To Beguile a Beast

Page 5

“Well, enough of that,” Helen said briskly. “Let’s do the washing up, and then we’ll start on the kitchen.”
“We’re going to clean this kitchen?” Jamie gaped at the cobwebs hanging from the ceiling.
“Of course.” Helen said it confidently, ignoring the flutter of trepidation in her stomach. The kitchen was very dirty. “Now. Let’s go fetch some water to wash with.”
They’d found the old pump in a corner of the stable yard just this morning. She’d pumped one bucket of water then, but she’d used it all up in making breakfast. Jamie carried the tin bucket as they all tramped out to the stable yard. Helen grasped the pump handle and gave an encouraging smile to the children before hauling it up with both hands. Unfortunately, the pump was rather rusted, and it took a great deal of effort to work it.
Ten minutes later, Helen pushed sweaty hair off her forehead and eyed the half-full bucket.
“It’s not very much,” Abigail said dubiously.
“Yes, well, it’ll do for now,” Helen panted. She took the bucket and returned to the kitchen, the children trailing behind.
She set the bucket down and bit her lip. The water had to be heated to wash the dishes, but she’d let the fire go out since breakfast. Only a few embers still glowed in the fireplace ashes.
Mr. Wiggins entered the kitchen as she was standing and staring at the hearth in dismay. The little man looked from her to the pitiful bucket of water and grunted. “Had a grand start, have ye? Why, th’ kitchen’s so clean it near blinds me eyes t’ look at it. Well, never fear. Yer stay is fixin’ to be short. Hisself is sendin’ me to fetch a carriage from th’ village.”
Helen straightened in dismay. “I’m sure that won’t be necessary, Mr. Wiggins.”
The little man merely snorted and left.
“Mama,” Abigail said quietly, “if Sir Alistair is sending for a carriage for us to go home in, maybe we don’t have to clean the kitchen after all.”
Helen felt sudden weariness sweep over her. She wasn’t a housekeeper. She didn’t know how to clean a kitchen or even know enough to keep the fire burning, it seemed. What was she doing, attempting a task this insurmountable? Perhaps Sir Alistair was right.
Perhaps she should admit defeat and take the carriage away from the castle.
Chapter Three
The black castle was cavernous and gloomy, with winding passages leading into more passages. Truth Teller followed the beautiful young man, and although they walked for long minutes, they did not meet another soul. Finally the young man led Truth Teller to a great dining hall and set before him a meal of roasted meat and fine bread and all manner of exotic fruit. The soldier ate everything gratefully, for it had been years since his vittles had been so fine. All the while Truth Teller ate, the young man sat and smiled and watched him. . . .
—from TRUTH TELLER
Helen let her head loll against the carriage side as they swept around a bend, and the castle disappeared from view.
“It was a very dirty castle,” Abigail said from across the carriage.
Helen sighed. “Yes, my love, it was.”
A very dirty castle with a surly master—and she’d let them both defeat her. She’d seen movement in the high tower window as they’d tramped out to the waiting rented carriage. No doubt Sir Beastly had been gloating over her rout.
“Our house in London is much nicer,” Abigail said. “And maybe the duke will be happy that we’ve come back.”
Helen closed her eyes. No. No, he wouldn’t. Abigail obviously thought that they’d be returning home to London now, but that wasn’t an option. Lister wouldn’t welcome them with open arms. He’d steal the children from her and toss her into the street.
And that was if she was lucky.
She looked at Abigail and tried to smile. “We won’t be going back to London, dearest one.”
Abigail’s face fell. “But—”
“We’ll just have to find another place to stay.” And hide.
“I want to go home,” Jamie said.
A headache started at her temple. “We can’t go home, sweetheart.”
Jamie’s lower lip protruded. “I want—”
“It’s simply not possible.” Helen inhaled and then said in a quieter voice, “I’m sorry, my darlings. Mama has an aching head. Let’s discuss this later. For now, all you need to know is that we must find another place to stay.”
But where else could they go? Castle Greaves might’ve been filthy and its master impossible, but as a hiding place it’d been perfect. She patted her skirts, feeling for the little leather bag that hung under them. Inside were some coins and quite a few jewels—the nest egg she’d saved from Lister’s gifts. She had money, but finding a place where a single woman with two children wouldn’t excite comment was going to be difficult.
“Shall I read to you from the fairy-tale book?” Abigail asked very quietly.
Helen looked at her and tried to smile. Her daughter really was a dear sometimes. “Yes, please. I think I’d like that.”
Abigail’s face smoothed in relief, and she bent to rummage in the soft bag at her feet.
Beside her, Jamie bounced on his seat. “Read from the story about the man with the iron heart!”
Abigail drew out a bundle of papers and very carefully paged through them until she came to the place she wanted. She cleared her throat and began reading slowly. “Once upon a time, long, long ago, there came four soldiers traveling home after many years of war.…”
Helen closed her eyes, letting her daughter’s high clear voice wash over her. The fairy-tale “book” she read from was actually a bundle of loose papers. The original book was written in German, and Lady Vale translated the tales for her friend, Lady Emeline Hartley. When the viscountess had sent Helen and her children north, she’d requested that Helen transcribe it so that she might eventually have the translation bound for Lady Emeline. All the long journey into Scotland, Helen had read the stories to the children, and now they were familiar favorites.
Helen glanced out the window. Outside, the purple and green hills rolled by, bringing them closer to the little village of Glenlargo. If she was still Sir Beastly’s housekeeper, she could’ve bought groceries there. Something more appetizing than moldering bacon and oats.
Oh, if only she wasn’t so terribly useless! She’d spent her entire adult life as the plaything of a rich gentleman. She’d never been trained in anything practical.
Except that wasn’t quite true. Once upon a time, before Lister, before she’d broken ties with her family, when she was still young and innocent, she used to help her father as he made his rounds. Papa had been a doctor—quite a successful one—and sometimes when he visited patients, she had accompanied him. Oh, not to help with the doctoring—that was considered too distasteful a task for a young girl—but she’d kept a little notebook in which she’d written his thoughts on the various patients they attended, kept a calendar of appointments, and made lists.
Lots of lists.
She’d been Papa’s helper, his organizer of lists. The one who kept his life and business in order. It hadn’t been a big job, but it had been an important one. And, now that she thought about it, wasn’t that really what most housekeepers were? Certainly they needed to know how to clean and run a house, but didn’t they often delegate these jobs to other people?
Helen sat up so suddenly that Abigail stuttered to a stop. “What is it, Mama?”
“Hush, darling. Let me think. I have an idea.” The carriage had reached the outskirts of Glenlargo. It was a tiny village in comparison to London, but it held everything a small, isolated community needed: shops, craftsmen, and people who could be hired.
Helen half stood in the swaying carriage and pounded on the roof. “Stop! Oh, stop the carriage!”
The carriage jerked to a stop, nearly throwing her back on the seat.
“What are we doing?” Jamie asked excitedly.
And Helen couldn’t help but grin at him. “It’s time to enlist reinforcements.”
ALISTAIR SPENT THE afternoon in his tower writing—or at least trying to write. Like many previous days, the words simply refused to form. Instead he filled a basket with crumpled sheets of paper, each covered in the crossed-out attempts at an essay on badgers. He couldn’t even find the first sentence. Writing had once been as easy as breathing for him, and now… now he feared he would never again finish an essay. He felt like a broken fool.
When four o’clock came and he noticed that Lady Grey had wandered from the tower, he took it as a good excuse to abandon his wretched attempts and go looking for the dog. Besides, he hadn’t eaten anything since that execrable morning meal.
The castle was silent as he made his way down the winding tower stairs. It was nearly always silent, of course, but last night, when Mrs. Halifax and her children had occupied his home, it had seemed less dead. He shook his head at the morbid thought. He’d watched the woman leave this morning and had rejoiced at once again being virtually alone—Wiggins hardly bothered him at all. It was good to be alone. Good to not be interrupted at work.
When he could work.
Alistair scowled as he reached the hallway, and strode to his own rooms first. Lady Grey liked to nap in a spot of sunlight under the windows in the afternoons. But his rooms were as he’d left them this morning: empty and untidy. He frowned at his unmade bed, the coverlet and sheets trailing on the floor. Hmm. Perhaps a housekeeper wouldn’t have been such a bad idea after all.
He returned to the hall and called, “Lady Grey!”
No scratch of claws on stone floor heralded her approach.
Most of the other rooms were closed off on this floor, so he proceeded to the next. Here there was an old sitting room he sometimes used. He looked, but Lady Grey wasn’t lying on either of the overstuffed settees. Farther down the hall was the room he’d given to Mrs. Halifax. He glanced in and didn’t learn anything besides the fact that her bed had been made. She might not’ve ever been here at all, so forlorn did the room look. From outside he thought he heard the sound of her carriage pulling away again. Fanciful nonsense. He continued his search. On the main floor, he checked all the rooms without success, ending in the library.
“Lady Grey!”
He stood staring at the dusty library a moment. There was a patch of afternoon sun where a curtain had fallen and never been replaced, and sometimes she would nap here. But not today. Alistair frowned. Lady Grey was over a decade old and noticeably slowing down.
Dammit.
He turned and strode toward the kitchen. Lady Grey didn’t usually go there without him. She and Wiggins didn’t get on, and the kitchen was where the manservant hung about most often. In fact—
He halted abruptly at the sound of voices. High, childish voices. He wasn’t being fanciful now—there were children in his kitchen. And the odd thing—the completely unexpected thing—was that his first emotion was gladness. They hadn’t left him after all. His castle wasn’t really dead.
Of course, that was followed very quickly with outrage. How dare she defy his command? She should be halfway to Edinburgh by now. He’d order another carriage, and he’d pack her pretty arse on it himself if he had to this time. There was no room in his castle, in his life, for a too-attractive housekeeper and her pair of brats. Alistair started forward, his intent focused, his stride firm.
And then the childish voices clarified into words.
“. . . can’t go back to London, Jamie,” the girl was saying.
“Don’t see why not,” the boy replied in a mutinous voice.
“Because of him. Mama said so.”
Alistair frowned. Mrs. Halifax couldn’t return to London because of a man? Who? Her husband? She’d presented herself as a widow, but if her husband was still alive and she’d fled him… Dammit. The man might’ve hurt her. There were very few things a woman could do if she married badly, but fleeing her husband was one of them. This put a different angle on things.