Six
“I am going into Haworth today,” the duchess said at breakfast the next morning. Everyone was present. There had been no early ride as the duke said he had things to do. “I want to call on Mrs. Bront?,” she continued. “I keep thinking of those children.”
Rose hadn’t told her about the encounter yesterday. That would have involved mentioning her encounter with Gavin, and though the duchess was a remarkably subtle chaperone, Rose didn’t know how far her tolerance would stretch. When Rose had slipped back inside yesterday afternoon, cold and windblown and carefully not in the company of Gavin Keighley, the duchess had caught her. She’d clearly been watching for Rose to return, but she only asked if it had been a good walk. There was no litany of questions, even though Rose had been gone for hours. Rose’s mother would have interrogated and scolded her. There had been none of that. There had been something else though. Rose had received the distinct impression that she was expected to monitor her own conduct and take responsibility for the standards she would meet. Which ought to be those that earned respect. The exchange had been surprising, and extremely interesting.
Now it almost seemed as if their hostess had sensed the meeting at the fort without being directly informed. “The children said their mother was ill,” Rose pointed out.
Over at the sideboard, the housemaid Lucy was setting down a fresh teapot. Ian the footman, who had just come in with a tray, bumped her elbow. Tea sloshed out of the spout onto the wooden surface. Lucy whirled, eyes flashing, and jostled the tray he carried. Crockery rattled and nearly fell to the floor.
The duchess turned. She and the duke had their backs to the sideboard. Rose and Gavin faced it, and thus had had a clear view of the servants’ tussle, perhaps designed to impress their feuding employers. The local war went on, they signaled. Rose sighed.
Under the duchess’s eye, Lucy dropped a curtsy, her gaze on the floor, and went out. Ian arranged clean cups beside the teapot, his figure rigid. The duchess turned back. “I intend to leave a card at least,” she said. “I shall consider the children a sufficient introduction. Will you come?”
Rose agreed. She was surprised when Gavin did too. Morning calls were not his habit. He seemed determined to puzzle her these days.
Ian departed with his empty tray. There was a clatter and a thud from outside the breakfast room door, followed by a half-audible curse.
A low feminine laugh followed and then a volley of muttering. The words were indecipherable, but the tone was fierce.
After a moment, the sound of footsteps receded.
“Did you hear that?” asked the duke. “Do you think something is wrong?”
“Cook says there is a vendetta in progress,” replied his wife.
Of course she would know what was going on in her household, Rose thought. She was beginning to think there was very little the duchess didn’t know.
“Vendetta?” asked the duke. “What do you mean?”
“Our servants seem to feel they have to…represent us,” said Rose.
“Represent?” The duke raised his dark brows. “Further your family dispute, you mean?”
Rose nodded, ashamed that it had spilled over into the duchess’s harmonious household.
“Cook is not particularly concerned,” the duchess said. “No broken china so far. A deal of heat but not much else, she said.”
“Phelps told me that our maid Lucy Trent is daft,” said Gavin.
She would check with Ian again, Rose thought. If he was being made miserable here, she would send him home. They could just do without a footman.
“Daft as in…unbalanced?” asked the duke. He looked at his wife with concern.
The duchess shook her head. “I believe she has quite a vivid personality. Which must be awkward in her position.”
“Or in any young woman’s,” Rose heard herself say. The others looked at her. Well, it was true. “And what does Phelps know about it?” she added. “He is never in the house.” Gavin might make an effort to manage the Keighley servants, she thought. What was the point of their appearance of amity if the staff made a mockery of it?
Gavin started to speak, then appeared to change his mind.
“Phelps is the one who goes out most days with a gun?” asked the duke.
He noticed things too, Rose thought. Really, nothing got past the Terefords.
“After rabbits, I expect,” Gavin answered.
“And yet we haven’t seen any on the table.” Rose thought Phelps was just sloping off so he didn’t have to do any work.
“Hunting is not an exact…” Gavin began.
“Yet Phelps is said to be so expert,” Rose interrupted.
He frowned at her.
The duke looked at them, then over at his wife. “We aren’t worried?” he asked her.
“No.”
“That’s good.”
They smiled at each other. Both seemed amused and very much in harmony. Rose felt her irritation—automatic over any matter involving Keighleys and Denholmes, or their households—fade away. The Terefords’ home was so unlike her own. There was no simmering rancor or constant flow of criticism. Instead, she felt warmth and acceptance and equity. The duke and duchess might have disagreements. They must, on occasion. Everyone did. But they seemed so ready to understand and make allowances. She wanted to live like this, Rose thought. Not always mired in suspicion and disputes. Not worrying about hostile encounters and malicious whispers. It was too bad she saw no way such a change could befall her.
Later that morning the Terefords’ elegant coach was brought up from the stables. The duke handed his wife carefully in, Rose joined her, and the men mounted up to ride beside them. They made a small cavalcade to the little village of Haworth six miles away.
Once there, the duke left them to meet with a builder who lived at the edge of the hamlet. The rest of them were directed to the parsonage, a rectangular gray brick house with five windows above and four below, the front door in the center. The unadorned building had a chimney at each end and a graveyard next door. Though she loved the moor, Rose had to admit that this residence was rather bleak.
Gavin dismounted and handed the women out of the carriage. His fingers were firm on Rose’s, seemingly reluctant to let go.
They knocked. After a short wait the door opened, and they were greeted by a female servant with a broad Yorkshire accent. She shook her head when the duchess asked for Mrs. Bront?. “Too ill for visiting,” she declared.
A small head appeared, peering around the servant’s broad hip. “It’s the duchess,” exclaimed Charlotte Bront?. “And Miss Denholme and Sir Gavin.”
“A duchess for truth?” The servant stared. “I reckoned they made that up.” She shook her head at the visitors. “They do make things up.”
Several small Bront?s jostled for position in the doorway. “Stop that,” said Maria’s voice from the rear. “Behave properly.”
“What is this noise?” demanded a man’s voice.
“Now you’ve disturbed the reverend,” said the maid. She looked concerned.
A tall man with brown hair and prominent cheekbones loomed up behind her. The children faded back as she stepped aside. “May I help you?” the man asked. There was just a touch of Ireland in his voice.
“How do you do?” said Gavin. “Gavin Keighley. We met soon after you arrived.”
“Ah yes.”
Gavin didn’t think the man actually remembered that brief ceremonial visit. He introduced the duchess, whose title brought raised eyebrows, and Rose.
“We met your charming children walking on the moor,” said the duchess. “I had thought to call on your wife.”
“She is too ill to receive you.” A pained bewilderment crossed Mr. Bront?’s features, as if he had no notion how to deal with this misfortune.
“I’m sorry to hear that.” The duchess said it as if they hadn’t already known.
Gavin wondered if Mr. Bront? was going to leave them on the doorstep. He seemed lost in despondence. But at last the man said, “Please come in. Tabitha, some refreshment in the parlor.” He used the word refreshment as if it was foreign to him and he had no idea what she would produce.
Gavin signaled the coachman. It had been agreed that he would take the horses to the village inn until they were needed again. They went in and sat down in the front parlor. The house was plainly furnished, the fire a bit meager.
“You are a neighbor, Sir Gavin,” stated their host. He remembered that much at least.
“As is Miss Denholme.”
“Not parishioners, however. Where do you attend church?” Bront? looked ready to admonish them.
“We are nearer to Burnley and go there,” said Gavin.
“Ah.” The reverend didn’t seem quite ready to ask a duchess about her religious habits. “Is there something I can do for you? As I said, my wife is very ill and cannot receive visitors.”
“Might we see the children?” asked the duchess.
“They should be at their lessons. I would not wish to encourage them to neglect them. Branwell in particular is prone to slacking.”
“Isn’t he young to be worrying about that?” asked Gavin.
“One cannot be too early in subduing the will.”
The last phrase galled Gavin. It sounded like the sour platitudes offered at his school, a place he had not enjoyed. “I rather think one can.”
“You are not an educator. I am. I was an examiner at Woodhouse Grove, a Wesleyan academy. So you see, I am better able to judge these things.” His pompous tone was just at the edge of offensive, though Gavin wasn’t certain whether he meant it to be. The Reverend Bront? did not seem very conscious of others’ feelings.
Rose could see Gavin’s temper rising. It was quite visible, she realized. His cheeks reddened. His hands had closed into fists, and his gray eyes…crackled. That was an apt description. An explosion seemed imminent. “Children are usually given some freedom before going off to school,” he said.
He hadn’t liked his school in Leeds, Rose remembered. He’d told a friend of theirs that the place made him feel like a sheep in an overcrowded pen, wanting to rampage and knock the fences down. Which hadn’t sounded much like sheep to her.
“That is a mistake,” replied their host. “It allows bad habits to take hold.”
“Habits? Such as?”
“Wandering attention. Back talk and argument.” Bront? said the last word as if it applied to this conversation and was a judgment on the nature of Gavin’s education.
Rose waited for the inevitable outburst. Not that Gavin would hit the curate as he had the duke, but he would surely utter some savage setdown.
A silence stretched. The riposte did not come, despite the annoyance in Gavin’s eyes. As Rose watched, his fists slowly opened.
Tabitha entered with a tray containing a plate of oat cakes, a jug, and four pottery cups. Could it be ale? That seemed unlikely in this house, as well as inappropriate for a morning call.
“Is that the cider?” asked their host.
“Yes, sir.”
“I told you… Why didn’t you bring tea?”
“We’re all out,” the maid replied.
Mr. Bront? gave her an impatient look. She set the tray on a table before the fire, filled the cups, offered them around, and went out. Rose sipped. The cider was very strong. It had clearly been fermenting in a barrel since pressing. Bront? tried his and set it aside with a grimace. If he had Wesleyan leanings, he would avoid alcoholic drinks. Suspecting that the cakes were meant for the children, Rose did not take one. Only Gavin drank all of his cider.
“My wife’s sister is coming to stay,” said Bront? abruptly. “To set things to rights.”
“I’m sure Mrs. Bront? will be glad of her company,” replied the duchess.
“I wish she would get here,” was the petulant reply.
They didn’t stay long after this. The children did not reappear, and their father made no pretense of enjoying his callers’ company. He escorted them to the door with obvious relief.
“Let us walk,” said the duchess when the door had shut behind them. It was not a long distance to the inn where the carriage waited.
“What a smug ass,” said Gavin when they had left the house behind. “I pity his children.”
“I thought you were going to tell him off,” said Rose.
Gavin looked at her, then at the duchess. He started to speak and then paused, perhaps remembering that they both knew how he had flown at the duke on first meeting. “I have been employing your method to curb my temper,” he replied.
“Method?” asked the duchess.
“You mean…” Rose was startled.
“Your grandmother’s method, rather,” he corrected.
The duchess looked brightly inquisitive.
Amazed that he’d remembered, Rose said, “My grandmother managed her anger by being grateful that the situation—whatever was irritating her—was not even worse. She said gratitude was a soothing balm.”
“I like that idea.”
“It is rather effective,” said Gavin, only a little grudgingly.
“What were you grateful for while the Reverend Bront? was speaking?” asked the duchess.
“That I didn’t choke on his wretched cider and fall over dead,” Gavin replied with a slight smile.
The duchess smiled wholeheartedly. “That would certainly be worse.”
“But insufficient,” he added. “Even though it would relieve me of the necessity of listening to him. So then I was grateful that the village was not being swallowed up by an earthquake.”
“An earthquake?” Rose exclaimed.
“They are terrible things apparently. From what I’ve read. The ground tosses like the sea and sometimes opens up into a bottomless abyss.”
“But they are hardly likely in Yorkshire.”
“They are worse though,” Gavin said.
There was a twinkle in his eyes. He was actually joking. Rose laughed.
“You laugh like the trill of a lark on the moor,” Gavin said, and immediately flushed bright red.
Sir Gavin Keighley speechless? And poetic? The world must be ending, Rose thought. Not in an earthquake but in some less visible revolution.
“I thought it took weeks to plan a ‘ball,’” Gavin complained to the duke two mornings later as they walked through the stable block together, examining what most needed repair. The Milsomes’ gathering was to take place that evening, and he couldn’t quite imagine how it was going to go.
“That depends on the arrangements,” Tereford replied. “This is to be a fairly informal occasion, I understand.”
At which Gavin would see his mother and sisters as well as Rose’s family. He’d confirmed that they were all invited, which made this an unprecedented occasion. The Keighleys and the Denholmes were never asked anywhere together. It was a neighborhood law. Now they had been, and curiosity was running rampant. Combine that with the chance to meet a duke and duchess, and the lure was irresistible. Everyone who could possibly wangle an invitation would be present, Gavin knew. He and Rose would have to face them all.
Only there was no and. They were not together. They had simply been planted in the same spot and made an agreement to appear to get along. Appear, Gavin thought wryly. He’d agreed because it was sensible and perhaps more…restful. Had he thought that? It hadn’t turned out to be restful at all! Who would have imagined that kiss? Had Rose been shaken to the core, as he had? He’d thought so, from the way she’d gripped him, the look on her face. And then there’d been a moment at their old fort when he’d thought it might happen again. But now she’d gone distant and seemed to want to forget all about it. Gavin gritted his teeth. That was impossible.
He didn’t know what to do.
He always knew what to do.
One of the great pleasures of Gavin’s life was to put things right when they went awry, to tend. He’d always been that way. The impulse seemed inborn. When his father died, he’d taken up his duties on the estate. He’d watched over his mother and sisters, as much as they wished him to, at any rate. He lent a hand when friends needed aid. That was why Yerndon’s decline had eaten at him. A nagging problem that he could not solve nearly drove him mad. And now Rose had become another.
No. She wasn’t a problem. She was…an old friend, an extremely attractive young lady, an interesting person, labeled a foe of his family. He wanted to draw her closer. He wanted to make things right. She hadn’t asked him to take care of her. How would he even do so? What was to be done? Were some matters simply intractable? He could not accept that idea.
Something flickered in the corner of his eye. It was Phelps, slipping around a corner toward a side door. He ought to send the man home, Gavin thought. The impulse to bring him had been wrongheaded.
“You don’t care for it?” asked the duke.
“I beg your pardon?” He hadn’t been listening.
“I wondered if you don’t care for dancing? You don’t seem in favor of this ball.” Tereford examined a half-rotted beam and made a note on the small pad of paper he carried.
“I like it well enough.” He’d danced in Leeds. There hadn’t been much opportunity closer to home. Certainly not to dance with Rose. He’d be able to do that at the Milsomes’. There was an idea.
“Are you worried that your mother and Miss Denholme’s father will fall into another…debate?”
Gavin turned to look at his host. “You heard about that?”
“The builder in Haworth mentioned it.”
He should have known that someone would have a flapping tongue. “I don’t think they will do that in the midst of a crowd, no.” Surely they wouldn’t. They would have some self-control.
“Or that your sisters will trip up Miss Denholme on the dance floor?” asked the duke.
Gavin grimaced. It was actually the sort of vengeance Janet and Jillian might plan. And there were two of them, so they could flank Rose.
“If there is any chance of a melee, I want to be prepared to keep my wife out of it,” the other man added.
A horrifying scene rose in Gavin’s mind—shouting, shoving, hair-pulling, an audience all agog. He shuddered. That would not happen. Rose would never stoop to such a scene, for one thing. But his sisters… He’d have to keep them under his eye. “There won’t be.”
“You did try to knock me down when I arrived,” the duke pointed out.
“I am sorry…”
Tereford waved the repeated apology aside. “Is your family all hotheaded?”
“My mother…” Gavin bit off the sentence. Whatever his opinion, he would not criticize her to a near stranger.
“Ah. I don’t suppose she boxes though. Does she?”
“Of course not!” Gavin met his host’s dark-blue eyes, which were twinkling mildly. The duke was nothing like the soft southerner Gavin had originally expected him to be. Nor was he a disdainful, sarcastic aristocrat. He was more complex, and far kinder. Now he wasn’t mocking. But he was laughing a little. And could he be blamed? This feud was ludicrous, Gavin realized. When one moved a bit outside it, the futility and triviality became obvious.
“Perhaps I could be of some assistance,” Tereford said. “I’ve faced far worse than quarreling neighbors.”
“What?” Gavin couldn’t imagine anything that would embarrass this man. He was a model of assurance.
“Public humiliation before most of the haut ton,” the duke replied wryly.
“You? I don’t believe it.”
“It is quite true.” The duke paused to examine a window frame, scraping it with a small pocketknife he had brought along. “Worm-eaten. This will have to be replaced.”
Drawn in, Gavin bent to look. “It’s only the window. The wall is all right.”
“Yes.” Tereford folded the knife. “I would be happy to, ah, join forces with you at this ball. To see that it goes smoothly.”
“Why would you help? After the way I greeted you.”
“Well, I like you,” said the duke. He smiled. “Despite the circumstances of our first meeting. Perhaps even because of them. But chiefly I want to keep my wife calm and safe.”
Gavin understood that very well. It was a strong motive. He nodded. “Thank you. I would appreciate your advice.”
“I don’t know that I have advice. More a plan of campaign.”
Gavin looked inquiring. Tereford proceeded to explain as they went on evaluating the state of the stables.
Rose had been watching out the parlor window for the gentlemen’s return. When she saw them approaching the house, she rose, smiled at the duchess as if she was just stepping out for a moment, and went into the entryway. She put her hand on the stair banister as if she was about to go up and waited for the door to open.
“Oh, hello,” said the duke when they came in.
“Hello,” Rose replied. “The duchess is sitting in the parlor.”
Tereford turned in that direction, as she had known he would. When Gavin made to follow, Rose grasped his arm and pulled him across into the dining room.
“What’s wrong?” he asked as she shut the door behind them.
“Nothing is wrong. I simply wished to talk to you. We must discuss this supposed ball.”
“Supposed?”
“It is far too grand a word…” Rose brushed this irrelevance aside. “You know it will be difficult. We must have a plan.”
“The duke has offered—”
“I have been thinking,” Rose interrupted. She’d been doing little else. “We will have to dance together. Once. Early in the evening. The first dance would be best. Exhibit ourselves and get it over with.”
“Will it be such a trial?”
She gazed up at him in exasperation. “That is not the point. Everyone will be watching us. Like hawks. To see what we will do. How we will act. Just waiting for a reason to stoop and sink in their talons.”
“You are exaggerating.”
“How can you say so? After all these years of feuding? We must establish the…tone. Show people that there is nothing to see. At once. Before anything unfortunate can happen.” Rose hoped he was actually listening.
“Unfortunate?”
“There is no need to growl at me. Or pretend that you don’t know what I mean.” She wrinkled her nose. “The scene in the churchyard? We must present the neighborhood with a perfectly commonplace country dance.”
“As if we were actors on the stage?” Gavin asked.
“Exactly. We will smile and converse. The picture of amiability. And then we need not bother for the rest of the evening.”
“So I am a bother to get over with as quickly as possible?”
“Why are you being obtuse? This has nothing to do with you. Or me.”
“Dancing together has nothing to do with either of us?”
“In this case, no. It is about preventing some sort of…social debacle.”
“A melee,” he murmured.
Rose had a sudden horrible vision—her father and Gavin’s mother faced off and shouting, his sisters and her mother staring daggers at each other, the twins doing something outrageous that she couldn’t even imagine. “If only our families will restrain themselves.”
“As they never do.”
“That is singularly unhelpful.”
“What do you expect? They never listen.”
Rose’s heart sank. It was true that her parents paid no heed to her opinions. She wasn’t meant to have any. But this was action, not argument. “We can set an example. That is my point!”
“Oh, is that it?”
He was behaving as he used to, contradicting whatever she said. He wore the mulish, offended expression that was so familiar. She’d thought they would work together. But the kind or complimentary things he’d said to her—the kiss!—were another illusion, broken when the outside world intruded. Underneath, things were just the same. She swallowed painful disappointment. It had been foolish to think years of acrimony could disappear. And she was not a fool. “Did you say something about the duke?”
“Oh, am I allowed to speak now?”
“You have been speaking all along. There is never any stopping you.”
“Never? Really?” His eyes were blazing.
“Why are you angry? You know everyone will be looking at us. We must make a plan.”
“Which you have done, it seems. You don’t appear to need anything from me.”
“Beyond your agreement? I would like to know that you will do your part.”
“I agree,” he replied in a cold, clipped tone. And he turned and walked out.
Rose stood in the entryway, alone. She had thought it was a good idea. She’d even imagined that they would…conspire together to make the ball…not a disaster at least. Perhaps she was a fool after all.
Gavin strode down the lane that led away from Yerndon. He hadn’t even taken off his coat before Rose…pounced. “A bother to get over with,” he muttered as he moved out onto the moor. Was that how she saw this whole visit—a trial, a strain, a performance? Had she decided their kiss was a mistake?
Perhaps it was time to end this farce and go back to his regular life.
Oddly, the thought of his old routines did not comfort him. Living outside them at Yerndon had revealed certain flaws. There was the good. He was competent, effective. He found satisfaction in his work. He loved the place where he lived. Gavin took a deep breath of the Yorkshire air as he walked. It was his heart home.
But then there was the other side. He was often angry and had to grapple with his temper. He had periods of boredom, which he viewed with impatience. He was…lonely.
Gavin’s authoritative stride faltered. He stumbled slightly before recovering and walking on. That made no sense. He had his mother and sisters at home, people he liked in the neighborhood. He thought most of them liked him as well, setting aside the Denholmes. Moreover, he enjoyed being alone, as he was now, out of doors. It was one of his chief pleasures. How could all that add up to lonely?
And yet he felt it now as a deep pang. Being at Yerndon—with Rose, yes, mostly it was Rose—had exposed some primal need. Not just the physical yearning, though that was strong. It had made him see a void at the center of his perfectly adequate life. Rose had done that somehow. Rose, to whom he was a bother to be gotten over with. Gavin gritted his teeth and fought his temper and…hurt. She had hurt him with her cool proposal that they perform for the neighborhood. She had not sounded like someone who…cared.
With a pain in the region of his heart, Gavin asked himself what would be worse than this hopeless longing.
He couldn’t think of anything.
He stopped and looked about him. His feet had brought him back to their old childhood fort, the place where she had nearly kissed him again. Or so he had thought. He didn’t know the truth of anything anymore. There was someone up there, atop the tumbled stones. Two someones, actually.
Gavin moved closer and stationed himself quietly behind a gorse bush.
A young woman was perched on the highest boulder. It was the housemaid Lucy Trent, Gavin realized. And the young footman who had come to Yerndon with Rose stood before her, gazing up at her face.
She waved her arms in a grand gesture. “‘This day is called the Feast of Crispan,’” she declaimed, her voice carrying out over the moor. “‘Him as lives and comes home safe will stand on tiptoes when ere this day is named and show his wounds.’” She swept her hands down her body as if exhibiting scars.
The young footman watched her, transfixed. Gavin was impressed by the girl’s intensity, though her speech made no sense to him. What were they up to?
“‘All shall remember the feats we did this day,’” she continued with one raised finger. “‘With drinking and tales, right till the end of the world.’”
She brought the palms of her hands together and held them as if in prayer. “‘We happy few, we band of brothers.’”
It was from a play, Gavin realized. Shakespeare. He didn’t remember which one. And the language wasn’t quite right, was it? It seemed skewed.
Lucy spread her hands and extended her arms. Her voice rang out even stronger. “‘Gentlemen in England shall curse they were not here to fight with us on Saint Crispan’s Day.’”
She folded her arms over her chest, waited a moment, then bowed.
The footman clapped enthusiastically. The girl straightened, grinning, and leaped off the boulder into his arms.
Gavin edged slowly away, keeping heather and gorse between him and the embracing couple. He felt a little envious at the sheer joy of the scene, and also concerned. His mother would dismiss any housemaid who slipped out for an assignation with another servant. Lucy would be sent away without a character if she was found out. Which seemed a pity after the girl’s unusual, exuberant performance. Not that he intended to tell his mother about any of this. But the pair were not being discreet. They had probably been missed at Yerndon. Someone else might inform on them. And he didn’t see what he could do about that.
Rounding a hillock, Gavin walked back toward the house. His thoughts went automatically to Rose.
He would follow the duke’s lead, as they’d agreed. He would prance across the dance floor as Rose had commanded. And then he really had no idea.