My heavens, what a sociable place this is!” Aunt Sarah’s tone was not as approving as one might suppose. She picked at the sumptuous tea tray as if more interested in finding a hidden drawback than in eating anything.
The village of Haven was so prosperous that Bernie could understand her aunt's wistful envy. It would be much less strenuous to be a vicar's wife in Haven than in Green Dell. Poor Aunt Goodrich.
Bernie herself was utterly charmed by the bright-eyed welcome everyone seemed to have for the vicar's party from downriver. The innkeeper and his wife were deeply solicitous of the weary older couple. Aunt Sarah wasn’t one to let others do for her, but even she was gratified by the way their hosts fluttered about Uncle Isaiah.
After Bernie had confirmed that her aunt and uncle were safely snugged into a private dining room with steaming cups of tea in their hands and hot bricks beneath their feet, she took Simon to their rooms to get them all unpacked.
She found that they’d been given the best rooms in the inn, ones with thick featherbeds, heaping wood bins and wide windows that looked out over the pretty village and the fields beyond.
“I can see the vicarage from here!” Simon, up on tiptoe, pressed his little nose against the diamond shaped panes of glass.
“You can likely see Green Dell from there,” commented Bernie drily, although she had to secretly admit to being rather impressed herself. As John Barton’s guests, they were being enfolded into the arms of the village as if they’d finally come home.
There was a tap on the door and two maids entered. A matched set of blondes, they were rosy-cheeked and pert with importance as they briskly shook out Bernie’s limited wardrobe, hanging her gowns and tucking her underthings discreetly into a chest. In no time at all, far faster than Bernie could have accomplished it, the trunks were unpacked and carted away to be stored during their stay.
Simon didn’t notice, of course. When he turned to see the room set to order, with his own spare set of pants dangling from a hook in the wardrobe and his treasured wooden horse set neatly by his bedside, he seemed to take the transformation in stride. Bernie regarded him with fond exasperation.
Born to be served. Perhaps it was a peculiarly male thing.
Bernie tried to give the maids the farthing she kept in her pocket, but they giggled and rolled their eyes at her.
“Aw, miss, that’d be too wrong of us. Honored guests, that’s what you are!”
The other girl nodded, her black curls bouncing. “That’s right, miss!"
Simon yelped. “Bernie, I see him! I think it’s John Barton. Is it? Is it him, Bernie?”
Simon was very eager to see John. At the age of two, he’d followed the young man about like a baby duck. Bernie doubted that he truly remembered John well, but Simon knew that his beloved toy horse had been carved by John and had decided that John was a kindred soul, a brother of the spirit, torn away by cruel fate.
In short, a hero.
Bernie certainly hoped Mr. Barton would not disappoint her little brother. She scurried to the window and pressed her own nose to the glass, peering through the frost etched pane into the bright courtyard.
She saw a tall shadow pass beneath them and she wondered if she recognized some aspect of bearing. “I think we ought to go downstairs and see.”
Simon pounded out of the bedchamber before Bernie could so much as dip her head down to the vanity mirror to check her appearance. Not bad. A little windblown, for certain, and her gown needed pressing after that carriage ride, but her jaunt about the village with Simon had put becoming roses into her cheeks. Not that she cared one whit how she appeared.
Still, it might be John Barton. Or it might not.
Matthias had left his mount in the sturdy hands of the innkeeper's stableboy, for he'd thought his business with Wermer might take a while. Now he stood at Perseus's head in the doorway of the horse-warmed stable and fiddled with the bridle. As he re-buckled the cheek pieces, and straightened the throatlatch, which didn't need straightening, for no Havensbeck groom would send his lordship out in slapdash trappings, Matthias gazed pensively down the curving main street of Haven.
Who was she? He didn't think she was local. She was well spoken, clearly not a farmer's wife. Perhaps a nearby squire had taken a bride? If he could've seen her hands without the gloves he might've spotted whether or not she wore a ring.
Not that it mattered that she was single or wed. He simply wasn't accustomed to strangers in his village. Having someone new visit would be occasion to comment, surely. In fact, he was surprised that Jasper had not said a word about newcomers. Matthias wished he had, for then he would've already known who the girl was and therefore could promptly forget her.
It was probably only the boy who'd caught his curiosity. A little boy named Simon? Of course his attention was riveted. It was only natural that he be curious about a child with his son's name. Was it not?
Strangers usually stayed at the inn. And he was already here.
Matthias stepped over the threshold of the Haven's Rest Inn and blinked against the dimness after the bright afternoon outside. Once again he found himself unbearably warm.
Did he keep Havensbeck so cold that he couldn't bear a normal interior any longer? How grim.
A pretty little maid rushed out to the antechamber with a smile, which probably disappeared as she gave a yelp of surprise at seeing him there. Her eyes were enormous as she put both hands over her mouth. She bobbed repeatedly as she backed away from him and scuttled back down the hallway.
Now he was frightening girls. Perfect.
A clatter of shoes brought the innkeeper, red-faced and puffing as he barreled into the foyer with his hands spread wide. "Your lordship! Oh, heavens!" He struggled for breath. "Welcome! How may I serve you today?"
Matthias gazed blankly at him. I came in pursuit of a woman. That wouldn't sound bizarre at all. Instead, he lifted his chin and fell back upon his social stature to gaze down at the man impassively.
He found that if he did this when he was at a loss for words, people usually filled in the blanks themselves.
The innkeeper paled, then reddened, then clasped his hands in front of him and grimaced painfully. "The maid is just shy, my lord. She's a good girl, she is. She meant no disrespect. She was that surprised to see you here, is all."
Blast it. Now everyone would think him a harsh fellow, berating a young woman for her moment of panic. He tried to ease the sternness of his expression. Sadly, he seemed to be out of practice. "I saw no fault in your maid, good sir. Your own swift arrival was most gracious." He bowed his head slightly. "I thank you for your prompt attention."
The man calmed at that. His face resumed something of its usual cheerful expression.
Matthias could not remember his name. He known it once, of course he had. The fellow had taken over this inn from his father, and probably his father before that. A family in his village for generations and he couldn't remember the blasted man's name.
What had he become?
"I merely stepped in to warm myself for a moment." This was certainly true, as he was sweltering. The inn was stifling, although no one else seemed to mind it. "How is business, Cransby?"
There. He done it. He dragged the man's name out of the murky past. Hadn't he?
The innkeeper hesitated and then licked his lips. "It's Cranston, my lord, but no matter. And business is right smart at the moment, thank you for asking. When the word got out the Christmas ball was going to be at the manor house as of old, folks decided to come from all around the county."
Matthias stared at the fellow blankly. "The Christmas ball, you say, at the manor?"
The man beamed. "It's awfully generous of your lordship to put on a special dinner and all. Oh, the missus is right thrilled, she is. Isn't a woman in town the village who isn't pressing her best dress right now!"
Not a simple village assembly. A ball. With a dinner. At the manor. Matthias held his breath for a long moment.
Jasper was the devil. Jasper must die.
At the top of the stairs leading down to the main rooms of the inn, Bernie paused as Simon pulled his hand from hers.
"I forgot my horse!" Simon dashed back toward their bedchamber. Bernie took a moment to smooth the lace at her neckline and check that her shoes were dry enough to escape notice.
"And have you had much new business due to the upcoming ball?"
The deep voice came from below, from the front hallway at the base of the stairs. The baritone rumble of the masculine tone were nothing like the innkeeper's cheerful tenor, or even Uncle Isaiah's resounding pulpit voice. Who is that?
The innkeeper spoke. "Oh, I'd say so for certain, milord."
Milord. It was him. Of course it was him. He sounded just as she'd heard him in her thoughts every time she'd read his letters. Bernie's heart began to race and she pressed her palms there as if to capture it and keep it where it belonged. Biting her bottom lip, she slid her foot down a step and bent to peer through the spindles of the railing.
"There's some has come from the remote farms, and there'll be more, I reckon, when the day comes. Folks don't want to be kept to home because of the weather." The innkeeper went on. "And of course, there's the vicar's people what come today."
"John Barton? I wasn't aware that he had family nearby."
Oh, that voice.
Bernie slid down one more step, then another, until she could make out a broad shoulder in a black greatcoat. The rest was blocked by the angle of the stair and by the innkeeper's stout form in his brown jacket. The innkeeper was taller than she was and yet this fellow loomed over him. Oh, if only they would move a step to the right!
"Be not so much relations as they be friends, I'd say," the innkeeper went on. "It's his vicar from downriver, the one that trained him up. He's right chuffed they could come. We're all puttin' out our best foot, like. Fine folks, they are."
His lordship had come to ask about them? Uncle Isaiah and Aunt Sarah and Simon and her? Suddenly recalling her hoydenish antics in the village, Bernie blushed hotly. He'd seen her gallivanting about with Simon? And in that awful redingote that made her look as shapeless as a bear, too! And Simon in his ill-fitting boots and patched trousers? She deeply regretted the urge that had led her to save her good things for the upcoming special occasion. Oh, what a picture they must've made playing in the snow and spoiling the old horse!
She could hardly blame the lord of the hall for coming to the inn to learn more about the odd newcomers disporting themselves so familiarly in his pretty village. Yet, was he so strict a master that the girls did not run and the boys did not fight off imaginary dragons?
"And is it only the elder vicar and his wife?"
The innkeeper burbled on even though Bernie wished to slap her hand over his overactive mouth. "There is the miss and the little boy, come to see good John. I don't know for sure now, so I shouldn't be telling, but if you were to ask me I'd say it is Miss Bernadette Goodrich that John Vicar be so eager to see."
"The vicar's daughter?
"I believe she be a ward, or a niece, or summat like that, milord."
"Well, I suppose that would be a good match for John."
Heavens, even strangers were all to ready to marry her off!
The innkeeper made an agreeable noise. "She's a pretty thing and sturdy, too, which is a handy thing for a vicar's wife."
Sturdy? Bernie wanted to die.
"And I'm thinkin' John will make a good father to the little lad. It'd be a blessin' all around for the old folks to get Miss Bernadette sorted away and young Simon raised proper."
Sorted away, like a spool of thread in a sewing box. And what was wrong with the way Simon was raised so far?
Bernie hadn't realized that she'd made it all the way down to the landing until his lordship moved slightly sideways and she found herself with a perfect view of his face. She pressed closer to the spindles.
He was not perfect, as she'd imagined. First of all, he was younger, perhaps thirty or so, although there was something weary in his expression. His face seemed carved of some fine and valuable stone. He was winter-pale, against dark-hair and dark eyes. Were they brown? Or perhaps blue. Shadowed by loss? He wore black, from his greatcoat to his trousers and boots. Even the scarf tossed loosely around his throat was the color of soot.
Yet for all his darkness, he did not appear threatening or even brooding. He seemed still. Not the stillness of a tranquil soul, overflowing with contentment. More the stillness of a hooded hawk held by its jesses in a falconer's grip. Confined, not panicked so much as waiting.
Waiting for you? Hardly. He barely knows you exist.
So there he was, standing before her as a real and solid as a man could be. Not words on paper. Not a silly schoolgirl dream. A real man.
No, a lord. A heart-stopping, handsome, tragic, lonely lord who waited for a beautiful lady to free him, a princess on a quest sent to unlock his grief-chained heart.
Not her, in her canvas coat and her scuffed walking boots, a penniless burdensome orphan, trailed by her beloved, skinny, snot-nosed little brother.
Scuffling noise brought Bernie out of her avid crouch where she knelt clutching the spindles of the staircase like a naughty child banned from the party below. She straightened, and briskly brushed at her skirts even as she took a breath to make some silly excuse about her odd behavior.
It was only Simon. He also hunkered on the steps above with his entire head trust between the spindles, ogling the scene below. Bernie grabbed for the back of his jacket and yanked him toward her. His mouth she did manage to clap her hand over.
"Not a word, I shall boil your drawers in poison oak!" she hissed in his ear.
The threat held and he stopped struggling, although he emitted an offended sniff. She would never do such a thing on purpose, of course, but apparently the one accidental incident had made an impression.
In the moment of suppressing Simon's urgency, who apparently intended for her to run downstairs and throw herself into his lordship's arms, the man himself managed to make his farewell to the innkeeper and slip away. Bernie resisted the urge to clatter down the stairs and watch him ride away through one of the windows.
Simon glared at her with his eyes full of the trenchant disappointment that only an eight-year-old could convey. He clearly thought she was a complete idiot, and had allowed an obvious opportunity to pass for some sisterly reason that he had no patience for.
She didn't answer his betrayed gaze, but merely pushed his hair back into place, straightened his collar and motivated him the rest of the way down the stairs with quick tap on his backside. "Aunt Sarah and Uncle Isaiah are expecting us. Shoo!"
The same goes for you, she commanded her wayward thoughts.
Good heavens, Lord Matthias was delicious!