The main creator of the gossip, Sir Edward, appeared sublimely unconscious of the fuss. The deference he showed her as they found their places in the crowded cathedral was unexpected. Clearly, he was sending a silent message to those gathered. She cast him a glance filled with gratitude as she slipped past him into the pew.
Once the service was over he held her hand firmly in his crooked arm as he greeted the bishop and then his neighbors.
“Good morning, Mr.s. Scott. Good morning, Major. Miss Carstairs is well known to you, is she not? Perhaps you’ve not met her mother, Lady Sarah.”
And so it went on, until he’d obliged everyone of note to acknowledge Alice’s presence. He even managed a few words with the Lord Lieutenant himself. Alice curtsied deeply as she was introduced. Tension crackled around them as Edward drew Lady Sarah forward. Would she be snubbed, cut directly by the regent’s representative in the county? Lord Malmesbury held out his hand without hesitation. Whatever his private opinions about her husband, there could be no doubt about his opinion of her.
Where the Lord Lieutenant led, the others could do nothing less but follow. Lady Sarah in her own subtle way let it be known she would be at home to receive morning callers. Tactfully seeded tidbits divorced the situation at The Priory from any hint of impropriety. Mr.s. Scott and several others were left with the distinct impression that Alice and her mother were rescuing the bachelor guardian from Lavinia’s gross neglect of her new babe. Housekeeper Lady Sarah might well be, yet none but Sir Edward and Alice would ever be aware of the fact.
After another fruitless squabble over who should sit with their back to the horses she settled in to the place in the barouche beside her mama. More tired by the strain of being on show than she’d expected, the ride home in the captain’s barouche gave Alice a chance to relax.
The sun shone down on hedgerows full of spring flowers. Yellows, blues, pinks and white danced on their backdrop of fresh new leaves. The fields lay clothed in the carpet of green she could see from the schoolroom window. The wheat and oats now stood inches high. In the meadows lambs frolicked around their mothers, startled by the sound of the horses on the road. Now and then, when the team stopped at a junction, the singing of meadowlarks could be heard in the clear air. It felt good to be alive.
After dinner that evening the ladies retired to the drawing room, leaving Sir Edward to drink his port in solitary state. To oblige her mama, Alice played on the pianoforte and sang for the first time in months.
The strains of “Sheep May Safely Graze” died away as she finished the final chords. The beauty of Bach’s music filled her with a solemn joy and she sat for a moment or two, her fingers still on the keys, contemplating the ways fate had dealt with her. Fully recovered physically, she knew that the scars in her mind would take longer to heal. It would be so easy to fall into a melancholy. The thought of Scripps being so wicked and her own cousin so vindictive cast a dark shadow over her spirits.
“That was very beautiful. Thank you.”
Startled by the voice she looked up into deep blue eyes.
“Oh, Sir Edward! I didn’t realize you had come in.”
“And I didn’t realize what a fine voice you have, ma’am. You’ve been hiding your light under a bushel.”
Confusion twisted her tongue.
“I…I enjoy singing. Music as fine as this needs a better voice than mine to do it justice, however.”
He shook his head. “I can’t agree. I find no fault in you whatsoever. Will you not play something else? I should very much like to hear you sing another song.”
His admiration ignited a glow in her chest. “Certainly, sir, although it’s still Easter Sunday and not perhaps a suitable time for ballads.”
“Indeed not. I’ll reserve that pleasure for another day. I do have a favorite anthem though. I suppose it’s too much to hope that you know the words from John’s gospel set by Thomas Tallis?”
Lady Sarah, sitting quietly on the sofa until now, laid down her sewing. “John, chapter fourteen, verses fifteen to seventeen. It’s a favorite of ours. ‘If ye love me, keep my commandments and I will pray the Father and he shall give you another comforter’.”
Alice murmured the next line as she fingered the keys. “‘That he may bide with you forever’. The setting is simply beautiful, is it not? But this is a part song, sir. Do you sing? Will you not join us?”
She could see him hesitate. “I would be honored, but you may regret that invitation, Miss Carstairs. It’s an age since I last sang this, when I was still a lieutenant, in fact. Aboard the Neptune we had some fine voices, but were confined to the limits of the first lieutenant’s fiddle and whether or not we could find one of the ship’s boys who could still sing a treble line. The captain had us sing always on a Sunday evening.”
Alice turned back from the keys to look at him again.
“I had not imagined a ship as a place of worship.”
He smiled. “Yet there’s a service every Sunday, weather and the enemy permitting. The articles of war make grim reading, it’s true, but my last captain was a very devout man. Never a Sunday would go by without evening prayers and a hymn or two.”
She’d so much to learn about Edward. There was so much his father had missed too, by his own culpability.
He stood behind her at the piano. Lady Sarah stood at her other hand. With only the three voices instead of four there were a couple of awkward moments, which Alice covered by playing the line forte, but Edward’s pleasing tenor voice held true to the notes as he came in faultlessly with his lines. Lady Sarah sang the contralto to Alice’s soprano. The drawing room, a place so godless when Sir Gregory had been alive, rang with the beautiful melody.
There was a little silence after the last note faded away. Edward was first to speak. “Thank you. You’ve brought back many happy memories for me and a few somber ones as well. We must do this again, if you’ll permit.”
“We look forward to it, don’t we, Alice? But it has been a long day and I think we ladies should retire. Let’s find our candles, my dear.” Lady Sarah led the way upstairs.
The following evening they gathered by the piano once again. After a few simple songs Lady Sarah took her turn at the keys. “You don’t want to listen to my poor voice after Alice has entertained us so well, so it shall have to be a tune. Maybe something more modern, a waltz, perhaps?”
Sir Edward nodded his agreement. “A waltz? By all means. I’ve heard them played. My social education has been sadly neglected, unfortunately. I’ve never learned to dance a waltz.”
Lady Sarah looked up from the keyboard. “Here’s a fine thing! There will be ladies aplenty at the assemblies who will be mortified when you don’t ask them to waltz, Sir Edward. It’s becoming quite the thing now, you know. All the officers lately returned from the Peninsula wish to dance it. Alice, we must attend to this at once.”
Lady Sarah played a few bars. “Come. There’s no time like the present for a lesson.”
Alice felt a flush of embarrassment creep into her cheeks. She couldn’t waltz with him! “Mama, you cannot mean it!”
“I should very much like to learn to waltz.”
His low-voiced request startled her almost as much as her mother’s behavior. Caught between the two of them, Alice felt her resistance crumbling. After all, she’d been required to play for hours when Lavinia learned the steps from the dancing master brought down especially from London. She knew exactly how it should be taught. But to waltz with Edward? It was her dream and her nightmare.
“As you wish.”
She inhaled sharply as she felt a hand slip around her waist. On this informal family occasion Edward had no gloves with him and the warmth of his bare hand diffused through her flimsy muslin gown. She could do no more than concentrate on his neckcloth as she uttered instructions.
“There’s a three beat movement. Start with your left foot. Forward, side together. Back, side together. And now, Mama, some music, if you please?”
“
I fear I’m the one who should be minding my feet, Miss Carstairs. You, surely, have no need.”
She looked up at the amused tone in his voice. His features were so close, smiling down at her. There was the tiny scar beside his ear she’d noticed once before and a single silver hair in his eyebrow she hadn’t. His scent enveloped her with the familiar freshness of soap. There was nothing to fear, except herself. With a conscious effort she forced herself to relax.
“Indeed, you’re a fast learner, sir. Shall we try a turn around the room instead of the box step?”
All was fine as they progressed in a straight line, but in the confines of the drawing room the turn was necessarily tight. Brought up sharp against a chair Alice shortened her step, only to have Edward tread heavily on her foot. He broke away with an exclamation.
“Miss Carstairs, I’m so sorry! I’m such a clumsy fool! Have I hurt you?”
Alice attempted to smile as she rubbed her big toe as surreptitiously as she could on the calf of her other leg. She blinked rapidly. “No, indeed. It’s nothing. You cannot expect to be perfect all at once, after all.”
He examined her expression. “I have hurt you.” To her shock he kissed the back of her hand. “I really am so sorry. Here, let me help you back to your seat.”
With his arm once more around her waist he supported her back to the sofa. “Is there anything I can get for you? Would you like me to retire?”
She had to laugh. The tears were gone now, replaced by a burgeoning tenderness that threatened to engulf her in emotion at any moment. He looked so anxious. Greatly daring, she slid off the satin slipper and wiggled her toes at him.
“See, no harm done.”
To her horror, he went down on one knee and took her stockinged foot into his hand. His action was completely unexpected, but she had to admit to herself that she’d practically invited him to do something like this. An anguished glance at her mother afforded her no aid. Mama looked equally shocked.
He massaged her toes. Warmth spread from the contact with his fingers to burst like fire into her cheeks. She didn’t ever want him to stop.
“Such a little foot to be nearly crushed so. And your slippers afford no protection whatsoever, do they? Take off your stocking and let me have a look. Hopefully I haven’t bruised it too much.”
Take off her stocking? What was he thinking? It would only be undignified to struggle. She waited impassively for him to let her go. Realizing by her silence that something was amiss, Sir Edward looked up from his contemplation of her toes. One glance at her face and he dropped her foot immediately.
“What have I said? I beg your pardon! I don’t know what I was thinking.” A flush rose into his face to match her own. “I…I am too used to dealing with my men, I suppose. I doubt I shall ever make a gentleman.”
Lady Sarah jumped up from behind the piano and hurried over to take his hand.
“Don’t be so silly! Sir Edward, you’re the finest gentleman I’ve ever met. No one doubts the sincerity of your actions. It’s just that Alice… Well, she cannot be too careful at the moment. Any hint of impropriety… What if a servant should have chanced to come in?”
“Say no more, ma’am. I fully appreciate your difficulty. It was an absolutely stupid thing to have said and extremely disrespectful as well.”
The expression on Edward’s face looked so bleak Alice wished there was anything to say to comfort him. She opened her mouth, only to close it again. She mustn’t encourage him. There was already too much familiarity in what was, after all, a master and servant situation. Hard as it might be, she had to remember her place.
Never did Alice more bitterly regret her father’s imprudence and the harm it had done her and her family. In other circumstances she could have claimed Edward as an equal and made an attempt to fix his interest. But not now. She could never do that now. He was lost to her forever.
She looked at him, not daring to say a word lest her feelings betray her. Edward gazed back, tension evident in his bearing and in the way his fists were tightly clenched.
He bowed. “If you’ll excuse me, Lady Sarah, Miss Carstairs. There’s a matter requiring my attention. Goodnight to you both.”
As the door closed softly behind him Alice turned to look into the fire, blinking rapidly to chase away the tears threatening to fall.
“Alice?” Her mother’s softly voiced query did nothing to restore her equilibrium. Fighting bravely, she managed a response in a voice that wavered only slightly.
“I’m more tired than I realized, Mama. Perhaps I shall go to bed.”
“Yes, no doubt you’re right. Your spirits will be easily overset for some time yet. I’ve some reflection to do over my own conduct, I must admit. I’ve fallen into the habit of treating Edward like another son, but that’s a mistake. Even though he feels like a son to me I’m in his employ, although he never mentions it and treats me with such courtesy.”
Would she want Edward for a brother? What a dreadful thought! No, Alice would never regard Edward as a brother.
When there was no reply Lady Sarah shook her head a little sadly. “I’ll see you in the morning, my dear.”
Upstairs, Alice stood at her bedroom window and gazed unseeingly out into the night. Her mama’s gently worded reminder had not been necessary. She was well aware of treating Edward too informally. Life had taken such an unexpected turn with his arrival, but the anguish of loving him might well prove harder to bear than all the privations she’d endured before. He wasn’t destined to marry a governess and she’d been long since excluded from any pretense of eligibility. She ached. This sorrow was too deep for tears. Oh, how her heart ached with longing for him.
Chapter Eight
After a sleepless night, Edward still felt dreadful. Frustration, annoyance and guilt all nagged at him. He had tossed and turned for hours, cursing and muttering until he had nearly driven himself mad. He strode down to the stables at first light and roused the groom out of his bed. Just the fact that others could sleep so soundly soured his mood even further. It took a great effort of will not to snap at the man, who had done nothing wrong, after all, save have a clear conscience.
Jed scrambled to bridle and saddle Ney, casting anxious looks over his shoulder all the while. Edward stood with his arms folded and his boot tapping the cobbles, as he waited for the bay to be brought out. He needed fresh air and space to sort his tumbled emotions and thoughts. At last he was up and away, breaking into a brisk canter as soon as he left the stable yard. He had ridden half a mile before he remembered he hadn’t thanked the groom for his services. Jed would think he had run mad.
So what? Why was he worried what a mere groom would think of him? The answer wasn’t hard to find. Jed, like all the others, was part of the net that had surrounded his life of late. Its meshes tightened around him every day, pulling him away from his beloved sea. No matter how much he wriggled and squirmed there appeared to be no escape. He was a mere herring and if he didn’t watch out he’d soon be a kipper.
Edward pulled up at last, about three miles from the house at the far side of Priory Water, the ornamental lake his grandfather had installed when money was plentiful. There was a gentle rise to the ground here, with an oak coppice at the crest. All very artistic and elegant, no doubt, giving an extremely pleasing aspect from the front rooms of The Priory, but singularly useless for all that. He would stock the lake with fish and set sheep, no, pigs would be better, to forage through the oaks for the acorns. No harm in being artistic and useful. Edward shook his head. What was he doing? Planning for the future? He wouldn’t be here, would he?
He tied the bay to a sapling and loosened the girth. What was he to do with himself? Frustrated beyond belief he kicked at a fallen branch. The branch was bigger and thicker than he thought it was. The instant pain in his toe paid him in spades for his childishness. He dragged his hat from his head and slammed it to the ground in an absolute fury, then hopped around, clutching his foot and uttering oaths that would have left the bo
sun’s mate speechless with envy.
There was no one here to talk to! No one understood what he wanted, what drove him to behave the way he did. He missed the sea and missed the like-minded men who served with him. Harding knew him well, but he couldn’t ask Harding about this latest problem.
Edward calmed himself at last, although the frustration simmered away. He felt better for yelling his anger at the dawn. He limped up and down, trying to control his breathing, trying to be logical. Nothing ever stayed the same and wishing it to be so was fruitless. His ship was gone and in its place The Priory and all its concerns ruled his life.
He stopped short, staring down across the lake at The Priory estate. The builders had been at work. Lighter patches marked the sections where the roof had been repaired and the broken windows were long gone. The house smiled up at him with an even set of teeth, an elegant lady now, not like the gap-toothed old crone who had snarled at him when he first arrived back home.
Home? Was this his home now? He’d been so unhappy here as a boy he’d never missed the place. But yes, he had to admit it. This was his home now. Only until he could obtain another ship, though. He’d leave without a backward glance.
The bay snorted and shook its head. Edward gave it a rueful look.
“Not even you believe that one, do you, Ney?”
It would be a terrible wrench to leave Alice. There, he’d admitted it. He’d grown more than fond of Alice. He thought of her sweet smile and the way her hair coiled into that smooth knot she wore, but at the same time curled so prettily round her ears. Her eyes, so expressive and her lips, so red—
“Stop it, dammit!”
He couldn’t think that way about Alice. She was the first unattached female he’d ever met. What if he felt the same way about the next woman who crossed his path? There was no way to tell. How could he ever offer any woman his hand, or his heart, knowing full well that he would leave them behind for months if not years on end?
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