AllFreeNovel
Share Us
‘I don’t know yet,’ Theo said frankly. ‘I’ll have to consult with my aunt, Lady Coghlane, and see what’s possible. I do promise that whoever I agree to wed would be of sufficient stature and wealth to secure Charles’s future. In the meantime, you will keep our secret.’
‘Will your...potential husband know?’
‘I would never deceive a gentleman about something so important. Of course, I would not reveal his true parentage until I was certain of a suitor’s esteem, superior character, and willingness to act as Charles’s mentor.’
‘Finding such a paragon may be difficult,’ Lady Hazlett said sceptically. ‘And if I do not agree to your terms?’
‘I understand there is much fine property available in Belgium, now that the war that killed so many of its owners is finally over. And I have a good deal of ready income.’
The two women faced each other for a long moment.
‘I didn’t come here to be your enemy,’ Lady Hazlett said at last. ‘For all I knew, you’d be happy to give up the boy. But I understand only too well what it is like to lose a beloved child; I wouldn’t be the means of parting a son from his mother. If he can be raised, not in an orphanage, but with a mentor who can offer him all the advantages due his station, and if we have assurance Hazlett and I can make him a part of our lives.’
‘Then we are agreed?’
Lady Hazlett reached out her hand and Theo shook it.
‘Now that that unpleasantness is settled, may I see my grandson?’
‘Why don’t you follow me up to the nursery?’
A little lightheaded, her hands still trembling in the wake of the confrontation, Theo led Lady Hazlett from the Green Parlour up the stairs. As they got closer to the nursery, she could hear Charles singing a Portuguese folk song with Constancia, his piping voice slightly off-key.
Nausea crawled up her throat and a wave of panic crashed over her. Should she have sent Lady Hazlett away and barred the door? If she mustered her forces poorly, would she lose the person who meant most to her in the world?
Don’t concede the field after the first skirmish, she steadied herself. Lady Hazlett wanted what would make Charles happy, and he wouldn’t be happy parted from his friends and the woman who had cared for him his entire life. She needn’t figure out every bit of strategy this very moment; she would have time to plan.
Plan to marry.
She swallowed another wave of nausea.
Then Charles heard her footsteps, and rushed to the nursery door. ‘Miss Theo!’ he cried, popping out. ‘Did you hear us? Constancia taught me a new song! Shall I teach it to you?’
‘In a minute, Charles. Right now, there’s a lady I’d like you to meet. She was a...a good friend of your papa’s.’
She led Lady Hazlett into the nursery, where Constancia curtsied and Charles made a fine proper bow. As he looked up, his bright green eyes fixing on a lady whose similar green eyes stared back at him, Lady Hazlett gasped.
‘He’s so like Marshall at that age,’ she whispered. ‘May I?’ At Theo’s nod, she reached out to brush a lock of golden hair off his brow.
Theo felt her heart constrict. How could she deny Marshall’s mother the chance to know and love his son?
She couldn’t. But that didn’t mean she wouldn’t fight sword, pistol and whip, take him abroad if necessary, to have him remain with her. He was her son, too.
‘Why don’t you show Lady Hazlett your soldiers before we have some nuncheon?’
‘Then can we go to the school?’
‘Then we can go to the school.’
‘Why can’t I stay at the school with my friends? Why do I have to have a—a too door?’
With an anxious glance at Lady Hazlett, Theo said, ‘Because you’re going to grow up to be a great gentleman, like my father the colonel, and your papa. And to do that, you must go to university. The tutor will help you get ready.’
‘I’d rather get ready to teach horses with Jemmie, or plant fields, like Georgie.’
‘That’s only because you don’t know yet how much fun it will be to learn many things and go to university. And afterward, you’ll have lots of horses to train and fields to tend.’
‘Should you like to have a horse of your own?’ Lady Hazlett asked.
Charles’s gaze hopped back to his grandmother. ‘Oh, I would! Miss Theo said after the school got ready, she would get me a pony.’
‘Your papa loved ponies. I think you should have one straight away.’
While Theo absorbed that challenge, Charles subjected Lady Hazlett to a frank stare. ‘I like you. Would you like to see my soldiers now?’
‘Will you show me?’ she asked.
‘Of course. I better help you, though. It’s awful narrow in the corner for a lady.’ He offered his arm.
Theo watched, anguish throbbing in her chest, as the son she could never acknowledge assisted his grandmother to the low eaves in the corner where his lead soldiers were displayed. How she wished Marshall had lived to see this!
But he hadn’t, which left her with quite a dilemma.
Now she, who had never wished to marry, needed to find a husband. A suitable husband.
And quickly.
* * *
A week later, Dom sat in a parlour of the Palladian masterpiece that was Holkham Hall, agricultural tracts spread out on the desk before him. He was immersed in the merits of the Norfolk Four-Crop Rotation system when a footman in gilded livery bowed himself in. ‘Mr Ransleigh, there is a...young person to see you.’
‘Young person?’ he echoed blankly.
‘When he arrived first thing this morning, the butler sent him away, thinking it most unlikely a rough sort like that would have any acquaintance with a gentleman. But he stationed himself in the kitchen courtyard, claiming that you do know him and that he will not leave until he’s spoken with you.’
The memory of another person a butler had been unable to shoo away popped into his mind—but the footman said this was a ‘he,’ not a young lady. Besides, he thought with a smile, if contested, Theo would doubtless put her ‘colonel’s daughter’ on and not be put off by a mere butler.
The smile faded as he considered the only other ‘young person’ he knew whom a butler would not consider receiving—and who had the gumption to refuse to be dislodged from his intent: a boy who’d grown up emulating his sergeant-major father. And Jemmie would never have come looking for him, unaccompanied by Theo, unless something was drastically wrong.
Having gone within an instant from amusement to alarm, Dom said, ‘Where is he? I will see him at once!’
The footman shifted uncomfortably. ‘I don’t think the butler would approve my showing him in here, sir. Perhaps...perhaps I could convey him into the servants’ hall?’
‘Nonsense!’ Dom snapped, agitation lending an edge to his voice. ‘I don’t intend to conduct my business in front of the servants—or in the kitchen yard. Bring him here at once!’
‘Very well, sir,’ the footman said, still looking dubious.
Wondering what could have happened at Thornfield or the school that would have prompted Theo to send Jemmie, Dom jumped up to pace the room. He was about to set off and fetch the boy himself when the door opened and an exasperated Jemmie trotted in.
‘Think I was tryin’ to break a prisoner out of stocks,’ he muttered. ‘I was about ready to find an open window and comb the place for ya meself.’
‘I’m sorry, Jemmie. I only just learned you were here. But why have you come—and how did you find me? Has something happened to Miss Branwell?’
‘Aye, something’s happened. Nay, she’s not hurt or nothin’,’ he added quickly at the concern he must have seen in Dom’s face. ‘Though I can’t make any sense of her takin’ such a crack-brained notion of a sudden.’
‘You’d better tell me the whole.’ Dom motioned to a chair, on which, after giving the gold-corded brocade upholstery a dubious glance, Jemmie perched. Seating himself at the sofa, he said, ‘Now, what has happened?’
‘Everything seemed just fine until about a week ago, when she come to school like she always does, but leaving Master Charles back at Thornfield. And she’s all agitated and fidgety-like. I asked her what was wrong—thought mebbe the boy’d taken sick or something, cause she sets great store by the little nipper. She said he was fine, but a lady who knew Charlie’s da had come to visit. Then she goes in and has a long talk with Miss Andrews, and after that she talks with Mr and Mrs Blake—that’s the cook and her man, what lives with us at the school. And off she goes again, without a word to any of us.’
Jemmie frowned. ‘I knew somethin’ bad was happenin’, cause Miss Theo never left any place, ever, without tellin’ me first where she was goin’. She didn’t come to the school at all the next day. Then the next day, she comes ridin’ up in the carriage with Master Charles and tells us she’s goin’ off to London, to see her aunt, and mebbe she’d be gone a good while. Then she said goodbye.’
