Hunting the Hero (16 page)

First impressions were important. That moment could never be recovered.
 

She waited while her eyes adjusted to the darkness and she could see the occupants of the room better. An old woman sat in a far corner with a young nursery maid, darning by the insufficient candlelight at her elbow. Across the space, three sad little faces watched her. The eldest held the infant close to her chest.
 

Meredith’s temper rose that the children were smothered in darkness. It was little wonder they were not happy. This had to stop. Hoping there was nothing blocking her path in the shadows, Meredith walked across the room. The little girls drew closer to each other, their ease of yesterday long gone.

Meredith paused to look about and give them time to grow used to her presence. “Oh, what I wouldn’t give for a firecracker right now so that I might see how pretty you all are. How do you do? My name is Miss Clark. Do you remember me from yesterday? Lady Farnsworth sent me to be your new governess.”

The little girls stared and clutched their cloth dolls, saying nothing. Meredith turned to the older woman and held out her hand. “Hello. I’m Meredith Clark, and you are?”

The old woman didn’t move a muscle. “Ridgeway,” she mumbled slowly in a voice so thick Meredith almost couldn’t understand her. “I’m the nurse. Been with our lady since she was small. This is Miss Cunningham, the butler’s niece.”

“How wonderful.” Meredith withheld a groan. A servant with ties to the past lady of the house and a relation of the butler. They’d likely be against her, and the girl was sure to tell the butler everything she did in the day. “A pleasure to meet you both.”

She glanced about curiously and noted the table was bare of food and teacups. She’d thought she’d timed her arrival to coincide with breakfast or perhaps even morning tea, but that did not seem to be the case. She set her bag at her feet and worked her gloves from her hands. At least the nursery was warm enough for her taste. She flexed her chilled fingers. “If you could point me in the direction of my room, I should like to lay my things aside and commence my duties.”

The old woman’s right arm lifted awkwardly to touch Miss Cunningham. “Show her the room and fetch tea,” she mumbled again.

The girl stood quickly and rushed for a far door. Meredith followed, casting a discreet glance at Ridgeway’s right arm again. Was she injured?
 

The gloom was as thick inside as the previous room and Meredith stumbled to the window to draw back the drapes so she could see. Bright light flooded a cheerful, papered room, and feeling better, she smiled at the girl. “Thank you.”

The girl yanked the drapes closed, hiding the pretty wallpaper in darkness again. “They’re to be kept closed out of respect for the mistress.”

The mistress had died two years ago. Good heavens. Was the staff expected to mourn her still? The study and the lower rooms hadn’t contained the least look of mourning. If Grayling could move on with his life, surely the staff could, too. “But I cannot see anything with them closed.”

She shrugged. “Butler’s orders.”

Ah, perhaps that was the real reason. Was Cunningham a fanatic about the proprieties? Extending full mourning to the whole of the house might not be within his reach, but he could impose it upon the servants under his control and Grayling might never suspect. He did not wear mourning dress and by his own admission had begun to return to society. Did the butler still mourn the lady of the house? Was that the reason for Cunningham’s frosty greeting to a newcomer, a potential temptation?

Meredith sighed heavily.
 

At Ridgeway’s call for Miss Cunningham, the girl bustled out quickly, leaving Meredith alone in the dark. Meredith did not like the dark except when it was supposed to be. At night. She yanked open the drapes again, tied them back out of the way. The view from the room was lovely. She could see the gardens, the distant woods, and the spire of a far structure. A folly, perhaps. If she was still here when warm weather came, she might even enjoy exploring the estate in her free time.

She turned about to inspect her bedchamber. A narrow bed was crammed against the far wall, and a chair, a cupboard, a tall mirror, and a washbasin on a stand completed the furnishings. An adequate carpet covered a good portion of the hardwood floor to keep her feet warm when she rose from bed. Perfectly enough for a governess and exactly what she’d expected to find. There would never be indecent objects of pleasure in the drawers of the cupboard; there would never be another body to share the bed. Given the proximity to the nursery, Grayling would never visit her.
 

Fighting off her disappointment, Meredith hung her bonnet on the point of the mirror and tucked her bag beneath the bed. There. She had moved in. There wasn’t much else to do but return to the children and see what she could make of them. Despite the strangeness of the situation, Meredith was looking forward to the challenge. At the House and other places she’d plied her trade, she’d always offered advice to the new girls, molding their habits to be pleasing, teaching them to dress and present themselves as a lady should, even if they were so new from the farm that they still had manure under the soles of their slippers.

More than a few had gone on to permanent situations as mistresses. One had even become a wife. Meredith was rather proud of the fact that every one of them was better off with her help and had made something of themselves. They’d found their place.

What could she do to shape three sad little girls into happy creatures? Only time would tell. When she returned to them, the girls were just as quiet. Their silence bothered Meredith, as most children she’d encountered in her life were chatterers, every last one. She’d spend no time shushing these little mouths. Getting them to talk would be her challenge.

Determined to draw them out, she carefully parted the drapes, aware that if they were always drawn shut then the brighter light might hurt their little eyes. As she’d feared, when she turned, the children and the old woman were blinking their eyes rapidly.
 

With the new light, she studied the old woman quickly, noting an odd slant to her features. Her arm lay unmoving in her lap, her legs were tightly bound in a woolen rug. She
was
injured. Did Grayling realize he’d left an old woman, who possibly did not have free movement, in charge of his children?
 

Fearing it likely, she turned away to hide her rising annoyance. Grayling should have taken better care of such precious treasures. The children needed more than to sit about and do nothing. Resolved to lure the girls away to something pretty, she eyed the rest of the room. Unfortunately, she could see nothing with which to amuse them.
 

“No use getting your hopes up,” Ridgeway warned. “Cunningham packed it all away into those far cupboards after the mistress passed.”

“That’s terrible,” Meredith replied, noticing the little girls had leaned forward at the mention of their mother. She moved back to the warmth of the fire to watch them. When Ridgeway said nothing more of the late Lady Grayling, their little faces dropped back to their dolls.

They were so sweet and so sad. Meredith was determined to see them smile at least once before the day was through, but she didn’t expect much assistance from the other servants.

Ridgeway sat stiffly, right arm on her lap, odd smile twisting her lips into a frown. Except she wasn’t frowning. Her eyes were sharp dots of blackness as she cleared her throat. Swallowing seemed to be an effort. “They only have those dolls to play with. Can never get them out of their hands unless they’re asleep,” she offered.

While Meredith would love to get to the bottom of the puzzle of Ridgeway’s illness, her priority was getting to know the children. Meredith crossed to them and sank to her knees on the worn rug. They each held those little dolls tight against their chests, as if they expected her to snatch them away. “Do they have names?”

Silence greeted her question.

Meredith swiveled to look at the old woman. “Do they not speak?”

“They only speak when their father comes and then very little. The eldest hasn’t said a word to anyone else in close to two years. If not for hearing her with the master, I’d swear she was mute.”

Meredith turned back to little Lady Willow Hunt. A pretty face peeked out from beneath poorly arranged dark locks. The child’s large eyes were fathomless pools of sadness. Poor angel. “That’s all right. You don’t have to talk to me if you don’t want to, but should you ever, I would love to hear your voice. I’m positive I can talk enough for everybody in the room.”

Meredith leaned forward and kissed the top of the child’s head. She winked at the middle child and brushed her fingers over the youngest’s cheeks. Such pretty children needed to be loved in the light, not neglected. She left them and opened all the drapes in the room and one window. It was time to end the mourning before these children were irreparably damaged. Grayling couldn’t possibly want his children to live in the dark.

Dust motes swirled in the air and she regarded the cupboards Ridgeway had spoken of. She tested the door handles, but they merely rattled. Locked. How cruel to store precious things but keep them in plain sight. Meredith raised her hands to her hair in search of a pin but remembered at the last second that she’d cut off her hair. Drat. How was she supposed to pick a lock without one?
 

As luck would have it, Lady Willow’s hair provided the needed pin. Meredith inserted it carefully into the lock and concentrated on the task at hand. It proved only the work of a moment before the lock clicked and the doors swung open freely.

Inside lay a treasure trove of childhood toys. She swiftly took inventory. Dolls, puzzles, pigskin balls to toss about. A closed box caught her eye. When she opened it, Meredith found it contained only brightly painted blocks of wood. Perfect for young Poppy to stack and knock down.

Meredith carried it across the room and then sat on the rug before the fire. She relished the heat permeating her gown before she upended her treasure and began to play. It took only a minute for the children to slide onto the floor and investigate what she was doing. She made a tall stack with the colored blocks and held her breath as Poppy reached for them.
 

When they crashed to the floor, she laughed and restacked the pile. As she did, she caught the swift exchange of glances between Willow and Maisy before they inched closer. Had they expected Meredith to scold a baby? Meredith gritted her teeth and considered how willing Grayling might be to providing her with a list of his former governesses. They deserved to be hunted down and expelled from their current positions.

When Poppy again destroyed her tower, the other two joined in and made their own. Meredith eased back a bit to give them room to play. Poppy chortled and stood. The next tower was felled by a wild swing of her foot. Meredith reached for her. “Be careful of your sisters, Poppy, love. Don’t hurt them.”

Meredith released the child and she squatted down to better view her sister’s work. This time, she used her hand and both Maisy and Willow complained. “We weren’t done yet, Poppy.”

Willow held Poppy back with one hand. “Wait.”

“No, not yet.”

“Now.”

Meredith smiled as the girls worked together to build a tower as tall as they could make it and then leaned back so Poppy could destroy it. Blocks scattered far and wide and the girls scurried to retrieve them to build again.
 

Meredith glanced at the nurse who was staring at her with openmouthed surprise.
 

“I think we’re going to need more blocks,” Meredith suggested.

“That and an increase in your wages,” Ridgeway said. “That was remarkable. How did you know Her Ladyship used to play on the floor with them?”

“I didn’t, but it seemed the sensible thing to do.” Meredith shrugged. “Wait till you see what else I’m capable of.”

CHAPTER 14

SILENCE COULD ONLY be good, surely. That’s what Constantine kept telling himself as the second day of the new governess’s employment progressed. So far, he had managed not to wander upstairs and see for himself how Calista, Meredith (God, he wished he knew what to call her) and his daughters were getting along. Maybe he could continue to call her Calista, but only in his innermost thoughts or when they were alone and no one could hear them. Especially in his fantasies.
 

No, he had to get used to the change.

Meredith Clark—another name that didn’t suit the woman. The name sparked images of a cold bookish spinster. There may be little gentle sweetness in the woman, but steel, nerve and cunning she had in spades. She
was
kind. He’d never thought her heartless, which was why he had no concerns about her influence over his daughters. Under her guidance they might grow to be strong young women, not one of those listless beauties waiting for a man to sweep them off her feet and propose before their first season had even begun.

He shook his head and cursed under his breath. What was he doing planning so far ahead? He knew, and Arabella had warned him, that Miss Clark might not stay in his employment for very long. She had a past that would scandalize many if the truth came out. Yet the thought of her leaving wasn’t a pleasant sensation. Not now he had her under his roof where no man would dare touch her.