Chapter One What They Say About Mary Beth Blackthorn #3
“He was born near Calder Moor. Quarry family. Started as a laborer, from what I have heard. Worked his way into surveying, then railway construction. Own firm now.”
Mary Beth folded the telegram.
“So he knows stone.”
“Yes.”
“And water.”
“Yes.”
“And how to repair a wall.”
“Presumably.”
“Then I do not care whether his grandfather dined with mine.”
Her steward hesitated.
“That is not precisely the concern.”
Mary Beth leaned back.
“Oh, do continue. You have made it sound interesting.”
“He is successful. Very successful, I am told. But there are houses in the county that would receive Mr. Tavener through the estate entrance and not the front door.”
Mary Beth held his gaze for a beat, then laughed.
The laugh was wholly impolite and the first genuine one she had managed since the gathering the night before.
Her steward waited for it to end.
“I fail to see the joke,” he said.
“I was informed yesterday that I have taken a lover from the north lodge.”
He closed his eyes briefly.
“I had hoped you had not heard that one.”
“Everyone heard that one.”
“And this is relevant because?”
“Because by supper tomorrow I shall have imported an unsuitable man from Leeds and placed him somewhere on my property.”
“Mrs. Blackthorn.”
“It will save them the trouble of invention.”
“You cannot possibly mean to—”
“Do calm yourself. I intend to hire him.”
The steward did not appear reassured.
Mary Beth looked again at the telegram.
Ambrose Tavener.
The Christian name had not been included, but she had seen it at the top of the letterhead attached to the original engineering recommendation her steward now produced from a file.
AMbrOSE TAVENER & COMPANY.
CIVIL ENGINEERING AND CONTRACT WORKS.
Leeds.
She tapped the paper against the desk.
“Give him the blue guest room.”
“He may prefer the inn.”
“He may. Ask him.”
“The blue room is in the family wing.”
“Then it will be convenient.”
“For whom?”
“For the man who must inspect a collapsing wall before it buries my road.”
Her steward gave up.
Mary Beth spent the rest of the morning outdoors.
The rain stopped shortly before noon. Clouds broke over the moor, leaving hard patches of blue between them. The estate smelled scrubbed raw: wet grass, stone, horses, turned earth. Men had opened the lower culvert enough to keep water moving, but the road remained closed.
She walked the upper drainage line herself, boots sinking into mud. The old stone channel disappeared beneath turf and emerged fifty yards later where the water should have run cleanly toward the beck.
It did not. Someone had saved money, as someone always did when the cost could arrive later for somebody else.
At half past three Mary Beth returned to the house, changed into a dry dark-green day dress, and told herself she had done so because mud on the carpet irritated the housekeeper.
At ten minutes past four, no one had arrived.
At twenty past, Mary Beth was reading correspondence in the morning room.
At twenty-seven past, wheels sounded on the drive.
The sound was too heavy for carriage wheels.
She went to the window.
A dark contractor’s wagon had stopped beneath the portico, splashed nearly to the box with Yorkshire mud. Two men climbed down. One was younger and immediately began speaking with the groom about equipment strapped beneath a canvas cover.
The other man stood still for a moment and surveyed Blackthorn Manor.
Mary Beth knew at once which one was Tavener.
He was not dressed for a drawing room. His dark coat was well made but plainly cut, his boots built for ground rather than carpets.
He was taller than she had expected and broad through the shoulders without the cultivated softness of men whose hardest daily work involved horses they did not groom themselves.
He removed his hat.
His hair was dark, touched with rain at the temples.
Then he turned toward the house.
Mary Beth could not see his expression clearly through the glass.
She could see the way he studied the cracked stonework above the west window before he studied the door.
That interested her. The butler entered behind her.
“Mr. Tavener, ma’am.”
Mary Beth set down the letter in her hand.
“Show him in.”
The butler hesitated only a fraction of a second.
Mary Beth noticed the hesitation.
“Here, ma’am?”
“Yes. Here.”
The man disappeared.
Mary Beth remained by the window until she heard footsteps in the hall.
Measured. Unhurried. Heavy enough to belong to a man accustomed to wearing real boots.
She turned as the door opened.
Ambrose Tavener entered Blackthorn Manor carrying rain on his coat and no trace of apology for it.
His gaze went first to Mary Beth rather than the room around her, and held there long enough to unsettle her.
For one unexpected second, the notorious Mrs. Blackthorn forgot every clever thing she had ever said.
Then Ambrose looked past her toward the windows and asked, without bowing deeply enough to satisfy anyone’s grandmother, “Where is the wall?”
A smile escaped her.
Whatever else Ambrose Tavener turned out to be, he had crossed her threshold asking about stone instead of scandal.