“Perhaps you might be more specific by what you mean,” Daisy said. “What is thiscertain way of going on?”
“Well, me and the boys have the comfortable habit of having a bit of wine after our duties are done for the day. It gives the fellows something to look forward to, you see.”
“I am not sure I do see,” Daisy said. “What, in your mind, is abitof wine?”
Bellamy stared over her head and out the window. “Oh, a bottle or two a man would do it.”
Daisy was nearly dumbfounded. A bottle or two each? Was he mad? They must all be drunk as soldiers every night. Or, theyhadbeen. They would not do so under her own roof. It might be technically the duke’s roof now, but while she lived in it, she would set the tone. She’d just arranged to keep any drunken visitors out of the house, she would not very well condone allowing drunken servants to terrorize her or Mrs. Jellops, or especially poor, dear Betsy.
“I am amazed you would propose such a thing,” she said sternly. “I will excuse it as a mistake one might make when one has served a bachelor for too long. I certainly will not tolerate such habits, nor would I subject my female servants who must frequent the downstairs to the inevitable offensive behavior. You and your footmen will be granted one glass of ale at meals. Drink a drop further at your peril. You may go.”
Daisy waited until the butler had made his way out of the room and closed the door behind him. The old fellow had gone very red in the face and she presumed he was outraged that his disgraceful habits were now curtailed.
She took a deep breath to calm herself. She had prevailed over Bellamy in this round and she would see to it that continued to be the case. The housekeeper she hired would be critical—as she knew well enough, the right forceful woman would bring Bellamy and his staff into line.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Charles had returned to the cottage, if that was what one called it. He had set Tate to doing with it what he could and his valet had not shirked on the matter. He’d found a bolt of canvas and hung it over Charles’ bed to stop the rain from falling on his face. He had scrubbed the floors and furniture with vinegar and placed bunches of lavender on every surface, the abode now smelling like a perfumed salad. A washstand had been procured, and Charles presumed Tate had stolen it out of the main house, as well as a tall bookcase that had been commandeered as a makeshift dresser to hold his clothes.
Before he could comment on the improvements, Bellamy burst through the door. “I am insulted to the end of my toes,” the butler said. “I do not know how I can stand for it!”
Charles eyed him. Bellamy was certainly in some kind of state, sweat dripped from the old heathen’s forehead. “I suppose you are determined to communicate the insult your toes have recently endured,” he said drily.
Bellamy began to pace the small room. “As you know, my lord, Miss Danworth wished to have a private interview. Well, she wanted me to understand in no uncertain terms that she is the mistress and you are nothing. Charles Battersea, Earl of Dalton and heir to the Duke of Glastonburg, is nothing!”
Charles folded his arms. It was highly unlikely that Bellamy had worked himself into such a lather over a slight to himself.
“That is all?” he asked. “She said nothing further?”
Bellamy stopped his pacing and stood staring at the lone window at the far end of the room. “She also said that me and the boys are to have no more than a glass of ale at mealtimes. At myperil, is what she said.”
“I suspect her father may have indulged to excess,” Charles said. “There were wine bottles in every corner of the house when I arrived.”
“And I should pay for that?” Bellamy said. “Ido not drink to excess.”
“You most certainly do,” Charles said, suppressing his laughter.
“I see,” Bellamy said petulantly. “Everybody is to drink all they like but the poor butler and his footmen. She says we may have a string of drunken louts arriving at the door and I am to keep them out. Without even a glass of wine to fortify myself against them!”
“Wait a moment,” Charles said, “who are the drunken louts she expects to turn up?”
“I do not know,” Bellamy said, and Charles could see very well he did not care. “She says her father had engaged in low company.”
“I bet he did,” Charles said softly. All the wine and brandy bottles strewn everywhere made more sense now. Childress had run his house as if he were a rogue bachelor, with no thought to having a daughter in the house.
“Stop your complainin,’ you old reprobate,” Tate said to the butler. “You don’t hear me complainin’ about the impossible working conditions, now do you? We’ve all just got to get on with it.”
“Probably good advice,” Charles said, “though I feel rather complaining myself. As for you, Bellamy, it will not do you harm to lay off the wine bottle for a few months.”
“We shall see!” Bellamy said. “I fear my body will be shocked and land me in a sickbed.”
“If your body is shocked by these new and improved habits, it will be shocked with relief and delight,” Charles said. “This may not be how any of us prefer to spend the summer, but we can at least comfort ourselves that I will outwit my father in his ridiculous schemes.”
“But my lord,” Bellamy said, looking as if a new horror had just occurred to him. “There is to be a housekeeper. A housekeeper! You know what they are like!”
Charles of coursedidknow what they were like. Lurking in every corner, pursing lips over the slightest irregularity, and generally making themselves a nuisance. It was precisely the reason he did not have one. He would go back to his comfortable bachelor ways in a few months.
But for now, he would not have it all his own way and neither would Bellamy.
