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Miss Barrow thought for a moment. “What is your happiest memory, Your Grace?”
“My wedding night,” Anne said without hesitation and in perfect truth.
“I must admit I am surprised.”
“You go too far, Miss Barrow. I thought perhaps we would be admiring the neighbor’s houses and envying their windows.”
Miss Barrow grinned. Anne was annoyed that she found it as charming as ever. “Do you often feel envy, Your Grace? Shall we get to know each other through examining the seven deadly sins?”
Anne couldn’t help it. She laughed. “Wherever did you learn your manners, Miss Barrow? No one speaks so familiarly to me.Ever.”
“I think maybe you like it.” She smiled. “Maybe you are beginning to like it outside, too, where it’s different from what you’re used to. Different company. Different ideas.”
The cold had seized her fingers, and her toes were curled in her boots, but the breeze now felt fresh instead of freezing, and the light flashing off the snow dazzled her eyes. She felt invigorated and alive, every sense heightened.
It was beautiful out here.
Anne stole another look at Miss Barrow. Beautiful, indeed.
* * *
Letty had been sorely mistaken in her assumption that winning the apprenticeship would cool Robert’s recent tempers. It was as if his grievances had multiplied when they should have lessened. He wasn’t home often, but when he was, he was peevish in a way thathe had never been before, not even when he had been a recalcitrant youth begging her for shillings to drink at any tavern he could find with his friends.
She couldn’t solve his issues for him. Her heart still hurt after his most recent outburst, and she suspected it would hurt more if she dwelled on it. Best to turn her thoughts to work. She brewed herself a cup of tea and brought it down to her workroom.
Letty thought of Hawthorne House, its rooms so familiar to her now. She wanted to change this house. Not simply for the money, or to secure her reputation. But she liked the bones of the building, the shape of its walls and stairs, its archways and windows. Fully decorated though the house already was, barring the duke’s bedchamber, the estate was starting to look like a blank canvas. What it lacked waspersonality.
She wanted to stamp hers all over it.
Letty frowned into the tea. This wouldn’t do at all. The house wasn’t hers, and it was dangerous to think about it with such arrogance. She had lost jobs over such things before, rushing in and thinking she knew better than the client. She had almost lostthisjob by doing exactly that with the duke’s dressing room.
But there was no harm in dreams, was there?
As she opened her sketchbook to a blank page, Letty let her thoughts wander to her favorite room of the house. She had seen it when Mrs. MacInnes had given her a detailed tour and history lesson about the estate, and though she had only spent a few minutes there, she had been captivated by its potential. It was a small parlor that opened into a smaller terrace. A haven of privacy.
Slowly, Letty started to sketch out the lines of the room, then tapped the pencil tip a few times against the paper as she thought of how she yearned to fill it. The room should reflect the peace and quiet of nature, with the theme being rest and respite. There would be oversized plants in big copper tubs, and trails of flowers hanging from chains hooked to miniature ceiling rosettes. Perhaps an ornamental tree or a fern in the corner. She penciled in a chaise lounge and a pair of deep-set chairs facing the opening to the terrace, which she would transform into French doors covered with gracefulgauzy curtains. Rosewood tables with thin legs and the slimmest of tabletops would be set between the chairs, perfect for a cup of tea and the newest books from the lending library.
She tapped her pencil against the page again. The duchess wouldn’t use a lending library, not when she had her own library and a staff who doubtlessly purchased books for it as soon as they were published.
No, this was purely Letty’s fantasy. It wasn’t for the duchess at all.
She tried not to look up too much while she worked. It was easier to lose herself in thoughts of luxury when she wasn’t gazing at the whitewashed walls of her workroom, and the scraps of fabric and trims that she could never afford for herself. She was grateful to live next to Fraser. It afforded her a sense of security. But though it was practical, it was also impersonal. Impermanent. Mrs. MacInnes’s parlor had more decoration in it than she had in her own rooms, even though Letty was the one calling herself a designer.
The townhouse that Letty had lived in for twenty years had been leased furnished with beautiful things, which she had naively considered to be hers for her lifetime. Curse the Wilsons for being heartless. But she didn’t like thoughts of them to intrude on her day, so she bent her attention back to her drawing.
She spent some time inking in the details of her sketch, and layering watercolor onto the page. Pale yellow walls, bright white chairs, deep green leaves, warm brown wood. While the paint was still damp, she scribbled her name in the corner.Letitia’s Parlor.
After all, the design was too fanciful for the duchess. It didn’t have the clean lines that she thought the duchess more likely to favor. She also thought the duchess would prefer greenery to be kept where it belonged, either out of doors or contained to a greenhouse. When it was time to focus on the rooms on the first floor, she would have to redesign the parlor from scratch. But for now, it gave her a little glow of satisfaction deep in her chest to look at it.
Letty thought again of the Duchess of Hawthorne. She needed to start piecing together what she knew of her so far and startthinking about potential design elements for her bedchamber and dressing room.
She knew that the duchess had a sweet tooth. She knew she liked being outside, even if she protested it. She knew the sound of her laugh now. High trilling notes, like birdsong. Letty felt a thrill at the thought that she had been the one to make her laugh, to shake her out of her polite mask and reveal something of who she really was. She knew the staccato clack of her heeled shoes and thought she could recognize her by rhythm alone at this point.
She knew the downward curve of her lip that seemed to be most often on her face even when relaxed, and the polite smiles that she wore from time to time, but what she yearned to see was a full smile, wide and genuine and delighted instead of decorous. Surely there was passion to be coaxed from those lips.
The duchess was uptight and reserved, but every conversation intrigued Letty further. She was eager to see her again and to explore what it was that this woman wanted from her life, instead of what the duchess wanted for her station.
Letty had always been attracted to unconventional women. Her lovers had ranged from business owners to artists to writers, and what they all had in common was a sense of disquiet. They were ambitious, like herself, and they wanted more for themselves, and for others like them.
