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She opened her eyes halfway. “Rosamund? Is that you?”
“She’s dead.”
Now Alex was awake. She sat bolt upright in bed. “Dead?”
“Millicent. The consumption took her overnight.”
The doll. She meant the doll.
“You gave me a fright.” Alex pressed a hand to her chest. Perhaps her heart would stop racing in a day or two.
“The funeral is prepared. We’ll be waiting on you in the nursery.”
Funeral?
Rosamund was gone before Alex could inquire further. She rose from bed and hastily dressed. Given her disorientation in a new room and the abrupt way she’d been roused from sleep, she didn’t do a very good job of it. After two attempts, she decided she could live with misaligned buttons for the moment, and three passes of the hairbrush would have to be enough. Clenching a few hairpins in her teeth, she made her way into the corridor, winding her hair into a knot as she went.
Alex hoped the standard of attire at this funeral wasn’t overly formal. She’d just jabbed the second pin into her haphazard chignon when she entered the nursery. Millicent lay in the center of the bed, staring up blankly from the swaddling of her shroud. The girls stood on either side. Daisy wore a scrap of black lace netting draped over her head as a veil.
Alex struggled, mightily, not to burst out laughing. If for no other reason than that doing so would launch the remaining hairpins in her mouth like missiles.
She completed her upsweep, composed herself, and approached the bed. To Rosamund, she whispered, “What happens now?”
“We’re waiting on—”
A male voice breezed into the room. “Such a tragedy. Deepest sympathies. A grievous loss.”
Mr. Reynaud had joined the group.
Alex slid a cautious glance in his direction. He wore the same black coat and boots he’d been wearing the night previous. His cuffs were undone, however, and his cravat was missing.
Probably draped over an antler prong somewhere.
He walked toward Daisy and made a deep bow of condolences before holding out his arm so that she could pin something around it.
A black armband.
She recalled his words from a few days ago. Millicent is Daisy’s doll. She kills the thing at least once a day.
So this was why he’d been wearing the black armband a few mornings past, when they’d conducted that farce of an interview in his not-at-all-a-gentleman’s retreat. He hadn’t been in mourning. Not for a human being, at any rate. Perhaps she shouldn’t have judged him quite so harshly.
He bent to place a kiss on Millicent’s painted forehead. “Bless her soul. She looks just as though she’s sleeping. Or awake. Or doing anything else, really.”
Alex’s mouth twitched at the corners, but she bowed her head and tried to appear bereaved.
“Let us begin,” Daisy said solemnly.
They formed a semicircle at the foot of the bed. Rosamund went to Daisy’s right side. Mr. Reynaud assumed what was clearly his usual place at Daisy’s left—which put him next to Alexandra.
She didn’t want to think about where he’d been since she saw him last, but her senses gave her no choice in the matter. When she inhaled, she smelled brandy and sandalwood, and the suggestion that he’d walked through a cloud of cheroot smoke. She didn’t detect any hint of a lady’s perfume, however. That should not have come as a relief, but it did.
She stared at the bedpost and set her mind on tragedy.
“Mr. Reynaud, would you kindly say a few words?” Daisy asked.
“But of course.” He clasped his hands together and intoned in a low, grave voice, “Almighty Father, we are gathered here today to commend to your keeping the soul of Millicent Fairfax.”
Daisy nudged him with her elbow.
“Millicent Annabelle Chrysanthemum Genevieve Fairfax,” he corrected.
Alexandra bit the inside of her cheek. How could the man keep a straight face through all this?
“She will be remembered for her faithful companionship. A truer friend never lived. Not once did she stray from Daisy’s side—save for the few occasions when she rolled off the bed.”
Oh, help. Alex was going to laugh. She knew it. Biting her tongue clean through wouldn’t help.
Perhaps she could disguise a burst of laughter as a cough. After all, consumption was catching.
“Let Millicent’s composure in the face of certain death be a model for us all. Her eyes remained fixed on heaven—and not merely because she lacked any eyelids to close.”
She cast a pleading glance at him, only to catch him glancing back with devilish amusement. He wanted her to laugh, the terrible man. And then, just as she thought she was lost, he took her hand in his, lacing their fingers into a tight knot.
Alex no longer worried she might laugh.
Instead, her heart squeezed.
On Mr. Reynaud’s other side, Daisy clasped her guardian’s hand tight. Then she offered her free hand to Rosamund. The four of them had formed an unbroken chain, and Alex realized the truth. Here were three people who desperately needed each other—perhaps even loved each other—and they would all rather contract consumption than admit it.
Daisy bowed her veiled head. “Let us pray.”
Alex fumbled her way through the Lord’s Prayer, quietly reeling. His grip was so warm and firm. His signet ring pressed against her third and fourth fingers. The moment felt intimate. The way they stood holding hands, heads bowed in prayer, it felt less like a funeral, and more like . . .
More like a wedding.
No, no, no.
What was wrong with her? Had she learned nothing from those months of foolish imaginings? All those silly fantasies had popped like a soap bubble when it became clear he’d forgotten her completely. Chase Reynaud was not the man of her dreams. By his own declaration, he would never even think of seducing her.
She really needed to start on that sampler.
“Lead us not into temptation,” Alex prayed fervently, “but deliver us from evil.”
When the prayer was done, Daisy placed the deceased doll reverently in a toy-chest “grave.”
Mr. Reynaud kept Alexandra’s hand in his. “Well, then, Miss Mountbatten. Now that’s over with, I shall leave you to your pupils.” He gave her hand a light squeeze before releasing it. “Let the education begin.”
Chapter Eight (#u4fc783d2-94ad-5d57-ba14-150cc7d31447)
The education was on hold. Before any lessons could take place, Alexandra had a ten-year-old girl to conquer.
After breakfast, the Rosamund Rebellion commenced.
Silence was her first strategy, and she’d marshaled Daisy into the campaign. Neither of them would speak a word to Alex. Indeed, once the funeral was over, neither of them even acknowledged her presence. Rosamund read her book, Daisy exhumed Millicent, and all three treated Alex as if she didn’t exist.
Very well. Both sides could play at this game.
The next day, Alex didn’t even try to start conversation. Instead, she brought a novel and a packet of biscuits—Nicola had sent her off with a full hamper of them—and she sat in the rocking chair to read. She laughed aloud at the funny bits—really, pigeons?—gasped at the revelations, and loudly chewed her way through a dozen biscuits. At one point, she was certain she felt Daisy gazing at her from across the room. However, she didn’t dare look up to confirm it.
It became a habit. Every day, Alex brought with her a novel, and every day, a different variety of Nicola’s biscuits. Lemon, almond, chocolate, toffee. And every day, as she sat eating and reading, the girls ignored her existence.
Until the morning a foul odor permeated the nursery. A sharp scent that even fresh-baked biscuits had no hope to overpower. As the day grew warmer, the ripe, pungent smell became nauseating. The girls offered no clue as to its origin, and Alexandra would not give Rosamund the satisfaction of asking. Instead she sniffed and searched until she found the source. A bit of clammy, shrunken Stilton buried in her bottom-most desk drawer.
Well, then. It would seem the tactics were escalating. She could rise to the challenge.
Alex had exhausted her supply of biscuits. She brought in a new box of watercolors, bright as jewels in a treasure chest, placing them in easy reach.
The girls dusted her chair with soot.
Alex brought in a litter of kittens Mrs. Greeley was evicting from the cellar. No one could resist fluffy, mewling kittens. And Daisy almost didn’t, until Rosamund yanked her away with a stern word.
That evening, a rotting plum mysteriously appeared in Alex’s slipper—and unfortunately, her bare toes found it.
Rosamund seemed to be daring her to shout or rage, or go complaining to Mr. Reynaud. However, Alex refused to surrender. Instead, she smiled. She allowed the girls to do as they pleased. And she waited.
When they were ready to learn, they would tell her so. Until then, she would only be wasting her effort.
At last, her patience was rewarded. She found her opening.
Rosamund fell asleep on a particularly warm afternoon, dozing off with her book propped on her knees and her head tilted against the window glazing. Alex motioned Daisy closer and laid out a row of wrapped sweetmeats on the table, one by one.
“How many are there?” she whispered. “Count them out for me, and you may have them for yourself.”
Daisy sent a cautious glance toward her sister.
“She’s sleeping. She’ll never know.”
With a small, uncertain finger, Daisy touched each sweet as she counted aloud. “One. Two. Three. Four. Five.”
“And in this group?”
Daisy’s lips moved as she counted them quietly to herself. “Six.”
“Well done, you. Now how many in both groups together? Together, five and six are . . . ?”
“Daisy,” Rosamund snapped.
Startled, Daisy snatched her hand behind her back. “Yes?”
“Millicent’s vomiting up her innards. You’d better see to her.”
As her sister obediently retreated, Rosamund approached Alexandra. “I know what you’re doing.”
“I never imagined otherwise.”
“You won’t win.”
“Win? I’m not certain what you mean.”
“We will not cooperate. We are not going away to school.”
Alex softened her demeanor. “Why don’t you want to go to school?”
“Because the school won’t want us. We’ve been sent down from three schools already, you know.”
“Don’t say you’d rather remain here with Mr. Reynaud. If it were up to him, you’d have only dry toast at every meal.”
“We’re not wanted by Mr. Reynaud, either. No one wants us. Anywhere. And we don’t want them.”
Alexandra recognized the defiance and mistrust in the girl’s eyes. A dozen years ago, those eyes could have mirrored her own.
A tender part of her wanted to clutch the girl close. Of course you’re wanted. Of course you’re loved. Your guardian cares for you so very much. But to lie would be taking the coward’s way out, and Rosamund wouldn’t be fooled. What the girl needed wasn’t false reassurance—it was for someone to tell her the honest, unflinching truth.
“Very well.” Alex folded her hands on the desk and faced her young charge. “You’re right. You’ve been passed around from relation to relation, sent down from three schools, and Mr. Reynaud wishes to rid himself of you at the first opportunity. You’re unwanted. So what you must decide is this: What do you want?”
Rosamund gave her a suspicious look.
“I was orphaned, too. A bit older than you are now, but I was utterly alone in the world, save for a few distant relations who paid for my schooling—on the condition that they would never have me in their sight. It wasn’t fair. It was lonely, and my schoolmates were cruel, and I cried myself to sleep more evenings than not. But in time, I realized I had an advantage over the other girls. They had to worry about catching a husband to help their families. I was indebted to no one, I answered to no one, and I needn’t meet anyone’s expectations of what a young lady should or shouldn’t be. My life was my own. I could follow any dream, if I was prepared to work hard for it. Do you hear what I’m saying?”
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