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“It is not a deficiency. It is not that you have no scent but rather one that is…” He huffed. “It is not…consistent.”
“There are any number of factors that may influence this, such as clothes drying in the sun as opposed to the laundry room, and the amount of exertion a person may undertake in a day’s work.” This was only common sense, was it not?
“But there is an underlying essence we perceive, much the way one recognizes the color of hair or eyes,” he said. Neither had stepped away. “It is like one’s characteristics, quick to anger or to blush, for example.” His finger lightly touched her cheek. “One may embody an essence as tangible as the sea at dawn or of a Burgundy rose in midsummer or even something as mundane yet homely as…” He spotted the candle on the floor and stepped away to pick it up. “As candle wax.”
Her face bloomed scarlet. “Give that here,” she said and fumbled it back into its holder.
“You have gone from having no fragrance to speak of to something I cannot fix on.”
“I find these comments about the state of my person to be less than gracious.”
“They are facts, not judgments, Madam.” Why did her skin shiver so when he called herMadamin that tone? Did he mean it to sound like an endearment?
“I must ask if this lack is influencing your decision regarding the child.” Beatrice set about rearranging the mantelpiece despite it requiring her to handle the candlestick holders.
“As to that—”
Tarben bolted into the room as though shot from a bow. “Uncle Arthur! Papa requires you in the kitchens, but Mum says to leave you and Aunt Beezy alone, but he asked first, and I think I ought to obey things in the order I receive them, what think you?”
The look Osborn gave her was…fraught. Fraught with humor, with warmth, with a world of potential. He took his nephew’s hand in his great grasp, and the reluctance in the gaze that passed from the child to her spoke volumes that even in her hopes she hesitated to fully read.
“I have orders to help my nephew fulfill, Madam.” He allowed Tarben to drag him out of the room. “We shall consult in due course.”
Eleven
We shall consult in due course.He had sounded like a clerk. Their future intimate relations were not a carriage he was considering for purchase or a decision regarding which field to lie fallow.
Madam appeared to hold his comment in equally low regard and presented him with a cold shoulder during the daily allotment of tasks on the day’s Schedule. Charlotte was in great good humor regarding Freya knew what, which she had shared with Ben, who kept giggling into his teacup. A brief spat about whether Madam was allowed outside the house was greeted with a reference to the sauce being good for the goose as well as the gander. An order was given for Mr. Todd to communicate Her Grace’s desire for the donkey cart to be hitched up, and so it was.
Arthur had no choice but to give over to his bear and follow in the shadows.
Shadows were, in fact, few and far between as green-thumbed Lowell footmen continued their assault upon the grounds. Hedges were trimmed, shrubs were wrestled back from ignominy, and the rose arcade’s latticework was shored up, its climbing vines pruned.
He followed along at a distance from the donkey cart. Madam was attired with her typical austerity but for an absurd bonnet, a confection of feathers and tulle in an unlikely shade of chartreuse. The ribbons tied beneath her chin flew over her shoulder as the cart tooled toward the eastern border. Despite the frivolous headgear, she was a dab hand with the reins, authoritative yet gentle.
Were they to keep the cart and donkey, never mind the footmen? The carriages that had brought the Lowell runts had been sent back but for one, as well as a team of draft horses large as elephants. How fortuitous that the barn had been restored. But of course it was why the barn had been restored, felines notwithstanding.
Madam attempted to make him read the letter from his peer, which he refused to do, admittedly for no good reason apart from general churlishness. Did Lowell see them as a charity case? The Osborn duchy was not impoverished; he knew what was required to wrench the funds out of His Highness’s grasp, which he would not do even if it meant indebtedness to that bloody wolf and to his own wife.
As to that: Why had Georgie chosen this little human for him to wive? There were any number ofversipellianheiresses who may have served if His Bloody Highness was so keen on increasing ursine solidarity. None were as small and yet self-possessed; some were as wealthy but none so generous. He had only to recall baroness thingamajig, a bird shifter of some species or other who had been so profligate with her wealth, to no one’s benefit but her own, even Georgie was appalled. No one else would have clapped eyes on this place and stayed; none he could name would have taken on this challenge with such aplomb and verve.
Here was Arcadia coming back to life, within and without, thanks to one small human woman. She hopped down from the driving seat and handed the reins of the cart to an unknown human—the foreman, he reckoned—as the man doffed his hat and the rest of the crew followed suit. Madam headed for the nearest ladder, and Odin above, if she dared to climb it to inspect the roof—ah. Todd had anticipated her and took to the eaves with alacrity. She would not have…would she? Not in her skirts. Odinhelpher if she started wearing men’s clothing as it was rumored the Duchess of Lowell had taken to doing.
His plump little cake in trousers? Odin helphim.
Todd shouted down his opinion of the work, which expressed high praise.
Madam turned and smiled at the foreman.
It was a small smile, the mere turning up of her lips and yet—
And yet?his bear, bored by the crouching and the lurking, piped up.
And yet she would gift it to a stranger.
He has pleased her, whereas you…
Arthur knew what would please her.
