The Earl's Iron Warrant (The Duke's Pact Book 6) Page 4

  “Lord Dalton,” she said, waiting for Mrs. Jellops to descend behind her.

  Though she was assisted by grooms on either side, that lady struggled down the steps and landed with a thud. “My lord,” she said.

  “Miss Danworth, Mrs. Jellops,” Charles said, bowing. “I condole on the loss of Lord Childress.”

  “Then you will be in small company,” Miss Danworth said. “And do not count me among the few who will miss him.”

  Charles had not expected such an answer. Whatever Lord Childress had been, he had supposed his daughter would appear suitably stricken.

  “I see you are shocked at Daisy’s forthrightness,” Mrs. Jellops said. “We have our reasons.”

  Charles nodded and thought he better not pursue that particular line of inquiry. “I realize the current situation is not usual,” he said, “but I hope I have made sufficient arrangements for your comfort.”

  Miss Danworth swept past him toward the open front doors and said, “Look to your own comfort, my lord. I imagine the cottage will require your full attention in that regard. We shall send over your dinners.”

  As Charles watched the ladies enter the house quite without him, he felt a veritable steam coming from his ears. She would send over his dinners? He was not even to dine in the house? It was outrageous!

  He paused. Miss Danworth might think she was to sashay in and send his dinners over, but there was not even a cook hired yet. He’d better tell her, and then she would descend her mighty throne and realize she required his help. Arrangements must be made with some tavern or other and he would see to it. He straightened his cuffs and marched in after her.

  Chapter Three

  Daisy had been both pleased and repelled to see Lord Dalton again. She had always allowed herself to like him a bit too much, but now that he was going to live in close quarters, she felt the need to push him off. She had intended to descend the carriage regally and portray an utter calmness of spirit, and hoped she had at least come close to it.

  She’d since been introduced to Bellamy, who was Lord Dalton’s butler and was to act as her own for the summer. As well, there was the lord’s valet and three footmen of dubious looks. Where were the other servants? She had only brought her lady’s maid, Betsy.

  “Pardon me, Mr. Bellamy,” she said, “I understand there may not be a housekeeper hired yet, but where are the housemaids? The cook? The kitchen maids?”

  Bellamy seemed relieved that his master was just now approaching and could answer these uncomfortable questions.

  “I have contacted an agency,” Lord Dalton said. “They are to send over some promising candidates on the morrow. You may interview them, or I can do it if you prefer.”

  “Of course, I will do it,” Daisy said. “I wish to have a hand in choosing the people surrounding me. Well, I suppose we must just shift as well as we might until then. I presume, my lord, you can arrange something in the kitchen. Eggs, perhaps?”

  Daisy did not fail to note the look of outrage on the lord’s face. She did not really think he could cook eggs or anything else, but it amused her to pretend that she did think it and that he would act as cook.

  “I wouldn’t know how to light the stove,” he said between gritted teeth. “I’ll arrange for something to be sent in.”

  Daisy nodded as if it were of no import to her how a dinner arrived. “As you wish. I suppose, under these unusual circumstances, you ought to dine here this night as an exception. It will only vex a proprietor if we arrange different orders to go to various locations.”

  “How kind,” Dalton said.

  Daisy nodded graciously. “Now, as I am to borrow your butler for the summer, I would have an interview. Mrs. Jellops, might you oversee Betsy? The footmen can carry up the luggage and she can begin to unpack. We will stay in our usual rooms, Lord Childress’ room may be closed and locked. Lord Dalton? I presume you have other matters to attend to?”

  Daisy watched with satisfaction as her directions were carried out, though Lord Dalton looked rather surly over being dismissed and Bellamy looked rather alarmed at being told to stay.

  She had resolved to gain a firm hand over the staff. Daisy had always been rather run over by her father’s servants, aside from her lady’s maid. Darling Betsy had ever been her champion below stairs, while Mrs. Jellops acted the same above stairs. She would hire a housekeeper she felt Betsy could get on with and as for Bellamy…well, it was imperative that he learn to take orders from Daisy and not Lord Dalton.

  “You may shut the door,” she said to the butler. She seated herself and took her time arranging her skirts, then said, “It is a rather odd situation, to have another’s butler act as one’s own, but here we are. I presume you know your duties well enough but there are a few particulars I wish to convey.”

  Bellamy nodded and appeared in deep thought over what particulars might be shortly coming his way.

  “My father has had occasion to consort with some rather low individuals over past summers. If any of those people arrive to the house, they are to be turned away instantly and told they need not ever return to it. You will know you encounter one of these rogues by their dress, their manner, and their lack of a decently composed card to send in. Anybody hinting that they are or have been a soldier must be kept out. Anybody claiming to be an old friend of Lord Childress must be kept out. Bring your footmen together to bar the door if necessary, but do not allow any of them to cross the threshold.”

  “Are there so many of them, Miss Danworth?” Bellamy asked, appearing agitated by the idea that they were soon to be under siege, and he was to be the battle commander manning the front line.

  “Quite a few,” Daisy said, “though how many will dare to gain entrance now that my father has departed the world, I know not. However, excessive drink, bold ideas, and the lure of a dowry may prompt a few.”

  Bellamy wiped his forehead with a handkerchief and Daisy thought he looked rather pale.

  “Further,” she said, “you are to carry out my orders as I direct them, with no consultation with Lord Dalton. He was your master and will be again, but he is not at this moment. That is all for now.”

  Bellamy nodded, then shuffled his feet and cleared his throat.

  “Is there something you wished to add?” Daisy said, certain that there was. She hoped he was not on the verge of attempting to cow her or otherwise override her authority.

  “It is only, that is…” Bellamy began, “it is quite right that you are the mistress. There is no confusion as to that. Only, I shouldn’t like my boys to go all topsy-turvy on me. These footmen have been with me a long time and we have a certain way of going on.”

  Daisy could see that something was about to be proposed that she was not likely to favor. Nobody hemmed and hawed as this fellow was now doing when they wished to communicate something agreeable.

  “Perhaps you might be more specific by what you mean,” Daisy said. “What is this certain way of going on?”

  “Well, me and the boys have the comfortable habit of having a bit of wine after our duties are done for the day. It gives the fellows something to look forward to, you see.”

  “I am not sure I do see,” Daisy said. “What, in your mind, is a bit of wine?”

  Bellamy stared over her head and out the window. “Oh, a bottle or two a man would do it.”

  Daisy was nearly dumbfounded. A bottle or two each? Was he mad? They must all be drunk as soldiers every night. Or, they had been. They would not do so under her own roof. It might be technically the duke’s roof now, but while she lived in it, she would set the tone. She’d just arranged to keep any drunken visitors out of the house, she would not very well condone allowing drunken servants to terrorize her or Mrs. Jellops, or especially poor, dear Betsy.

  “I am amazed you would propose such a thing,” she said sternly. “I will excuse it as a mistake one might make when one has served a bachelor for too long. I certainly will not tolerate such habits, nor would I subject my female servants who mu
st frequent the downstairs to the inevitable offensive behavior. You and your footmen will be granted one glass of ale at meals. Drink a drop further at your peril. You may go.”

  Daisy waited until the butler had made his way out of the room and closed the door behind him. The old fellow had gone very red in the face and she presumed he was outraged that his disgraceful habits were now curtailed.

  She took a deep breath to calm herself. She had prevailed over Bellamy in this round and she would see to it that continued to be the case. The housekeeper she hired would be critical—as she knew well enough, the right forceful woman would bring Bellamy and his staff into line.

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  Charles had returned to the cottage, if that was what one called it. He had set Tate to doing with it what he could and his valet had not shirked on the matter. He’d found a bolt of canvas and hung it over Charles’ bed to stop the rain from falling on his face. He had scrubbed the floors and furniture with vinegar and placed bunches of lavender on every surface, the abode now smelling like a perfumed salad. A washstand had been procured, and Charles presumed Tate had stolen it out of the main house, as well as a tall bookcase that had been commandeered as a makeshift dresser to hold his clothes.

  Before he could comment on the improvements, Bellamy burst through the door. “I am insulted to the end of my toes,” the butler said. “I do not know how I can stand for it!”

  Charles eyed him. Bellamy was certainly in some kind of state, sweat dripped from the old heathen’s forehead. “I suppose you are determined to communicate the insult your toes have recently endured,” he said drily.

  Bellamy began to pace the small room. “As you know, my lord, Miss Danworth wished to have a private interview. Well, she wanted me to understand in no uncertain terms that she is the mistress and you are nothing. Charles Battersea, Earl of Dalton and heir to the Duke of Glastonburg, is nothing!”

  Charles folded his arms. It was highly unlikely that Bellamy had worked himself into such a lather over a slight to himself.

  “That is all?” he asked. “She said nothing further?”

  Bellamy stopped his pacing and stood staring at the lone window at the far end of the room. “She also said that me and the boys are to have no more than a glass of ale at mealtimes. At my peril, is what she said.”

  “I suspect her father may have indulged to excess,” Charles said. “There were wine bottles in every corner of the house when I arrived.”

  “And I should pay for that?” Bellamy said. “I do not drink to excess.”

  “You most certainly do,” Charles said, suppressing his laughter.

  “I see,” Bellamy said petulantly. “Everybody is to drink all they like but the poor butler and his footmen. She says we may have a string of drunken louts arriving at the door and I am to keep them out. Without even a glass of wine to fortify myself against them!”

  “Wait a moment,” Charles said, “who are the drunken louts she expects to turn up?”

  “I do not know,” Bellamy said, and Charles could see very well he did not care. “She says her father had engaged in low company.”

  “I bet he did,” Charles said softly. All the wine and brandy bottles strewn everywhere made more sense now. Childress had run his house as if he were a rogue bachelor, with no thought to having a daughter in the house.

  “Stop your complainin,’ you old reprobate,” Tate said to the butler. “You don’t hear me complainin’ about the impossible working conditions, now do you? We’ve all just got to get on with it.”

  “Probably good advice,” Charles said, “though I feel rather complaining myself. As for you, Bellamy, it will not do you harm to lay off the wine bottle for a few months.”

  “We shall see!” Bellamy said. “I fear my body will be shocked and land me in a sickbed.”

  “If your body is shocked by these new and improved habits, it will be shocked with relief and delight,” Charles said. “This may not be how any of us prefer to spend the summer, but we can at least comfort ourselves that I will outwit my father in his ridiculous schemes.”

  “But my lord,” Bellamy said, looking as if a new horror had just occurred to him. “There is to be a housekeeper. A housekeeper! You know what they are like!”

  Charles of course did know what they were like. Lurking in every corner, pursing lips over the slightest irregularity, and generally making themselves a nuisance. It was precisely the reason he did not have one. He would go back to his comfortable bachelor ways in a few months.

  But for now, he would not have it all his own way and neither would Bellamy.

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  Daisy had not the first idea what was involved to have a dinner delivered to the house. She did not wish to admit that fact and so sat in the drawing room with Mrs. Jellops and attempted a serene expression.

  It seemed to her that Lord Dalton was very well acquainted with the procedure, as he had been directing a long line of boys carrying trays into the dining room. She supposed he did not even bother to keep a cook at his house in town.

  Bellamy had made an appearance to announce that dinner was to be served in a quarter hour. Daisy had not missed that he practically spat the words out and neither had Mrs. Jellops.

  “He is an unpleasant fellow,” Mrs. Jellops said, after Bellamy closed the door.

  “He is put out because he proposed that he and his footmen be allocated one or two bottles of wine every night,” Daisy said. “One or two bottles each.”

  “Each? He never did,” Mrs. Jellops said. “Goodness, what an idea.”

  “Apparently, it is how he goes on in Lord Dalton’s house in London.”

  “Well,” Mrs. Jellops said, patting her hand, “it shan’t go on here. There will be no carousing in this house.”

  “No, there will not,” Daisy said resolutely. “We will not allow the past to be recreated under our noses. I should like to go to sleep without pushing furniture in front of my door or listening to shouts and the sound of broken glass below me.”

  “Those days are over, my dear,” Mrs. Jellops said. “You must do your best to leave them in the past else they haunt you forever.”

  “That would not do at all,” Daisy said. “We cannot have survived only to survive unhappily.”

  “Just so.”

  “Dinner is served, Miss Danworth,” Bellamy said. He had reappeared and stood gravely in the doorframe. He turned on his heel and marched off.

  Daisy glanced at Mrs. Jellops. “It does not appear that we are to be led in, so I suppose we must escort ourselves.”

  “Have my arm, dear,” Mrs. Jellops said, “and I will take you in.”

  Mrs. Jellops showed the way and Daisy was surprised to find the dining table very near what it would have been had she a cook in the kitchens. At least, if the cook had decided to send everything up at once and do the carving while he was at it. The table was laid with sliced beef, a carved roast chicken, a large pork pie, and a fish in a white sauce. There were salads, pickled vegetables, cheeses, and berry tarts. A large soup tureen sat on a sideboard. It became apparent to Daisy that they were not to have courses. They were to have one course that included everything.

  Bellamy had uncorked the wine and poured it into glasses, though he looked like murder doing it. For that matter, the footmen appeared surly as well. Daisy supposed they were imagining the wine they poured might have been their own under a more lenient mistress.

  “I do not know what seating arrangement you prefer,” Lord Dalton said, “and so I have put you at the head of the table with Mrs. Jellops on your right, while I will take the bottom end.”

  “Quite right,” Mrs. Jellops said. Daisy did not know if it were right or not, but it seemed satisfactory enough.

  “In any case, I presume you will hire a cook on the morrow and we may be done with this arrangement. As I am to have my meals sent over.”

  Daisy understood perfectly well that Lord Dalton felt himself poorly used over the scheme to keep him to the cottage at meals
. Still, what else could she do? She did not trust herself to dine with the gentleman every night of the week. There was no telling how she might fall for his charms, such as they were, and then attempt to convince herself that he was not like the others. Men were all the same, with only rare exceptions, that she knew. But how many women had fooled themselves to think otherwise? Her own mother certainly had done.

  There were times when she felt society’s rules about how a lady was to conduct herself were burdensome, and then other times when she felt protected by them. In this case, she felt rather protected.

  “I realize it is an imposition, Lord Dalton,” she said, “but I really do not see how else we are to go on. It would not be seemly to do otherwise.”

  Lord Dalton nodded. “You are, naturally, afraid of any talk that might arise,” he said. “I suppose one in the Marriage Mart must be cognizant of such things.”

  Daisy laid down her soup spoon. “The Marriage Mart?” she said.

  “It is just a phrase, Miss Danworth,” Lord Dalton said. “No need to appear over-delicate about it.”

  “I am not swooning over the phrase,” Daisy said curtly. “I am surprised at the idea. Did you really think that a daughter of Lord Childress, one who has seen what men are, would be so willing to chain herself to one of them?”

  Lord Dalton looked up from his soup in surprise.

  “I think,” Mrs. Jellops said hurriedly, “perhaps that is a subject for another day. Or no day at all.”

  “So,” Lord Dalton said slowly, “you have no intention to marry?”

  “Certainly not,” Daisy said. “Aside from children, and the money I do not need, what use are men?”

  “When Daisy reaches her majority,” Mrs. Jellops put in, “we will go to the seaside. Brighton, we think.”

  “You are already at the seaside,” Lord Dalton pointed out. “Why not stay here? I am sure my father would not mind turning over the house to you if you wish it.”

  Daisy looked around at the four walls and said quietly, “This is the very last place I would stay.”