Rather than take them to her boudoir, Lady Hester surprised Desirée by leading the way to a drawing room just beyond 7A. On the door of what had been Latimer More’s home before his marriage to Jenny was a sign Desirée hadn’t noticed before: Vicar In Residence.
When she paused to stare, Adam looked at the door and said, “Gawd, the old phony’s back. He’s been on some sort of pilgrimage—but not for long enough as far as I’m concerned.”
“A minister lives here?”
“Keep your voice down,” Adam said, “or you may tread on a toe or two. I’m not sure you met the Reverend Larch Lumpit. Moved in last year when Lady H. took pity on him because he had no living. You were away by that time. We don’t see much of him when he is here because he has become a contemplative—prays all the time except when he’s eating what Barstow makes especially for him.”
“I heard about him,” Desirée said without adding that everything she’d heard had been awful. “Fancied himself heaven sent to take care of Jenny?”
“Mmm. Even managed to get himself moved from 7B to 7A after Latimer moved next door. Said the stairs were too much for him. Barstow dotes on him—only don’t ever suggest she does. I think he takes her kindness as his due.”
“Take me.” Desirée blinked and clamped her mouth shut. Tossed over his shoulder and carried swiftly to his rooms where he would close the door softly to avoid attracting attention. Kissed, again and again, perhaps standing just inside the door because he couldn’t bear to wait another second, or stretched out on his couch…or slid beneath the quilt on his bed. He might take off his jacket and waistcoat, unbutton his shirt even. He might…touch her again while he kissed her…
“Desirée! What is it? Are you ill.”
Her beloved’s voice. She smiled softly at him. Her beloved’s voice shouting at her. “Oh, yes, yes, Adam dear. No, I mean no, there’s nothing wrong and I couldn’t feel better. I was lost in thought for a moment.”
“I think I’d give you a penny for those thoughts,” he said.
Desirée lowered her eyes. “Well, I believe I should expect a higher price than that.”
“Children?” Lady Hester called from the drawing room.
“If I were forty, or fifty, she would still treat me like a child,” Adam said in low tones, ushering Desirée ahead of him into a room with the palest of moss-green silk on the walls.
Desirée was grateful for Lady Hester’s intrusion and looked about the room. So recently had it been redecorated that Desirée could smell paint. Striped cream and green draperies were drawn back from windows with a view on the small side garden between Number 7 and the tall fence that separated it from Number 6. Mounded snow covered every bush, clung to the top of the fence and covered the grass.
“Sit by the fire,” Her Ladyship said. She tugged on an embroidered linen bellpull beside the fireplace and waved Desirée and Adam toward a small but plump sofa in plum-colored velvet. “Come along, come along. Barstow will see to it that we get some refreshments.”
“It’s very nice in here, Lady Hester,” Adam said. “Tasteful. I had no idea it was being changed.”
She fluttered the fingers of one hand. “It was overdue and since I have new plans…” She let the sentence trail away and Adam didn’t press the subject.
Sir Robert had walked as far as Number 7 with them before excusing himself. Desirée wanted to know more about Lady Hester’s friendship with him, if that’s what it was, and why she had failed to mention the man earlier. But first, and much more so, Desirée wanted to get away. She wanted, oh, how she wanted, to be alone with Adam. How long, she wondered, would they have together.
She sat where Lady Hester had told her to sit, but Adam remained standing. Why would that dreadful man who had accosted her say evil things about Adam? He stood with his arms crossed, his head slightly bowed, and she felt that his thoughts had taken him far away—not something she cared to contemplate.
“There you are, Barstow,” Lady Hester said. She settled into a slipper chair. “What is that sour look for?”
Barstow’s considerable bosom rose with an exasperated breath she made no attempt to suppress. “I thought you and that Sir Robert had taken yourselves off.” A solidly built woman, she wore nothing but gray and her hair, uncompromisingly styled, was the same color. The effect was formidable, but Desirée knew how much kindness there was in this faithful servant.
“We were out,” Lady Hester said. “Now I am back—with Adam and the Princess. We should like tea, please, and some of cook’s delicious pastries.” She glanced at Desirée and smiled. “I want you to help me put some meat on this girl’s bones. She is much too nervous and has little appetite. And this is the time of her life when she must bloom.”
Desirée thought better of asking why.
“Young things looking toward marriage and children are more sure of fulfillment if they are in robust health. Isn’t that so, Barstow?”
“Yes, Milady.”
The heat in Desirée’s face annoyed her since Adam would see it. She would not look at him.
“Was there something else, Barstow?” Lady Hester asked.
“Yes, Milady. The Reverend Lumpit has come home.”
Spivey here:
Look, I’ll only take a moment of your time but surely you see how distraught I must be. Just as I have success within my grasp. Just as I begin to believe that with the help of a few women who don’t know what they’re doing I will see Adam Chillworth married to Princess Desiré e and safely installed—far away from here—Lumpit returns. I told him not to. The man is an Empty I once thought would help me—in getting rid of Latimer More to be precise.
A nightmare, I tell you. It was a nightmare. The wretch began to think for himself and ruined everything—almost.
And Barstow refers to Number 7 as his home!
Lumpit must and will go.
But I do think things may be shaping up rather well with Adam and Desirée, don’t you? Now, nothing particularly interesting will happen between them today, so you can all just run along. I’ll let you know when you’re welcome around here again.
Oh drat, I am not to be given a moment’s peace.
“Yes, sir, Reverend Smiles, sir. I hear you, sir. I’ll be there at once. Goodness and mercy? That’s the subject of the next class? I’ll look forward to it. Show and tell? Show and tell what? Oh, yes, yes, of course.”
An example of my own goodness and mercy? Why, there are so many that my only difficulty will be to choose just one.
“Au revoir.”
“I noticed he had,” Lady Hester said of Reverend Lumpit’s homecoming. She untied her bonnet and gave it to Barstow. “The sign on his door? Necessary, you think?”
“Oh, yes, Milady. He’s a man of God and it’s important everyone knows 7A is a holy place now and not to be entered lightly. Reverend Lumpit doesn’t like visitors. He prefers to go to those he helps.”
“Is he in there now?” Lady Hester’s soft mouth had drawn somewhat tight.
“He is, and resting after his journey. I’m making him a light snack right now.”
“Half a dozen pasties, a pound or two of cheese, a loaf of bread, a bathtub of ale—”
“Enough, Adam,” Lady Hester said, but her eyes crinkled. “Reverend Lumpit must wait until you have tended us, Barstow, and that may take some time.”
Barstow left, her face like stone, and Lady Hester settled herself more comfortably. “So,” she said, “When she returns you will have left. I will tell her you had to go and I will make sure she doesn’t find out where you are—which will be in the attic, of course.”
When the ensuing silence became unbearable, Desirée popped to her feet and went to the windows with unseemly haste. The pressure of the day had become more than she could bear. Adam had spoken out for them to be allowed to talk together—alone—yet he had made no further attempt to do so.
“I don’t mean to upset you,” Lady Hester said. She spoke in a soft tone. “Do you think I sometimes doubt myself and say the wrong things? If you do you are right. I want the best for you—I have wanted the best for all of you. This time, ah, yes, this time the task is great.”
“What task would that be?” Adam asked with quiet fervor.
“I think you know,” Lady Hester said. “May I be forgiven if I am wrong, but I will be an accessory to something I believe in and which I think you two believe in. I don’t know, I just don’t know, but I will take the chance with you. I will do what I can to help. All I will say as a warning is that if you betray my trust, you will break my heart.”
Desirée trembled. She turned her back on the pristine beauty outside and regarded Adam, soundlessly appealed to him for his strength and wisdom.
Adam stared back at her. “What would be a betrayal of your trust, Lady Hester?” His eyes didn’t as much as flicker.
“Squander love and you will betray me,” she told them. Looking at Adam she added, “Take love lightly, use it to quiet your hunger then fall back when you confront the disapproval you know must come, and I shall know despair—as will you. Think with your heads as well as your bodies. If there is a way to have what others would deny you, find it, but do no harm. Now leave me.”
Now what do you have to say for yourselves, hmm? Embarrassed, aren’t you? And you should be. You should have listened to me. I always told you Hester was a brilliant woman.