“Emmeline,” Aubrey repeated—for the woman who alighted from the carriage wore a brilliant chartreuse gown that could belong only to her. Another woman followed in a dress of more sedate robin’s egg blue, setting off the golden gleam of hair curling from beneath her hat. “And Rowena.”
“By Jove!” said Lindsey, who’d gone to the window to confirm Aubrey’s report. “Suppose they’ve had their fill of Paris?”
They hadn’t long to wonder, for Emmeline appeared as little more than a streak of chartreuse as she hurried into the house, and soon afterwards she appeared in the library doorway, her hat askew and her cheeks flushed pink.
“Aubrey!” Emmeline cried.
This was all the warning he received before she swooped down upon him.
Aubrey braced himself for the impending crush, but his preemptive wince appeared to warn her off, and the embrace she gave him proved none so tight as he’d feared from her urgency. Her delicate arms wound around his shoulders as gentle as butterfly wings, though the brim of her hat flattened against his face. He tucked it out of the way as gingerly as he could manage from his disadvantaged position, then returned her embrace as softly as she’d given it. At length, she released him.
“Are you quite well?” she asked, laying the back of her hand against his forehead as if by instinct, then snatching it away as she realised what she’d done.
“Well on the mend,” Aubrey assured her, unable to suppress his own fond smile at her evident concern.
Rowena, meanwhile, had entered the library, having followed her friend at a more sedate pace. She turned to her brother, still standing at the window.
“We had a letter,” Rowena explained, “saying the chief electrical engineer had fallen off a horse and caught pneumonia.”
“So of course,” Emmeline interrupted, “we couldn’t possibly delay our return another moment! We simply had to see you—and to render whatever assistance we might!”
“We passed Mr Halloway at the train station,” Rowena continued speaking to her brother with perfect sangfroid. “Most convenient, for then we didn’t have to send for the carriage. I believe another quarter-hour’s wait would have killed her.”
“Happy, then,” Lindsey replied, enough recovered from Emmeline’s ambush to join the conversation, “that coincidence prevented her from leaving me a widower.”
“But how are you, really?” Emmeline urged, still intent upon Aubrey.
“I’m quite all right, now,” said Aubrey.
“Three broken ribs,” Lindsey cut in.
“Cracked,” Aubrey countered. “Not broken.”
“And not yet healed, either,” Lindsey reminded him, putting his hands on the back of Aubrey’s chair.
Aubrey wished he’d focus more on the positive aspects of his recovery. “I’ve thrown off the pneumonia, at least.”
“And thank goodness for that!” Emmeline chimed in.
“I’d thought you’d find it a disappointment,” said Rowena, not bothering to feign surprise. “You seemed so intent upon nursing him. Alas, we’ve arrived too late.”
“I did get to use oxygen canisters,” Aubrey offered.
Emmeline’s expression brightened. In wondrous hushed tones, she asked, “Did you, indeed?”
Behind her back, Rowena rolled her eyes and beckoned her brother closer to form their own conversation.
Aubrey ignored her in favour of divulging all the details of the oxygen canisters to Emmeline’s evident delight. She in turn told him all the technical splendour of Eiffel’s tower.
And yet, even as he fell back into familiar discourse, there remained a disquieting notion in the back of his mind that, before the end of their visit, he had best speak to the other lady returned to the house this day.
The opportunity to do so did not arise until after dinner. Having returned to the library, Aubrey witnessed Rowena tap Lindsey on the shoulder and whisper a few choice words into his ear. Aubrey could not actually discern which words she used, but he concluded they had something to do with the duties of a gentleman towards his bride-to-be, because no sooner had she spoken them than Lindsey took Emmeline aside and engaged her in conversation regarding her experiences at the House of Worth. Rowena herself retreated to a settee, and before she could open Belgravia, Aubrey took the chance to approach her.
“Rowena,” Aubrey said with hesitance—despite the many months passed since she’d granted him permission, it still felt odd to address her by her Christian name. “I’ve some enquiries about the staff, and I’d hoped you might…”
“Serve as your fountain of knowledge?” she finished for him with a wry smile. “It would be my pleasure. What do you wish to know?”
“What are their names?”
She blinked at him, her wry smile frozen on her lips.
As the heat rose in his cheeks and ears, Aubrey hastened to add, “I know Charles, of course, and Mr Hudson—and Fletcher—and I’ve already been introduced to Miss Owen, but otherwise I’m afraid I’m quite ignorant.”
“Introduced,” Rowena echoed, incredulous, “to Miss Owen?”
“Yes,” Aubrey affirmed, despite his better instincts.
A single line appeared between Rowena’s brows as she gazed upon him with an expression of utter bewilderment. “I’m sure I don’t know who—Oh! Do you mean Freddie?”
Aubrey took on her confusion. “I…”
“Miss Winifred Owen,” Rowena clarified. “Whom the other maids call Freddie.”
“She is a housemaid, yes,” said Aubrey, relieved to find a common understanding at last.
“Then I hardly see why you required an introduction,” Rowena replied, half to herself. With a sly glance from under her lashes, she added, “Should I worry after your intentions for her?”
Aubrey, unamused, didn’t see fit to answer her little jest. “No one else has told me her name, or the names of anyone working in the house. I had to ask it of her for myself. I’m willing to do the same for everyone else, if I must.”
“But you had hoped I might have an easier answer for you,” she concluded. “I do. I know the names of all the staff by heart. Such a feat is not typically expected of gentlemen, though I suppose you have your reasons for asking.”
“I am unaccustomed,” Aubrey said with forced calm, “to live amongst strangers.”
“They’re hardly strangers, Aubrey.”
“Not to you, perhaps,” Aubrey allowed. “You’ve hired them yourself. Or grown up with them. It’s all rather different for me. I’m thrust into a sea of persons whom I mustn’t acknowledge, yet who know all about me and my life as I lead it here. It’s… unsettling. And I’d hoped if I knew something more of them—could recognise them on sight, at least—it might help things feel more settled.”
He waited, with the horrible sensation of having divulged more than he’d intended, for whatever cutting remark she might use to dismiss his concerns.
Whatever levity she had prepared in response did not leave her parted lips, for realisation dawned upon her face and stopped her cold. The customary arch of her brows fell into a more natural expression. After a moment’s hesitation, she replied in a low tone and with more warmth than before, “I see.”
Aubrey waited.
After another moment’s consideration, she added, “The best assistance I might provide, I believe, would come in the form of a written list, of all the staff, their duties, and a brief description of their appearance. I can have it ready for you by nightfall.”
A fraction of the tension in Aubrey’s chest melted into relief. “Thank you.”
“You’re quite welcome,” she replied, and seemed about to say more, but something over Aubrey’s shoulder caught her eye.
Aubrey turned to find Lindsey approaching and Emmeline vanished.
“What happened to your fiancée?” Rowena asked before he could speak a word.
“She’s gone upstairs,” Lindsey replied, blithe as ever, “to fetch her sketches of Eiffel’s tower.”
“Just as well, I suppose,” said Rowena. “We were just speaking of the staff.”
Lindsey’s smile faded. He glanced between Aubrey and Rowena. In an instant, Aubrey knew precisely which mistaken assumption he had come to, and how, but even as he opened his mouth to correct it, he knew he would prove too late.
“I had meant to ask you about it,” said Lindsey, despite Aubrey’s silent screams for him to stop. “Though I didn’t like to put it in writing, so I rather thought it might wait until you came home. Aubrey has already told you all the details of the incident, I presume.”
Rowena stared at her brother. “What incident.”
“It’s hardly worth calling an incident,” Aubrey protested, to no avail.
Lindsey cast a sympathetic look at him, yet continued speaking to his sister, as though Aubrey weren’t pleading with everything short of words for him to shut his mouth on the subject. “Some of the staff have taken issue with Aubrey’s presence in the house.”
Aubrey wished for the cunning and craft required to surreptitiously strangle himself with his own necktie. Alas, he had no such skill.
“What happened, exactly?” Rowena pressed.
“I overheard a conversation,” Aubrey cut in before Lindsey could say more, adding, with reluctance, “Two conversations. Whatever was said, it’s my own fault for eavesdropping.”
“And what,” Rowena asked, turning her full attention upon him, “was said?”
Seeing no way out of it, Aubrey answered her, though it took considerable effort to force the words past his lips. “The maid who used to clean the master bedroom declared herself afraid of my face. Which is understandable. And before you ask, the issue is already resolved, for the other maid she spoke to readily agreed to trade rounds with her.”
“This other maid is Freddie, I presume,” said Rowena. “Or Miss Owen, as some know her.”
“Yes,” Aubrey admitted. He didn’t dare look to Lindsey to see what he thought of the matter.
Rowena waited for him to continue, and when he did not, prompted, “And the other conversation?”
Aubrey pulled the words from his teeth like taffy. “A footman said he wished I might wear a bell, so they could all be warned of my coming and be spared the sight of my scars.”
Rowena raised an eyebrow, which was about as much reaction as Aubrey would have expected of her.
Lindsey, however, defied expectations.
“What,” he said, in a voice so low, so flat, and so cold as to immediately demand Aubrey’s attention.
Aubrey glanced his way at last and found Lindsey looking quite unlike himself. He’d had a glimpse of it before, when he’d first told Lindsey of the incidents—all the angles of his face hardened, not even a hint of a smile to soften his sharp cheekbones or formidable brow, his blue eyes cold as ice without the warm sparkle of his sunny disposition.
Yet all Lindsey said when he unclenched his jaw to speak was, “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I did,” Aubrey protested.
“You told me something had occurred, yes,” Lindsey conceded, “but nothing of what was actually said.”
Aubrey hated the tone Lindsey’s voice had taken—a wavering note had come into its solemn timbre, a layer of hurt woven into its concern. He wished Lindsey would shout at him instead. He knew how to handle anger. “I didn’t think it worth your while.”
“Didn’t think—?” Lindsey cut himself off, shaking his head and turning away.
“What difference does it make?” Aubrey asked.
“It makes every difference!” Lindsey cried, raising his voice at last as he whirled to face him again. “He said he wished to bell you like a cat!”
“Which is hardly the worst thing anyone’s ever said of me,” Aubrey insisted. “Sit down.”
“I will when we have rid our household of whosoever possesses such a foolish tongue.”
“That won’t fix anything,” said Aubrey, desperate to regain control over the conversation even as he felt it slipping away through his fingers, like the reins of a bolting horse.
“He’s right,” said Rowena.
These two words accomplished all Aubrey’s protestations could not. Lindsey stopped talking, pacing, or gesturing, and instead focused all his energies upon serving a blank stare to his sister.
Rowena continued. “If Aubrey’s first exercise of his authority as a member of our family is to weed out the staff’s ranks, they may very well come to view him as something of a Robespierre, lopping the heads off all who give offence. And one can hardly blame them for it.”
Aubrey hadn’t words enough to express his gratitude for her adept assessment. Yet before he could even say so little as thank-you, Lindsey spoke.
“What, then,” he urged, “would you have me do?”
“Nothing,” said Rowena. “I’ll have a word with Mr Hudson and Mrs Sheffield.”
“No,” said Lindsey.
Rowena looked as shocked as Aubrey felt.
“We cannot always await your return before resolving our domestic issues,” Lindsey explained. “Particularly if we are to continue with setting up our own establishment in Manchester. You’ve said yourself that Emmeline, wonderful as she is, cannot be relied upon to resolve complaints amongst the staff. Therefore, in your absence, it must fall to me.” He paused, then added, “Irregular as such an arrangement may be.”
“There seems to be very little about our domestic arrangement which could be described as regular,” Rowena noted dryly. “But I concede your point. What shall you do in my stead?”
Rather than answer his sister, Lindsey turned to Aubrey.
“Don’t leave it up to me!” Aubrey protested before he could begin.
A hint of a smile returned to Lindsey’s face at last. “As you wish. But neither do I intend to act without your approval. You must admit you are very much concerned in the matter.”
“Not by choice,” Aubrey muttered.
“We’ve already established,” Lindsey went on, “that those who disparage you appear to be in the minority. This maid—Miss Owen—certainly does not dislike you. And I am convinced those in the stables hold you in regard.”
Aubrey, recalling his conversation with Fletcher, cleared his throat. “I find them very good fellows.”
Rowena’s left eyebrow achieved an angle hitherto unprecedented. “And the footmen?”
At the reminder, Lindsey’s face hardened again.
Glancing between the siblings and seeing no way through but the truth, Aubrey swallowed his pride and spoke. “Rowena, when you hired the footmen… I’m told they may have been selected in anticipation of certain other duties which might not befall them in other households.”
Colour came to Lindsey’s cheeks. He turned aside and coughed, no longer able to meet his sister’s gaze.
“They were,” Rowena replied without a trace of shame.
Aubrey plunged ahead. “I believe some among them might consider their hopes dashed by my arrival.”
Lindsey’s eyes went quite round. Apparently the possibility hadn’t occurred to him. Warmth spread through Aubrey’s heart at the reminder of Lindsey’s good nature, unassuming and optimistic, never even considering the pettier aspects of humanity. Though even now he had to admit this charming naïveté might not serve them well in confronting the issue at hand.
Rowena, on the other hand, appeared nonplussed by this revelation. “And you fear these dashed hopes may have begotten the bitter feelings now expressed in idle gossip amongst them.”
“Indeed,” said Aubrey, relieved she’d grasped the issue so quickly.
She brought a hand to her chin. “It is certainly something to consider, moving forward.”
Lindsey cleared his throat. “We can hardly accuse the staff of allowing jealousy to interfere with their duties.”
“Not directly,” Aubrey agreed. “But I think Rowena’s suggestion—talking to Mr Hudson and Mrs Sheffield—is a good start.”
Lindsey nodded. “I certainly shall.�
�
And yet, as Aubrey considered the problem, he wondered if it would be sufficient. Lindsey talking to the butler and the housekeeper, they in turn passing the message along to the under-butler and cook, the footmen and maids, and then trickling out-of-doors to the grooms and sundry other persons Aubrey couldn’t name but felt quite sure must exist to maintain the massive estate. A message which began strong enough from Lindsey’s lips might dilute as it dispersed through the staff.
“Though I wonder,” Lindsey added, as if reading Aubrey’s thoughts, “if I might speak with the staff as a whole.” In response to Rowena’s alarmed expression, he added, “Not regarding the footman’s jealousy, you understand. But regarding our expectations of their respect for Aubrey in general. I think the subject is worthy of direct address.”
Rowena gave her assent just as Emmeline reappeared in the doorway, sketchbook in hand.
~
Lindsey had a great fondness for the Wiltshire house. The beautiful serenity of its grounds, the sport of its hounds and horses, and the fresh air all delighted him. But above all else, he had a particular love of falling asleep with his arms wrapped around his Aubrey and the low, comforting sounds of a country summer evening floating in through the open window.
Tonight, however, he found his gentle peace tainted by the knowledge that two of his own staff had said words against his Aubrey.
He knew, of course, as all gentlemen did, that staff would gossip about the family of whatever house they worked in. But he’d always assumed such gossip would limit itself to more harmless topics. Gossip about what a fool the master of the house was to buy a certain horse at such a price. Gossip about how he let his tender feelings, which shied away from the culling of runts, prevent the hound-master from maintaining an efficient pack. Gossip about his taste in clothes, or his eating habits, or which periodicals he had delivered to which house, and which ones went unread, and which ones fell apart with reading.
But gossip regarding his Aubrey…
Lindsey didn’t consider himself a temperamental man, but the thought was enough to make his pulse pound. This pounding pulse kept him awake well after Aubrey had fallen asleep beside him. The sight of Aubrey’s face in sleep—all furrows of concern smoothed from his brow, no worry curling the corners of his lips, his heavy lids shut over his soulful eyes, and his narrow chest slowly rising and falling in the steady breath of true repose—could only do so much to soothe him. For to look upon such a handsome face and know others thought it hideous stoked the furnace of his discontent.
Throw His Heart Over Page 14
