Wenna

by Virginia Taylor

  Until she found her next job, she would hide away, and hope the incident would be forgotten.

  Chapter 4

  Leaning against the doorway, Dev watched Wenna assess his dingy second bedroom. He imagined, being a lady’s maid, she was used to better. “How old are you?”

  “Twenty-six,” she answered, toeing a box near the window. “What’s in this?”

  “I don’t know.” Merely his age. Interesting. He had always preferred older women. “My father sent them on to me after he’d cleared out my mother’s possessions.” The early afternoon light from the window painted a pink halo around her hair and outlined her shapely silhouette.

  She gave an exasperated sigh. “See if he sent anything useful. If not, stack two boxes in that corner for me to use as a bedside table, and move the rest behind the door.”

  “No sooner said than done.” He opened the nearest box and picked through the paper wrapping. “Plates in this one.”

  “Take them to the kitchen.” She sounded as though she meant to put order into his life. “This one seems to be framed paintings. You can hang those up.” She straightened, glancing at him with her fine red eyebrows raised. “Shall I go through the rest while you buy a bed? We don’t have many more hours of daylight left.”

  He tugged out his fob chain to check the time, and remembered. “My watch first,” he said, palm out. “And my ring, too, if you please.”

  Her mouth considered. She blinked. “Oh, yes, your watch. Now that I have a place to stay and all my things, you should have your sureties back.” From somewhere in the folds of her skirt, she casually pulled out his valuables.

  He donned both, annoyed that she accepted his trust as her ransom. “You’re a mightily suspicious woman. So, I’ll be off now to buy you a feather mattress.”

  “Feather?” She gave him a smile he could only describe as long-suffering. “That would be too much to ask.”

  Expecting an expensive mattress that with luck would not be used more than a few days would be unreasonable, but challenged, he left without answering. He would buy her a damned feather mattress, if only to confound her.

  A few lanes farther along the street, he bought a bed, which the maker sent two boys to deliver. Dev hoped Wenna would let them in, or he would need to carry the thing upstairs alone, not that the lightly-made frame would weigh more than a few pounds. Finding a feather mattress was another matter. The colony had a surfeit of hair mattresses. Finally he was forced to buy one, knowing she would continue to think him entirely useless.

  On his way back to the first shop he had tried, the closest to his lodging, he heard his name. “Ah, the Honorable Devon Courtney, if I’m not mistaken.” Strictly speaking, Dev was Lord Dellacourt, but not until last year, when the second of his brothers had died. As the only son now, Dev would hold the title of the heir to the Earl of Marchester, but certainly not in this country. He glanced at the speaker, a tall, outrageously handsome chap wearing a tailored suit and a faultlessly placed hat.

  “Dev to you,” he said chidingly to Nick Alden, assuming Nick was ragging him, as was the colonial habit when confronted with aristocratic lineage.

  Nick’s mouth tilted at one corner. “I’m sure you are still perfectly honorable.”

  “I prefer not to seem like a twat, if you don’t mind.” Dev examined Nick’s face and shook his head. “You didn’t get a shiner from that ball yesterday, I see. I can only spot a slight bump and a bruise on your face.”

  “You’re on the wrong side of the bruise. From my side, it’s a headache for which I fortunately have the cure.” Nick gave a jaded smile, indicating the tavern. “I don’t seem to have the self-protective instinct these days to play cricket.”

  Six years ago at Cambridge, where the two had met, Nick had been carefree and charming, although as irresponsible as the rest of the South Australian lads. Before Dev had arrived in the colony, Nick had returned from England with the others, but he’d found greener pastures in New South Wales, from which he’d only recently returned. At the cricket match yesterday, Dev had briefly seen a changed man who no longer cared for anything he couldn’t find in a bottle. Word was that alcohol could be addictive. Dev wasn’t sure. He could take a drink or ignore a drink, depending on his mood. “Did you come back to town this morning?”

  “Yesterday. My father banished me from the hills the moment he saw the lump on my head. Thought I should see a doctor. The doctor mumbled something about drunks and fools. Since I’m a combination of the two, I’m immune to hard knocks, or so he led me to believe. Whither thou goest, my fine young man?”

  “Off to get a mattress.”

  “Then I’ll go with you.” Nick stumbled slightly onto the path and righted himself. Years of practice, no doubt.

  “Good. I was wondering how I would carry it home.”

  “It?” Nick gave him a strange glance. “We didn’t have a chance to talk yesterday before I was removed from the field. I hear you’ve been in Adelaide for a couple of years.” He began strolling alongside Dev. An unwary woman approached, glanced at Nick and, open-mouthed, walked into a lamp-post. He had that effect on females, though he didn’t seem to notice, or he’d had years of practice in not noticing. “Your father’s idea?”

  Dev nodded. “He thought a couple of years in France would do me well. Then, no sooner than I began to take an interest in the growing of wheat on the home farm, he decided I should come out here with the governor’s retinue. As you can see, I didn’t return.”

  “How long will you get away with that?”

  “Not much longer. I’m booked to return on the Hougoumont, which will be here in June.” Dev stopped, swooping an arm in the direction of a narrow doorway. “In here. This is the place where I plan to buy a mattress.”

  Nick glanced around, frowning. “A mattress? I thought you said a mistress. I was interested to see where you would get one you had to carry home. I keep mine in her own house. So much more convenient.” He stepped back. “I’ll leave you with your mattress.”

  Dev put his fists on his hips. “If you’ve nothing better to do, you can help me carry it back to my lodgings.”

  “Through the streets?”

  “Are you about to perform your dainty act?”

  Nick gave a twisted smile, Dev paid, and Nick reluctantly assisted him in moving the mattress to the foyer of Dev’s lodgings.

  “We’ll keep your business as your business,” Nick said. “I’ve forgotten about your lofty relations, if that would suit you better.”

  “It would.” Dev watched his formerly carefree friend leave, somewhat reassured that Nick couldn’t mention the title, since he appeared to know nothing about Dev’s brother’s demise. Dev dragged the mattress upstairs, with its proposed occupant in mind.

  Wenna stood in the doorway of the spare bedroom. Twists of curls escaped the confines of her net, and wanton tendrils clung to the sweaty skin of her face and neck. From the moment he had met her, he had wanted to bed her. Seeing her with her hair loose and flying around her head had brought back memories of love and sunshine, laughter and happiness. He wanted those carefree days back.

  However, those days would never return. Jenny was lost to him and Wenna was single-minded, opinionated, and a handful. She challenged him, but a diversion in his duty-filled life wouldn’t go astray. “Did the bed arrive?”

  “Just in time for the mattress,” she said with the first real smile he’d seen from her. Her momentary happiness transformed her face. With her hair loosened, she looked younger, softer, and infinitely desirable She stood aside so that he could wrestle the mattress onto the frame.

  The room had changed in the time he’d been away. The grimy lace curtain had disappeared, and the hot afternoon sun twinkled on the motes streaming in with the light. She’d covered a couple of boxes with a fancy tablecloth beside the bed. Black skirts and bodices lay across the other couple behind the door.

  “The mattress is horsehair. I couldn’t
find anything else on the spur of the moment, but I have a couple of feather comforters in my room, under the bed, I think. You can use one.”

  “Do you also have spare sheets and pillows?”

  “I do.” He turned on his heel and grabbed a pillow off his bed and clean sheets from his bottom drawer.

  “Your father sent you quite a trousseau,” she said when he returned. “You could have been living comfortably if you’d deigned to look.”

  “That’s my girl. Back to your usual critical self. Now, what’s your next job for me?”

  “Take those two boxes downstairs and then you can please yourself.”

  Judging by the distracted look on her face, he doubted she would let him please himself, and in lieu of bouncing her onto his bed, he resignedly hefted the two large heavy boxes to the kitchen.

  * * * *

  Having worked as a maid most of her life, Wenna quickly made up her bed using the finest linen she had ever seen, monogrammed with the letter M twisted with flowers. Mr. Courtney disappeared into his uncomfortable little sitting room when he returned from downstairs. The story that his aunt had been the governor’s wife might be true, judging by the quality of the goods his father had sent. The boxes had also contained silver candlesticks, crystal bowls, and flatware. Wenna had him move the tableware down to the kitchen, leaving her a nice room once she’d draped another lace tablecloth over the rod above the window. The dirty lace curtains could be washed tomorrow.

  She hummed while she worked. This was the first time since her father died that she’d had a space she could imagine was hers. If Mr. Courtney wasn’t interested in the kitchen either, and he wouldn’t be, she could make that hers, too, even if only for a few weeks. In the meantime, she wondered about her meals. Surely he would pay, since he had lost her three months’ wages. Perhaps not, given that she’d already cost him a new bed and a mattress.

  “Meals,” she said, hovering in the doorway of the sitting room. “Do you have food in the kitchen?”

  He sat at the desk minus his jacket and, with the sleeves of his white shirt rolled up to expose his sinewy golden tanned forearms, he looked more approachable and entirely male. Without a doubt, he was the most attractive man she had ever met, physically. Mentally, he left a lot to be desired, being irresponsible and entirely too casual about money and possessions. If he had spent part of his life with nothing, like she had, he might have been more careful.

  He lifted his gaze from the stack of papers in front of him. “Normally, I eat out.”

  She sighed. “As I thought. I’m sure you’ll never run out of gullible women.”

  “Unfortunately, I don’t have a gullible woman awaiting me tonight,” he said with overdone politeness. “I thought I would eat at The Pig and Whistle across the street, instead.”

  Hearing no invitation in his tone, she dropped her gaze. She must remember not to be so critical. At least she’d had a pie today. She wouldn’t starve, and tomorrow she could buy food to keep in her room. Eventually she would have to break into the ten shillings she’d picked up with her clothes at the Brooks’ house, but she would hold off as long as possible. “Do you mind if I use this sitting room when you’re not here?”

  He looked surprised. “Of course not. Use any room you like. Sit with me for a moment, because we need to talk about our situation.”

  She moved into the room, not knowing what to assume about him. “If we’re going to be living together for a couple more weeks, we should try to get along. I’ll keep the place tidy, because I can see you don’t, and I’ll cook meals if you pay for the food. I think that should work.” She sat in an over-padded armchair, after moving a pile of papers onto the floor.

  “Isn’t that rather one-sided?” He had turned his chair to face her.

  “You’ll have me cooking and cleaning for you,” she said, offended. “That should more than pay my way.”

  “It does pay your way. But should you pay your way when you’re in this position because of me? Seems to me ... I should keep my mouth shut. I have a very good deal. A paragon like you—why is it that you are not married?”

  “I don’t need a man,” she said, her jaw tight. Her father had wanted a houseful of boys. He had only been given a girl, who had from the start done her best to match up to his expectations. Then he died, and all his dreams for her and her dreams for herself had been put on hold while she worked with her mother to survive. “I’m perfectly self-sufficient.”

  “Though, as you said, you might not be able to get the job you want.” He kept his eyes focused on hers. “When the story of last night is retold, and if I know Patricia it will be, you won’t be described by name. You’ll simply be ‘the redheaded maid.’ On the other hand, my name will be told, but my part in the whole thing will be glossed over. The chaps will wink and nudge me, and the ladies will pretend to be deaf.” He meshed his fingers across his flat belly, his gaze a challenge.

  She pressed her lips into a straight line. “And I’ll be seen as the immoral one, not you, if Miss Patricia tells. I don’t suppose a redheaded lady’s maid will be employed for months.” She kept her tone waspish.

  “You could dye your hair black.”

  “Very amusing.”

  “Or you could marry me. I did offer to take you to Cornwall with a promise of more money and comfort than you’ve ever known.”

  She let her head fall forward, wearied by his ridiculous proposition. “Yes, you did say that.”

  “Now will you listen?”

  She laughed wryly. “You might think me being unemployable is a joke—”

  “I don’t. I’m offering reparation. Would you grant me the honor of your hand in marriage?”

  “It would serve you right if I said yes.” She crossed her arms.

  “It might serve us both right if you said yes. The fact of the matter is that I want a wife and child.”

  “The one usually follows the other, but if you want a wife, I’m sure you won’t have any difficulty finding one amongst your own class.”

  “I need a very special wife. One who wants to live in Cornwall. The red hair ...” His expression looked annoyingly charming. “Well, that’s a bonus. I should tell you from the start that I wouldn’t be marrying a woman who didn’t have the first attribute. That’s an essential. And the child. My family needs an heir.”

  “You are serious?” She stared at him, knowing he could find a hundred women who would snap up the chance.

  “I’m proposing a marriage of convenience, you might say, but as convenient for you as for me. We’ll both have what we want.”

  “I wouldn’t be the only woman in South Australia who wouldn’t mind living in Cornwall. It seems to me, you’re snatching at someone who would be a poor match for you.”

  “It seems to me that you shouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth.”

  She tried to read his face, but saw nothing but a man waiting for an answer. “When something seems too good to be true, it usually is.”

  His gaze remained unwavering. “You only need to ask yourself if you could...ah ... do the conceiving with me.”

  He sounded slightly hesitant; an act, no doubt. Any woman who wanted a baby would happily do the conceiving with him. Since her first sight of him, she’d been undeniably attracted, but not even close to losing her head. He was nothing but a credible rogue with an open-hearted smile that could charm the birds right out of the trees—the sort of man to keep at a distance.

  “I think it’s the conceiving act that interests you most.” She must have looked suspicious, because he gave her a harmless smile. If he was speaking the truth...but of course he wasn’t. Golden gods like him didn’t marry scrawny spinsters like her. She rubbed the side of her neck and still couldn’t think of a credible objection.

  “What do you have to lose? Oh. Are you a virgin?”

  She pressed her lips together. “I’m twenty-six.”

  “And truthful.”

  She
gave him a quelling glance.

  His shoulders rose and his mouth hitched up on one corner. “I want to bed you, Wenna.”

  “But you really don’t want a wife.”

  “I really want a child. Legitimate.”

  She stared at him, puzzled. “An heir. To what?”

  “My family estates in Cornwall.” He tapped his fingers on the arms of his chair.

  “So, you want to marry me, poke me, give me a baby, and take me off to Cornwall to live as happy as a pig among the daffodils?”

  “Daffodils?”

  She waved a hand casually. “Everywhere. Up the hills and down the dales. Green pastures full of daffodils and violets.”

  He laughed, filling the entire room with a joyous sound that somewhat fuddled her brain. “In private gardens, perhaps.”

  She didn’t know what to make of him. He’d been kind since the carriage trip to town. He might not be rich, and he might not be moral, but he had certain qualities, one of which was optimism. She wouldn’t mind if he spread some into her life. For years she’d thought she would be able to elevate herself and, despite only being a daughter, replace the successful son her father had hoped for, but this latest setback put that dream out of her foreseeable future.

  “When are you planning this wedding?” she said, realizing a marriage of convenience would suit her, too. Love matches were only for the fanciful.

  “I’ll have to see about a special license first. Don’t think me unenthusiastic, but it’s been quite a day so far. I’d rather rest for a while and see what I can do tomorrow.”

  “Then, should I make a cup of tea?”

  “The perfect way to pass time. The stove will be cold, though.” He angled a query at her.

  With another sigh, she rose to her feet. Having a task to perform gave her some direction. Now with a more immediate aim in her mind, she could mull his sincerity about marriage. She took the stairs down to the kitchen and entered a small room with another two doors in the far wall. A woodstove had been set against the wall between a working bench built with an indoor tap and a set of shelves containing a small pile of tumbled wood and a basket of kindling. Against the wall in common with the building next door sat a small wooden table with two chairs.