Chapter 4 #2
"That's essentially what happened. My father was an enthusiastic collector but not an enthusiastic organizer."
"And you?"
"I've been otherwise occupied." With being jilted, becoming a social pariah, and avoiding anything that reminds me of my spectacular failure.
"The rules, Miss Whitcombe. You're to work Monday through Friday, nine o'clock—and I do mean nine o'clock—until four.
You're not to remove any volumes from the house without permission.
The rare manuscripts are to be handled with appropriate care. .."
"Obviously."
"Do not interrupt me."
"You were stating the obvious."
"I was establishing parameters."
"You were treating me like a fool who doesn't know how to handle rare books." She set down the volume she'd been holding with exaggerated care. "Shall you also explain that books have pages, or that Latin is read left to right?"
Every man in London yields before my word. She alone tosses it back at me like a gauntlet.
"You seem to be labouring under the misapprehension that this is a partnership," he said coldly. "It is not. You are my employee."
"I'm your cataloguer. If you wanted someone to blindly follow orders without question, you should have hired a clerk, not a scholar."
"Perhaps I should have."
"But you didn't." She met his gaze steadily, those brown eyes holding a challenge. "You hired someone who knows the difference between order and indifference. Though clearly, Your Grace favours the latter."
Why on earth do I not dismiss her?
Because she was right, the irritating woman.
Because his library was chaos and he'd been indifferent to it, just as he'd been indifferent to most things since Juliette's defection.
Because she stood there in his sanctuary, this small, fierce woman with her ink-stained fingers and escaped curls, and made him feel something other than bitter ennui.
"Continue your assessment," he said, waving a hand as if bored. "Try not to destroy anything irreplaceable."
She moved through the library like a force of nature, occasionally gasping in delight or horror.
She found treasures buried behind common novels, mice damage that made her actually curse in what sounded like Greek, and at one point, a family of bookworms that had her looking like she might commit murder.
"Oh, this is wonderful," she breathed, pulling out a volume with the care one might use for holy relics.
"Is this Athenaeus's Deipnosophistae? Third century discussion of food and dining customs?
This is extraordinary—and completely covered in dust. It deserves better than to be moldering between.
.." she checked the adjacent volumes, "a guide to sheep farming and what appears to be someone's personal diary from 1742. "
Adrian stiffened. He owned Athenaeus's Deipnosophistae? He'd never even heard of it, let alone read it.
She has caught me unarmed. I, who have routed Parliamentarians with a phrase, undone by a slip of Greek from the lips of a woman.
"I'm sure it's thrilling," he said with studied indifference. "Ancient dining habits being such captivating reading."
"It's more than that. It's a window into daily life, into the things historians usually ignore.
How people ate, what they talked about over dinner, the jokes they told.
" She opened it carefully, her face lighting up as she scanned the Greek text.
"Listen to this; 'The Spartans dine in common, eating the same food, wearing the same clothes, so that luxury may not soften them.
' Imagine, an entire culture that believed comfortable dining was dangerous. "
"Sounds perfectly reasonable to me."
She looked up, caught his expression, and actually laughed at him, his own employee in his own library. "You would sympathize with Spartans. All that austere dignity and emotional restraint."
"Emotional restraint?"
"What else would you call it? They weren't even allowed to express joy properly. Rather like English dukes, come to think of it."
He should have been offended. He was the Duke of Everleigh, and this nobody of a woman was comparing him to emotionally restrained ancient Greeks.
Instead, he found himself watching her mouth as she spoke, the way her lips shaped the ancient words with obvious pleasure.
He could not help but imagine those lips engaged in other, far more debauched activities.
He felt a stirring in his lower abdomen as his imagination took control.
Why does she have to pronounce Greek like it's a lover's endearment?
"Your linguistic enthusiasm is noted," he said dryly. "Perhaps you could channel it into actual cataloguing rather than historical commentary."
"They're the same thing, really. You can't properly catalogue books without understanding what they are, why they matter.
" She moved to another shelf, her movements quick and economical.
"This library isn't just a collection of objects—it's a collection of ideas, of human thought across centuries. It deserves to be treated as such."
"It deserves to be organized so I can actually find things."
"That too." She pulled out a small notebook and began scribbling furiously, her entire body taut with energy and purpose.
"I'll need to do a complete survey first, room by room.
Create a temporary classification system while I develop something more comprehensive.
We'll need proper supplies, such as boxes for the manuscripts, cotton gloves, book supports. .."
"Whatever you need."
She looked up, surprised. "Just like that?"
"Did you expect me to argue about cotton gloves?"
"I expected you to argue about everything. You seem the type."
"I seem the type?" He leaned back, studying her. "And what type is that, precisely?"
"The type who needs to control everything, who can't bear to be challenged, who responds to any questioning of his authority with arctic temperatures and cutting remarks."
"How perceptive. And yet you persist in challenging me anyway."
"Someone has to." She turned back to her notebook. "Otherwise you'd just sit there in your perfectly pressed clothes and your perfectly controlled manner, letting your library rot around you while you pretend not to care."
She will disorder my peace, of that I am certain.
He watched her work, the way she moved through his space like she belonged there, like she had every right to judge his books and his character with equal frankness.
Her hair was coming further undone, more curls escaping to frame her face.
There was a smudge of dust on her nose that she hadn't noticed and her tongue peeked out slightly when she concentrated on her writing.
But she will not bore me.
Juliette had never challenged him. She'd been perfect, porcelain, agreeable to a fault.
She'd never argued about philosophy or corrected his Latin or accused him of emotional restraint.
She'd also never looked at books like they were treasures, never gotten genuinely excited about third-century Greek texts, never made him feel anything stronger than mild satisfaction.
And I fear that is far more dangerous.
"Your Grace?" Miss Whitcombe was looking at him expectantly. "I asked if you had any particular preferences for the organizational system."
"Whatever you think best." The words came out more curtly than intended.
"Are you well? You look rather... peculiar."
"I'm perfectly well."
"If you say so." She studied him for a moment longer, then shrugged and returned to her notebook. "I'll start with this room, then move to the adjoining chambers. This is going to take months, possibly years to do properly."
"That's fine."
"You might regret saying that when I start moving everything."
"Miss Whitcombe," he said, suddenly needing to establish some distance between them, "I have correspondence to attend to. Try not to burn the house down in your reforming zeal."
"I make no promises," she said without looking up from her writing. "Some of these arrangements are offensive enough to warrant arson."
He left her there, scribbling and muttering, occasionally pulling out books with little sounds of delight or dismay. He had estate business to review, letters to answer, a dozen things that required his attention.
Instead, he found himself standing in the hallway, listening to the sound of her moving through his library, the occasional exclamation in Latin or Greek, the scratch of her quill pen on paper.
The morning's news about Juliette seemed suddenly distant, unimportant. So what if she was glowing with maternal joy in Rome? He had a bluestocking destroying his library while comparing him to ancient Spartans.
Somehow, improbably, that seemed like the better bargain.
Heavens help me, he thought, running a hand through his hair again. I'm actually looking forward to tomorrow.
The thought should have been alarming. Instead, as he heard her curse creatively in what sounded like three languages simultaneously after discovering another nest of bookworms, he found himself almost smiling.
Dukes of Everleigh did not smile at the linguistic creativity of their employees. Even if those employees had ink-stained fingers and opinions about everything and a way of looking at books like they held all the secrets of the universe.
Even then.