Once Upon a Tower (24 page)

“What if I were to attend the recital this afternoon?” His lips hardly moved.

Edie could practically feel Bardolph’s interested stare boring into her shoulder blades.

“I would be happy to see you.”

“But you will not agree to my request that you not play in front of men.”

“I did not hear a request, but a command,” she observed.

“Please, will you refrain from playing in the presence of men?”

“I will not play public recitals, if you wish.”

“Thank you,” Gowan said. His face was expressionless, but the image of an icy lake came into her mind as she looked at his eyes.

“You are welcome to join me during the recital, as I gather you are worried that I . . .” What? Did he imagine that she would start flirting with that young Frenchman? Throw aside her cello and embark on an act that she found not only painful, but distasteful?

His eyes hardened. “I trust
you
implicitly. What I do not like is the fact that your partner will be able to savor his lust during every moment in which you play together.”

She shook her head and, against all odds, felt a pang of sympathy for him. “You do not understand what duets are like. I would play only with a true musician. If I hadn’t talked to Védrines for two hours last night, I would never have considered it. I assure you that he will be thinking about the music, not my posture.

“We shall practice this afternoon in the orchard, if you would like to join us.” Then she turned, curtsied rather blindly to the room at large, and fled.

She didn’t get far. Mrs. Grisle caught her, dragged her into the housekeeper’s sitting room, and plied her with question after question. Two hours passed. Bardolph joined them, and droned on for fifteen minutes about the linen closet at the Highlands estate near Comrie. They had mice.

Mice?

Mice were everywhere. She managed to impress upon Bardolph the concept that said mice—indeed,
all
mice—were his concern.

It took another hour before Edie realized that if she didn’t organize the household better, she would never have time to put bow to strings.

There were bound to be a few problems in running a household of this size. Every once in a while, she thought about how Gowan had stated that she should not play in front of men. It lent her a spark of rage that she had never experienced before.

By the time Bardolph summoned her to the midday meal, she was reasonably certain that the household understood the way things were going to go from now on.

Meanwhile, Gowan deserted all the men in his study and engaged in a brief conversation with Védrines. It took only a couple of minutes to establish that Gowan would slaughter him if his eyes fell below the duchess’s neck.

“I would not,” the Frenchman stated. And then he added, rather defensively, “When one plays, one thinks only of the music, Your Grace. Though, of course, one’s concentration depends upon the musical abilities of one’s partner.”

A faint undertone implied that he was as uncertain of Edie’s musical prowess as she was of his. They both held their own playing in damned high esteem. Gowan took a good look at the Frenchman’s indignant eyes and realized that Védrines was no threat to his marriage. He didn’t think of Edie as a woman at all. There was some other currency in play here.

“Right,” he said, holding out his hand. “I offer you my sincerest apology for the insult.”

The man looked at his hand for a moment, but he took it. For some reason, Gowan liked that the most of all. Védrines was on the verge of walking out of the castle, even though he desperately needed the income. “What are we paying you?” he asked.

Védrines flushed, and named a sum. It must rub at the man to have to accept employment.

Gowan nodded. “From now on, we’ll pay you twice that.”

Védrines’s brows drew together. “Why, Your Grace?”

“Every castle should have a musician,” he said.

The young Frenchman pulled himself upright, although that put his eyes only at Gowan’s shoulder. “I should be remiss in my duty as a gentleman not to point out that you do your duchess a dishonor.”

“How so?”

“You imply base things. Her Grace is all that is gracious and virtuous.”

Gowan felt even more cheerful now. He had acquired an employee with just the right kind of reverence for his wife. “Just wait until you marry.”

“I shall both maintain and display faith in my bride,” the Frenchman said coldly.

“As do I,” Gowan assured him.

He wasn’t sure what to expect when he left his study for luncheon sometime later. Apparently, there had been quite a fracas. Bardolph had actually interrupted him to deliver a complaint, but Gowan had cut him off: the household was now the duchess’s domain.

The first person he encountered was Layla. “Did you really sleep in the nursery?” he asked.

“I did, and your servants sleep on deucedly hard mattresses, Gowan. I had to tell Barlumps to bring me a new mattress or I won’t be able to straighten my back tomorrow.”

“Bardolph,” Gowan corrected.

Edie entered the morning room, greeting him with a face that betrayed no irritation stemming from their earlier conversation. In fact, it betrayed nothing at all, which he found annoying. He had the trick of concealing his own feelings, but he didn’t appreciate it in his wife.

“How was your meeting with Mrs. Grisle?” he asked, as they sat down.

Edie smiled at the footman offering her a helping of cheese pudding. “I dismissed her.”

“
What?
” Whatever he expected, it wasn’t that his wife would toss out a housekeeper who had held the post for a decade. Not that Mrs. Grisle was particularly pleasant, or particularly efficient, but she didn’t steal the silver.

To his left, Layla drew Védrines into a conversation.

“Why did you dismiss her?” Gowan asked, reminding himself that marriage entailed sharing power, at least in the household.

“She was unable to trust herself to make decisions,” Edie replied, looking quite unperturbed. “She felt she had to constantly check with me and actually requested that I spend two hours with her every morning. I told her that I would be happy to give her a few minutes in the evening, but I did not wish to be interrupted during the day, and she was quite discomfited by that. Were you really giving her an hour or more daily?”

Gowan nodded.

“The housekeeper should report to the factor, if she must recapitulate her daily accomplishments,” Edie said, cutting up her roast beef. “Your time is far too valuable to waste learning whether the laundry is drying properly. And, frankly, so is mine.”

Something like a smile twitched at the corners of Gowan’s lips. He would have loved to witness that conversation.

“In the end, we agreed that it would be more comfortable if I found someone able to work in the manner to which I am accustomed. Mrs. Grisle was agitated by our conversation, which merely confirmed my decision. I cannot abide people who raise their voices when angry.”

That was reasonable. “Have you dismissed anyone else?” he inquired.

“Two upper housemaids, a kitchen maid, and a footman.”

“Have you tasked Bardolph with finding replacements?”

“No,” Edie said. “I am quite certain he can take that initiative without my having to prompt him. I did instruct him to give each a substantial severance payment. The morning was disruptive, but from now on, I expect the servants will be far more self-directed.”

Gowan wondered what the footman had done to offend, but decided there was nothing to be gained by asking.

“Hopefully, there will be no further need for encouragement on my part.” She smiled at him without a bit of irritation in her eyes. It was as if their battle of the morning had never happened. “You are probably thinking I am headstrong, but my excuse is that I took housekeeping lessons at Layla’s knee.”

She touched the back of Gowan’s hand and an embarrassing streak of heat shot from her touch. “The household will settle down once they know my ways.”

Gowan thought they might well be dealing with an entirely new group of servants by then, but, as Edie said, that was Bardolph’s problem.

Edie went upstairs to practice after the meal, and Gowan invited Layla to come to his study. She was wandering about looking rather critically at the towering stacks of ledgers on Bardolph’s desk, when he simply said what he’d been thinking.

“It seems to me that you and Susannah are enjoying each other’s company.”

Layla whipped around, her face more serious than he had ever seen it. “I love Susannah.” She came over to him, her face alight with determination. “I—”

He held up his hand. “I agree that you would be an entirely appropriate person to care for Susannah.”

“I don’t want to merely be her nanny,” Layla said firmly. “I am her
mother
.”

“Do you mean that you wish to adopt her?”

“Of course.”

He thought about it for a moment. His mother had never bothered to tell him of the child, but even so . . . “I would be quite uncomfortable if I were not responsible for her education, wardrobe, and other expenses.” He hesitated. “And I don’t want to lose her entirely.”

Layla smiled, a wide, generous smile without a trace of the coquette in it. “How could that be? Edie is one of my favorite people in the world, and the person my husband loves best. You will see far too much of us, I’m sure.”

“Very well. We can work out the formal side of it when Lord Gilchrist arrives.”

Her mouth tightened.

“And if he doesn’t pay a visit in the near future, I will send the papers to him,” Gowan added.

Something eased in Layla’s eyes and she embraced him. “We are family now. This simply binds us closer together.”

“Of course,” Gowan said. “I am certain that Edie will feel the same.”

The smile fell from Layla’s face. “You did speak to her before you asked me to care for Susannah, didn’t you?”

He didn’t like the tone of her question. “I assure you that Edie will not disagree with my choice for Susannah’s guardian. Your affection for my sister is obvious.”

“Edie should have been consulted. Just yesterday, she was to be Susannah’s mother, and now you are giving the child away?”

“I think we can both acknowledge that Edie showed no great aptitude when it came to mothering Susannah. She had already informed me by letter that she didn’t welcome the role, so I did not find it surprising.”

“Edie will be a wonderful mother!” Layla snapped.

“But a person would have to be blind not to see that you and Susannah belong together,” he offered.

Her face eased into a smile. “She is the child of my heart. Not being able to conceive a child has been heartbreaking. But now I can only think how glad I am that it never happened.” A haunted look crossed her eyes. “If I had my own children, I wouldn’t have come to Scotland. I would never have met Susannah.”

Gowan was not a demonstrative man, but even he could tell when something other than a bow was required. So he allowed himself to be enfolded in Layla’s perfumed embrace once again. It wasn’t as unpleasant as he would have thought.

She drew back. “I have a present for you.” She put a book into his hand. “Love poems. These collections are quite the rage at the moment; everyone is reading them. I thought that, because you quoted
Romeo and Juliet
in that entirely outrageous letter you sent Edie, you would appreciate them.”

Poems . . .

His head snapped up. “Are you suggesting that I need to write poetry to my wife?”

Layla frowned. “Why on earth would I suggest that you write poetry? With all due respect, Duke, you don’t strike me as having a poetic soul.”

“I apologize,” Gowan said, turning the book over. “Of course you weren’t saying that.”

“In any case, Edie has a tin ear when it comes to poetry.”

“She has?”

Layla nodded. “Her governess tried to drum some into her head, but she is a proper dunce about the written word.”

“She
is
?”

“I think it must be concomitant with her aptitude for music. Edie does not read with pleasure. But she does love to listen to poetry read aloud.”

“Of course. She prefers sound.” The book was leather-bound and embossed in gold. On the cover it said
Poetry for a Lonely Evening
.

“You could read some to her.”

“All right,” Gowan said, thinking that he scarcely had time to kiss his wife, let alone read poetry to her. He put the book to the side and went back to work. But when the bailiff from the Highlands estate missed his appointed hour, rather than attend to the hundred items awaiting his attention, Gowan picked up the book again.

He skipped Shakespeare’s sonnets; he’d memorized all those in his youth. There was a great deal of verse written by a man named John Donne, who seemed to have a sense of humor, at least.
I am two fools
, he read,
for loving, and for saying so in whining poetry
. Gowan gave a bark of laughter, and turned the page.

He read the next poem four times . . . five. It begged the sun not to rise and call lovers from their bed.
Shine here to us, and thou art everywhere; This bed thy center is, these walls thy sphere.

The element that was missing from his marriage was printed here in black and white. The bed gave no center to their lives.
She’s all states
, Donne wrote,
and all princes, I. Nothing else is.

Gowan looked around himself with a bleak sense of futility. If he was a prince, Edie was not his state, nor his dominion. He was a prince of land and soil, of small villages and wheat fields.

Not of a woman as elusive as the wind. He had failed. He had failed in their bed, and his heart squeezed with the pain of it.

Later that afternoon, he looked out the window and saw the recital. Layla and Susannah were sitting on a blue blanket, looking like bright flowers. Edie sat in a straight-backed chair, her back to the castle, and Védrines stood to her right, a violin tucked under his chin.

Even from this distance, he could see Edie’s body sway as they began playing. And he could see that Védrines was standing at an angle, facing away from her, his eyes presumably on the music stand before him. He had probably concluded that his employer was stark raving mad, but he was keeping to his word.