The Nightingale Legacy (Legacy 2)

Little Eleanor was sleeping soundly in her cradle next to Miss Mary Patricia’s bed. Owen had returned to Scrilady Hall after assuring himself that Alice had drunk a warm glass of milk prepared for her by Mrs. Mayhew. Bennett Penrose, in the company of Flash Savory, was now journeying to Honeymead Manor to Mr. Ffalkes, carrying with him a letter from North that requested he take Bennett in hand and make him into a man, a task North wasn’t certain anyone could accomplish—he’d grinned then and told Caroline he believed, after his own dealings with Ffalkes, that the man considered himself above every other mortal in the land. It was a challenge he trusted Mr. Ffalkes wouldn’t be able to refuse. Also, what more could Ffalkes want than a chance to pound another man into the ground after he himself had been so thoroughly pounded?

North was now standing against the mantel, his arms crossed over his chest. He said to Caroline, “I didn’t have a chance to tell you all of it.”

“Do you think Bennett will stay at Honeymead Manor with Mr. Ffalkes?”

“He doesn’t have anywhere else to go. I asked Ffalkes to pay him for his labor. I also asked him to teach the fool how to gamble so he wouldn’t lose all his wages. I also mentioned that Bennett’s whining was rather annoying and he might also consider encouraging Bennett to stop it.”

She laughed. “That’s just perfect, North. You thought of everything.”

Again, he felt as if something deep inside himself was unfurling, growing full and heady—her words and that lovely smile of hers making that something expand deeper and deeper still and making him want to smile and laugh and kiss her until his mouth was numb.

“We’ll see,” he said, trying to sound not at all touched, and probably failing. “Now, let me tell you about Polgrain and Tregeagle. They were at first very stiff in the collar, wouldn’t meet my eyes, treated me like the hangman. I asked them if they wished to remain. Tregeagle said he hadn’t realized what Coombe had done. He said the letter to me was beyond the line. However, he thought the monster’s face on your wedding night hadn’t been a bad idea, only he would have known it wouldn’t work with you, for you’re too bloody stubborn, too strong-willed. He said that argument and logic were the only weapons appropriate to men of goodwill. Polgrain then said he feared that Mr. Coombe had put something in the oxtail soup.

“I then asked them if Coombe had felt so strongly when my father first married my mother. They looked at each other but refused to say it wasn’t so, which leads me to wonder if perhaps Coombe, even as a very young man, took a hand in continuing with the Nightingale legacy of betrayal. I don’t know, and I believe neither Polgrain nor Tregeagle knows either.

“So, I put it to them. They are to tell me tomorrow what they wish to do—either stay here and treat you as you should be treated, or retire to a quaint cottage down by Land’s End and learn how to fish.” He paused, expecting Caroline to say something. Indeed, he’d expected her t

o say something long before this, but she was utterly silent, just sitting there in the chair, very still, which was quite unlike her, not even moving her hands, which were always doing something, and when they were doing things to him, it invigorated him to his very toes.

“My God,” he said at last, staring at her. “I do believe you’re brooding. My Caroline is actually brooding. I must call the hounds and insist that you walk with them on the moor. I must fetch you a volume of poems from the library written to depress the spirit, to darken the soul, to question man’s very existence on this pitiful earth. I must buy you a black billowing cloak and have you sit on those ancient pitted rocks by the sea and stare into infinity as a strong wind gusts around you.”

She finally looked up at him and gave him a crooked grin. “I’ve never brooded before. Leave me alone, North. It’s an experiment. I’m not certain I like it but I’m willing to give it a chance. A black cloak, did you say? Billowing in a nice high wind? I quite approve the gothic touch.”

He laughed deeply, paused a moment, surprised that he’d laughed, then swooped down on her, hauled her up in his arms, and hugged her tightly against him. “Your laugh is wonderful, North,” she said against his throat. “Just wonderful. I think I’d rather listen to you laugh than brood, all right?”

“All right. Don’t worry about all the unpleasant folk. I have the feeling that Tregeagle and Polgrain just might surprise us.”

“I shan’t lay a wager on it, North.”

Tregeagle and Polgrain decided to stay. They appeared chastened, they appeared resigned to all the changes at Mount Hawke. Polgrain even showed a modicum of politeness to Mrs. Mayhew, asking her opinion on an apricot sauce he was preparing for an evening’s meal. Tregeagle even told Molly that she’d done a nice job polishing the silver. Both of them, when it was necessary, called Caroline “my lady.”

Caroline didn’t trust either of them.

It was becoming colder now that it was full into November. Not a bone-aching cold, but chilly enough to warrant fires in all the rooms.

Evelyn went into labor at noon on the twelfth of November and very quickly produced a little boy by dinnertime. She named him Frederic North. Eleanor squalled when she was introduced to the baby, which brought a smile even to Tregeagle’s stiff face, or perhaps it was a grimace masquerading as a smile. Who ever knew with them?

Caroline said, “I suppose I should call you Big North as opposed to Little North.”

“I do like the sound of Big North, makes me sound very important.”

She laughed, punched his arm, then rubbed it, soon caressing not only his arm but his shoulder, his chest.

“Caroline, I just got a letter from Marcus Wyndham, the Earl of Chase. You remember, I told you about him. Well, he and the Duchess will be visiting us in a week. You will like them.”

“Ah, good. I’ll see that everything is in readiness for them. Oh, there’s something else, North. I was thinking that Miss Mary Patricia is quite recovered now and seems a bit on the distracted side.”

“What do you mean?”

“She’s bored. She needs to be doing something. What do you think if we sent her to Scrilady Hall to be the female manager, so to speak, Evelyn with her, and they both could run the Hall for the purpose Aunt Eleanor originally intended?”

“Namely a refuge for girls who are pregnant and have no choices at all.”

“Exactly. What do you think?”

“You’re picturing Miss Mary Patricia as being teacher to the children born there? Perhaps Evelyn ensuring that everything the girls needed was provided, perhaps helping them find positions after their children are born?”

“Yes. I spoke to Mrs. Trebaw about it just the other day and she was—”