Page 13 of Tremaine's True Love
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“Lovey, if you put fewer cakes on the tray, then the Bishop of Haddondale might not stay as long.” Nick punctuated this observation with a kiss to his wife’s temple. “Not that I’d encourage my dearest lady to anything approaching ungraciousness.”
Though, of course, his wife wasincapableof ungraciousness. Leah was also incapable of idleness, which was why Nick had had to track her down to his woodworking shop, to which she alone had a spare key.
“I do wonder how Nita put up with Vicar,” Leah said, glowering at a stack of foolscap on the workbench. “If he didn’t feel compelled to add a line of Scripture to his every observation, he might also be on his way sooner. I fear he aspires to match his son up with our Della, which ridiculousness you willnotapprove, Nicholas.”
Nick added coal to the brazier, because his shop was at the back of the stable, where warmth was at a premium. Leah worked with fingerless gloves, the same as any shopgirl might have when totting up the day’s custom.
She sat on a high stool, but Nick was tall enough to peer over her shoulder. “As my countess wishes, but lovey-lamb, why are you hiding here?” Nick certainly hid in the wood shop from time to time, and only Leah would disturb him when he did.
She tossed down a pencil and leaned against him. “You are so marvelously warm. Where is your coat, Nicholas?”
“My countess will keep me warm. You’re working on menus.”
The Countess of Bellefonte nuzzled her husband’s chest. “I hate menus. I hate mutton, I hate soup, I hate fish, I hate that Cook expects me to remember which we ate Tuesday last and in what order, and I hate most of all that, for some reason, one must never serve trifle at the same meal as lobster.”
This was old business, this jockeying between Leah and the staff she’d inherited upon becoming Nick’s wife. She’d won over the maids and footmen, and Hanford was devoted, but Cook was temperamental and contrary.
“Shall I have a word with Cook?” Nick dreaded the prospect, though Leah had taken Cook on more than once.
The countess straightened and tidied her stack of papers. “You shall not. Household matters are my domain, Nicholas, though I appreciate your willingness to entertain Vicar when he comes snuffling around.”
His Holiness had a prosperous figure for a man of the cloth, because Nick supported the living generously. Nick put Leah’s menus aside, turned, and hiked himself up onto the bench, so he faced his wife.
“What was Vicar going on about,” Nick asked, “with all that ‘the Lord will provide for the less fortunate according to their deserts,’ and ‘the laborer is worthy of his wage’?”
Leah rested her head on Nick’s knee, a rare gesture of weariness.
“He was referring to Addy Chalmers,” she said. “Nita likely prevailed upon the vicarage for some charity. Addy has a number of children and her family turned their backs on her years ago.”
“Five children now. Five living.” Nita had reminded Nick of the total rather pointedly. According to Nita’s clipped recitation, the oldest was eleven, an age at which Nick had been haring all over the shire on his pony, his half-brother Ethan at his side, and nothing more pressing on his mind than whether to put a toad in the tutor’s boot or in his bed.
“Five children,” Leah said, “and winter only half over. I’ll send a basket. I should have sent one by now. Children must eat, despite the sins of the mother or the father. I, of all people, know this.”
More old business. Prior to marrying Nick, Leah had endured her share of scandal and heartbreak. Nick had his spies in the stables though, and knew Nita had already seen to the basket.
“Addy Chalmers doesn’t sin in solitude,” he said. “My most enthusiastic sinning was ever undertaken in company. To the extent that Nita’s charitable, she has my admiration, but she has no regard for her station.”
Leah patted his thigh, then straightened, which was prudent of her. A man married less than a year was prone to certain thoughts when private with his wife, particularly when that dear lady was in need of comfort, the door was locked, and the brazier giving off a cozy warmth.
Alas, Leah had also recently become a mother, and restraint was still the marital order of the day.
And the night.
“I have endless admiration for Nita,” Leah said. “She’s been very helpful acquainting me with the household matters, but, Nicholas, I doubt that galloping off at all hours to tend to the sick and the dying is making Nita happy.”
“It’s not making her married, you mean. Perhaps she can find a younger son who’s turned up medical.” Though where Nick would find one of those for Nita, he did not know. This medical younger son would have to be a forward-thinking chap with some means.
Nita needed somebody with a light heart too, not full of death or Scripture, and it wouldn’t hurt if the fellow were inclined to have a large family.
Nicholas’s father had maintained that women with large families were too busy managing their own broods to wander into mischief. Nita didn’t wander into mischief, she charged at it headlong.
“Come spring, we’ll open a campaign to see Nita settled,” Leah said. “Kirsten, Susannah, and Della will abet us. I think Della has taken an interest in Mr. St. Michael.”
Of all the burdens Nick shared with his dear wife, the burden of being head of his family was the one he most appreciated her counsel about—even when she was wrong.
“Della isn’t out yet, lovey. She shouldn’t be noticing any gentlemen.” Besides, Nick had St. Michael in mind for Kirsten, who, like St. Michael, suffered no fools and didn’t put on airs. “Why do you think Della is considering St. Michael?”
