Millie, observing Ryan’s rapt attention to her form, felt a little bolder. She turned away from him to frustrate his eager eyes and said, “You need to undo Effie’s knots first.”
But Ryan, before stepping forward to grapple with the knotted cords, took his opportunity to survey Millie’s curves from the back.
“Get on with it please, Ryan,” Millie commanded, smiling to herself with the knowledge that he was probably on as unfamiliar territory as she herself was.
Ryan undid the knots almost instantly and began to loosen the strings of the corset. “Feel better?” he asked as he pulled the whalebone structure away from Millie’s torso.
“Oh yes,” she said and heaved a sigh of relief to be able to breathe properly again. Millie stepped out of the corset, which Ryan threw onto a chair. Looking back at her, still standing before the fire, Ryan suddenly realised that all that now came between his hands and her bare flesh was a thin layer of cloth. “I’ll fetch you a blanket,” he said rather awkwardly and left the room.
Millie was quick to make herself at home. She pulled up the old, wooden rocking-chair closer to the fire and sat down in it.
Ryan returned and, kneeling down beside her, draped a woven blanket about her shoulders. “Would you like some tea?” he asked. “There’s some in the pot.”
“Yes please,” Millie replied. She watched Ryan rise and top up the teapot with hot water from the copper kettle on the fire, before pouring her a drink.
“This place is like going back in time,” Millie observed, allowing her eye to wander over to the paraffin lamp that, apart from the firelight, was the only source of illumination in the room.
“Right enough, Sir Randolph hasn’t managed to get us electricity out here yet,” Ryan said. “Not sure my Gran would want it anyway,” he added on reflection.
“She’s asleep?” Millie enquired.
“Yes.”
“I’ll keep my voice down.”
“No need to worry too much – she’s practically deaf,” Ryan said, handing Millie her mug of tea. “You warm enough?” he asked as he took his place beside her chair on the rug.
She nodded and drank from the cup.
Gazing up at Millie, Ryan reached a hand to push back the blanket from her shoulders, to reveal her flesh to his eyes.
She didn’t curb his action. She put down her cup and looked at him.
“You’re so beautiful, Millie,” Ryan said, beginning to stroke the soft skin of her upper arms, whilst gazing upon the pale flesh of her cleavage.
“You can touch me anywhere, Ryan,” Millie said boldly.
Ryan raised his eyebrows in surprise and Millie worried that she might have gone too far. But unaccountably she found herself continuing, “Arabella Price tells me there are times when a girl can’t get pregnant. She’s explained it all to me and I believe that, if we were to –you know– I wouldn’t get pregnant now.”
Ryan’s hand was stilled by these words. He looked into Millie’s eyes and raised his hand to her cheek, saying, “It’s not that simple, Millie.”
Millie was confused.
“I’m a Catholic,” Ryan explained. “We don’t have relations outside of marriage.”
“Oh,” Millie said.
“But that doesn’t mean I can’t touch you or hold you,” Ryan continued.
Kneeling, Ryan reached up to kiss Millie’s lips and it wasn’t long before she had slithered from the rocking chair onto the rug in front of the fire. Millie felt Ryan’s arms about her, all of his strength employed to hold her so tenderly. She didn’t really know what Arabella had been talking about but she trusted Ryan completely.
* * *
Millie left the cottage at an ungodly hour, her sky-blue chiffon dress now dried out; her corset abandoned and concealed at the cottage, to be returned to the Hall at some point the next day. Millie held the folds of her long cape close about her over her dress. Thankfully the rain had ceased and the winds had abated.
Ryan had been insistent he should escort Millie back to the house but she had resisted and, in the end, ordered him to stay at home. Discovery would be all the worse if he was found with her.
Millie made her way back along the woodland path by the light of the moon, her frame still shaking from the thrill of Ryan’s caresses. How did he do that? How did he know how to touch her?
When Ryan had pulled her to the floor and taken her in his arms, Millie had instinctively gone to unbutton his shirt, eager to feel his bare skin. But Ryan had stopped her, saying that he thought it was something they shouldn’t do.
“How can it be wrong when it feels so lovely?” Millie had questioned.
Ryan had shaken his head and, smiling at her innocence, kissed her again.
Millie regained entry to the house through the kitchens, having taken the key from the place where she knew the housekeeper kept it. Removing her shoes, she tiptoed through the long corridors and up the staircases, relying on her instinct and what moonlight invaded the Hall through its numerous windows, to guide her, until she reached her own room.
Once settled in her bed, she thought of Ryan: how she longed to touch him; how tender he was and yet how he must have the capacity to match that tenderness with passion.
But Millie felt sadness upon remembering what he had said to her; she would never know that passion because he could never be her husband. In the end she cried herself to sleep dwelling upon that thought.
Chapter 5
The morning after Sir Randolph’s grand dinner, Millie, sleep-deprived due to her nocturnal adventures, stood before her father and Aunt Rose, having been summoned to the dame’s temporary apartments in the house.
“And so, Millicent, your prospects have been irreparably damaged by your disgraceful neglect of Mr Windham–”
“To be fair, Rose, he did state the reason for his untimely departure to be his sense that a frivolously long weekend in the country seemed wholly inappropriate with a war looming–”
“Well, he would say that, wouldn’t he, Randolph?” Rose insisted.
Millie wasn’t really attending. From the back windows of Aunt Rose’s rooms she had spotted Ryan, splitting logs down in the courtyard. It being a fine morning, he had removed his shirt.
“Millicent!” Rose snapped to recall the girl. “Have you no sense of remorse about this situation? Your father planned this whole house party with the express intention that it should culminate in an engagement between yourself and Benjamin Windham. Do you have any idea of the trouble and expense he went to?”
Millie looked at her father, rather than Rose. “I’m sorry,” she began simply, “but, to tell the truth Daddy, I don’t think Ben Windham is quite proper. I don’t trust him,” she clarified.
“Why, Millie?” Randolph asked.
“I can’t account for it really,” Millie replied. “I just don’t trust him.”
“Nonsense!” Rose announced scathingly. “If she were my daughter, Randolph, I should let her become an old maid and see how she likes it.”
* * *
Out in the courtyard, Rose having dismissed Millie and her father from her quarters in order to prepare to set out on her constitutional morning walk, Millie lingered in the shadows of the entrance to the scullery, watching Ryan at work. After a few minutes she walked quietly out into the sunlight, taking care to avoid disturbing him.
His skin, though fair, was tanned with the outdoor work he had been doing over the summer. You wouldn’t have said Ryan was slender but there was little spare flesh on his muscular upper body. Millie recalled the sight of him in evening dress and reflected, with a smile, that he looked almost as good clothed as unclothed.
He turned and saw her. “Are you spying on me, Miss?” he asked jovially.
Millie walked over to him, saying, “I was just admiring you,” when she was close enough to ensure that their exchange wouldn’t be overheard.
Ryan lay down his axe and went to pick up his shirt from on top of the woodpile.
“No n
eed to cover up on my account,” Millie was quick to say, as she watched Ryan bend over in his roughly-woven trousers, the thickness of the leather belt around his waist catching her eye as he rose again.
“But if someone saw us, Millie, it wouldn’t look proper.”
Millie took one last, longing glance at his smooth and flawless chest before he concealed it from her eyes. “It’s tiring work,” he said as he buttoned up his shirt.
“Looks it,” Millie replied. “I thought the house staff dealt with firewood–”
“Listen, when Mrs Overton tells me to do something, I do it, no questions asked.”
Millie chuckled. Mrs Overton, the housekeeper, had a reputation that went before her.
“Miss Millie, we shouldn’t talk like this – someone might see us.”
“When can I meet you then?” Millie asked. “Tonight?”
Ryan shook his head. “Don’t you know I’m off with Randolph this afternoon to look at a racing horse?”
“He’s buying another one?” Millie remarked incredulously.
“Not outright, but he’s considering entering into a syndicate; the horse wouldn’t be kept here – it’s already in stables.”
“Oh,” Millie said. “When will you be back?”
“The day after tomorrow,” Ryan replied.
With a sigh of resignation, Millie said, “I’ll just have to wait till then, won’t I?”
* * *
The day that Randolph and Ryan went to look at a racing horse seemed like any other to Millie, apart from the fact that her Aunt Rose was still in residence at Glassnest, which curtailed Millie’s freedom somewhat.
In the morning she hung restlessly about the house, thinking of Ryan the whole time, wondering what he was doing – what conversation went between him and her father? She knew, however, that their only shared interest was horses.
If Millie had still had a horse, she would have gone riding on a day like this. But since she’d lost Charger, she had no stomach for it. Certainly, she could have had her pick of the horses in the stables – even Wellington, in the absence of her father, although he was a fierce brute of a horse; Millie never felt quite safe with him. But she just didn’t want to ride; not now her beloved Charger was gone.
In the end, in a bid to occupy herself and escape the beady eye of Aunt Rose, Millie slipped out of the house at eleven o’clock and embarked on a long ramble around Glassnest’s extensive grounds.
It wasn’t until two in the afternoon that she began to wend her way back towards the Hall, taking, irresistibly, the woodland track that led to Ryan’s cottage.
As Millie passed by the cottage garden, she spotted the old lady, wrapped, as was her custom, in her shawl, stooping over a vegetable patch.
“Hello there!” Millie called to her.
The old lady turned and slowly stood up straight.
“Why, Miss, it has turned out a fine day to be sure,” she called to Millie, who made her way over to the garden fence.
“I’ve had a lovely walk in the woods,” Millie said.
“You do right, Miss,” Ryan’s grandmother commented. “I would dearly love to walk, if only my old bones were up to it.”
“What have you got there?” Millie enquired, gesturing to what the old woman held in her hands.
“Oh just a couple of spuds for my tea.”
Millie suddenly felt concern that she might be struggling to look after herself in Ryan’s absence. “Is that all you’re having?” she asked involuntarily.
The woman laughed. “Oh no Miss, these are to accompany a very nice slice of salmon quiche that was left over from the party at the weekend.”
“Oh yes,” Millie said, relieved, “Cook’s quiches are the best!”
“I do very well with what’s sent over from the kitchens – they treat me well here,” Ryan’s grandmother continued.
“I’m glad to hear it,” Millie said.
“You’re welcome to stay for a cup of tea, Miss,” the old lady offered warmly. “I was just about to brew a pot for myself.”
Millie hesitated momentarily before saying, “Yes, that would be lovely.” What did she care if Aunt Rose was missing her?
* * *
Millie didn’t return to the Hall until almost five o’clock. Though she’d never before really spoken with Ryan’s grandma and had felt at first nervous upon entering the little cottage with her, it had not been long before the two had settled in front of the fire and begun to talk easily. Millie had insisted upon making the tea, and first building up the fire in order to heat the copper kettle.
Ryan’s grandma had told her many stories about their family and life in Ireland, including the sad tales of the deaths of both of Ryan’s parents. She had enjoyed reminiscing and Millie, of course, had been eager to digest all she was told. There was no better way of coping with Ryan’s absence than talking about him. Sitting in her chair on the hearth, sipping her tea from the same cup and saucer that Ryan had given her, she felt entirely happy to be in his home.
“He’s a good boy, our Ryan,” the old lady said.
“Yes he is,” Millie agreed, recalling, with some embarrassment, the things they had done the last time she’d been at that fireside.
“I worry that, if there’s a war, I’ll lose him,” the old woman couldn’t help but add.
“Oh that won’t happen,” Millie said glibly. “There won’t be a war.”
* * *
When Millie finally re-entered Glassnest Hall it wasn’t long before she bumped into a sombre-looking Mrs Overton. “You’re wanted by your Aunt Rose in the study, Miss,” she said.
Millie sighed and headed on in the direction of the stairs.
“No Miss Millie,” Mrs Overton said sternly, “you are to report to her straight away.”
Millie wondered what on earth she’d done now.
She knocked on the door of the study like a disgraced schoolgirl.
“Enter,” came a call from within.
Millie pushed open the heavy dark-wood door to see Aunt Rose seated at a table, reading from a large volume.
“Mrs Overton said you wanted to see me, Aunt,” Millie began.
“Where have you been all day?” Rose asked irritably.
“I went for a walk–”
“For six hours!” the grand dame cried.
“I went to visit Grandmother O’Flynn on my way back–”
“Really Millicent, your tendency to fraternise with the lower orders is inexcusable, inexcusable–”
“I had nothing better to do, Aunt,” Millie replied casually. “What’s the problem? What have I missed?” she asked with a hint of sarcasm.
Rose looked upon the girl steadily and Millie sensed that her aunt’s customary stance of disapproval was tempered by some real anxiety. She began to feel nervous. “Nothing’s wrong is it? Ryan’s alright? Daddy’s alright?”
“Typical – you think of the groom before Sir Randolph!”
“But nothing’s happened?” Millie said urgently.
“So far as I know, Millicent, your father and his boy are in the pink. But, referring to your earlier enquiry as to what you have missed, I’m sorry to have to be the one to inform you that we are at war with Germany, Millicent–”
“War?” the girl echoed softly.
“Yes, Millicent, war,” Aunt Rose confirmed.
Chapter 6
Millie had been watching from the window of her father’s first floor apartments for the last half-hour. From here she had the best vantage to see any vehicle approaching on the long drive that ran up to the forecourt of the Hall. After what seemed an eternity, she spotted her father’s car.
Millie rushed out of the chamber, along the corridor and down the flight of stairs to the grand entrance lobby. She opened the heavy double doors and ran out on to the terrace, just in time to meet the car.
Randolph stepped out of the passenger door and was immediately engulfed in his daughter’s arms. “Daddy!” she cried, only now realising how m
uch tension had been building up inside her since Aunt Rose’s revelation of the previous evening.
“Oh my darling,” Randolph said comfortingly, as he drew his only child closer to him.
“Where’s Ryan?” Millie asked eagerly. She longed to embrace him too.
“I sent him on ahead,” Randolph explained.
The sight that Millie beheld from the corner of her eye, of Aunt Rose emerging from the house, confirmed her awareness that she couldn’t have hugged Ryan even if he’d been present.
“Good afternoon Randolph,” Rose began coolly, intending the greeting to break the embrace between father and daughter – such displays of affection didn’t do in front of the servants.
Randolph reluctantly let Millie go and went to kiss Aunt Rose.
“I thought you were merely intending to enter into part-ownership of a horse, Randolph, but you appear to have brought one home, so the house staff tell me,” she continued.
“Ah,” said Randolph, “I did enter into the syndicate –the racehorse is a fine specimen and it was too good an opportunity to miss– but what we have bought is an ex-racehorse,” and Randolph gestured to Ryan, who was now walking the horse around from the back of the house. “It was young Ryan’s idea really,” Randolph admitted, at which Rose tossed back her head scornfully. “I thought my little girl needed a bit of cheering up and Ryan spotted this fine-looking mare, so…”
Millie heard hooves on the gravel behind her. She turned to see Ryan holding the reins of a large, chestnut horse.
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