Page 19 of Nice Earls Do

Luca had resumed staring about the entry hall with wonder, but he had not loosened his grip on Kit’s hand. “All right,” Kit agreed. Whatever her reservations to the contrary, he trusted Beth’s judgment.

And so, as a foursome, Luca’s hands clasped in Kit’s and his sister’s, and Isabella’s other hand in Beth’s, they turned and ascended the wide, polished stairs. He’d dreamed some variation of this scene many times: he and Beth, together, a family at Ferncliffe manor. Even unsure what they’d find when at the top of the stairs, he once more found the reality better than anything his imagination had fashioned.

By the time they reached the top floor—the children vacillating between awed quiet and anticipatory chatter—Kit’s heart was hammering, and not from exertion. He should have insisted on taking them somewhere else. The awful, empty nursery would be no welcome for Isabella and Luca. When Beth reached for the door, he almost begged her not to open it.

Before he could speak, however, she swung the door wide. Isabella gasped.

“Tell her,” he began, “tell them we hadn’t time to—no, tell them we wanted them to be able to choose...”

But Beth wasn’t listening. She was following Isabella through the doorway—well, being dragged along behind, more accurately. Luca went next, almost pulling free of Kit’s hand. What choice had he but to go along?

A few steps more and he stopped abruptly. Blinked. Twice, three times.

The room had been transformed. Panels of blue silk, into which tiny holes had been cut, swagged over one end of the room, creating the illusion of a starry night sky. Beneath that tent lay two plump mattresses, mounded with pillows and blankets. More stars, these crafted from paper, hung from the ceiling. Beneath one window, a table had been placed, its carved legs sawn off to make it a more comfortable height for little ones; instead of rigid chairs, its sides were surrounded by a trio of cushioned footstools, collected from various rooms around the house. And over the bare walls had been sketched the outline of an expansive scene, one which transitioned seemingly without effort from the Mediterranean Sea and Mount Vesuvius to Ferncliffe, nestled among the rolling hills of Hertfordshire—in other words, tracing the journey from one home to another.

Luca squirmed free of both Kit’s and his sister’s hands and scampered over to investigate the tent. Isabella, still attached to Beth, focused her attention on the mural, her questions and observations intelligible to him through their enthusiastic intonation. He watched Beth, her dark head bowed to catch every syllable, and wondered what she was thinking.

Eventually, Isabella was persuaded by her brother’s repeated summons to join him in admiring the silk version of the night sky. They lay side by side on one of the low beds, looking upward and nattering to one another, a contented murmur of sound punctuated occasionally by a giggle.

“I think it would take very little encouragement for them to fall asleep,” Beth said softly, stepping closer to him. Already, the stream of conversation was broken by stretches of silence. “They must be exhausted by their travels, by all the disruptions and uncertainties. Now they feel safe, just as I told you they would.”

Something burned in his chest, a sudden rush of love for these two children, though strangers. And for Beth, his dearest friend.

She was looking around at the room, not up at him. “Oliver must’ve stayed up all night.”

Kit nodded. “It appears he commandeered the draperies from the dining room.”

“Oh dear,” she said, sounding at once horrified and amused. “Well, Oliver has never played by the rules.”

Kit nodded. This was not at all what he’d had in mind for the nursery, nothing anyone he knew would consider appropriate for the niece and nephew of the Earl of Stalbridge. “Thank God,” he murmured, never in his life so happy to be wrong. “He took something I thought of as hopelessly dull and made it magical. I underestimated him, even after that grand speech he gave me last night, about the true value of the kinds of domestic work so many are prone to dismiss.”

“Including me,” she confessed with a low laugh. “But you see now why I was determined to protect ‘Mrs. Goode.’”

Kit fished for her hand. “I also see the person who encouraged his creativity, who inspired him.” Raising her fingers to his mouth, he brushed his lips over her knuckles. She watched him do it, wide-eyed, but not protesting. “You were his mentor, his first teacher—oh, maybe not in the skills needed to transform an empty room into the stuff of childhood fantasies. But in something more important. You taught him those dreams were worth having, that he didn’t have to stuff them into a box and tuck them away in the attic just to satisfy someone else’s notion of what his life should be.”

There were tears in her eyes, more than she could blink away. “Did I?”

“Look around, Beth,” he urged. The children had at last fallen silent, safe and cozy in their makeshift beds. “You may not be Mrs. Goode. But none of this would have been possible without you.”

She still looked dubious. “Does that mean I shouldn’t regret marrying Manwaring?”

Kit considered his answer. “I will not go so far as pretending to be happy about a marriage I would have prevented if I could. But I think the present Lord Manwaring has reason to be glad of his father’s choice. And if your parents hadn’t been determined you’d marry well all those years ago and had you educated accordingly, you might not have been able to speak words of comfort to Isabella and Luca today.”

“I suppose that’s true. I hadn’t really looked at things in quite that light before. Perhaps there is some use in a young lady’s accomplishments. But I’ll still never be a paragon of domesticity.”

By the hand he still held, he led her over to the low table and helped her to one of the footstools before sinking onto another himself. He would worry about how to get up from it later. “Rest assured, I’ll never ask you to be anything other than who you are—and who you want to be.”

“So,” she asked, in the manner of one posing a test, “you won’t mind if I do not wish to spend all my time in the country?”

“No, though of course I can’t abandon the estate entirely. And after so much time apart, I would prefer to avoid lengthy separations, with you in Town and me here.” She nodded. “But I like London too, and it’s past time for me to take up my responsibilities in the House of Lords.”

She let out a breath and dragged in another, as if relief of one worry only made room for the next. “What about...children?”

“Luca and Isabella, you mean? You are not eager to be known as their wise and fun-loving aunt?”

Her answering smile was weak. “Your children, I meant. I can’t give you a son.”

“I have no need of a son. I have an heir.”