CHAPTER 8
Rosa listened, her ear pressed to the door. Mr Gavenor would castigate her for not having her foot up, but she wouldn’t mind that. He’d brought Papa here!
Papa’s arrival would not save her reputation, which had been fragile before someone revived the old rumours about her aunt, and was now in tatters, but his presence eased her mind. She restrained herself, but was in a fever of impatience by the time George from the inn achieved his rapid departure. As soon as she was sure he had really departed, she hobbled into the hall.
“You should have your foot up,” Mr Gavenor growled.
“How can I ever thank you? How is my father?”
“Sleeping, Miss Neatham. I put him on the couch in the study. If it will make you feel better, you can settle yourself in there while I tidy up a bit.” He glared at the pile of packages in the corner as if their condition represented a personal affront.
She took in the little pile of bags and pillowcases. “Oh dear.”
“Yes.” Mr Gavenor twisted his mouth and bowed his head. “I am sorry. There was no way to bring them without things getting wet, and I did not trust your neighbours not to break down the door and strip the house bare once I left.”
“Of course. You are right.” Rosa had not meant to sound critical. “I could not be more grateful, and a little water will not hurt.”
He looked up at her from under his brows. “I wrapped the books and put them as safely as I could in your father’s trunk. Anything else that might be damaged by water, too.”
Right. To work then. “Towels to take up the worst of it, and then we can spread the clothes and linens to dry in the spare bedchamber. Fortunately, we do not have a lot.” She reached the heap, lifted the items on top and began to sort them into things that were barely damp, things that could easily be wiped dry, and things that would require wringing out and then hanging.
Mr Gavenor hovered over her, his hands opening and closing as if he could barely keep himself from picking her up and carting her off to the parlour.
“Miss Neatham, I insist that you sit down. If you must help put all of this to rights, I will bring the things to you.”
“Perhaps you could bring me a chair, then, Mr Gavenor,” she suggested, “so we don’t spread puddles through the rest of the house.”
For some reason, her request tickled his sense of humour. One corner of his mouth quirked up in a smile, and his eyes gleamed before he strode off to the parlour and returned with two chairs. “One for your foot,” he explained, positioning them. “I will fetch some towels.”
“The old patched ones from the bottom shelf, please,” she commanded, and was rewarded with another amused glance.
A bossy fairy. He had never imagined such a thing, but he rather liked it. He knew where he stood with Miss Neatham; somewhat higher than Pelman and cockroaches, but considerably lower than her father and the missing goats. She was unlike any Society lady he’d ever met.
Apart from Lady Ruthford, who had been a merchant’s daughter and then an army wife, and who retained the kind of practical good sense that a man like Bear appreciated. And his great aunt, of course. She had been another no-nonsense lady who said what she meant and did not try to cajole or manipulate him. Unless the grumpy note left with her will was manipulation.
“Do not be a fool and avoid marriage just because the examples you have seen are poor. And do not avoid women because of your mother. She was a stupid woman, and a selfish one. She made my nephew unhappy, and she made you miserable. I have left my house to your daughter, great-nephew, so find a decent woman you can be happy with and grow me an heiress. A legitimate child, if you please. I am not encouraging immorality.”
I tried, Aunt Clara. I tried.
The lawyer who had brought him Aunt Clara’s will had explained he could challenge the provision, since he had neither wife nor child, but Aunt Clara had been the only person in his family to care whether he lived or died, and surely it was not too much for her to ask him to marry? He would have to try again, and he dreaded the idea.
Together, he and Miss Neatham sorted their way through the Neatham’s possessions, him handing her things to fold or to dry, taking others out into the covered porch so he could wring as much water as possible from them.
“I owe you an apology, Miss Neatham,” Bear said, after a while. “I asked Pelman to find me somewhere to stay close to Thorne Hall, which led to you being turned from your home.”
She looked up from the trinket box she wiped, startled. “You did not know I existed, I imagine.”
“I did not. But I know now, and feel some responsibility.”
She tipped her head slightly, her brow creasing. “You have been very kind, Mr Gavenor, but you are not responsible for me. It seems we must share this roof, at least until I can make other arrangements. Let us just leave it at that. That pile of linen in the buckets? There is a drying rack in the lean-to off the stable. Would you fetch it when next the rain stops, and set it up in the spare bed chamber?”
Bear had expected financial demands, or the command to leave her house immediately, or even (if Pelman’s hints held any truth) a proposition that he take the part of protector, a role into which Pelman had been trying to bully his way. No. That was just a fantasy of his base self. He would lay odds that she was nearly as innocent as she appeared.
CHAPTER 9
Over the next three days, they fell into a routine. Mr Gavenor refused to allow Rosa to look after her father at night, but carried them both downstairs to the parlour each morning. Rosa sat close enough to attend to the invalid when he needed a drink or to have his chin wiped, to talk or read to him, to continue with the sewing in the work basket Mr Gavenor had carried home on his first trip, and to carry out the little tasks she begged Mr Gavenor for while her father slept.
“I am perfectly capable of peeling vegetables, mixing batter, and sewing that button back on your waistcoat,” she insisted, and he quirked his smile at her and gave in.
Whenever the rain stopped for more than a few minutes, he left them to walk over to Thorne Hall. “I am no builder,” he told Rosa, “but I’ve learned a few things in the last year or two. I need to get some idea of the number of local men I’ll need to hire when my work crew arrives from Liverpool, and that depends on what can be saved, and what must be demolished.”
He made copious notes in a small notebook, which he transcribed into a large ledger each evening.
Father was comfortable with him, which was a blessing, since Mr Gavenor took over all of the embarrassing personal services, at least when he was home.
“He’s a good lad, this man Lord Hurley sent,” Father said. He had never lost the habit of speaking in front of the servants as if they were deaf, and he was convinced Mr Gavenor was a servant, though some days he thought him a valet or footman from Thorne Hall, and others he went further back in his memories to his days at Cambridge and even to his childhood.
At least twenty times a day, he asked Mr Gavenor his name, and each time received the patient reply, “They call me ‘Bear,’ sir.”