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“And their mother?” Mari asked. “Is she in residence?”
Mrs. Fairfield stopped so abruptly that Mari nearly ran into her and had to grab hold of the banister to keep her balance.
“I thought Mrs. Trilby would have told you about the... unusual nature of this post.”
“I expect she didn’t have time. I was sent over so swiftly, and all.”
Mrs. Fairfield searched her face for another moment before answering her question. “The twins were raised on the coast of France by a Moroccan nurse. A most unorthodox upbringing, though they did have an English tutor and their speech is quite correct. Their mother has passed away.”
Did their unusual upbringing mean the children were illegitimate? It would explain Miss Dunkirk’s whispered censure.
“They only have the duke, and he’s very absorbed in his work,” said Mrs. Fairfield, resuming her swift ascension.
Did dukes work? Perhaps Mrs. Fairfield meant brandy sipping. Or billiards.
The housekeeper turned at the first landing, walked up another flight of wide stairs, and traversed a hallway at a fast clip, almost as if she didn’t wish to field any more questions.
She knocked forcefully on a carved oak door and cracked it open. “I’ve brought the new governess to meet you, Your Grace,” she called into the room.
Before they could enter, a maid in a white apron and cap came flying down the hallway. “It’s Laura, Mrs. Fairfield,” she gasped. “She’s set fire to the biscuits again.”
“Well? Did you throw water on them?” asked Mrs. Fairfield.
“She upended a pan of drippings over the range and it flared up and singed her eyelashes clear off. And cook is out and no one knows what to do.”
Mrs. Fairfield made an exasperated noise in the back of her throat. “I’m afraid I must leave you, Miss Perkins. Don’t be frightened, dearie.”
Which of course produced the opposite effect. Was this duke such a terror?
“Lady India is here so you won’t be alone with him.” Mrs. Fairfield squeezed Mari’s hand and left her standing there.
Alone.
Merely a man. Merely a man.
She shook out her skirts, tucked a flyaway curl back into the braids atop her head, and marched purposefully into the room.
Banksford’s head was bent over his desk, chestnut hair falling over his brow and obscuring his face as his quill scratched across a large piece of parchment.
He was garbed in a sober black coat and haphazardly tied cravat, quite different from the silk and frills she’d imagined the nobility wore.
“Good afternoon, Your Grace,” she said in her most superior tones.
He raised his head.
Merely a larger-than-life monstrosity of a duke,she amended.Though he’d clearly been assembled from all the best parts of mere mortal men.
Glittering gray eyes. Shadowy cheekbones. An angular jaw and a commanding slash of a nose. The powerful shoulders and lean frame of a tavern boxer.
He didn’t look pliable in the least.
Mari shivered, feeling slightly light-headed confronted by all of this blatant masculinity. She’d spent her whole life in a school for girls, after all.
“And you are...?” he asked.
Name.She knew that one. “Miss Mari Perkins, Your Grace. Mari with ani—it rhymes with starry.”
Why had she told him that? What a silly thing to say to a duke. He didn’t care that she’d changed the spelling and pronunciation of Mary, the name the orphanage had assigned her, in a small, yet soul-sustaining, act of rebellion.
