The end approached. Terror rose at what might follow the last note. Why was he singing? Why so calm?
His voice was rich and even—the sort of voice that would grace any drawing-room.
“Three, three, the rivals,
Two, two, the lily-white boys,
Clothed all in green, O.”
Glancing sideways, Maggie saw that Emma was staring up at her uncle, entranced, clearly unaware of any danger to come. In fact, there was plain adoration in her face.
She loves him like a father,Maggie thought with a pang.And yet he locks away her mother’s memory and hides from her.
It was not fair. None of it was fair—girls left motherless; men doing their best, and yet not enough.
The song dwindled to its last lines. The duke’s voice deepened, almost breaking on the finalevermore. Jenny’s head came up—Maggie saw the movement from the corner of her eye and knew the nursemaid had not heard him sing until this moment.
“One is one and all alone
And evermore shall be so.”
Maggie played the last chord and let her hands slip from the keys onto her lap. She dug her fingers into her legs, heart thumping, and waited.
At the end of such a song, in company, there would be a cheer, a laugh, a call for more. Here, there was only silence—a silence so dense she wanted to shrink beneath it.
If you are to be dismissed, she told herself fiercely,do not receive it with your head bowed like a whipped cur.
She sat tall, drew breath, and lifted her chin. She met Jenny’s frightened eyes and tried a reassuring smile. She turned to Emma—still beaming at her uncle—and at last to the duke himself.
He appeared to be staring at nothing in particular. His eyes were directed towards the keys, but they were glazed, and Maggie thought that he seemed to see nothing at all.
It was Emma, in the end, who broke the silence first.
“Mama used to sing that song all the time, didn’t she?” the little girl chirped. “You said it was her favourite, Uncle.”
He seemed to wake from a reverie. “Indeed it was. Whose idea was it to come in here?”
His words carried weight now. Before anybody else could speak up, Maggie spoke.
“Miss Emma wanted to see the room, and I thought there would be no harm in it,” she said, her voice steadier than she felt. “Jenny advised against it.”
There—confessed and done. If blame were to be laid, it would fall on her shoulders, not Jenny’s.
“You must not blame Jenny,” she added quickly.
The duke’s blue gaze—storm-water after a gale—turned upon her. “I do not blame Jenny.”
That, thought Maggie, wilting a little,does not bode well.
Emma’s smile faltered; at last, she sensed the change in the air. “Miss Winter only wanted to cheer me,” she said, small-voiced.
“Cheer you?” he echoed. “Emma, you ought to be at your lessons.”
“Ordinarily we should have taken an airing,” Maggie said, her throat tight. “But the rain—” she faltered, trailing off.
She hated still being seated. Yet rising seemed impossible. No one moved. He stood so near that the faintest stir of his breath brushed her shoulder. His scent was clean and earthy, like grass after rain—not the suffocating spices some fashionable men favoured.
Hehad always reeked of such perfume—the cloying sweetness that lingered long after he had gone.
