not have been sitting as dormant as he’d once thought. “Whether it was or wasn’t, we’re here to enjoy it and use it now,” William finally answered.

  Derek nodded and started murmuring to himself about titles, occasionally opening a book to check the publishing date.

  “After dinner I’ll take you on a tour of the house. Then tomorrow you can start right here in this room. I’ve got pens, ink, and the type of ledger you requested all ready for you.”

  Derek gave a jerk and then looked up at William. “I’m sorry, what? Oh yes. Dinner. And a tour. Yes, it’s best to start fresh tomorrow and make a system.”

  William turned to Daphne, who was still standing in the doorway, watching Derek with open amusement. He couldn’t blame her. Within a day or two he’d appear considerably more normal, though he’d still be spouting off facts about things one didn’t even know had facts to learn.

  “Please see that the table is prepared for dinner, Da, er, Mrs. Blakemoor.”

  “I’ll have the table set for two, my lord,” she said softly, her gaze tucked somewhere beyond his left shoulder.

  Irrational pain hit his chest. This was what made sense. There wasn’t a future for him and Daphne. Better to cut it off before either of them started thinking in ways they shouldn’t. And definitely before either of them started doing things they shouldn’t.

  He had indulged himself with the impossible, but it was time to return to reality.

  He’d brought in a chaperon.

  While Daphne had no doubt that Mr. Thornbury was there to do a job, he was also there to put Daphne back in her place. She’d dared to try to return to a status she’d once taken for granted, and William, no, Lord Chemsford, was reminding her that it wasn’t a climb she was allowed to make.

  “I suppose there’s some comfort in the fact that he couldn’t do it himself. He had to arrange a visitor to get me to go away,” Daphne grumbled as she walked into the kitchen.

  “Did you say something?” Jess asked as she helped Eugenia finish the dinner preparations.

  “Nothing important,” Daphne said with a sigh. She started to collect the dishware needed to set the table for dinner.

  “Eugenia can do that,” Jess said. “It’s time for you to go dress for dinner, isn’t it?”

  “No.” Daphne swallowed and clutched the plates closer to her chest. “You’ll be happy to know that I’ll be returning to my proper seat this evening.”

  Jess was well within her rights to say I told you so at the moment, given that she’d tried to warn Daphne nothing good would come of these dinners, but she didn’t. Instead, she stood there, watching Daphne, looking through Daphne, the spoon in her hand slowly dripping onto the table.

  Without a word she reached for the recently emptied pot and started pouring the cooked vegetables back into it.

  Laughter bubbled up in Daphne’s chest as she set the plates back onto the table and rushed around to keep Jess from putting the food back over the fire. “You don’t have to burn his dinner simply because he remembered who he was and who I was.”

  “Who you are?” she asked in a hard voice, but at least she didn’t shove the pot into the flames. “Who would that be, Daphne, because I’m fairly certain you are the same person you were last night, and if he was willing to have you at his table then, he should be willing now.”

  “It doesn’t work that way.” Daphne took the pot from Jess and scooped the vegetables back into their dish. “I’m the housekeeper.”

  “You’re a person. Believe me, I’ve known every class of person possible and the only difference is the clothes they wear and the houses they live in. Those things had no bearing on if they were good or bad, generous or greedy, thoughtful or cruel.” She placed the meat on a platter and didn’t bother to make sure it looked nice. “I was beginning to hope that he could see that and be . . .” She faded off and stabbed a knife into the ham.

  “Be what?” Daphne asked.

  Jess braced her hands on the table and turned her blue eyes in Daphne’s direction. Her mouth was pressed together, the corners turning down in an expression that looked like the sadness that remains when anger fades away. “I thought he could be the one to show you that you mattered.”

  Daphne turned away and scooped up the plates again. “I know I matter.”

  “Do you?” Jess asked, taking a moment to rearrange the ham on the platter.

  “Of course I do,” Daphne said. She told the children all the time that they mattered. It would be the worst thing in the world if they thought where they’d come from made them less in God’s eyes. Even if they lived their lives as servants or in trade, God considered them worthy of love.

  She was sure of its truth right down to her bones.

  Why would Jess question if Daphne knew it?

  When Daphne finished arranging the table for dinner, it looked the same as it had every evening for weeks. Only the second place wasn’t for her.

  That was life. That was how it worked. They couldn’t all be lords and ladies of the manor and they couldn’t all be farmers. It took a variety of people to make the world turn, and that was good. She would hate it if everyone were forced to be the same, live the same, act the same.

  Just imagining Benedict being told that he couldn’t work with wood because he had to be a farmer made Daphne feel ill. Or Sarah being told that she had to stop practicing music because not everyone could play like she could. No, it was good that people were different. God saw value in differences.

  But Jess saw more than she said and she didn’t speak unless she was sure. So why would she say such a thing?

  As Daphne stood in the dining room, pondering Jess’s words, she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror over the sideboard. Daphne didn’t often look in mirrors in either a literal or figurative manner. As long as her hair was all caught up and her face free of smudges there was no reason to look closer.

  Life had changed her. She was a far cry from the woman who’d walked through that front door twelve years ago, and even further from the girl who’d held up drawing room walls all over London.

  That girl had been happy to watch life pass her by. She’d had her friends—well, her friend—and standing to the side had never bothered her. She would speak to those around her, smile at everyone who passed, then go home and dream about what her future could be.

  Daphne still dreamed, but not about her future. She would imagine scenarios, explore the might-have-beens, but never did she truly think there was anything better waiting for her tomorrow. Any future hope had been placed on the children. If they went on to be successful and live full lives, that was all she needed.

  At least it had been.

  What about when the children were gone? What then?

  Daphne smoothed a hand over her skirt. What then? was an excellent question. Somehow, when she’d buried her past, she’d buried her future right along with it.

  If she faced the pain and dug up those memories, took time to remember where she’d come from, really looked to see the direction her life had taken, perhaps she could see where that path might actually lead instead of filling her mind with unattainable dreams.

  It was easy to recall the recent years, with the children and the work of Haven Manor trying to save women and children from a fate worse than what Daphne’s had been.

  The memories from the year before weren’t too difficult to remember either. Just Daphne and Kit in a borrowed house on the edge of Marlborough, living on charity and what they could make doing a bit of mending. But they had a beautiful baby boy and the money that should have been their dowries to create a future, once they determined what that was.

  But parts of those days had been bleak, lik
e having her father rip her from his life or the tumult of emotions that cut at her as she came back from the dark for the sake of her child, smiling wider than she was ready to because Benedict and Kit needed her to be the happy one.

  Daphne suddenly felt weak and she collapsed into a chair by the table, cracking her knee against the head of one of the gargoyles and sending a shooting pain up her leg. As much as it hurt, it was rather convenient, as she could blame the sudden burn of tears on the physical pain.

  Much better to blame the gargoyle than decade-old memories.

  With the heels of her palms pressed tightly into her eyes, Daphne admitted something she’d never even considered.

  She’d died the day Benedict was born.

  That first night she’d lain in bed, looking over the edge at the little bundle wrapped so carefully and lying in an old wooden cradle. His perfect cheeks, the adorable pucker to his mouth, the soft mewls he’d made in his sleep. God had given her a precious gift, despite her mistakes. From that moment on, it had become all about making sure that little boy knew God loved him even though he’d come from a poor decision.

  Daphne didn’t exist anymore, and what she wanted didn’t matter.

  But without Benedict, without the children, what did Daphne do now? What would happen to her? How did someone learn to live after denying themselves for so long? Did she even deserve to make her way back to such a state?

  A sound from the next room sent Daphne scrambling from the dining room. The last thing she needed to worry about right now was what Lord Chemsford thought of her. She wasn’t even sure what she thought about herself.

  Chapter thirty-one

  William should not have been able to identify individual people in the work yard from a window three floors above the ground.

  He also shouldn’t have been spending his time standing in the chapel because it was the only room in the house with a window from which the servants’ work yard could be seen.

  Yet here he was.

  And there she was. A small figure draping linens over the line to dry. Over the weeks he’d known her he’d seen her dresses—all six of them—and learned all her movements.

  He knew it was her.

  This was the most he’d seen of her in the three days since Derek had arrived. Their interactions had been on the verge of companionable and now they had been reduced to distant professionalism. Very distant. Only-through-other-people sort of distant.

  It was what he’d wanted, to put that distance between them again, to establish their roles.

  But now that he had it, he didn’t like it.

  “Chemsford?”

  “Yes?” William didn’t turn around while acknowledging Derek’s arrival and statement. He was too busy watching the slight sway in Daphne’s movements. What song was she humming? One she’d played for him?

  “In the library, you have an exquisitely carved chess set.”

  “Yes, I know. It’s missing a pawn.” It was a shame. It was one of the most unique chess sets he’d ever seen.

  “Yes.” There was a shuffle of feet, as if Derek were pacing across the back of the chapel. “Strange, isn’t it? For a house that’s been standing empty? Items don’t tend to go missing when all they do is sit.”

  William turned from the window to see Derek not pacing but merely shuffling his feet back and forth while he clasped his hands together with an earnest look on his face. He almost looked excited. Over a chess set? Perhaps it was more than simply pretty.

  “What is the chess set?” William asked.

  The other man looked a bit startled. “It’s simply a chess set. Very nicely carved and of a rather unique design, but there’s no marks on it that would indicate it as something out of the ordinary. But I thought perhaps in the process of new inhabitants the pawn had fallen, so I’ve been searching the room this morning.”

  At this rate, Derek would be lucky to finish cataloguing the library by the end of the year. “Did you find the piece?”

  “What? Oh yes,” Derek answered. “It had rolled under the desk, in that carved opening beneath the drawers.”

  And he’d felt the need to find William and tell him that? The past two days, he’d stored up news of his more interesting discoveries and shared them over dinner. “Good.”

  “But there was something else under there, too, Chemsford, and I think you’ll want to see it.”

  Why hadn’t the man led with that? Whatever Derek had found, if it was enough to send him into some sort of fit like this, it might just be enough to take William’s mind off Daphne. She was an impossible problem that didn’t seem to make sense. Everything was just the slightest bit wrong. Or maybe he wanted it to be because it gave him an excuse to think about her more.

  “Lead on.” William gestured for Derek to go back toward the library and then followed close behind.

  A ledger covered in tufts of dust and smudged with dirt on the bent green cloth–covered corners was spread out across the desk in the library. Neat lines and columns marched across the page, but from this distance William couldn’t read the words.

  “What is it?” he asked as he rounded the desk.

  “A ledger.”

  William stopped and gave Derek a look that, hopefully, told the man he wasn’t quite that thick.

  The scholar cleared his throat. “Yes. Well, it appears to be quite different from the rest of the house accounts, which were in that cabinet over there and all bound in a similar-colored leather. And while the other account books hold very helpful recordings of art purchases and the like, this, well, this seems to contain mostly household expenditures.”

  So much for the distraction he’d been hoping for. The household accounts of an eccentric hermit weren’t likely to hold William’s attention for long. “He probably kept separate books for his house and his art.” William glanced at an entry for a purchase of coal. “It’s rather obvious he cared a great deal about his collection.”

  “Yes, but look at the date.”

  The excitement was back in Derek’s voice and hope sprouted wings once more as William dropped his gaze back to the book. “November 1809.”

  A time when the house had supposedly been empty but for Daphne’s care, being kept from degeneration. William flipped back a page in the ledger. “Have you looked through this?”

  “Of course, but I’m afraid it doesn’t make any sense. I would think it had somehow come from another estate except that I found a book of sketches of the house labeled as Haven Manor, and that is the name in the front of the book.”

  Derek came forward and flipped to another page. “There’s the sorts of deposits one would expect to see, well, if this had been a working estate.”

  Entries for goat cheese, goat milk, and eggs marched down the page. The sorts of items one might sell if he or she had a large flock of chickens and a herd of goats. “Yes,” William said slowly. “I think this ledger is for here.”

  A moment of silence met William’s declaration, but soon Derek was moving through the pages again. “Normal household expenditures,” the man murmured before stepping back from the book with a look of curious frustration. “And not a single listed wage.”

  “Not even a housekeeper?” William’s brows scrunched together. Surely Daphne hadn’t been caring for the place with only a roof over her head in return.

  “No. But over here”—Derek flipped a page over—“there are sizable deposits made next to people’s names. All the same amount and at the same time. Two for each person.”

  “Alice, John, Blake, Reuben.” William’s voice got tighter as he continued down the list. “Eugenia, Sarah.”

  He knew those names—well, some of them. And the amounts next to their names weren’t small.

  He’d wanted a distraction, something big enough he’d be forced to give it his attention. He’d gotten it. But he didn’t think it was going to help him stay away from Daphne.

  Likely quite the opposite.

  She’d known it couldn’t last forever.
He would eventually insist that she stop avoiding him. The note on her desk when she returned from hanging linens proved he’d reached the end of his patience. She glanced at the note one more time.

  I need to meet with my HOUSEKEEPER.

  The implication was clear. She was not to send Horatia or Cyril as she’d been doing. If she were honest, he’d allowed her to do so for longer than she’d anticipated.

  She paused in the antechamber to the library, standing in the shadows to get a feel for the situation. He was sitting at the desk, hunched over a book, occasionally writing something on the paper set to the side of the desk.

  This wasn’t the first time she’d seen him like this. He actually spent a great deal of time working through papers, ledgers, charts, and other tasks she had no idea went into the management of a title’s holdings. There was something appealing about his attention to detail and responsibility.

  But she didn’t know what it had to do with her.

  Behind him Mr. Thornbury paced. Occasionally he would reach over and point at something in the book on the desk. Lord Chemsford would nod and make another note.

  Daphne lifted onto her toes and raised her chin to see if she could determine what they were looking at. From its size she would guess it to be some sort of ledger. She could do ledgers. She’d been studying her maths, after all.

  “You wanted to see me, my lord?” she asked, stepping into the room.

  “How long have you been caring for this house, Mrs. Blakemoor?” Lord Chemsford asked without looking up.

  Daphne frowned. They’d been over this. Repeatedly. “Twelve years, my lord.”

  He crossed his arms on the desk and looked up at her. “And how long have you been employed to care for the house?”

  Her gaze dropped from his and fell back onto the book on the desk. Now that she was a few steps closer she could see more details, and the familiar green cloth, though dirty and obviously neglected, sent her stomach plummeting into her toes. She knew that book. And while she could honestly say she hadn’t written any of the entries, she was all too aware of what it contained.