Mrs. Smith clapped her hands together, nodding at Ashley over his head. She had seen the cook saving scraps for the poor, knew she had a soft spot for the lost ones, as she called them.
“We will take care of him, lady.”
The boy grabbed hold of Ashley’s skirts, brown eyes beseeching. “Don’t leave me here, mistress.”
Ashley knelt. “I’m going to find Lord Winterforth and tell him you’re here.” Seeing his terrified look, she clarified: “Don’t worry—you are under my protection, and he will allow you to stay.”
She brushed a curl back from his face. “Do what Mrs. Smith tells you and don’t make a fuss when they give you a bath. You are rather smelly. I think the horses smell better than you.”
He gave her a tiny smile. It was enough.
Ashley whispered, “I bet if you’re good, Mrs. Smith will find something sweet for you to eat after dinner.”
She met the gaze of the cook, who nodded, wiping her eye.
“One of the girls will come and fetch me when you’re nice and clean. Then I’ll show you where you can sleep.”
The boy didn’t speak, he simply nodded and watched her go, the look on his face one of utter desolation. It took everything Ashley had not to run back and pull him close, hold him tight, tell him she would protect him always. Never let anything happen to him and that he would never be alone again.
She was furious his parents would leave him, even though she knew how strong superstitions in this time were, and when she looked at it from their point of view, she could almost understand. She would keep him safe and tell him how to hide his birthmark.
It was early afternoon, so Christian was probably in his solar with the rodent steward, going over the books. As she raised her hand to knock, she heard low voices. There was something about the tone that made her pull her hand back. Christian’s guards were nowhere to be seen, but Ulrich was always close, so she likely only had minutes until he came back. Knowing she shouldn’t eavesdrop if she didn’t want to take a chance on hearing something she didn’t like, she put her ear to the door anyway.
“You must send her away, my lord. She is a temptress. You are to be wed. ’Tis not right to have your mistress under the same roof as your wife.”
His mistress? Was that what people thought of her? Feeling sick, Ashley left without telling Christian about Merrick. She’d overstayed her welcome, and there was no way she wanted people gossiping about Christian. He’d had enough awful things said about him. As for her? What did she care what they thought? She sniffed and turned away.
CHAPTER 20
Ashley wasn’t usedto having free time on her hands. As someone who had worked since she was sixteen, this life of leisure was disconcerting. Seemed she lacked any useful skills—her college degrees would be useful for wiping one’s rear and that was about it.
Cooking? Disaster. In fact, poor Mrs. Smith had banished her from the kitchen, telling her never to return, except, of course, for a lovely chat. It was good the kitchen was made of stone, or Ashley might have burned the whole place to the ground. The good thing about her brief time in the kitchens? Homemade pastries. Mrs. Smith worked with her to perfect them. A bit of jam inside and a sprinkle of sugar on top. Ashley liked them because she could put one in her pocket to eat later, as she’d found she wasn’t hungry first thing in the morning. And while they probably should’ve been more of a dessert than breakfast, there was a lot of jam in the larder, so she figured it wouldn’t hurt to have them now and then.
Crafts. The next fail. As a child she’d never gotten into crafts. Both her parents were solid lower-middle class, and worked all the time.
Reading had always been her greatest love, and while Christian had a large library, many of the books were in languages she couldn’t speak. She guessed she could spend her time learning French, Greek, Latin, and Italian. Oh, probably German too. So she read the books he had in English, but she yearned for a good thriller to pass the time.
The servants were horrified when she asked to help clean, especially when she spilled the bucket. A housekeeper was provided for her dorm at school, and she’d always had a cleaning lady in the city, so that was another no-go.
When she tried the stables, she was firmly shooed away. It was fine for a lady to talk to the animals and brush her favorite horse, but nothing more.
So she’d taken to walking, as Christian did. He told her walking helped him think, and she’d found out from one of the guards that he liked to go riding at night. Now that was something she needed to add to her list. To become an accomplished horsewoman. She no longer worried about falling off every time she climbed on a horse, but she still couldn’t consider herself accomplished, especially when she saw the little kids riding, putting her to shame. Then again, she’d like to see any of them try and drive a car. Or navigate the subways.
Ashley remembered when she was in London a year ago. She’d been on the tube and there’d been some guy talking to people. She could tell many of the passengers were annoyed, and she didn’t blame them. Morning tube time was like your own precious bubble of space, and you didn’t want to talk to anyone. The guy had said he was trying to change the culture. She couldn’t believe how arrogant he was to think such a thing. He had said he was from Oregon, and she wondered how he would like it if someone from another country came to Oregon and started telling him what to do to change his culture.
With that in mind, she’d tried to be considerate. It wasn’t herplace to change the culture or people, as much as some things bothered her, like Merrick being left in the woods to die. She had always believed in trying to gather all the facts before making decisions.
The whole women’s rights thing was a big issue, but she knew it was going to take hundreds and hundreds of years before anything really changed, though she’d figured out, the way Christian talked, that he and his family seemed to be an anomaly. They treated their wives well, and it seemed the wives had a great deal of say. So maybe it was a generalization to say women didn’t have rights. Maybe women had figured out what women had always known. How to work within the confines of their lives to achieve their end goals.
Cloak pulled tight, she walked past the garden behind the chapel, smiling at the sundial. A group of children were gathered in a circle, heads bent, talking in excited voices.
“What do you have there?”
One of the boys hid a piece of paper behind his back.
“I’m not going to take it. I just want to see what it is.”
The children shook their heads, and it was Merrick that spoke.
