would be blind if she didn’t admire him, and turned slowly to lean back against the mantel, his arms crossed over his chest. “How very sorry I was for the loss of your trust in me. It was all a mistake, a dreadful mistake that happened because I was taken in by a woman who was more experienced than I, a simple man from the country. I was weak, I admit it. This is no excuse, pray don’t think it is. The fact is that I was weak and was led astray. That woman is no longer in my heart or in my mind.”
“That was certainly fortunate, since you then married that poor girl in York. Do I have that right?”
“Ah, my poor little Anne. She died nearly a year ago, you know, so unexpectedly, leaving me and her father bereft.”
“I am sorry. I had heard she died late this past fall.”
“The time has passed so slowly, my despair so deep, it could be ten years,” he said. “After her tragic death I could not look backward or forward. Only recently have I felt the moments of life flicker again within me.”
“I had forgotten how very lovely you speak. Such eloquence, such grace.”
“It is not kind to mock a man who’s known such pain. What I said is true.”
“Was she as young as I was when you married her?”
“She was eighteen, a woman who knew her own mind, a woman grown.”
Hallie shook her head. She picked up the teapot on the side table and poured herself a cup. She sipped it as she looked over at Elgin Sloane, Lord Renfrew. “I have been thinking that females shouldn’t be allowed into society or into the company of men until they are twenty-five.”
He laughed, a dark brow climbing up to what she’d always considered a highly intelligent forehead. “A marvelous jest, my dear. You know very well that no gentleman would wish to wed a female that old.”
“How old are you?”
“I am thirty-one.”
Hallie sat down and drummed her fingertips on the arm of the chair. “My uncle always said that men needed more years to leaven than women. One could think you were far too leavened now.”
“I am considered a young man.”
“And twenty-five is old for a woman?”
He had to regain control, not that he’d had any sort of firm control over her yet, truth be told.
She toasted him with her teacup. “Goodness, you were far too old for me before, but I was such an infatuated young fool I never even noticed those wrinkles around your eyes. Or perhaps they weren’t there a year and a half ago.”
His hand flew to his face, then, not looking away from her, he slowly lowered his hand back to his side. “I have always loved the way you joke. You will keep me humble, Hallie, a good thing for a man.”
“This is really too much, sir, since-”
There was a horrible crashing sound from the back of the house. Hallie was out of her chair and through the drawing room doorway in an instant.
The kitchen, Lord Renfrew thought, that dreadful noise had come from the kitchen. A man didn’t appear to best advantage in the middle of a mess in a kitchen. Best to remain here, above all the chaos, calm and clear- eyed.
“Good grief, who are you? What’s going on?”
CHAPTER 22
“I, sir, am here to visit Miss Carrick. I believe she just ran back to the kitchen, some sort of female disaster.”
Female disaster? Jason stared long and hard at the elegant vision standing at languid ease in front of him, thinking that he didn’t particularly care for the latest gentlemen’s style. The waist looked too nipped in, the tails too long, altogether unpractical, at least if one were mucking out stalls.
Jason heard a shriek. When he ran into the kitchen, it was to see Cook, Petrie, Martha, Angela, and Hallie bent over coughing, covered with the settling smoke still billowing up from the new Macklin stove. Since he and Hallie had been assured that this modern wonder would be in use until the turn of the century, Jason didn’t believe this to be a propitious beginning. He saw that there was no fire, only smoke. He opened the kitchen door and the three windows and waved.
“Is everyone all right?”
Black tears streaked down Petrie’s face. He was wringing his filthy hands. “Oh, Master Jason, look at what that smoking monster has done to my linen, all spotless only three hours ago, and now look.”
Martha poked Petrie in the shoulder. “Here now, Mr. Petrie, don’t cry or I’ll tell Mr. Hollis meself-myself. Get yourself together-be a butler.”
Jason hoped Petrie wouldn’t throw Martha onto the still-smoking stove.
“Anise seed won’t help get us clean, I’m afraid,” Hallie said, wiping a hand across her face. “Don’t worry, Petrie, Martha is good with all sorts of stains. Angela, your face is a bit black.”
“So is yours, dear. Do you know this lovely gown was once green?”
Hallie grinned, shook her head. “Jason, I believe we were cheated by that lovely man who talked us into buying this modern marvel.”
Angela said, “Perhaps it’s simply breaking itself in, getting itself used to our house.”
Jason said, “I’ll have One-Armed Davie look at it once it’s cooled down. The wood is embers now; it won’t take long.”
Angela said, “It amazes me what that man can do with only five fingers and his teeth. Cook, are you all right? You’re not hurt, are you?”
Mrs. Millsom had forgotten her stinging hand. She stared, eyes fixed, at Jason, who was standing right in her kitchen, not three feet away. “Mr. Sherbrooke saved us,” she whispered.
“Oh dear,” Angela said.
“Well, actually not, Mrs. Millsom,” Hallie began, but Mrs. Millsom appeared not to have heard. She continued to stare at Jason, who continued to look splendidly male, hair windblown, white shirt open, leaving his brown neck bare, his britches lovely and tight, his boots dusty, and Hallie could only roll her eyes. “Actually, all he did was open the door.”
“And the windows,” Mrs. Millsom said, still in a whisper.
Jason stretched out his lovely brown hand and came to within a foot in front of her. “Cook? Mrs. Millsom? Are you all right? Ah, you’ve burned your hand.”
Cook stared at him, shook her head as she held out her hand, which he gently held between his own. “It’s not bad. Angela, hand me some butter, we’ll cool it down. Petrie, fetch some bandages.” To his astonishment, Cook looked down at her hand held by both of his, and fell into him, almost knocking him down. He caught her even as Hallie grabbed his arm, pulling him upright.
Angela called out, “Ah, Jason, be careful of the-”
Jason went down on the large spoon covered with some sort of batter, pulling Hallie with him, Cook on top of him.
“Oh dear,” Angela said.
Jason felt flattened. As gently as he could, he rolled Cook onto her back even as Hallie came up onto her knees over him. Jason said, “Why did she swoon? Is she in pain?”
Hallie could only laugh at his utter bewilderment. “Jason, you are such a moron. You touched her, that was all it took.”
He patted Cook’s face even as he shook his head, and everyone began to laugh. Cook’s eyes fluttered. She stared up into the delicious young master’s concerned face. Concern for her. The breath whooshed out of her. “Oh, Mr. Sherbrooke, oh, sir, I only wanted to make you a lovely ginger cake.”
“Ginger cake.” Angela fell against the kitchen table she was laughing so hard. As for Petrie, he found himself slapping Martha on her thin shoulder, telling her that her face was black as one particular All Hallow’s Eve he remembered as a boy.
“I say,” came an astonished voice from the doorway, “there is no more tea in the pot.”
