by Julia London
“Ah.” She smiled, put a hand to the side of her gown and ran her palm across it. He noticed her fingers were long and delicate—
“Well. I shan’t keep you from your tasks,” she said, and with another quick, alluring smile, carefully resumed her seat and picked up her book.
Liam shifted the bag with the goose in it, dislodging a feather from his shoulder. He told himself to turn and walk away, but his mouth opened of its own accord. “I beg yer pardon, madam,” he blurted, “but might I ask, where is Laria, then?”
“Pardon?”
Had he said it incorrectly? “Ah…LAA-ree-aah,” he said again, enunciating carefully.
Natalie’s mother looked at him in surprise, then at the heavens as she shook her head, muttering something unintelligible before she turned a charming smile to him again. “I do beg your pardon, sir. I’m afraid my daughter has quite an imagination. Laria exists only in her mind.”
Only in her…Ach, what a bloody fool he was! Strangely, he could feel a curious heat rushing up his neck. He should have known, what with the crippled mother and all that. The beauty was smiling, clearly amused by his foolishness. That was not an image he would have linger, so Liam took an uneasy step toward her, smiling thinly. “Then I should presume there will be no Christmas pageant, eh?”
She laughed, tossing her head back, drawing attention to the smooth curve of her neck. “A Christmas pageant? Did she say such a thing? Goodness, Natalie!” she exclaimed, smiling down at the girl. Natalie scooched further down on the bench.
Liam took another step forward. “And…a milliner—more fantasy, is it?”
“Oh, no, the milliner is quite real, fortunately,” she said, and laughed again, a sound so low and rich that it gave Liam goose bumps (the goose notwithstanding). “The milliner fashions hats,” she explained, “but we mean to only look at them,” she added, looking sternly at Natalie for a moment. She smiled up at Liam again. “Captain…I beg your pardon, but have you a name, sir?”
“Lockhart. Captain Lockhart.”
“How do you do, Captain Lockhart? Ellen Farnsworth.”
Ellie. A lovely name for a lovelier woman. It suited her, he thought. “’Tis a pleasure to make yer acquaintance,” he said properly, bowing low, cabbage in hand. And it was indeed a very special pleasure, he thought, straightening again to gaze at her smiling blue eyes—until he realized he was gawking, and instantly took a step backward, a wee bit flustered. God blind him, what was the matter with him? He was not the sort to be so easily unsettled! He was a Highland soldier, an assassin, a man with nerves of steel! “There ye are. I suppose I ought to be on my way.”
“You’ve sprung a bit of a leak,” she said pleasantly.
Horrified, he blinked. “I beg yer pardon, I’ve done what?”
“You seem to be leaking,” she said again, nodding politely to the bag he was holding.
Liam looked down, saw it was the forgotten goose that was leaking (not him, thankfully!), but felt his heart nonetheless climb right to his throat. Marvelous, this was. He was a rustic bumpkin who carried his food about in a pillow casing and a cabbage in his hand! He stared at the blood dripping to the ground and wondered what a true gentleman might say in an awkward moment like this. Righto, so I have. Or Bugger me, look there, will you? Liam remembered his training—when one is in a situation from which one cannot cleanly extract oneself, one should retreat with all due haste—and took one involuntary step backward. “Well then. Good day to ye.”
“Do enjoy your day, sir. It’s rare to have so much sunshine this time of year,” Ellie said, looking at the blue sky with a smile on her face.
“Aye,” he said stupidly, and pivoted sharply, striding instantly in the opposite direction, as fast as his legs would carry him, the goose leaving a thin red trail behind him.
When he reached his rooms and shut the door firmly behind him, he realized he had been clutching the bag so hard that his fingers had frozen in a cramp.
What in hell was the matter with him? He was acting as if he’d never seen a woman before! Disgusted, Liam stalked across the room and tossed the bird in the bag into the basin, walked to the small brazier, stirred the coals from the morning’s fire, and added more. As he waited for the coals to heat, he returned to the basin, took out his dagger, and began to clean the bird, plucking her feathers in a sharp, jerking motion.
A half hour later, he had removed all his clothes but the buckskins, had eaten his cabbage, and was roasting his bird over the brazier coals. When he finished his meal, and was at last fully sated, he cleaned up best he could, dumping what was left of the bird into the bag. He wandered to the lumpy bed and fell onto it, thinking about Ellie.
He must have fallen asleep, for the next thing he knew the smell of entrails was quite strong, permeating everything in the room. Liam glanced at his pocket watch—it was late afternoon. He had slept for more than two hours! A bloody waste of time—if he wanted to find Nigel before the chap fell into his cups again, he’d best be about it!
However, the stench in the room was unbearable. Who knew when Follifoot might come around to remove the remains? Liam took the foul-smelling bag to the window. He opened the double panes, leaned over, and looked at the mews below, spotting the rubbish heap he had noticed earlier. He lifted the bag, gave it a good swing, and watched it fall, landing atop the heap. Satisfied, he began to pull inside the window, but a movement caught his eye, and he leaned out, looked to the right. There on the walk in front of the house was Farnsworth, tottering off on his little feet, wrapped in a cloak.
Gone gambling for the evening, he supposed. Behind him, Miss Agatha appeared, scurrying across the square, trotting off to a life heaven knew where before she had to return to Hades House the following morning.
Liam pulled himself back in and shut the window, staring at the dingy, cracked pane for a moment as a very dangerous and ill-advised thought played at the corner of his mind. A thought so ludicrous, so absolutely preposterous, that it was a damn disgrace to the soldier that he was. After all, he had his work cut out for him with Nigel and the English Lockharts, didn’t he? Losing his focus could only compromise his mission; how many times had that been drilled into him? Single-minded, focused on a task. Isn’t that what they had taught him in the military?
He shook his head, returned to the basin, and used what little water there was left in the ewer to clean up. He dressed in more of Grif’s foppish clothes, combed his hair, and washed his mouth, preparing to set out for the evening.
When the familiar knock came to his door, he opened it, stepping aside so Follifoot could bring in whatever foul thing they had served up that night. As usual, Follifoot was silent as he passed by, carrying a tray laden with something that smelled remarkably like raw haggis.
Liam picked up his coat, slung it over one arm. “Be a good lad and clean up the basin, will ye?” he asked, and walked out, smiling at the shock on Follifoot’s face. He proceeded down the long corridor, turned at the bottom of the winding staircase toward the door, one foot in front of the other, on his way out to find his cousin.
But the foot came down and stopped dead, immobile. Glued.
Slowly, Liam turned and peered up the winding staircase, leaning as far to one side as he could to see around the bend. Nothing. Not a sight of anything or anyone, not even a peep. His fingers drummed impatiently against his thigh. Lunacy, sheer lunacy! Of course now he knew why Farnsworth had forbade him from climbing those stairs. If he were going to leave a wife as bonny as Ellie here alone, he would not only forbid it, he’d put an iron gate across the bloody staircase. Armed guards. Hell, he’d not leave her, which just proved once again that Farnsworth was a stupid bastard.
Aye, better to leave well enough alone, he told himself, even if he did have a burning need to show her that he was not some rustic bumpkin, contrary to all appearances thus far. He had given Farnsworth his word. Besides, what should he care what she thought of him? She was a married woman, a mother, and English, for chrissake
s, a member of the Quality and all that, the last sort of woman who should ever spark an interest in him. Actually, he had no business thinking about her at all. At all.
Except that he couldn’t seem to get her out of his mind.
Just go, then! Disgusted with himself, Liam snapped back around, faced the door, and reminded himself that he had to find Nigel before the goat drank his weight in whiskey, or else he would lose another entire day. But the sound of Follifoot at the basin drifted down the corridor, rattling Liam in his indecision, and suddenly, in a moment of sheer insanity, he pivoted on his heel again, looked up the winding staircase, and darted stealthily upward.
Eight
When Follifoot brought tea, Ellen informed him that she and Natalie would not require supper, to which Follifoot smiled sympathetically. Damn Farnsworth, but the old man was so very tight with his precious pound sterling it was a wonder he could get anyone to cook for them. This cook, whoever she might be, had to be the worst yet. The food was bland and nondescript, and in the most unfortunate of cases, inedible. Thank God for Agatha—the dear woman had taken pity on poor Natalie and what she called the new cook’s tripe. Once or twice a week, she prepared a delicious meal for them. This evening, the smell of roasted beef wafted through the suite of rooms, causing Ellen’s mouth to water.
Ellen walked to the room adjoining the sitting room, where Natalie was hard at work on a new drawing (to add to the hundreds she had already made). She paused, peeked over her daughter’s shoulder, and saw that this one was like most of the others—a damsel in distress, a princess locked in a tower, awaiting the knight who would come and rescue her.
Just like the two of them.
“Agatha has roasted a beef for us. We’ll dine when you’ve washed your hands.”
Natalie frantically began to color one part of her castle, not ready to put it away just yet. “One minute more, Mother, please?”
“A minute more, then it’s up to wash your face and comb your hair,” Ellen agreed, and brushed her hand across the top of the girl’s head. She left her daughter then, in her world of drawings and one-act plays, all of them about a lonely princess in a tower.
Ellen went to her dressing room and surveyed her gowns. It really didn’t matter if she dressed for supper or not, since it was only she and Natalie, but she stubbornly refused to give in to the hopelessness of their virtual exile, and insisted on carrying on as if they were indeed out in society. She chose the blue silk her sister Eva had given her. Like all the gowns Eva gave her, it was a little snug in the bodice, but it was very pretty, and frankly, Ellen could use something to brighten her day. This was the part of the evening she hated most, dressing alone, looking at herself in the mirror, reminded that she was twenty-eight years old and shut up like an old widow.
Please, God, something had to change. Something. Anything! But what? And how? Those questions beat a steady rhythm through every thought and every dream—even now, as she let loose her hair, methodically brushed it, and wrapped it in a simple chignon, it played in her mind until she couldn’t see anything but hopelessness staring back at her.
Hopeless, yes. But then she’d think of Natalie, whose stories grew more fantastic with time, and she felt a keener sense of urgency to find a way out. It mattered little for herself. She had long since passed the point of tears—they simply weren’t good enough for the sort of pain she felt inside. But for Natalie, she could not, would not, allow them to live like this for the rest of their lives. She would not allow Natalie to end up like her, alone. Dead. No hope of happiness.
God in heaven, her impotence was choking her.
Ellen stood abruptly before she drowned in it. She went to gather Natalie, who was still working on her drawing of the princess in the tower. After some cajoling, she finally convinced Natalie it was time for her supper, and helped the girl change her apron, wash her face, and comb her hair.
Together, they opened the door of the austere dining room and instantly heard a scratching sound.
“It’s the mouse,” Natalie opined.
“Wretched little thing,” Ellen muttered, disgusted. The very thought of a mouse in her suite made her skin crawl. “Must be starving, too, as often as it comes round. Please set the plates, Natalie,” she said, gesturing toward the sideboard where a few plates were neatly stacked. “I’m going to find him,” she added, picking up a poker.
“Don’t hurt him!” Natalie cried.
“I won’t,” Ellen lied, and walked out into the corridor. She paused, listening, and thought she heard something in the old sitting room across from their dining area, which Agatha used for her sewing. She walked into that room, looked around at the cloth strewn about and the pair of silver shears Agatha had proudly shown her one day. Ellen picked up the shears, turned them over in her hand, and wondered what they would bring on High Street.
And just as suddenly, she dropped the shears. What was she now, a thief? Disgusted, Ellen turned her back on the shears and walked out, the mouse forgotten.
When she entered the dining room, Natalie was sitting patiently at the table. “Did you find him?”
“No,” Ellen said.
“Good!” Natalie exclaimed, clapping, as Ellen put the poker aside to uncover the dish Agatha had left. Roasted beef, leeks, and potatoes…it smelled heavenly. She dipped the ladle into the dish, put some on Natalie’s plate, then her own. Ellen looked at her daughter and asked, “Would you please say grace?”
Natalie nodded, clasped her hands together and bowed her head. “Dearest God,” she said softly. “Bless us our bounty and Miss Agatha for bringing it. And please find us a new place to live. Amen.”
And please let me never think of stealing from Agatha again, Ellen thought. Please, God. Amen.
Natalie picked up her spoon, dipped the edge of it into the beef. “Did you ever know any princesses, Mother?” she asked.
“Just you, darling,” Ellen said, reaching for her spoon. A muffled sound in the corridor caught her attention, and she lifted her head. The mouse again.
“I’m going to be a princess someday. Do you know the story of the princess in the tower? She lived there for ten years, and no one knew it, except her father, but he was a king and he was a very mean man.”
“Mmm,” Ellen said, tasting the beef, the excellent flavor spoiled only by the sound of the mouse again. She sighed wearily; Farnsworth wouldn’t pay for a rat catcher unless a rat found its way to his door.
“And he wouldn’t let her out of the tower because he didn’t want anyone to marry her. But one day, she put her head out the window and looked all around, and—”
“Don’t forget to eat, darling,” Ellen gently reminded her, and Natalie quickly put a spoonful in her mouth.
“The princess looked all around, and she could see cows and sheep and donkeys and dogs, and…”
“Cats?”
“Cats!” Natalie exclaimed, and put another spoonful in her mouth as she considered that, before she finally shook her head. “No. She didn’t see any cats,” she said definitively. “But every day she put her head out the window to have a look around, and one day, she saw a man on a horse, and she waved to him, and she said, ‘Good day, good daa-aaay!’ ”
Another sound from the corridor, and Ellen put her spoon down, stood resolutely from her chair. “Did the man see her?” she asked as she surreptitiously picked up a poker from the hearth.
Caught up in her story and oblivious to her mother’s actions, Natalie nodded eagerly as Ellen walked calmly to the corridor door. “Yes! He saw her and he thought she was the most beautiful girl he’d ever seen!”
“Ah,” Ellen muttered absently, gripping the poker to give the mouse a good what-for, and abruptly threw open the door, but was so startled by the shadowy figure of a large man that she shrieked, dropping the poker with a loud clatter on the bare floor. Behind her, Natalie shrieked, too, and dropped her spoon onto her plate.
“I can explain, I can!”
What was this? The captain? Inc
redulous, Ellen put her hand over her wildly beating heart and peered out into the dim corridor to make certain it was him. “Captain Lockhart, what do you think you are about?” she demanded hotly.
“I can explain, I swear it,” he said, looking very sheepish.
“Captain Lockhart!” Natalie squealed with delight.
“Then by all means, do so,” Ellen snapped, ignoring her daughter. “Are you in the habit of sneaking about a ladies’ suite?”
His green eyes widened with shock; Ellen couldn’t be entirely certain, but she thought he even blushed.
“What? Sneaking…? Lord God, no, of course no’! I am a captain in the Highland Regiments of the Royal Army in service to His Majesty, the king! I would never do such a thing!”
He declared it so loudly and emphatically that Ellen couldn’t help but believe him. Yet there he stood. “Then what, pray, are you doing at the door of my dining room?”
The captain bit his lower lip, and for a moment he reminded Ellen of a giant little boy. “In truth, I…I gave me word to his lordship that I’d no’ come up those stairs, but I…I…” His voice trailed off, his brows dipped in confusion, and he suddenly jerked his gaze to the room behind her. “What’s this smell, then?” he asked, peering over Ellen’s shoulder, trying to see into the dining room.
The beef. Of course! The poor man had been subjected to the cook’s fare, too—he likely was starving. Ellen glanced over her shoulder at the large soup tureen. “So you’ve sampled our haute cuisine, I take it?”
He sighed. “I’m afraid I’ve had the bloody misfortune, indeed.” He caught himself, coloring slightly at his curse, but Ellen laughed. It was a bloody misfortune!
Standing there in his overcoat and looking rather abashed, the captain tried not to look at the tureen. “I beg yer pardon and yer forgiveness, madam. I didna mean to startle ye so,” he said, his gaze now falling to the poker lying on the floor between them. “I didna mean to climb the stairs a’tall—”
