The Gypsy Curse
“I’m to give cooking lessons to the kitchen maid of another house?” Mrs. Creedy, the cook at Brideswell cried, leaning rather fiercely on her rolling pin. Then she suddenly appeared to remember who she’d just barked at. “I mean, if that is what you wish, my lady, of course I would want to do so. But how would I fit it in with the tight schedule of Brideswell? What will Her Grace say?”
Julia smiled, moving back to let the kitchen maid scurry past with pot in hand. “We’ll find a way, Mrs. Creedy. And Her Grace has already approved.” Zoe was all for the idea, to help Hannah Talbot. “It might not be necessary at all. I shall speak to Mrs. Talbot today. She may not feel she needs help at the moment, but I want us to be there to support her.”
“All right, but it seems a strange business to me. A kitchen maid elevated to cook in one afternoon? And I’ve heard the new earl wants simpler food and less of it.”
Julia nodded. “Yes, his lordship is concerned about waste of food, which is quite admirable and noble.”
Mrs. Creedy snorted. “His lordship has no idea what needs to be done in a kitchen.”
“But he is in charge. And I want to ensure Hannah does not suffer as the new earl endeavors to bring American ways to his kitchens.” In the depths of her heart, she did see why waste would appall him. After all, he had been starving. But she would not let him hurt or frighten the poor kitchen-maid-turned-cook, Hannah, even if he believed he was helping her. He had claimed she had produced excellent meals, but rumors had come to Brideswell from the other kitchen maid, Tansy, that poor Hannah was quite out of her depth.
Cal’s anger at Mrs. Feathers was justified—Julia had been shocked by the bruises on Hannah’s arm—but he had used Hannah as a pawn to score a point on Julia. And she intended to make that right.
“Thank you, Mrs. Creedy,” Julia said. But as she walked away, she saw she was as bad as Cal. She was using Brideswell’s cook to score her own point on him.
But she would ensure Mrs. Creedy was rewarded for helping, and it would make things much better for Hannah.
She had reached the bottom of the servants’ staircase when Bartlet, Brideswell’s butler, stepped out of his room and looked at her in surprise. “Lady Julia! I did not expect to see you here. There is a call on the telephone for you. The dowager duchess. I fear she believes she is already speaking to you, my lady. There appears to be sound emanating from the receiver.”
Julia couldn’t help but smile. “I will take it on one of the upstairs extensions.”
Zoe had insisted Brideswell would have more than two telephones—it sported four. Most people were mystified. They all rang at once, for a start. And who needed so many? Their peers dismissed it as American vulgarity.
When Julia lifted up the telephone in the foyer, her grandmother was saying, “That is what I think, Julia. Of course you agree.”
Julia rolled her eyes. “Grandmama, I just got to the phone. I haven’t heard a word you said. But how are you?”
“Fine, fine, but let’s not bother with that. If I shall have to say it all over again, I will.”
Julia knew Zoe had given Grandmama a telephone to be cheeky, for the dowager duchess had first approached it as if touching the receiver would mean certain death. Now Grandmama was addicted to the thing. She’d realized its power. On any whim she could make a telephone call and disrupt the entire house.
“You have made a conquest, my dear!”
“A what?”
“A gentleman is smitten. Really, dear, do keep up. I invited the Earl of Summerhay to tea, and he would talk about nothing but you, Julia. All you must do is give a nudge in the right direction—”
“No nudging, Grandmama,” Julia broke in. “I do know Summerhay is interested—”
“Then what on earth are you doing about it?”
“I told him I was not ready.”
“Not ready? What are you waiting for, dear?”
Julia opened her mouth but the dowager rushed on, “If it’s Dr. Campbell, I’m afraid he is out of the picture. If he isn’t strong enough to defy all of us to pursue you, he isn’t good enough for you.”
Julia almost dropped the telephone. For she had not thought of Dougal when her grandmother asked the question. The first face that had come into her head had been Cal’s.
But she wasn’t in love with Cal.
“Grandmama, I must go. I am taking Cal—the new Earl of Worthington—around the estate so he can meet his tenants.”
“You call him ‘Cal,’ do you? And what does he call you? Please tell me it’s not ‘Julie.’”
“I can safely assure you it is not that.”
“Do not be too familiar with that man,” the dowager declared, over the wires. “I think he’s one who would need no encouragement. And since Nigel was overcome by madness and married an American, I dread to think what folly you might slip into if you are not properly guided.”
“I’m rather old to be guided.”
“That is often said by people who feel they are capable of living with their mistakes. The problem is that they have no idea how miserable that will be. Now I shall need to speak to Zoe. I think a dinner party is in order and I must convince my granddaughter-in-law to hold one.”
Oh, she must stop this. “What of your romance, Grandmama?”
“What romance, dear? At my age, a woman barely remembers what romance was.”
“That is not true. You can’t deny Sir Raynard is courting you. Did he not invite you to a musical revue in London?”
“He invited me to a jazz club, my dear. Of course I said no. Next thing, he would be wanting me to dance the Black Bottom with him.”
Julia had to clap her hand to her mouth. She had to smother the giggles that came from picturing her grandmother dancing a primitive-style dance with her bottom sticking out. “I’m sure he just wanted to introduce you to the new jazz music.”
“I fear not. An older gentleman in love can be utterly exhausting. The first thing he wants to do is prove how young he is.”
“Please don’t discourage him. I think it would be rather lovely for you to have a gentleman in your life.”
“I won’t discourage Raynard, dear, if you don’t discourage Summerhay. Now—to plan a dinner party. Toodle-oo, my dear.”
She heard the dial tone. Grandmama was rushing off to scheme. Oh dear.
Julia set down the receiver, and someone cried, “There you are!” right behind her, making her jump. Before her heart slipped down from her throat, her mother grasped her hand and towed her into a drawing room.
Mother carried a letter. Her green eyes sparkled and she looked filled with life. She had not glowed with such happiness for a long time. Not since before Will had died. Losing her youngest son had devastated Mother. A Catholic, Mother prayed every day at the small chapel Father had built for her on the estate. Julia was happy that whatever news Mother had gotten was good.
“Bradstock writes to say how much he enjoyed seeing us again, Julia. Of course he mentions you. Of course he is too much of a gentleman to be blunt, but I know he’s wrangling for an invitation. Viscount Yorkville is a disappointment—I heard he became engaged to an earl’s daughter. I am going to speak to Zoe and Nigel about throwing a ball. That would be the perfect thing to place you in the path of the duke.”
Now she knew why Mother was happy. “Mother, I am not interested in the duke.”
Definitely not, after the things he’d said about her charity work. He had apologized but her entire life would be dictated by a man like that.
“Julia, you are almost seven and twenty. You must be interested in the duke, whether you like it or not. No woman wants to be a spinster. At this age, you should have an establishment of your own. You are restless—and you can’t deny it. That is why you are dabbling in this rather scandalous work. Fallen women indeed!”
For years, after unhappiness in marriage, her mother had withdrawn from the world. For this, she had suddenly found strength. Julia wanted her mother to be strong. To no longer be trapped in mourning Will. But why did it have to be for something they were destined to fight about?
Zoe had confided how her American mama had wanted her to marry Nigel instead of Sebastian from the start. Now Julia found she was saying to her mother exactly what Zoe had said to hers: “Mother, I am not going to marry the duke.”
For the first time in forever, Mother set her jaw resolutely. She folded her arms over her gray cashmere cardigan. “Then who will you marry? There were no dowries before, so there were no offers. Now there will not be many, my dear, because of your advanced age. You will never be content as a country doctor’s wife. You were raised to be mistress of a grand estate. You would never be happy with anything less.”
“As for men attracted by my dowry—what good are gentlemen who assess you only by your money?” Julia asked. “I don’t want to be married to one. So many great estates are being sold. I could marry the duke and he could have to sell his home six months later. Nothing is certain in the world anymore.”
“Julia, your dowry will be sufficient to keep an estate—”
“Not if he gambles his way through it. Or invests it badly.” She spoke on instinct and pain flashed over Mother’s face. Father had gambled through the money, and he’d had no sense of investment at all. “I’m sorry, but it is true. I do not want to have to turn over my money to a husband and have no say in how it is spent.”
For she realized she didn’t blindly trust a man to be cleverer than her. Ten years ago she might have believed it, but not anymore. She now knew marriage was not an achievement, but a beginning—and she didn’t want it to be the beginning of a descent into hell.
She had no place in the world. She had been waiting for marriage to define her. She was not supposed to seek a career. And what would she do? Become a secretary? Build engines for locomotives? Take a job from a deserving man with a family to feed?
Her siblings seemed to have found their places. Nigel was the duke and he was a good, responsible one. Sebastian loved to paint. Isobel, her younger sister, wanted to become a doctor.
She needed to find her place.
Her mother touched her arm. “If you make a wise choice, darling, you will have nothing to worry about.”
“But that is not true! I do not want to hope and pray I marry a sensible man who doesn’t make my life miserable. There must be more for me. Why could I not make money of my own? Buy my own house?”
“You are a duke’s daughter. Dukes’ daughters marry.”
“And those who don’t become spinsters. This is the 1920s! There has to be more. More than this constant worry about suitors and titles, dowries and estates.”
“Those have been the reasons for marriage in our class for centuries.”
“It’s not good enough for me. I want love.”
“Love and affection can develop.”
And she knew that wasn’t enough, either. “I want more. I want to be swept away by the person I marry. I want to feel a whoosh. I want passion.”
Her mother’s mouth dropped. She went white, then blushed scarlet. But what was wrong with a woman wanting to go to bed with the man she had married?
She’d had few kisses in her life, but Julia knew what she’d felt when Cal had draped his shirt around her. Hot, trembling, aching—and filled with a dizzying need.
She had seen the way Zoe and Nigel looked at each other. Enough heat to ignite flames. She had seen Nigel sweep Zoe into his arms to carry her to bed—or Zoe lead Nigel by his necktie to his bedroom. Desire and joy had exuded from both of them.
How could a woman think of decades spent with anything less?
But Mother shook her head. “Passion is a terrible reason for marriage. It fades. It ends. And it leads to disaster.”
Julia swallowed hard. “Maybe it doesn’t have to. If both parties feel it.”
“A gentleman is very ready to feel passion for any woman who catches his eye. He may still feel it for you, but I assure you that will extinguish anything you feel for him. You are much better to marry for sensible reasons. If you marry a man like the duke, he can never take away your happiness if you are happy to be a duchess.”
“But your happiness was taken away—”
“Because I hoped for more, Julia.” Her mother drew herself up, looking almost as fierce as Grandmama. “If I had not had that rather hopeless hope, I would have been happy.”
Love would have made Mother happy. But what was the point of saying it?
She couldn’t trade an estate for her heart and soul. She simply couldn’t. Even if it meant eventually she ended up with nothing. For somehow she would survive. Wouldn’t she?
“I must go, Mother. I must visit some families on the Worthington estate. And look in on some of the Brideswell families.” She left the room and hurried upstairs. Julia threw on jodhpurs and a hacking jacket, along with her riding hat. The fashions had gone away from the old-fashioned riding habit. She went down to the stables and had a groom saddle Athena. Zoe and Nigel took care of the Brideswell families, but she still liked to visit them. And she had promised Anthony she would look after Worthington. Spurring on her horse, she galloped away to do this work she loved—leaving the problem of marriage behind her.
* * *
Being in the house made Cal feel like an animal trapped in a gilded cage.
He was walking down the drive when he saw an elegant white horse canter toward him. A woman was on top, wearing jodhpurs, a trim-fitting black coat, a black riding hat.
Julia. His heart rate accelerated and Cal felt nerves he hadn’t felt since he was a boy of fifteen, trying to coax a girl to let him make love to her because he was tired of being the only virgin in the Five Points Juniors Gang.
“I wanted to take you to see more tenants but Athena needed exercise,” she called to him. “And the chauffeur was fixing something on my motor. We can take one of your vehicles if you wish. Can I stable Athena here while we go?”
“I haven’t been down to see the stables yet.”
“You must go. The grooms will be wondering why you have not. I assumed you would have thoroughly explored the house and grounds. If I’d known, I would have taken you myself.”
She spoke to him like a disappointed schoolteacher—not that he’d had much experience with one of those. Mam had wanted him to be educated but he didn’t see much use for school. But his father bought books and pushed him to read, so they could debate, in the few hours his father was not working at some menial job.
“Worthington’s stables are admired throughout the county,” she went on. “There are some fierce horses, but there are gentler ones, too, so you could learn to ride.”
Julia’s smile entranced him, but it reminded him they were from two different worlds.
He had come to Worthington filled with defiance about his humble origins. Now, damn it, when he was with Julia he found himself wishing he had a better past.
Why should he damn well care? He wasn’t going to be like the Duke of Bradstock or the Earl of Summerhay. He hadn’t been to the right schools and he had the blood of simple, hardworking people in his veins.
He was never going to be good enough for Lady Julia. Not to marry her. But he could be good enough to seduce her.
What he wanted was to see her sparkling eyes filled with desire—for him—as he made love to her. That was all he wanted.
“It would be a good idea for you to learn how to ride. Most gentlemen ride. I would be delighted to teach you.”
“I’m not a gentleman,” he said, “and I don’t have any intention of trying to act like I am one.”
Hurt showed in her face.
He needed to remember that she was getting in the way of his plans. She was making him care about the people on the estate. Getting her to leave him alone would be a damn good idea.
But he wanted her. Wanted her badly.
“All right, doll,” he said. “Teach me to ride.”
* * *
Cal may not have ridden before, but he had a way with horses that surprised Julia. He went to the stables with her, dressed in his threadbare clothes, which shocked the grooms at first. But his engaging manner won them over. The head groom, Michaels, found a gentle mare for Cal.
As soon as Michaels gave him the reins, Cal stroked the mare’s nose, fed her from the palm of his hand. The horse whinnied happily as he stroked her withers.
Cal could make any female melt, Julia realized.
He spoke in soft murmurs to his mount, Empress, then tried to swing up onto her. The first time, he fell back, landing hard on the ground.
Julia cringed, certain his pride would be hurt.
But Cal laughed. A rich, husky laugh that spoke of joy and wickedness. He tried again, and got into the saddle with stunning grace. He seemed happier, less angry than he had when she and he had herded the pigs.
Within an hour, he’d progressed to trotting around the fenced-in ring. Julia had seen many gentlemen ride and some looked magnificent in the saddle, but compared to Cal they all looked stiff. He had such sensual grace. Watching the loose-limbed movements of his arms and shoulders made her want to snatch off her hat and fan herself.
“You are a natural. Born to it,” she called out.
“You’re my teacher. The credit is all yours.” He grinned. “Where did you intend to take me today? Can we ride there?”
“Lower Dale Farm. It’s one of the most productive on your estate. Yes, we can ride.”
She led him to a path that wound through the meadow below the stables. Wildflower blooms swayed in the late spring breeze. Bees buzzed around the flowers. The horses flicked their tails. The trail was wide enough for them to ride side by side. She could see Cal’s inexperience in the jerky way he handled the reins, but Empress was a patient, placid horse.
“Do you realize everything on this estate needs modernization?” Cal asked. “I’ve driven around on my own, looking at the farms. I went out early this morning.”
“You went to look at them?”
“Yeah. All of these farms would be improved with mechanization. They need tractors instead of horses and plows. They need to adopt some up-to-date methods of farming. New barns. New houses for the farmers. Those stone cottages are damp and cold. How does anyone survive the winter?”
Her heart lifted. For him to show such interest was a good sign. She was getting through to him. These were all the things she and Anthony had planned to do, but she knew she must take a different approach. “We use fires and once there is a good blaze going in the hearth, the houses do warm up. And the people of the estates are hardy. They are accustomed—”
“That’s not good enough,” he broke in. “What they need are—” He stopped and faced her with a stubborn look on his face. “Don’t look so smug, Julia. These are just observations.”
Bother. She had hoped to goad him into vowing to do all those improvements because she had “implied” the people did not need them. And it had been working, so it was impossible not to look victorious. “Of course. But I think the tenants are very happy as they are.”
“And I say they are not.” He frowned. Muttered, “Damn it.” Then he said, stubbornly, “I have to examine the place before I figure out what it could sell for.”
“I hadn’t thought of that.” She tried to sound disappointed. To sound as if she feared she had lost. But she was certain she was winning. So she asked, “What did you mean when you said you couldn’t live with yourself if you stayed and lived like an earl?”
He rode in silence for a while. Silence that made her uneasy. She yearned to know the answer. She’d been awake most of last night wondering about it.
Suddenly he said, “I’m obsessed with painting you. I’ve tried painting you from memory, but I can’t capture what I want. I need to have you sitting there so I can study you while I work. I need to paint you, Julia. It’s eating at my soul. I need you to pose for me.”
The fierce, vehement way he said it shocked her. But she didn’t believe he needed to paint her. “You are trying to change the subject,” she protested.
“I’m not, doll. I’m telling you the truth. For me, painting is like breathing air. I need it to live. And when I get obsessed over painting a woman, it drives me crazy. So will you pose?”
A searing image struck her. Cal in his white shirt with the sleeves rolled up, watching her with this fiery, intense yearning in his eyes. It took her breath away. But a lady would never reveal how unsettled she was. “You paint barely dressed as I remember.”
He gave her a scorching look. “I need to be comfortable when I paint. Would it bother you?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t know about having my portrait painted. I don’t think I would like to sit for hours and hours.”
“You don’t want to spend hours with me?” he asked lightly.
“What if I said yes? Would you explain what you meant?”
He shrugged, holding the reins. “I meant what I said.”
“Cal, you are a good man. A kind man. I saw that in the way you leaped to Hannah’s defense, in the way you want to help Ellen, and how tender and gentle you were with Mrs. Brand. You don’t seem like the kind of man to be vengeful or cruel.”
“Every man has his breaking point, Julia,” was all he said.
She wished she knew what exactly had happened when the old earl had disowned Cal’s father.
“I asked around the village about Sarah Brand, Julia.”
She jerked her head toward him. “You did?” He had been concerned about the Brands and that touched her heart.
“I heard she was seen driving with a man in a fancy automobile. How could she never have been found? Wouldn’t it have been easy to find a man who drove a car back then? Or didn’t they look for her all that hard?”
“What do you mean? I was quite young but I assure you that people scoured the estate in case she’d had an accident, Cal. Even I joined in to search—though my mother was shocked that I did.”
He moved at her side, thighs rising and following with the motion of his horse. He seemed lost in thought for a while. Then he said, “People said there were only automobiles at the great houses at the time. Brideswell had a car. So did the earl at Worthington Park. I heard the old earl had bought an up-to-date motorcar for his eldest son.”
Her horse reared beneath her. She had jerked abruptly on the reins, startling Athena. With a firm grip of her thighs, firm hands on the reins and soothing words she settled her horse. Was she just leaping to suspicions over what he was implying?
“Mrs. Brand said he had a flashy automobile,” he went on. “Which means she must have seen it.”
“Anthony loved it and drove it all over Worthington. Of course she would have seen it.”
“The man who took Sarah out in his car could have been one of the men at Worthington or Brideswell.”
“What are you saying?” she cried. “Brideswell’s car at the time was a rather sedate vehicle. And I can assure you that none of my brothers was flirting with Sarah Brand. Nor could it have been Anthony or John.”
“Why couldn’t it have been one of them?”
“John was young. Only fifteen. And Anthony—Anthony was already courting me.”
“You thought he was in love with you by then,” Cal said. “I expect he was. But Sarah Brand wasn’t a girl like you.”
She knew he was implying she might be blind to the behavior of her former fiancé.
“I just wondered if the law believed the man in the car was a toff, a local one, if they really investigated.”
“The magistrate did investigate, I assure you,” she answered stiffly.
But he had put a horrible thought into her mind. One she had never, ever considered before. Could Anthony—?
What if he’d had his way with Sarah and didn’t want to marry her?
No! No—Anthony was not that kind of gentleman. She was sure of it. “You are deliberately trying to poison my mind with awful thoughts so I’ll stop fighting you.”
She gave Athena a press with her heels and urged her horse ahead as they entered the woods. It was impossible to talk unless they shouted. Once they emerged from the woods into another meadow, Cal caught up to her. “Julia, that wasn’t what I was trying to do. I didn’t mean to hurt you. But there couldn’t have been many men who could afford an automobile. And would Sarah Brand really have gotten justice if an earl’s son was involved?”
“Yes,” she declared. “She would have done.” But in her heart, she feared he was right. About justice, not about Anthony.
Cal glanced around, frowning. “I smell smoke.”
“Cooking fires,” she said. Her hands trembled around the reins.
Strains of music came to them from the other side of a meadow—the jaunty notes of a fiddle, the jingle of a tambourine. And laughter. A group of children exploded out of the tall meadow grass, chasing a young, barefoot girl who ran like wild.
Julia had gathered control of herself, and she turned to Cal. “There are several Roma families who come here to live in the summer and autumn. In return they work to pick fruit and to pick hops later on. Hop picking is grueling work and the hop juice stains your hands terribly.”
“I would’ve thought the earl would have run them off his land.”
“Not the old earl—Anthony’s father. He appreciated their help with the work. They provided the labor he needed only when it was required, and they were quite content to camp and receive a stipend for their work. Though when John was the earl, briefly, he expressed dislike of the gypsies and did say he should not let them stay. Pegg, the land agent, talked him out of it.” She dismounted and smiled at Cal. “Shall we go and say hello?”
* * *
Cal watched as the children spotted Julia and ran to her. She laughingly greeted them all and his heart gave a pang. Something he’d never felt. He never wanted to be tied down. Yet he watched Julia and felt yearning.
He also knew he’d frightened her with his speculation. Why else would she have jerked on the reins and made her horse shy?
“You have all grown so much!” she declared. She carried on as if nothing had happened to disturb her. At first, that used to irritate him. He wanted to smash her sangfroid. Now—hell, now he found he admired it. Lady Julia Hazelton was tough and strong.
She motioned to Cal. “This is the Earl of Worthington.”
The girls, all dark-haired and lovely, curtsied to him. The boys bowed.
He dismounted also and tied the reins of his horse to a tree, leaving Empress alongside Julia’s mare, and he followed Julia into the camp.
Three caravans—wooden structures with domed roofs, all painted in bright colors—stood around a fire pit. Older men sat and smoked. A young man played a fiddle, all the while watching a young woman who worked with other women, preparing food. Others sat and sewed. The people treated him with deference, though they gave his clothing strange looks. Cal grinned at her. “Even to the gypsies, I guess I make a strange-looking earl.”
“Isn’t that what you wanted?” she responded teasingly. Then she left him to go and speak to the women of the camp.
Was she really teasing? Disapproving? That was the power of her controlled, ladylike expression. He couldn’t tell what she meant. Couldn’t see into her heart. And he wanted to know.
He wanted to break through that ladylike armor. Was she a mass of pain, passion and fear inside, and she’d never learned how to let it out? Was that why she’d been locked in grief for so long? That was another thing the villagers told him—that Lady Julia had spent too long grieving.
He stood, watching Julia, then felt someone staring at him and turned.
A woman with a grizzled, tanned face and white-streaked hair was seated in a chair by the fire. She motioned Cal to join her and handed him a drink—strong coffee. The gypsy woman smoked a pipe, and he had the sense she was someone of importance. Brightly patterned skirts spread around her. An embroidered vest and white blouse covered her upper body. Smoke wreathed her.
“I’m Genevra. So ye’re the new lordship, are ye?” she asked. “Ye don’t look all that happy to be in the role, milord, I would say.”
“I never expected to be an earl,” he said.
“Aye. I thought not. Ye look like a wild one.” Genevra chuckled deeply. “I notice ye’ve barely taken your eyes off Lady Julia for all the time ye’ve been here.”
His cheeks felt hot. “I like looking at her.”
“I can see ye do.” She wagged a finger at him. “She’s not for you.”
It was true, but her nosiness made him angry. “I don’t see that’s your business.”
“Ye’ve got a hot head, too.”
“I’m the earl around here. Did you pass personal observations on my uncle?”
“No. But then, he’s not like you.” She leaned toward him confidingly. “I’m happy Lady Julia did not marry Lord Anthony, the old earl’s son. No good would have come of that. Not when the curse claimed her.”
“You’re saying there’s a curse on Lady Julia?” There were gypsies in America, and they were driven away even there. People were suspicious of them, and many believed they could lay curses. He didn’t.
“Does she have to cross your palm with silver to escape it?” he asked mockingly, remembering his dark-haired mother with her long-lashed Irish blue eyes, telling him of pixies, leprechauns, spirits. He had loved the stories as a boy, got impatient with them as a youth. He didn’t believe in fortunes and fate.
Genevra shot him a haughty look. He’d offended her. “There is no curse on her. But if she had married Lord Anthony, there would have been. Have you not heard of it? You being the earl now, I thought someone would have told you. They’re all afraid of it, up at the house. Oh, they deny it, but they are. If Lady Julia had married Lord Anthony, the curse would have been on her. That would have been a tragedy. She is good, kind and generous of spirit. Her soul is pure.”
The gypsy blew a ring of smoke. It rose above her, lingered like a halo, then blew apart. “It will touch the woman you marry, milord.”
“What is this curse?”
“The curse befalls whoever marries Lord Worthington, milord. A century past, the Countess of Worthington ran down one of our children with a carriage. The child’s mother cursed whoever became the Worthington Wife. Callous and heartless, that countess was, and she paid the price. She lost six of her eight children to illnesses and accidents. Even the current countess has suffered much loss and much pain.”
“I don’t believe in curses. You can’t say a few words and change someone’s fate.”
“But someone did with yours, milord, when they told you that you were the new earl.”
He lifted his brow at her, and she laughed merrily. The sound was low and husky. “The funny thing about curses, milord, is that we make them come true when we seek hardest to deny them. Or avoid them.”
Then the fiddling music grew louder and faster. In the center of the camp, the children danced. Two girls clung to Julia, dancing with her. Julia twirled and laughed, nothing like a cool and austere lady.
And Cal couldn’t take his eyes off her.