Page 30 of Reforming Lord Neil

She dropped their tin cups into the basket with a loud clatter. “Mrs. Clapham.”

He sat up then, bringing up his knees and resting his forearms upon them. “I beg your pardon. That was a slip of the tongue.”

“That, I do not believe. You were testing me. Come. I need to return home. There is work to be done.” She lifted the hamper and went to the wagon. She heard him sigh, and then he called to the horse. Teresa climbed atop the wagon without assistance and took her seat.

She told herself she had grown upset because Mr. Duncan had become too familiar, had asked too many personal questions. But he had not. Not really. Yet the turn in conversation to Henry’s gambling had unsettled her.

Nothing about Henry gambling had ever made sense to Teresa. It had been easier to put aside thoughts of those circumstances once she, her mother, and Caroline came to the farm. To think on it again, to try to understand what she could not, merely to soothe Mr. Duncan’s curiosity, would only prove a frustration to her.

Never mind that her pride had been hurt, too. The man had dared to compliment her looks, not once but twice that day. Seeing him as anything other than a laborer would not be wise. Even if he was a gentleman, and witty, and charming. Nothing could ever come from a flirtation with such a man, especially given her current state.

Teresa looked down at her hands, brown and calloused, her nails short and her knuckles rough from work. They were not the hands of a lady. They never would be again.

She was a farmer. And he was a temporary hireling, likely to return to his family once their problems were resolved, leaving her behind upon her patch of dirt.

Chapter Thirteen

Neil stood beneath one of the cherry trees, now stripped of fruit by birds as well as the people on the farm. Mr. Putnam, leaning heavily on a rough-hewn cane, stood next to him. “You see that branch, there? It’s not got a leaf or stem upon it. You need to get it down, before it hurts the rest of the tree.”

“It is only a dead branch.” Neil folded his arms over his chest and peered up into the shadows of the tree. “Surely it can stay where it is until the wind brings it down.”

But the old man shook his head. “Nay, lad. The branch may be blighted. Cherry trees, they are forgiving if the bad branches are removed right away. But if it’s left, the whole tree could be sick by next spring. You need to go through the orchard and cut off every limb not bearing leaves.”

Neil looked from the tree above him to the others, his heart sinking. There were a lot of trees. He had been sick of them, fully, when they harvested the last of the cherries the week before. Teresa had stopped working near him and only addressed him when she needed to give him the next chore upon the growing list.

He had mucked out the stables every other day, chopped wood, fetched and carried grain from the nearest town, fixed the fence on the property, and tilled up more dirt for an expansion of Teresa’s herb garden. He had been gathering deadfall from around the property and bringing it to the house to break into kindling, when Mr. Putnam had appeared and informed him of Teresa’s new chore.

Lopping off tree branches.

Neil looked back over his shoulder at the house, glaring at the back door. Though their relationship had started unusually, he had thought a friendship had begun to grow between Teresa and himself. Until he opened his mouth to talk about her husband’s gambling. Or had it been his use of her Christian name that drove a wedge between them?

It seemed he would forever attempt friendly relationships with the wrong people.

He sighed and turned to the tree again.

“Mr. Duncan?” The old man studied him, his bushy gray eyebrows drawn together. “Is there something on your mind, lad?”

With a forced smile, Neil shook his head. “Not at all. Thank you for showing me what must be done. I will begin at once.” Even if the ache in his left arm was enough to make him wince. It hurt nearly precisely where he had broken it the year before.

“Best get a move on, then. Rain is coming. I feel it.” The old man patted his wrist.

“In your bones, hm?” Neil asked, amused.

“Aye. Where I broke this one, thirty years ago. I was about your age. Fell off the back of a wagon and snapped my wrist.” Mr. Putnam tucked his hand into his coat pocket. “It never fails to warn me of a change in the weather. The rest of me just aches about all the time.” He chuckled and started on his way.

A break in the bone. Interesting. Neil’s arm, broken in a carriage accident, might serve him the same way. How unfortunate.

He went along to the barn to fetch a ladder and a saw he had seen with a long handle. Once inside, Neil shed his coat, too. The work would go faster, and likely be safer, with more freedom of movement.

He returned to the orchard, grateful when he saw clouds moving in to block the sun.

His skin had turned darker with each day spent outside. His hat and neckcloth could only protect so much of him. The gloves helped a great deal. The blisters had stopped appearing, but his hands were rougher than they had ever been.

Yet he did not utter a single word of complaint. Not to Mrs. Godwin, Caroline, Teresa, or even in private to any of the animals. The women worked as hard as he did, and had been at it longer, though even less prepared for such a way of life than he. If Teresa could sing and hum as she performed the labor of a peasant, he could bite his tongue.

Though he said several choice words over the lack of any word from his mother and sister. Every other day, he rode to Dunwich to check for any post. Nothing had come, though it had been nearly a fortnight since his arrival at Bramble Cottage.

His mother might have at least written to him and revealed who his true father had been. He could think of no one in their lives that he resembled and doubted the affair had continued for too many years. Though he and Olivia looked a great deal alike, and seven years separated them in age.