Elizabeth Mansfield (9 page)

Her eyes, as she looked up in startled embarrassment, were, Tom thought, beautifully dark in that pale face. “
Lord!
” he gasped, getting to his feet and moving trance-like toward the stairs, “someone should have told me household service could be like this!”

“
What?
” the woman on the stairs asked, blinking down at him in confusion.

A strangled gurgle came from deep within Mrs. Nyles’s throat.

“The name is Tom,” he said, taking her hand and helping her down the last two steps, “and I was saying that if I’d known there were housemaids like you on the premises, I should have entered service years ago.” He grinned down at her, amused and delighted by her complete astonishment. He put one hand on the bannister and the other on the wall, thus quite effectively preventing her from being able to move away from him.

“
Told
you that he’d like it,” Daniel chortled, delighted at seeing his friend involved in a flirtation.

“Hush, Dan’l,” Betsy murmured, an instinct warning her that something was wrong. “The poor lass looks frightened.”

“Frightened?” Tom asked, glancing at Betsy over his shoulder. “Don’t be foolish. I mean her no harm.” Looking back at his prisoner, he took her chin in his hand. “You aren’t afraid of me, are you, girl? Surely every fellow for miles about must be after you—and more forcefully than
this
. Why, I haven’t even tried to
kiss
you yet.”

The astonished woman gasped. “Mrs. Nyles!” she sputtered furiously. “Who
is
this person?”

Mrs. Nyles choked, unable to speak. “I … I …” she managed in a choking voice, her face reddening alarmingly.

“Go ahead and kiss ’er,” Daniel urged, laughing. “There ain’t a female in the world wouldn’t prefer the deed to the word.”

“You’re quite right,” Tom agreed, slipping an arm about his quarry and pulling her to him.

“Don’t you
dare!
” the woman exclaimed in a voice of unmistakable authority. “I realize you’ve mistaken my identity, but even a
maid
ought to be safe in the kitchen of this house!”

Tom’s grin faded. “Mistaken your identity?” he asked, his eyes narrowing.

“Oh,
heavens
,” Mrs. Nyles cried, finding her voice at last. “I’m so … I d-didn’t
dream
… oh, yer
ladyship
, I—”

“Your
ladyship?
” Betsy gasped.

Daniel choked and Tom whitened. Dropping his hold, he backed away from her aghast.

“Yes, I’m Lady Wyckfield,” Camilla said furiously. “And
who
, may I ask, are you?”

The three strangers, utterly confounded, stood rooted in their places. Mrs. Nyles rose from her chair and approached her mistress fearfully. “I don’t know
how
t’ apologize, your ladyship,” she mumbled. “They’re r-relations of Mr. Hicks, y’ see, an’—”

“Relations of Hicks’s? I don’t believe it!” her ladyship said, looking at them sternly.

“It’s true, ma’am,” Daniel said, stepping forward with head lowered abjectly. “He’s my uncle.”

“
Is
he indeed! Well, he won’t be very pleased with you when I report to him how you comported yourselves in my kitchen!”

“No, ma’am, he won’t,” Betsy said miserably. “We’re dreadful ashamed. We never meant no harm,
though. It was the apron, y’ see.”

“I see quite well. Is it your habit, young man, to accost everyone who wears an apron in that
libertinish
style?”

Tom, recovered from his initial shock at learning her identity, began to find the entire scene very amusing. “Not
every
one, my lady,” he said, his lips twitching. “Only the very prettiest ones, I assure you.”

“
Tom!
” Betsy protested in a hissing whisper.

Camilla flushed in irritation. “Oh, you find this incident amusing, do you?” she snapped. “You’d do better, fellow, to recognize the depravity of your character and attempt to mend your ways.”
Good heavens
, she thought, surprised,
I sound just like Ethelyn
.

“Depravity, ma’am?” Tom regarded her with an irrepressible glint of humor. “If a pinch on the chin is depraved to you, you must be leading a saintly life. However, I’ll try to mend my ways if you’ll tell me how to go about it.”

She frowned at him, not knowing what to make of his unchastened manner. “For one thing,” she declared repressively, “you can try to show some sincere
regret
—”

“Am I
not
showing it? I assure you, ma’am, that I’m positively awash in regret.”

“One would scarcely notice it,” she said suspiciously. “But if you are
truly
sorry for that lecherous behavior, it’s at least a beginning.”

“Oh, it’s not my
behavior
I’m sorry for, ma’am. It’s my
lack
of it.”

Something in his eyes told her that she would make no headway bandying words with him, but somehow she went on with it. “Lack of it? I don’t understand.”

He grinned broadly. “What I’m sorry for is that I didn’t kiss you when I had the chance—before I found out who you were.”

“
Tom!
” Betsy cried, appalled.

Tom kept his eyes on the lady’s face. “Now, you see, my chance is gone forever.”

“What I
see
, young man, is that you’re quite incorrigible!” She gathered up her skirts and turned to mount the stairs. “I suggest, Mrs. Nyles, that you rid yourself of your ‘guests’ as soon as possible. When they’ve gone, please come up to the sitting room to go over this list with me. In the meantime, I hope you will make it clear to these … persons … that they will not be made welcome in this kitchen ever again!” With that, she marched up the stairs without a backward look and disappeared from view.

There was a moment of stunned silence in the kitchen. Then Mrs. Nyles stalked up to Tom and swatted him smartly on his backside. “You jackanapes! A fine stew ye’ve got me into!”

“Y’ should’ve told us,” Betsy piped up in his defense. “How was he to know?”

“Was
that
Lady Ethelyn?” Daniel asked. “Will she take it out on
you
, Mrs. Nyles, like she did on my uncle Hicks?”

Mrs. Nyles hooted scornfully. “Oh, no, don’t worry yer head about
that
. It was only Lady Wyckfield. Camilla, y’ know. She’s the soft one.”

“Camilla,” Tom mumbled, staring up at the stairway.

“Lovely name. Suits her.”

Mrs. Nyles struck him another blow. “Never mind her name, ye great looby! That tongue o’ yours’ll get ye in fat trouble one o’ these days.”

She turned away and began busily to clear the table. Betsy, meanwhile, paced about before the fireplace. “Good God!” she exclaimed suddenly. “If that was the
other
lady … then
she’s
the one goin’ to be mistress of the London house!”

“My Lord!” Daniel stared at her in dawning alarm. “Ye mean—?”

Tom groaned and dropped into a chair, struck all at once with shame. “She means that, because of me, Mr. Hicks will never be able to hire us now.”

Wordlessly, his friends sank down beside him. This latest blow was too great to permit them even to utter words of consolation to him. The last of the spirit that had sustained them all day deserted them, and they were aware only of the dire hopelessness of their situation.

Mrs. Nyles, crossing from the table to the larder with the left-overs, paused and squinted at them. “Why are ye sittin’ about like three stones fer a passerby t’ trip over?” she demanded. As far as she was concerned, the incident with her ladyship had been a momentary embarrassment and had passed without causing any permanent harm. She gave it no further thought. “My Henry’ll be leavin’ without ye if ye don’t take yerselves over to the stables.”

“No use goin’ to London now,” Betsy said, unable to keep her unshed tears from showing in her voice.

“No use?” Mrs. Nyles, stowing away the food, wrinkled her brow in confusion. “Why ever not?”

“Didn’t ye hear what Tom just said?” Daniel asked morosely. “My uncle won’t be able t’ take us on now.”

“Ye mean because of what just passed?” Mrs. Nyles strode back to them and, taking a stance in the middle of the room, glared at them with arms akimbo. “You three fall more easy into low tide than anyone ought! Don’t make so much over nothin’. Just ferget all about that meetin’ with her ladyship and go about yer business.”

“Ferget it?” Betsy asked. “Ye can’t mean it.”

“O’ course I mean it! Don’t even think on it no more.”

“But Mr. Hicks would never—”

“I wouldn’t even
mention
it to Mr. Hicks, if I was you.”

“Not mention it?” Betsy eyed the meddlesome cook dubiously. “But if he should engage us, and then the lady sees us, what then?”

“She won’t even remember you, most likely. By tomorrow, she won’t remember yer faces, and by the next day she’ll have fergot the, whole affair.”

“Do ye really think so?” Daniel asked, his eyes brightening hopefully.

“I’m fair certain. Do y’ think the lady has nothin’ better on her mind than the likes o’
you?
Get along to the stables, now, afore ye miss my Henry altogether.”

She shooed them cheerfully toward the door, fluttering her apron after them as if they were a brood of chickens.

“We don’t know how t’ thank ye, Mrs. Nyles, fer all yer kindnesses,” Betsy said at the door. “We shan’t ever forget ye.”

Daniel leaned down and kissed the cook’s cheek. “No, we shan’t. We don’t forget as easy as some.”

“If it’s her ladyship ye mean,” Mrs. Nyles retorted with spirit, thwacking him on the arm with a combination of affection and reprimand, “she don’t ferget the things she oughtn’t. Ye should feel glad that y’ ain’t important enough fer her to remember. An’ you, too, ye lummox,” she added to Tom, swatting him on the backside for good measure.

Tom made a mock outcry of pain and rubbed his rear tenderly. Then, just before taking off after his friends down the path to the stables, he gave her a saucy grin. “It may be that her ladyship’ll forget us, and it may be she won’t,” he tossed back, laughing, “but if I’d have kissed her, she’d have remembered me right enough!”

Mr. Hicks was feeling nervous. It was a most unusual feeling for him; he was not the nervous sort at all. But today, for the first time in all the years he’d worked for Miss Camilla, he was conscious of strong pangs of insecurity and guilt. He and Miss Camilla had always been straight with each other, but now he was about to play her false.

He frowned resentfully at the three troublemakers lined up stiffly before him awaiting his inspection.
Damn
his nephew for placing this awkward situation in his lap! “Let’s have a look at your fingernails,” he barked irritably.

The three of them stuck out their hands, and Hicks gave them all a thorough inspection. “Very good. Now, stand up straight and let me make certain you look presentable.”

If he hadn’t been told the lurid tale that lay hidden behind the innocent faces they presented to the world, he’d have had to admit that their appearances were perfectly satisfactory. Collinson, his nephew’s friend, was tall and quite prepossessing now that his lightish hair had been properly cut. Daniel, although perhaps a bit too stocky to make an ideal footman, was nevertheless strong and capable. And Betsy was an endearing little puss. Miss Camilla would undoubtedly take a shine to her, especially since she was so modest about the child she was carrying. Betsy had used good sense in decking herself out, for the dark, plum-colored dress she wore lay quite neatly over her swelling belly, and, although it didn’t completely hide her condition, it didn’t call undue attention to it either. Hicks would have been proud to recommend all three to Miss Camilla, if only he didn’t have to hide from her the dark facts of their recent history.

If it weren’t for his fond memory of his dead brother, Daniel’s father, he’d never do it. As sympathetic as he was to their plight (for no one who’d ever heard an account of a victim of a press-gang could blame them for what they’d done—not if he had a heart in his chest), he never, in ordinary circumstances, would get himself into a situation in which he’d have to lie to Miss Camilla. But these circumstances were different. Daniel was his only remaining relation—his own flesh and blood. Without his help, poor Daniel and his friend might even end up on the gibbet!

If only he didn’t have to lie. But the two men had no letters of commendation and no one at all to vouch for them. So he, who had never before said or done a dishonest thing to his mistress, had concocted a fabric of lies and deceits to legitimize their backgrounds. And while one part of him was glad to assist them to start a new life, the other part writhed in remorse and guilt.

But there was nothing to be gained in dwelling on the matter. He’d made up his mind to recommend them, and he would go through with it, nervous or not. More than half-a-dozen candidates for posts on the household staff of Miss Camilla’s new abode were probably already awaiting him in the corridor outside Miss Camilla’s rooms in the Fenton Hotel. There was very little time left to make certain all would go well. “Let’s get on with it,” he muttered, looking them over with a last, critical appraisal. “Let’s go over our stories once more, before we leave for the Fenton. Remember, I’ll present
you to her ladyship, and then she’ll ask you a few questions. Shall we try it out? I’ll be her ladyship. Let’s say I turn to you first, Thomas. Step forward.”

“A giant step or a baby step?” Tom asked, teasing.

“No levity, if you don’t mind, Thomas,” Hicks said reprovingly. “Remember that a footman attempts to be invisible and inaudible unless otherwise required.”

“Invisible and inaudible, yes, sir,” Thomas said agreeably.

“I am not ‘sir,’ I told you. I’m
Mr. Hicks
to the staff!” He rolled his grizzled eyebrows heavenward to beg for stamina. “May the Lord grant me the patience to deal with these loobies. Now, Thomas, I’m her ladyship, and I turn to you and say, ‘What’s your name, my good man?’”

“Thomas Collinson, your ladyship.”

“And where did you work before?”

“I was underfootman to Dr. Newton Plumb of Derbyshire.”