Ambersley (Lords of London) (19 page)

“
Johnny, no one’s ever risked his neck for me before. Oh, once or twice in India, but the Army’s different. The next man helps you because he’s hoping to God you’ll do the same for him. In the heat of battle most men don’t think, they react. What you did yesterday was heroic, and I want to reward you for it.”

Johnny’s face warmed beneath his praise. “Your Grace, it’s not necessary”

“
I know it’s not necessary. I’ve thought long and hard, and I want to make you my ward. You would live with me, get an education, and become a gentleman. What say you?”

Johnny pretended to give the proposal grave consideration, though her insides clenched with panic. She couldn’t tell the duke,
no, I don’t like the idea, thank you for the honor just the same.
He’d ask her to explain, and how could she without telling him the truth?

“
You do me a great honor, but it’s too much. I’m a boy of questionable parentage raised by a gardener. It’s not my destiny to be a gentleman.”

“
Sometimes we must challenge our destiny.” The duke looked away. “I did.”

“
Becoming a duke was within the realm of your imagination. I could no more imagine myself a gentleman than you could imagine yourself King of England.”

“
I see. Would you not be happy to be a gentleman?”

“
I’m happy simply to be
me
. I hope you will be satisfied with what I am and not with what you would try to make me.” With that, Johnny pushed away from the monument and walked slowly into the misty rain.

Derek watched him go. It wasn’t proper for a servant to leave the presence of a duke without permission, but the boy had never stood on ceremony with Derek, and he preferred it that way. For a long time he stood in the rain and pondered the enigma that was Johnny.

Chapter 9

Ambersley, September 1811

Four days later, Martha died, and Johnny realized her own troubles were insignificant.

She came home to the cottage to find Tom kneeling beside Martha’s prone form. His shoulders shook, though he made no sound. Johnny froze in the doorway, afraid to intrude upon his grief, yet unable to leave. She felt sick inside that she’d been so preoccupied with her own thoughts since the stable fire, as if she should have foreseen this possibility.

Tom sensed her presence and glanced over his shoulder. “Come here, Johnny. No need to fear. Martha’s just passed on is all.”

Is all
. With the fresh memory of discovering her parents during the Hall fire, death held a finality that was deafening. But she braved it, for Tom’s sake, and went to him. She wrapped his head in her arms, and he held her around her waist and wept unashamedly while her tears fell unheeded. Guilt stung, for as much as she wanted to comfort Tom, she longed to run to the duke and share this horrible news, convinced he’d find a way to erase the bitterness from this moment. If Death had come to Ambersley, had she somehow outwitted Him by rescuing the duke only to have Him collect Martha’s soul instead? Her reserve broke in a sob.

Tom reached up to frame her face as she cried out grief and fear and loss. “There now, Johnny. Don’t make yourself sick, child. You know Martha would never want that. In fact, she wouldn’t put up with this nonsense of us grieving like this while she’s lying on the floor.”

At his gruff tone, Johnny smiled tremulously. Indeed, she could hear Martha ordering them to remember their duties. “I’ll ask Mrs. North to gather the women to prepare her for burial.”

Tom nodded. “I’ll find Rory and Cushing to help me dig a grave. We can have the burial tomorrow. Help me lay her out on the table. Watch your arm.”

She gripped Martha’s stiff ankles, and they hefted her atop the long trestle table until it creaked beneath her weight. Tom and Johnny looked at each other across Martha’s lifeless body.

“
She was so proud to be your wife. You made her so happy,” Johnny told the stocky man.

“
She loved you, child. You know that, don’t you? She’d lost her only child when he was but a little boy. You were a gift to us, and you meant the world to Martha.”

Johnny swallowed the lump in her throat. “She was my mother.” She looked at the relaxed planes of Martha’s face. She’d never seen the woman with no trace of worry. “I’ll fetch Mrs. North now,” she whispered and escaped the cottage while she could still see.

She ran towards the Hall, until her aching lungs made her slow. The blood pumping through her injured arm made it throb viciously, but she saw it only as an inconvenience. Perhaps this was what the duke had meant when he’d told her that in the Army death made all pain seem minor in comparison. Silently, she gave thanks again that she’d been able to save him.

After the fire, he’d gone to London to see Mr. Minton, and Lady Vaughan, Olivia and Curtis had accompanied him. While having Curtis gone made Johnny feel safer, she didn’t trust him with the duke. She’d been present when the barber had put three stitches in the duke’s scalp. Everyone believed he’d been injured by the fear-crazed stallion.

Everyone but Cushing. “You did well to pull him out of there,” he’d said darkly.

She’d been tempted to voice her suspicions, but as she had no proof, she remained silent. Instead, she watched as His Grace and Lord Curtis mounted a pair of hacks while Lady Vaughan and Lady Olivia rolled down the drive in the crest-emblazoned coach. The two men were laughing in perfect accord, but Johnny wouldn’t be content until Curtis returned to Oxford. She’d certainly be on her guard whenever he visited Ambersley.

Whether or not he knew it, the duke needed her. Now, more than ever, she needed to hold fast to her secret.

~

Derek returned from London alone. “Curtis was invited cubbing, and Mother thought she should keep her eye on him,” he told Paget, who reallocated the staff so some could help rebuild what was left of the stable.

Once more Derek doffed his waistcoat to work with servants and tenants in clearing away debris and salvaging what he could of a building. At least this time he could pay for the repairs.

“
Curtis started teaching Olivia to ride this summer,” he said to Rory one day as they took a break. “Did she take to it?”

Rory nodded. “Aye, we placed her on a gentle mare. She’ll need some guidance, but I’d say she’s got a sound seat.”

“
We’ll need to set someone to ride with her when she returns to Ambersley in the fall. Is there a lad we can entrust?”

The groom bit back a laugh. “It would need to be someone immune to her fetching ways who could keep a tight rein on her. She’d give most lads the slip.” He considered the question for a few more moments. “What about Johnny?”

“
Johnny? Does he even know how to ride?” Derek’s mind flew back to the first day he’d arrived at Ambersley when the boy had been nearly trampled.

“
No, but he can learn. He’s always around the stables when his chores are done. He understands the horses. It wouldn’t take much to teach him to ride. I could do it.”

“
No, you’re too busy with things around here. He can ride with me in the mornings. We’ll start him off on Livvie’s mare.”

When told she was being promoted from gardener’s apprentice to stable lad, Johnny trembled at the thought of taking responsibility for the headstrong Olivia. She could only hope the girl would take pity on her for all their years of friendship. In the meantime, the duke taught her how to brush down a horse, how to saddle it and feed the bit tenderly between its teeth.

Once she mounted Olivia’s mare, he placed the reins in both her hands and positioned them low over the horse’s withers. As he ran his hands down her leg to set her heel low in the stirrup, she tried not to flinch at the warmth radiating from his touch.

“
You’ll want to keep your seat in the saddle. And you might find you need to readjust yourself a bit, for comfort and safety.” Derek patted the front of his own breeches and grinned.

Heat raced up her neck and face. Once they set forth, she regained her composure as she concentrated on staying astride.

As their rides progressed, Johnny lost her nervousness and treasured their time together. They discussed many topics until, one October morning, Johnny—aware Curtis’s imminent return for the Christmas holidays spelled possible danger—gathered her courage to ask of him a favor. “Could you teach me swordsmanship?”

He shifted in his saddle to study her. “Why would you want to learn?”

Johnny tried to sound unconcerned. “You never know when I might need to defend Lady Olivia.” She couldn’t very well suggest she wanted to be better prepared should Curtis set upon her. Besides, were the duke ever attacked, she might be able to help defend him.

“
Then, by all means, let us begin your training tomorrow. We certainly cannot leave my fair sister defenseless. Think of all the dangers lurking here at Ambersley.”

He was laughing at her, she knew, but she chose to ignore it since he seemed willing to teach her. Instead, she changed the subject to one that had been troubling her unaccountably. “My lord, do you ever think about marrying?”

The duke reined his horse into a crab stepping walk. “Why would you ask that?”

In truth, she’d lain awake nights thinking of the duke and the confusing emotions he’d inspired. She’d always wanted to be his loyal servant, but now that she knew she was his equal in birth, she found herself wishing for a different sort of relationship. The problem, of course, was she couldn’t tell him of her birth without admitting that she’d
lied
to him for years.

Johnny met his eyes with what candor she could spare. “You seem content to live alone, but since Martha’s death, Tom looks lost. I wonder if a man lives his whole life seeking his mate.”

“
Tom and Martha loved each other. Among the nobility, marriages are business arrangements made for power and prestige, money and land, or to beget an heir. Since I have all those things, I’ve no need to marry.”

Johnny pondered this as their horses picked their way through the home wood. The marriage he outlined didn’t sound happy. “So you don’t ever plan to marry?”

“
I won’t say never. Perhaps if I find the right woman.”

“
What would she be like?” Johnny held her breath, awaiting his answer with anticipation.

Absentmindedly, he scratched his horse’s shoulder. “She’d be beautiful but sensible, have good breeding, she’d understand that my word is law, and she’d be a good mother to our children.”

Johnny exhaled a deflated sigh then took herself to task, for it mattered not what he sought in a wife. It wasn’t as if he were ever going to marry
her
. Still, he hadn’t mentioned any of the qualities she’d overheard him tell Mr. Harry all those years ago by the stream. Perhaps he’d changed his mind. “And you would love her for all that?”

The duke snorted. “What does love have to do with this?”

Warmth flooded her face, but she pushed on, above all wanting to understand his views. “But, if you have children together—” She stumbled, unable to finish the question.

Derek drew rein again to study the boy shrewdly. “Johnny, have you ever
been
with a woman?” He could tell the boy understood him by the way his face glowed bright red above his collar. Even flushed, there was no mistaking the delicate bones of the face, the skinny body and the smooth facial skin. No, the maids at Ambersley weren’t fighting over the gardener’s son. The lad’s discomfiture finally drew a laugh from him.

“
Johnny, don’t be embarrassed. It’s perfectly natural. Let me give you some advice. For your first time, find a woman older and more experienced than yourself. She’ll be flattered, and she’ll give you guidance that will serve you well with your future partners. Second, don’t confuse love with lust. Women often do. Despite what the vicar will tell you, two people do not need to be married to bed together. You’re living proof of that.”

If possible, the boy flushed deeper crimson.

“
Don’t be ashamed. Some people risk everything to be together, they believe for love. But in my experience, love doesn’t last. Men and most women enjoy the physical act of bedding together, lovemaking some call it. But love is not necessary for two people to share and enjoy that act. In truth, some men find the need to bed a woman so strong, they hire a woman to suit their purpose. They’re called strumpets, and it’s quite a trade in London.”