Chapter 6
Chapter Six
“Look, Ezra, it’s Rosemere Hall!” exclaimed Lady Louisa, pointing out of the coach window as their vehicle rounded a bend in the road. “Do you see the house on the other side of that lake? Isn’t it beautiful? Rosemere is where I grew up.”
Lady Louisa’s enthusiasm was infectious and little Ezra pointed and shouted “Rosemere!” in turn as he bounced on her knee.
“Beautiful,” echoed Benedict before realizing his eyes were on Lady Louisa’s honey-gold curls and sparking hazel eyes rather than the landscape outside.
Swiftly, he turned his gaze to the view ahead and was genuinely impressed with what he saw.
While not a large house compared to Northwick, or Wexford Manor, Rosemere Hall was a very picturesque country estate nestling on the edge of the lake country, well-furnished with scenic rose gardens, sparkling streams, and what seemed to be the ivy-clad ruins of an ancient abbey.
“Mrs. Wilcox is there on the steps, I believe,” said Lady Louisa excitedly, speaking more to herself than to Ezra now.
“She’s our housekeeper. Oh, I think they must have seen our carriages already for everyone is coming outside now.
There’s Mr. Harper, the butler, with four of the footmen, and Melissa and Alice, two of our maids… ”
Of course, she was exactly the kind of young woman who would know the name of every single staff member, Benedict reflected with a mixture of weariness and amusement.
Likely Lady Louisa also knew of the servants’ health, their families and when to send pots of calf’s foot jelly or Rosemere estate preserves to their ailing relatives.
Benedict himself knew that his staff were well-paid and well-treated and was always civil in his address, but he did not encourage familiarity beyond this.
He could say he even liked Thomson, his faithful valet, who had traveled ahead from London, and should already be at Rosemere.
That still did not mean he wished to talk to Thomson about anything beyond gentlemen’s dress and grooming.
“There’s James the head groom, and his lads, ready to look after the horses,” Lady Louisa continued.
“Do you like horses, Ezra? I hope my mare, Storm, is well. I shall take you and Fanny to meet her. Storm is expecting a foal soon, James says, so I shall not ride her too much. You can feed her a carrot.”
Benedict smiled as he listened to her speaking to Ezra on a small child’s level but without being patronizing. In her own small world, Louisa managed to speak to everyone on their own level and they loved her for it. Yet surely such a sunny disposition might be dangerous in the wrong company.
He had begun to understand Lady Esher’s protectiveness.
Perhaps he had even felt something of it himself that night of the inn when he thought Lady Louisa might have run into problems among the men in the busy inn.
Benedict still could not decide whether he had overreacted or not.
As the lady herself had not raised the matter again, he had let it drop.
“Later, you must come to meet Mrs. Finch in the kitchens, Ezra. Our cook at Rosemere bakes the best cakes in England and she always has biscuits for good little boys who eat their dinner.”
“I like biscuits,” Ezra pronounced. “I like cake too.”
“Then it seems likely that you will like Mrs. Finch, young man,” Benedict remarked cheerfully. “What a lovely home you have, Lady Louisa. I can see why you and Lady Esher are so happy here.”
He was rewarded by Lady Louisa turning the full force of her bright smile upon him and could not remember being so dazzled by a woman’s face before, not even the most noted society beauties or the most seductive courtesans of the demimonde.
“I don’t remember the day I arrived here,” she told Benedict, thankfully training her gaze once more on the house approaching from the window. “But Rosemere has always felt like home and it is always a joy to return here.”
“Is that why you have never married and moved away, Lady Louisa?” he asked and could have kicked himself for such an indelicate question.
“No one has ever asked for my hand, Your Grace,” she laughed, un-offended and untouched in any negative way at all. “Anyway, I should decline even if anyone did propose. You know that I believe in true love. Unless I find that, it would be very wrong to marry.”
Benedict said no more, only smiled. What was there to say in the face of such unworldliness?
Lady Louisa was so blissfully assured in her goodhearted and naive view of the world, that most of its ordinary denizens seemed to go along with her.
But if she ever met one its worse types, she would be as helpless as a newborn baby…
That thought sparked an unexpected surge of protectiveness in his chest.
If any scoundrel ever threatened Lady Louisa Ascot, I would…
Would what? Fight the blackguard? Kill him? Benedict checked himself swiftly and pushed down his bleakest memories, definitely not wanting to look upon them here and now. Lady Louisa was home now and she was perfectly safe. There was no need for him, or anyone else, to do anything.
“The old nursery has been thoroughly cleaned and set up for the children as you instructed, Lady Esher,” Mrs. Wilcox assured her employer as she led the party into the house, a crowd of servants around the two coaches already unloading baggage and trunks.
“It is the sweetest nursery, with such a beautiful aspect over the gardens and so sunny in the summertime,” Lady Louisa enthused.
“I can even sleep in one of the nursery bedrooms while Fanny and Ezra are with us and help to take care of them. The Rosemere nursery used to be a big bedroom suite for married couples with children and there are so many rooms attached.”
“Why was your nursery in a bedroom?” asked Fanny, curious about the setup of a different house. “Ours is just in a nursery.”
“I chose it when I arrived here. I was even younger than you then, Fanny, and I think I only wanted to be near Aunt Beatrice really. She let me have my way.”
“Yes, I was sleeping in the suite across the corridor then,” Lady Esher reminisced with a chuckle. “It’s the largest of the guest suites now. You would come and find me in the night if your nurse was sleeping, Louisa. Well, I didn’t mind. We were company for one another, weren't we?”
“Where were your Mama and Papa?” Fanny pursued, struck by this aspect of the story. “Didn’t they want you to live with them?”
“They died in an accident a long, long time ago,” Lady Louisa said gently, without a hint of any shadow crossing her face. “Aunt Beatrice has always looked after me and I was very happy here.”
“It was lucky that Aunt Beatrice wanted you,” remarked the little girl with a lack of self-consciousness that would have been rude and shocking in someone older and might still have been offensive to someone thinner-skinned than the present audience. “You would have been all alone.”
Lady Louisa only laughed again. As with her smile, Benedict found that he was charmed by the sound of her laughter, so very easy, natural and devoid of artifice.
Sometimes on their journey it had made him want to amuse her only to hear it again.
Right now, it was a welcome ray of sunshine in a conversation that was darker for him than others in the room could realize.
“Yes, I was very lucky and I still am, Fanny,” said the young woman. “Today I feel lucky to be able to show you and Ezra around Rosemere for a week or two until your parents are ready to take you up to the Highlands…”
No one seemed to notice Benedict’s present silence and he was glad of it.
He too had lost both of his parents young, although under very different circumstances to Lady Louisa.
There had been no Aunt Beatrice to make everything right for young Benedict, but he had done well enough anyway damn it all!
Mrs. Wilcox still lingered at the drawing room door as they took seats around the room and Lady Esher looked to the housekeeper expectantly.
“I hope you have prepared one of the best suites for His Grace, the Duke of Northwick, Mrs. Wilcox,” the elderly mistress of the house said with a smile. “He has been a most thoughtful and appreciated escort on this trip and I should like him to be comfortable with us here at Rosemere.”
“We had thought to put His Grace in the large guest suite you already mentioned, Lady Esher, across the corridor from the nursery. However…”
The housekeeper glanced at Lady Louisa and then back at her mistress, the pointed question in that look not lost on Benedict.
Regardless of his virtuous resolutions and good behavior on the trip, likely neither of these sensible older ladies would put a man of his reputation in a bedroom so close to an unmarried young woman.
“Yes, we need to rethink that,” Lady Esher agreed in neutral tones. You do not feel a need to be near the children, I presume, Your Grace? After all, your friends inveigled you into this trip as our escort and protector, and your duty is done now.”
“There is no need to place me anywhere near the children,” Benedict confirmed quickly, thinking that he would likely sleep better the further away he was placed. “If they have Lady Louisa and their nursemaids nearby, then…”
“Perhaps the east wing, second floor, Mrs. Wilcox? The main suite there looks over the gardens too. His Grace does not strike me as a man who will struggle with an extra flight of stairs.”
“Nooo!” shouted Fanny abruptly, having listened to the adult conversation and only now belatedly realizing that one of their favored playmates was to be removed from the vicinity of the nursery. “You have to sleep near us too, Benedict.”
“Your Grace,” Aunt Beatrice corrected the little girl, who only pushed out her lower lip stubbornly.
“Papa and Mama call him Benedict,” she insisted. “So I shall too.”
“Fanny,” sighed Aunt Beatrice. “The correct form of address for a duke is ‘Your Grace’, just as yours is Lady Fanny, even though your family and friends don’t use it. It is respectful for children to use…”
“Do not worry,” Benedict intervened with a shrug, his mind far from titles and correct forms of address. “Now, as to bedrooms, the second floor would be no trouble to me at all, Lady Esher.”
Suddenly Fanny made a dash across the floor and seized one of Benedict’s legs, sitting down on his foot and clinging on tightly. Espying his sister’s game, a giggling Ezra quickly attached himself to Benedict’s other leg.
“His name is Benedict and he has to sleep near us so that we can play together,” Fanny declared.
“Maybe Uncle Benedict?” suggested Lady Louisa with a mischievous smile that rather weakened Benedict’s resolve to keep his distance in any way.
“There might be monsters in the nursery and they’re scared of dukes,” Fanny added, as though this fictitious argument should trump all others.
“You are making it very hard for me to say no to you, young Lady Fanny,” Benedict told her, swinging each of the children forward on his legs in turn and sparking fresh bursts of happy laughter from both.
Had he ever been so happy as a child? He suspected not. Certainly, no adult had ever played with him, although his mother had done her best to care for him, as far as she could. Glancing at Lady Esher, Benedict could see her resolve weakening with his own.
“There will be two nursemaids in the other nursery bedroom,” Rosemere’s mistress murmured to the housekeeper. “That should suffice.”
The housekeeper nodded, although it was impossible to say whether she agreed the nursemaids were sufficient chaperones or was merely acceding to his mistress’s will.
“I shall go and make sure all is in order,” Mrs. Wilcox replied, just as their tea arrived on trays.
“It looks like you two little tyrants have got your way,” Benedict told the giggling children, “but you must promise to be good neighbors and not make too much noise. I do not want to be disturbed in the night.”
Looking up, Benedict’s eyes met the sweet and sparkling hazel gaze of Lady Louisa.
His heart began to beat more powerfully in his chest as he again noted the prettiness of her features.
It came to him that even if the children were quiet, there were other types of disturbance he must guard against here at Rosemere.
Benedict was confident he could control his actions around this comely young woman, as he had promised Lady Esher, but could he entirely control his own urges and imagination?