Page 26 of The Marquess Wins a Wife
Latin? “It’s what ladiesdo, or so I’m given to understand.” Luke meandered across the room, swiping his palm across the top of a disused bookshelf, feeling for any hint of a bottle. “Girls have governesses, don’t they?”
“Ihaven’t got one.” A pugnacious tilt of that stubborn chin.
“Clearly,” Luke grunted. “How old are you, anyway?”
“We’re ten. Georgie and I, I mean.”
“Your brother should be in school.” It was an absent remark, delivered as he scoured the last remaining cupboard, finding only more aged sheet music, which crumbled even as he touched it.
The girl drew a swift breath. “Don’tsay that in Georgie’s hearing,” she snapped. “Papa promised he could go to Eton, but he never paid the school fees.”
One more sin to lay at the feet of Papa Talbot, he supposed. It was unlikely he could force the man to produce the funds—one couldn’t squeeze blood from a stone, and if the man turned up only to relieve the house of whatever valuables might be remaining, then it was nearly certain that the man was poor as a pauper.
The child continued, “And hardly anyone has paid their rents inyears—”
“Rents?” Luke turned, aghast. “What the devil do you mean,rents?”
The girl’s brows shot up. “Georgie owns most of the land around here,” she said. “Half the town at least. Maybe more.”
“Don’t you mean your father owns it?” Luke asked.
A firm shake of her head that sent her plaits sailing over her shoulders. “It was Mama’s land, held in trust for her children. Lizzie says that’s the only reason Papa hasn’t sold it off already.”
Because hecouldn’t, Luke supposed. The land—and the profits derived thereof—belonged to his son. “And your tenants aren’t paying?”
“Not many of them, anyway. They don’t listen to Lizzie,” the girl said, thrusting out her lower lip in a pout.
“She should have spoken to the bailiff. Had him evict those that haven’t paid.”
A scoff. “The bailiff rents, too. He says he doesn’t see a reason he ought to pay rent to a child.”
By the glow of ire in her eyes, Luke supposed she understood well enough how dire their circumstances were, what they had been deprived of through no fault of their own. The myriad ways their lives might be different, had their papa cared enough to safeguard his children’s interests. Perhaps she would not be wearing dresses three inches too short, the seams of which looked to have been let out past the point of usefulness. Perhaps her brother would have gone to Eton, as he’d been promised. Perhaps the whole family would not have to stretch every meal to its breaking point and beyond.
This uncommonly astute child—Jo, if he recalled correctly—had more pride than most grown men. She stared him down as if daring him to make a single unwise comment. Lizzie had given that to her, he suspected. They did not make a production of their circumstances, or complain of them. In fact,hehad complained more strenuously of them than they had in his hearing. He had bemoaned the substandard fare served to him, his sleeping arrangements, the lack of creature comforts with which he had been provided. But they simplylivedtheir circumstances, each and every day.
Their lives had been falling apart in bits and pieces for years, and still they weathered on. What must it be like to have that sort of determination, that resolve? He had watched his life fall to pieces years ago, and he’d simply let the broken shards lay where they had fallen. He had never managed to shove aside his apathy enough to repair it—butthis. This he could fix. It wouldn’t even be difficult.
He told himself it was simply something to do. Something small to distract him from the monotony of the countryside, since there was little else to hold his interest.
But he knew it was a lie.
∞∞∞
“Have the carriage brought round. You are going to take me into town at the earliest opportunity.”
Lizzie jumped at the sharp command, spilling a sprinkling of flour across the countertop. “Into town?” she echoed, staring at the marquess, who had stormed into the kitchen with the purposeful strides of a man who expected everyone around him to leap to his slightest whim. “What purpose could you have in town?”
He slapped his good hand down upon the counter alongside hers, sending a puff of scattered flour pluming into the air. “It seems I must have certain words with a certain bailiff who has not paid his rents in—how long, exactly?”
Lizzie felt her lips purse into a moue of annoyance. “Four years. Not that it is any of your business.”
“If unpaid rents are keeping meat from gracing the dinner table, Miss Talbot, then they damned wellaremy business.” It was a guttural growl, almost offended—as ifshehad somehow trespassed against him by concealing information which he had deemed to be crucial.
Ofcourseit was his stomach which had prompted him to action. She might’ve known. Possibly he was already counting up money which did not even belong to him, considering all the ways it might make his continued presence here more comfortable.
Her life was so farbeneathhim that he would throw the weight of his title around only to be served a proper cut of beef for dinner. Perversely, it made her so furious that she slapped her hand upon the counter beside his and gritted out, “No.”
He blinked, arrested. “I beg your pardon?”
