“Mrs. Nye, it is you who must excuse me,” he cut in, striding forward, and standing in front of her. “I’m afraid I let my natural feeling run away with me. It was not my intention to insult you and neither is it my place to upbraid you. I was not in full possession of the facts,” he said, frankly. “In truth, I came to thank you for your intercession the other day.” His lean cheeks flushed. “If you had not stepped in, my ward would have been ruined indeed.”
Mina inclined her head. “I was glad to do Cecily a good turn and I’m pleased if you were able to smooth that business over.”
“Only by following your advice,” he said with a bitter laugh. “My temper would have gotten the better of me on that occasion also if you had not intervened.”
“I am happy indeed, if I was able to offer advice that was beneficial for Cecily,” Mina answered colorlessly.
“It may be that I can see my way to offer you some respite from your current predicament,” he hesitated. “Cecily is at a difficult age, too old for a governess, yet far too naïve to let loose in society as I have recently learned to my cost. I have been thinking and it may be wise—”
“Sir Matthew, allow me to stop you there.” Mina cut across his words. “I am not in need of respite. I am a married woman. You mistake my situation.”
He fell silent at that. “Do I?” he muttered. “I do not think so, Mrs. Nye. Indeed, I fear there will come a time when you are desperately in need of rescuing from this… place.” Mina looked back at him, tight-lipped. When he realized she had no more to say on the subject, he sighed. “I am in your debt, Mrs. Nye,” he said tightly. “Something that does not sit easily with me, in light of your current company. But if you will not allow me to make reparation or alleviate your suffering—”
“Again, Sir Matthew, I must remind you that you mistake my situation.”
He shook his head. “You are a stubborn woman, Mrs. Nye.”
“I thank you for your concern,” she said, bobbing him a curtsey. “But I must now humbly beg your leave. Urgent business awaits me.”
Sir Matthew held out his hand and Mina shook it. He held it for a beat longer than necessary and Mina looked up at him in surprise. “I must then remain a debtor to you.”
Mina pulled her hand from his. “Pray do not give it another thought, Sir Matthew,” she said and turning on her heel, abruptly left the room. As she wrenched the door open, she came face to face with Reuben’s ginger beard as he straightened up guiltily from the door. “Reuben?” she addressed him in startled accents.
“Yes ma’am,” he stammered.
“Do you have some message for me?”
“No ma’am,” he said, his eyes avoiding hers shiftily. “I’m just going out back now, ma’am.” Mina stared after him as he shambled off, and then she made her way thoughtfully back to the kitchen.
She had just opened the sack of potatoes when the door burst open and Nye stood on the threshold, chest heaving. Mina dropped her paring knife and stared up at him. “Now what’s happened?” she demanded in exasperation as he slammed the door shut behind him. Really, was she to get no peace this morn!
“Care to tell me what that was all about?” he demanded, gesturing over his shoulder as Sir Matthew’s curricle bowled out of the yard.
Tamping down her irritation at having to rake over the whole thing, she forced herself instead to remain calm. “Sir Matthew Carswell called in,” she said. “To tell me he did not care for his ward to be associated with me anymore, but that he considered himself in my debt. Something he was most put out about.”
Nye continued to watch her narrowly. “So, he didn’t ask you to run away with him, then?”
Mina spluttered, retrieving her knife, and sitting in her chair. “Of course not! Where on earth did you get a preposterous idea like that?” He remained tight-lipped, but at the furious look in his eye, she realized something. “Reuben!” she gasped. “He was listening at the keyhole! Well of all the—”
“So, he did, then?” Nye burst out furiously.
“Of course not!” she seethed. “Reuben could not follow the conversation clearly if that’s what he thought. He asked me out for a drive to St Ives…” She paused at Nye’s fresh explosion of wrath. “Naturally I declined his invitation as I was far too busy.”
“Because your husband would damned well forbid it!” he corrected her hotly.
“Well, as I never entertained the notion for even an instant, I did not think it through that far,” she admitted.
“And that was it?” He shook his head. “I don’t believe it.”
Mina sat up indignantly. “What do you mean, you don’t believe me?”
“Reuben said you had to remind him you were a married woman. Even you wouldn’t be so outraged at the idea of a mere drive to St Ives!”
“Even I?” Mina fumed.
“Stop trying to distract me,” Nye thundered. “Why did you have to remind him you were married, tell me that!”
“I—because, you were right,” she told him helplessly, then saw his gaze ignite. “Not about that!” she said hastily. “But he did want to offer me a position as Cecily’s companion. You remember? You asked me if he had before, but at the time, I thought it extremely unlikely and—”
“That bastard,” Nye snarled.
“Nye!”
“Next time he comes calling, you do not see him without me being present, am I understood, Mina?”
“I highly doubt that he will ever—”
“Mina!”
“Oh, very well, you unreasonable beast!”
A footfall in the doorway, had them both spinning around and to
