A Return of Devotion Read online

  “Quite good of you,” Mr. Gherkins said, “even if it means you’re dodging gargoyles in the meantime.”

  So far, so good. William took another bite and swallowed before pushing the conversation on. He needed to learn the character of a man who would let his daughter slink away in shame after an encounter with a marquis’s nephew. It didn’t seem to fit, given that Mr. Blakemoor appeared to be the sort of man who would express a suggestion without hearing the opinion of the higher-ranking man first. That showed a strength of character William hadn’t expected.

  Unless the situation hadn’t happened the way William was assuming it had. He really needed to find time to sit Daphne down for that uninterrupted talk.

  “I trust your journey was pleasant,” William said as he cut into the roasted beef.

  “Of course,” Mr. Blakemoor said. “’Tis an easy ride to Marlborough, after all, though a bit of an adventure to get to your home.”

  Mr. Gherkins nodded and laughed. “I was beginning to wonder if we were being hoodwinked somehow.”

  “I am in the process of restoring the estate. I’m afraid we’ve a long way to go, though, particularly on the grounds.”

  Conversation continued in idle politeness for several minutes. Eventually the men began sharing the basics of their business strategy. The first course was removed and another took its place. Still the conversation delved into nothing personal.

  On a normal day, such a course of events would be a cause for rejoicing. Today William found it frustrating.

  “Have you family, Mr. Gherkins?” William asked, the words sounding strange in his voice. He’d never been the one to turn a conversation personal and certainly had never asked about family since he didn’t want any similar questions aimed back in his direction. Still, he pressed on. “A son, perhaps, whom you intend to groom for your business?”

  A strange glance passed between the two men. William tilted his head so he could more easily see Mr. Blakemoor’s expression while Mr. Gherkins answered.

  “Yes, I’ve a son. Two sons, actually. They’re a bit young to be involved in the dealings of business just yet, but one day I hope they’ll take it over.” Mr. Gherkins smiled with a hint of pride.

  Unexpected jealousy spiked through William. Had his father ever worn such an expression when speaking of his eldest son? He never had in William’s presence. Edmond’s presence, yes. His second son could do nothing that wasn’t excellent, according to the late marquis. Part of William knew it had nothing to do with either boy and was simply an extension of the man’s regard, or disregard, for their respective mothers. Still, it was disconcerting to know his father had never been happy that William would one day take his place.

  This wasn’t about his father, though. It was about Daphne’s.

  He swung his gaze over to the man in question. “And you, Mr. Blakemoor? Do you have children who intend to partner with Mr. Gherkins’s sons one day?”

  The man coughed and became overly interested in the food on his plate. “I’m afraid my wife died many years ago. We were never blessed with any”—cough—“sons. I live near to Mr. Gherkins. Just across the lane, actually. I’ll be happy to leave my workings to those young men.”

  William wanted to ask about daughters, but he didn’t. Men hardly discussed daughters at the best of times, unless marriage was on the table. If not for Daphne he’d have never considered asking about daughters. Probably wouldn’t have even asked about children. To continue this line of conversation would only make the men wary.

  Daphne had promised to tell William everything. He was going to have to be patient.

  As the second course was cleared and an artful pudding set before each man, William drove the conversation toward the more comfortable topic of business. If only he could stop wondering what Daphne was doing, he’d be fine.

  Chapter nineteen

  I could put a bit of foxglove in your father’s breakfast,” Jess murmured as she arranged her laundered clothing in the wardrobe that evening.

  Daphne sighed as she ran a brush through her hair. “There’s no call for that.”

  “Not enough to kill him,” Jess said as if that had been Daphne’s issue, or something she’d even considered. “Just enough to make him rather ill for a while.”

  It was times like these Daphne had to remind herself that Jess had lived a very different life, and such a suggestion wasn’t an indication that the person was bound for Bedlam. She shook her head, left the brush on the dressing table, and wandered over to the window. “If he gets ill, then he’d have to stay longer. I’d rather he see to his business and leave.”

  “Your father is the taller of the two, isn’t he? I never met him when I worked in London.”

  “Yes.” Daphne turned away from the window, a small smile tugging at one corner of her mouth. “But you still aren’t poisoning his breakfast.”

  Jess shrugged but promised nothing.

  Daphne had never pried too much into Jess’s past. Having her own secrets tended to make her a bit more respectful of the secrets others might be holding. Jess knew most of Daphne’s past, of course, since it was the motivation for caring for a dozen illegitimate children. Perhaps now, with Daphne’s past so blatantly exposed, Jess would be willing to discuss hers. “You worked for a duke, didn’t you? You’d have hardly encountered my father there.”

  Jess wouldn’t meet Daphne’s eyes as she arranged the bedcovers. “That’s an untrue statement given he’s currently the guest of a marquis, but yes, I was the parlor maid for a duke.”

  “Were you spying on the duke?” Daphne dropped onto the bed, halting Jess’s progress with the blankets. She grinned up at the small, delicate blonde. One fact Daphne did know about Jess was that, at one point, despite the slight French lilt that occasionally slipped into her speech, she had worked as a spy for the Crown.

  A slight, crooked grin formed on Jess’s face. “No. But I did report on his aunt and cousin for a while.”

  Daphne opened her mouth to ask more, but Jess spoke first. “Are you going to talk to him?”

  A click sounded through the room as Daphne clamped her mouth shut hard enough to bang her teeth together. She understood Jess’s refusal to discuss her past because Daphne was just as adamant that her father not be a topic of discussion either.

  Except she’d promised the marquis they would talk about him, and she hadn’t yet come up with a way out of that.

  Still, for tonight, she could put it off. She dropped her gaze and cleared her throat. “The marquis? Of course I’ll talk to him. I’m his housekeeper, after all.”

  “And he has questions you have to answer.”

  Daphne winced. “Yes. Hopefully I can avoid telling him any more than absolutely necessary. I’m not the best prevaricator, though. I wonder if he’d accept hearing the story from you.”

  Jess snorted and flicked the corner of her blanket so it whacked Daphne in the ear. “Are you going to talk to your father?”

  “There’s no reason I should.”

  Daphne picked at a loose thread on her night rail. She didn’t like going back in time, thinking about what she’d done, what her father had done. She didn’t like remembering what a fool she’d been. Imagining life had gone differently was nearly impossible because she couldn’t wish Benedict out of existence. She couldn’t picture gaining any amount of health and happiness for herself at the expense of all the children she’d raised or the women she’d helped.

  That was the beauty of fantasizing about the future. She could change things, make things good, pretend there was still something good ahead for her.

  “Your father might regret sending you away,” Jess said, oblivious to Daphne’s mental slide into dark despair. “You never gave him a way to contact you.”

  “I did, actually,” Daphne said, her voice calmer than she’d thought it would be. She’d never admitted this, not even to Kit. “On Benedict’s first birthday. We’d just taken in Sarah’s mother. I was so excited for the future and what Ki
t and I were going to do. I looked down into Ben’s face and I felt, for the first time ever, that I was right where I was supposed to be, that I was capable of doing what was in front of me.”

  It was a task she no longer had. There would be no more children to raise or women to save in Daphne’s future. Soon she would lose the one thing that made her feel useful to God.

  Had she not done enough? Was that why it was all coming to an end?

  “Within the next year the roof sprung its first leak, Benedict nearly toppled an entire cabinet of vases and sculptures I can only assume have great value, and the enormity of raising more than one baby became an overwhelming reality.” Daphne took a deep breath. “But in that moment, I was powerful. So I sent him a letter.”

  Jess dropped onto the bed beside Daphne. For a while, both women stared at the faded wall coverings, one corner dropping away from the ceiling trim. “He didn’t answer.”

  It was a statement, the obvious result of her attempt at contact, but Daphne confirmed it anyway. “No. For all I know he refused to pay the postage on it or threw it in the fire without reading it.”

  “What did you tell him?”

  Daphne wrapped her hands in her night rail to hide the fine tremble that had crept across her fingers. “That I was safe. That his grandson was beautiful. That I’d found a purpose in life and I thought, hoped, prayed God was going to honor that purpose despite my foolishness. I couldn’t bring myself to call it a mistake, not with Benedict sitting right next to me. I’ve since managed to separate the two in my mind. Acknowledging I made a mistake isn’t the same as hating where life went afterward. That would be like getting lost in the woods and breaking your leg and then never walking again because of the scar.”

  Jess tried to smother her laugh but didn’t quite manage it. “That’s a terrible analogy.”

  Daphne gave Jess a quick smile before dropping her gaze to her knees. She knew her mind worked oddly, that she viewed life differently than other people. It wasn’t a problem as long as she made sense to herself and didn’t have to attempt to explain her thoughts to other people.

  She really, really didn’t want to have that conversation with Lord Chemsford.

  “I’d say it’s his loss, but we already knew that, didn’t we?” Jess bumped her shoulder into Daphne’s. “For what it’s worth, I think you’re incredible. Strange, but incredible. I’ve never met anyone like you, Daphne, so determined to see the good and the possibilities in a situation.”

  “I can’t see the good right now,” Daphne grumbled. “Benedict hasn’t talked to me once since he found out who his father was.”

  “Maybe he liked pretending you didn’t know. He’s your son, after all. He may look like his father’s family, but you raised him. He’s bound to possess a bit of that Daphne-esque imagination.” Jess gave Daphne a push. “Now get off my bed. Some of us aren’t avoiding the big house tomorrow and have breakfast to cook.”

  Jess wasn’t a hugging person, but Daphne was, so she threw one arm across Jess’s shoulder and squeezed before rising from the bed and moving across the room to her own.

  She wasn’t tired yet, rarely was when she tucked herself beneath the covers, but she knew she needed sleep in order to function the next day.

  Tomorrow she would have to remain aware of everything. If she wanted to see to her duties while avoiding the gentlemen, she would have to know where everyone was at any given moment.

  Once in her bed, she wriggled and shifted until her head was nestled perfectly in her pillow, the blankets fell just so across her feet, and she had a view of the shadows the moon cast through the uncovered window.

  Then she dreamed.

  What would it be like if her father knew she was here? Without any sort of power or significance or purpose, just working as a housekeeper to survive. Most women of gentility who fell upon hard times were able to find work as a companion or a governess. Few truly had to go into service.

  Daphne rubbed her hands together. Those other women wouldn’t have calluses on their fingers from hours spent holding a broom or a shovel. They wouldn’t know how to plant a garden or efficiently clear a room of dust and debris.

  It would be nice, though, if her father didn’t care about that. What if he took one look at her and was simply happy she was alive? He could take her in his arms, call her the ace up his sleeve like he did once upon a time, ask to meet Benedict.

  How lovely it would be if he wanted to meet Benedict.

  It would mean that he, too, had come to the place where he was able to separate the regret of the past from the blessings of the present. He would see that God could do wonders despite the consequences that had befallen her.

  Because Benedict was wonderful. He was a blessing. She couldn’t be prouder of the man he was becoming. He was going to achieve more than she could have ever dreamed for herself.

  And if her father were to join her in that pride, how amazing would that be?

  Sleep tugged at Daphne’s eyelids. She gave in to it gratefully, visions of her father showing Benedict around one of his new factories dancing through her dreams.

  The list of things Daphne should be doing right now was long.

  Standing behind a bush wasn’t on it.

  Yet here she was, back pressed up against the stone foundations of the library wing, eyes closed, enjoying the breeze that ignited a melody in her mind and brushed along her skin as she tilted her head toward the open window to listen to a sound she hadn’t heard in years.

  Her father’s voice.

  She didn’t have the slightest clue what he was talking about. It had to do with new developments in machinery and the potential of steam engines, but she really didn’t care. She could hear his voice again and that was enough.

  Over the years her memory had faded a bit, but the patterns and tones of his speech wrapped around her with familiarity, like a favorite blanket that had been forgotten and found one day in the attic.

  A few tears rolled silently down her cheeks. She didn’t mind them. It was understandable to cry at a time like this. She’d thought to never see her father again. And while they would still likely never embrace or speak, just hearing his voice was a balm she hadn’t known she needed.

  He was doing well.

  She was glad.

  And if she enjoyed the brisk tones of the marquis while she was standing here, well, there was no fault in that. It meant two-thirds of the conversation was enjoyable to hear.

  Most of the time when she heard Lord Chemsford’s voice there was a justifiable edge of incredulity in it. When he wasn’t perturbed, though, he was quite nice to listen to. There was power in his voice, a briskness that almost clipped off the ends of his words as if he were in a hurry to get to the next one and make his point. She didn’t understand the particulars of the conversation, but there was a noticeable lack of subtleties and prevarications. His questions were direct, his observations stated with boldness.

  It was little wonder that he didn’t expect this meeting to last more than a couple of days.

  But now more than ever, she dreaded the coming conversation. He wasn’t going to forget about it, and he wasn’t going to let her slide by with a few vague answers.

  If she had any secrets left when he was finished she would be astounded.

  “What do you say we stretch our legs a bit, gentlemen?” Lord Chemsford’s voice drifted through the window, softened a bit from the edge it had born earlier. “I know the grounds are a bit of a shambles, but there’s still some fine prospects toward the lake.”

  “That’s a fine idea. I don’t suppose you’ve a bit of fishing gear here?” her father asked. “It’s been an age since I’ve sat along the edge of a beautiful lake and enjoyed the breeze.”

  The voices moved toward the double doors that led from the library out to the side lawn.

  Daphne shrank down a bit lower behind her bush. If they were walking to the lake, there would be no reason for them to come around to the front of the house, yet D
aphne didn’t trust her luck. She would remain scrunched and hidden until the voices were gone.

  But then she faced another dilemma.

  The only door on this side of the house was the main front door.

  It was a door she’d once used freely but now, if she wanted to be a proper housekeeper, it was a door she should avoid.

  Then again, all the men were outside. None of them would see her use the front door, so it didn’t actually count, did it?

  She pushed through the line of scraggly bushes beneath the library windows and ran up the wide stone steps to the front porch. Feeling a bit like a daring criminal, she pushed open the front door and strode through.

  Only to find Mr. Morris walking through the front hall.

  With a frown she cast her eyes heavenward. She could have done without the reminder that God could still see what she was doing and had allowed her defiance to produce yet more embarrassing consequences.

  The valet said nothing. Then again, he rarely did if he could help it. Instead, he usually conveyed his sentiments through a curled lip, perhaps a bit of a grimace, or, like today, a look of utter, outright disdain.

  Daphne gave him her biggest smile in return. “Good morning, Mr. Morris.”

  “Good morning,” the man returned. Despite his derision, she had to allow that the man stuck to a code of manners.

  “’Tis a beautiful day,” she said, pulling the door closed behind her.

  “I wouldn’t know,” he said, “as I’ve been acting as valet to all three gentlemen, in addition to being a footman and a butler, since apparently we don’t currently have a housekeeper.”

  Heat rose up Daphne’s neck, but she refused to acknowledge it. Instead, she forced her smile a bit wider. “Having a woman in their midst would ruin the professional mood.”

  He sneered as if she were an idiot and walked toward the stairs to the workrooms below.