“Ride? As I did at home? Oh no, sir, surely the earl and countess couldn’t be that lax with their servants, and that’s what I am. In America I’d be an employee, but here, surely, I’m just a servant of no account at all.”
“You’re dining with the earl and countess.”
“That’s different. They just want to know all about James. They miss him.”
“Yes, he’s an interesting man. He’s been through a lot, but he’s survived, and gotten all the stronger for it.”
“Yes, I know about his wife and child dying.”
“That was one thing, yes. Ah, now mind your steps, these stairs can be treacherous to females, males too if they’ve imbibed too much.”
Jessie said nothing more until the Grand Personage had guided her down to the last magnificent oak step and her feet were solidly on the black-and-white Italian marble entrance hall that was larger than the entire downstairs of her father’s house.
She felt very provincial. Her laughter was long gone. She looked around her and felt the same terror she’d felt when she’d walked through those cathedral-like double doors with their huge brass lion-head knockers.
“I never imagined a house like this, sir.”
“You’ll become used to it. The Duchess hated it as a child, thought it was cold and overwhelming, but now she’s proud as the devil of it. Let’s take you to see the earl and the Duchess. They’re in the small gold room this evening. Mr. Sampson believed you would feel more comfortable there on your first night here.”
“James told me that the earl named her the Duchess when she was nine years old.”
“Yes, he did.”
“Are you visiting here, sir? Are you also an earl? Or perhaps a duke?”
“Not to my knowledge. Now, I want you to keep your head high, keep those shoulders squared, and smile. Act as if you were the queen of America come here deigning to visit. Will you try to do that?”
Jessie gulped. “I’ll try. Aren’t you coming with me?”
“Not this evening. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“You’re most welcome.”
12
JESSIE JUST COULDN’T take it all in. Here she was sitting in a priceless chair that must be hundreds of years old, holding a silver fork that weighed as much as her arm, picking at fresh garden peas that rolled around on a plate that had more gold on it than every wedding ring in Baltimore melted together.
She realized this wasn’t a state banquet hall, but rather just a cozy little dining room no larger than her mother’s huge parlor. The walls were painted a light yellow. Windows lined the front, and the light silk draperies were drawn back to show the front lawn with its well-scythed grass that melted into an oak forest. She heard a strange sound that so startled her, she dropped her fork.
“It’s all right,” the Duchess said. “That was Fred.”
“Fred?”
“The peacock. He’s currently infatuated with Clorinda, but she’s having nothing to do with him. She’s a fickle little brown peahen. He is constantly fanning his magnificent tail, but alas, no luck. He’s complaining about it to us. Just ignore him.”
“All right.” Ignore an infatuated peacock? Well, she supposed that since this was England she would have to adapt to any number of strange things.
“Do you like what Maggie did to your hair?” the earl asked.
Her hand went self-consciously to the thick braids wound around and interwoven to form a circle atop her head. “And now some little streamers as I call them,” Maggie had said, “to soften the effect around your sweet face. Like that. Just pull them loose and let them curl where they will.”
“I don’t feel like me at all,” Jessie said.
“From a male perspective, you look lovely,” the earl said as he forked down a bite of boiled leg of lamb in white sauce and closed his eyes in bliss. He grinned. “Forgive me, but Badger is the chef tonight. He wanted to prepare a special dinner just for you.”
Jessie dutifully took a bite of the veal cutlet garnished with young carrots and rice. It was delicious. She took another bite then another. “James told me how Badger could cook the socks off the king’s own chef at Carlton House.”
“Try the ragout of duck and the green peas,” the Duchess said. “Yes, James always claims he’s died and gone to glutton’s heaven when Badger cooks for him.”
“Ah,” Jessie said, and closed her eyes just as the earl had. “How do both of you remain so thin?”
If Jessie wasn’t mistaken, the earl was grinning at the Duchess like a man who’d just stolen a kiss from the preacher’s wife.
His wife frowned at him and said, “Badger doesn’t cook for us like this all the time.”
“That’s right,” the earl agreed very quickly. “Now, what do you really think of Maggie and her talents?”
“Maggie said I looked splendid.” There was such disbelief, such utter bewilderment in her voice, that both the earl and the Duchess laughed.
“You do,” the earl said. “Try the trout a` la Genevese. You also look splendid in the Duchess’s gown. It has always made her look sallow, what with that dull black hair of hers and that washed-out complexion. Yes, that emerald green is becoming on you. I’m just surprised it wasn’t in Maggie’s armoire.”
“Maggie decided to allow Jessie to try it,” the Duchess said. “She did say, though, that if Jessie didn’t do it justice then she’d remove it while Jessie slept and wear it herself since it was a rather acceptable gown and deserved to be shown off. Did Maggie believe it became you, Jessie?”
“She just looked me up and down and hummed.”
“An excellent sign,” the earl said. “You mentioned that you were a jockey.”
“Yes, I’ll admit it since I’ve already spit it out. I know you probably have some very proficient jockeys here who are of the right sex.”
“Becoming a nanny is very different from being a jockey,” the Duchess said. “Are you certain you wish to deal with Charles?”
“He drools a lot, Jessie,” the earl said. “Except with Spears. He never drools on Spears. It isn’t fair. He looks at me, grins, gets this evil look in his eye, and waters from the mouth the moment he’s in my arms. He’s teething right now as well as drooling. He likes to bite my chin.”
“He bites anything that doesn’t move quickly enough.”
“I look forward to meeting him. I’m sorry, but the fact of the matter is I’ve never been around babies all that much, but you see, I love the new foals. I play with them and brush them and speak to them and—”
“Well, that’s a relief. It’s very nearly the same thing, isn’t it, Duchess?”
“Almost exactly,” the Duchess said. “I must also warn you, Jessie. Charles’s brother, Anthony, just turned six years old. He’ll be jealous that Charles has you. Thus you’ll have the two of them hanging onto your skirts.”
Jessie’s eyes lit up. “Anthony rides?”
“Like a little centaur,” the Duchess said fondly. “ Perhaps you can be his horse nanny.”
“Yes,” the earl said. “You could teach him all about the fact that most horses are Barbs imported via France from northern Africa.”
“Oh yes,” Jessie said, forgetting her delicious dinner, forgetting the exquisite Aubusson carpet upon which her cheaply shod feet rested, forgetting that she was a Colonial in the presence of near-royalty. “That would be wonderful. You don’t mind?”
“Not at all,” the earl said. “Ah, here’s Badger, come to be praised. Badger, this is Jessie Warfield, come to us from the Colonies. She’s a friend of James’s.”
He was ugly and big, with huge fists, a full head of white hair, and a big smile. He was dressed like a gentleman who’d just chanced upon a huge white apron and tied it around his middle.
“You’re Badger?”
“Aye, that I am. You liked the Julienne soup?”
“Oh yes.”
“And the boiled leg of lamb and white sauce?”
r />
“She did her duty by every dish, Badger. Now, what have you there?”
“Nesselrode pudding, my lord.”
He served the pudding as three footmen deftly and silently removed the plates and set down new ones, these with just as much gold as the others.
When he finished, he nodded to Sampson, motioned to the footmen, and said, “I’ll speak to you tomorrow, Miss Jessie. You rest well tonight. Master Anthony will be so excited to meet you, he’s liable to roar into your bedchamber and jump up and down on you. It’s because you’re an American, of course. He’ll look closely to make certain you don’t have an extra finger or an extra ear. Good night, my lord, Duchess.”
He was gone. As were the footmen. Sampson said, “Good night. Mind what Mr. Badger said, Miss Jessie. That Master Anthony is a wild monkey.”
“I’ll mind,” Jessie said, and watched Sampson leave the small informal dining room that had, she was certain, an echo.
“Now, my dear,” the earl said, sitting back in his chair, “before we adjourn to the drawing room for some of Badger’s incredible coffee, tell us what happened between you and James to send you flying to a foreign country.”
She looked from one to the other and blurted out, “I didn’t want to go to Aunt Dorothy in New York. She’s my father’s younger sister and she’s petty and mean and pious and expects you to be grateful when she tells you what a bad person you are.”
“I shouldn’t consider going to her either,” the Duchess said. “She sounds as bad as James’s mother.”
“James’s mother is a terror. She makes me want to disappear under the floor. She once said to my face that I was a tart and should be whipped. Then she tried to cover it by saying that I hadn’t heard her aright, that she’d said I was smart and that my skirt was ripped. It wasn’t, I looked.” Jessie sighed, then said, “There was no place else. I’m sorry I just knocked on your door and disrupted your lives.”
“Lives occasionally need disrupting,” the earl said. “We get so bloody complacent. Disrupt all you like, Jessie. What happened between you and James?”
“I was found by everyone lying on top of him in Blanchards’ garden, but I really wasn’t kissing him, truly, I just wanted to make sure he was conscious so I was patting his face and perhaps I was breathing too close to his mouth, I’m not really certain now but James does have a lovely mouth, not that it matters now, for you see, I was ruined. James wasn’t because he’s a man. What could I do? James doesn’t want me. Nobody did except one man who isn’t a gentleman who attacked me at the racetrack and tried to take liberties. But James saved me. I would have saved myself, mind you, but this one man had a knife to my throat. James was very angry, not that it changed anything. I’m truly sorry.”
“I see,” the Duchess said. “Perhaps you could tell us what you were doing on top of James?”
Jessie took a deep breath, then recounted the sorry string of events.
“And you were ruined,” the earl said.
“Yes. It isn’t fair that the man isn’t ruined as well.”
“Well,” the earl said, “the man is supposed to marry the woman if he’s caught with her lying on top of him. Isn’t that right, Duchess?”
“In the usual course of events, yes.”
“He would have, but I know that James doesn’t even like me. I would never do that to him.”
“I see,” the Duchess said, looking into Jessie’s eyes. Beautiful green eyes, a lighter green than James’s, and filled with a pain that was much too much for such a vulnerable creature as Jessie Warfield. She’d been delighted when Jessie had walked into the drawing room all proud and scared at the same time and ready to show off her new plumage and try not to puke at the same time. She’d told her she looked lovely, an observation Jessie took as a rank fabrication. But the Duchess wasn’t deterred. She would continue to build her confidence. Perhaps that was all she needed, confidence and a bit of training. The Duchess wanted to see her on horseback.
Maggie had done a fine job with her. She wasn’t a classic beauty, but there was intelligence in those green eyes of hers, and a mouth that curved up naturally with humor. She had lovely white teeth and a jaw more stubborn than James’s. She was tall and slender, and she carried herself well. She had lovely white skin, and the Duchess found the sprinkling of freckles across her nose charming. What was wrong with James? Surely he wasn’t still brooding over Alicia, now dead three years?
Jessie cocked open an eye to find herself staring into two deep blue eyes that were only an inch from her face.
She shrieked.
“Shush,” a very young male voice said. “Spears will come and put me under his arm and carry me away if you don’t be quiet. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
It was a child, and he was speaking with that ludicrous starchy accent everyone else in this strange country spoke. “All right,” she said. “I’ll be quiet. I can’t imagine what startled me so much. I mean, you’re not precisely touching your nose to mine. I can’t stand people who yell.”
“I can’t either.”
“You’re rather heavy. Do you think you could move a bit to the side?”
“Oh certainly. I say, is that better?”
Jessie could breathe again. She thought now that turning blue from want of air was what had awakened her in the first place.
“Much. Now—”
“You talk very funny, like Uncle James when he first arrives home before he learns how to speak properly again. Papa says it’s because he comes from a savage land and we have to civilize him over and over. I’m always there to help Uncle James learn English again.”
“You’re Anthony.”
“Yes. I’m named after Anthony Welles, the Earl of Clare, a very good friend of my grandpapa’s. I never met either one of them, but the Earl of Clare was supposed to be a dashing gentleman who lived in Italy half the year and here in England the other half.”
Jessie was fully awake now, utterly charmed by this outpouring of confidences from a little boy who would surely grow up to be at least as handsome as his papa. “Your mama told me you ride like a centaur.”
“Mama truly said that? A centaur? You’re certain you didn’t misunderstand her because you’re an American?”
“I promise I have it right. Now, Anthony, I’m Jessie. I’m going to be Charles’s nurse and your horse nanny. I ride like a centaur, too, you know, and I also race.”
“Really? Mama said Aunt Frances was the only lady she knew who rode sometimes in races.”
“You’re introducing me to a lot of names I’ve never heard before. Give me a while to get my bearings, Anthony, then add a new name a day, all right?”
“I should have known you’d be tormenting poor Jessie.”
“Papa!” Anthony rolled off the bed, his nightshirt flying around his ankles, and dashed to the door where his father stood, dressed in riding clothes and lovely black boots that shone as clear as mirrors. The earl lifted his son high in his arms, then lowered him to give him a hug and kiss. “Your mama thought you might have slipped through Spears’s net. You’re slippery, my boy.” He looked at Jessie, who was struggling to pull the blanket to her chin. “We’ve considered locking him in the dungeon at night, but he’s got the knack of quivering his chin, and the servants fall for it every time. They’d never let him stay in the dungeon for more than five minutes. What are we to do? But I found him, right where his mama knew he’d be. Now, Anthony, you didn’t awaken poor Jessie, did you?”
“Oh no,” Jessie said quickly. “I woke up all by myself and there Anthony was, standing in the doorway, as quiet as a mouse, just waiting for me to do something.”
Anthony gave her an approving look and said, “She talks funny, just like Uncle James. Can we take her riding with us, Papa? She claims she’s good. I told her about Aunt Frances, but she said she’s got too many names on her plate now and I had to slow down.”
“An excellent idea. Go to Spears now and let him get you dressed. After breakfast, we?
??ll all go riding.”
Anthony squeezed his papa’s neck once more and scrambled down to his feet. “I’ll see you at breakfast, Jessie,” he yelled as he ducked behind his father and out the door.
“He’s the very image of you, my lord,” Jessie said. “He’ll slay women in droves when he grows up.”
“I’ll try not to let it bother me that you’re in a lady’s bedchamber, my lord.” It was the Duchess, and she was wearing a lovely dark blue riding outfit with a jaunty blue velvet riding hat that had an ostrich feather curving around her cheek. Jessie had never seen anyone so beautiful in her life. Actually, seeing the two of them side by side, she realized they looked remarkably alike. They were cousins, after all. Beautiful cousins.
“Good morning, Jessie. How did you sleep?”
“Like a dead rock,” Jessie said, and yawned, unable to help herself.
“I’ll take my husband from your bedchamber so you can bathe and dress. Here’s Ned with your bathtub and some water. We’ll see you downstairs.”
“What about Charles?”
“Unlike his brother,” the earl said, “Charles still doesn’t quite grasp that you’re here for him and thus at this moment, he’s quite uncaring, being burped by his other nurse after the Duchess here let him eat for nearly an hour.”
Maggie came into her bedchamber twenty minutes later, just as Jessie had finished braiding her own hair, she hoped just as Maggie had done it the previous evening. Maggie was carrying over her arm a riding habit of dark green velvet.
Maggie looked at her for a few moments, then said, “Sit down a moment, Jessie. I think you’ve half the knack of it.”
Jessie sat.
“Now, my pet, you don’t want to look outrageously beautiful the way I do all the time. I owe it to the house and to my husband to be a pearl during the day and a diamond during the evening and during the night—well, that’s something you don’t need to know just yet. But you, Jessie, you’re not like me. You don’t want to be unbraiding braids all the time. You want to be comfortable. Let’s save all the plaited braids for the evening. How about just a single one for the morning? Now, here’s how you make it straight. Yes, that’s it. Now we’ll just loop it up like this and pin it. Nothing to it. The last thing you do is loosen it all up.” Maggie looked at the tightly pulled-back hair, took the handle of the comb, and eased the hair looser on the top and sides of Jessie’s head. Then she pulled loose “streamers” to curl haphazardly about her face. The one that fell over her ear itched, but Jessie decided she could become used to it. She just stared at herself. It was amazing.