Page 11 of Aurelia

The more Aurelia heard about her new employer, the more she wondered what she had got herself into.

***

Roland had put Arthur’s interruption behind him and was making strides on his article when there was yet another knock on his door.

He flung down his quill and spattered the scattered parchment with ink. “Damnation!” he muttered, hastily blotting up the mess with his handkerchief. “What in the name of God did she do now, Arthur?” he shouted.

The door opened and Beekman, his butler, entered. “I beg your pardon, sir.”

“Oh. It’s you. What do you want?” he barked.

“Miss Burton has arrived, my lord,” Beekman said, immune to Roland’s odious temper.

He glanced at the clock and saw it was later than he thought. He would get no more work done today. “Well, show her up, Beekman.”

“Sir Gideon is with her.”

Roland frowned. “Talbot? Why the devil is he here?”

“He rowed her over, my lord. He asked that he might have a word.”

He considered putting the man off, but Sir Gideon Talbot could be persistent, so he might as well get it over with. “Yes, go ahead and show them both up.”

“Shall I have tea sent up, sir?”

The last thing Roland wanted to do was spend a tedious half-hour over tea and crumpets with Sir Gideon Talbot. “Not now. Wait until after I’ve sent Talbot on his way.”

“Very good, sir,” Beekman said, exhibiting no surprise at all at his employer’s rudeness.

Once the door closed Roland removed his glasses and went to the mirror over the fireplace to check his appearance. He had no ink stains on his face but his overlong hair looked as if a very small farmer had made tiny haycocks all over his head. When he worked, he had a tendency to run his fingers through his hair and smear ink all over everything.

On one memorable occasion, he’d delivered a talk at the Royal Society with black smudges on his chin and the end of his sizeable nose. Even among a group of men notorious for their lack of sartorial awareness, he had been a figure of amusement.

A few moments later the door opened and he turned to find Gideon Talbot standing beside an exceedingly lovely young woman.

Roland was momentarily poleaxed. He hadn’t thought much about his new artist other than to assume that she would be an elderly woman. That assessment had been based on the quality of her illustrations, which were superlative. The ability to breathe life into stuffed or bottled specimens was difficult work and a rare skill.

The woman currently hovering in the doorway was not old. Indeed, she could not be any more than four-or-five-and-twenty, although she was garbed in rather matronly clothing, as if she believed it would distract people from her expressive hazel eyes, exquisite facial features, and shapely figure.

“Hallo Crewe,” Talbot said in his sunny, cheery way, pulling Roland from his gawking.

Roland forced a smile, still not taking his gaze from the woman. “Good afternoon, Talbot. Welcome to Crewe, Miss Burton.”

“My lord.” She dropped a graceful curtsey.

Beautiful and graceful. She only needed to add sexually promiscuous to that list and Arthur would be apoplectic when he saw her.

“You are probably wondering how I was fortunate enough to deliver your newest employee,” Talbot said once the two had taken seats in front of Roland’s desk.

“I was, rather.” It was a struggle to wrench his gaze from Miss Burton, but the flags on her cheeks told Roland that his blatant ogling had been noted, so he forced himself to turn to Talbot.

“Were you aware of who was living with Judith Pomeroy?” Talbot asked.

Roland’s brow knitted at the bizarre segue. “Daventry’s daughters. Why?”

“Formerly Daventry,” Talbot corrected, as if the entire nation wasn’t aware of the attainder of the peer—something that had only happened a handful of times in the last five hundred years, as far as Roland knew.

“What of it?” he asked, his gaze sliding again to Miss Burton.