Chapter One #2
They drank in silence. The sherry was excellent—smooth, expensive, wasted on an afternoon interview that felt more like an interrogation.
The duke set down his glass with precise care. "Hendricks will show you to my aunt's chambers. She is expecting you. Fair warning…. She will test you. Thoroughly. If you survive the first day, we will discuss your duties in more detail."
"Thank you, Your Grace."
Margaret rose, curtseyed and turned toward the door.
"Miss Hartwell."
She looked back.
The duke stood very still, backlit by the window, his expression unreadable. "I may be cold, but I am not cruel. If you find the position untenable, you may leave with a month's salary and a reference. I will not trap you here out of spite."
The statement should have been reassuring. Instead, it felt like a warning. Or perhaps a confession.
"I appreciate your candour, Your Grace."
She left before he could say anything else that might unsettle her further.
Hendricks waited in the corridor. "This way, Miss Hartwell. Her Grace's chambers are on the second floor."
Margaret followed, her mind churning with the strange interview.
The Duke was exactly what she had expected, cold, controlling, and determined to manage every detail. But there had been moments, brief, barely perceptible, where something else had shown through. Grief, perhaps. Or simply exhaustion from carrying authority he did not want.
The thought was dangerous. Margaret had learned long ago not to see her employers as human. Seeing them as human meant caring. Caring meant vulnerability. And vulnerability was a luxury that women in her position could not afford.
They reached the second floor. Hendricks led her down another corridor—this one slightly warmer, with windows letting in weak February light.
"Her Grace's chambers," Hendricks said, stopping before an ornate door. "She is awake and expecting you. Ring if you require anything."
He withdrew. Margaret stood alone in the corridor and drew a careful breath.
This was the moment that would determine everything. First impressions with dying duchesses were invariably crucial.
She knocked gently.
"Enter."
Margaret opened the door and stepped into chambers that were a stark contrast to the rest of the house. These chambers were warm and bright. Cluttered with books and correspondence and evidence of an active mind refusing to acknowledge bodily decline.
And in the centre of it all, propped up in an elaborate four-poster bed, sat the Dowager Duchess of Blackmere.
She was tiny. Illness had ravaged whatever physical presence she once possessed. But her eyes, sharp, intelligent, missing nothing, pinned Margaret with the intensity of someone who had spent a lifetime commanding rooms through sheer force of will.
"So, you are the latest sacrifice."
Margaret curtseyed. "Miss Margaret Hartwell, Your Grace. I am honoured to serve."
"Honoured. What nonsense." The dowager gestured impatiently. "Come closer. I will not shout across the room."
Margaret approached the bed but stood at a respectful distance.
The dowager studied her with unnerving thoroughness. "You are older than the others. How old?"
"Two and thirty, Your Grace."
"Unmarried?"
"Yes, Your Grace."
"Why?"
The blunt question should not have surprised Margaret. Dying women rarely bothered with subtlety.
"I had no prospects and no dowry, Your Grace. Spinsterhood was the logical outcome."
"You say that without self-pity. That is refreshing." The dowager shifted in her bed with visible discomfort. "Most women your age who discuss their unmarried state do so with either bitterness or false cheer. You simply state a fact. I appreciate that."
"Thank you, Your Grace."
"Do not thank me yet. You have not heard my requirements." The Dowager reached for a glass of water on her bedside table. Margaret moved instinctively to help, but the Dowager waved her off. "I am not dead yet. When I require assistance, I will ask for it. Is that understood?"
"Perfectly, Your Grace."
"Good. Now. My requirements. I rise at eight.
I have breakfast at nine. I read until eleven.
I receive correspondence until one. I take lunch at half past one.
I rest, under protest, until three. I walk the gardens when the weather permits.
I dine at seven. And every evening, I am supposed to dine with my nephew. "
Margaret's breath caught. "With His Grace? Every evening?"
"Every evening, because it is written into his father's will, a requirement for maintaining the estate.
His father was convinced that forcing Nathaniel to dine with family would prevent him from becoming a complete hermit.
" The Dowager's mouth twisted. "It has not worked, though.
He never appears to dine with me, but the requirement stands.
And you, Miss Hartwell, will ensure I am presentable and transported to the dining room each evening regardless of how I feel or if my nephew appears or not. "
"Your Grace, if you are unwell…"
"If I am dying, I will die with dignity and routine intact.
Not languishing in bed like some pathetic old woman.
" The Dowager's voice was sharp. "I will not spend my final months as a burden to be managed.
I will maintain my household. My schedule.
My dignity. Your task is to facilitate that.
Not to coddle me into an early grave out of misguided compassion. "
The statement was so similar to what the duke had said, almost word-for-word in some places, that Margaret almost smiled.
They were family indeed. Both convinced that control was the only acceptable response to circumstances beyond their power.
"I understand, Your Grace."
"Do you? I wonder." The dowager studied her again. "Miss Hartwell, why did you accept this position? A dying woman is not an attractive prospect for long-term employment."
Margaret chose honesty. "Because I need the salary, Your Grace. And because three months of difficult employment is preferable to unemployment of any duration."
"Mercenary. I like that." The dowager nodded approvingly.
"You will do, I think. Better than the weeping girl who lasted four days.
Better than the simpering miss who told me I was being very brave about my illness.
Brave. As if illness were a choice requiring courage rather than an inevitability requiring management. "
Despite herself, Margaret felt the corner of her mouth twitch. "You do not care for sympathy, Your Grace."
"I do not care for dishonesty disguised as sympathy. If you pity me, keep it to yourself. If you admire my fortitude, likewise. I require competence. Efficiency. And someone who will not dissolve into tears when I die." The dowager paused. "Can you provide that, Miss Hartwell?"
"I can, Your Grace."
"Good. Then we will suit admirably." The dowager waved toward a door on the far side of the room.
"Those are your chambers. Adjoining mine.
You will hear me if I require assistance in the night.
Your salary is sixty pounds per annum, paid quarterly.
Room and board provided. Use of the library permitted. Questions?"
Margaret had a hundred questions. But she asked only the one that mattered. "What does Your Grace require of me beyond the daily schedule you described?"
"Honesty, competence and the willingness to tell my nephew when he is being autocratic and overbearing.
" The Dowager smiled; the first genuine warmth Margaret had seen.
"Nathaniel needs someone who will not simply defer to his authority.
Someone who will challenge him when a challenge is warranted.
I suspect you are that person, Miss Hartwell. Am I correct?"
Margaret thought of the interview. Of telling the Duke he was confusing honesty with rudeness. Of nearly walking out when he demanded unthinking obedience.
"I am capable of speaking plainly when circumstances require it, Your Grace."
"Excellent. Then we have an agreement. Welcome to Blackmere Hall, Miss Hartwell. Try not to let my nephew's coldness freeze you entirely. There is a man somewhere beneath all that ice. Though I confess, I have not seen evidence of him in five years."
Five years. Since the duke's wife died, Margaret remembered from the sparse information she had been given before accepting the position.
"I will do my best, Your Grace."
"I am certain you will. Now, leave me. I am tired. We will discuss the evening routine later." The dowager waved her toward the door. "Oh, and Miss Hartwell—dinner is formal. You will need to change into something appropriate. I assume you brought an evening dress?"
"I did, Your Grace."
"Good. Seven o'clock. Do not be late. Nathaniel despises tardiness."
Margaret curtseyed and withdrew to her new chambers.
They were smaller than the Dowager's but comfortably appointed. A bed, a writing desk, a wardrobe and a window overlooking the gardens; bare and grey in February cold, but doubtless lovely in better seasons.
Margaret unpacked her trunk methodically. She hung her few dresses, arranged her books on the small shelf and placed her writing materials on the desk.
Then she sat in the chair by the window and tried to process what she had agreed to.
Three months. Perhaps less. Caring for a dying duchess who refused to acknowledge her mortality. Navigating the demands of a duke who controlled everything around him with rigid precision.
It should have felt oppressive. Impossible.
Instead, Margaret felt something she had not experienced in years. Not quite curiosity. Not quite hope.
But perhaps the faint, dangerous possibility that this place, this cold, controlled, carefully empty house, might demand more from her than mere invisibility.
Whether that was an opportunity or a threat, she could not yet determine.
Outside, the wind rattled the windows. Inside, Blackmere Hall maintained its careful silence.
And Margaret sat in her new chambers and wondered whether survival here would require making herself smaller than ever before.
Or whether, impossibly, dangerously, it might require her to claim something more.
The question remained unanswered as the afternoon faded toward evening and the time for dinner approached.