“Yes?” Beck’s gaze went beyond Sara to the wide windows that opened on a bleak view of the snow-dusted Downs to the north. He had the sense this mother Sara alluded to lived off in that direction.
“She worried, like I’m worrying. Papa too.”
He took a step closer. “Over Polly’s talent? Allie said Polly is her instructor.”
Sara looked momentarily confused. “Yes, they worried over Polly, but over me too, and Gavin.”
“Who is Gavin?” Beck shifted again to stand beside her.
“Was.” Sara glanced over at him, a mere flick of her gaze over his face before she was again inspecting the hills in the distance. “He was our older brother, but he died shortly before I married. Everybody called him Gavin, but his real name was Gavotte.”
“Allemande, Gavotte… Was yours a musical family?”
“We were. My husband said he fell in love with my name.”
Her tone suggested this was not a cheering memory. “Sarabande,” Beck guessed. “It is pretty, and your sister would be Polonaise?”
“Polly for short, and I’m Sarabande Adagio.” Her lips quirked up, as if a housekeeper ought not to have such a fanciful name. “I was Sara Addy when was I younger.”
“That’s lovelier than Beckman Sylvanus Haddonfield. My mother wanted me to have a name that would stand up to the rigors of being the spare.”
“Are there rigors?” This time, her glance lingered on him. “You don’t seem like a man who’s burdened by his birthright.”
“That’s the second time the topic has come up today.” Beck shifted away from the substantial chill coming off the windows. “North quizzed me on it over breakfast, and his questions set me to thinking.”
“About?”
“What is a land steward doing reading the label of my soap tin?” Beck asked slowly.
“Waiting for his turn in the bath?”
“The label is entirely in French, Sara,” Beck said gently. “Florid, silly French. He quotes Shakespeare, and his clothing is made by the finest tailors in London. How much do you know about our Mr. North?”
“Not as much as you’d like to know, apparently,” Sara replied. “I know this. Until he arrived shortly after us, the place was a shambles. Lady Warne hasn’t been here for years and years, and if you think it’s a disgrace now, you should have seen it before Gabriel put his shoulder to the wheel.”
“I don’t dispute that he works very hard.” Beck regretted bringing the subject up at all, but if North hadn’t served in the military, the explanation he’d given for his scar was somewhat suspect. “And a man’s past is his own business, unless it’s going to haunt him and those around him.”
“We’re all haunted by our pasts.” Sara shifted away from the window, as if leaving the topic itself out there on the Downs. “Luncheon approaches, and that seems more worthy of attention at the moment. I trust Gabriel, and I do not feel comfortable discussing him behind his back.”
“Not well done of me,” Beck admitted. “I’m to spend the afternoon with him going over the books. Have you started on your shopping list?”
“I have not,” Sara said, preceding him through the door. “I spent the morning cutting out a dress for Allie. Warm weather finally approaches, and the only bolt of suitable material I have is summer weight.”
“And what about some new dresses for you and Polly?” Beck asked, putting her hand on his forearm. “You are females, and human, and that means a new frock from time to time is in order.”
“We’re managing. One needn’t have an impressive wardrobe to bring Hildy her slops.”
Beside her, Beck remained silent, but he felt frustration stirring. Managing was Sarabande Adagio Hunt’s euphemism for eking out survival on a rotten, neglected estate far from meaningful society. He suspected some fear kept her here, grateful for her bleak, busy existence, but he railed against the compromise she’d made for herself and for her daughter.
Maybe she rusticated here, far from home and family, because she was afraid this was her only alternative to starvation.
Maybe she was still grieving the husband who died in Italy.
Maybe she feared the world’s influence on her talented daughter.
And maybe—claiming to have been married but bearing the same last name as her unwed sister—Sara feared her own secrets might come to light. Beck felt that thought settle in the back of his mind, knowing it wouldn’t let him rest until he’d gotten to the bottom of it.
“I believe the hallmark of the term ‘footman’ is that those answering to the description be on their feet.” Beck kept his voice down because no Haddonfield over six feet tall ever had to raise his voice to be heard. When he saw he had Timothy and Tobias’s attention, he continued in the same chillingly civil tones.
“I wanted to give you two the benefit of some doubt.” He glanced around the room. “But seeing—and smelling—the state into which you’ve allowed your own quarters to deteriorate, there’s little likelihood you’re just a pair of misguided, empty-headed fellows needing a firm hand to steer you back to the true definition of earning a wage.”
“Now see here, guv.” Tobias, the less odoriferous of the pair, managed to stand at last. “You can’t come a-bustin’ in here, tossing insults around like some… some…” He glanced at his brother, and support arrived on cue.
“Like some nabob new to his riches. Footmen wait on the family, not on the servants, and that’s a natural fact.” Tim didn’t bother to get to his feet to deliver this pearl, but from his position lounging on his cot, he grinned at his brother.
Tobias nodded smugly. “Aye, like a nabob new to his riches.”
“Because I am Lady’s Warne’s family, you ignore my words at your peril,” Beck said. “Firstly, you will wash your persons at the cistern behind the barn. You disgrace Miss Polly’s table in your present condition, not to mention the memory of a mother who no doubt raised you better than this. Secondly, you will present yourselves, in livery, to Mrs. Hunt, and notify her that henceforth, you will be filling all of the wood boxes and coal buckets twice daily. You will trim wicks, refill the oil lamps, dust the entire library weekly, then start on the windows in the library, and continue on until every window on the house is scrubbed inside and out. Lady Warne pays good money to the Crown for the privilege of her windows, the least you can do is allow us to see out of them.”
“You want us to wash?” Tobias looked utterly flummoxed. “In the cistern?”
“You aren’t fit for the laundry. Should you find my direction not to your liking, I’ll be taking the team into Portsmouth soon. You are welcome to collect two week’s wages and seek other employment there, in which case you will need to clean this sty—Hildegard would disdain your chambers in their present condition—or the cost of cleaning it will be deducted from your severance. I’ll tell Mrs. Hunt to expect you by two of the clock.”
“Severance?”
The word hung in the air as Beck softly closed the door and took a few lungfuls of clean, cold air. They had a parlor stove in their room, and apparently felt no compunction about keeping it stoked with coal. The stench had been amazing, as had Beck’s forbearance.
He couldn’t stand a cheat, and these two had been cheating his grandmother—step-grandmother, true, but an old woman nonetheless—for years. He sincerely hoped they caught their deaths scrubbing in the cistern.
“You look like you want to kill someone,” North remarked conversationally.