Regency Romance: Each Other

Regency Romance: Each Other is a short story by Amelia Fernside.

  ***

  “I fear for your safety!” the Duke thundered. But he might as well have been barking at the moon. Isabella, his beautiful but supremely arrogant niece, scoffed at the notion. That is, until a man dressed in black pointed a gun at Isabella. Now what? You’ll soon find out, dear reader.

  Contents

  Chapter 1: A Dire Warning

  Chapter 2: The Golden Gown

  Chapter 3: Trading Places

  Chapter 4: Up Is Down; Down Is Up

  Chapter 5: Goodbye, My Lady

  Chapter 6: The Blackguards

  Chapter 7: Each Other

  About the Author

  More Books by Amelia Fernside

  Regency Romance:

  Each Other

  by

  Amelia Fernside

  Copyright 2016 Amelia Fernside

  Chapter 1

  A Dire Warning

  “Miss Olivia! Hurry up! The cock has crowed three times this morning, and still you are not at your station!” cried Mrs. Mason, the housekeeper, whose voice was as shrill and irate as the fowl of which she spoke. “Goodness knows what you are doing out there!” she came again. “You’ll cause a scandal before your very first day has begun!”

  Olivia winced, but did not dash inside. Instead, she held the hands of Mr. Ashburn, whom she called Thomas, having known him since their toddler years, and squeezed them for luck.

  “I wish you well in your enterprise,” he said, his solid brown eyes deep and soothing to her, like a forest in a summer’s evening. “Don’t be afraid of the Mistress. For the whole time I have been here, I have never even seen her up close. I’m sure you’ll do splendidly.”

  “Miss Oliviaaaa!” thundered Mrs. Mason.

  “Dear Thomas, did you get me this job as a blessing or a curse?” she tittered.

  “Twill be a curse, if you upset Mother Hen this early. She has not even had her morning tea!”

  “Good lord!” Olivia shouted sarcastically. “That cannot be tolerated! I am off!”

  She turned and bustled into the house. Thomas called after her. “Remember, if you need me, I’ll be right on the grounds. Don’t worry, Olivia.”

  She caught sight of him waving, and then she was through the door.

  “Are you out with the gardener again, you silly thing?” scolded Mrs. Mason as Olivia emerged into the smoking and crowded kitchen. Sending a polite smile to a pair of scullery maids as she dodged past them, she at last presented herself to Mrs. Mason. A tall, broad, imposing woman, with the vocals and stature of a bullfrog, she was universally feared, respected, and, when out of earshot, grumbled about by all the household staff. Yet, from what Olivia had heard, she kept her ship in tight working order and could not help but be admired for her handiwork.

  “You know, child,” she said, plucking a leaf from Olivia’s skirt, “already people are beginning to talk. Gossip grows like weeds in a house like this, and not even your dear Mr. Ashburn will be able to keep it at bay.”

  “Gossip?” said Olivia, astonished. “You mean between Thomas and myself? Mrs. Mason, I can assure you, he and I are like siblings. You see, we grew up in the same –”

  “Frankly, child,” Mrs. Mason interrupted, “I do not care what you do, so long as you attend to your duties as you are expected. But I will warn you; you have his baby and you’re out of a job.”

  Olivia stared at her. How exactly does a polite woman reply to such a statement? How would a rude woman? Mrs. Mason, unperturbed by Olivia’s hesitation, ploughed on.

  “Now, your task this morning is the guest rooms. All the linens must be changed, the mattresses turned, the floors scrubbed, etcetera. My goodness, some of the guests Her Ladyship has at this place …”

  “Are they quite deplorable?” Olivia inquired, flouncing behind the housekeeper as they strode up the stairs. The woman stopped so abruptly that Olivia rammed into her.

  “Don’t you ever let me hear you speak in such ways about the honoured guests of my Lady!” she snapped. “You would be blessed to even have them sneeze upon you, wretched child!”

  And she stomped onward.

  Olivia sighed. She knew better than to point out that Mrs. Mason had just been insulting the guests. She had worked under too many housekeepers to try, women who scraped their master’s glory onto themselves, like hungry scullery maids picking leftovers off a gentleman’s abandoned plate.

  “Start there,” Mrs. Mason instructed, “and work towards the west. And remember, the Lady can be, ah, flighty at times. Be sure not to get in her way.”

  “Yes, Mrs. Mason,” Olivia replied dutifully. Lady Isabella of Roslyn, the mistress of this estate, had a well-known reputation for her lavish parties, and for her capriciousness with household staff. Her reputation extended across all of England Although this of course was stressful on the average housemaid, it did mean there was plenty of work to be done, and no shortage of money to compensate it. When she’d heard, earlier that month, that Thomas would be working as the gardener here, she had breathed a sigh of great contentment. As long as he could remain sensible – which, she thought, about summed him up – Thomas was safe for life. When she herself had been granted a position, through Thomas’ influence, she was at once both grateful and afraid. To be a sturdy, handsome gardener whose cottage was some distance from the Lady’s mansion was one thing. To be a little mouse of a maid to this feline mistress, right under her nose, was something else entirely.

  Mrs. Mason bid her adieu with a stern look, and Olivia entered the first guestroom. It was so richly adorned and furnished that even the most estimable of landed gentry would have been proud to call this their master bedroom, but for the Lady, it was merely one of many. A large, mahogany four-poster bed, hand carved with rose blossoms and topped with a cream-colored canopy embroidered with grape vines, stood at the centre of the room. Around it, rich upholstered armchairs and footstools offered the lazing guests several more options to rest their weary, polished toes. A fireplace large enough for Olivia to sleep in was built into the opposite wall from the bed. She sent up a private prayer of thanks that, it being high summer, she would not have to deal with that particular monstrosity for a while.

  Sighing at the daunting task ahead of her, Olivia clambered atop the mountainous bed and began to strip it.

  Within minutes, however, something caught her eye that duly distracted her.

  A bookshelf was tucked inconspicuously behind the left post of the bed. The books were obviously rarely read – the dust on them was thick, and therefore one more thing Olivia must do. But this was not what had attracted her attention. It was the titles: Romeo and Juliet, Candide, Inferno, The Prince.

  Those were books that were spoken of with as much awe and esotericism as stories of fairies and dragons. Olivia felt herself drawn to them – she could read, one of the few skills her ailing mother had bequeathed her before she died. Olivia was supremely aware of the forbidden and lofty magic that must be held within. As if enchanted, she raised her hand, selected one (Paradise Lost, by John Milton, which, by the handprints, seemed to have been touched most recently) and began to read.

  Better to rule in hell than serve in heaven…

  “Quick, quick, Camille, in here!”

  A voice split her reverie like a fork of lightning. She looked up just in time to see Miss Camille, the Lady’s maid, and the Lady Isabella of Roslyn herself dash into the room. Olivia uttered a short squeak, dropped the book, and darted behind a changing screen, praying that Her Ladyship and her servant hadn’t seen her shirking her chores.

  But the two women seemed to be hiding from something themselves.

  “Did he see us?” Camil
le said with a giggle, fluttering next to her mistress.

  “No, no, I don’t think so,” drawled the Lady. “My uncle can be so trying at times. I do wish he’d just leave us in peace!”

  “Shh! He’s coming!”

  The two quieted, their heavily padded and beribboned rears bouncing as they bent to peer through the room’s keyhole. Olivia heard the sound of heavy, booted footsteps pass the door.

  “Thank goodness, he’s missed us,” exclaimed the Lady, before flouncing onto the bed as if she had just overcome a great hurdle. “All his talk about trouble to the east, and jealous gentry, oh, I find it so irreparably tiresome. Perhaps those nasty French bastards will rid us of him instead.”

  “Oh, my Lady, are they French?” queried Camille. The daughter of a Duke whistled at her Lady’s maid’s ignorance.

  “Of course not, you ninny. But, seeing as they don’t like me, they might as well be.”

  And the two dissolved into a fit of giggles. Olivia shifted nervously in her hidey-hole behind the screen. What superficial nitwits, she thought.

  “My Lady, what is that?” Camille said, pointing towards the screen. Olivia felt as if her heart would fail her. The Lady, one of the most powerful women in the kingdom, rolled over and wiggled her way closer. She outstretched her hand, leaning towards the screen…

  “Oh, that’s just one of the blasted books my father left to me before he died, poor thing,” she said, plucking up the copy of Paradise Lost, eyeing it without even reading the title, and tossing it back on the floor. “I hadn’t the heart to get rid of them, of course, but I couldn’t stand looking at the things, so I sequestered them here. Quite clever, don’t you think?”

  “You are a wonderful daughter, my Lady,” Camille said in her best obsequious manner. Olivia fought the urge to roll her eyes.

  “Perhaps not that good of one,” Isabella said with a grin, facing her servant. “You know what I have realized? This is the very room in which the Earl of Balton slept last night! My goodness, do you think the sheets still smell of him?”

  She pressed her face into the bed and breathed deeply. Then she noticed the pile of dirty sheets crumpled on the floor, where Olivia had left them to bring to the laundry.

  “Blast, it seems as if one of those stupid housemaids has changed the sheets already. I suppose I’ll just have to invite him again!”

  “Most assuredly!” gushed Camille, as the two rose from the bed and ventured toward the door. After checking whether the coast was clear, they departed, and Camille continued, “You could then wear your golden evening gown. It goes ever so well with your locks of hair …”

  Olivia heard no more.

  Feeling both stupid for landing herself in this situation and yet mightily clever compared with the inanities of the two women’s discussion, she wriggled her way out from behind the screens, shelved the copy of the book and scooped up the discarded sheets. Absent-mindedly, she pressed her nose into them and inhaled. They did indeed smell lovely. A mix of resin and gun polish. Smiling, she drifted halfway out of the room, paused, then returned to tuck the copy of the book into her bodice.

  She had plenty more work – and more reading – to do.

  ●●●

  Bored with playing hide and seek in the mansion, Isabella dragged Camille outside, where the two sat and flicked rocks into the fountain, which served as the focal point of the garden. As they sat, chatting about nothing, a sudden voice called out to them:

  “Olivia! How lovely you look. Where on Earth did you acquire such an outfit …”

  He trailed off as he approached them, a look of horror on his face.

  “Forgive me, my Lady!” he cried, bowing low. “I mistook you for someone else, I would never have …”

  The man continued mumbling his apology, completely mortified.

  Isabella caught her friend’s eye and smiled.

  “You are the gardener, are you not?” she asked, rising to her graceful, tiny feet.

  “Yes, my Lady,” he replied, still bending low.

  “And what would you do, if you wished to garden me?” she asked.

  He finally raised his gaze, and blinked at her in confusion.

  “Forgive me,” he said. “But what, my Lady?”

  She put her hands on her hips and glared at him with all the beautiful disdain she could muster.

  “What would you do,” she repeated slowly, as if speaking to a child, “if you were to garden me?”

  The gardener obviously sensed a trap, for he wrung his cap in his hands in quiet alarm. “No gardener on Earth could ever presume to till you, my Lady,” he said, “for who could prune perfection? That is the station for God, and Him alone.”

  The Lady Isabella eyed him with frank curiosity. “Perhaps you’ll do,” she said. “Now leave us!”

  Visibly trembling with relief, the poor man dashed back into his gardens with his tail between his legs.

  Isabella broke into a fit of laughter.

  “Oh, my Lady, must you be so mean to your servants? He is actually very handsome.”

  Isabella’s eye suddenly became hard. “Remember, Miss Camille, you are a servant, too.”

  “Isabella!” Another shout interrupted. The Lady winced. Only one man present in the entire mansion had the right to call her with such familiarity.

  “Greetings, uncle,” she said brightly, rising to give him a proper curtsey. Camille, the Lady’s maid, rose, bowed, and fled without saying a word.

  “Coward,” Isabella muttered under her breath.  

  “My dear Isabella,” said her uncle, the Duke of Brexington, panting after he hurried to meet her.

  “What’s the matter, uncle?” she cried, noticing the sweat on his forehead, the red veins pulsing in his neck. She couldn’t decide whether he looked more like a rhinoceros or a riverbed seething with snakes.

  “That … man …. to whom you were speaking. Who is he?” He had a hard time getting past his stomach in order to lean on his knees.

  “Oh, him?” said Isabella dismissively. “That was the gardener. Now what is all this hullaballoo?”

  “Gardener? You should not be alone with any man! Your reputation already hangs by a thread.”

  “I was not alone!” she snapped, outraged. “I was with Miss Camille!”

  “My dear, that girl has all the intelligence and personality of a mirror in a poorly lighted room. I would not even count her.”

  Isabella thought it only fair to acknowledge his point.

  “So that is why you ran all the way out here? To prevent my reputation from being tarnished by a man with brambles in his hair?”

  Having finally caught his breath, the old Duke rose, and, looking rather sheepish, replied. “No, my Lady. I thought him perhaps an attacker. Trouble brews in the east. There is still no news of your father, the Duke, from the Peninsular War front, and many are becoming jealous of the uncontested power you possess. I fear, in fact, for your safety. I repeat, I fear for your safety!”

  “My safety? What utter nonsense,” she scoffed. “I am perfectly safe here. Who would dare attack the Duke’s family?”

  “In these times of unrest, with lowly commoners competing for a gentleman’s wealth, and gentlemen competing for the esteem of a King gone mad, anything is possible.”

  “The only thing mad, uncle,” she said, “is how silly you look after a run. Really, you should go out more. Hunt some foxes. Shoot a gun. Ride a horse, if you can find one sturdy enough.”

  The Duke glared at his niece but did not counter. The Lady, spoiled enough at first by her father and now by his absence, was too well accustomed to license.

  “All I ask, is that you be careful,” he said after a moment.

  “Of course, of course, dear uncle. That is why I am having all of these parties. To surround myself with bodyguards. You should really come to the next one. It’ll be enormous, and I’m making sure that the Earl of Balton will be there …”

  She trailed off, curtsied, then wandered away in sea
rch of her startled playmate. She paid no mind to her uncle’s sigh as he collapsed on the edge of the fountain, his head in his hands.