Alistair leaned back in his ancient kitchen chair. “Why should I spend my money on servants that are useless to me?” He didn’t add, servants who would no doubt loiter in the halls to stare at him and his scars.
“Cooks aren’t useless,” Jamie objected.
Alistair raised his eyebrows at the lad. Jamie sat across from him, his elbows flat on the table, a slice of bread with jam between his hands.
“Indeed?”
“Not if they can make steak pie,” the boy pointed out. He had jam smeared on either side of his face. There was jam on the table in front of him as well. “Or custard.”
Alistair felt his mouth quirk. Warm custard, fresh from the oven, had been a favorite of his as well when he’d been Jamie’s age. “Can this cook make steak pie and custard?”
“I believe so,” Mrs. Halifax said primly.
“Pleeease may we keep the cook?” Jamie’s eyes were wide and earnest.
“Jamie!” Abigail chided. Her eyes weren’t pleading at all. Interesting.
“I don’t think Mama can make a steak pie. Do you?” Jamie whispered hoarsely to his sister. “At least not a proper one.”
Alistair glanced sideways at Mrs. Halifax. A pretty blush was creeping up her cheeks. It had spread down as well; disappearing under a gauze fichu she had wrapped about her neck and tucked into her elegant bodice. She caught his gaze, her eyes wide and blue and a little sad. The sight of those eyes, even more than the tender skin at her throat, caused him a sudden and altogether unwelcome jolt of desire.
Alistair pushed back from the table and surged to his feet. “I’ll give the cook—and you, Mrs. Halifax—a week in which to prove yourselves. One week. If I’m not convinced of the usefulness of cooks and housekeepers by then, you’ll all go. Understand?”
The housekeeper nodded, and for a moment he felt a tiny twinge of guilt when he saw her stricken look. Then his mouth twisted at his own idiocy. “If you’ll excuse me, madam, I have work to do. Come, Lady Grey.”
He slapped his thigh and the dog got slowly to her feet. He strode from the kitchen without a backward glance.
Damnable woman! Coming to his castle and questioning and demanding and taking his time when all he wanted was to be left alone. He took the tower stairs two at a time and then had to pause and wait for Lady Grey. She was climbing the stairs slowly and stiffly as if her legs pained her. The sight made him even angrier. Why? Why did everything have to change? Was it too much to ask to be left to write his books in peace?
He sighed and climbed back down the stairs to Lady Grey. “Come on, lass.” He bent and gently scooped her against his chest. He could feel her heartbeat under his hands and the trembling in her legs. She was heavy, but Alistair held the big dog in his arms as he ascended the tower stairs. Once in the tower, he knelt and set her in her favorite place on the rug before the fire.
“Nothing to be ashamed of,” he whispered as he stroked her ears. “You’re a brave lass, you are, and if you need a bit of help up the stairs, well, I’m glad to oblige.”
Lady Grey sighed and laid her head on the rug.
Alistair stood and walked to the tower window that overlooked the back of the castle grounds. There was an old garden there, terraced in steps that led down to a stream. Beyond, rolling purple and green hills met the horizon. Vegetation overgrew the garden, falling down the buttressing walls and crowding the paths. It hadn’t been tended in years. Not since he’d left for the Colonies.
He’d been born and raised in this castle. He didn’t remember his mother, who had died giving birth to a stillborn baby girl when he wasn’t quite three. His mother’s death might’ve infused the castle with gloom, but though she’d been well loved, it hadn’t. He’d grown up running wild over the hills, fishing with his father in the stream and arguing history and philosophy with Sophia, his older sister. Alistair smiled wryly. Sophia had usually won the arguments, not only because she was the older by five years, but also because she was the better scholar.
Back then, he’d thought that eventually he, too, would marry. He’d bring his bride to the castle and raise another generation of Munroes, just like all his ancestors. But that hadn’t happened. He’d been betrothed at three and twenty to a girl named Sarah, but she’d died of a fever before they could wed. Grief had kept him from forming another alliance for years, and then somehow his studies had taken precedence. He’d traveled to the Colonies when he was eight and twenty and had stayed there three years before returning, a prematurely aged one and thirty.
And after he’d returned from the Colonies . . .
He traced the eye patch on his cheek as he gazed out at his countryside. It’d been too late by then, hadn’t it? He’d lost not only his eye, but also his soul. What remained was not fit for civilized company, and he knew it. He stayed far from other people to protect himself and, perhaps more importantly, to protect them. He’d seen sorrow, smelled death’s rotting breath, and knew that savagery lurked close beneath the thin veil of society. His very face reminded others that the basic animal was very near. That it might pounce on them as well.
He’d been resigned, content if not boisterously joyful. He had his studies; he had the hills and his stream. He had Lady Grey to keep him company.
And then she had arrived.
He didn’t need an officious, too-beautiful housekeeper to barge into his home and life. He didn’t need her changing his retreat. He didn’t need this sudden desire that hardened his muscles and made his skin itch with irritation. She would be appalled—revolted—if she knew what she did to him physically.
Alistair turned from the window in disgust. Soon enough, she’d tire of playing housekeeper and find some other place to hide from whatever—or whoever—she was running from. In the meantime, he would make sure she didn’t keep him from his work.
“IT’S BEEN OVER a fortnight,” Algernon Downey, the Duke of Lister, said in an even, controlled voice. “I ordered you to hire the best men in London. Why can’t they find one woman traveling with two children?”
He swung around on the last syllable and pinned Henderson, his longtime secretary, with a cold stare. They were in Lister’s study, an elegant room newly redecorated in white, black, and dark red. It was a room appropriate for a duke and the fifth richest man in England. At the far end, Henderson sat in a chair before Lister’s spacious desk. Henderson was a dry little man, mainly bones and sinew, with a pair of half-glasses perched on his forehead. He had an open notebook on his knee and a pencil with which to record notes in one shaking hand.
“I admit it is very distressing, Your Grace, and I do apologize,” Henderson said in his whispery voice. He thumbed through his notebook as if to find the answer for his own incompetence there. “But we must remember that Mrs. Fitzwilliam has no doubt chosen to disguise herself and the children. And, after all, England is a very large place.”
“I’m well aware of how large England is, Henderson. I want results, not excuses.”
“Of course, Your Grace.”
“My resources—my men, money, contacts—should have found her by now.”
Henderson gave several quick birdlike bobs of his head. “Naturally, Your Grace. Of course, we have been able to trace her as far as the road north.”
Lister made one sharp cutting motion with his hand. “That was nearly a week ago. She may’ve laid a false trail, gone west to Wales or Cornwall, or for all we know, caught a ship for the Colonies. No. This is simply unacceptable. If the men we have on her now can’t find her, then hire new ones. Immediately.”
“Quite, Your Grace.” Henderson licked his lips nervously. “I shall see that it is done at once. Now, as to the duchess’s trip to Bath…”
Henderson droned on about Lister’s wife’s travel plans, but the duke hardly listened. He’d been the Duke of Lister since the age of seven; his title was centuries old. He sat in the House of Lords and owned vast estates, mines, and ships. Gentlemen of all ranks respected and feared him. And yet one woman—the daughter of a
quack physician, no less!—thought she could simply leave him, and what was more, take his bastard offspring with her.
Unacceptable. The entire thing was simply unacceptable.
Lister strolled to the tall windows of his study, which were draped in white and black striped silk. He’d have her found, have her and his children brought back, and then he would impress upon her how very, very stupid it was to cross him. No one crossed him and lived to gloat about it.
No one.
Chapter Four
When Truth Teller could eat no more, the beautiful young man showed him to a large, handsomely decorated room and bade him good night. There the soldier slept without dreaming and in the morning woke to find his host standing beside his bed.
“I have been looking for a brave fellow to do me a task,” said the young man. “Are you such a fellow?”
“Yes,” said Truth Teller.
The beautiful young man smiled. “That we shall see.…”
—from TRUTH TELLER
Mrs. McCleod, the new cook, was a tall dour woman who hardly spoke, Helen reflected the next afternoon. The woman had once cooked for a great house in Edinburgh, but she hadn’t liked the rush and noise of the city and had retired to the nearby town of Glenlargo where her brother was the baker. Privately, Helen wondered if Mrs. McCleod hadn’t become bored with the slow life of Glenlargo and her brother’s bakery, for she certainly accepted the job as cook quickly enough.
“I hope the kitchen meets with your approval,” she said now, twisting her apron in her hands.
The cook was nearly the height of a man, and her face was wide and flat. She was expressionless, but her large reddened hands moved lightly and swiftly as she rolled out pastry on the kitchen table. “Hearth needs sweeping.”
“Ah, yes.” Helen looked nervously at the giant fireplace. She’d been up at the crack of dawn, scrubbing the kitchen as best she could in preparation for the cook, but she hadn’t had time to clean the fireplace. Her back ached terribly now, and her hands were raw from the hot water and harsh lye soap. “I’ll have one of the maids do it, shall I?”
Mrs. McCleod expertly flipped the pastry into a pie plate and began trimming the edges.
Helen swallowed. “Well, I have other matters to attend to. I’ll return in an hour or so to see how you’re getting on, shall I?”
The cook shrugged. She was arranging vegetables and pieces of meat in the pie.
Helen nodded, just to give the appearance that she knew what she was doing, and went into the hallway. There she took out a small notebook and tiny pencil. They’d been the first items she’d bought in Glenlargo yesterday. Opening the notebook, she flipped to the third page and wrote, clean hearth. This notation was at the bottom of what was becoming a rather long list that included among other things air library, clear ivy from windows in sitting room, polish hall floor, and find the good silverware.
Helen put away the notebook and pencil, smoothed her hair, and continued on her way to the dining room. This, she’d decided, would be the first room to be completely set to rights in the castle. That way, Sir Beastly could enjoy a properly cooked dinner tonight and, more importantly, realize how very useful it was to have a housekeeper. She hadn’t actually seen the master of the castle all morning. When she’d brought his breakfast to the tower room, he’d yelled through the door to leave it outside. She very much hoped he wasn’t going to sulk in his tower and then throw them all out of the castle in a fit of ill temper tonight. All the more important to have the dining room at least cleaned.
But when Helen rounded the corner into the dining room, the sight that met her eyes was pure chaos. One of the maids was shrieking and covering her head with her apron. The other maid brandished a broom as she chased a bird about the room. Jamie and Abigail were helping the maid with the broom, and the two footmen—young lads from the village—were doubled over with laughter.
For a moment, Helen gaped in horror. Why? Why must every single thing be so hard? Then she shook herself. Aching back, difficult servants, filthy castle, it simply didn’t matter. She was the one in charge here. If she couldn’t bring order to this scene, no one else would do it. And if she couldn’t bring order, then Sir Alistair would dismiss her and the children in the coming week. It was as simple as that. She hurried to the windows that lined the far wall of the dining room. They were made of ancient diamond-paned glass, and most were immovable, but she found one with a catch and shoved it open.
“Chase it over here,” she called to the maid with the broom.
The girl, a sturdy redhead who obviously had a level head on her shoulders, obediently did so, and several frantic minutes later, the bird found freedom.
Helen slammed the window shut and latched it.
“Now, then.” She turned to her troops and took a breath. “What happened?”
“It came out the chimney!” Jamie exclaimed. He was so excited his hair was on end, and he was quite red in the face. “Nellie was sweeping it”—he pointed to the maid now removing her apron from her face—“and the bird fell down with a heap of soot.”
A large mound of soot and what looked like an ancient bird’s nest lay on the hearth.
“Gave me ever such a turn, mum,” Nellie concurred.
“And then you stood there and yelled like a banshee while it flew about the room.” The red-headed girl had the broom over one shoulder like a musket and her other hand on her hip.
“Oh, will ye now be holdin’ it over me, Meg Campbell, that ye know how to chase a bird with a broom?” Nellie shot back.
The maids started arguing, while the footmen guffawed.
Helen felt a headache begin to pound at her temple. “Enough!”
The cacophony of voices silenced and all eyes turned toward her.
“You”—Helen pointed at the tallest footman—“go to the kitchen and sweep out the fireplace.”
“But that’s a lass’s job,” the boy objected.
“Well, you’re doing it today,” Helen said. “And mind it’s well swept and scrubbed.”
“Aw,” the tall footman groaned, but he went from the room.
Helen turned to the remaining servants. “Meg, come help me polish the dining table. You two”—she gestured to the other maid and the shorter footman—“finish cleaning that chimney. We have to get it clear if we’re to have a fire in here tonight without setting the room ablaze.”
They worked all through the afternoon, cleaning, sweeping, polishing, and even taking the rugs and curtains out to beat them in the wind. By six o’clock, the dining room was as neat as a pin and a fire roared in the fireplace, though it did still smoke a little.
Helen looked about, one hand massaging the ache at the small of her back. What a tremendous chore! She’d never take a housemaid’s work for granted again. At the same time, she couldn’t help a pleased smile spreading over her face. She’d set her mind to it, and she’d done it! Helen thanked the maids and the two rather worn footmen and sent them off to the kitchen for a well-deserved cup of tea.
“What shall we do now, Mama?” Abigail asked. The children had been wonderful workers all afternoon. Even Jamie had helped polish the windows.
Helen smiled at them. “Now we go wash up so that we can properly greet Sir Alistair when he comes down for his supper.”
“And we’ll eat in the dining room with him!” Jamie exclaimed.
Helen felt a pang. “No, dear, we’ll have a lovely supper in the kitchen.”
“But why?” Jamie asked.
“Because Mama’s the housekeeper, and it’s not proper for us to eat with Sir Alistair,” Abigail said. “We’re servants now. We eat in the kitchen.”
Helen nodded. “That’s right. But the meat pie will taste just as good in the kitchen, don’t you think? Now, let’s tidy up, shall we?”
But forty-five minutes later, when Helen and the children again came down the stairs, Sir Alistair was nowhere to be found.
“I think he’s still in his tower,” Abigail said,
frowning at the ceiling overhead as if she could see the master of the castle four floors above. “Perhaps he sleeps up there, too.”
Both Helen and Jamie glanced instinctively up at the ceiling. Mrs. McCleod had said that she planned supper for seven o’clock. If Sir Beastly didn’t appear soon, his supper would be cold, and, more importantly, he might offend the only qualified cook for miles and miles.
That decided it. Helen turned to the children. “Darlings, why don’t you go to the kitchen and see if one of the maids can make you tea?”
Abigail looked at her. “But what will you do, Mama?”
Helen straightened her fresh apron. “Fetch Sir Alistair from his den.”
THE KNOCK ON the tower door came just as Alistair lit the candles. The light was fading, and he was in the midst of trying to record his observations on badgers. This was for his next great work: a comprehensive listing of the flora and fauna of Scotland, England, and Wales. It was a huge undertaking, one that he felt without vanity would place him in the ranks of the great scientists of his age. And today he’d been able to write for the first time in weeks—months, if he was honest with himself. He’d eagerly begun the work over three years ago, but for the last year or more, his work had slowed and faltered. He’d been beset by a sort of lethargy that made writing extremely difficult. Indeed, for the last few weeks he’d made barely any progress at all.
Today, however, he’d risen knowing exactly what to put down in his manuscript. It was as if a breath of reviving wind had been blown into his lungs by some unseen god. He’d spent the day in intense writing and sketching, accomplishing more than he had in months.
So when the knock interrupted his labors, he was not pleased.
“What?” he growled at the door. It was bolted so a certain female couldn’t just swan in at will.
“Your supper is ready,” she called back.
“Bring it here, then,” he replied absently. Sketching a badger’s nose could be quite difficult.