Practical Widow to Passionate Mistress (Transformation of the Shelley Sisters 1)

‘You may call me Mrs Halgate,’ Meg said. ‘I am housekeeper here.’ He was family, and should be treated as such. But did Ross mean to acknowledge him? ‘Can I help you find something?’

‘I don’t know. I’ve never seen so many books all in one place.’

‘What do you like to read?’ Meg asked, wondering how well he had mastered his letters. Had he been to school?

‘Anything,’ he said with a smile, so very like Ross that she smiled back. ‘Newspapers, the Bible…Anything.’

‘I know.’ She took Gulliver’s Travels from the shelf. ‘Your brother likes this one.’ He showed no surprise at her description of Ross. ‘And I looked at this the other day, it is Cornish legends, the engravings are fascinating.’ She put them on the table and gestured to the seat next to her. ‘Come and see.’

One book led to another. Soon the table was littered with open volumes as they delved into the collection, reading snatches to each other. ‘Look at this, Mrs Halgate,’ William said and she came to look over his shoulder at an illustration of a whale, just as there was a sound behind them.

Meg turned. It was Ross, one hand on the window frame he had just stepped through, staring at the pair of them as though he had seen a ghost.

‘Good afternoon, my lord,’ Meg said, summoning up all her composure. ‘I will clear up directly.’ Beside her William scrambled to his feet.

‘That is all right,’ Ross said. ‘I told my brother he may use the library.’

‘But you did not tell me I could turn out half the bookshelves.’ Meg cast a rueful look at the table.

‘I’ll put them away,’ William said. ‘Mrs Halgate was helping me.’ She could feel his tension in case Ross was angry.

‘I know.’ Ross smiled at her. Meg felt light-headed. There was so much meaning in that smile, so much warmth in the caress of his eyes.

‘I will just go and see whether they have finished in your bed…bedchamber.’ She stumbled over the word. ‘We changed the curtains for something lighter. But I haven’t found the seascapes I was going to replace the portraits with yet. Excuse me.’

Ross watched as Meg whisked out of the door, her cheeks pink. He had never seen her so flurried before and it was both charming and, he was amused to discover, flattering, that he could put her in such a state.

But she was not the only one feeling disconcerted. He had stood at the window watching them—the woman who was his lover, the boy who could pass as his son—and had felt a shock of recognition, a premonition almost. They had looked right together, companionable, sharing and enjoying the books without the need to say very much. She must have known who William was, but she accepted him.

‘I like her,’ William said as Ross continued to stand looking at the closed door. ‘Mrs Halgate. I like her a lot.’

‘Yes.’ Ross turned back to the table and picked up Gulliver’s Travels, running his fingers over the leather binding as he pictured Meg sitting on the trunk in the cabin with it open in her hands. ‘So do I.’

Chapter Seventeen

Patrick Jago’s letter was short and brutally clear.

Dear Mrs Halgate,

I regret that I have been unable to find any clues as to the whereabouts of your sisters. I can be clear on only three points: the facts that I communicated to you in my last letter, the fact that nothing is recorded under their names in any parish register for ten miles around and the certainty that they are nowhere in the vicarage or its adjoining buildings, which I must confess to entering and searching on Sunday last during morning service.

I am in London now. I enquired at all the coaching inns receiving passengers from East Anglia, in case one or both went to London. However, at such a distance in time I have not been surprised to find no one remembers two young ladies amongst so many.

I find myself detained by another, personal, matter, and will remain here at the Belle Sauvage on Ludgate Hill, where any correspondence will find me, for the foreseeable future.

Yours etc…

‘Et cetera, et cetera,’ Meg murmured, refolding the letter.

‘Not good news?’ Mrs Harris topped up Meg’s tea cup.

‘No. Not bad, either.’ She knew what Jago had meant by that reference to parish registers. He had been searching for burials.

‘Bless your heart.’ The cook’s homely face creased with concern. ‘And on top of the fright you had last night with those wicked smugglers, too. What a mercy you were on your way back to the house before they landed.’

‘I should never have gone swimming,’ Meg confessed. ‘I was feeling a trifle…agitated and thought it would be calming.’

‘And no wonder you were,’ Mrs Harris said comfortably. ‘All that worry about your sisters and then that big party to prepare for. Not that his lordship found anyone he likes the look of, not that I can see. I’d have heard if he’d gone calling on the ladies afterwards. We’ll be having another dinner party soon with another selection, mark my words.’