Lessons in Enchantment

by Patricia Rice

  Drew was still stewing over the lady’s high-handed comment when he strode out later that morning, already late for the transportation board meeting.

  He almost collided on the doorstep with a bespectacled fellow with graying mustache wearing a low-crowned, curled-brim hat from a prior decade.

  “My pardon,” the older man said, stepping aside. “Is this the residence of Mr. Andrew Blair?”

  “It is. I’m he. You’ll have to make an appointment,” Drew said, impatiently stepping toward the street, expecting the gentleman to follow.

  “I have an appointment with Lady Phoebe. Good meeting you, sir. I’m Thomas Lithgow, Esquire, the family solicitor.” He hung his umbrella over his left arm and offered his right hand.

  Hell and tarnation. She was still going to argue over the contract? “Pleased to meet you, Mr. Lithgow. I’ll be off then.” Drew lifted his top hat in farewell.

  He hadn’t expected his life to become this complicated when he’d agreed to take the children. A governess who had a lawyer! The end of the world must be nigh.

  He’d always avoided the aristocracy with their inherent belief that blood made them better than people who worked for a living. The privileged few had had their own way for so long that they’d become unreasonable in their expectations. A governess who had her own lawyer! There was a gulf a mile wide between his upbringing and hers.

  Drew believed in hard work and education. The upper class apparently believed in the magical power of connections. Maybe they were right. Since he didn’t know any powerful people in aristocratic circles, he wasn’t likely to find out. He’d settle for the middling class businessmen who understood profits.

  Where in damnation did Lady Phoebe fit into this equation?

  He had just reached the main thoroughfare when Dalrymple’s carriage pulled up beside him.

  “Climb in. We’ll go to the meeting together,” the older man suggested.

  Drew had wanted to clear his head with a brisk walk, but he climbed in anyway. Sometimes his neighbor had valuable insights. Drew had quite a bit invested in the consortium with Dalrymple, so he liked to keep on top of what was happening.

  “The meeting is just routine business today, isn’t it?” he asked, settling onto the cushioned seat.

  “As far as I know.” Dalrymple made a dismissive gesture with his chubby hand. “The women tell me you have children. I hadn’t realized that. Your own?”

  Simon shrugged, uncomfortable with explaining his family to outsiders. “My wards.”

  His neighbor nodded knowingly. “Family can be an imposition. You have to put them to use, although I understand yours are a little young yet. I wanted to bend your ear about the new education bill the women are championing.”

  Relieved that he needn’t explain, Drew studied his new boots with the elastic siding instead of buttons. They saved time, he supposed, but they needed to be broken in. “Can’t say I’ve paid attention. Education is always a good thing, isn’t it?”

  “They want to take education out of the hands of the kirks and made free for all,” Dalrymple objected. “They’ll need buildings and teachers and those don’t come free. You know what that means.”

  “The kirk schools aren’t regulated in any way,” Drew said, not sure what this topic had to do with anything. “I understand the legislation simply establishes a school board to see that all students receive a proper education, and not just lashings at the whim of some misguided reformer.”

  He’d been on the receiving side of some of those poor kirk schools. He’d been large enough to intimidate teachers, and smart enough to work his way up to better schools. That didn’t mean everyone had his advantages.

  “Let the kirks reform, then. We don’t need to be paying our hard-earned money for the thieves and scalawags in the slums. Just think of those lazy Irish in Cowgate! I’ll pay my tithe to the kirk. The government has no place wasting it on some chumpy goody two-shoes notions.”

  Drew had the uneasy feeling that he’d been one of the scalawags in the slums in Dalrymple’s world, so he just grunted noncommittally, letting the older man rant.

  “Then you’ll support me when I run for the council?” Dalrymple finished as he pulled up at their destination.

  Startled by the demand, Drew didn’t have an appropriate response prepared. Dalrymple was a useful man to know, but he was receiving the impression that his neighbor wasn’t precisely open-minded.

  “I’ll certainly think on it,” he said enthusiastically, shaking the older man’s hand. “I appreciate the ride. There’s Northolt. I need to speak with him. I’ll see you inside.”

  “I’d rather build boxes and pound nails,” Drew muttered later as the meeting drew on over some infinitesimal argument.

  He liked making money, he reminded himself. His family relied on his money. His mother couldn’t work. His sisters had growing families. Simon’s ambitions required cash. His wards would need schooling.

  He’d turned a few boring valves and screws into patents and manufactories which had produced his first success. He couldn’t count on everything he did achieving the same level of profit. So he had to invest with men who understood money better than he did, which meant working with the consortium. Not being able to putter and play was part of growing up.

  A fact Lady Phoebe didn’t acknowledge, he concluded as he returned home that afternoon to find the children and the new governess running about the house, apparently in a game of hide and seek. How the devil could he work in these conditions?

  Drew growled at Enoch crouching under his worktable. Before he could order the brat out, the boy held a finger to his lips and pointed.

  A whiskered nose quivered and sniffed from beneath a stack of rags Drew had left on the floor. The weasel?

  Torn between wanting to work and discovering what the hell was happening, he waited impatiently.

  Satisfied the room was safe, the creature—a mouse!—scampered from hiding and under the table, where it chattered enthusiastically, then fled under a far cabinet. His house had mice, or was the lady bringing them in like the cat?

  “It found me,” Enoch cried, grinning from ear to ear. “I gave him seeds as a reward.”

  “I see,” Drew said, although he didn’t. “And the purpose of this exercise?”

  “First, to teach him not to fear me,” Enoch said, crawling out and dusting himself off. “Lady Phoebe says her mice chatter to let her know when there is trouble. But she can hear them in her head. She wants them to come find us so we can hear too.”

  She heard mice in her head? Maybe he should rethink the suitability of the new governess.

  But he wanted to work and this seemed a harmless game. “You’ll need to find better hiding places than here. I have sharp tools you can hurt yourself on. Did you learn anything else today?”

  “We are writing a letter to the Librarian. The twins don’t write their letters well, but I finished mine,” he said in evident satisfaction. “Is it time for tea?”

  “Maybe you should ask the mouse,” Drew said dryly. “Run up to the nursery and see.”

  He was deeply immersed in aligning the pterotype’s keys when Hugh arrived, waving papers as usual.

  “Your governess and her solicitor have made mincemeat of our contract,” his partner complained. “We might as well have no contract at all.”

  “Which I suspect is the lady’s intention.” The mention of food made him realize he was feeling peckish, and he pushed away from the table. “Can we discuss this over tea?”

  Hugh wrinkled his broad nose. “If we can find anything to eat, we will have to take it to your office or the dining room,” he said stiffly, with disapproval. “The lady and the children are playing a game with the kitten in the parlor, and cats make me sneeze.”

  “Then tell them to play elsewhere.” Drew strode down the hall past the windowless office to the sunny parlor. He and Hugh never used the formal dining room. They had organized their boxes of supplies and files there.

>   The children sat on the floor, watching as a brown and gray tabby slept in a cozy nest they’d made in a basket.

  With her unruly tresses uncovered and pinned in loops that were already falling into temptingly touchable curls, Lady Phoebe beamed at their arrival. “Kittens need a lot of sleep,” she informed them.

  Drew dragged his mind back to the situation at hand. “I see that. Could he sleep elsewhere? Felines are an irritation to Hugh’s nostrils, and we need the parlor for discussing the changes in your damn—” He cut off the curse and amended, “In your contract.”

  “Our apologies, Mr. Morgan.” She stood and handed the basket handle to Enoch. “I think Kitty has done an astounding job of locating all the intruders. She needs her rest.”

  Intruders? Drew refused to ask. It was obvious the only intruders here were animals.

  “Children, why don’t you run up and fetch your favorite book and practice finding your letters and words you know in it? I’ll be up after I speak with your guardian.”

  Feeling a little more confident that the lady had heeded his request, Drew watched in approval as the children obediently curtseyed, bowed, and trudged upstairs with the kitten, only bickering slightly over who got to hold the basket.

  Lady Phoebe brushed off her crinoline-free skirt—in bright blue wool today—and beamed at them. Drew knew better than to fall for her wide-eyed, deceptive smile. He waited for the ax to fall.

  “Piney and Raven have been exploring the neighborhood. You have a vagrant living behind the stable, and the Dalrymple cook has been feeding him. You might wish to learn more. And there is an infestation of squirrels in your attic. I dislike letting Piney use his predator instincts, but squirrels are destructive and do not belong inside. I’d rather they fled outside where I might put them to better use.”

  “You’re asking my permission?” Drew asked in confusion, fretting over the vagrant.

  “I’m trying to show you that your contract does not exactly apply to all the ways I might be truly dangerous. Use your imagination, gentlemen.” She bobbed a brief curtsey and departed.

  “How destructive can a squirrel be?” Hugh asked.

  “Have you ever seen one gnaw through a gas valve?” Drew asked ominously. “Let’s go find the vagrant and not worry about rodent infestations.”

  Or what Lady Phoebe might do with them.

  Seven

  Feeling uncertain and out of place, Phoebe tried to keep to as much of her usual routine as she could in this strange new world. She knelt beside her fluffy new bed to say her prayers in a pretty blue room on the nursery floor. Admittedly, the space was lighter than her old rooms, the furniture much fresher and more comfortable. But it wasn’t home. She hoped prayer would stifle her urge to weep. It had been a long, trying few days.

  The nursemaid, Daisy, slept in the room next to the children. She could answer their calls for drinks and their cries at night, if needed. The children were familiar with Daisy. It would take time before they completely trusted Phoebe, so her separation from the nursery presented no difficulty and offered an illusion of freedom.

  Vagrants in the alley didn’t bother her too much. Madmen who cut axles and might kill children. . . gave her cold shivers. If she told her aunts. . . but she couldn’t desert the children. She had to stay.

  Mr. Lithgow had not been very confident about Phoebe’s desire to sue the tenement owners over the loss of her home. The knowledge that she might be permanently homeless had made him anxious to appease her on her employment contract.

  The contract was very generous. Her expenses here would be almost nonexistent. She could turn her earnings into a little nest egg. Maybe in a year or two, when she had enough money, she could try the other veterinary school. Admissions policies could change.

  Although she feared she might have to disguise herself in trousers. And she would, too, if she thought they would teach her how to look after small animals, not just cattle.

  Planning seldom worked well in her world, but it didn’t hurt to dream. Having a goal prevented the dismals.

  The kitten rustled in its basket, hungry. The marten had been active all day, learning his new abode, but his habits were normally nocturnal. He was prowling the house, keeping the mice in the walls. The mice told her the men were still below, doing whatever men did at this hour.

  She should be feeling secure and exhausted. She wasn’t.

  Oh well. She bolted the door and turned on a lamp to read one of her books. That should make her sleepy.

  The bed was extremely comfortable. So were the pillows. But she was so used to a hard mattress, and the racket of horses and wheels, shouts and brawls carrying up from the street, that she couldn’t adjust to the quiet.

  She got up and fed the kitten from the scraps she’d brought upstairs for the purpose. “Mr. Blair is very handsome, is he not?” Andrew, she’d heard his friend call him. “It was brilliant of him to build your litter box, wasn’t it? And give you this nice home? Even if Mr. Morgan doesn’t like you.”

  Intent on eating, the kitten didn’t reply.

  “I did not realize men can be so attractive when they’re clean. Perhaps I should spend more time studying the students at the university so I can learn not to notice my employer.”

  The kitten condescended to lick her hand, but it was evident that exploring was on his mind.

  “I think he notices me,” she whispered.

  That was the part that thrilled and frightened her. Even when he regarded her with annoyance, Mr. Blair was seeing her, despite her lack of elegance.

  How could she intimidate a man like that into ignoring her?

  Raven shrieked a warning. Still not sleepy, Phoebe donned her wool slippers and the fleece-lined robe her mother had given her one Christmas, and headed for the attic.

  Annoyed with himself and the world, Andrew dusted the straw off his coat and shucked his hat at a hook at the back door. “Could we ask Queen Vicki if she’d install the brats in Holyrood?” he grumbled. “She’s never there anyway.”

  “Wouldn’t help if the miscreants believe the bairns can tell you anything incriminating. I still think your family is dicked in the nob for worrying over them. Who’d believe a babe?” Hugh shrugged off his coat. “If you start imagining spooks around every corner, we may as well all move to the palace.”

  His partner was a practical man who didn’t believe in Letitia’s Sight or the children’s gifts, even when wrenches floated past his face. Hugh lacked imagination and saw everything in terms of physics and numbers.

  “What other reason is there for that stranger in the alley, studying our door?” Disgruntled, Drew called for coffee to ward off the chill from their stint in the stable. The stranger—not the vagrant— had run off before he could be confronted. “Is Lady Phoebe still awake?” he asked the maid. “Ask her to come down if she is.”

  “You’re a savage,” Hugh remarked, heading for the stairs. “It’s late. You don’t entertain governesses at this hour. I’ll take my coffee in my room, where all sensible people are at this hour.”

  Drew wasn’t ready to sleep. The search for the vagrant and the unexpected result had left him unsettled and restless. He supposed he could take another look at the pterotype. Maybe he’d suffer a sudden stroke of brilliance.

  The maid returned and bobbed an apologetic curtsey. “Lady Phoebe is not in her chamber, sir.”

  Not in her chamber, at this hour of the night. What the devil did that mean? Was there something wrong with the children?

  Alarmed, he headed for the stairs before he realized that’s why he was paying for a damned governess—so she could watch over the children. Undeterred, he continued upward.

  The children were sleeping snuggly in their beds. The kitten peered up at him from beneath Clare’s cot. Wasn’t it supposed to be in a basket somewhere?

  Where could a governess go in the middle of the night? Had he unwittingly hired a spy for Simon’s enemies? He couldn’t think of another good reason strangers were w
atching his house.

  He stalked down the hall, noting the nursemaid’s closed door and the governess’s open one—which probably explained the kitten’s escape.

  And then he saw the open door to the attic.

  Now that he knew the way, he went directly to the roof. Lady Phoebe sat huddled in an ungainly robe against the parapet. Was she crying?

  Panicking at female tears, Drew wanted to back away, but he simply wasn’t that kind of coward. The aristocratic governess looked much too vulnerable in slippers and tumbling curls.

  Figuratively girding his loins, he crossed the roof and slid down beside her, dragging his own coat around him. She hastily wiped at her eyes.

  “Your vagrant finally showed up. He’s nephew of the cook next door. He lost his position, has no references, and can’t find another, so he’s been sleeping in the stable.”

  She nodded, and Drew noticed she’d wrapped her hair in rags, making her look like a street urchin. He’d have to remember that image when she pulled the haughty act on him.

  “I gave him a job guarding the stable,” he offered when she said nothing.

  She finally turned liquid blue eyes in his direction. “You’re paying him for a roof over his head?”

  “And peace of mind,” he reminded her. “A villain is less likely to cut axles if there’s someone to notice. The carriage driver goes home before dark.”

  “Of course, very wise of you.” Her voice cracked as if she might still be holding back sobs.

  “And both Henry, our new stableboy, and the carriage driver report strangers skulking about the alley today, watching the house.” His teeth grated at the news. He was developing his cousin’s fears for the children, on no grounds whatsoever.

  She nodded. “You need a dog.” She finally glanced up at him. “Why are you up here?”

  “Where else would I find you?” he asked. “Has anyone said anything to upset you?”

  She pulled her robe tighter. “Raven must have seen you in the alley. He sent a warning. And when I came up to see what he did, I. . . I don’t know. It’s all very strange over here. I think I miss the noise.”