Chapter Nine
That Sunday, Lady Serena was as good as her word and rode over from Braithwaite Castle with Lady Helen. When Williams admitted them, Caroline was crossing the hall in the direction of the study and paused to greet them. Helen ran at her, and Serena hastily pressed a letter into her hand.
“It was delivered to the castle yesterday,” she murmured.
Caroline’s heart lurched in fear, for it was her mother’s hand which had scrawled the wrong address. The reasons for such carelessness were truly terrifying. Fortunately, Williams took Serena and Helen straight up to Miss Benedict in the drawing room, so Caroline was able to flee to the quiet of the study.
She knew the room would be empty, for from her chamber window, barely twenty minutes ago, she had seen Mr. Benedict walk into the woods with Tiny. By past practice, he would not return for hours.
With her heart in her mouth, she tore open the seal, sinking onto the sofa. But there was no way to prepare for the blow she feared.
For a few moments, the words danced before her eyes, making no sense. Then she realized what they were saying and reread them properly, tears streaming down her face.
“Thank God,” she whispered. “Thank God.”
She didn’t even hear anyone come in, but suddenly, Tiny’s head was in her lap, and Mr. Benedict knelt at her feet, frowning into her face.
“What is it?” he said urgently. “What has happened?”
She smiled through her tears. “Peter is well. He was probably never in any real danger, but when they didn’t write I was so afraid…” She dashed her hand against her cheeks in a belated attempt to hide her emotion, but to her surprise, he caught her hand and held it. Suddenly she was blurting out the whole story of Peter’s illness, the cost of the doctor, and her managing to send the money home via Lord Braithwaite, only to hear nothing at all of his health since.
Mr. Benedict gave her a large handkerchief. Only as she took it, did she realize she was clutching his hand. She released it with a hiccup of apology and hastily wiped her face and eyes.
“I’m sorry,” she muttered. “You must think me very foolish to be crying over such happy news.”
“Not foolish. I can see you care a great deal for the child.” He caught her gaze. “Tell me truthfully. Is he really your nephew?”
She stared at him uncomprehending. “Really my…oh!”
She jumped up, narrowly missing the dog’s great feet as she backed away from Benedict.
“Of course he is my nephew,” she said stiffly. “Do I have your permission to take Rosa to the drawing room to meet Lady Helen? I thought Lady Tamar and I could take them for a walk.”
“Of course,” he said impatiently. “I told you so yesterday. Miss Grey—”
“Thank you,” she interrupted and stalked out of the room. How dare he? How dare he even think Peter is mine? What does he take me for?
She’d run to her bedchamber, splashed water on her face and toweled it dry before she admitted to herself why she was so angry. The way he’d looked at her occasionally, with that wild, exciting heat. His words that first night—“Go in before I forget I was once a gentleman.” His apparent favor to her, allowing her to copy out his book, thrusting her more into his company… Was it all a ruse because he imagined she had a child out of wedlock and was therefore easy pickings? A light-skirted female who’d already tried to seduce Lord Braithwaite—and succeeded for all Benedict knew.
“Dear God, it was a mistake coming here,” she whispered. But she had come, and she had her duties. She threw the towel onto the table by the washing bowl and walked into Rosa’s room.
Rosa sprawled on the bed, reading. She seemed more nervous than delighted by the treat of Lady Helen’s company, and showed a tendency to cling to Caroline as they went to the drawing room.
“I don’t go about much,” Miss Benedict was saying to Serena. “I haven’t for a long time now, but I must say your party sounds delightful. And here is Rosa.”
Rosa curtseyed to Lady Tamar as Caroline had taught her.
“Goodness, you curtsey much better than I can,” Helen observed.
“That’s because you’re in too big a hurry,” Caroline said, “and only pay about a quarter of the attention necessary.”
“Well, it’s not a very interesting thing to learn,” Helen complained.
Caroline had to allow her that one. It even won the glimmer of a smile from Rosa.
“But it is necessary if one moves in polite society,” Caroline said primly. “Or any society, really.”
“Quite,” Miss Benedict said with a sage nod.
“Shall we take a walk while the sun is shining?” Serena suggested.
“Perhaps we can take Tiny,” Caroline suggested.
“Who is Tiny?” Helen asked, bewildered.
Rosa smiled mischievously and beckoned the other girl from the room.
It was a start.
In the end, not only Tiny, but Tiny’s master chose to accompany them. He appeared around the corner from his study, his coat fastened and his cravat tied carelessly about his throat. Helen, pinned to the wall by Tiny, stopped laughing to stare at Benedict in awe. Even Serena’s breath caught at her first glimpse of the legendary tenant of Haven Hall.
And he did look dangerous in the shadows of the back hall, his long, jagged scar standing out lividly across his saturnine face. Until Rosa and Tiny both bounded at him.
“I see you’ve met Tiny,” he observed.
“Lady Tamar, allow me to present Mr. Benedict,” Caroline said as calmly as she could. “Sir, Lady Tamar and Lady Helen Conway.”
Benedict bowed with unexpected elegance. “I hope you realize there are no formal gardens here. The grounds were thoroughly overgrown when we took the place, and I confess I’ve done nothing about them.”
“We enjoy natural beauty,” Serena assured him.
“Well, we have the natural in abundance. Heel, Tiny,” he added severely, and opened the door with one hand while he unhooked his old coat and hat with the other. No one could have accused him of currying favor with the beautiful young marchioness.
Inevitably, Tiny shot out of the door like a cannon ball, both girls at his heels.
Caroline, thrown by this sudden turn of events, hoped Benedict’s anxiety for his daughter wouldn’t inspire him to interfere and keep too close an eye on the girls. And indeed, he did begin by walking beside them while she and Serena followed some distance behind. He threw a stick for Tiny, who seemed to fly through the air to catch it at its height, before landing on his feet again. Helen clapped her hands with delight and laughed at whatever Benedict said to her.
After that, he veered off the path and the girls ran off after the dog to throw the stick for him again.
“Well, he’s not what I imagined,” Serena murmured.
“Because he hasn’t yet eaten the children?”
“Pshaw. I thought he’d be much staider and colder. Or at least grumpier.”
He emerged back onto the path a little further on and walked with the ladies, responding civilly to Serena’s conversation, with occasional sardonic asides that seemed to amuse the marchioness. Caroline added very little. Already angry with Benedict, she was appalled to discover the added pain of jealousy, because beside Lady Tamar’s vitality, charm and beauty, Caroline was nothing.
And what exactly is it you want to be to him? she asked herself furiously.
Perhaps fortunately, the walk was not a long one, for the rain was threatening. They repaired to the house to have tea with Miss Benedict before Serena’s carriage was summoned. The two girls seemed comfortable with each other, if not yet bosom friends, and Caroline thought that it had been a good day’s work for Rosa.
Mr. Benedict had retreated once more to his study or elsewhere, but his sister and Rosa accompanied Caroline to the front door to wave goodbye to their visitors.
“Come over to the castle if you can,” Serena invited as she climbed into the carriage. “We can dress up!”
“What does she mean by that?” Miss Benedict wondered.
“I expect she means to find me one of her old gowns,” Caroline replied frankly, “so that I might not afflict her party with drabness.”
“My dear, you are not remotely drab!” Miss Benedict protested. “You have brightened us up wonderfully!”
“Then you are quite happy for me to attend with you and Rosa?”
“Of course. Perhaps, since it is an early party, we do not need Javan’s escort?”
Miss Benedict, clearly, assumed her brother would not go. Caroline, who had once thought of persuading him, said nothing. Following Miss Benedict back inside, she resolved to go for a longer walk, alone, to clear her head. So, she merely passed through the house to the side door, resumed her cloak and bonnet and went out again.
She hadn’t gone far before a crashing in the undergrowth heralded the appearance of Tiny, who greeted her like a long-lost friend.
“You’re not out on your own, are you?” she murmured, pulling his ears. And of course, he wasn’t, for a few moments later, Mr. Benedict also emerged from the undergrowth, frowning over two plant cuttings in his hand as he walked.
Despite Tiny, Caroline would simply have hurried by with a quick, “Good afternoon, sir,” and indeed, she walked faster to do just that. However, Mr. Benedict, glanced up and saw her.
“Miss Grey,” he said at once, stuffing the plants in his pocket. He took a step nearer, blocking the path. “I have to apologize for my misunderstanding, and the offence I have given. You should know that I thought no less of you, whatever I imagined.”
“I cannot believe that is true,” she said flatly.
He looked surprised. “Can’t you? You would not have been the first gently bred girl betrayed through no fault of her own. Despite what I once said about Braithwaite’s mistress not being fit to teach my daughter, I regarded your situation—what I imagined was your situation—quite differently.”
“I doubt the rest of the world does!” She drew in a breath. “However, I, too, must apologize for losing my temper. In truth, I was angry because…because I do almost regard Peter as my own. In my worst moments, I have wished he was my own,”
Frowning, he began to walk. “Why?”
“Because his father was once my whole world,” she blurted. “I was young and naive and we were engaged to be married. And then he met my sister and married her instead. I used to torment myself with the belief that he should have been mine, that if Theo had married me as he’d promised, and not Eliza, then he would have been mine.”
She would not look at him, but his gaze burned into her face.
“And yet,” he said, slowly, “now you work to keep your sister and the child who should have been yours. You are a lesson in duty.”
“No, just necessity.”
He walked on in silence. “Do you miss him?” he flung at her at last.
She thought about it, then shook her head. “Not really. In fact, I believe we would have been most unhappy together, for he was a shallow and feckless man who left my sister without a penny. Imagine the disillusion of discovering such a thing of your spouse rather than of your sister’s spouse.”
He let out a short laugh. “I don’t need to imagine. It seems we have both been deceived.”
“Did you love your wife very much?” she asked before she could stop herself.
“Once,” he replied. “For five minutes or so. I was not a very satisfactory husband.”
Shocked, she waited for more, but that appeared to be the end of his confidence.
“Then we are still friends?” he said, casting her a sideways glance.
“No, sir,” she replied firmly. “You are my employer. And I am your daughter’s governess.”
Her skin flushed under his continuous scrutiny, but she would not meet his gaze.
“And in spite of our better understanding,” he said, “you still refuse to believe why I seek your company.”
“And why is that, Mr. Benedict?” she challenged.
His lips quirked. “Because I like you, Miss Grey,” he said softly. “Because I like you.” He tipped his old hat to her and sauntered off down the other path toward the woods.
*
“That is the one,” Lady Tamar said warmly.
They stood before the glass in her bedchamber, where Caroline had tried on several of the marchioness’s evening gowns. On the other side of the room, Rosa and Helen were doing likewise—except where Serena snatched certain gowns from their grasp. The children did not appear to mind. There were plenty to choose from. At the moment, Helen sprawled on the chaise longue in a caricature of a fashionably languid lady. She wore a slightly torn but gorgeous yellow silk that trailed so far beyond her toes that Rosa knelt beneath her on the floor, wrapping the train of the gown about her shoulder. They both found this exquisitely funny, and Caroline smiled to see them laughing together.
With an effort, Caroline dragged her gaze back to herself in the glass. She was a little thinner than Serena, who gathered the fabric of the gown at her back to portray a better fit. It was a high-waisted, delicate peach silk, worn over an under gown of a slightly deeper color. Although the low-cut neckline was not quite immodest, it exposed far more of her chest and shoulders than she was used to. Still, it did not look ill. Instead, it seemed to bring out the creaminess of her complexion and the brightness of her eyes.
“I don’t look like the governess,” she said flatly. “People will talk, say I’m encroaching and giving myself airs.”
“Well, they might if you covered yourself with diamonds, too, and walked about with your nose in the air as if you were too good for Blackhaven. Those who know you will be glad to see you looking so well and enjoying yourself. Those who don’t, will never guess that you’re a governess.”
“Except that I’ll be with the children,” Caroline said.
“Well, they pretty much look after themselves,” Serena argued. “There’s no need for you to be with them constantly. Let me just pin this, and I’ll have Mrs. Gaskell take it in at the waist and alter the length.”
“I don’t know,” Caroline said doubtfully. “When you held your midnight revel, I wore my own clothes.”
“Well, no one wore their best because we were on the beach,” Serena pointed out. “And besides, at night by the sea, with lit braziers and burning torches all over the place, the children did have to be watched more closely. But I don’t see why you have to play the governess all the time.”
Caroline blinked. “I’m not playing. I am the governess.”
“Will he come?” Serena asked.
Caroline didn’t need to ask who. “I don’t know,” she replied candidly. “But Miss Benedict is eager, and he has no objection to my going, with or without Rosa.” In fact, he hadn’t brought the subject up recently, even in the evenings they spent in his study.
Those evening hours had secretly become Caroline’s favorite part of the day when she sat only feet from him, conversing little, as a rule, but simply soaking up his silent company, his very physical presence as he worked. He drank brandy constantly and yet never seemed inebriated. Nor did his manner to her ever change below the civil. And yet, she surely didn’t imagine the sense of intimacy between them—inappropriate, dangerous, but still unspoken.
Last night, as he’d poured himself another glass of brandy, she’d blurted, “Why do you drink so much? For the pain?”
His eyebrows had flown up and he’d gazed at the glass in his hand, as though wondering how it had got there. His lips twisted. “Old pain and habit. I suppose it dulls the edges.”
“Of pain?”
His gaze had lifted, devouring her. She had never seen such hunger in a man’s eyes. It was dizzying, frightening, and yet wickedly exciting.
A short laugh had broken from him. “Pain, yes. Let us call it that.”
He had sat back down at the desk, the glass by his elbow. But the thrill of that look, of the fierce desire it revealed, still churned inside her.
“What do you think, girls?” Serena asked the children, turning Caroline to face them while still holding the dress material in at the back.
The girls untangled themselves from the yellow gown and regarded Caroline with unexpected awe.
“Why, Miss Grey, you’re beautiful,” Helen said, while Rosa nodded slowly.
“If only I’d known,” Caroline mourned. “So many wasted years! All I’ve ever needed is one of Lady Tamar’s gowns.”
Lady Tamar gave the gown a little twist to tighten it. “Any gown rather than the ones you have. I can’t believe they ever became you.”
“They weren’t meant to,” Caroline said. She’d chosen them, altering them from her mother’s unworn collection, for precisely that reason. She’d thought being plain and dull would mitigate against her youth when looking for a position.
“Well, you were always beautiful,” Serena retorted. “Ugly dresses and severe hairstyles do not disguise the fact. Trust me, you have been noticed,”
Disconcerted, Caroline twisted around to look at her. “By whom?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Serena said hastily. “I merely wish you to know, to make you comfortable going into society in this capacity.”
“I don’t think it does make me comfortable,” Caroline murmured. “I think I will just wear the brown—”
“No!” Serena and Helen exclaimed together, and Caroline laughed self-consciously.
“Come, let’s go and find the others and take a walk…”