Summerset Abbey (8 page)

“No, you have to press harder. That’s why you can’t do it with rags, see?”

So Prudence scrubbed.

The pots were so tarnished, she thought it would never come clean, but when it finally did, she found a certain satisfaction in taking a dull pan and making it look shiny and bright.

“Do you have to do this every day?” she asked.

“Every bleedin’ day,” Susie said grimly. “Look at my hands.” She held out a hand for Prudence’s inspection. They were small and capable, but the skin was chapped red and the knuckles swollen.

“Language!” Cook yelled from the kitchen.

Susie rolled her eyes and continued scrubbing.

“Do you like your job?” Prudence asked.

Susie snorted, “I’m the scullery maid. What do you think? I’m the lowest of the low.” She leaned closer and whispered, “But I’m hoping to be a cook someday.”

Prudence couldn’t imagine a life where being a cook was the highest of one’s aspirations. But then were hers any better? She just wanted to take care of those she loved. Maybe have a family someday. What she wanted in life didn’t seem nearly as important as what she didn’t want: to be facing everything alone. But Susie didn’t seem intimidated by the thought of a solitary life, because cooks never married. “What’s so great about being a cook?” Prudence asked.

“Much better pay. And you get to order other people around all day!” Susie yelled this last part over her shoulder.

“I heard that!” Cook yelled back from the kitchen, and Prudence and Susie giggled.

“I’ve worked here for about eight months. It’s not a bad job. The food is good. I have a roof over my head and I’m working for an earl, which lets me lord it over my sisters on my days off. They just have day jobs in town.”

“Do you like the Earl?” she asked.

“Oh, I’ve never met him. I met the Countess once, when she hired me. She said I looked a likely gal and I got the job. I was so nervous!”

Prudence frowned and scrubbed with renewed vigor. How odd to take such pride in working for an earl when he hadn’t even bothered to meet someone in his own employ.

Though Susie said the work would go faster with the two of them, it seemed to take forever. Then the bells started ringing on the bell board and everyone snapped to attention.

“They’re back from the service.” Cook grabbed some silver salvers from the china closet. “They’ll be wanting their tea.”

Hortense came hurrying down the narrow stairs. Prudence had seen her only once, in passing. She noticed
she
didn’t have to wear an ugly uniform. Instead, the statuesque black-haired Frenchwoman wore a smart black-and-white-checked twill suit that couldn’t be anything but couture.

“Miss Rowena was asking for you. She is in her room.” Hortense clapped her hands.
“Rapidement!”

Prudence wiped her hands on the apron Susie had lent her and started up the stairs.

“
Non
! Take her some tea. Idiot!”

Prudence turned back and Cook handed her a tray with a teapot and cups. Then she hurried up the steps while Hortense muttered in French below.

The servants’ stairway had inconspicuous doors that opened up on each floor, so they could move about the house without their presence being known. It seemed odd to Prudence to have a small army of silent, invisible workers keeping the house running in tip-top shape and not even be aware of them. Did Elaine ever wonder about the fire that warmed her room in the morning when she awoke, the never-ending supply of biscuits in the jar next to her bed, or how her slippers and dressing gown were heated and waiting for her to crawl into after she bathed? Prudence wasn’t sure she would like that kind of luxury at all.

Even if the rules hadn’t stressed being quiet at all times, Prudence would have tiptoed. The inside of the house, with its exquisite art, plush carpets, and the wide, gleaming staircase that seemed to stretch on forever, required a certain decorum. Besides, the last thing she wanted to do was rouse the ire of Mrs. Harper, who already seemed to have taken an instant dislike to her.

She found Rowena in her room, looking out the mullioned window. Ivy had been allowed to grow up the walls on this side of the house and it surrounded the window, making it look as if Rowena were peering out into a secret garden. “I brought you some tea,” Prudence said stiffly. Even though she loved Rowena, a part of her smarted at being maneuvered into this situation by her own sister.

“Thank you, Pru.” Rowena turned her face away from the window and Prudence’s heart melted at the sadness on her face.

She set the tray down on a small table near the window, then put her arms around Rowena.

“It was so sad. He loved Summerset, but I kept thinking that he wouldn’t want to spend the rest of eternity here. He loved our home as much, if not more, and he loved to travel so.”

Prudence’s arms tightened. “Just don’t think of him stuck here. He’s in a better place, you know.”

“I know.” Rowena sighed. “Has Victoria come home yet?”

Prudence frowned. “What do you mean? I thought she was with you.”

“She was, but then she couldn’t bear it anymore and went for a walk. I tried to call her back, but you know how she gets. I felt it would be disrespectful to shout or follow her. One of us needed to be there.”

Alarm kicked Prudence’s pulse up a notch. “But it’s so cold outside. Do you think she’ll get lost?”

Rowena shook her head. “Remember, Vic has been here every summer since she was born. She should be fine as long as she gets in before dark.”

“We should go look for her.” Prudence turned away from the window, but Rowena grabbed her arm. “No, look. There she is now.”

Prudence spotted Victoria’s slight figure coming up the walkway through the formal rose garden. The roses had been cut back for the winter and looked shorn and disgraced.

A light knock on the door startled both girls.

“Come in,” Rowena called.

Prudence swallowed as Lady Summerset gracefully glided in. Her ladyship hesitated for a fraction of a second when she saw Prudence, but then continued her elegant approach toward Rowena. Lady Summerset wore an ivory lace and tulle tea gown with a simple tunic top and softly gathered sleeves that ended at the elbow. Silver threads wound their way haphazardly through her abundant brown hair and one would have to be cruel to call them gray. As she came closer, Prudence detected the pink scent of talcum powder and flowers, as if her ladyship were concealing a hidden bouquet of dusty roses.

Prudence wasn’t sure if she should curtsy or disappear behind the draperies, so she stood perfectly still and tried not to stare.

“I wanted to make sure you were doing all right, my dear. Has Victoria returned?”

“She’s coming in now, Aunt Charlotte.”

“Oh, good. I was hoping to speak to you alone.” She paused and both girls caught her meaning at the same time.

Prudence edged away, but Rowena caught her arm. “Aunt Charlotte, I don’t think you have met my dear friend, Prudence. She has lived with us since we were both young. Prudence, this is my aunt Charlotte.”

For a moment it looked as if the grace and superb manners Lady Summerset wore around her like a cloak would fail, but at the last moment she tilted her head slightly and acknowledged Prudence’s presence.

Not to be outdone, Prudence curled her lips into a semblance of a smile and curtsied. “Pleased to meet you, my lady.”

She turned and touched Rowena’s shoulder. “I am going to go see to Victoria. She’s sure to be chilled and in need of a hot cup of tea.”

As Prudence left the room, she caught a look that the Countess directed at her before her lashes were quickly lowered. Unlike her husband, who looked at Prudence as if she were a worm, in a purely impersonal way, Lady Summerset looked at her with a malevolent expression in her blue eyes, and, it seemed to Prudence, it was very, very personal.

CHAPTER

SEVEN

“
I
t’s only been a week and Uncle Conrad just left for London. What was I supposed to have accomplished in a week?” Rowena consciously kept her tone light, but she could feel herself losing patience. Victoria kept hounding her about Prudence, about going home, about the house,
about everything,
and she didn’t know what she expected her to do about any of it.

“But you haven’t done anything!” Victoria stood in the middle of her bedroom with her hands on her hips. “It is
intolerable
that Prudence sleep in the attic, that she has to wear that horrid uniform, and that she isn’t allowed to read in the library! I have to
sneak
her books!”

Victoria’s eyes flashed and a feverish color stained her cheeks. Rowena was afraid she was going to work herself into another episode.

“I don’t know what to do about it right now. Remember, we just buried our father! Now is not the time to throw fits! Would you please calm down?”

“I know we just buried our father! I also know
he
would have never stood for this. And I will not calm down until you tell me what you are planning to do about it.”

The fact that she had no plan only made Victoria angrier. Rowena knew Prudence was miserable. She knew it was her fault. But she couldn’t just defy her uncle. Every time she tried to bring it up, he would become taciturn and grim and she would back down.

And hate herself for it.

Victoria kept on, rubbing salt in the wound. “You don’t have an answer for that, do you? You’re doing the same thing you always do—wait for someone else to make your decisions for you.” She sat abruptly on the bed and crossed her arms.

For the first time in her life, Rowena wanted to slap her little sister. She kept her voice controlled with great effort. “I’m not even going to dignify that with an answer. I’m going to go riding so I can think without someone haranguing me.”

Prudence came into the room, her green eyes wide. “What is going on? I could hear you out in the hall.”

Seeing Prudence just made her feel guiltier. “Fetch my riding habit. I’m going out.”

The hurt in Prudence’s eyes made her cringe. She hadn’t meant . . . Oh, forget it. Shamefaced, but unable to back down, Rowena marched into the bathroom, her eyes smarting with unshed tears.

*   *   *

The wind coming over the hills whipped through the netting covering Rowena’s face, but she didn’t care. Her lips were becoming chapped and her cheeks stung, but those discomforts didn’t even come close to the tangled emotions inside.

Why did all this have to fall into her lap? When did she become responsible for everything?

When her father died.

Rowena turned her horse toward the Buxton family cemetery. Carefully keeping her mount to the perfectly groomed walkways, she read the names of the Buxton women who had either lived at or resided over Summerset. She paused at her mother’s grave and tears filled her eyes. She only had hazy memories of the small, golden-haired woman who had been confined to a bed for a good portion of Rowena’s life, but she would never forget the love shining from her eyes or the sweet smile that lit up her face whenever Prudence’s mother set baby Rowena on the bed.

Next to her mother’s grave was a statue of a cherub. Halpernia’s grave. Halpernia, the change-of-life baby who died at three years old the year Rowena was born. Whose death so affected everyone in her family that they refused to speak of her at all, as if she’d never existed.

Rowena looked past the gravestones and toward the berm where her father was interred. The pain hit her low in her center and she turned away. What had she been thinking to expose herself to such pain? She urged her mount into a cantor, taking a dirt track up over Briar Hill. Keeping her horse to a leisurely pace, she skirted hedges, outcroppings of rock, and dense thickets of flaming red thimbleberries. She loved riding. She rode in London, of course, but riding sedately in Hyde Park could not come close to riding through the forest and fields of Suffolk’s countryside.

Once she reached the top of the hill, she slowed to a walk and followed the ridge overlooking the valley below. The town of Summerset lay nestled between the hills and the River Lark. The town had grown quite a bit since she was a child. Back then, it had been an agricultural town providing goods and services to the estates surrounding it. Now it boasted its own glove factory, which provided much-needed employment, a leather processing plant, several blocks of shops, and even a mechanic’s garage.

Suddenly she became aware of a low buzzing noise behind her. The noise grew louder and she turned in her saddle to see what it was. It sounded much like a motorcar but louder and coming from somewhere above her. Her horse spooked and she turned her attention to controlling her mount. Out of nowhere, an aeroplane flew above her so close, the wind of it tugged at her hat and flattened the dried grasses. Her horse leapt in terror and ran about a hundred yards before she was able to stop it.

She’d seen aeroplanes before, of course, but none so perilously close to the ground. The engine spit and sputtered. Rowena watched in horror as the wing hit a tree and the body careened sideways before landing in a mangled heap of canvas, wood, and metal halfway down the side of the peak.

She stared at the wreck in a state of shock for a moment before urging her still trembling horse carefully down the hill. She was only halfway there when her horse stopped and refused to go any farther. He blew and snorted in protest as she dismounted and wrapped his reins around a tree branch.

The brush and rocks tore at her skirt, making it difficult to walk. She gathered her riding skirt more tightly in her hand and made her way downward. She could hear her own heart beating in her ears as she drew closer, afraid of what she was going to find.

As she neared the main part of the aeroplane she could see part of a man’s arm poking out from underneath the wing.

“Oh, God, please let it be attached to the rest of him,” she prayed out loud.

She grabbed the edge of the wing and pushed it up enough so that she could see the rest of the body the arm belonged to. It was a young man, that much she knew, but his features were obscured by a leather hood and goggles.

He wasn’t moving.

By pulling and tugging, she managed to drag him out from under the wing. She pushed his goggles up on his head and then leaned down to see whether he was still breathing. Once she ascertained that he was, she checked the rest of his body to see whether he was bleeding, but apart from a small gash on the side of his head, he seemed to be intact. More worrisome was the red and blue knot swelling above his right eye.

She took off her riding jacket and rolled it up, placing it underneath his head. Then she sat back on her heels, cursing herself for not knowing how to help more.

He moaned and she looked anxiously for signs that he was waking up. Though his eyelids fluttered, they didn’t open and she wondered what she should do next. Obviously he needed help, but she didn’t want to leave him. Perhaps someone else had seen the crash and would come looking for him. Or maybe someone was waiting for him to come back and would sound an alarm.

He moaned again and she took his hand. “Hush, now. Everything will be all right,” she told him softly. She took care not to disturb him as she settled herself beside him and searched desperately for some indication of what do to next.

The pilot looked no older than herself. Red-gold strands of hair escaped from under his leather hood, which meant he wore it as long as aesthetes do. Though none of the aesthetes she knew would be interested in piloting a plane. They were more interested in writing poetry and contemplating art. His lips were thin but well formed, and his jawline square and strong. She wondered what kind of a daredevil he would have to be to fly one of these newfangled aeroplanes into the wide blue sky. She wondered what it would feel like to be untethered from the earth.

A groan came from his lips and his eyes fluttered open. They were a clear blue against his windburned face. He looked around, confused, before his eyes focused on her.

He blinked, but his eyes never left hers. “You’re not Douglas.”

His voice was thready and weak. She shook her head. “No. I’m not.”

His eyes searched her face. “You must be my guardian angel. You have no idea how much I need a guardian angel right now. Please don’t leave me, all right?”

Rowena’s breath caught as his hand searched for hers. She slipped her hand into his and he gripped it as if he would never let it go. Their palms melded and their fingers curled together so naturally, as if this was the hand hers had been waiting for.

He broke eye contact with her and she felt a sudden emptiness in her chest, as if she had just lost something of great value. He glanced around without moving his head, and Rowena had a feeling he had taken in everything, the trees, the bits of broken plane, and the waning light, in the seconds before his eyes swept back to her. She wondered how his head felt. He seemed very careful not to move it.

“Where am I?” he asked.

“Near Briar Hill.”

He nodded and then winced.

She bent closer in panic. “Oh, no. Please. I don’t think you should move.”

His lips twitched. “Then you expect to spend the night out here?”

She looked around. Unless someone knew where to look for them, they wouldn’t be found. “Surely someone will come looking for you.”

He nodded and then grimaced at the movement. “Yes. How about you?”

She thought a moment. Yes. They would start to look for her, but not until dark. She wondered whether Victoria would feel bad about their quarrel if she didn’t come home. “Eventually.”

His eyes glanced over her and she felt her skin grow warm. “Eventually,” he murmured.

Then his eyes fluttered shut. Rowena leaned closer, wondering what she should do. “Are you going to be all right?”

His eyes opened again, and the blue of the heavens was a mere inches from her face. “I’ll be fine.” They drifted shut and then he murmured, “Just don’t leave me.?”

She gave the hand she still held a squeeze to reassure him and then on impulse leaned forward and laid a soft kiss just above the bruise on his temple

His eyes widened and seemed to glow as he looked at her for just a moment before he drifted off again. She wondered what she would do if no one came after them. Surely it wouldn’t do him any good to freeze here with him all night? If it started to rain, they would be in very real danger from the cold. She sat with him, feeling utterly helpless, for perhaps an hour or so—long enough that the thin autumn sun had dipped down over the horizon. She was just making up her mind to break her promise and go for help when she heard someone above them.

“Hello?” a voice called. “Are you all right?”

She stood, staggering a little from having been in one position for so long. “We’re down here! The pilot is unconscious.”

A crashing of brambles, along with muttered curses, told her that someone was coming down the hill and none too gracefully. In a moment, one of the largest men she’d ever seen came crashing out of the woods. He wore a leather flight jacket and matching boots with laces. Under his cap, his hair shone a brilliant shade of red. The man’s eyes widened when he saw her, then he came and knelt beside her with effort. “Is the lad still alive?”

His accent told her that he came from up north, maybe even Scotland. “Yes, but he’s been in and out of consciousness. I had no way of getting him up the hill, so I just stayed with him.”

He put his hand on the pilot’s face and then on his forehead. “We shouldn’t move him. We have no way of knowing if his insides are hurt, but it won’t do him any good to leave him like this.”

He frowned. “Was that your animal tied to the tree?”

She nodded.

“Do you think you can get him down here?”

“I can try. He’s sure-footed, but the crash spooked him.”

“If you can, we can toss him over the animal’s back and get him up to my motorcar.”

She nodded and headed up the hill. The woods were darker now that the sun had almost set and it was rough going. Her horse was exactly as she left it, the sweat from their run dried along his neck and withers. He nickered when he saw her and she patted his nose. “There’ll be an extra ration for you tonight, boy.”

She led him down carefully, but the horse was more surefooted than she was and they made better time on their way back.

The pilot still hadn’t awakened when she returned, and the big man stood over him, worry written on his face. “I don’t like this. I don’t like this at all. He should have come to by now . . .”

He was awake before, she thought, worry shooting through her. He musn’t die. She had no idea why it was so important that he live, but she wanted him to be all right with every fiber of her being. She held the horse still while the man picked the pilot up as if he were a boy. The pilot moaned.

“Damn it, Douglas, you’re going to be the death of me,” the young man muttered, and the big man grinned, relief evident on his face.