Eight Hunting Lyons (The Lyon’s Den Connected World)

Chapter Three

S he appeared to Daniel like a lump of fine loam, which is to say, Miss Lina looked like dirt. She wore a dust-covered dark cloak, a tattered widow’s veil, and he heard the heavy clomp of men’s boots as she descended from the mail coach. He knew her immediately, of course. Despite the way she seemed to drop from the carriage onto the ground. He knew she was taller than she appeared, but she had chosen to be small now. Her hands were hidden, her valise was minimal, and she moved as little as possible as she looked around the inn yard.

And yet as he looked at her formless shape, all he saw was potential. He knew the things she painted in the morning when she thought no one cared. He knew because Mrs. Dove-Lyon had shown him them. She’d also explained that Miss Lina had come to England on a slave ship, been freed by Mrs. Dove-Lyon, and had worked as a bookkeeper ever since.

A bookkeeper! When she could paint such amazing things? It was criminal, and so he vowed to bring her here where she would have sun, good food, and room to grow.

He stood as was his wont, with his hands in his pockets and his face shielded from the sun, though it was nearing dusk. He didn’t move from his place next to his horse in the corner of the posting inn. He was there to see that his housekeeper found Miss Lina, greeted her respectfully, then escorted her to his home. He employed Mrs. Hocking because she had a good eye for what he wanted disturbed and what he did not. She also made excellent cream tea and hevva cake. He’d sent her to pick up Miss Lina because Mrs. Hocking was the only female in his household and therefore a better choice than his gardener. Unfortunately, he was mistaken in that.

Mrs. Hocking was busy eating her dinner from a basket meant for Miss Lina. She hastened to finish it as the other passengers scattered, leaving the lady to stand awkwardly in the center of the yard. His housekeeper finished her food, cleaned up the crumbs on her dress, then hopped down from the cart seat.

“You Miss Lina?” she called, her voice loud enough to be heard throughout the courtyard.

His new bookkeeper turned at the call. If she said anything, he couldn’t hear it.

“A’right. Toss yer things in there.” Mrs. Hocking pointed to the back of the cart. It was not the proper way to handle a lady, but then Mrs. Hocking wasn’t a London servant who knew how to greet a woman. She was all business which—up until now—hadn’t bothered him.

Fortunately, Miss Lina didn’t seem to mind. She set her bag in the back of the cart, then stood there with her head bowed and her hands hidden away.

“Best use the privy ’ere,” continued his housekeeper. “His lordship got the only good pot and it’s a long haul taking yer piss out at the castle.”

Daniel frowned. What a thing to say! And it wasn’t true, was it? But what did he know about his servants’ privy habits?

Miss Lina hesitated, probably because she didn’t understand Mrs. Hocking’s heavy accent.

“Go on, then! Right over there.” Mrs. Hocking stabbed her fingers in the appropriate direction, but in the end, she had to lead the way. Miss Lina followed, still looking like formless dirt somehow floating across the innyard. Daniel waited, his misgivings gnawing at him. Should he have picked the girl up himself? Mrs. Dove-Lyon had told him Miss Lina was skittish around men, and it would be best if he had a woman to settle her in. How a woman who worked in a gaming hell could be skittish around men was beyond his understanding. Either way, he’d selected Mrs. Hocking and now his housekeeper was eating more of Miss Lina’s food while the lady used the inn privy.

Hell.

He was about to take over when Miss Lina emerged. She glided back across the yard to where Mrs. Hocking was climbing into the cart. Miss Lina made it to the side and waited as if she didn’t know whether to climb onto the bench or into the back of the cart with the sack of last season’s potatoes Mrs. Hocking purchased at the inn. Eventually his housekeeper jerked her chin toward the bench.

“Up you go,” she said.

There was a moment’s hesitation and no wonder. Miss Lina wore a great deal of fabric. She had to gather her skirts as she climbed. Eventually she managed it while Daniel admired the flash of shapely calf. Then he watched Mrs. Hocking shove the half empty basket into Miss Lina’s lap before clucking at the mule that drew the cart. A moment later, the animal started plodding his way to the castle.

Daniel watched them go, frowning as he mounted his own horse. It would take them the better part of an hour to get to his crumbling front door. He’d make it in a fraction of that time if that were his destination. Unfortunately, he had work to finish in the opposite direction. It had been a wet spring, but summer was drying things out quickly. He had one last wheat field to walk, checking for areas that needed water, and then he would go greet his guest.

That was his plan, except nothing ever went according to plan. There were dry patches in his tenant’s field, so he helped carry water as needed. That was backbreaking work that he did alone because his tenant Bob Mellin was laid up with a broken leg. Truth be told, Bob Mellin was often laid up. The man was a drunken sot, but his wife and two children deserved better, so Daniel helped when he could.

Didn’t make it easier, though, when he heard the bastard cursing his wife and kids from his bed while Daniel kicked the mud off his boots from doing the man’s work. Bob Mellin was a waste of a human being.

“Hello, Anne,” he called out as he knocked on the open cottage door. “How are you doing today?”

Anne rushed out from her husband’s bedroom. “Oh, my lord! I didn’t see you there. Bob’s much better now. No more shaking, but he’s weak as a kitten.”

He hadn’t asked about Anne’s husband, but he took the information with a grim nod. “Not a drop of ale or beer for him, remember? Clean water and your good cooking. That’s all.”

She winced as she picked up her youngest child to keep him from crawling into the fire. “I know you said that, my lord, but—”

“No buts. That’s my rule. If you want my help with the fields, then he can’t get a drop.” He leaned over and checked on the older boy’s chalkboard. There was a great deal of doodling on the slate, but also the correct answers to several mathematics problems he’d posed the day before. Little Jory was smart, and right now he was playing with several stones and sticks that he arranged on the floor. “What are you doing there?” he asked the child, though he had a good guess what it was.

“I’m thinking about where to put stuff,” the child answered as he pointed at the rocks and sticks. “Wheat. Sheep. This ’ere is the hill, and that…” He pointed to his shoe. “That’s the peat bog. It’s wet ’ere, which is good in summer, but—”

“Spring would drown the seeds—”

“Yes, an—”

That was as far as the conversation went before the lad’s father started bellowing for a drink. The words didn’t matter. Fury filled the little home while Anne and her two boys fretted in silence.

“You can’t have naught but water,” Anne said as she crossed into the bedroom. “His lordship says—”

The foul curse words that followed should have set Anne to blushing, but she simply whimpered and looked to him. After all, Daniel was the one who had said no, so it was up to him to silence the man’s howling.

He squeezed Jory’s shoulder and straightened up, going to speak to the drunken lout that would have been tossed off the land years ago if Daniel had had a say in it. But this was his late brother’s land—now in his son’s hands—and Daniel hadn’t had control until now.

The room stank and the arse in the bed was the source. “Good God, did you piss yourself?” he asked, already knowing the answer. He closed his ears to the stream of abuse he endured from the man’s mouth. Instead, he stepped back out to grab Anne. “I’m going to take him down to the river and wash him. Do what you can inside here while I’m gone.”

“What? But he ain’t strong enough. He’s had a cough these last days. Says it’s the Witch Woman who cursed him.”

“The Woman in the Woods is no more a witch than I am,” he snapped. The belief in witches ran deep in Cornwall, and he hated the ignorance of it all. “There’s no curse. Just a drunk who blames everyone else for his problems.”

“He don’t mean what he says.”

“He does and a whole lot worse.” He looked down at the boy who would need to grow up much too fast. “Jory, bring the soap and a brush, plus fresh clothes. I can’t carry that and your father by myself.”

The boy nodded and scrambled away. Amazing how quickly the entire family managed to ignore the filth still bellowing from the bedroom. The man was definitely on the mend, as his voice had power, but it sputtered and died when Daniel stepped into the bedroom and spoke in a low, threatening tone.

“I’m going to carry you to the cart, Bob, and then we’re going to wash the piss off you—”

“Go to the devil!” the man bellowed as he swung weakly with his right fist. It was a slow swing with even less force behind it. Daniel caught it and squeezed until the man yelped.

“Swing at me again, Bob, and I’ll leave you in the river to drown with nobody to miss you. I spent the last three days fixing things you ought to have done afore now—”

“Damned nestle bird. Everything were better when yer brother was alive!”

So he’d heard all his life. His brother Peder had been the flashy, titled earl. Daniel was the usurper “nestle bird” who helped work the fields, mend the fences, and plan the crops. Until he’d gotten tired of it and decided to put his love of art to work for him. Prinny himself had lavished praise on Daniel for discovering a treasure trove of Greek urns, one of which had been gifted to the Prince Regent. But that never changed the endless diatribe of abuse he got from those he helped the most. “Too bad Peder isn’t here to help you. He’s as dead as your busted leg right now.”

Peder had died seven months ago leaving behind a wife and two boys, none of whom was equipped to manage the estate. So Daniel had returned home, going back to working the fields, mending the fences, and ordering the crops all on behalf of his nephew Stefan, the new earl. Which meant that he had to deal with the likes of Bob Mellin.

“I take care of what’s my own,” the man sulked.

“The hell you do. Annie was a lively woman once. You’ve beat that out of her. Jory’s bright as a new penny, but he’s going to be trapped here cleaning up after you. You’re a miserable sot, but God gave you a gift in this broken leg. You get sober while you’re mending, and you do the things that a man does.”

More curses in a banal circle of repetition. Daniel lifted him out of bed and didn’t feel sorry when he jostled Bob’s leg hard enough to make him scream. The leg was set between three pieces of wood tied tight with rags. It was safe so long as Daniel didn’t do any of the murderous thoughts that churned through his brain.

He was none too gentle as he dropped Bob into the cart and then rode to the nearby stream. He barely held back his contempt when he scrubbed the idiot raw because the bastard couldn’t manage it himself. Soon the humiliation was too much, and Bob crumpled to his side and sobbed like a child. Daniel was at a loss then. Bob was in pain, obviously, but Daniel had little sympathy for an adult who drank himself into a stupor every day and then blamed witches that his life was a mess.

He stood to the side and left Bob to cry it out. As it was taking a while, he eventually settled on the side of the stream next to Jory.

“This is what drink does to a man,” he said to the boy. “You’ve got a good mind, Jory. One I mean to help if I can. Don’t let yourself turn into this.”

Jory said nothing beyond a sober nod, and suddenly he felt a fierce kinship with the child. No one would likely ever see or appreciate whatever Jory did to help his family, and yet this quiet child would probably keep his entire family from starving. Especially since the boy was whip-smart and willing to work.

“A man does the work that needs to be done,” he said softly. “That’s all. Don’t look to anyone else to see it or love you for it. It won’t happen—”

“I’ll see that the work gets done,” Jory said, and Daniel could hear a man’s strength inside his tiny body.

“And I’ll see that you get help doing it.” A vow between the two of them sealed when they shook hands. And then they turned back to Bob who had begun to shiver.

It was time to dry him and take him home. It was full dark by then and Bob was exhausted, so it was a little like dressing a large rag doll. Jory helped, and Daniel mourned that any child should see his father like this. But better he see it and be warned than become it.

The house was quiet when he returned. The babe asleep in the cradle, and Anne doing what she could to refresh the bed. Daniel set Bob down then took Anne outside as he tended to their nag.

“He won’t change. You need to think of yourself and your boys.”

“He was a good man once, my lord. He made that cradle himself. Carved it with his own hands.”

Daniel shook his head. “I don’t much care who he was. It’s who he is now that worries me. What of your kin? Have you no father or brother to take Bob’s work?”

He knew she did, but she would not acknowledge it. “Bob’s me husband and he’ll come round. He just needs a drying out—”

“And will he stay dry? If he doesn’t, then we’ll be right back here again. And you can’t count on me doing this again.” He was willing to help, but he had other responsibilities.

“You’ve been right kind, my lord.”

“Write to your kin, Anne. I’ll support you if you want to show Bob the door. He’s been nothing but a drain—”

“He’s my husband!” Outrage made Anne’s slender frame quiver with indignation. “I’m a god-fearing woman. I won’t throw away a good man—”

“What about a bad one?”

She pressed her lips together and lifted her chin. And who was he to blame her for sticking to her marriage vows? Just the man who was cleaning up the mess.

“Do you feel loved, honored, and cherished, Anne? That’s what he promised you at the church. He broke those vows first,” Daniel said. “So by my way of thinking, you’ve got every right to send him packing.”

She folded her arms across her chest. “I don’t think the vicar would agree with you there.”

No, the man definitely would not. But at least Vicar Trewin was easier to talk to than this illogical woman. “He’s the next person I mean to see,” he grumbled as he set out hay for their nag. Then his expression softened. “Get some rest, Annie. There’s a full day ahead, and I don’t doubt that you’ll be shouldering the worst of it.”

She dipped into a curtsey. “Thank you, my lord. You’ve been right kind.”

He had been, but his gut told him that it was work thrown to the wind. Bob would find a way to destroy it all. “Make sure Jory practices his letters. He needs to read and write if he means to do better than his father.”

“I will, my lord.”

He saddled his horse and headed out. He meant to go home then. Miss Lina likely had arrived and settled in by now. He needed to greet her. But he had told Anne that he would speak to the vicar next and though it had been an off-hand comment, he wouldn’t break his word.

So he headed away from his home to have a discussion with a stodgy man of faith. At least he’d get a good pint at the vicar’s home, though after tending to Bob, he decided he’d much rather have a meat pastie instead.

He looked at the rising moon and cursed under his breath. Mrs. Hocking had likely gone home by now which meant Miss Lina was wandering about his crumbling castle all alone. He really hoped she didn’t break her neck in the process.