Page 68 of Miss Delightful
“Has she come home?” Mrs. Benton did not hang up Isaiah’s effects, but rather, placed them on the sideboard. “Let’s have your coat off, and I will see if she’s receiving. Since we had word of Young Vicar Delancey’s impending visit, poor Miss Delancey has been run off her feet.”
Mrs. Benton aimed a cheery smile at Isaiah, and he smiled right back. “Please convey to Miss Delancey that my longing for a moment of her company is great.”
“I certainly will. Make yourself at home in the guest parlor, and I’m sure she’ll be down shortly.” She hung Isaiah’s coat on a peg and bustled up the steps.
Isaiah thumbed through the stacks of mail in the trays on the sideboard. The outgoing correspondence looked to be intended mostly for other clergy located in various obscure corners of the Home Counties. Old cronies, doubtless, who must be informed of Michael’s royal progress. The incoming mail appeared to be invitations—Thomas Delancey knew a few Honorables—and an occasional merchant’s bill.
Not much to be learned there. Isaiah made a quick inspection of the desk in the study and learned only that Thomas was working on some bit of bombast having to do with seed falling on fallow ground, deafness, and blindness. Metaphors to send the congregation into a collective doze, but Isaiah could profitably allude to the parable of the sower when next he and Thomas conversed.
Isaiah was pacing the cozy confines of the guest parlor when Mrs. Benton returned.
“You will have to try your luck another day, Mr. Mornebeth. Miss Delancey is snatching a nap and begs for your understanding. She truly is quite exhausted.” And there was that same smile, all pleasant hospitality.
This time, Isaiah did not smile back. “I don’t suppose you know what specific errand has reduced Miss Delancey to this state of extreme fatigue? She looked well enough when I glimpsed her at the vicarage’s door ten minutes ago.”
Mrs. Benton’s smile acquired a few more teeth. “In addition to all the preparations for her brother’s visit, she is attending to regular church and family duties, Mr. Mornebeth. Spring is a busy time for any vicar’s household, and that happy season will soon be upon us. Perhaps you could stop by again tomorrow?”
“I am expected for tea at Lambeth Palace tomorrow.” A slight embroidering on the truth. Isaiah would stop around to greet his prospective superior and to burnish his halo as an eager new recruit to the palace. Grandmama had spoken, and Isaiah had seen the wisdom of her suggestion.
“Well then, we’ll look for you later this week.” Mrs. Benton preceded Isaiah through the parlor door. “Whatever became of that bunch of daffodils you bought at the market?”
He’d taken them to Grandmama. No sense letting good coin go to waste. “Nipped, I’m afraid. The flower girl should have taken better care.”
“Nipped? Daffodil buds nipped when the weather has finally shown signs of moderating? Well, that is unfortunate.”
Mrs. Benton passed him his coat and other effects, while Isaiah wrestled with the urge to accidentally trip such that Delancey’s housekeeper was shoved rather violently against the wall. Her sunny smiles hid too much superiority for a mere domestic, and if she thought Isaiah would be put off by her little games, she was much mistaken.
Mrs. Benton had known Isaiah would not be staying, else she’d have hung up his things and not piled them unceremoniously on the sideboard.
No matter. Dorcas would soon learn that female scheming was doomed where Isaiah was concerned. He’d make that point quite clear to her, and to blazes with Michael Delancey’s impending visit.
* * *
“You have a caller,”Mrs. Benton said, taking Dorcas’s cloak. “You also have flowers. The sweetest little bouquet of forget-me-nots. I put the flowers in your private parlor, and the caller is in the family parlor.”
Bother all callers. Dorcas had come from Alasdhair’s house, where she’d learned the rudiments of whisky-making. Alasdhair grew animated discussing oak barrels, peat smoke, and the exciseman, his burr deepening to rolled r’s and rumbled vowels.
Dorcas could listen to him talk about potatoes and scarecrows—tatties and tattie bogels, to him—and be enthralled.
He’d encouraged her to reminisce about her mother, an indulgence Dorcas generally refrained from around Papa, and about growing up with Michael. Recollections of Mama were sweet. She’d been practical, sunny, and occasionally silly. Michael, who was expected at the vicarage any day, was a more complicated topic.
Mrs. Benton hung up Dorcas’s cloak and bonnet. “Your caller is Mr. Mornebeth, miss. I told him you were out, and he announced that he would wait, then saw himself to the family parlor. I can interrupt in ten minutes if you like.”
The offer was mildly disconcerting. “You don’t trust him for even ten minutes?”
Mrs. Benton eyed the plaid scarf in Dorcas’s hands. “I do not. Not very Christian of me, but he’s a thrusting sort of man, and I have never cared for such as them.”
Isaiah would not cease dropping by the vicarage merely because Dorcas dreaded his visits. “He’s calling on me, not Papa?”
“Afraid so.”
Well, drat and perdition. “Bring a tea tray. Nothing lavish. Who are the flowers from?”
“I did not peek at the card.”
Dorcas longed to wrap the plaid scarf about her neck and shoulders like a magic cloak, but no. That would be eccentric, and Isaiah would notice, and all she wanted was to endure the two cups of tea mandated by good manners and see him on his way. She instead stopped by her private parlor, intent on learning who had sent her flowers only to find Isaiah Mornebeth lounging in Mama’s favorite reading chair.
“Mr. Mornebeth, good day.” What in blue blazes was he doing in Dorcas’s private parlor? “I believe the family parlor will be cozier at this hour.”
