Miranda watched him stride into the other room.
In her mind’s eye, she could see him brush the flannel over his bearded chin, around his neck and into the hollow at his collar.
She pulled the pillow over her face, trying to close out the visions of him, but the gesture didn’t work.
She noticed him in a way she’d never been aware of a man before.
He was titled and she was certain that increased her awareness. Even though her father had lived among the peerage, he’d always kept her secluded from his life.
He’d really not wanted her observed. After all, she was his ward, not his child. He’d never accepted her.
She’d not particularly cared. He’d been gruff with the servants, not spoken to her governess and had been condescending to her mother.
The only thing she ever remembered her mother openly going against him was in her insistence that Miranda be their ward and a part of their family. Although Miss Cuthbert claimed her father didn’t have a bad opinion of Miranda, she strongly doubted it.
When Miss Cuthbert left, then heard of another governess post and wrote to Miranda about the employment, Miranda obtained it before telling her father. She presented it to him as a fait accompli.
His jaw had flexed when she told him and he’d agreed it might be best for her.
Within days, she’d started over in her new life. None of the servants seemed particularly welcoming at first, but she didn’t care. Getting away from her stepmother had made Miranda feel like singing and kicking up her heels.
She had sung and she’d danced with the baby in her arms. Willie’s mother usually spent Sunday afternoons with him, and spare mornings here and there, but she was completely happy to keep Miranda close at hand.
Miranda had been so thrilled to discover a new child was on the way.
Willie’s mother hadn’t recovered from the second birth. But Miranda hadn’t had time to mourn her as Dolly had been a fitful newborn and the first wet nurse hadn’t stayed. Willie had also been demanding because he’d been used to constant attention. Miranda had had a morose employer, Mr Trevor, a little boy with an over-abundance of energy and a baby who needed cuddles much of the time.
But in those circumstances, she and the staff became closer. They all rallied together, working to bring Mr Trevor back among the living, to keep Willie quiet and Dolly settled.
One night, after a particularly rough day, Cook stepped out of her role and brought Miranda teacakes after the house quietened. Miranda had been surprised, both that Cook had noticed Miranda hadn’t eaten and that she’d strayed upstairs, and taken on the duties a maid would normally assume. Cook had claimed that she’d not wanted to see Miranda faint away with a babe in her arms, as her own daughter once had.
They’d talked long into the night, alternating who carried the whimpering Dolly, and Miranda had realised she had a family.
Now, she gazed around the room at the meagre surroundings. She’d lived in poverty and in wealth. While she liked the tidiness wealth brought with it, she hardly noticed her surroundings, only aware of the people around her and their goodness or badness.
Chalgrove stepped back into the middle of the room and scrutinised the walls, windows and doors, before his regard stopped on her and locked with the intensity he might have used if she’d had the key to their escape.
Her hair, Chalgrove noticed, haloed around her head, pins loose.
He could easily understand why she was a governess, particularly after she got misty-eyed over a little one. Miss Manwaring would be good with children. It was the comforting feeling he’d sensed emanating from her. The children would like that. Hell, grown men would like it.
He’d never really reflected much about having children, but now that he was with Miss Manwaring he realised he’d want someone like her as a governess to his children.
It would make marriage easier, not having to worry about who took care of his offspring, or what kind of mother his wife might be. If Miss Manwaring would be a governess to his babies, his wife would never even have to check on them. He’d not even need to take much care in their raising until they were... Until his children were old enough to be in society. He would need to introduce them to the people among the ton.
‘Children are fine enough, once they speak and if they are well mannered.’
She jumped as if he’d slapped her.
‘My father would agree.’ Her lips and her chin went up.
He had been slapped in retaliation. A novelty. Oh, his long-time friends would offer verbal jabs and punches, but a woman didn’t do such a thing. He wondered if she’d jab again. He wondered if he could see those eyes flash.
Softly, he took in a breath. ‘Babies. They’re such a nuisance. Squabbling little things that take too much care. A woman’s work. Not suitable for a man.’
Her lips thinned. Her eyes narrowed.
‘Babies are best kept secluded from society. The crying and all.’ He spoke softly. The fury increased and, if her eyes were any indication, it was directed at him.
‘I’d really consider you overqualified to be a governess, having been raised in prosperity. I’d suppose this Miss Cuthbert is more suitable to taking care of the smelly little beasts.’
There was silence between them and her eyes reminded him of a lit fuse reaching its end where the powder would spark and flash.
‘I suppose you could be correct, Your Grace. Thank you ever so much for that wise observation from a man who was once a smelly little beast.’
He’d never heard the words ‘Your Grace’ spoken quite so directly, except on the rare occasions of ire when his mother addressed his father so. He tightened his lips to keep the smile hidden.
‘It is fortunate you have not married,’ she muttered.
‘And do you agree with my assessment on children?’
‘I think they do sometimes grow up into narrow-minded adults and that is a shame.’
He scratched his cheek. His narrow-minded adult cheek. ‘Tell me one good thing about a babe less than a year old.’
Her chin jutted his way and her body followed. ‘Their little wisps of hair. It is the softest thing. Better than any silk when it brushes against your cheek. And it has a soft scent. That is what love smells like. And then, when you hold them in your arms, if you have a heart at all, it just melts with love.’
‘Does it?’
‘If you have a heart.’
‘I suppose I’ve never held a child. Perhaps I will some day, just to see if I have a heart.’
‘It would be a waste of your time, I’m afraid.’
‘You are very sensitive about those little babies, aren’t you?’
‘I suppose I have ancestry of the lowest class, because I noticed quite a few of the servants smiling when they saw Dolly and even now as she’s older. It is the joy of childhood. She doesn’t yet know she’s better than everyone else.’
‘Oh.’
‘Willie does. He was born that way, though. I suppose it is because he is a male, Your Grace.’
The words were softer this time. She’d rested her gauntlet after testing it a few times across his face.
‘Perhaps it will be enlightening to hold a child. And see what love smells like.’ His eyes held hers.
‘Don’t be surprised if the baby wets on you. They tend to do that.’ Smug eyes. Lovely ones, and he’d bet his last pence that if he ever held a child, it would wet on him. It just would and the awareness jumped between them. She would have the last laugh on that.
‘And you still like them?’ he asked.
‘Of course. It would be impossible not to. For me.’
‘Some day, I will hold a child and, if it wets on me, I will think of you.’
‘Please do,’ she said, eyes smiling, accepting his surrender. ‘Babies are very good about sensing when a stranger is holding them and not good about hiding their feelings.’
Their eyes met and locked. In that moment, he imagined them in a room, a child between them and the laughter over the baby’s actions.
Both jerked their gaze away at the same time.
If they didn’t get out of the little room, he’d soon be as daft as the old woman. He needed to get his mind off the governess who held that babies smelled like love.
He changed the path of his thoughts to their escape. He had to get them free.
‘When you were brought here, did you notice anything about the door? How it might be barred?’ he asked. ‘Was it a simple board slid into a U-shaped holder at each end?’
She took in a breath and shrugged. ‘I rushed in. I didn’t pay much notice.’
‘How did they get you inside? I assumed you were taken just as I was.’
She stopped. ‘A man came to get me in a cart. He said someone I used to know was dying and she wished to speak with me.’ She clasped her hands, brushing a thumb over her wrist. ‘How could I refuse a dying woman? I thought she might have something to tell me about my birth. My parentage.’
He could see her point, but still, she wasn’t revealing all she knew. She wouldn’t be keeping secrets unless they were harmful.
For some reason, the knowledge saddened him. She was betraying him. He just didn’t know how.
Progressing to the door, he prodded the wood, taking out his frustration on it. He found a dark shape when he inspected the crack in the door facing. A board crossed on the other side. Barred, just as he expected.
‘If I had a small rope—the door is lax enough at the hinges so when I heave against it, pushing to the side, a crack opens up the height of it. I can see through the crevice.’ Then he crouched on one knee and examined the base of the door. He knelt completely, peering closely at the threshold.
‘With a string, if the hole is big enough, perhaps I could get it outside the door from above, over the board, then let it dangle down and trap the end to pull it up, looping it under the board. If I lifted one end and it slid, then it could tumble to the ground.’
She braced herself, interested. ‘Corset ties are small, strong, and might be long enough to be used to pull the board up from the outside.’
He crouched on his knees, scowling at the wood. ‘I’ve nothing to snag the tie so I can drag it inside. Even the spoon she left for us is too thick.’
She pulled out the butterfly pin in her hair and walked towards him. He stood and watched as she held out her hand and offered her hairpin. ‘Perhaps this will help.’
She tapped the sharp end lightly against her finger, smiling into his eyes. ‘My mother told me to always keep it handy when strangers were about.’
He took it, held it carefully in both hands, rotated it slowly and inspected it. High quality craftsmanship. Those sparkles weren’t glass. They were diamonds of a nice size.
‘Your mother gave this to you?’
‘Yes.’
‘We can use it, but we may break it. I will have it repaired, later.’
‘My mother would not care. It might help me and that is all that would matter to her.’
‘Susanna would have made me promise to buy her a new one if I damaged this one.’
‘Maybe she truly loved you. Her husband could have been a mistake.’
‘I am sure he was.’ His voice was resigned. ‘And he told me too much about myself to convince me that Susanna had true emotion for me. She—’ He stopped. ‘I suppose she cared enough in her own way. And she would have married me if she hadn’t had one marriage in the register to a man disinclined to turn up his heels—who knows, we both might have been content.’ He tapped his hand on to his knee. ‘He told me he’d made sure his brothers knew of the situation, so if he was found floating in the Thames, Susanna would be punished before anyone could work out who the body was. Said he’d told her the same many times.’ Susanna would be huddled in the corner crying if she were in the room with them.
He grasped the pin tightly. ‘Let’s try the corset tie.’
She moved to the second room, untying her corset. A few minutes later she stepped out, triumphant, holding them high. The ribbons dangled to the floor and he ignored the delectable roundness of her dress, but it was too late. He’d already committed her shape to memory. She wasn’t as willowy as he’d thought.
He pulled his concentration back to the task of escaping.
‘It’s getting dark. Unless one of her cohorts is standing right at the door, he won’t see anything—unless the board falls. If he notices earlier, then we’ll be aware there’s someone out there when he stops the string. But if I get the bar to drop—’ His voice dipped. ‘Even if he sees me, it’ll be too late.’
He took the corset fastening and looped a huge knot in the end. Then he poked the unknotted end through the crack at the top of the door, working the tie to the other side, until he stopped as only the large end remained. He slid the knot down the inside of the door, stopping when he reached the barred area.
‘Can you see enough under the door to snare the string?’ he asked.
Carefully, she pulled out her hairpin and slipped the straight end of it outside. She levered the pin one way and then the other while he dangled the string after each movement.
‘I felt it.’ She lifted the end so she could scrape the point against the earth, trapping the string and sliding it inside.
Bending down, Chalgrove scooped the tie, sliding it up, along the crack. When he raised it to the level where the bar rested, he had one end of the ribbon in each hand and the tie was looped outside around the board.
Slowly, he lifted both hands, fingers tense.
‘It’s not rising. I’ll lift the end as high as I can, until the board tilts out of the string. Then the downward force should make the board slide out of the other side as well.’
He lifted, putting all his strength into it. Snap. The tie broke and he stumbled backward from the momentum in his efforts.
Merde. The board was wedged too tight. His efforts were from the wrong side of the wood and the sideways pull had broken the string.
She’d moved out of his way when he’d caught his balance. Now they stood side by side.
‘I should have had a new corset made a long time ago. I knew it.’
‘I doubt it would have worked,’ he admitted, ‘even with a stronger ribbon. The wood is too tight and perhaps there is something wedged to hold it in place. Or perhaps the bar slides into iron brackets.’
Her shoulders dropped.
He grasped them. He hated disappointing her. ‘We’ll get out.’
They stood silent and he had to repay some of the comfort she gave him.
‘This was just a first attempt. We’ll be free soon.’
Then he moved so close he could scent her hair and his jaw tightened. He wagered her hair smelled the same as a babe’s. It did. It must. No wonder she liked them.
‘Don’t worry, Miss Manwaring.’ He touched her elbow.
Eyes gazed up at him. ‘I am. Worried.’
He clasped her arm tightly, reassuring her. In that moment, he recognised that even though the old woman was likely her cohort, Miss Manwaring wanted to be released as much as he did. ‘I’m missing something to get us out of here. I’ll find it. Then we’ll be freed.’
Her face was a mixture of despair and sadness. He could not bear it. ‘My pardon,’ he said, then he put an arm around her, keeping a blanket of air between them, yet nudging her to the bed so she could rest.
They both sat at the edge, shoulders touching, and their purpose intertwined. The silence grew between them, adding a feeling of camaraderie.
‘You don’t act like Susanna,’ he said. ‘She would be weeping. I don’t miss her any more. I haven’t in a long time.’
‘I’ve had a beau and know what it’s like to be disappointed. I didn’t want to wed him, but I was so intrigued by him that when he left my life, it was as if I mourned him. He made certain that his hair always had a wave over his forehead. He had sweet words for every occasion.’ She wound the corset string around the fingers of her left hand, interweaving it. ‘What was odd was that I felt sad after it ended. If he had been an upstanding man, I would have guessed I was recovering from love. I suppose it was the friendship I missed. The stolen moments. Or perhaps the flowery words and the dreams of my future.’
‘Stolen times can be compelling,’ he agreed. ‘I find them so.’
‘You must have many women hoping for your notice. I would imagine you are practically tripping over women who coincidentally find themselves in your path.’
He saw no reason to deny it. He recognised it on some occasions and found it flattering. He certainly had with Susanna. Then he’d shied away from it, hiding the annoyance that flourished in him when he saw the fascination with his title.
‘I don’t want another Susanna in my life and my mother was pushing for me to marry. So, I suggested she find a wife for me.’
‘That was daring of you.’ She unwound the string and tossed the ties into the corner.
‘Mother has trouble with decisions. She can’t make up her mind between two shades of fabric for a ball gown. Now she doesn’t complain that I can’t find a wife. She only bemoans that she can’t find one for me.’
‘What if she did and you didn’t like the woman?’ Miranda perched at the edge of the bed, back straight.
‘Easy enough. I would just ponder about a flaw I’d suggest and Mother would notice it and continue the search. She expects perfection. She mistakenly credits me with it and she wants the same in my wife, yet she can see the flaws in women easily.’
She rubbed her hands over her arms as if she were cold. ‘There is another reason that prevents me from marriage,’ she said. ‘Willie and Dolly. The children I care for. I can’t marry and remain their governess. Their father would forbid it and, even though Willie can be so annoying, I do care for them greatly.’
‘So, your heart is full.’
She nodded. ‘I do have a family and they need me very much. I need them, too.’
He couldn’t imagine living without being surrounded by blood relations. The ties that his family brought had enclosed him all his life.
‘You don’t feel alone?’ he asked.
‘In my mother’s house, I was always the ward. Deep inside me, I knew it. While my mother loved me and cared for me, and was all that I could ask, I could sense that...sometimes she didn’t feel happy. She could be moody even behind her placid face and perfection. I knew it and I stayed closer to Miss Cuthbert on those days. Where I live now, I am the governess. For the children, that is a stronger word than mother. They don’t remember their real mother, but they will remember me.’
Light flickered over her face when she turned to the window.
‘The children and I have that in common. I know nothing of the woman who gave birth to me and I’ve told them sweet stories of their mother. Every scrap I can find out about her.’
She shut her eyes briefly. ‘More terrifying than being abducted, or losing my own life, is the possibility of losing the children.’ Pain flashed across her face.
He would see that she was released. But if she had been in league with the old woman, it would be harder than she realised to return to the children she loved.
He mulled over his family. His mother. Sister and cousins. They normally faded into the background of his life. Always there. Always caring. A continuous, permanent connection.
If he could not secure their release soon, each day would bring less of a chance for freedom. He surveyed the room with the intensity of a warrior planning his next onslaught.