I had met few titled gentlemen. During my lifetime abroad nearly all were in England tending their acres—or wasting the profits of those acres on gambling, drinking, and wenching—while the untitled masses fought to protect their right to do so. It’s not that my father was an anarchist, I hasten to say. The king and all his minions could not find a more loyal officer, but there were times when my mother and I had wavered, horrified by the carnage and resentful of a government which did not always seem to appreciate the sacrifices made in its name.
And now I stood facing a peer of the realm, only to discover he reminded me of generals I had known, Wellington in particular, though the earl’s nose was not so prominent. I am considered tall for a woman, but as he rose from behind his desk, he towered over me, exuding the authority of a man accustomed to directing the world around him. His once-handsome features might be marred by lines that hinted at more than normal aging—like Wellington after Badajoz and Toulouse—but there was no doubt who was in charge. I curtsied low then slipped into the chair he indicated with an imperious wave of his hand. Though the room was warm and well-lit, I felt as if the mists were once again closing around me.
We sat in silence for a long moment while he looked me over, his aristocratic forehead wrinkled in a frown. Chin high, I looked straight back at him, even as my innards quivered. His hair had once been brown but was now streaked with gray. His eyes, however, were the blue-green of a summer sea, sharp, and perhaps not as kind as I would have liked. But when had I ever expected a senior officer to be kind?
“Penelope Ruth,” he said at last. “Your parents must have valued faithfulness and loyalty above all else to name you so.”
I blinked, swiftly rearranging my thoughts to accommodate this unexpected gambit. “They did, my lord. I was brought up on tales of Penelope and Ruth, though I must tell you it is my mother who should have had those names. No one could have been more faithful or followed more closely where her husband led than Rosemary Ballantyne.”
“That is why I chose you,” he said. “At least in part. I felt the daughter of parents who named their child Penelope Ruth would have been raised with the virtues I desire in a companion for my daughter. And,” he added, raising one finger to keep me from responding, “I also felt that a young woman who had followed the drum all her life would have the necessary resiliency to cope with any problems she might find at Moorhead Manor.”
I stared, swallowing my words of thanks for the compliment, unable to summon an adequate response to his last remark. It’s not that I thought being a companion to an invalid would be easy. I had, in fact, wanted the position because it sounded more challenging than the other positions available. But there was something ominous about the earl’s words, something that brought back the vague threat of mists and shadows.
Clasping my hands together so tightly my knuckles cracked, I managed a fairly credible, “It is true that I have learned to survive in an often inimical world, my lord. But I must tell you Devon seems most peaceful in comparison. Surely you are not telling me danger lurks here.”
Once again he assessed me, his gaze shrewd though a trifle skeptical. “How old are you, Miss Ballantyne?”
“I will be twenty-one in early December, my lord.”
“And no gallant soldier snapped you up in all those years with the army?”
I huffed a breath, could feel my eyes snapping fire. There were some things no one should imply, not even an earl. “When one lives surrounded by men, my lord, one quickly learns how to keep them at arm’s length,” I returned in the freezing tone I’d used on importunate young officers.
“I beg your pardon, child, but you are far more beautiful than I anticipated. We are a predominantly a male household, and I fear to set the cat among the pigeons.”
“My lord!”
He shrugged. “But as you say, you are accustomed to keeping men at bay. I trust you will continue to do so.”
I bristled.
A bark of laughter put me in my place, the earl’s amusement turning my anger to chagrin. “Good,” he approved. “This household needs a woman of spirit. As you will see,” he added on a more kindly note, “when you meet my sister, Lady Emmaline, who came to us many years ago after her husband’s demise. A more soft-spoken, kind-hearted creature you will not find. She took over management of my household after my wife’s–ah–departure, but she knows not how to say boo to a goose, and managing my daughter is quite beyond her. I can only hope your vitality and independence do not send her into a fit of the vapors.”
“My lord,” I chided. And realized as his lips twitched just how unusual it must be for anyone to speak to the Earl of Hycliffe in such a tone. But I had spent my life with men of all ages and ranks, even the rudest and crustiest putty in the hands of a daughter of the regiment who had learned how to charm almost before she could walk. I had, consequently, been placed on a pedestal far above the male sea, descending into the ugliness of war only when there was no way to avoid it. I had seen it all during those long years on the Peninsula. Snow, ice, biting winds, scorching heat compounded by the dust of miles-long columns of tramping feet, pounding hooves, rolling caissons, and creaking wagons. I had endured floods and mud, forded rivers and streams. I had seen the carnage of battle, heard the anguished cries of the wounded, the faint whimpers, the dying calls for mothers and wives. I had known the death of Mother, Father, my hopes for the future.
Let Hycliffe think what he would. I had seen sights he could not even imagine.
“Now let us speak of Lady Vanessa,” the earl said, drawing my wandering attention back to an austere face that had lost its moment of wry amusement.
I sat up straighter and gave him my full attention. My new reality was that I was a paid employee, the earl my employer. I had been adapting to new situations all my life. This was merely one more challenge I must meet.
“As I stated in my correspondence,” he said, “twenty months ago my daughter suffered a fall from her horse onto rocky ground that has left her an invalid. A series of doctors have failed to find a specific reason why she has not recovered, but as the months pass we are beginning to lose hope.”
I murmured what I hoped were suitable words of sympathy.
“My intention,” the earl continued, “was that by adding a lively young woman to the household, you would not only provide the companionship of someone Vanessa’s own age but would perhaps encourage her to become more mobile. Yes, yes, a great burden to expect so much of you,” he added hastily, holding up a hand, palm out. “But wishing to see my only daughter marry, have children, lead a normal life, I grow desperate. Unfair, I know, to expect miracles from a young woman who has not yet reached her majority, but you are not exactly a typical young miss, now are you?”
I had to swallow before I could answer. “I am typical of young women who followed the drum,” I told him.
“I doubt it,” he shot back, although I could see he regretted his frankness the moment the words left his mouth. “What I meant,” he qualified, “is that surely not many young women of good family follow the drum, particularly after they reach marriageable age.”
This was true, I couldn’t deny it. A fact that had made me unique. But there had been no relatives in England to take me in. And my mother was not about to abandon my father to go live on the fringes of society, which was all we could afford. After all, I had a plethora of stalwart young officers to choose from right where I was.
Yet although I had suffered the inevitable fleeting schoolgirl infatuations, no man had measured up to my dream of the love exemplified every day by the devotion of my parents, no matter how terrible the world around us. Foolish girl, to want a love so few people would ever have.
“Vanessa can be difficult,” the earl was saying.
That got my attention. Stupid, stupid, to let my mind wander when I needed this position so badly.
“She was always a trifle autocratic. And now . . . after so long an illness, her temper has become . . . shall we say, frayed.” For a moment the earl steepled his fingers beneath his chin before slamming both hands flat on his desk, his face grim. “And if that were not enough, she has become overly attached to the young man who pushes her chair.”
He paused, glaring at me as if I had spoken my thoughts out loud. “Easily fixed by hiring someone else? Ha! Do you not think we tried that? You have no idea the anguish of seeing a poor sick child descend into hysteria—screams and sobs that go on and on . . .” The earl heaved a sigh and shook his head. “Have I frightened you, Miss Ballantyne? I wished only to give you a hint that this position is more challenging than most, but I fear I was carried away by my frustration. Shall I arrange transportation back to London?”
I gazed straight into those sad azure eyes and said, “My lord, after this last year of my life, I am in great need of a challenge to help me forget.”
“Very well then.” He nodded and rang a small brass bell on his desk. “I must warn you Vanessa is not best pleased with the addition to her closed little world, which means I am far from her favorite person at the moment. I shall have Mrs. Linnell take you up.”
Merciful heavens! Lady Vanessa didn’t want me? That didn’t bode well. I dropped a deep curtsy, keeping my head down to avoid the earl’s shrewd gaze, then turned and followed Mrs. Linnell from the room.
A footman was lighting the candles in the wall sconces as we walked down a long corridor on the floor above the earl’s study. But the flickering light did little to dispel the gloom of rapidly descending night. Though I had twice passed this way earlier, nothing looked familiar. It was as if an inimical hand had cast a spell during those few minutes I had spoken with the earl, enveloping this part of the house in sinister shadows. I shivered, then took myself sharply in hand. Young women who followed the drum were not allowed active imaginations. Or fragile sensibilities. Else I’d have been overwhelmed long since.
Mrs. Linnell rapped lightly on the door across the corridor from my room. It was opened by a rather burly yet hatchet-faced woman whose countenance, unaccountably, plunged my spirits straight into my half-boots. Oh dear. Perhaps my reaction was due to the look of intense dislike she was casting in my direction. Ah yes, I was invading her domain. Inwardly, I sighed and followed Mrs. Linnell into a large, well-appointed sitting room, where a roaring fire had been built up to the point of roasting the room’s occupants like pigs on a spit. The air was stifling, as if the windows had not been opened in years. Yet in spite of the heat, the atmosphere was almost as cold as the mountains in Galicia.
A wooden throne-like chair sat before the fire, its occupant glaring at me with all the animosity I imagined in a confrontation between Wellington and Napoleon. The face of the woman—little more than a girl—in the chair was beautiful, although her classic aristocratic English features were marred by lines of pain, or perhaps merely petulance. Her hair was guinea gold, her eyes more sky blue than azure. Somehow I had thought she would be older. And suddenly, in spite of her attitude, my heart broke for her. So young, so very young to be struck by tragedy. And with no mother to support her in her time of need.
“Lady Vanessa,” Mrs. Linnell said, “may I present Miss Penelope Ballantyne, whom his lordship has employed as your companion.” I curtsied. “Miss Ballantyne, Lady Vanessa.” I received no acknowledgment in return, the invalid maintaining her cold stare.
“May I also present,” the housekeeper continued, Miss Scruggs, my lady’s nurse.” Nothing more than a cool nod from Hatchet Face. “And this is Mr. Tremaine,” Mrs. Linnell added, and I realized I had been concentrating so closely on Lady Vanessa that I had failed to take in the young man standing directly behind Lady Vanessa’s chair. But when I did . . .
Oh dear. No wonder Lady Vanessa was enamored. How could the earl have been so foolish as to hire such a startlingly handsome young man to attend a girl at the most impressionable age? Mr. Tremaine was a tall, sturdy young man, with black hair and snapping dark-eyes that defied me to upset the balance of his neat little world. His features were too rugged to be called aristocratic, but he was far from a peasant. Lower gentry perhaps. His nod was so stiff it was a wonder his neck didn’t snap.
“David!” Lady Vanessa barked, and suddenly the whole chair was moving forward until it came to an abrupt stop just inches from where I was standing. A chair with wheels. Not that I’d never seen such a thing, but not one like this—the product of local carpentry, no doubt, the wheels fastened to the legs of an ordinary chair. “Is it true,” Lady Vanessa asked, “that you followed the drum on the Peninsula?”
“Yes, my lady, and in India before that.”
“Surely no woman can survive such experiences without being irreparably coarsened.” I stiffened as she searched my face. At that moment I was ready to take the next stagecoach back to London and to the devil with the practical business of earning my living.
“And yet I do not see it.” Lady Vanessa’s arrogant tone grated on my nerves like chalk on a slate board. “How is that, do you suppose?”
“My father was a ranking officer, my lady, not a trooper.”
“And your mother not from the ragtag bobtail female followers, I take it.”
“My lady!” Mrs. Linnell echoed my shocked gasp. Mr. Tremaine’s hand clamped down on Lady Vanessa’s shoulder.
A roof over my head. Food on the table.
Pride warred with common sense, and because I was who I was and because my parents had done everything they could to teach me to adapt to new situations, I finally managed to say, “My lady, please give your father’s choice the benefit of the doubt. We are close in age, and I hope I may be of service to you. As I hope living here will be of service to me. It was a very long war. I lost both my parents, and my greatest desire is to live as far from the cannon’s roar as possible. Please allow me to attempt to fulfill my duties. A few months, shall we say? And then if I do not suit, I will be on my way and leave you in peace.”
“You will want me to open the windows, go downstairs, go outside. Attempt to walk. Papa said so.” With each word Lady Vanessa’s voice rose more shrilly toward hysteria.
I quailed. There was no other word for it. I’d scarce begun and already I’d failed. The long road back to London stretched before me.
And then the strangest thing happened. Mr. Tremaine’s face softened to a look of sympathy and he said, “Come back in the morning, Miss Ballantyne. “You are needed here, and I believe Lady Vanessa will soon come to realize that.”
“’Tis true, miss,” Mrs. Linnell added, and to my astonishment Hatchet Face nodded her agreement.
“Then I’ll bid you goodnight,” I murmured and exited hastily before my legs collapsed beneath me. Surely most companions did not begin their employment so inauspiciously.
“Dinner is at seven, miss,” Mrs. Linnell told me as I fumbled at the latch to my room. “There you will have the opportunity to meet the rest of the household.”
Numbly I thanked her, staggered into my room and collapsed onto my bed. Dear Lord, however was I to cope with such a situation?
You are needed here.
I sat quite still for a very long time, the best and worst moments of my life chasing through my head, my parents’ many admonitions to bravery finally coming to rest on top of the heap as my jumbled thoughts coalesced out of chaos into some semblance of sanity.
For better or for worse, I was now a resident of Moorhead Manor, and I must make the best of it.