The Governess Affair (3 page)

Freddy sat before the window, holding her sewing up so that the faint illumination from the street lamp shone on her work. Serena had been told she looked like her sister, but Freddy’s skin was pale and her hair was orange, like their mother; Serena took her darker hair and skin from their father. If there was a resemblance, she’d never seen it.

“Good evening, dear,” Freddy said absently, as she worked her needle through the cloth.

Serena came to stand behind her. “Good evening.” She set her hands on her sister’s shoulders, and gave her a light squeeze. “You’ve been working on this all day, haven’t you? Your shoulders are so stiff.”

“Just a few moments longer.”

“You’ll ruin your eyesight, sewing in this failing light.”

“Mmm.” Freddy made another precise stitch.

She was piecing together another quilt of interlocking rings. She didn’t sell her work—that would have made her a laborer, and ladies, as Freddy so often explained, did
not
labor. Instead, Freddy gave her quilts away to charitable organizations. Almost half her extra income went to scraps and second-quality yarn for the deserving poor. More than half her time was spent knitting scarves and sewing blankets for babies. It didn’t seem quite fair to Serena; without stirring from her rooms, her elder sister managed to make her feel both exhausted and inadequate.

Serena sighed.

“You don’t have to do this, Freddy. Why do you force yourself to it?”

“Don’t call me Freddy. You know I hate that name.” Freddy laid down her work. “You don’t have to do this, either. Serena, you know I love you, but this is not what we were born to do. Why must you bother Clermont? He hurt you once; why give him the chance to do so again?”

An image of a dark room tucked under the eaves darted into Serena’s head. She could see Clermont ducking through the too-short doorway, could hear the sound of the door shutting behind him.

She shivered.

She wanted proof that she wasn’t the sort to cower in the corner, no matter what had happened to her. She wanted to conquer that complex burden of shame and confusion and anger.

Serena set her hand over her still-flat belly. She had enough to contend with as it was.

“I want justice.” The words were flat in her mouth, and yet sharp, so sharp. “I want to show that he can’t win.” Her fingers curled with want. “That he can’t just—”

Freddy sniffed dismissively. “We’ve enough to survive on,” she said as if money were a substitute for fair play. “Stay with me. I always said you should. But no; you had to run off governessing, when we were left with the sort of competence that could see us through our lives, if we economized.”

“We were left fifteen pounds a year,” Serena protested. Enough to avoid starvation; enough to have a roof over their heads. But every year, costs went up. It hadn’t taken much forethought to see that in twenty years, expenses would outrun income.

“But,” Freddy said, continuing with the lecture, “you had to want more. You’ve always wanted more. And see where it’s left you? You can’t eat justice.”

No. But at least she wouldn’t choke on it. Serena unclenched the fist she’d made at her side.

“By the by,” Freddy said more casually, “where
has
it left you?”

“Without a position,” Serena snapped. “With no hope of a character reference.”

“All your fine plans,” Freddy said, half scolding, half comforting, “and they’ve come to naught. Best not to dream, dear. If you don’t, there’s nothing that can be taken from you.”

Pure cowardice, that. Freddy fretted when she had to cross the street to purchase milk. When she’d gone to meet Serena at the yard where the stagecoach had left her, she’d been white-lipped and trembling. She’d complained of pains in her chest all the way home. Freddy didn’t handle change well, and nothing changed so often as the world outside her door.

There was a reason that Serena had signed away her portion of their father’s bequest. Freddy could not have survived on her half, and she was incapable of making up the shortfall.

“All of your fine plans,” Freddy repeated gently, “and here you are. With nothing. Less than nothing.”

“No,” she said thickly. “Not…not nothing.”

“With nightmares and a babe on the way.”

Serena kept her eyes wide open. Her hands trembled; she forced them to stillness, pushing them against her skirts until they grew steady. She imagined the spark of life growing inside her, gestating next to her bitter fury. Sometimes, she feared that all of that cold, trembling anger would eat her child alive.
Not after I win. Then I’ll be safe, and I’ll never be hurt again.

“I told you already,” she said. To her own ear, her voice seemed to come from very far away. “I don’t have nightmares. I don’t have time to be frightened of anything.”

At her last position, the Wolvertons had obtained a microscope for their children’s instruction in the natural world. They’d magnified everything. Sometimes, the memory that played itself through her dreams seemed like those enlarged images. The edges danced, overhung with the chromatic effect of a dark, shadowing halo. She felt as if she were looking at something very small, something very far away. So distant that it almost wasn’t happening.

She had felt so helpless then, so utterly without recourse. She should have screamed. She should have bashed the duke over the head. She should have
fought.
In her memory of that night, her own silence mocked her most of all.

She hadn’t screamed, and because she hadn’t, she’d felt silent ever since.

Freddy simply sighed. “When you’re ready to give up,” she said, “I’ll be here. But I don’t know what you hope to accomplish, except to bring that horrid wolf-man down on both our heads.”

This, at least, Serena could answer. “I have it on the best of authority,” she said, “that he’s a thickheaded fellow. All brawn and no brains. When it comes down to it, I’ll simply outsmart him.”

“Oh, dear.” Freddy leaned over and tapped Serena’s cheek. “When you fail, I’ll be here to pick up the pieces. As usual.”

H
UGO HAD MORE THAN
enough to do the following day. Nonetheless, thoughts of the governess followed him throughout his work. He sent out a man to discover what had
really
happened between his employer and Miss Serena Barton at Wolverton Hall. If she wouldn’t tell him and Clermont wouldn’t say, he’d have to find out on his own.

He spent the morning attempting to banish thoughts of her—of that chestnut hair, bound into a loose knot, waiting to become unpinned. Her eyes were gray and still, like water too long undisturbed. Her hands had been quiet—unmoving.

By the afternoon, he gave up the cause of work as hopeless and wandered to the window. He’d caught glimpses of her sitting on her bench all morning. Now, she sat still as a statue, scarcely moving, scarcely
breathing,
and yet somehow completely alive.

She wasn’t what he would have called pretty. Handsome, yes. And there was something about her eyes… He shook his head; her appearance was hardly relevant.

He’d been testing her yesterday, mentioning rape. It was…horrifyingly possible. He wasn’t sure what he would have done if she’d confirmed his fears. He’d done a great many things on Clermont’s behalf, but he’d never hurt a woman. Even his wounded conscience had its limits.

But she’d not even flinched when he’d said the word. She hadn’t reacted to anything at all.

And therein lay his second problem. When he’d introduced himself, he’d assumed that she would recognize his name. But she had apparently gleaned his reputation entirely through gossip columns, and they only ever referred to him as the Wolf of Clermont. There was no reason anyone who had just arrived in London
would
know his name.

He should have corrected her misapprehension.

He hadn’t, and he wasn’t sure why. Just an instinct. For all the duke’s blasé reassurances, he suspected that whatever was at the heart of this quarrel was a scandal—and one that could undo all of Hugo’s fine work. He couldn’t fix the problem if he didn’t know what he was facing, and if she worked herself up into a fear of him, he might never learn the truth—not until he saw it on the front page of a newspaper.

Still, he didn’t like lying. Not even by implication.

“Whatever you are up to, Miss Barton,” he whispered, “you will not cost me my five hundred pounds. I have worked too hard for it.”

Fifty yards on the other side of the pane of glass, she swung her head, startling him with the sudden movement. He stepped back—but she was only watching a bird that had landed on the ground in front of her.

With a sigh, Hugo pushed the rest of his papers aside. No sense wasting any more time wondering, when he could be finding out.

He exited the house via the servants’ door, tromped back through the mews, and then back ’round to the street. Miss Barton was still sitting there when he crossed into the square. She gave him a smile, this one a little warmer than the one he’d received yesterday.

There was something about her that drew his eye.

“Mr. Marshall,” she said. “I did say you wouldn’t be successful in your quest for gossip, did I not?”

“You wound me.” He didn’t smile, and her own expression fluttered uncertainly. “You assume that I only have interest in gossip, when in fact, I might just be searching out your company for the sheer pleasure of it.”

She thought this over, tilting her head to one side. Then: “I have now considered that possibility. I reject it. Come, Mr. Marshall. Tell me you didn’t come out here hoping for some sordid story.”

“So you admit the story is sordid.”

She wagged her finger at him. “I am guessing as to your own thoughts. There’s no need to prevaricate. I know what people are saying about me. Secretly, you’re judging me, and you’ve already found me wanting. You’re all saying that I’m no better than I should be.”

Hugo shrugged. “I’ve never understood that saying—no better than you should be. Why would anyone
want
to be better than required? I only behave when it counts; I wouldn’t begrudge you similar conduct.”

She stared at him a moment.

He was misleading her enough as it is. He had no intention of outright lying to her. “You don’t believe me,” he said. “I can’t help it—it’s my face. It makes everyone think that I’m quite friendly, when anyone who knows better will warn you off. I’m entirely ruthless. Quite without morals.”

The smile she gave him was patronizing. “Is that so? Well. I’m sure you’re a very, very bad man. I’m so scared.”

Hugo looked upward. “Drat.”

“Drat?” She hid a smile. “Surely a man as awful as you could conjure up a ‘damn’ in mixed company.”

“I don’t swear,” he explained. “Not in any company.”

“I see. You
are
bad.”

He glanced at the sky in exasperation. “I am aware that this fact in isolation hardly proves my point. Which is this: If you wish to speak to me in confidence, if you wish to tell your tale without fear of judgment, I’m your man. Nobody would dare to gossip with me.”

She stared at him. “You’re very convincing,” she said, in a tone that implied she believed anything but. “But you are…what, an accountant? Someone who keeps the household books?”

He nearly choked. “You could say that,” he finally said. “I suppose I make sure the books balance at the end of the day.”

She gave him a patronizing nod of the head. “All that ruthlessness, and only the books to balance. Poor Mr. Marshall.” She smiled at him. “I consider myself a good judge of character. And you, sir, are safe.”

Safe.

It had been so long since someone
hadn’t
taken him seriously that he’d forgotten what it was like. But here she was, dismissing him.

He sat gingerly on the edge of her bench.

“Maybe I am safe,” he said. “I don’t swear. I don’t drink spirits, either.” He took a deep breath. “You’re sitting here for a reason, though, Miss Barton, and I doubt it’s for your health. Is it so wrong of me to want to help?”

All the latent humor bled from her face. “Help,” she repeated blankly. “You want to
help
.”

“This is no triviality before you. A lady does not risk the wrath of a duke without reason. I don’t want to see you hurt.”

“Why not?” she asked. “If you’re so ruthless.”

He smiled in spite of himself. “
Ruthless
doesn’t mean that I survey the available options and gleefully choose the cruelest one. It means that I solve problems, whatever the cost. I’m
good
at that.”

“And so out of the goodness of your heart, you’re offering—”

“No,” he said, leaning in. “You misunderstand. There’s no goodness in my heart—that’s what I keep trying to explain to you. You are a problem. It distracts me from my work to think of you here. To wonder…”

She sucked in her breath and pulled away from him slightly. Her eyes seemed round and very gray. She scarcely moved. The air around them seemed suddenly charged. He couldn’t look away from her, and he could almost hear his words echoed back at him.

It distracts me to think of you
.