‘Thank you, Mrs Thomas, I shall.’ This seemed to calm the servant, though as she gained the door she stopped, a look of resolution on her face.
‘The boys have imaginations, miss, vibrant imaginations that set all the other governesses to odds with them because they could not understand enchantment. But I’d be thinking you can see things bright in the air around you that others tend to miss. At least I hope you do.’
With that she disappeared and Seraphina stared after her. The whole day had been awash with emotion and this small part of it was as confusing as the rest.
She had slept in the corner of a building on her last night in London, tucked under the overhang of an eave and frightened out of her wits in case anyone should find her there; now she was here in a room that was more than adequate with a servant confiding much about the nature of her charges.
Sitting on the bed, she felt a cloud of comfort envelop her, the icy rain beating against the windows as though it might never cease. Everything here was a warm reminder of how her life had been once before …
No!
The only way she had survived the past weeks had been to not think. She shook her head, but with this small quiet amidst the larger chaos her mind returned again to the horror of her last days in London.
Lord Ralph Bonnington, the Earl of Cresswell. Even the name scared her. Her father had made certain that they were left alone in the front room of the London town house, no care given for her safety; the large florid-faced man with the balding pate and beady eyes telling her exactly what he wanted out of this unexpected opportunity. She had bitten his lip when he had pressed in unbidden, demanding much more than she was willing to give, his hands ripping the bodice of her best gown in a rough attempt to sample that offered by her father in an agreement to save Moreton Manor. The sight of her skin had sent the earl into frenzy and he had forced her to the couch and laid himself on top of her, his hand across her mouth to stifle noise.
The heavy metal ewer had come into her grip as she struggled against him and she had used it to good effect on the shiny top of his head. It had been easy then to simply open the window and escape.
Her father, Seth Moreton, the Earl of Banbury, had shot himself the next evening; she had seen it in the papers as she roamed the back streets of London, trying to decide what to do. Mrs Whittle’s Agency for Prospective Governesses had solved the problem.
Lying back, Seraphina felt hot tears scald down the side of her eyes and disappear into her hair at the temple. ‘Mama,’ she whispered softly, ‘Mama, I need you.’
Trey sat in his library, listening to the rhythms of his house: the creak against timber from the elm-tree branch too low on the eaves; the hiss of a spark in the grate where a final ember flared. Heavy rain slanted in from the west, widening the Crouch River, he supposed, as it made its way to the sea.
The natural progressions of nature on land held in the Stanford family name for centuries, and his sanctuary.
In the hallway outside the library a servant hummed a carol softly. Crossing to the piano, Trey laid his hands down on the ivory keys, letting them sink into other music to block out the Yuletide notes.
Once he had loved Christmas. The thought surprised him, but Catherine had found the season a burden with all the effort required and so it had been largely forgotten about altogether. He was certain that Lady Moreton would be the sort of woman who might attack the idea with vigour: the Christmas pudding, the decorations, the charity visits and the long table full of food and family.
Standing, he walked to the window, looking at the snow deep around the house, bands of rain slanting against the light from his library. Terence had made the jump from the land of the still and the silent and his governess had undone years of aristocratic manoeuvring by mysteriously leaping backwards into an unexpected servitude. Uncertainly, he lifted his finger to the shadow of himself in the glass. He should send her back to London on the morrow, the trail of intrigue woven about her wearisome and unwanted, but there was something that stopped him.
She was Elizabeth Moreton’s daughter and her ghost would not allow him to simply turf her out into the winter cold. Besides, there was something about his new governess that was beguiling. Swearing under his breath, he turned to find his best bottle of brandy.
Chapter Three
20 December
The maid brought her down to the dining room in the morning and Seraphina saw that the duke sat there already, a plate of breakfast before him and no one else at the table.
Surely as a governess he did not wish for her to be joining him for the first meal of every day? She remained still as she gained the room, uncertain as to what was expected.
‘Please have a seat, Miss Moorland, for I would like to talk to you,’ he said as he folded away the paper he had been reading. When she hesitated, he looked around. ‘I take it your dog has been whisked off by the boys. A jaunt through the park should do Melusine no harm and a full breakfast may do you some good.’
The servant held out her chair and Lord Blackhaven waited as she sat, his calm menace more easily seen in the new light of day. The scar across his eye was reddened, the angled planes of his cheek moving under a pull of muscle and there was a tick visible around the damage. As if by magic the two footmen who stood at attention to each side of the hearth disappeared, though she had seen no sign from him to make this happen. Outside through the tall windows the day looked much brighter than it had yesterday.
‘Your references are more than salutary, Miss Moorland, though were I to guess their origin I would say that they all came from the same hand.’
The drink Seraphina had taken a sip of was swallowed with a gulp at his words, shock leaping where caution had lingered. ‘I do not know what you mean, sir.’
His dark-velvet eyes caught her own. ‘The hand of a woman who, by her own admitted necessity, took this position of governess and far from London?’
When she did not speak he went on regardless. ‘I worked in intelligence and part of my mission in Europe was deducing which written orders were fakes and which ones were original. The job requires a special attention to the sweep of letters, you understand, and the repeat of line. Put succinctly, I do know a forgery when I encounter one.’
‘I see.’ Her heart was thumping wildly. ‘Under the circumstances, would you like me to leave then, my lord?’
He smiled. ‘And have Terence revert again into silence when your dog disappears with you? Oh, I think not … Lady Sarah?’
She stood at that, barely able to breathe. He knew her name and station as well? He knew exactly who she was? Would he turn her in as an impostor and send her back? Would he summon the law and have them deal with something he would have no mind for? A hundred questions surfaced and she wanted to run, but her feet seemed carved of wood. The reputation she had in London was hardly salubrious.
‘You could flee from this room and this house as certainly as you fled from London, my lady, or you could sit down and listen to what I have to say to you. Which is it to be?’
Seraphina sat, the sweat between her breasts building in fear.
‘Good, I had rather hoped that you might do that. We both have our secrets, I would guess—undisclosed mysteries that tie us to a particular path or a preferred option. You need employment and I need a governess, for the probability of finding another with your long list of accomplishments would be slim until well after the Epiphany. So I propose a truce. You stay and tutor my boys until the end of January, after which I shall see to it that you are transported to the place you next wish to travel to and nothing more said of any of it. A month. Lodging. Food. A wage and no questions?’
She could only nod,