Page 52 of Miss Dashing
Staff came and went discreetly, leaving a breakfast tray and tidying up. The house party moved into its second week, with Portia glaring daggers from behind potted lemons, the Corvisers losing more than a few pence at whist, and Isaac Brompton maintaining a bored distance from the other guests.
No great loss, though Brompton continued to treat Hecate with drawling condescension, while Lord Nunn had barely bestirred himself to preside over Sunday dinner. As long as Phillip spent much of his days in hard, useful labor, he could survive his first house party without running afoul of Society’s myriad unwritten regulations.
Though as to that, hard, useful labor was apparently an infraction in and of itself. “Oh, the Quality,” Phillip muttered, passing his scythe to Henry Wortham.
“You are the Quality.” Henry added the blade to the collection in the wagon bed. “Never seen a toff willing to toil in such earnest.”
“I wasn’t always a toff, and wearing a toff’s clothes doesn’t mean a man deserves the insult. How is Mrs. Riley?”
Henry became focused on organizing a pile of sickles and scythes that needed no organizing.
“Had a healthy girl baby just this morning. Named her Willa, after William, her late da. Midwife says everything went well.”
“Leave Mrs. Riley some flowers.” Phillip dusted his fingers through his hair and wiped his face with a handkerchief. “Two bouquets, one for the mama, one for the baby. Pick them yourself.” Phillip had picked flowers for Hecate that morning and left them in her bedroom. She’d been fast asleep, done in by a visit to the summer cottage.
Making love under the stars was wonderful. Making love in a big, soft bed while the night breezes stirred the curtains was another kind of magic entirely.
“Flowers?” Henry appeared to be working out a complicated math problem. “Two bouquets?”
A Crosspatch Corners tradition shared from father to son and uncle to nephew. “Two. When Mavis is recovered enough to receive callers, ask to hold the baby. Admire the child, who is doubtless beautiful, as all babies are beautiful. Bathe before you call and bring Mavis some smoked beef or a quarter ham. She needs to regain her strength.”
Henry perched a hip on the wagon bed. “I’m the oldest of eight. I know all about babies. They are little and troublesome and loud, when they aren’t little, troublesome, and smelly.”
Ah, youth.“That tiny girl is all Mavis has of the man who loved her enough to spend the rest of his life with her. When you admire the baby, you respect Mavis’s memories.”
Henry made a face. “I respect Mavis, but William was the better man. Smarter than me. Not such a brute. I stink of the forge when I’m not stinking of worse. Pa won’t give up smithing, and yet, I’m supposed to take over for him if he doesn’t outlive me.”
“Are you thinking of looking for work in London?” Phillip took out his flask and offered it to Henry. This was a discussion he’d had with many a young fellow in Crosspatch. “That’s lemonade. Leave some for me.”
Henry sipped and passed it back. “Wages are higher in London, and I’m a hard worker.”
“You’re the one directing the crews, aren’t you? Travers barks the orders, but you’re telling him what work needs to be done.”
“Travers is a tenant. He knows his patch and does right by it, but I’ve rambled the whole estate since I was old enough to toddle, and I like to be busy. I’m also bringing in a bit of coin when the forge is slow.”
Phillip drained what remained in the flask—his spare—and knew he ought to be getting back to the summer cottage. The sun was still far above the horizon, but the house party was observing country hours, and all that aside, he missed Hecate.
“London wages are higher, but everybody and his cross-eyed dog are in Town looking for work. All the soldiers who’ve mustered out, the domestics whose rural households can’t pay them, the weavers who can’t make a living because of the factory looms, the sawyers replaced by steam power,everybody. I’d advise against a foray into Town.”
“I know,” Henry said. “We get the London papers. People starving in the streets, turning to gin, perishing of disease. I don’t want to leave, but…”
“I’ll put in a word with Tavistock,” Phillip said. “He recently bought a property in Berkshire, and every estate can use workers who know what they’re doing.”
Henry’s smile was wan. “Can’t court Mavis if I’m in Berkshire.”
“You can write to her.”
Henry looked intrigued, as if the concept of using the royal mail to further the interests of true love had never occurred to him.
Phillip put away his flask and bid Henry and the rest of the crew farewell. The walk across the park was pleasant, and the long hours of work passed the time between sightings of Hecate. Across the terrace, at supper, over a chessboard … She was always lovely, always poised and correct, but to Phillip’s eye, she had also acquired a quiet sparkle.
Maybe he was sparkling a bit, too, if such a thing—
“My lord.” The Earl of Nunn, attired for riding, emerged from the bend in the path that led to the arched bridge. “Out impersonating a peasant again, I see.”
The old besom was very much on his dignity, while Phillip could not be bothered to be offended. In less than six hours, he’d once again be abed, listening for Hecate’s key turning the latch on his French doors.
“I impersonate a peasant every chance I get,” Phillip said, wondering if he should have bowed. “The land thrives when those charged with tending it take a direct hand in matters. You have a beautiful estate, my lord.”
