Chapter Three #2
‘It is to show how much I appreciate you taking your boots off as soon as you enter the house. I saw how much it pained you to do so initially, but you did not grumble.’
He lifted an eyebrow, unsure if she was mocking him, but the smile she gave him in return was genuine.
For a second he was reminded of his sister.
She often bought him spontaneous gifts, never anything that expensive, but thoughtful little items that showed she’d listened to his gripes and interests and, when she’d seen something that she thought might make his life better even by a small degree, she’d bought it for him.
‘Do you like them?’ She looked a little unsure of herself now, probably because of his muted reaction. ‘Perhaps you might like to try them on to see if they fit?’
He bent down and placed the slippers on the floor, putting one foot and then the next into them. They fit perfectly and he could not deny it was an improvement from walking on the cold, hard stone floor of the cottage.
‘Thank you,’ he said quietly, still frowning.
Amelie gave a half-curtsey, suddenly awkward, and he cursed himself silently for ruining her moment of kindness.
‘Dinner will be ready at seven,’ she said over her shoulder as she left the room.
For a few minutes, Will sat and listened to her moving around in the kitchen, wishing he had handled their interaction differently.
He was not good with people; he did not have the skill to put others at ease with a charming smile and light conversation.
Much of the impact of this was mitigated by the fact he was a duke.
People wanted to speak to him, and they never seemed to realise he didn’t say much in return.
He had a reputation amongst the young women of the ton as a brooding, silent, mysterious man, but none of that was cultivated.
They misunderstood his awkwardness for mystery, romanticised his faults to make him the man they hoped he would be.
The only person he’d ever felt completely at ease with was his sister. She had loved him even though she’d known the true quirks of his personality. Now she was gone, he felt a deep loneliness that gnawed away at him whenever his mind wasn’t kept busy elsewhere.
Giving himself a shake, he stood, trying to put all thoughts of his own awkwardness from his mind.
There was a good hour and a half of time before dinner to work on his book, time better spent productively than musing about his own failings.
The light in his bedroom was good at this time of day and he had set up his desk close to the window to allow him to work until the sun began to set.
Later, he would thank Amelie properly for his slippers and that would be the end of any uneasiness.
Amelie sang whilst she worked, enjoying the evening sunshine as it streamed through the windows and bathed the kitchen in a golden glow.
She had not realised how much she missed country living until she had settled in here at Grantchester.
In her heart, she was a country girl, used to running through meadows, walking alongside trickling streams, eating blackberries straight off the bush and picking flowers to weave into her hair.
There had been a lot of changes in the past few years, but moving to London had been one of the hardest to adjust to.
She thought of the house she had grown up in.
It had been sprawling in size, built three hundred years ago, and subsequent owners had done just enough to keep the old place standing.
Yet it had been the perfect refuge for Amelie’s childhood.
She’d loved her bedroom with its ancient four-poster bed and the view of the woods beyond.
It had been a shock when they had first arrived in London and the only view was of other people’s rooftops and washing.
Here in Grantchester she felt as though she could finally breathe again.
For the past year she had not allowed herself to think of the future.
Her focus had to be on the here and now, making enough money to pay Mrs Creedy to keep her sisters and brother for another week, to buy shoes for their ever-growing feet and to provide food to keep them thriving.
It was a relentless treadmill of worry that for months she had not been able to get off, but here she’d been forced to pause.
The serenity of the countryside was good for her.
In Grantchester, Amelie found herself smiling again, taking a moment to listen to the bird song as she hung the washing on the line or breathe in the scent of the sweet flowers in the cottage garden.
For the first time she had allowed herself to think of something other than survival.
Her dreams now weren’t excessive, but she hoped one day to move back to the country, find a little cottage not unlike this one and bring her relations to live there so they could experience the joys of a country childhood just as she’d had.
With a shake of her head, she smiled. The practicalities of it seemed impossible, but a year earlier, when they had first been thrown from their home, even the mild contentment she felt now had seemed out of reach.
Amelie left the kitchen and looked up the stairs, listening carefully to ascertain if there was any movement.
Lord Beescroft was difficult to rouse when he was working and she had already called twice.
It was unlikely a third time would make any difference.
She quickly ran up the stairs, ducking under the low beam so as not to hit her head.
There were only two rooms on this level, Lord Beescroft’s well-appointed bedroom and her smaller one.
She knocked on the Duke’s door, waiting to hear his summons, then entered.
‘Dinner is ready, Your Grace,’ she said as she stepped into the room.
Lord Beescroft didn’t look up. His face was a mask of concentration, his eyes narrowed as his pencil glided across the paper, his expression making it clear he was unhappy with what he saw.
With an irritated sigh, he picked up the paper and folded it in half, pushing it to one side of his desk.
Amelie had to suppress a smile; anyone else would have screwed up the offending drawing and thrown it across the room, but even in this the Duke was controlled and measured.
‘Is it not going well, Your Grace?’
He looked up, seeming surprised by her question.
‘No,’ he said eventually. ‘The writing flows easily; the pictures of the plants and flowers take time, but the end result I am satisfied with. It is the drawings of the animals I cannot master.’
Amelie bit her lip and then, against her better judgement, slid her hand across the desk to the piece of paper the Duke had discarded. She glanced up at him as she took the paper, realising he was too stunned by her boldness to object.
Before she could unfold the paper he regained control of himself, his hand shooting out and grasping her wrist. His grip was firm but not tight enough to hurt, his intention to stop her going further, not to chastise.
‘Forgive me,’ she said, dropping the paper onto the wooden surface. ‘I only meant to see if I could work out where you were going wrong.’
‘Are you a student of fine art, Amelie?’ His tone was cold, barbed to hurt.
For a long moment she looked at him, holding his eye, before shaking her head.
‘No, but I can draw a fox without the need to waste all this paper,’ she said, her words clipped as she motioned to the other discarded pieces of paper balanced on the corner of the desk. His hand was still on her wrist and she pulled it free forcefully.
‘Dinner is ready, Your Grace.’ She took care to make her voice completely neutral, devoid of any emotion, then she turned and strode from the room, closing the door behind her with some force.