He opened his mouth and began wailing again. Tears dripped from his eyes and soaked the floor beneath him. He looked so terrified she almost wanted to cry with him.
She rose up and sat on her calves and motioned for Scarface to come closer. She usually took control over situations quickly. This was no exception. But these were savages. She couldn’t forget that.
“Is he like this all this time?” she asked. “Or did it begin when Avice left him?”
“When Avice left,” he answered after a moment of thinking about it. “Everyone here cares fer the lad, Miss. We might give in to him too much but he isna afraid of us. Of his faither and me, mayhap, but ’tis only because he doesna know us.”
Julianna folded her arms across her chest. “Where has this child’s father been that his son does not know him?”
Scarface gave a good effort at trying to scowl and snarl at her for her question and the accusatory tone in which she asked it. But he couldn’t contend with the truth of guilt for staying away and causing the condition of the boy. His shoulders sagged and he looked away. “France, Spain, to the south where forests are as dark as some souls.” He murmured something under his breath that sounded like, “To the past.”
Julianna hadn’t really wanted their exact route. In truth, she didn’t care where they’d been. There was a question of much more importance to be asked. “How long has his father been gone?”
“Two years,” Scarface told her with a defensive undertone. Julianna realized how loyal he was to the earl.
“He had—”
“No. I do not care,” she said and held up her palms. All she could think of was the poor babe under the bed. The hysterical child with no one to be confident in, his instinct for safety telling him his safety was gone.
She’d felt it as a child, as had William. She knew William had been taken from his family in Scotland—while she still had her mother and father. But her father, as governor of one of King Edward’s mightiest strongholds, was, for the most part, not around, and if he was around then not easily available. She saw her mother even less. She would have had no one if not for Berengaria and William.
She understood how Elias felt.
“Where is the boy’s mother?”
“Dead. Mattie died givin’ us Elias.”
Dead. What a pi—Mattie? Where had she heard that name before? There was no time to think of it now. Elias was still crying. He needed Avice, but he would have to settle for Julianna.
She swept her mantle off and her hood with it and dropped the pile of wool onto the floor beside her. “You may leave,” she told the two men.
“I willna leave him with a stranger,” Scarface insisted. The other man left as if he’d just been pardoned from hanging.
“I’m the new governess,” she told Scarface.
“Ye would like to be—”
“I am,” she whispered with determination staining its softness. “Unless you go find Avice, I am!”
“Nicky didna choose ye,” he insisted.
She narrowed her eyes on him and gave herself a little shake as if she just kicked aside her doubts and fears and let confidence and determination fill her. “His son will choose me.”
He blinked at her. Elias cried out pitifully for Avice.
Julianna forgot the man and bent to look under the bed again. “Elias, come here, sweet babe,” she cooed. His crying grew louder. She repeated her invitation again, softer this time, holding out her arms. “I know you are frightened, dear heart. I am here now. There is no more reason to be afraid.”
She continued to speak to him slowly, softly, until finally he stopped crying. By the time he exited from under the bed, he was so exhausted; he crawled into her arms, stuck his thumb into his mouth and fell asleep.
“’Tis a miracle,” Scarface rejoiced under his breath and smiled at Julianna when she looked at him.
“Berengaria taught me how to comfort a babe,” she said softly.
“Who is Berengaria?” Scarface asked.
“She was my nursemaid. She taught me how to put one to sleep, feed one, bathe one, and much more. You must speak softly but not be utterly quiet so that your babe can grow used to sounds—because they are sure to come,” she said the last in her Berengaria voice. “Mostly I learned by watching when she showed new mothers how to care for their precious bundles.”
She hoped one day to have a child. Now, she was getting old. Twenty-three in a fortnight.
