May 1763
1832 Words
May 1763
The squirrel approached cautiously. The countess sat as motionless as a statue.
Will watched the countess, not the squirrel. She was a thousand times more beautiful than when she’d arrived as a bride at Creed Hall all those months ago. Then, she’d been powdered and painted and doll-like. Now, the smooth paleness of her skin, the delicate color tinting her cheeks, the rose-pink of her lips, were entirely natural. She glowed with youthfulness and health.
The squirrel snatched the nut from the countess’s knee and retreated a few paces to nibble it. The countess sat utterly still, watching. A breeze ruffled her unpowdered raven-black ringlets, ruffled the sparkling surface of the lake, ruffled the grass.
When the squirrel had bounded away, the countess turned her head, delight shining in her eyes. “Did you see that?”
“Yes, ma’am.” Will allowed himself a polite servant’s smile, while his heart turned over painfully in his chest.
The countess rose to her feet, almost a dancing movement. “Soon it will eat from my hand!”
“Yes, ma’am.”
The countess picked up the blanket she’d been sitting on. “Tell me about Oscar again, please,” she said, shaking the blanket. “You kept him in your pocket?”
“That I did, ma’am.”
She listened, her eyes on his face, while Will packed up the picnic. “He used to run up my arm and sit right here, on my shoulder, and talk to me.” He mimicked a squirrel’s chittering.
A smile quivered on her lips. “What do you think he was telling you?”
“Where he’d hidden his acorns,” Will said, strapping the hamper behind his saddle. “Which was in my shoes, mostly. Or sometimes in my hat for church.”
Laughter lit her eyes. “Truly?”
“Truly.”
“I wish I could have met him.” She folded the blanket and handed it to him.
“Oscar would have liked you.” Will strapped the blanket into place. “He would have sat on your shoulder.”
She smiled shyly. “Do you think so?”
Will nodded. “A good judge of character, Oscar was. He’d have known you have only kindness in your heart.” His feelings for her were almost audible in his voice. He cleared his throat. “Are you ready to mount, ma’am?”
The countess glanced at the low afternoon sun and sighed. “I suppose we must.”
They rode slowly back to Creed Hall. Will filed the day away in his memory while he groomed Dancer. He’d made the countess smile, almost made her laugh. Maybe one day soon she’d actually laugh out loud.
He imagined her laughing, imagined her hazel eyes bright with joy.
“You’re a fool, Will Fenmore,” he told himself, resting his forehead against the mare’s warm shoulder. “She’s a countess. Remember that.”
But when he saw the countess the next afternoon, Will knew he wouldn’t make her laugh that day. Her face was pinched, pale, frozen. It was a familiar expression; he’d seen it every day before the earl’s departure.
They rode silently to the folly beside the lake. Will unpacked the blanket and the picnic, but the countess didn’t eat anything. She removed her riding hat and gloves and walked down to where the rowboat was tied and stood looking across the water. The stiffness of her jaw told him that she was trying not to cry.
A chittering came from the bushes. “The squirrel’s here, ma’am. Do you wish to feed it?”
“Not today, Fenmore.” She took a letter from her pocket and began to read it.
Will fed the squirrel. The countess was still at the water’s edge when he’d finished. He walked over to her and halted a few feet distant. Countess, tell me what’s wrong. Let me help you.
His hand lifted as if to touch her shoulder, his lips parted to utter words of comfort. For a moment he struggled between right and wrong, between what he ought to do as a servant and what he wanted to do as a man—and then Will lowered his hand and closed his mouth. It wasn’t his place to comfort the countess, however much he wished to.
He turned away.
“Fenmore.”
Will turned back. “Yes, ma’am?”
“Have you ever seen a person drown?” The countess glanced at him, her eyes dark and bleak. “Do you know how long it takes?”
Will’s heart kicked in his chest and then seemed almost to stop. His body moved without him thinking, his feet closing the distance between them, his hand grabbing the countess’s elbow, dragging her away from the water, making her stumble and clutch at him for balance.
“Fenmore!”
He ignored her protest and tightened his grip, hauling her towards the folly.
“Fenmore! Let go!”
Will halted. He was breathing heavily. His heart thundered in his chest. “I won’t let you kill yourself!” he said fiercely. “Do you hear me? I won’t let you!”
The countess’s face twisted. He saw despair shine like tears in her eyes.
“Ah . . .” The panicked fury drained from him. Unthinkingly, he gathered her in his arms and hugged her.
The countess didn’t pull away. Instead she began to cry, huge, racking sobs that shuddered through her body.
“Hush,” Will whispered, cradling her head in his hand. “Hush.”
He held her, rocked her, and when the storm of tears subsided, he didn’t let her go. “Tell me what’s wrong,” he said, gently stroking her hair. “What’s happened?”
The countess didn’t try to pull away. She leaned against him, limp and defeated, her head resting above his heart.
“Countess . . . what is it?”
She gave a shuddering sigh. “Henry wrote. He’s coming back early—” Her voice broke. “I can’t do it again. I can’t.”
“Leave him,” Will said.
“I can’t.” The countess pushed free of his embrace and turned away, wiping her face. “I have nowhere to go.” She sat on the marble steps of the folly, hugging her knees, bowing her head.
Will sat alongside her. “Your family . . . ?”
She shook her head. “I tried to leave Henry when we were still in London, but Father sent me back. He said he had a contract with Henry and I had to fulfill my share of it.”
Rage ignited in Will’s chest. “Your father sent you back to him?”
The countess hugged her knees more tightly. “Father gambled away the Darracott fortune—my dowry, my mother’s jewels, everything. Henry’s settlement . . . it’s all that’s keeping Father out of debtors’ prison.”
“Then don’t go to your family. Go somewhere else. Build a new life.”
“How? I have no money.”
Will looked at her. Her riding jacket was made of damask, the wide cuffs trimmed with a luxuriant froth of gold lace. The lace alone cost more than he’d earned in his life. “Sell your gowns.”
“I can’t. While Henry’s away I’m forbidden to leave Creed Hall.”
Will frowned, thinking. Ladies’ maids were given their mistresses’ castoffs to sell. It was one of their perks. “Could your maid—”
“Boyle is Henry’s creature. Hired to make sure I don’t run away again.” The countess rubbed her face wearily. “And besides, the gowns aren’t mine to sell. They belong to Henry. It wouldn’t be right.”
“What Quayle does to you . . . do you think that’s right?”
A spasm of pain crossed her face. She averted her head and was silent for a long moment. “It is a husband’s right to beat his wife.”
“Not like that,” Will said. Not every night, and not as a prelude to s*x.
This time the countess was silent for even longer. “How much do you know?” she asked finally, in a low, shamed voice.
“I know that what Quayle does is wrong. Whatever the law says.” And I know he’ll burn in Hell when his time comes. Will tried another tack. “Countess . . . what about your jewels? Could you sell them?”
“They’re Henry’s.”
“Even the lowest of servants is paid. If you were Quayle’s servant, not his wife, what sum would you place on the duties he demands of you?”
A shudder ran through her. “No sum would be enough.”
“Then sell some of the jewels. It’s not stealing. You’re taking what you’re owed! What you’ve earned with your own blood.”
The countess turned her head and looked at him, considering his words, then shook her head. “Boyle keeps the jewels locked away. I don’t have the key . . .” She paused and frowned, as if a sudden thought had crossed her mind.
“What?”
“My godmother died before Christmas.” The countess sat up straighter, her face brightening. “She left me her ruby set. They came in their own case—and I have the key to that, not Boyle!”
“Then sell them.”
Her animation faded. “How? As soon as I leave, Boyle will have people searching for me. I’d be found before I got to the nearest town.”
“I’ll help you,” Will said. “If you like . . . I could sell one of the pieces. So you’d have some money.”
Her head tilted to one side. “You would?”
“Yes.” He reached out and gripped her wrist, trying to infect her with his urgency. “Countess . . . leave him!”
She studied him, a long and serious deliberation, as if she was trying to see inside him. “Where would I go?” she asked finally.
“Somewhere Quayle will never find you.”
She nodded.
“America.”
The countess jerked back, pulling her wrist from his grip. “America?” He saw from her face that it was too far away, too frightening.
“I’ll go with you,” Will said. “I’ll help you.”
The countess’s mouth opened, and then closed. She stared at him for a long, frowning moment. “Why would you wish to go with me?”
“I always planned to leave Northamptonshire when my mother died. Quayle’s not the sort of master a person likes working for.”
Her eyes narrowed slightly, as if she was thinking. “Mrs. Fenmore, the old housekeeper . . . she was your mother?”
He nodded.
“Didn’t she die last year?”
Will nodded again.
Her brow creased. “Then why are you still here?”
Will hesitated. Should he tell her the truth? “Because I couldn’t leave you here,” he said, with the sense that he was plunging off a cliff. “Not with him.”
The countess blinked. Her face stiffened. She drew back slightly. Had she interpreted his words as a declaration of love?
“If I go with you to America, I wouldn’t be anything more than your escort,” Will said hastily. He might be fool enough to care for her, but he wasn’t fool enough to believe she could ever be his wife. She was a countess; he was a servant. “I know you’re too wellborn for someone like me.”
The countess looked away. “If I leave my husband, I shall never remarry.” Her voice was flat, adamant.
“Countess . . .” Will hesitated—Dare I?—and then threw caution to the wind. He’d already jumped off one cliff. What was another one? “Your marriage . . . what Quayle does to you—that’s not how it’s meant to be. A husband should treat his wife with tenderness and respect, and in the marriage bed he should strive to give pleasure, not pain.”
The countess didn’t look at him. She stared down at her lap, smoothing a wrinkle in the damask silk.
“Countess,” he said urgently. “Please don’t say you’ll never marry again!” She was too young to condemn herself to a loveless existence. “One day you’ll meet a man who’ll make you happy.”
She raised her head and looked at him. Tears shone in her eyes.
Will swallowed. I love you. “Countess, if you go to America with me, I give you my word of honor I won’t compromise you. I won’t touch you. I won’t—”
“Thank you, Fenmore.” A faint smile touched her mouth. “I trust you.”
Her words made something clench in his chest, as if his rib cage had wrapped itself around his heart and squeezed. Will held his breath for a moment, and then exhaled slowly. “You’ll come to America with me?”
“Yes.”
“When is Quayle returning? How much time do we have?”
The countess dug in her pocket for the letter. “Here.” She held it out to him, and then hesitated. “Can you read?”
“Yes.” Will took the letter and unfolded it. “My mother always hoped I’d start in service as a footman, become a butler one day.”
“Oh.” The countess blinked, her brow creasing slightly, as if she tried to imagine him in a footman’s wig and livery. “Is that why you speak better than the other grooms?”
He nodded.
“But you don’t want to be a footman?”
“I prefer the stables.”
She was silent while he read. “September,” Will said, when he’d finished. “Good, that gives us time to plan. I promise you we’ll be gone before he returns.”
The countess smiled at him, a smile that seemed to shine right through her, as if she was lit from the inside. “Thank you, Fenmore.”
- Writer
