Darling Beast

“What do you want, Montgomery?” Makepeace all but growled.



The duke shrugged delicately. “As I’ve said: to employ an architect of my own selection to design and build the theater and musician’s gallery and various other follies I might like in the garden. I shall, naturally, be paying him from my own pocket. Come now, it’s not as if you have a choice.”



At that, Makepeace did growl.



“Fascinating,” Montgomery drawled, cocking his head as he watched Makepeace simmer. Apollo wondered if the man had any sense of self-preservation. “But I shall take that as agreement.”



He turned and strolled leisurely away.



“We can’t trust him, ’Pollo,” Makepeace said, abruptly and low. “We couldn’t trust him before, but now he knows your name.”



And Apollo couldn’t help but agree.



“HE’S JUST A gardener,” Maude muttered later that day as she watched Lily dither over the picnic luncheon she was packing. “Well, that’s what he told you, anyway.”



“Do you think he’d like roast chicken or boiled eggs better?” Lily had spent the morning frantically writing so that she might take a few hours’ break in the afternoon, which meant she had only minutes to pack the picnic luncheon. “And he isn’t just a gardener, he’s the head gardener—he’s designing the entire pleasure garden, as far as I can tell.”



“Hinney, a man as big as that, working hard all day, will eat anything and everything you set in front of him,” Maude opined. “If he’s the head gardener and such an important man as all that, why is he livin’ rough in the garden and wearing such common clothes?”



“I don’t know, Maude.” Lily put both the eggs and the leftover roast chicken securely in the basket. It was normally used for Maude’s knitting and she’d been none too pleased to have her work dumped out on the table so Lily could commandeer the basket. “Perhaps he’s down on his luck. Or maybe he likes to stay at the garden he’s working on. Or…” But her imagination had run out. There really wasn’t an explanation for Caliban’s many strange habits.



“And the fact he won’t tell you his real name or that he let you think he was stupid when you first met, can you explain that, my girl?”



Lily couldn’t, so she just kept her head down and wrapped a half loaf of bread securely.



“You can get any man you want,” Maude said. “I’ve seen them look at you when you’re prancing about the stage—and off—from footmen to bejeweled lords, they all fancy you. Why not let one of them take you out?”



“I’m not interested in lords, bejeweled or otherwise,” Lily said lightly.



“I’ll give you that,” Maude said, “but there’s plenty o’ other men. Why bring a picnic lunch to a great brute you know nothing about?”



Why indeed? Lily’s hands stilled as she tried to explain, both to herself and to Maude. “He’s big, but he’s gentle.”



“He was fighting some stranger just yesterday!”



“I know!” Lily took a breath and said more quietly, “I know.” She met her old nursemaid’s eyes. “I don’t know why Caliban fought that man, but I know he felt he had to.”



“Hinney…” Maude’s old face seemed to have grown lines.



Lily caught her hands, squeezing gently. “He looks at me in admiration, but not like those other men—as if I’m an object he wants to have, for other men to admire. When he looks at me I think he sees a woman he likes, a woman he wants to talk to. And I want to talk to him, Maude. I want to learn what he thinks about when his lips turn up, and what he sees when he looks at his garden, and what he’ll be doing tomorrow and the next day.” She stopped because she knew she’d lost any hope of eloquence. “I can’t explain it. I only know I want to spend time with him. When I’m with him, the minutes, the hours, fly by so fast and I hardly notice.”



She blinked and stared helplessly at Maude.



“I don’t want you hurt, hinney.” Maude’s voice softened, turned pleading. “I can’t get Kitty’s face out of my dreams, I can’t. She haunts me at night and I think it’s a warning, I do. Remember she was so taken with that man, so sure he would be kind to her.”



“He was different,” Lily muttered. “He wasn’t nearly as nice as Kitty thought and we all knew it, even from the first. We told her not to go with him.”



“As I’m telling you not to go with this Caliban fellow,” Maude said. “Think, dear one, what do you know of him? What has he told you of his family, his life outside this here garden?”



“Nothing,” Lily said. She didn’t want to face it, but it was true: Caliban was hiding who he was. “But Maude, he isn’t violent—not to us. You’ve seen how gentle he’s been with Indio.”



“And what if that’s just a false face?” Maude’s voice quavered. “He was sweet at first, too. I couldn’t bear to lose you, hinney, I just couldn’t.”



Lily finally looked up to see to her horror that Maude’s eyes were misted. Impulsively she hugged the older woman tight and whispered in her ear, “You’ll never lose me, Maude, not even if you try.”



“Oh, get on with you,” Maude said, pulling away as if embarrassed at her own show of emotion. She swiped at her eyes with the corner of her apron. “Just be careful. Promise me.”



“I promise,” Lily said solemnly as she picked up the basket and left before Maude could make any more arguments.



She found Indio outside kicking at a charred stick, breaking it to bits, while Daffodil nosed at a clump of violets. Indio held his precious boat in his arms.



He looked up eagerly as she came out the theater door. “Did you bring the boiled eggs?”



“Yes.” Lily fell into step with him.



“And the jammy tarts Maude made?” Indio asked, skipping beside her.



“Of course.”



“Huzzah!”



She smiled down at him and then nodded as they passed a group of gardeners. Two of the three men stopped and doffed their hats, making her feel quite fine. They hadn’t seen many of the gardeners beside Caliban, as most of the work seemed to have been away from the theater thus far. It was inevitable, she supposed, that their restoration would eventually reach the theater, though she was not looking forward to the loss of their privacy. Stepping outside to find strange men would be a bit disconcerting. Lily wondered if she ought to ask Mr. Harte for some sort of lock for the theater door.



Abruptly she realized that she didn’t know where Caliban was working today. She looked down at her son, happily skipping with his boat cradled in his arms. “Do you know where Caliban has gotten to?”



“He’s by the pond, digging a hole in the ground,” Indio said promptly.



Lily raised her eyebrows. “Is he? Whatever for?”



“Dunno,” Indio said, unconcerned. “But it’s a big ’un—bigger than any I’ve ever dug before.”



He sounded admiring. Of course to a little boy the adventure of digging the hole was probably reason enough for the labor.



They came to the pond and began walking along it as best they could given there wasn’t a path. Several times they had to dodge away from the pond to go around debris, but at last they found Caliban.



He was a terrifically dirty mess, shoulder-deep in a hole that was indeed quite big. Daffodil ran to the edge and barked at him until he placed his hands on the side and levered himself out. He wore a bandage on his head to cover his wound, but it was much smaller than the one she’d dressed it with the night before.



He grinned at the small dog and Indio, who showed him the boat, and then looked at Lily. Even with his face and hair dusted with dirt, his shirt near brown from the silt, her heart gave a little jump. Like Indio when he was excited.



She shook her head at herself and called, “You need to wash before luncheon.”



He looked down at his muddy hands and nodded. Then he simply took off his shirt and knelt by the pond to scoop water over his shoulders and face. The man had no modesty at all, it seemed.



Lily busied herself spreading a blanket on a dry patch of ground and unpacked their picnic. Daffodil immediately galloped up at the sight of food and attempted to steal a tart.



“No, Daff!” Indio cried. The tarts were rather dear to his heart. “Have this instead.” And he handed her the fatty chicken tail they’d saved for her.



Daffodil scurried off with her prize. Lily hoped fervently that the little dog wouldn’t decide to bury the chicken tail, for she’d done so in the past with what she considered delicacies and the results had been rather messy when disinterred for later leisurely enjoyment.



Caliban sat down, his shirt pulled over his head, but left loosely unlaced.



Lily looked away primly, her heart beating fast. He’d slicked back his wet hair and he was, if not handsome, certainly compelling.



Hastily she took one of the plates from the basket. “Would you like a chicken leg? Oh, and a hardboiled egg?”



He nodded, his broad mouth slightly curved as if he was amused.



“I’d like an egg,” Indio reminded her.



“Guests first, Indio,” she said gently, and put a generous helping of everything she’d packed on a plate for Caliban before handing it over to him.



He lounged on his side, like a Roman aristocrat, carefully picking up a small piece of meat to eat.



She watched him out of the corner of her eye as she served Indio and then selected an egg and some bread for herself. She sat back, her legs curled to the side under her dress, and tilted her face to the sun—it was quite welcome after the dreary weather they’d had lately.



Daff came back, proudly bearing her chicken tail, and Caliban smiled at the little dog.



Which reminded her.



Lily cleared her throat as she tore off a bit of her bread. “I noticed yesterday that you laughed.”



He looked up, his head cocked in obvious inquiry.



“It’s just…” She gestured with the bit of bread before realizing and placing it carefully on her plate. “Well, it was out loud. I wondered, well, if you can laugh…”



He was still staring at her, his expression hard to decipher.



She inhaled and just blurted it out. “When was the last time you tried to speak?”



He reached over and picked up his cloth bag, opening the flap and taking out the notebook. He bent to write and then showed her the notebook. Months ago. I assure you nothing happened.



She licked her lips. “How long ago did you lose your voice?”



He frowned and wrote. Nine or so months ago.



“So recently!” She looked up in excitement. “That’s less than a year. Don’t you see? Your infirmity might not be permanent.”



“What are you talkin’ about?” Indio asked, scrambling to his knees. “What’s a ’firmity?”



“It’s like an illness or a sickness.” Lily glanced at Caliban and saw that his face had closed. His eyes flicked to her and then to Indio and she took the hint, though she was determined to continue the discussion later. “What are you digging the hole for?”



Caliban sat up at that, and Indio edged closer to look at his notebook as he wrote. I intend to plant an oak tree here.



She looked between his writing and the huge hole. “That’s a big hole.”



His mouth quirked as he wrote and she knew even before she read his words that he’d had a quick rejoinder.



She was correct: It’s a big tree.



“But how can you plant a big tree?” she asked as she cracked her egg. “Won’t it die when it’s dug up from where it originally grew?”



He began to write furiously at her question. She ate her egg as she watched him, marveling at how deeply involved he was in his profession. Indio lost interest in the discussion and delved in the basket for a jammy tart.