Chapter 4 #3
“Then came the rest of us,” said Doreen, taking up where Eunice had left off.
“Miss Genevieve took a special concern for any child that had nowhere to go after spending time in the prison. First came Grace, then Annabelle, then Simon and Charlotte. She asked me to come here after I was jailed for liftin’ a wee bit of brass from the customers at the tavern where I used to work for slave’s wages.
” She snorted with contempt, as if it was beyond comprehension how she could have been imprisoned over such a trifling matter.
“Said she could really use my help, since I knew about servin’ and cleaning up after crowds of people and such. ”
Haydon looked at Oliver. “What about you?”
“Well, lad, I’m proud to say I’m the only true professional amongst the lot of us, descended from a long and distinguished line,” Oliver declared loftily.
“Your father was a butler?” said Haydon, somewhat astonished.
“A thief,” Oliver corrected him, amused.
“And one of the best in the county of Argyll, I might add. Began teachin’ me the family business when I was but a wee lad of seven.
I could ask a gentleman, ‘What time is it, sir?’ an’ lift his watch and billfold before he’d finished giving me the answer,” he boasted, chuckling.
“Because I had an uncommon talent for it, my da had me breakin’ into houses and robbing coaches at an early age.
There isn’t a lock in all of Inveraray I can’t get past. ’Course there’s no honor to it anymore,” he finished, scratching his white head wistfully.
“Thieves today just bob a pistol or a blade about and terrify people into givin’ everything over.
I ask ye, where’s the bloody sport in that? ”
“And Miss MacPhail took you from the prison as well?”
Oliver’s expression softened. “Like a bonny angel she was,” he said. “Cold had seeped into my bones in that miserable place, and I was plagued with a nasty cough that made me sure I was about to take my dying breath. And she marched into my cell and asked but one thing: Did I like children?”
Haydon absorbed this in silence. How had one small slip of a girl found the strength and the resources to salvage the shattered lives of all these people?
he wondered. And how did she manage to support all of them?
Clearly money was tight, as was evident by Eunice’s thrifty approach to meal preparation.
These three were obviously not paid much, but even so, to maintain a home and feed, clothe, and otherwise provide for ten people would be very costly.
And that cost was only exacerbated by his presence, he suddenly realized.
A stab of guilt penetrated his reflections.
It was Genevieve’s uncommon concern for others that had enabled him to lie shivering upon her bed for the past three days, just one step ahead of the law.
He needed to get out of here soon, before his presence placed her and her family in any further danger.
“Well, laddie, if ye’ve eaten enough to tide ye over ’til dinner, ye’d best be thinkin’ about getting yerself back in bed,” Oliver suggested. “If Miss Genevieve were to come home and find ye wandering around naked but for a plaid about yer waist, I’m sure she’d have somethin’ to say about it.”
“What time will she and the children return?”
“She usually takes them to a tearoom after their gallery visit, where they have to mind their manners and sit still and learn how to behave in public,” said Doreen, banging her pot of mutilated carrots on the stove. “They’ll likely be gone another two hours or more.”
Haydon rubbed the dark growth of beard on his chin. “It appears I am in need of a shave and some clothing.” He raised an inquiring brow to Oliver. “Do you think you might have something that would fit me?”
“Only if ye dinna mind havin’ yer shirts stop at yer elbows and yer trousers end at yer shins,” he joked, amused by the idea. “I’m thinkin’ we’ll have to do a sight better than that if we don’t want to have ye arrested for indecency.”
“What about the viscount’s clothes?” suggested Doreen. “There’s two whole trunks of them up in the attic. Very fine things, too, I might add—Miss Genevieve has been keeping them so that the boys might wear them one day, providin’ the fashions haven’t changed overmuch.”
“Well, now, that just might do,” said Oliver, critically studying Haydon.
“From what I understand, the viscount was nae as tall as you and he carried a fair bit of pudding on him, but with a nip here and a tuck there, we might be able to make ye look tolerable. Both Eunice and Doreen know a thing or two about needle and thread, and I can shine up a pair of boots until they look like glass.”
“I’m thinkin’ a lovely bath might do you a world of good as well,” said Eunice.
“Why don’t you take him upstairs and fix him one, Ollie, while Doreen and I see what we can find amongst the viscount’s clothes?
If we all work together, we’ll have his lordship cleaned up and looking presentable before Miss Genevieve comes home with the children. ”
“All right, then, laddie,” said Oliver, delighted to have a task that released him from his duties in the kitchen. “Let’s see if we canna get ye lookin’ more like the gentleman ye were before this whole sorry murder business began.”
THE FRONT DOOR CRASHED OPEN AS A GIGGLING, yelping crush of children surged inside.
“I win! I made it in first!” declared Jamie, triumphant.
“Only because you pushed me out of your way,” Simon complained, shoving at him hard. “You cheated.”
Grace sniffed the air. “I smell ginger biscuits.”
“That’s not ginger, it’s allspice,” said Annabelle, wrinkling her nose in distaste. “Eunice is making haggis again.”
“Maybe she made biscuits and haggis.” Charlotte’s expression was hopeful as she limped through the door.
“If she did, she won’t let you have a biscuit now,” Jamie told her with certainty. “She’ll tell you it’s too close to dinnertime.”
“Tell her you saw some naked ladies in the paintings today,” suggested Annabelle. “Then she’ll give you a biscuit to make you forget about it.”
“If you want to discuss the paintings you saw today with Eunice that’s fine,” said Genevieve, walking through the door. “But you just had tea and scones, and that should suffice until dinnertime.”
“I only had one cup of tea, and Simon had two,” complained Grace. “That wasn’t fair.”
“Fine, next time we go you shall have two cups,” Genevieve assured her, trying to restore the balance of justice. “Then you’ll be even.”
“Can I sit beside Jack next time?” asked Jamie, smiling at Jack as he sauntered in.
“I believe you shall have to ask Jack that.”
Jamie gazed at the older boy with worshipful eyes. “Can I, Jack?”
Jack shrugged and looked away.
Genevieve studied him, taking in his careless stance and averted gaze.
Throughout the afternoon, he had remained cool and removed from the children, always standing just beyond the cluster she had instructed them to maintain, barely answering them when they asked him an excited question.
It was as if he was uncomfortable with their obvious fascination with him, and was trying to maintain his distance.
He was still planning to run away from her, she realized, troubled by the thought.
Jack was older than the others had been when they came into her care, and therefore had a greater sense of his own maturity and independence.
She could only hope that he would realize the benefits of staying with her far outweighed the freedom and autonomy for which he apparently yearned.
“All right, everyone, let’s put our coats and hats in the cupboard and then we shall go into the drawing room and continue our reading of Gulliver’s Travels,” she said, releasing the ties of her bonnet and cloak. “Simon, would you please hang this up for me?”
The elfin lad sprang forward to retrieve her heavy cloak, which practically buried him within its voluminous folds. His thin little arms could carry no more, so she popped her bonnet on his head, much to all the children’s delight.
“Look at me—I’m Genevieve!” he squealed, spinning around so they all could see.
“Mind that you don’t crush the fabric,” Genevieve warned with mock severity. “All right, now, everybody ready? Let’s go inside.” She pushed open the doors leading to the drawing room.
And gasped as a tall, elegantly attired man rose to greet her from the chair in which he had been comfortably ensconced.
“Good evening, Miss MacPhail,” Haydon said, tilting forward in a mannerly bow. “I trust you and the children have had a pleasant day?”
Gone was the savagely handsome warrior with the dark, tousled hair and the roughly bearded cheeks who had found it an effort just to remain upright.
Haydon’s jaw had been scraped clean, revealing a strong, chiseled line that might have been rendered by a Renaissance artist, and his thick, coal-black hair had been washed and trimmed, causing it to curl at the edge of his collar.
His muscled body had been fitted into a charcoal frock coat, dove-gray waistcoat, white shirt and loosely cut trousers, with an expertly tied cravat arranged around his neck.
They were her father’s clothes, Genevieve realized as she studied them, but somehow they had been adjusted so that they clung to her patient’s immense frame in long, fluid lines.
His carriage was tall and sure, and his movements were no longer burdened by pain.
Indeed, he looked every inch the fashionably refined gentleman, ready to host a dinner party for thirty, or perhaps simply depart for his favorite club.
Or for his home near Inverness.
A bewildering sense of loss swept through her, as if something she was beginning to treasure had suddenly been wrenched away.