Lady of Milkweed Manor (30 page)

Sally will know Anne is not mine.

That thought pushed Charlotte into action. Hurrying, she gently laid Anne in her little cradle in the guest room, wincing in anticipation but breathing deeply when the child did not cry. She then quickly opened the front door and stepped out onto the path, not waiting for her visitors to knock.

“Lady Katherine! What a lovely surprise!”

Both women, still standing beside the tall carriage, turned to look at her. But it was Sally who sprung into movement first, handing her bundle to Katherine and hurrying over to Charlotte, arms outstretched, her thin face overwhelmed by her crooked, toothy smile.

“Bless me, Charlotte! I didn’t know it was you we was visiting!”

Sally threw her arms around her and held her tight.

Charlotte took the opportunity to whisper urgently. “Sally. Please. Don’t say a word about … my son. I’ve a baby here, a girl. Please don’t say anything. They all think she is mine.”

“But … I don’t understand …”

“Please. I’ll explain when I can.”

“Well, I gather you two have never met,” Katherine said wryly. Charlotte and Sally pulled apart. Katherine was looking at them with a speculative grin.

“Sally and I met in London.”

“Oh?”

Charlotte took a deep breath. “Yes. She worked at the lying-in hospital where I … spent my confinement.”

Katherine shook her head, lips pursed. Charlotte lowered her focus to the ground.

“That father of yours …” Katherine grumbled. Charlotte looked up at this unexpected response. “Well, cousin”-Katherine raised a brow-“are we to be invited in for tea or not? I am dying to show off my son.”

Charlotte glanced quickly at the bundled child in Katherine’s arms, where she had been trying to avoid settling her gaze.

“Yes! Forgive me. Please do come in.”

Once they were all inside, Charlotte began the introductions. “This is Margaret Dunweedy, my great-aunt on my mother’s side. And this is Lady Katherine, my cousin on my father’s side.”

“And this is my son,” Katherine added. “Little Edmund Harris.”

“Oh, he’s lovely,” said Mrs. Dunweedy appreciatively. “How old is he?”

“He was born October …” Katherine thought for a moment.

Staring at him, Charlotte whispered, “The second . .

Katherine looked at her, puzzled. “The seventh.”

“So, six months old,” Margaret went on quickly, smiling and glancing at one, then the other of them.

“And this … ?” Margaret nodded toward Sally.

“Oh.” Katherine waved her hand dismissively. “This is Edmund’s nurse.”

“Sally Mitchell,” Sally supplied with a friendly smile.

Katherine sat on the worn, stuffed chair, holding Edmund on her lap. She turned sideways a bit in her seat to show her child off to the fullest vantage. “What say you, Charlotte? Is he not absolutely perfect?”

Charlotte swallowed, her eyes drinking in the still-familiar face-the prominent, upturned nose, the crease between the faint eyebrows. Yet how changed he was! He was able to sit up now, with a bit of support. His cheeks were rounder, his close-set, serious eyes more alert. Her heart ached. Her arms ached to hold him.

“Yes, perfect,” she mumbled, then forced a smile. Edmund gave a toothless grin in response, and Charlotte had to bite her lip to hold back tears.

“I think he looks just like Charles. Do you not agree, Charlotte?”

“I could not say …”

“Of course you could, for you’ve known my husband longer than I have.”

Charlotte’s mouth went dry, and she studied the child’s face again, glad for the excuse to savor the sight of him.

“Yes, I see the resemblance,” Charlotte said quietly. “Indeed.”

Charlotte excused herself and she and her great-aunt went into the kitchen to prepare tea. Charlotte helped her hostess bring out the tray of tea things and served their guests, trying in vain to keep her hand from shaking as she poured tea and passed the plate of scones. She was relieved Margaret had decided to purchase an unaccustomed sweet from the baker in addition to their usual sparse fare.

Katherine handed Edmund over to Sally and placed one of the damask napkins in her lap in his place. Katherine took a sip of tea, barely covering a grimace-Margaret made their tea weak to conserve-and began filling the awkward silence with her articulate speech, telling how they had closed up their London home for a few months and returned to Charles’ estate.

“Charles feels the country air will be so much better for Edmund. I am not so sure how I shall fare, so isolated from the rest of the world. How I shall miss the season in town. But you know how it is-maternal sacrifice and all that. Whatever is best for my Edmund.”

Charlotte’s stiff smile began to waver, and she brought her teacup to her mouth just in time to cover the quiver of her lips.

Katherine took a bite of her scone, with a somewhat more approving expression, leaving the room silent again. Even Margaret was not her talkative self for once. Perhaps she found having a titled lady in her home somewhat intimidating.

Then, above the dainty clink of china cups on saucers and the clicking of the mantel clock, a baby’s single cry pierced the silence. For a moment it seemed everyone froze, or didn’t appear to have heard. Charlotte kept her eyes on her teacup, praying Anne would fall right back to sleep. Another cry arose. Margaret looked over at her first. Sally looked down at Edmund-sitting happily on her lap-then glanced up at her, questioningly. Katherine looked around the room at them all.

Charlotte got to her feet and said brightly, “Well! That was a short nap.” She walked to the guest room and looked down into the cradle at Daniel Taylor’s daughter. Anne’s face was a wrinkled peach of need, which relaxed into contentment as soon as Charlotte lifted her into her arms.

“Forgive me. I don’t know what else to do,” she whispered and returned to the parlor.

“And this is Anne,” she said, returning to her seat on the settee and holding the child close to her. She attempted to move the conversation along. “We were all so dreadfully sorry about the fire. Have the repairs been completed?”

“Yes, for the most part,” Katherine said, eyes on Anne.

“And Mrs. Harris. That is … Mr. Harris’s mother. She is well, I trust?”

“Yes. Quite well. Pleased to be back in her beloved home and delighted with her new grandson.”

“Of course she is.”

“You are familiar with her other grandson, are you not?” Katherine asked.

“Yes. Mr. Bentley visited the vicarage on occasion.”

Katherine looked at Charlotte closely, then her gaze dropped again to the child in her arms. She set down her plate.

“Here, let us see her. Anne, was it?” Katherine held out her hands, leaving Charlotte little choice but to rise and place the child in her arms for inspection.

“Hello there, Miss Anne,” Katherine began, situating the girl on her lap. “Was that you making all that fuss? Not very ladylike, are you? Oh, that is better. I believe she has fixed her eyes upon my feather.” No conventional platitudes about the child’s beauty nor perfection from Katherine Harris. “She is so different from Edmund. They look nothing at all alike.”

Was that relief in her voice? Had she suspected, somehow, her own husband?

“Well, that is not surprising,” Charlotte said. “You and I are not so closely related. And though they were born only a week or so apart, boys and girls are often so different-“

“She is a bit on the small side, is she not?” Katherine interrupted.

“Perhaps a bit,” Charlotte allowed.

Katherine seemed to study the child more closely. She looked from the babe to Charlotte, then back again.

“We have not seen William for quite some time,” she said quietly, not lifting her eyes from Anne’s face.

Charlotte did not answer immediately, for she had not seen him nor anyone from home these many months, save Aunt Tilney and Charles. Neither of whom she could mention.

Just when Charlotte decided Katherine expected no response, that she had merely mentioned William idly, Katherine looked up at her, eyebrow raised in question.

Charlotte shrugged. “Nor I.”

Only belatedly did she remember that she had seen Mr. Bentley, though only in passing-and him very drunk on his way to a ball with another woman. But, considering, well, everything, she thought it not worth reporting.

Katherine looked back at the infant. “Yes, I see the resemblance,” she announced finally.

Charlotte’s stomach lurched. Was she really suggesting the child resembled William Bentley?

“Resemblance?” Charlotte asked weakly.

Katherine smiled at her. “She looks a great deal like her mother.”

Charlotte smiled stiffly, steeling herself as Katherine went on.

“You forget-and some days I should like to that I had already seen my first season when you were born. She reminds me very much of you as a baby. The big eyes and something about the mouth …” Katherine waved vaguely about the child’s face in a circular motion.

Charlotte swallowed. “Thank you.”

She could feel Sally’s eyes, wide and questioning, on her profile, but she kept her own gaze straight ahead.

Charlotte refilled teacups, although Katherine refused with another wave of her hand. When Charlotte had set the pot back down, Katherine handed Anne back to her.

“I went through no small ordeal to find you, Charlotte. I trust you do not mind the invasion?”

“Of course not,” Charlotte said halfheartedly, returning to her seat.

“I even asked after you at that lying-in hospital back before Christmas. But neither the matron there nor Edmund’s own physician would acknowledge you had been there, nor give me a clue to your whereabouts. All very private.”

Charlotte’s mind was whirling. Edmund’s own physician?

Suddenly Charlotte remembered, and her palms began to perspire and her breathing escalated. She had to get Katherine out of here!

“It was your own father who finally tipped me off,” Katherine continued. “And I had to all but threaten him with social ostracism before he would.”

Father knows where I am?

“Why?” Charlotte asked with a half smile and a broken laugh.

“Why indeed! To help you, of course.”

“Thank you, but … how?”

“Well, for starters, I shall be sending over more tea.”

Anne began to fuss in earnest. Charlotte had put her off as long as she could, bouncing her and offering her little finger to suck on, but the child would have no more of that and was burrowing her face into Charlotte’s bosom in a most humiliating manner.

“Please excuse me. Anne needs to be fed.”

“Sally, do nurse Edmund as well. Then we really must be „ going.

“Yes, m’lady.” Sally nodded.

“Why not join me in my room, Sally?” Charlotte offered. “That way these ladies may remain where they are.”

Sally nodded again and, when Katherine didn’t object, followed Charlotte to the guest room down the short passageway.

Both women busied themselves with their gowns and helping their charges latch on and begin nursing. When Anne was settled against her, Charlotte looked up. Sally, already nursing Edmund, was watching her, her eyes moving from Charlotte to the child and back again.

“Who is she?” Sally whispered.

Charlotte, sitting on the small chair near the door, cocked her head, listening, before responding. Hearing Katherine’s voice as she regaled Margaret Dunweedy with an enthusiastic description of Edmund’s christening-“The finest London has seen in many a year, I can tell you”-Charlotte reached over and pulled the door nearly closed. “Sally … I …”

“Is she a foundling?”

“Well, in a manner-“

“Bless your heart, Charlotte, I guessed it! You’re motherin’ a wee one from the foundling ward in place of your own poor lad gone to heaven. What a saint you are.”

“I’m no saint, Sally. Far from it.”

“Well, I think you are.”

She opened her mouth to tell Sally the truth. But how could she admit she had lied to avoid the immense shame it would bring her family if it were known she was a wet nurse Sally’s own chosen profession?

“Well, all I can say is that this little girl needed a mother’s care. So I’m caring for her-at least for a time. But, please, Sally, don’t say a word to Katherine or anyone about my son. Please. I cannot tell you why, but it’s very important. Promise?”

“But if she knew, she could-“

“No, Sally. No one must know. Ever.”

Sally looked at her, eyes wide, searching. Finally she said, “Very well, Charlotte. If that’s what you want.”

“It is. It is what I need.”

Charlotte looked down at Anne, who had nursed for only a few minutes before falling into a deep sleep. “Oh, Anne …” Charlotte mumbled, gently trying to rouse the baby.

“No use.” Charlotte sighed. “She’s hardly nursed all day. Too tired, I suppose.” Charlotte rose and laid the sleeping child in the cradle. “She didn’t sleep well last night. I think the poor thing had an earache.”

“Would you mind, then?” Sally looked at her, then away, almost too casually.

“Hmm? “

“Well, you’re needin’ to nurse and I’m needin’ a rest. This lad is never satisfied, and I want to have enough milk fer the long ride home.”

Charlotte was stunned. A warm ache of need pooled within her as she stared at Edmund. Sally pulled him gently from her breast and stood, child in arms. Charlotte sat down, speechless, and Sally handed him to her.

“Mind if I take a lie on your bed?”

“No, of course not,” Charlotte whispered, still staring down at Edmund.

Sally left her peripheral vision, but Charlotte didn’t pay attention. Her mind barely registered the creak of the bed ropes as Sally reclined her eyes were focused on her son. She guided him to her breast and cuddled him close. She felt his wet little mouth, the tug of his tongue, the sweet sting of milk coursing through her, the bittersweet flow of tears on her cheeks. She glanced up and saw Sally lying on her side on the bed, watching her all too closely.