A Lady Becomes a Governess

by Diane Gaston

  ‘Would it make a difference if I were not a governess?’ she asked.

  What an odd question.

  ‘But you are a governess.’ He searched for another argument. The obvious one. ‘You would risk conceiving a baby. What would you do then?’

  * * *

  Rebecca lifted her chin. ‘Raise the child. Love it.’

  ‘How would you live?’ He put on one shoe then the other. ‘No one would hire a governess with an out-of-wedlock child.’

  She averted her gaze for a moment, then faced him again. ‘You would support me and the child. You are that sort of gentleman.’

  She knew with every fibre of her being that she could trust Lord Brookmore to take care of her and a baby. He did not abandon those who needed him. He was indeed that sort of gentleman.

  He faced her and looked her directly in the eye. ‘There is something else, Miss Tilson—’

  She longed for him to call her Rebecca.

  ‘Something I should have told you before.’ His eyes held hers and it seemed an age before he spoke. ‘I am betrothed. I am to marry the daughter of the Earl of Trowbridge. Lady Agnes. It is a good match.’

  Rebecca felt as if all the blood drained from her body.

  He was betrothed. He was to marry. An earl’s daughter.

  Like her.

  ‘I cannot cry off,’ he went on. ‘It would be assumed that I found something objectionable in her. It would ruin her for other suitors.’ He frowned. ‘I cannot make love to you, Miss Tilson. It would dishonour you and her.’

  Rebecca closed her eyes against the pain of her foolishness. To weave this fantasy of sharing carnal love with him for one night. To convince herself it would have no consequences. To believe she could be content with one night.

  All along he’d belonged to another woman, her social equal. It stung.

  ‘I should return to London. To—her. Not remain here.’ His brow furrowed. ‘You will stay, will you not? You will stay with Pamela and Ellen?’

  She crossed her arms over her chest. ‘I will stay.’

  Would he be honourable enough to give her a good reference if she wished to leave? What would he think if she told him who she really was?

  She could not leave, though, or tell him the truth. Because she wanted to stay with Pamela and Ellen. Losing them would truly be like losing everything dear to her. Pamela and Ellen.

  And him.

  ‘I will stay.’ She calmed herself. ‘And so must you. You have been telling me for days how you must help your tenants and workers and give them a reason to work harder for the estate. You would be neglecting them if you left. How honourable would that be, my lord? I will not allow you to leave them because of me.’

  His voice turned low. ‘How can I remain with what passes between us?’

  But even if he were not betrothed to Lady Agnes, there would still be a barrier between them. She’d given up her social status equal to Lady Agnes’s and if she revealed herself to be Lady Rebecca, she’d lose Pamela and Ellen and they would lose her along with the other losses they’d endured.

  ‘Then go,’ she said, keeping her voice carefully even lest she reveal the confusion of emotions swirling inside her. ‘Leave this house. Leave your nieces. Leave all these people who work for you and esteem you. Leave this room, too. I suddenly wish to be alone.’

  He straightened, almost as if receiving a blow. With one long gaze at her, he turned and walked away.

  Rebecca stood, grasping the bed post, watching him until the door closed behind him.

  Chapter Eleven

  Rebecca rose early the next morning, having slept little, fired by the emotions within her. About herself. About Lord Brookmore.

  She’d been too impulsive once again, a fault her teachers told her would be the death of her. Perhaps Lady Rebecca, with all her illusions and fantasies, ought to pass away.

  She needed to be Claire. A governess who knew her place. She’d made a choice to be Claire impulsively, but it could not be undone without hurting Pamela and Ellen and that she would never do.

  If she had not pretended to be Claire, Lord Brookmore would have disappeared from her life, nevermore to be seen. She was glad to have made that impulsive choice, glad she’d had this time with him.

  She was even glad to have been kissed by him. And refused to feel guilty for wanting to make love with him. After a day so harrowing, so filled with life and death, she’d needed him. That had been one impulsive choice she did not regret. She only regretted that he’d stopped. It had been her only chance to experience that sort of love and she’d only wanted that sort of love with him.

  There was something between them, that elusive element for which she’d yearned, but had been absent in any other suitor. What she felt for Lord Brookmore bound her to him, even if he married another.

  Still, he’d been right to stop. At that moment, she’d been wild with disappointment and still was, really, but he’d been right.

  It was not right of him to leave his nieces and his estate because of her. That she could not allow.

  One of the lower maids entered the room to tend the fireplace. She jumped when she noticed Rebecca seated in the chair by the window. ‘Oh, miss!’ the maid exclaimed. ‘You startled me.’

  ‘I am up early, I know.’ Rebecca smiled at the young woman. ‘Please tend to your task as if I were not awake.’

  The maid swept the ashes into her bucket and placed new coals on the few that still glowed. She refilled the coal bin and wiped the hearth with a damp cloth.

  She gathered up her things and started for the door. ‘I’ll be going, miss.’

  Rebecca stopped her. ‘May I beg a favour? You are Meg, are you not?’

  ‘Yes, miss,’ the maid said.

  ‘Will you help me into my riding habit?’

  The maid put down her things and wiped her hands. ‘Yes, miss.’

  A few minutes later Rebecca made her way down the back stairs, out of the house and across the park to the stables, determined to ride, as Lord Brookmore had once invited her.

  She would ride until these emotions blew off her, like leaves off a tree, and hopefully she would be calm in time for breakfast with the girls.

  And Lord Brookmore.

  The stable door was open and she walked in.

  ‘Is anyone here?’ she called.

  A stable worker emerged from one of the stalls. ‘Miss?’

  She lifted her chin. ‘Lord Brookmore said I might ride. Is there a horse you could saddle for me?’

  He wiped his hands on a cloth as if considering her request.

  ‘I assure you, I am an experienced rider,’ she added. ‘The more spirited the horse, the better.’

  ‘Yes, miss.’ His voice was sceptical.

  She walked through the stable until reaching the tack room. She pointed to her saddle, one of two side saddles that hung there. ‘That one is mine.’

  He took the saddle and walked by two or three stalls, whose horses eagerly reached for him with their muzzles. He finally chose a lovely bay mare.

  ‘This is Lily,’ he told her.

  While he saddled the horse, Rebecca introduced herself to the animal, stroking its neck and getting it used to the sound of her voice.

  ‘You know horses, miss.’ The stableman nodded approvingly.

  ‘I love horses.’ She pressed her cheek against the horse’s neck.

  The stable worker checked the saddle and led the horse to a mounting block. Rebecca was soon in the saddle and out in the crisp morning air.

  The stable worker had chosen well. Lily was steady, but eager. When Rebecca accustomed herself to the feel of the horse, she lengthened the reins and gave Lily her head.

  Galloping over the fields and jumping fences with the green mountains shrouded in fog gave Rebecca exactly what she’d craved. T
he pleasure of the ride. Freedom from thought and emotion.

  Lily slowed and Rebecca turned back towards Brookmore House. They kept a sedate pace. Inhaling the clear morning air, Rebecca felt cleansed.

  The day before, so filled with drama, was over and she could move past it, just as she’d moved past the shipwreck and entered Claire’s life. Time would make everything better. She’d get used to being a governess. She’d get used to Lord Brookmore marrying an earl’s daughter.

  Rebecca would keep her distance from him, as she’d learned to do with her father whenever they were in the house together. Lord Brookmore would not have to leave because of her.

  She patted Lily and drank in the beauty all around her.

  As the house and stable came in to view, so did another lone rider making his way back, as well.

  Lord Brookmore.

  He saw her and stopped to wait for her to reach him.

  ‘I heard you took a horse out,’ he said when she came near.

  He had invited her to ride, had he not? She felt her emotions bubbling to the surface. She pushed them down.

  ‘I needed a good run.’ She leaned forward to pat the horse. ‘Lily is a wonderful horse.’

  He rode beside her, not speaking, like that last day on the road, the day they’d arrived at Brookmore House.

  Like that day she broke the silence. ‘I suggest we leave yesterday in the past,’ she began. ‘I plan to devote myself to Pamela and Ellen, nothing more.’

  She darted a glance towards him. Did he realise what she meant? No more kisses. No lovemaking.

  He frowned. ‘Very well, Miss Tilson.’

  She bit her lip to keep from saying more and managed to accept his silence for the rest of the way to the stable.

  They walked back to the house together, still not speaking. Rebecca still felt the same towards him, as if they were tethered together, but she could not indulge such a feeling.

  They walked up the back stairs to the second floor and emerged into the hallway near the breakfast room. Would he eat with them this morning, Rebecca wanted to ask, but she held her tongue.

  He started to walk away from her, towards his room, but he turned. ‘I will see you and the children at breakfast.’

  At least she had not spoiled that for Pamela and Ellen.

  * * *

  Garret expected great difficulty being in Miss Tilson’s company, but over the next week she made it easy, never getting close, never turning the conversation to anything personal between them. How was she able to do that? he wondered. He still felt the physical yearning for her, but because she kept herself at an emotional distance, he managed to do the same. On the outside, anyway.

  That he’d been busy helped, as well. He’d joined his tenants and workers in the fields, the stables, or wherever they toiled, and he’d asked them to tell him of their needs, their complaints, their ideas for improvement. He’d kept a log of everything they’d said and worked with Ben to begin with the most important repairs. He abandoned his plan to leave right away. He’d stay as long as he could.

  He continued to eat dinner with Miss Tilson—he could not bear to give that up—but they limited their conversation to his work with the tenants and hers with the children, even though he longed to ask if she still had visions of the shipwreck, if her new dresses pleased her, if she were happy.

  She rode almost every morning, as did he. Twice they’d ended their runs riding next to each other and all he could think of was of riding next to her on the trip from Moelfre, how his admiration of her grew on the trip, how he had kissed her.

  Would another moment eventually come when he—or she—would weaken and they’d again be caught in a whirlpool of desire? He hoped for her sake he could resist.

  This day was to be another busy one, busier than most, in fact. Today the sheep shearing was to begin. Garret was surprised how much he looked forward to this. It had been many years since he’d thought of the delights of the sheep shearing. He’d loved it when he’d been a boy.

  That morning at breakfast he’d invited his nieces to watch the shearing, which meant, of course, that Miss Tilson would also come.

  Garret walked with Ben to the pen set up for the shearing. Already they could hear the bleating of sheep.

  ‘It sounds like the clipping has begun,’ Garret said.

  Ben responded, ‘I am glad you are staying for the clipping. The sheep are everything to the workers and the sheep are everything to the farm.’

  Garret nodded. ‘I confess, I am itching to be down there with them.’

  Ben grinned. ‘Like when we were boys.’ He turned serious. ‘The workers like to see you out there with them, doing the work. That is something even your father did not do.’

  Garret smiled. ‘I remember my father standing with my brother, instructing him on the shearing. They never noticed me in the midst of the sheep.’

  Garret had herded the sheep to the shearers or rolled the sheared wool into bales. In those days he’d do whatever the workers let him do, which was mostly the dirtiest jobs. Garret hadn’t minded. The dirtier the better, he’d thought at the time.

  The sheep had been brought down from the fells into a pen that funnelled them one by one to the shearers, several who were itinerant, making a living by going from farm to farm in July when the Herdwick sheep were typically shorn.

  Miss Tilson and the girls were already at the wooden fence watching the operation. Pamela and Ellen had climbed on the slats of the fence so they could see over the top. Miss Tilson leaned on the top slat, her face alight with interest. Her eyes seemed involuntarily drawn to him for an instant, but she immediately turned her attention back to the sheep.

  Garret greeted the men and joined the work, some of the older men joking with him that they’d give him the same dirty jobs they’d given him when a boy. The Herdwick wool did not bring in much money; it was too coarse for most clothing, but the sheep were valued for their meat and the shearing protected them from blowflies and bluebottles laying eggs in their wool.

  Garret loved it all, loved the bleating of the sheep, the scraping of the shears and the voices of the workers as they toiled. He walked among them, helping when he could. There was no slacking off on this job as far as he could tell. Everyone worked with efficiency and skill. Ben said it was because Garret was among them.

  Throughout the morning, though, Garret was aware of Miss Tilson. He felt her gaze as if it were an actual touch.

  * * *

  The afternoon wore on and eventually the numbers of sheep shorn exceeded those in the pen preparing for the clippers. Garret’s skin softened with wool oil. His back was damp with sweat.

  He was picking up stray bits of wool when Ben tapped him on the shoulder. ‘A carriage is coming towards the house.’

  Garret glanced to the road. A large black coach, an aristocrat’s carriage drawn by four horses, approached, but was too far away for him to see the crest on the side.

  ‘Who the devil could that be?’ he said aloud.

  He wiped his hands on a towel and made his way out of the sheep pen, striding towards the house.

  * * *

  ‘Where is Uncle Garret going?’ Ellen asked, twisting around to watch him.

  Rebecca, of course, had seen him leave the pen and cross the paddock. Her gaze had followed him wherever he’d been. Helping pull sheep into the shearing area. Holding sheep until the shearer had the animal well in his grasp. Rolling the wool and gathering the stray bits that scattered on the floor.

  She turned to see. ‘A coach is coming.’

  ‘A coach!’ Ellen cried. ‘A big coach!’ She jumped down from the fence. ‘I am going to see who it is!’

  ‘No, Ellen!’ Pamela cried. ‘Uncle won’t like it.’

  But Ellen paid her sister no heed.

  ‘Ellen!’ Rebecca called after her. ‘Come back!�
��

  Both she and Pamela left the fence and chased after Ellen.

  ‘She should know better,’ Pamela exclaimed to Rebecca. Pamela had become her ally in trying to rein in Ellen.

  ‘Stay away from the coach’s horses!’ Rebecca cried after the little girl.

  Lord Brookmore had already reached the front door. Two footmen emerged from the house as the carriage pulled up.

  Rebecca and Pamela caught up to Ellen several feet away from the carriage. Rebecca caught the little girl by the nape of her jacket just in time to see a fashionably dressed young lady emerge from the carriage.

  ‘Let us go see who it is!’ Ellen tried to pull away.

  ‘Not like little hoydens,’ Rebecca said. ‘We will walk like ladies and when I say stop, you must stop. No running up to your uncle. He will tell you who it is if you are to know.’

  ‘Yes, Ellen.’ Pamela mimicked Rebecca’s tone. ‘Do not act like a little hoyden.’

  Pamela took her sister’s hand to guard against another impulsive run, Rebecca thought.

  An older woman and a maid also disembarked from the coach.

  Rebecca allowed the little girls to approach a little closer, close enough to hear, but not to be in the way.

  ‘You weren’t able to send a message?’ Lord Brookmore asked the young lady.

  ‘Brookmore, darling. I wanted to surprise you,’ she replied.

  Rebecca had a sinking feeling she knew who this was.

  The young lady was petite enough to make Rebecca feel like an Amazon. Pale blonde hair peeked out from beneath her exquisite silk bonnet, the same deep blue as her perfectly tailored travelling dress. The hue complemented her blue eyes, their colour visible even from this distance.

  Lord Brookmore wore the expression of someone punched in the stomach.

  ‘Oh, are these sweet little girls your nieces?’ the lady asked while her maid carried in a large piece of luggage.

  Ellen skipped towards her and curtsied.

  ‘Yes,’ Brookmore said stiffly. ‘May I present Miss Pamela and Miss Ellen.’