Chapter Six
Damian had been very careful to keep his distance from Mrs Lamb for the past two weeks. They had exchanged the odd remark relating to her new position, but for the most part he had left her in Pip’s charge.
He had been shocked at how pleased he had felt when she had agreed to his proposal. It wasn’t like him to feel so...giddy? He was used to being in charge of his emotions.
As a consequence, he had given himself some space. Got himself under control. After all, he wasn’t the sort of man who needed anyone else to make him happy. And now it was time to put the second part of his plan in motion.
Having dressed for the outdoors, he wandered down to the servants’ hall for breakfast.
Mrs Lamb was already sitting at the table, reading a newspaper.
She rose upon his entry. ‘My Lord. I am sorry I did not realise you had stayed over last night or I would have prepared more of a breakfast.’
He had purposely not relayed his intention to stay the night—the first time he had done so for two weeks.
He had wanted to take her by surprise.
‘No matter.’
‘Were you planning on staying for dinner?’
‘I was, if that won’t put you out too much.’ He could see her mind racing to take stock of what food she had on hand.
He browsed the offerings on the buffet. A couple of slices of cold ham, toast, marmalade, some sweet breads, and fruit.
‘Did you make this marmalade?’ he asked.
‘I did. From the oranges you provided and the last of the little oranges from your tree.’
A sly reminder that the tree needed some care, no doubt. Well, she need not bother. He was leaving England once he had accomplished his purpose. He had decided.
He poured himself coffee and put the ham on his plate with a slice of toast and a scoop of marmalade.
He took the seat opposite her and, having eaten the ham, slathered the preserve on to his toast. He was aware of her watching him.
He took a bite of toast. ‘Oh.’ He had not been expecting it to taste so extraordinary.
‘Is something wrong?’
‘What on earth did you put in it? It isn’t marmalade, its ambrosia.’ It was. It had all the flavour of oranges, but more.
She chuckled, clearly pleased with his reaction. ‘It is a secret.’
He wanted to smile back. Damn the woman. It seemed he had no armour against her charm. ‘You had better be careful. I may end up sending you a cartload of oranges instead of a box.’
‘Unfortunately, I have run out of the secret ingredient.’
‘Which is?’
She smiled enigmatically.
He laughed. ‘I will find out, you know.’ He tasted the marmalade again. ‘I think it is some sort of liquor.’
She raised an eyebrow. She definitely did not intend to reveal a thing. And he was enjoying teasing her, he realised.
She got up and poured herself another coffee and sat down again. ‘How long will you be staying, My Lord? Only I may need to send to the village for supplies.’
‘A day or so. I thought I might see if I could bag a duck for dinner before I started on some paperwork.’
‘A duck would be a welcome addition to what I have on hand.’ She looked as if she would say more.
‘What?’ he asked.
‘I was thinking I could use a walk. I would like to see if there are any mushrooms in your woods and there is a chestnut tree I have been meaning to have a look at over near the river. Unless you prefer your own company.’
‘Not at all. You would be more than welcome.’ It couldn’t be better. He had been thinking of broaching the matter on his mind over dinner, but he had a sense she might be more amenable to his proposal while wandering outside in the woods. As long as he didn’t overplay his hand.
‘Do you think it will rain?’ she asked. ‘It looked pretty overcast when I looked out earlier.’
‘It might. I can lend you an oilskin, if you wish and some boots, too. I think there are some smaller ones, left from—’ Damn it, he did not want to think about his mother.
‘No need. I have my own. I am quite used to tramping around in the wet.’
Of course she was. He kept forgetting she was supposed to be a servant, because she did not talk or act like a servant.
‘If you can give me some time to clear up here and get ready,’ she continued, ‘I will accompany you.’
‘No need to hurry. I have to clean my gun and that will take a bit of time. I’ll meet you outside in, say, an hour?’
‘Perfect.’
And suddenly the day, although gloomy, seemed much brighter.
He must be losing his mind. He left before he did something stupid.
When she entered the courtyard, Pamela discovered Dart waiting, leant against the stable wall, his gun beside him looking like a typical English nobleman off on a hunt. Sensibly clothed in raincoat and hat, his hunting accoutrements slung on straps crossways over his chest, he looked ready for anything. Not unlike herself. In addition, he wore a pair of gaiters to protect his trousers above his walking boots.
Seeing him so dressed reminded her of when she used to go with her father on the occasional shoot. Not that Dart was anything like her father. Not in the least. Even in his heavy rain gear, he looked fit and healthy and terribly attractive.
Gah. Not something she should be thinking about her employer.
He greeted her with a wave, shouldered his gun and side by side they set off across the park.
It had rained the day before so the long grass was wet. ‘This would be a beautiful lawn, if it was mowed,’ she said.
‘There is no one here to see it.’
True. His guests never arrived before dark and were gone long before the sun rose. At least, at this time of year. ‘Still, it seems a shame. It looks more like a hayfield than a lawn.’
‘Yes.’
She sensed he was not pleased with her line of conversation.
There was no pleasing the man. If she owned a house like this, she would want it to look its very best. Not only did he not seem to care, he seemed almost opposed to any sort of restoration that did not directly relate to his parties. To the making of money, in other words.
Rooks cawed somewhere ahead. ‘Noisy creatures. They must have a rookery nearby.’
‘Yes.’
Why had she bothered to walk with him? She would have been better company alone. She might not have bothered trekking as far as the woods either. No doubt she would have found a few field mushrooms hiding in all this long grass.
They reached the edge of the beech woods to the west of the park. Wet leaves slid underfoot, making the path treacherous.
Here and there brambles stretched long barbed tendrils to grab on to her skirts and his coat. Clearly this path was rarely used, though at one point it must have been a well-trodden route to the river.
They walked in single file and now and then he would turn to hold back a bramble or an encroaching thorn bush.
The air smelled of earth and damp. A typical autumn scent, dark yet not unpleasant. She kept her gaze peeled for any signs of fungi. They loved this sort of environment.
She spotted a blood-red ox tongue fungus clinging low on the trunk of one of the few oak trees in this woods. It was not a flavour she preferred and passed it by, remembering its location in case she did not find something more appetising.
Dart halted without warning. Looking for mushrooms off to the side, Pamela bumped into him. ‘Oof,’ she said. ‘What is wrong?’
‘Shh.’ He cupped his ear, gazing off to their right.
She listened. Nothing. And then she heard it. A sort of squeaking. Some sort of rodent? She grimaced. She wasn’t all that keen on mice or rats. As a cook she had to deal with them, but that didn’t mean she would seek them out.
‘Wait here.’ He pushed off through the undergrowth.
She followed.
He gave her a dark look over his shoulder as if to say on your head be it and continued on, but she noticed he was careful not to let twigs or brambles snap back at her.
A clearing opened before them and at its edge on the other side she could see the source of what she now recognised as whimpering.
A dog. Large and black and rangy.
Its ears flattened at their approach and its lips curled back from sharp-looking teeth.
‘Careful,’ Dart said as she moved around him. He unshouldered his gun. ‘Stay back. I may have to shoot it.’
‘What? No.’ As she drew closer she could see the source of the problem. Twine around the animal’s paw. ‘It is caught in a snare. Oh, you poor thing.’
‘Don’t get too close. It is liable to bite and you are now in my line of sight.’
She turned to see him loading his gun.
‘You are not going to shoot it,’ she said, horrified.
‘I will shoot it if it attacks. Have you ever seen a case of hydrophobia? No? I have. Believe me, you won’t want to take the risk.’
She knelt beside the dog warily. It whimpered and flattened itself to the ground. ‘It is not attacking.’
He hunkered down beside her and reached out. The dog snarled.
‘It’s all right,’ he said gently. ‘I’m not going to hurt you.’ The dog whined, then dropped his head. Its tail gave a hesitant wag.
He pulled out a knife from his belt and reached for the twine.
Pamela could see the dog was anxious by the way it tensed. She stroked its head. ‘It’s all right. He won’t hurt you.’
The dog looked up at her and in that instant Dart reached for the snare. The dog, quick as a wink, jerked its head around and snapped.
‘Damnation.’ Dart sucked on one finger.
‘Did it bite you?’ she asked.
‘No. I cut myself. Just a nick.’ He dived into his pocket and pulled out a pair of gloves. ‘I should have put these on in the first place.
The dog, some sort of retriever breed, though a bit of a mix of more than one something else, she thought, licked at its paw.
‘Now,’ Dart said firmly, ‘hold still.’
The dog whined, but surprisingly held still while Dart cut the snare.
The dog rose and shook itself.
Pamela peered at its paw. ‘I don’t think it’s been caught long. It doesn’t seem to be bleeding.’
She petted the dog’s head and stood up. Dart had removed his glove and was looking at his wound.
‘Let me see,’ she said.
‘It is nothing.’
She glared at him.
He rolled his eyes and held out his hand. ‘See. Nothing.’
The cut wasn’t deep, but it was still welling with blood.
‘Let me bind it up until we can put some salve on it at the house.’ She picked up the knife he had dropped beside his gloves and, turning away from him, cut off a strip of her petticoat.
Looking rather surprised, he held out his hand for her to bind the strip of material around his finger. ‘That will keep it clean,’ she said.
The dog was sitting watching them, its bright red tongue lolling and its tail wagging.
‘I wonder where he came from?’
Dart regarded the animal for a moment. ‘He looks a bit on the thin side. He might be a stray.’
He did look a bit scruffy.
‘Off you go,’ Dart said to the dog. ‘Go home. And try to stay out of poachers’ snares in future.’
The dog cocked its head, but didn’t move.
Dart looked about him. ‘It will go when its ready, I suppose. The river is this way. Not far now, as we have taken a bit of a shortcut.’
The dog followed them, occasionally leaving their trail to explore on one side or the other, but always returning after a few moments.
‘It looks like you have gained a new friend,’ she said with a chuckle.
Dart glared back at her. ‘Someone in the village will know who owns him.’
He sounded annoyed.
An Englishman who didn’t like dogs. Her father had always said you could judge a man by his dogs, how they responded to him would tell a lot about a man’s character. Did his lack of liking for dogs mean something?
The trees thinned out and changed from beech to the occasional willow and the grass grew longer and the ground became wet and squelchy. And then, before them, there was the river. Not terribly large as rivers went, about ten feet across, and quite sluggish with a low muddy bank and reeds growing along its edge.
Dart checked his gun, then walked quietly towards the bank. ‘I will see if there are ducks on the water. Please remain here,’ he said softly.
She nodded.
The dog disappeared off into the long grass. A moment later a duck broke cover with a whirr of wings and a quack.
‘Sacre bleu,’ Dart said softly, lining up. He fired. The duck came down in a flutter of feathers and landed in the river.
‘Devil take it,’ Dart said.
Without warning, the dog leapt from the bank into the water a little further down.
Pamela almost laughed at Dart’s helpless fury at the sight of the dog about to have duck for dinner.
Dart stomped back to her. ‘It is not funny. I didn’t come hunting to feed a dog.’
They watched as the dog snagged his prize and swam strongly for the bank.
Once out of the water it dropped the duck and shook itself from stem to stern. Then, to Pamela’s astonishment, it retrieved its prize, brought it to Damian and dropped it at his feet with a big doggy grin.
Dog and man regarded each other for a moment. ‘Well, that is a surprise.’ He patted the dog, picked up the duck and tied it to the lanyard at his belt.
‘Good boy,’ Pamela said.
The dog gave a half-hearted tail-wag, but its gaze was firmly fixed on Damian.
Damian shouldered his gun.
The dog looked puzzled.
‘We only need one,’ Damian said to it. ‘You will get your share. Now we have to find a chestnut tree, I believe.
Damian was enjoying himself, he realised to his great surprise as they wound their way back through the woods. He had forgotten that he had hunted in these woods with his father. The longer he had lived in France, bearing the responsibility for feeding his family, by fair means or foul, his life before Marseilles had begun to seem like a dream or one of those interminable stories his father used to tell about the good old days.
Providing for your household by hunting was somehow a great deal more satisfying than he expected. Far more satisfying than some of his nefarious activities.
He pushed the thought aside. That part of his life was behind him. Stealing scraps of food and robbing the poor box was something he would never have to do again.
He was sorry that his mother and father had not lived long enough to see how successful he had become, how he was restoring the family fortunes. And, in the process, exacting a fitting revenge.
The dog had wandered off for a few minutes, but returned as if to check on their welfare. Heaven help him, the last thing he needed was to be adopted by a dog.
‘What will you do if you can’t find its owner?’ she asked.
Like some sort of mind reader.
‘Find someone who will take him, I suppose.’
‘He seems like such a good dog. Why would anyone abandon him?’
In other words, why would he not want to keep him? If she thought she could pull on his heart strings, she was in for a disappointment. He did not have a heart.
‘Do you recall exactly where this chestnut tree is located?’ he asked.
‘Somewhere up ahead, I think.’
How did she even know one tree from another? He preferred the bustle of city streets. Trees he could do without. ‘What sort of trees are these?’
‘Beech.’
‘How do you know?’
The look she gave him was one of astonishment, mingled with pity. ‘By the shape of the leaves, the ridges on the trunk. All sorts of things.’ She chuckled. ‘And by all these little nuts underfoot.’
Oh. That’s what those were. ‘Are they edible?’
‘Somewhat. Not really a delicacy.’
‘The only thing I can recognise with any certainty is an oak tree.’
‘That is something, I suppose, since you are an English nobleman and there are oak leaves decorating your coat of arms.’
He laughed at her wry tone.
He looked around, to see if he could spot anything that might be a chestnut tree.
‘There it is,’ she said.
He glanced back and she was pointing off to his right.
And then he saw it. A tree of larger girth than the others around it and with golden leaves still clinging to its branches along with clusters of green fruit.
When they reached the tree, she looked about her on the ground. ‘I think it is a bit too early. There really aren’t many here.’ She gingerly picked up a twig with a couple of bright green whiskery-looking balls attached to it.
He reached for it.
‘Stop’ she said.
The dog barked at her sharp tone.
‘Enough,’ Damian said to him.
She laughed. ‘He is protecting you. Don’t touch them. They really are horribly prickly.’
‘Oh, now I remember.’ He remembered something else.
He took the twig and dropped it on the ground. He gently captured one of the casings between his boots and split the soft shell open. Out spilled three bright glossy reddish-brown nuts. He picked them up and popped them in her basket.
‘I do remember this tree. Not its location, exactly. But I remember doing this when out on a walk with my mother.’
It was a strangely painful memory he wished he had not recalled.
‘It is a good thing you have sturdy leather gloves,’ she said. ‘Mine are far too thin for the task. Perhaps, if you wouldn’t mind, you could gather up whatever we can find and I will shell them when we get back.’
He raked through the leaves and found quite a few more spiky shells. Almost enough to half fill her basket, but the majority of the harvest remained up on the tree. ‘Shall I climb up?’ he asked.
She glanced upwards. ‘Actually, I think it is time we returned to the house, because I think it is starting to rain again. Much harder than before.’
The sky had indeed got much darker.
And, if he wasn’t mistaken, the wind had picked up, too. He took the basket.
‘And we still haven’t found any mushrooms that you promised me for dinner,’ he teased.
She pulled her hood up over her hat. ‘Then we had better hurry.’
And hurry they did. They were almost to the edge of the forest when she dove off to one side. ‘Yes,’ she called out. ‘Exactly what I was hoping for. Chanterelles.’
She foraged around, popping small, yellow, frilly fungi in the basket he held out to her as she went.
‘There. That will be enough,’ she said.
The rain was coming down harder, but she was grinning from ear to ear as she looked up at him. She looked positively lovely. Sweet. Happy. Full of joy at such a simple accomplishment.
And he couldn’t stop himself. He bent his head and kissed her cheek. She tasted of fresh cold air and sweet, sweet smiles.
She gasped.
He stepped back, mentally shaking his head at his madness. What the devil had come over him?
She touched a gloved finger to her face as if she could still feel his touch. ‘Oh.’
And he wanted to kiss her again.
Properly. On her mouth. With his hands on her, instead of clutching a basket full of prickles.
A gust of wind brought raindrops splattering down on them.
She laughed. He grinned back at her. Indescribably relieved that she didn’t look the least bit offended. To his shock, she rose up on her toes and, holding on to his lapels, she kissed him back. A soft sweet brush of her warm plush lips on his mouth.
Instant arousal.
If there had been the slightest chance of a warm dry spot anywhere close, he would have pulled her close and devoured that delicious mouth. A pang seized his heart. Sweetly painful.
Another cold splat hit his cheek and brought him to his senses.
‘Hurry up,’ he said, his voice strangely rough. ‘Before we get soaked and you catch an ague.’ He took her hand and urged her forward, to the house. As they ran, the dog circled them, barking excitedly.
‘Foolish animal,’ she said, breathless and laughing.
He, Damian, was the foolish one. He wanted more of this.
But that wasn’t the plan.
They entered through the side door and discarded their outer layers and boots in the mud room while the dog remained outside, whining and yapping his disapproval at their disappearance.
Damian carried the basket through to the kitchen and set it on the table.
He opened his mouth to say something, but the vision of her glowing from exertion, windblown, and damp tendrils of hair clinging to her cheeks, robbed him of speech.
They stared at each other silently. The air tingled with unspoken longing. Not something he had ever experienced.
The dog scratched at the outside door. Dammit it.
‘I better...’ ‘You better...’ they said at the same moment and laughed.
‘I will see to the dog,’ he said. ‘I am looking forward to our dinner.’
‘Six o’clock,’ she said, smiling.
His heart felt the warmth of that smile all the way to the stables. He didn’t even care that the dog almost tripped him up twice.
It seemed he had reached a new understanding with Mrs Lamb and now he must use it to his advantage.
A pang of regret slid down his spine.
No. He regretted nothing. From here on, everything would go according to plan—as long as he remained in control.