The Peculiar Pink Toes of Lady Flora Read online

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  A cart arrived that day, loaded with boxes and crates, things he had apparently sent for via letter to his solicitor. There were all manner of treats for the Yuletide season, including some of the best brandy and port from Castle Malgrave's cellars, fish from his lake, packed and preserved in salt, and a brace of pheasant. But he was most excited about one gift in particular— a pair of boots.

  They were sturdy, brown and went all the way up to her knee. There was no heel, no embroidery, no bows. Nothing to make them pretty. They were no-nonsense, practical, somewhat stiff until worn in. They were the Duke of Malgrave in boot form.

  "There," he said, his eyes gleaming with satisfaction, "these will protect your pink toes, madam. Now you can keep up with me."

  And because he looked so pleased, and he had ordered them just for her, she loved those plain, unpretty boots with all her might.

  The next horses to arrive at Darnley brought a carriage that deposited his sixteen-year-old heir, Nicholas, who was to stay for the season, and the solicitor, Halfpenny Plumm, who came only for a brief visit on business for the duke.

  The boy was rather quiet and shy at first, but Flora had soon put him at his ease, and nobody could fail to see the joy he felt at being once again in company with his father. Even more so because Maxim had written, asking him to come.

  "My lord father has never requested my presence before," Nicholas told her one day, soon after his arrival. "I was afraid he might have some terrible news for me, but it rather seems as if he just...wanted me here." Evidently the young man had rarely felt wanted and he was still getting accustomed to the sensation.

  She saw that there was some awkwardness between father and son, most of it stemming from Maxim's inability to set down his guard and be less formal.

  "He is not an associate in business, you know," she whispered to him one day. "He's a boy. And you don't have to be afraid of him."

  "Afraid?" he exclaimed. "Nonsense!"

  "He's just you, in smaller, younger form. Can you not remember how you felt at that age?"

  "I was already in charge of the estate," he muttered irritably. "Nobody cared how I felt about anything. Why would they?"

  "Then here is your chance to make a difference."

  He looked peevish. "I suppose you recommend hugs."

  "One step at a time, Fred. Try a pat on the shoulder first. We do not want to leap into a full embrace when we have only just mastered a smile to soften the formal handshake."

  "You exaggerate, woman."

  "Remember how pleasant it was to be Massimo, relaxed enough to put your feet up in my presence? Why can you not be that way with Nicholas and shake off this hard shell?"

  "That was with you. You're different."

  "How so?"

  "You already had a low opinion of me. Nicholas still thinks I'm a god."

  She rolled her eyes. "Just when I thought we were making inroads on that insufferable arrogance."

  "I was the same with my father. He was without fault in my eyes." Maxim rubbed his forehead with one hand. "I always strove to be just like him, of course. I do not wish to disappoint Nicholas."

  Flora would have taken his hand or his arm, but Plumm was watching from across the room, so she brushed down his sleeve instead, as if she found a stubborn dog hair upon it. "I think you'll find it does no harm, once in a while, to let him see that you're human. And that you love him. He could hardly be disappointed with that."

  After this conversation she was gratified to see him make a greater effort with Nicholas, even sitting down with him for a game of chess. But the softening would not happen swiftly and she did not expect it to. The Duke of Malgrave remained, in many ways, a victim of his isolated upbringing. He would argue with her, of course, that it did not make him a victim; he would say that he survived in the role to which he'd been born, by putting up his walls and facing the world as a cold monolith. It was necessary.

  Such a man would never come completely down from his lofty heights to move easily among "ordinary" folk, as he called them.

  Which made it all the more startling and gratifying to Flora that he spent this time with her. She mentioned this to him once, only half joking, and he replied solemnly, "You're an earl's daughter, even though you do try to disguise the fact. There is not a great disparity in our status. Your name is just as ancient as my own. The Chelmsworth-Manderby lineage just as aristocratic as the Fairfax-Savoy's."

  She wanted very badly to say, "Ha! Well, then here is the proof that ordinary folk are not so very different to you after all, your grace. Because, guess what..."

  But she chose not to correct him. In fact, she said nothing at all. Nothing at all.

  The moment passed and after a while she decided it was simply too late. Like the moment for discreetly pointing out a slice of ham hanging from a man's wig.

  The Duke of Malgrave would not thank her for pointing out his error. He was not ready for that.

  Captain Fartleberries took a liking to Nicholas, as he had to Maxim, and she rose every morning to see the lad throwing sticks and balls for her generally lazy dog, who had perked up considerably now that he had men to impress. Typical. All males together. Good thing she still had Martha for feminine companionship, for as the weather worsened there was no hope of another visit from Persey— especially now that she was soon to enter her confinement.

  "My father seems different here," Nicholas remarked to her one morning. "Less closed off. Perhaps it is because this is a smaller house with fewer rooms in which he can hide away. Here he must be sociable. He laughs more than I have ever heard him."

  "When I first met him I thought he had no sense of humor, but now I think he was simply very clever at hiding it."

  "And you have brought it out, Lady Flora. He is at ease around you."

  She was amused. "Only sometimes."

  Nicholas wanted to know if she had children of her own and she explained that she had not been so blessed during her marriage.

  "My mama has gone away abroad. I suppose you know all that. Everybody does. They tease me at school."

  "Then the boys who tease you are very wicked and had better hope they have no misfortune in their own lives."

  "I do not think she really wanted me in the first place, Lady Flora. She told me once that it was my fault she'd been trapped into marriage to my father. She cried a great deal and called him terrible things, I remember, but he was never cruel or unkind to her. Not deliberately. He stayed mostly in his wing of the house and she stayed in hers, or she went to London. The times she spent away became longer and longer, until suddenly she did not come home. My father was away at war then. He did not know she'd left, until he came home."

  Clearly, Nicholas had waited to find someone to whom he could say all this. It gushed out of him like blood from a wound, and yet there was a look of relief on his face. As she listened quietly and with concern, the fear and weariness left his eyes.

  "Marriage can be very difficult," she said diplomatically. "It can take its toll on both parties and the children."

  "My father does not discuss his feelings, of course, and has little patience for those who dwell upon their own. He thinks it is a weakness. My mother, on the other hand, was always frantic, always on the verge of hysteria, veering from one emotion to another. They were not well matched."

  For a boy of only sixteen he was sensitive, intelligent and perceptive. Having witnessed the dark side of his parents' marriage, the lad seemed to blame himself for their unhappiness. A heavy burden he took upon his shoulders.

  "Nicholas," she said, putting her arm around him gently, "I do not know your mother, but I do know your father and I can tell you that he loves you dearly. He may not know how to express it, but he is abominably proud of you. The very first thing he talked about when he came here was you and how important you are to him, how he wants to initiate changes and make up for his years away."

  The boys smiled shyly. "He did?"

  Flora gave him a s
queeze. "Do not tell him that I told you all that. He'd have my guts for garters."

  His smile widened. "No, he wouldn't. You could get away with anything. He's utterly smitten. Yesterday he was watching you from across the yard and he put his boots on the wrong feet."

  When Maxim came upon them both laughing together he demanded to know what was so amusing and Flora made up a hasty fib. "I was telling your son about the wheelbarrow races in which I once participated across the lawns at Castle Malgrave."

  "Kindly restrain yourself from leading my son astray too," he muttered. "Are you not satisfied with one Malgrave in your clutches?"

  * * * *

  Halfpenny Plumm was very interested to see how her plans for Darnley had progressed and she reluctantly explained about her poor harvest.

  "It was only your first, my lady," he replied kindly. "You have so little experience of working the land and matters of horticulture."

  "Yes, and I really didn't have any idea of the task I set myself." She had seen her friend Persey maintaining a pretty herb garden, and she had memories of Goody Applegate tending her orchards, so she'd assumed it couldn't be so very hard. But he was right, her experiences had always been on the edge, observing others. Usually while she lounged in a chair under a parasol, sipped wine and nibbled strawberries. Oh, how very pointless and pampered this life had been until now.

  "Finally you have the proper footwear, my lady," Plumm pointed out. "And the proper person to help."

  She beamed, heartened by the thought. "Yes. Thank you, Plumm. I know this was your doing."

  His bristled brows wriggled. "Me, madam?"

  "Yes. Thank you for bringing him back to me and giving us a second chance."

  He denied it, of course, claiming it was his master's idea to return and that he'd had no hand in her finding Darnley Abbey; that the latter was all her friend Persey's doing. But before she left him to light the candles and lanterns, as she did every evening, the solicitor suddenly put a hand on her arm.

  "Madam, his grace has asked me to put the wheels in motion for a divorce."

  "Good god!"

  "It will be a scandal, naturally. Divorce has never been contemplated in the Fairfax-Savoy family, but his grace has finally decided this will be the best solution for all."

  "I am sorry. It must be very hard for him to consider such a desperate measure." But she was not that sorry. Her heart picked up a faster pace. It was wicked of her to wish his marriage dissolved and to think ill of a woman who had only done what she was probably told to do, forced into a union much as Flora had been in her youth.

  "Indeed." The solicitor bowed his head. "It was a difficult decision for his grace, but he has reason now to free himself of that anchor."

  "He would be angry if he knew you told me, Plumm."

  "Perhaps. But I know he will need genuine friends and supporters when the news is generally known. I thought you should be prepared, Lady Flora."

  "You can rely on my discretion, of course, and my loyalty." We are very, very good friends. He said so himself. She sighed.

  He had half turned away, but she sensed there was more. Then, in a rush of breath, the solicitor confessed, "You should also know that many years ago his last letter to you was intercepted and destroyed by his mother. I tried, several times, to apprise you of the fact, but my efforts failed. Time and circumstances marched on, as did the duke. But I am now too old to care what his mother might do to me. So there it is."

  She suddenly wanted to cry, which was not like her at all. Perhaps the weeks of hard work and long hours caught up with her in earnest.

  "I see," she managed on a slender breath. "It was a long time ago and I do not suppose anything would have happened differently. The duke and I were on separate paths back then."

  I almost wish we were butterflies and lived but three summer days. Three such days with you I could fill with more delight than fifty common years could ever contain.

  Where did she hear that? Flora was almost certain it was by a poet called John Keats, but Fred claimed not to know the name. It had come out of her mouth before she even thought about it, but now she felt the pain of regret for lost years when they might have been together. She had wanted to stay cheerful and sunny that day, even under the menace of rainclouds, so that he would not see her sorrow, not see her regret. But inside she felt it dearly.

  Whatever time they had together, she would make the most of it.

  She looked at Plumm as he waited by her window, watching father and son playing with the dog outside. There was something familiar about his profile and the way he stood.

  How old was Maxim's solicitor? Sixty at least, perhaps a little older. Plumm: of all the names she might have dreamed about.

  "Were you ever at sea, Master Plumm, as a boy?"

  "At sea?" She could not see his expression now for he was a shadowy silhouette, with the light of the window behind him. "I often feel all at sea, I must confess." He huffed out a short puff of laughter that came from his nose rather than his mouth. "But I am not one for travel, my lady. I do not have the bowel for it."

  "Ah. I thought I knew a boy once, by the name of Plumm..." But how could she have known him as a boy? It would have been fifty years ago, or more.

  "You did, madam? Well, 'tis a common name."

  "Is it?"

  "In Putney."

  No, Plumm the stowaway and cabin boy, was merely part of a dream. A colorful, remarkably detailed dream, but a dream nonetheless, a quilt sewed by her imagination from scraps of experience or— as Great Aunt Bridget had suggested— things she'd read in books.

  He had gone very still, and she sensed he studied her as she had done to him.

  "I had better see if Martha needs my help in the kitchen," she said breezily.

  He bowed. "Very good, my lady." But as she left him there, Flora was certain she heard him murmur softly, "Impossible. Surely."

  It was a thought she often had herself.

  Chapter Nineteen

  It snowed the day after Plumm left for London. Flora made the great hall cozy with a roaring fire and bowers of evergreen and holly. They enjoyed roast pheasant from the Malgrave estate, potatoes from her own garden, and spiced, mulled blackberry wine that his tenant made herself. After dinner they played cards and Fred, despite his reluctance to play, won every hand.

  He wondered if she let him win. After all, she was rumored to be a highly proficient player.

  Amongst all the boxes and crates Plumm had brought to Darnley, there was one that Maxim had quickly spirited away out of sight. Now, on each day until twelfth night, he took a wrapped item from that box and gave it to Flora. Each one was labeled, as he had requested in his letter, each one another step in his plan to court Flora Chelmsworth. This time he would do it properly. As it should have been done before.

  The first gift was a tiny box inlaid with a mother-of-pearl pear tree. Inside it sat a miniature gold partridge that chirped merrily when his lid was lifted. On the second day he presented her with a fan, painted with turtle doves, one of whom winked at the other when fluttered. Similar gifts followed— a small pillow infused with French lavender perfume and decorated with three speckled hens; a brush with four "colly" birds made of ebony on the handle; a gold ring with five intertwined bands; a bracelet with six geese and their eggs— which were little dangling pearls, and a silk shawl embroidered with seven elegant swans, their beaks sewn of amber beads. On the eighth day his gifts turned slightly more practical.

  "A milkmaid's cap?"

  He led her outside to greet the delivery of eight beautiful calves to supplement the two dairy cows she had brought to Darnley when she first came.

  "Now you will have a real herd to manage," he warned her. "Do you think it too much?"

  He knew, of course, what she would say to that. She was already naming the new arrivals, falling in love with all eight pairs of big brown eyes.

  They would need to hire a milkmaid, of course— at least one— but she would find that ou
t for herself once she realized the hard work involved in milking ten cows twice a day.

  On the ninth day, he gave her dancing slippers with ribbons of pink silk.

  "They are lovely, but I do not dance anymore. I have no time for that."

  "We'll see," he replied, finding it very hard to imagine her giving up all her entertainments. Not wanting her to do so either.

  The tenth day's gift was a pair of gloves, each finger decorated with the image of a comical leaping gentleman.

  "How clever you are, Fred! I have never seen anything like them."

  "They are unique, of course. Like you. Nobody else has the same."

  "Just for me?" She clutched them to her bosom, eyes wide and shining. "I shall treasure them forever."

  On the eleventh day, he gave her an Italian flute with a book of eleven tunes to learn, "So you can entertain me in the evenings."

  "But I am not a very accomplished musician. I was always too distracted to learn and too lazy to practice. Besides, is a harp not more ladylike than a flute?"

  "I have patience and can wait for you to master the instrument. The nights are long now, and I need something to keep the boredom at bay."

  She frowned, waving the flute at him. "And this was the first thing you thought of asking me to play upon?"

  He turned away quickly before he might laugh. "Perhaps I have given you too many gifts now, if you are starting to pick fault, woman."

  "Oh, I did not mean to sound ungrateful. I'm sorry. It's lovely. It's a lovely...flute."

  "It's damned hard coming up with twelve gifts, you know."

  "I didn't ask you to do this. You needn't have gone to all this trouble, just for me." She walked up to him. "I don't need presents."

  "But you should have them."

  "I would rather just have you."

  There she went again, making it seem so simple. He took a breath, realizing that he'd been holding it. "I came back here to tell you...that I ...I want you in my life. However long we have together now. I want you, Flora Chelmsworth." Good god, had that really come out of his mouth? He was aghast. Did not know where to look or what to do with himself.