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‘He never answered, so in the end she scraped together enough money for the stage and set off to London to find him. She came back a month later, looking ghastly, and said he’d died in a tavern brawl. Knock on the head and too much drink. She’d seen the lawyers and they said there was some assets and more debts. I was the earl, and that kept the creditors at bay for a bit, but it was too late for Mama. She died a week after Phyll got home.’
‘If she took only enough money for the stage, how had she lived in London?’ Ashe asked, knowing the answer only too well. She could have turned around and gone home when she didn’t find her wastrel father at once, but she had hung on, kept searching even though she was starving.
‘Got some odd jobs, I suppose. I never asked, what with Mama and the news about Father.’ Gregory scrubbed his hand over his face. ‘I should have thought. She was as thin as a rake, took her ages to put the weight back on.’
So she had sold herself for the money to stay alive while she found her father, because if she did not then her mother and brother would starve. And the world would think—he had thought, damn it—that what she had done dishonoured her. And she believed that if she married him it would compromise his honour.
‘I have fallen out with Phyllida,’ Ashe said bluntly. ‘I’ve hurt her and I doubt she’ll open the door to me now.’
‘Do I need to name my seconds?’ Gregory asked and set his glass down with a snap.
‘No. You need to give me your door key and eat dinner out. In fact, I suggest you go and beg the Millingtons for a bed for the night.’
‘The devil you say!’ But Gregory was pulling the key out of the pocket in the tail of his coat.
‘Don’t ask and I won’t have to lie to you. Thanks.’
‘You had better be intending to marry her,’ Gregory warned. ‘I’ve been a damned slack brother, but I mean to do the right thing by her now.’
‘I can ask. Only Phyllida can accept,’ Ashe said and pocketed the key.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Ashe let himself into the house in Great Ryder Street with the care of a burglar. The ground floor was silent, but he could hear the murmur of voices from the basement, the clang of copper pans. Soft-footed, he moved to the top of the stairs and listened. Three feminine voices, none of them Phyllida’s.
They were devoted to her, he knew that from observing Anna. Whether that devotion would move them to fillet him with a boning knife or help him, he had no idea, but he could hardly be alone and uninterrupted with Phyllida unless they knew he was there from the start.
‘Good afternoon.’
The cook dropped the ladle she was holding and the little maid gave a squeak of alarm. Anna jumped up from the chair by the range where she had been mending and marched up to confront him. ‘What did you do to her? You got her away from Buck, I’ll say that for you, but she’s shut herself away in her bedchamber and she won’t talk to me, or come out. If you’ve hurt Miss Phyllida, you rakehell, his lordship will beat your brains out and we’ll cheer him on!’
‘I didn’t do anything to her,’ Ashe said and sat down in a chair by the kitchen table, neatly unsettling Anna who did not seem to know how to deal with gentlemen lounging at the table, stealing Cook’s still-warm jam tarts. ‘I managed to say the wrong things, not say the right ones, and comprehensively put my foot in it with her. So, yes, I’ve hurt her, but not the way I suspect you mean, Anna.’
He laid the key on the table. ‘That’s Lord Fransham’s, by the way. He knows I am here and he won’t be in now until tomorrow.’
‘So that’s the way it is,’ Anna said and sat down too.
‘If you’re all going to eat those tarts, I’d best put the kettle on,’ Cook said, suiting her actions to her words. ‘Get the tea caddy, Jane.’
‘Are you in love with Miss Phyllida?’ Anna demanded. Ashe raised his eyebrows at her tone, but she was not to be intimidated and sat there glaring at him while she waited for an answer.
Am I? ‘Do you think I’d tell you before I tell her?’ he asked. ‘I do not mean her harm, that I promise you.’
Cook passed him a cup of tea and pushed the plate of tarts closer. ‘Well, get your strength up. You’ll need it,’ she added darkly.
She could not stay in her room for the rest of her life. Nor the rest of the day, come to that. Phyllida swung her legs over the edge of the bed and ran out of energy to stand up.
This would not do. Life had to go on and Gregory would be worried and the staff would fret if she hid herself away like a lovelorn adolescent. There was much to be done, that would help. A manager to find for the shop, the Dower House to whip into habitable shape, Gregory’s wedding to plan for.
Goodness, she would be
so busy she would forget Ashe Herriard in a few days. Oh, who was she deceiving? Not herself, obviously. Phyllida lay down again, curled up into a miserable ball and stubbornly refused to cry. A girl was entitled to mourn for a day when her heart was broken, she told herself with a rather hysterical attempt at humour.
The door opened. ‘Go away, Anna. I do not want to be disturbed.’ It closed again, but there were soft footfalls, the sound of breathing. ‘Anna, please go away. Tell Cook I will not be down to dinner and say to Lord Fransham that I have a headache.’
‘Lord Fransham will not be in to dinner. He is staying the night with the Millingtons.’
Ashe? Phyllida uncurled and sat bolt upright. ‘What the devil are you doing here? I said goodbye and I meant it.’ How could he come and mock her like this?
