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The smaller child pointed away from Ightham. ‘Over there. In a big house.’ She spread her arms to aid in her description.
Marguerite knew of only one big house in this particular area, though she had never visited it. Good lord. Marguerite had assumed they were children of villagers, or tenants, but now that she had time to look more closely, she could see that their dresses and pinafores were of far too good a quality to be worn by children of common folk. ‘You mean Bedwell Hall. You are Lord Compton’s daughters?’
The older girl left off sucking the back of her hand and nodded.
Marguerite recalled her abandoned specimen with a sigh. She’d have to pick one another day, because these children should not be wandering around in the fields alone. What on earth could Lord Compton be thinking?
‘Come along, ladies. It is time you went home.’
The younger one giggled. ‘Ladies.’
‘You are ladies, are you not?’ Marguerite said.
The older one left off her rubbing. ‘I am Lady Elizabeth and she is Lady Jane. Everyone calls me Lizzie.’
‘I’m Janey,’ the younger one added.
Marguerite took their hands. How tiny they were. And grubby. It made her think of her childhood. When she had been young and innocent. She could scarcely remember it. Mama had died when she was very young and then it seemed as if she had become mother to her siblings, especially to her sister, Petra.
And now Petra had remarried, leaving Marguerite entirely alone. She liked it that way. She really did. Not having to care for anyone else, being able to do exactly as she pleased, when she pleased, was heaven. And if she needed company, she could always call on Petra and her new husband, Ethan, or go for a visit to Carrie and Avery at their home in the north of England.
Right now, Petra and her husband were off visiting Ethan’s elderly relative in Bath. Ethan had thought Petra was looking a little peaky and had thought a change of air would do her good. Bless the man. He really was good to her younger sister.
They climbed a stile and crossed a narrow laneway bounded by a high wall.
‘The gate is that way,’ Lizzie said.
They really were quite a distance from the house. It did not seem right at all. ‘How old are you, Lizzie?’
‘I am eight,’ Lizzie said, ‘and Janey is six.’
Marguerite frowned. ‘Are you supposed to be wandering around the fields on your own?’
‘No,’ Lizzie said. ‘But we ran away.’
A cold chill travelled down Marguerite’s spine. ‘Why?’
‘Because Papa is mean to us,’ Janey said. ‘So we runned away.’
‘Ran,’ Marguerite said. She did not like the sound of this. Not at all. How many times had she, too, had the urge to run away?
In the end, it had been Neville who left her. She never had understood why he, of all people, had gone off to war with her brother and brother-in-law, but of the three of the women left behind to become widows, she must have been the only one who celebrated her husband’s departure with a toast to whatever impulse had sent him off.
She hadn’t wanted his death. But she had been glad to see him go. Unfortunately, she wasn’t yet free of the misery he had imposed on her life from the moment they wed. But she would be. Very soon.
Not far down the lane, a side gate into the Bedwell estate stood ajar.
She frowned at it. This lord did not care very much for the welfare of his children, that much was certain. She ushered the children through and closed it behind them, making sure it was firmly latched. With growing anger for this careless papa, she marched the two girls up the path to the back of a beautiful Palladian mansion. Once, this house had belonged to the Westrams. Back before Oliver Cromwell had turned England upside down.
It would not have looked like this then. It had been vastly improved since its Tudor days.
Not a soul hustled out to meet them. Had no one realised these girls were missing?
* * *
‘My lord?’
Jack Vincent, Earl Compton, glanced up from reviewing his bailiff’s weekly report on several matters relating to the estate. He frowned. Johnson was staring out of the estate office window with a puzzled expression.
‘What is it?’
‘A young woman, my lord. With Lady Elizabeth and Lady Jane in tow.’
Jack shot out of his chair and around the desk to see what Johnson was talking about. Indeed. It was as his bailiff had said. A willowy woman was striding across the stable yard with his daughters dragging their feet as she urged them along.
‘Wait here,’ he commanded. He strode for the kitchen door.
Cook looked up, flustered at his entry. ‘Is there...?’
He opened the door to the courtyard and emerged into the spring sunshine. He blinked against the glare.
‘Lord Compton?’ an imperious, slightly out-of-breath voice asked.
He bowed slightly to the dishevelled woman whose hems were damp and muddy and who had locks of auburn hair dangling from beneath her cap as if she had been pulled through a hedge backwards. ‘Who the devil are you? And what are you doing with my daughters?’
She recoiled and drew herself up straight. ‘We have not met, but I am Lady Marguerite Saxby. I live in Westram.’ Her mouth tightened. ‘As for your other question, I found these ladies wandering in the field outside your walls. Lady Elizabeth has had an unfortunate encounter with a stinging nettle.’
He froze, looked at the tears staining his eldest child’s face and felt anger rising inside him. How had this happened? ‘Why were you outside?’
Lizzie flinched.
Damn it. He hated when she did that. He reached for a modicum of calm.
‘We runned away,’ Janey announced.
‘Ran.’ He and this woman, this Lady Marguerite, spoke at the same time.
He glanced at her. She glared back. As if he was somehow in the wrong.
‘You know you are not allowed to go outside without a maid.’ He sounded gruffer than he intended.
Lizzie lifted her shoulders. ‘Nanny said everyone was busy.’
‘Then you wait.’ He ran his hands through his hair. ‘Look, if you can’t do as you are told, Lizzie, then I’m sorry, but you know the consequences.’
Lizzie burst into tears. ‘Nooooo!’
The woman thrust herself between Lizzie and himself. ‘Leave the poor child alone. She has been punished enough, I should think. Look.’ She gently pulled Lizzie forward and held out her hand for his inspection.
It was covered in white bumps with red edges. His stomach churned. His brain went numb at the sight of the painful swelling. ‘Go,’ he yelled. ‘Upstairs. Get Nanny to put something on it.’
‘I gave her dock leaves,’ Lady Marguerite said. Her voice was beautifully modulated, if a little deeper than most women’s. For some reason it calmed him.
She crouched down. ‘Take the leaves to your nanny, she will know what to do.’ Lizzie nodded and ran off with Janey scurrying behind.
Jack hated to see his children hurt. Could not abide it. Why the devil would they not do as he had instructed and stay indoors with Nanny James?
The young woman rose to her feet. She was almost tall enough to look him in the eye. And delightfully feminine, despite her drab clothing. ‘What on earth are you about, Lord Compton?’
He stared blankly ‘About?’
‘Those children should not be wandering the countryside alone. Anything could happen.’
‘Do you think I don’t know that?’
She blinked.
Damn and blast, he had raised his voice. Again. He lowered his tone. ‘They know better. I have told them time and time again.’
Her finely arched eyebrows, a darker auburn than her hair, lowered. Her pretty green eyes narrowed. ‘The gate to the lane was open. They were a long way from home and you had no idea of it. Children of their age need proper adult supervision.’
Good lord, who was she to come here laying down the law? He was the magistrate. ‘Nonsense. They have proper supervision. Indoors.’
‘I see.’ She looked completely unconvinced.
‘There is a nanny, three footmen and a cook, all there to see that they have whatever their little hearts desire. Is that enough supervision for you, madam?’ Devil take it, why was he explaining himself to this woman? He took a deep breath.
Somehow, she managed to look down her nose at him. ‘Not enough of the right sort of supervision, apparently, and while a punishment is likely in order, I beg that it be denial of some privilege, a story at bedtime, a visit to the village, something that will not cause physical pain.’
Stunned, he stared at her. Pain?
She narrowed her eyes. ‘Good day, Lord Compton.’ She spun around and marched back the way she had come.
How dare she come here and accuse him of not looking after his children? And...and did she think he was going to beat them? Damn her, for judging him so poorly. ‘Johnson, get a chain and a lock and secure the damned gate. And find out who left it open.’
He strode for the nursery. As he expected, his daughters, his little girls, were gathered around Nanny’s chair. They looked so innocent. So sweet. They were the bane of his life.
No. No. That was not true. But somewhere along the line he had lost control. And that would not do. A man needed to be in control of his family or bad things happened. A shudder ran down his spine. The memory of what had happened to his wife when she took it in her head to go visit her scallywag of a brother without his knowledge leapt to the forefront of his mind. If he had been stricter, more in control of his wife, she would be alive today.
‘Elizabeth, what on earth were you thinking?’ He fixed his gaze on his oldest daughter. ‘I have warned you about this sort of thing. This was your last chance, I am afraid. As I said, you must face the consequences.’
‘Now, now, Master Jack,’ Nanny said. ‘What has you in a pelter?’
‘In a pelter?’ He stared at the woman who had been his wife’s nanny. ‘I can assure you I am not in a pelter. I would simply like to be informed why my daughters ignored my orders and went roaming the countryside. That is not too much to ask, is it?’
Elizabeth stared at the carpet and the toe of her shoe traced the pattern on the carpet. ‘No, Papa,’ she whispered.
Now he felt like an ogre. He steeled his resolve. He could not give in. Would not.
‘We wanted to find a frog,’ Janey announced as if that was a perfectly good explanation. ‘Bert told Sam there are frogs in that field over there. He put one in his sister’s bed and made her scream.’
She was talking about two of his grooms. Which meant they had been hanging about the stables. Another thing they were not supposed to do. Horses were dangerous.
Janey’s eyes filled with tears. ‘But we couldn’t catch one. Then I wanted to pick a bouquet for you, but I couldn’t reach the flower and then the weeds bit Lizzie and she screamed. I was frightened.’
He winced. ‘Were you?’
She nodded. ‘Then the nice lady came along.’ She beamed up at him. ‘And here we are.’ Her expression changed. ‘We didn’t mean to be bad, Papa. It won’t happen again.’ Her lower lip trembled. He reached out and she stepped into the circle of his arm.
‘No crying,’ he said. He couldn’t bear it if they cried. He picked her up and held her close to his chest. Unfortunately, they knew their tears troubled him and he was never sure if they were real or if they were simply using them to get their way.
He also did not fancy carrying out his threat. But how could he run his estate if he was always worrying about his girls getting into some sort of scrape? His only option was to send for his spinster aunt Ermintrude. She would keep the girls in order.
He’d been terrified of her as a lad. ‘I am sorry, but I cannot have the rules disregarded in this way. I will write to your great-aunt today.’
Nanny paled. ‘They won’t do it again, dearie.’
Netty climbed on to Nanny’s lap and stuck her thumb in her mouth. Almost three already. He could scarcely believe it was nearly two years since Amanda had been brutally murdered. And still Netty wasn’t talking. Nanny kept telling him there was nothing wrong. That she would talk when she was ready, but Jack was starting to worry.
‘Please, Papa,’ Elizabeth said, clasping her little hands to her chest. ‘We promise we won’t do it again.’
No tears from Elizabeth.
‘You promise?’ he said, suddenly weary. ‘On your word of honour?’
‘Yes. I promise. Cross my heart and hope to die.’
He put Janey down. ‘This really is your very last chance.’
‘Yes, Papa,’ the girls chorused.
Exhaustion rose in him. ‘Very well. But I am holding you to your promise. A Vincent always keep his or her word.’
They hung their heads. ‘Yes, Papa.’
Nanny cocked her head on one side. ‘You did thank the lady, my lord? For bringing the girls home?’
Had he? All he recalled was trying to defend himself from her unwarranted attacks on his character. Damn, no doubt he’d been rude. He usually was these days. He didn’t have time for niceties and walking around on eggshells. ‘I will thank her next time I see her. And I will see you both at bedtime.’
He left before they convinced him to do something else that was against his better judgement. Frogs indeed. Apologies to rude young women. Yet another chance. Was he losing his grip on things?
He pitied the men who married his daughters. They wouldn’t stand a chance.
Not that he had any intention of letting any man within a hundred miles of them before they were at least twenty-five.
Perhaps he should try another governess. The girls had chased two off already. He needed one with a strong character.
* * *
