A Fine Gentleman Page 6

  She’d traded her ability to trust and the right to be trusted for her family’s well-being only to lose them in the end.

  “Papá is not coming back, is he, Mariposa?” They’d been in France a year when Santiago had asked her that question.

  “No, he is not.” She’d managed the reply with matter-of-fact steadiness, though her heart had broken, realizing the little boy had lost another piece of his childlike innocence. She had tried to shield him as much as possible.

  She’d wrapped her arm around his shoulder as they’d sat side by side watching the sun set over the French countryside—a rare moment of peace in their war-shattered lives.

  “Papá didn’t forget me,” Santiago had said. “Everyone else does.”

  Abuela had still been very absentminded at that point, Mamá debilitatingly so.

  “I will not ever forget. That is a most solemn pledge.”

  Not a single day passed without her thoughts turning to Santiago. Thoughts of him and Mamá pushed her onward in this increasingly frustrating search. Concern for him kept her from making her efforts known, despite the dishonesty required to do so.

  She had not forgotten her beloved brother, and she would never stop searching for him.

  Chapter Eight

  Jason enjoyed the occasional jaunt through Hyde Park but only ever in the earlier hours of morning when hardly a soul was about and London was as close as it ever came to being quiet. The vendors setting up their carts and the street sweeps beginning their day’s work took little note of him. He could allow himself a measure of lightness unbefitting a barrister in his office or speaking before the court. He even whistled a tune now and then. During those early walks, the tension he carried with him the rest of the day eased and lessened. He felt more like the carefree boy he’d once been, indulging in larks with his brothers and getting into mischief at Lampton Park. Though those years were far behind him now, he needed the reminder once in a while. He needed that brief taste of home.

  But even a second chorus of “Early One Morning” did not ease his thoughts today, filled as they were with his father’s words: “If I ever hear you’ve mistreated a lady, young or otherwise, I’ll box your ears until you cry like a little girl.”

  He had said that to each of Jason’s brothers in turn every time they’d left home for school or to spend a short holiday at the home of a friend or relative. Father had never permitted any unkindness toward a female, be that treatment deserved or otherwise. He would have entirely disapproved of Jason’s final encounter with Miss Mariposa Thornton.

  Jason felt heartily ashamed of himself over it. He had clearly seen her embarrassment at the implication of his words. Why he’d said such an unfeeling thing, he couldn’t say, except that she frustrated him excessively. He knew she was baiting him, playing him for a fool, but he didn’t know why. She seemed to have no qualms about humiliating him. But, he scolded himself once more, that did not give him leave to belittle her.

  He maneuvered around two older women shuffling their way down the park path and paused just long enough to tip his hat to them. He continued on, his thoughts still on Miss Thornton.

  The sight of a small flower vendor attempting to wave off a very determined terrier captured his attention almost immediately.

  “These aren’t yours,” the young boy kept telling the tenacious pup. “Off with you.”

  The dog’s tail wagged with unmistakable excitement, as if his nemesis were actually encouraging him. Jason shouldn’t have chuckled, but he couldn’t help himself.

  The poor beleaguered boy turned pleading eyes on him. “He’ll not leave the flowers be, sir. I’ll have nothin’ to sell.”

  He attempted to summon the little dog with a whistle. The animal looked at him but did not give up his quarry.

  “Off with you, dog.” The boy’s command emerged too desperate and overwhelmed to be truly effective.

  Jason scooped the mutt into his arms. “You seem to have found the only dog in all of London who likes flowers more than foxes.”

  “Not too bright, is ’e?” Some of the boy’s worry had fled.

  Jason turned the dog enough to look it in the eye. “Is that true, you troublemaker? Are you not too bright?”

  The flower boy smiled as he quickly began lifting his flowers onto the waiting cart. “I usually get m’ flowers on the cart before he can get to ’em. I was too slow this morning.”

  “What is your name?” Jason asked.

  “Benny,” he said, carefully straightening his flowers.

  Jason addressed the dog again. “Benny is a man of business with a right to his inventory. You stop tormenting him.” The dog responded by licking his face.

  Benny laughed. “You’re talking to a dog, sir.”

  “Have you never talked to a dog?”

  “Yes, but I’m a li’l boy.”

  Jason chuckled. “I was a little boy once too, you realize.”

  “Did you talk to dogs then too?”

  He nodded as he set the troublesome mutt on its paws once more. “My brothers and I did a great many silly things.”

  “Do you still?”

  No. No, they didn’t. He didn’t spend a great deal of time with his family now that they were mostly all grown. Their days of laughter and larks were far behind them. At times he deeply regretted that. But his professional reputation, his attempts to counteract Philip’s embarrassment to the family name required solemnity and unfailing dignity. Only during these early mornings did he allow himself any indulgence in frivolity.

  “I’ll take a posy,” he said to Benny, slipping his fingers into the small pocket of his waistcoat where he had a few coins.

  “Thank you, sir.”

  He nodded, paying for the handful of violets. “Best of luck with your flower dog.”

  Benny dipped his hat, and Jason did the same. He added the boy to his mental list of street children he meant to keep an eye out for.

  “Buy an eel pie, sir?” a cockney voice asked from somewhere near his elbow.

  Jason turned in that direction. A young girl, likely not more than nine or ten years old, her clothes little better than rags, her face dirty and her hair disheveled, watched him with heartbreaking hopefulness. She held a pie up for his inspection, though he was a bit too distracted by the filthiness of the hand in which she held it to take much notice of the offering itself.

  “Only a ha’penny, sir. It’d be a fine bite for you, guv’nuh.” Her eyes pleaded with him. “A ha’penny.”

  He had intended to buy the pie even before she’d begun begging. The street vendors could sometimes be very pushy, almost threatening. Everything about this poor child spoke of desperation. Her circumstances were clearly far worse than her flower-selling counterpart.

  “How many pies do you have in your basket, child?”

  She peeked into it. “Six, sir.”

  “I’ll take them all.”

  Her eyes pulled wide. “Truly, sir? You’re not funnin’ me?”

  “Not at all.”

  “It’ll come to three pennies, sir.” So much doubt still filled her expression, as if she felt nearly certain he’d change his mind once he knew the total. “Do you still wan’ ’em?”

  He nodded firmly.

  “I could wrap them up in paper for you.”

  “That would be fine.” He didn’t intend to eat them either way. Too many vendors sold items that left a person ill for days on end.

  The girl dropped to her knees and meticulously wrapped up her six questionable pies. “If you’re one to be walkin’ about here often, I sell my pies every morning, sir. And sometimes I make oyster jellies too, if’n you’re liking that more.”

  She had determination, he would give her that. And if she could make a living at selling her foodstuffs, she’d not need to begin selling herself, a fate that awaited far too many girls
and women in London.

  “What is your name?” He asked that question a lot during his morning walks.

  “Fanny Smith.”

  “Do you like to cook, Fanny?” he asked as she wrapped up another pie.

  She nodded emphatically. “And I’m good at it, or I’m trying to be at least. Someday I want to own a cart to sell from. Customers buy more from carts, thinkin’ it’s better food.”

  She had an eye for bettering her situation as well. He liked that. “If you could cook in a pub or an inn or a great house, would you prefer that? Or is your dream truly to have a vendor’s cart?”

  She looked up at him through her loose strands of brown hair. “I could never work in a great house. I don’t talk proper like.”

  Then that was where her ambitions truly lay. “Refined speech isn’t necessary in the kitchens, at least not when one is beginning. By the time a girl like yourself reached the level of a cook, she’d likely have learned to speak more properly.”

  She sighed as she finished wrapping the last pie. “It’s all just smoke though, ain’t it? I’d never find a position like that, no how.”

  “Are you willing to work?” he asked.

  “I ain’t never been afraid to work, sir.”

  Precisely what he’d hoped to hear. He pulled from his case one of his calling cards. “I want you to deliver those pies to Lampton House.” He explained to her how to find it. “And bring this card with you.” He handed it to her. “Ring at the servants’ entrance and tell them I am requesting they give you a chance to prove your worth in the kitchens.”

  “No trickery, sir?”

  “No trickery. This is my brother’s home. He and his wife treat their servants well. If you work hard and prove your worth, you might just manage to have a job cooking in a fine house someday.”

  “Oh, sir!” The girl was fairly shaking.

  “I mean to ask Cook how you’re getting on,” he told her. “I hope to hear good things.”

  “Oh, sir. Thank you, sir.”

  He didn’t at all expect she would be anything but a welcome addition to the household. Fanny would not be the first street imp he’d sent to Lampton House, though there hadn’t been a great many. He now and then crossed paths with children like this Fanny Smith or Benny with his flower cart, children who hadn’t yet been destroyed by the harsh realities of life on London’s streets, who had dreams and a willingness to see them through.

  Cook and Mrs. Jeffers, the housekeeper at Lampton House, knew Jason well enough to accept this oddity in him. He couldn’t save every child in London, but he could help some. And he meant to do just that.

  Fanny actually ran from the park toward Lampton House, her basket of newly wrapped eel pies swinging on her arm. He felt certain she would be a good addition to the household, but adding a new body to the kitchen would cause at least temporary upheaval.

  “I should probably send Cook a handful of daisies in apology.”

  “Daisies are more of a ‘good day to you’ flower. Violets make better apologies.”

  He didn’t have to turn around to know who spoke. Miss Thornton’s accent, though subtle, didn’t precisely blend in amongst the crowds of London.

  He looked over his shoulder at her. “Violets?” he asked.

  She nodded, her sincerity punctuated by the unmistakable amusement in her eyes.

  He turned fully. “Such as these?” He indicated the violets he had purchased from the flower vendor only a few minutes earlier.

  “Precisely like those, though I do not think Cook will be overly upset with you.”

  A kind word from Miss Thornton? That was entirely unprecedented. “You must believe she has a high opinion of me.”

  Miss Thornton waved the idea away. “She will be pleased with Fanny. The girl is here every morning. I’ve eaten dozens of her eel pies.”

  “Dozens?” He widened his eyes as if in shock. “And you’re still alive?”

  She smiled. “You are in a pleasant mood this morning, Señor Jonquil.”

  “I am in a pleasant mood most mornings.”

  Miss Thornton made a sound of pondering. “You are good to give little Fanny a job, señor.”

  Jason shook his head. “I’ve given her an opportunity. What she makes of it depends on her.”

  “Sí. But most would not do even this for someone small and unimportant.”

  “No one is unimportant.”

  The smile she gave him in return was bright and filled with approval. Though he’d not gone in search of her good opinion, he found himself warmed by the thought that he might have secured a small piece of it.

  “You are very like him,” she said. “I had hoped you would be.” As usual, she spoke in riddles, not actually giving him any solid information.

  She once more wore that same vague expression she had during her visits to his office. He knew it was not genuine—the mask had slipped during that very conversation—yet he couldn’t say why she affected it.

  Reminders of her visits to his office brought firmly back to his thoughts the apology he yet owed her. He didn’t imagine it would ever be a comfortable undertaking. He might as well take care of that now. “Miss Thornton, before we go our separate ways, I wish to offer my apologies for the unintentional insult I offered you when last we met.”

  A deep blush immediately heated her face. She obviously remembered and had indeed caught the accidental slight to her character.

  “I apologize for what I said,” he continued. “I ought not to have allowed my temper to cloud my judgment.”

  Her dark brows angled downward, and her gaze studied him. Though his apology was sincere, it seemed the effort was proving insufficient.

  “And,” he added, “because I have it on excellent authority that violets are a crucial part of any expression of remorse”—he held the flowers out to her—“with my deepest regrets for speaking unkindly.”

  She accepted his offering with surprising graciousness for one who had shown herself to be dishonest and, at times, insulting. She had also interrupted what ought to have been a very peaceful and calming walk.

  He meant to reclaim his morning. “I bid you a good day, Miss Thornton.” He offered yet another quick bow.

  He took only two steps before stopping. She was alone in Hyde Park. He couldn’t simply leave her so utterly unprotected. While this was not the worst area of Town, he still couldn’t countenance a young lady being there on her own.

  He turned back, even as a sigh of frustration escaped him. “May I summon you a hired hack, Miss Thornton, to return you to your home? I cannot like the idea of you being here alone.”

  She smiled as unconcernedly as ever. “I am not alone.” She motioned behind herself. “Will is here.”

  Her enormous footman was, indeed, not too far away, keeping a close eye on everything. He could certainly look after her. But Jason knew his father would never have been satisfied with such a slight effort.

  “My offer yet stands. I would be happy to summon a hack. You are a good distance from your home.”

  She shrugged. “I crossed Spain and France on foot, señor. London will be”—she snapped her fingers—“no challenge for me.”

  And yet she was a challenge to him. “Well then. Once again, I bid you good day. Do send along any further information you can find about your father’s family.”

  “I will.”

  “But send it. Send.”

  She gave him a small wave. “Until we meet again, Señor Jonquil.”

  Meet again? He, for one, wasn’t holding his breath. She had shown herself to have a good heart—she’d been buying eel pies from Fanny for weeks, after all, and had not been unforgiving in the face of his insults—but she was also deceptive.

  Thank goodness he was headed to Corbin’s estate at the end of the week. Miss Thornton could continue wreaking
havoc on London. He would be safely tucked away in Nottinghamshire.

  o

  When Jason arrived at Havenworth, he found very nearly all of his family members there. Last he had heard, only he and his mother had been expected. Corbin would not be happy about the company. He was a quiet and withdrawn sort of person. He had been known to go days at a time without talking even to his closest family, and that was when they had all lived at home.

  “What has brought everyone to Corbin’s home?” Jason asked his brother Harold.

  In his characteristically pious tone, Harold said, “Mater did not wish to leave Charlie or Caroline at the Park, as both have been giving her difficulties of late.”

  “And you have come to . . .”

  “Spend a little time with my family,” Harold said. “We are not together often anymore.”

  That was quite true. With Stanley on the Continent, they were never all together. Even before their brother had returned to his regiment, the Jonquils had not been together in quite some time.

  They were all shown into the sitting room to await the arrival of their host. Jason took his customary spot at a tall window that overlooked a large stretch of lush grassland. It was his favorite prospect at Havenworth. His brother’s home was peaceful in a way few places were. Lampton Park was too full of memories of Father. Lampton House in London was Philip’s realm, and that alone made it a place of discomfort.

  Havenworth was one of the only things any of Jason’s brothers had that he truly envied. Not the estate, specifically, but the sense of contentment he saw in Corbin at having land of his own, doing what he loved, and being respected for it.

  Jason enjoyed the law, but it never seemed like enough. Philip certainly wasn’t impressed. Miss Thornton wasn’t. Would Father have been? At times, Jason wasn’t sure.

  Corbin arrived and looked as nervous in company as he always did. Poor Corbin. What must it be like, being uncomfortable even with one’s own family?

  Mater immediately launched into another of her recitations of their youngest brother’s many misdeeds. Charlie was going to be a handful. Jason sincerely hoped Philip was equal to the task. Father had been gone for ten years, and Charlie, unlike the rest of the brothers, hadn’t had the benefit of his wisdom during his most difficult growing-up years. Jason hadn’t been fatherless until he was fifteen years old.