The Captain's Christmas Family (3 page)

“You can’t do that, sir!”

With a raised eyebrow, Gideon inquired what prevented him.

“What I mean to say is, I’ve got a wife and family and I’m not as young as I used to be.” Dutton’s former bluster disappeared, replaced by fear of reaping the bad harvest he had sown. “If word gets out that I’ve been dismissed…”

“I have no intention of broadcasting the information,” replied Gideon. “Though I could not, in good conscience, provide you with a reference.”

“Please, sir. Perhaps I have let things slide around here of late.” The man looked a proper picture of repentance. “But if you give me another chance, I’ll lick the estate into shape. So help me, I will.”

Though he knew the importance of decisiveness in maintaining command, Gideon hesitated. Granting second chances had not worked well for him in the past. One might argue that it had contributed to his present predicament. Too often, offenders looked on such a reprieve as a sign of weakness to be further exploited. And yet, there was Dutton’s family to consider. His wife and children had done nothing wrong, but they would suffer for his conduct, perhaps more than he.

“A fortnight.” Gideon fixed the man with his sternest scowl, so Dutton would be in no doubt this was an undeserved opportunity he had better not abuse. “I will give you that long to persuade me you are worth keeping.”

Ignoring the man’s effusive thanks, Gideon turned on his heel and strode away. He hoped this decision would not prove as much a mistake as his last one.

Making certain Cissy and Dolly did not disturb Captain Radcliffe was proving a great deal harder than she had expected. Marian reflected on that difficulty as she put the girls to bed one evening, a week after his arrival at Knightley Park.

Part of the problem was the captain’s unpredictable comings and goings. She could never tell when he
might be spending time in the house, out roaming the grounds or riding off around the estate. If she knew, perhaps she could have adjusted the children’s schedule of lessons to take advantage of his absences. As it was, she could not take the chance of encountering him out in the garden or on their way down to the music room.

Since their disastrous run-in, Dolly had taken an unaccountable fancy to the captain and would no doubt pester him for attention if they met again. Cissy clearly resented his presence and might offend him with a rude remark.

Neither of the girls took kindly to being confined to the nursery after enjoying the run of the house during their father’s time. Just that morning, the governess had overheard Cissy muttering about being “kept prisoner.”

Marian found it difficult to discourage such an attitude, since it mirrored her own far too closely. In all her time at Knightley Park, and especially after Mr. Radcliffe’s death, she’d felt at liberty to come and go as she pleased, even free to borrow books from the well stocked library. Wistfully, she recalled the master’s hospitable answer when she’d first asked if she could.

“By all means, Miss Murray! Those books might as well serve some better purpose than giving the maids more things to dust.”

Since Captain Radcliffe’s arrival, she had not even dared return the last volume she’d borrowed for fear of meeting up with him. Considering the captain’s reluctance to have his young cousins around, Marian doubted he would tolerate a servant making use of
his
library. She knew she must soon put it back, before he noticed its absence and blamed someone else.

Perhaps now would be a good time, with the girls off to bed and the captain occupied with his dinner.

“I won’t be long, Martha,” she informed the nursery maid, who sat by the fire darning one of Dolly’s stockings. “Just a quick errand I have to run.”

And run she did—first to her own room to fetch the book, then down the back stairs. She was in such a hurry that she nearly collided with the butler on the landing.

Poor Mr. Culpepper seemed more agitated than ever. “Miss Murray, have you heard? Mr. Dutton has been threatened with dismissal! I fear I shall be put on notice next.”

The news about the steward did not come as a great surprise to Marian. Though she was working hard to make sure Captain Radcliffe was not conscious of the girls’ presence in the house, she found herself constantly aware of his. It was as if a salty ocean breeze had blown all the way into the landlocked heart of England, bearing with it a host of unwelcome changes.

“These naval men have most exacting standards.” Mr. Culpepper wrung his hands. “At my age, where should I go if I am turned out of Knightley Park?”

Marian bristled at the thought of such a good and faithful servant treated so shabbily. “Has Captain Radcliffe complained about the running of the house?”

The butler shook his head. “Not in so many words. But he is so very quiet and solemn, just the way he was as a boy. Who knows what plans he may be making? He is so little like his cousin, one would scarcely believe they could be of the same blood.”

That was true enough. The girls’ jovial, generous
father had been a down-to-earth country squire devoted to his children, his horses and his dogs. His cousin seemed distinctly uncomfortable with all three.

“Don’t fret yourself, Mr. Culpepper. I’m sure the captain would tell you soon enough if the housekeeping was not up to his standards. He seems the type that’s quick to find fault. Silence is as close to praise as you can hope for from him.”

The furrows of worry in the butler’s forehead relaxed a trifle. “I hope you are right, Miss Murray. I will endeavor to remain calm and go about my duties.”

“Good.” Marian flashed him an encouraging smile, pleased that she had been able to ease his fears a little. “That’s all any of us can do, I reckon.”

As she continued on down the stairs, Marian strove to heed her own advice, though it wasn’t easy. She would have feared the captain’s disapproval less if her position was the only thing at stake. But with the children’s welfare hanging in the balance, she could not afford to put a foot wrong.

As she tiptoed past the dining room, the muted clink of silverware on china assured her the captain was busy eating his dinner. A few moments later, as she hurried back from the library, a sudden crash from inside the dining room made her start violently. It sounded as if a piece of china had been hurled to the floor and smashed into a hundred pieces. The noise was immediately followed by a wail of distress from Bessie, a nervous, and often clumsy, housemaid. What had the captain done to make the poor lass take on so?

Marian marched toward the dining room, not certain
how she meant to intervene but compelled to do what she could to defend the girl.

She was about to fling open the door when she heard Bessie sob, “I’m s-sorry, s-s-ir! Have I burnt ye with that tea? I told Mr. Culpepper I’m too ham-fisted to be waiting table. Now ye’ll send me packing and I wouldn’t blame ye!”

So it was Bessie who had fumbled a teacup. A qualm of shame gripped Marian’s stomach as she realized she had once again jumped to a most uncharitable conclusion about Captain Radcliffe.

His reply to Bessie made Marian feel even worse. “Don’t trouble yourself. If Mr. Culpepper asks, you must tell him it was my fault. I am not accustomed to handling such delicate china. Now dry your eyes, sweep up the mess and think no more of it.”

As Marian fled back to the nursery, her conscience chided her for all the harsh things she’d thought and said about Captain Radcliffe since his arrival. She should have been grateful to him for allowing Cissy and Dolly to stay at Knightley Park when he’d been under no obligation to keep them here. Instead, she’d compared him unfavorably with his cousin and held those differences against him. She’d resented the loss of a few petty privileges, as if they’d been hers by right rather than by favor. Worst of all, she had allowed mean-spirited rumors to poison her opinion of the man without giving him a fair opportunity to prove his worth.

Clearly she needed to pay greater heed to her Bible, especially the part that counseled “judge not, lest ye be judged.” It might be that, in the eyes of God, Captain Radcliffe had a great deal less to answer for than she.

C
oming to Knightley Park had clearly been a huge mistake. As Gideon returned to the house after several frustrating hours reviewing the steward’s progress, he reflected on his folly.

He had come to Nottinghamshire expecting to escape his recent troubles by revisiting simpler times past. But Knightley Park was no longer the calm, well run estate it had been in his grandfather’s day. And he was no longer the solitary child, made welcome by one and all.

The seeds of gossip had followed him here and found fertile soil in which to breed a crop of noxious weeds. Young footmen turned pale and fled when he approached. Tenants eyed him with wary, resentful servility. Housemaids trembled when he cast the briefest glance in their direction. His cousins’ governess sprang to her young charges’ defense like a tigress protecting her cubs.

Gideon had to admit he preferred Miss Murray’s open antagonism to the sullen aversion and dread of
the others. And he could not fault her willingness to shield the children, even if there had been no need. Unfortunately, his flicker of grudging admiration for Miss Murray only made her suspicion and wariness of him sting all the worse.

As he entered the house quietly by a side door, Gideon could no longer ignore a vexing question. How could he possibly expect the Admiralty’s board of inquiry to believe in his innocence when his own servants and tenants clearly judged him guilty?

Passing the foot of the servants’ stairs, he heard the voices of two footmen drift down from the landing. He did not mean to eavesdrop, but their furtive, petulant tone left Gideon in no doubt they were talking about him.

“How long do you reckon we’ll have to put up with him?” asked one.

The other snorted. “Too long to suit either of us, I can tell you that. With old Boney beaten at last, I’ll wager the navy won’t want him back.”

Gideon told himself to keep walking and pay no heed to servants’ tattle. He knew this was the sort of talk that must be going on behind his back all the time. The last thing he needed was to have their exact words echoing in his thoughts, taunting and shaming him. But his steps slowed in spite of himself, and his ears strained to catch every word.

Did part of him feel he deserved it?

One of the footmen heaved a sigh. “So he’ll stay here to make our lives a misery instead of his crew’s. It’s not right.”

“When did right ever come into it?” grumbled the other.

Gideon had almost managed to edge himself out of earshot when a third voice joined the others—a woman’s voice he recognized as belonging to Miss Murray.

“Wilbert, Frederick, have you no duties to be getting on with?” she inquired in a disapproving tone, as if they were a pair of naughty little boys in the nursery.

“We just stopped for a quick word, miss. We’ve been run off our feet since the new master arrived.” They were obviously counting on the governess to sympathize with their disgruntled feelings.

By now Gideon had given up trying to walk away. He braced to hear the governess join in abusing him.

“Perhaps if you’d kept up with your duties during the past few months,” she reminded the young footmen instead, “you might not have to work quite so hard now to get the house back in decent order.”

“Why should we run ourselves ragged for a master who’s done the things he has? They say he did away with a young sailor. If he wasn’t the captain of the ship they’d have called it plain murder.”

As he waited for Miss Murray’s reply, Gideon wondered if he’d been wrong to assume her opinion of him had been tainted by the kind of gossip she was hearing now. Surely, she would not have wanted her young pupils to remain in the same house as a rumored killer. Perhaps this was the first time she’d heard the worst of the accusations being whispered against him.

Though he tried to tell himself one unfavorable judgment more or less did not matter, Gideon shrank from the prospect of Miss Murray thinking even less of him.

“I am sorely disappointed.” The gentle regret in her tone troubled Gideon worse than the harsher censure he’d expected. “I thought better of you both than to condemn your master on the basis of malicious rumors.”

Had he heard her correctly? Gideon shook his head.

The young footmen sputtered in protest, but Miss Murray refused to back down. “Has the captain mistreated either of you in any way since he arrived at Knightley Park?”

“No…but he is very haughty and ill-humored. You must grant that, miss.”

“And did you hear he threatened to give Mr. Dutton the sack?”

“I have heard such a rumor, though that does not guarantee it is true. Besides, Wilbert, I have often heard you complain what a poor job Mr. Dutton has been doing of late. If you were in the captain’s place, would you have kept him on?”

After an awkward pause, Wilbert muttered, “I reckon not, miss.”

“And you, Frederick, would you be jovial and talkative in a place where you were made to feel as unwelcome as I fear we have made Captain Radcliffe?”

Gideon did not catch the young footman’s muffled reply, but that scarcely mattered. What did matter was that someone had defended him against the whispered slurs he could not bring himself to acknowledge, let alone refute. What astonished him even more was to find a champion in Marian Murray, a woman he could have sworn detested him.

And not altogether without reason, he was forced to admit. None of their encounters since his arrival had
been particularly cordial. And his reaction to the children’s presence might have given her cause to regard him as a very hard man indeed. Yet there she was, taking his part against the prevailing opinion of the other servants. He did not know what to make of it.

To be championed in such a way when he neither expected nor deserved it stirred a flicker of welcome warmth deep within his fallow heart.

The hangdog looks of the two young footmen reproached Marian. What was she doing?

For as long as she could recall, she had felt compelled need to stand up for anyone who was the victim of mistreatment. The stronger the forces against them, the more fiercely she felt called to intervene.

It had not occurred to her that a man of strength and authority like Captain Radcliffe might need
anyone
to defend him, let alone her. But when she’d heard Wilbert and Frederick exchanging backstairs gossip about the captain, she had suddenly seen the matter in a whole new light. A sense of shame for the unfair things she’d thought about the man and her manner toward him had made her leap to his defense all the more fiercely.

Now she realized that that was not fair either. “I beg your pardon. I have no right to reproach you when I have behaved just as uncharitably toward Captain Radcliffe.”

Her rueful admission seemed to have better effect on the young men than her rebuke.

“That’s all right, miss.” Wilbert hung his head. “I reckon we may have been too hard on the master.”

Frederick nodded. “It’s true enough what you said,
miss. The captain hasn’t done us any harm. We’ll mind our tongues after this.”

“We should get back to work,” Wilbert added, “before Mr. Culpepper comes looking for us.”

After brief bows, the pair hurried off below stairs, leaving Marian to follow as far as the ground floor. Lost in thought about her encounter with the footmen and the sudden reversal of her opinion toward Captain Radcliffe, she rounded the corner and nearly collided with him.

“I beg your pardon, sir!” She started back, frantically wondering whether he’d heard what had just passed in the stairwell. “I didn’t expect to find you home at this hour.”

The captain seemed every bit as rattled by their sudden meeting as she. “I…er…just got in. I’m sorry if I startled you.”

Caught off guard, his whole appearance was far less severe than Marian had yet seen it. The austere contours of his face seemed somehow softened. The sweeping arch of his brow looked less forbidding. His steely gray eyes held a tentative glimmer of warmth. Had he changed so much or was it her perception that had altered?

“No, indeed,” she sputtered, painfully aware that she owed him an apology for offenses she dared not confess. “I should have minded the warning I gave Dolly about charging around corners.”

“Ah, yes.” A half smile crinkled one corner of the captain’s resolute mouth. “I hope the child has recovered from our collision.”

“Entirely.” Marian nodded, relieved at this turn in
the conversation. Perhaps the captain had not overheard anything between her and the footmen after all. “I believe you took greater injury from it than she did.”

His unexpected query about Dolly’s well-being emboldened her to continue. “I believe she would be less apt to run in the house if she could use up some of that energy running and playing out of doors.”

“I agree.” The captain raised an eyebrow. “What prevents the children from going out? Are they ill? Do they not have warm enough clothes?”

A fresh qualm of remorse gripped Marian. Not only had she misjudged Captain Radcliffe, she had allowed her prejudice against him to make life less agreeable for her pupils. In doing so, she might have provoked Cissy’s aversion to the captain.

“The girls are quite well,” she replied, “and they do not lack for warm garments.”

“Then what is the difficulty?”

She might as well confess and hope the captain would be as forgiving with her as he had of the clumsy serving maid. Marian inhaled a deep breath and forged ahead. “I’m afraid I thought, sir…that is…I presumed… You did tell me I should keep the girls from disturbing you. I was afraid we might disrupt one of your walks, or their noise from outdoors might bother you while you were trying to rest or read.”

“I see.” He flinched slightly, as if she had injured an unhealed wound but he was determined not to let her see the pain it caused. “I suppose my reputation made you fear I would have them flogged for it.”

He must have overheard her talking to the footmen. Marian scrambled to recall exactly what she’d said. If
the captain had heard only part of their exchange, might he think she was spreading malicious gossip about him?

“Nothing like that, sir!” she cried, though her stricken conscience forced her to confess, “Though I was worried you might send the girls away from Knightley Park.”

Captain Radcliffe gave a rueful nod that seemed to excuse her suspicions. “I fear you and I have gotten off on the wrong foot, Miss Murray. For that I take full responsibility. In future, feel free to do with the children whatever you were accustomed to before I arrived. Proceed as if I am not here. All I ask is that you not seek me out. I have no experience with children and, as you have seen, no knack for getting on with them.”

Perhaps not, but in spite of that he had managed to catch Dolly’s fancy. In her forthright innocence, the child must have responded to something in him that had eluded Marian.

“Does that include the music room, sir?” she asked. “It can be irksome to hear a great many wrong notes struck on the pianoforte.”

After only a slight hesitation the captain nodded gamely. “It is difficult to learn anything of value without making mistakes.”

His assurance made Marian more conscious than ever what a grave error she had committed in her judgment of him.

“Thank you, Captain.” She dropped him a curtsy that she hoped would convey an apology as well as gratitude. “I’m sure the girls will be very pleased to enjoy greater liberty.”

He replied with a stiff bow. “I am only sorry they were ever deprived of it.”

The captain made it sound as if that were his fault, yet Marian knew which of them was more to blame. Perhaps it was the burden of her misjudgment that made her more self-conscious than ever in Captain Radcliffe’s presence. A blush seemed to hide in the flesh of her cheeks, ready to flame out at any second.

“I was just on my way to the music room to fetch a song book. If you will excuse me, I must finish my errand and get back to the nursery before the girls wonder what has become of me.”

“By all means,” he replied. “Do not let me detain you.”

Marian made another curtsy, then hurried away, torn between eagerness to escape his presence and a strange inclination to linger.

“Miss Murray.”

The sound of her name on his lips made her turn back swiftly, as if some part of her had anticipated the summons. “Sir?”

He hesitated for an instant, making her wonder if he had not intended to call out. “Thank you for speaking up on my behalf to those young men. I only hope I will have as able an advocate to defend me when the Admiralty convenes its inquiry.”

The blush that had been lying in wait now flared in Marian’s cheeks. “I don’t deserve your gratitude. I wish I could claim I have kept an open mind about you and not let my opinion be influenced by reports I’ve heard…or read. But I’m afraid that would not be true.”

Captain Radcliffe gave a rueful nod, as if her con
fession grieved him a little but did not surprise him. “If your mind was not fully open, neither was it altogether closed. May I ask what altered your opinion of me?”

His question flustered Marian even more. She could not bring herself to admit eavesdropping on his exchange with Bessie over the broken china. “I…I’m not certain, Captain. Perhaps it was hearing Frederick and Wilbert talking that made me realize I hadn’t given you a fair chance. I reckon it’s easier to see our own faults in others.”

“Perhaps so, but it is not so easy to admit those faults and alter our conduct accordingly.” A note of approval warmed his words and went a long way toward absolving Marian’s shame over her earlier actions.

She was about to thank him for understanding and head away again when Captain Radcliffe continued, “I can assure you the nonsense being written about me in the newspapers is entirely without foundation. I never laid a hand on that poor lad, nor did I drive him to do away with himself on account of my harsh treatment.”

What made her believe him so immediately and completely? Marian could not be certain. Was it only guilt over her prior misjudgment of him or was it something more? Even at first, when she’d thought him a strict, uncaring tyrant, she had not been able to deny his air of integrity.