Netherby Halls (11 page)

His affairs were always with widows, married women
who knew how to please and had ‘understandings’ with their
husbands, and occasionally serving wenches who also knew the game.
That was the way of it—no complications.

But this one, this Miss Sassy Winthrop, drove his
rules into the ground and buried them. He couldn’t think when he
was near her. All he could do was
feel.

He remembered the overpowering sensation he had felt
seeing her in close conversation with Dr. Bankes. Jealousy and
something else.

Netherby was not what it seemed, and part of his
reason for bringing Percy to Delleson was to become acquainted with
Netherby and what it offered in the dark.

One of the things he had already discovered was the
rumor that Miss Sallstone and Dr. Bankes were lovers. In and of
itself, that meant nothing to the marquis, but now, with Sassy in
the picture, it meant all too much.

He should go out. The local tavern was a short walk,
and the serving girls were pliable, but there was only one woman
occupying his thoughts, one woman his cock pulsated for, and at the
moment no other would do. He shook his head. He was in
a
damnable situation
!

* * *

Sunday morning glowed through half of Sassy’s window,
as she had completed one hanging of the soft green material the
night before.

With a stretch and a squeak, she pushed the covers
away and hunched herself up on her elbows. A yawn forced itself out
of her mouth, and she shook off her sleepiness as she faced the
coolness of her room and made ready to bathe.

She then saw the wall clock and exclaimed out loud,
“Goodness! Seven-thirty? I have slept right through services!”

Miss Graves had informed her in an offhand manner
that they were spared the necessity of trudging with the girls to
the town chapel because a kindly parson, known as a ‘field
minister’, traveled from Bath and volunteered his services every
Sunday morning promptly at six-thirty, before continuing on the
open road to the open fields to offer service for the poor who had
no easy way to get to church.

Sassy scrambled about her room, poured cold water
into her bowl, and shivered as she washed up before throwing on her
undergarments. It was Sunday, and she chose one of her better
gowns, a peacock-blue velvet trimmed around the low scooped
neckline with cream-colored lace. The gown was high-waisted and
long-sleeved. The skirt fell in a straight line to the scalloped
hem at her ankles.

She brushed her long hair and tied it back with a
ribbon, allowing wisps of curls to trim her forehead and ears.

She managed the few buttons at her back and with a
harried exclamation peeped out of her door in the hope of finding a
stray girl about. She was in luck; Molly was coming up the stairs
with an armful of sheets.

“Molly, thank goodness you are here! I am having a
frightful time with these back buttons—would you mind
terribly?”

“Oh, Miss, how grand you look! Oh, but you should
always wear colors. What a shame that you are hidden here at
Netherby.” Molly sighed as she put down her load on a wall table
and buttoned Sassy’s gown.

Sassy laughed and said, “Molly, your father mentioned
that you were enjoying lessons with Miss Saunders before she left,
and I thought, if you liked, we—you and I—could continue those
lessons.”

Molly’s face lit up. “Ye don’t have to do that.”

“I know, so that proves it, doesn’t it? That I want
to.” Sassy touched the girl’s shoulder. “We could start this
evening, after dinner.”

“Oh thankee, Miss, but she won’t like it if she hears
of it.”

“Well, my time is my own, isn’t it?” Sassy smiled at
her, hesitated, and finally made up her mind to ask, “Molly, did
Miss Saunders have drapes?”

Molly’s face went stern. “Papa says I am not to go on
about her, and I don’t want to cause him trouble, which is what he
says my mouth will bring him if I don’t stop going on about Miss
Saunders.”

“Rest assured that what you tell me will be
confidential, but why should a question about drapes elicit all
this mystery?”

“’Tis not so simple as it seems, Miss, as you will
soon hear,” Molly whispered after looking over her shoulder. “It
took Miss Saunders the better part of a month to save up and buy
some fine pink cloth—real pretty it was. Bought it the day she
vanished, in fact.”

“How do you know this?” Sassy felt a cold chill
wiggle up her spine.

“She showed the cloth to me. I even offered to help
her make them up, but she wouldn’t have it. Said I worked hard
enough around here already. Does that sound like she was planning
to run off?”

“No, it doesn’t, and what happened to the
fabric?”

“Well …” Molly hesitated.

“Good gracious, Molly! Well what? Do you think she
has come to some harm?”

“I will tell ye this—something had Miss Saunders
spooked. She wouldn’t speak of it. I asked her if something was
wrong, and she told me not to worry my young head over it and would
say no more.”

“Then maybe her trouble called her away, and she took
the cloth with her?”

“No, Miss Winthrop, so I’ll tell ye that in the end I
made her give me the fabric. I did and told her I would work on
them. She would not have let me do that if she meant to leave, I
just know it.”

Sassy frowned. “I shall have to give this some
thought, but for now, I must rush if I am to make it for the
service in town.”

“That be at nine, Miss, and Mistress Sallstone drives
there in her carriage. She won’t like having to take you up, but
there ain’t any way she can refuse you a ride if you was to ask
her,” Molly said, smiling impishly.

“I think I would rather walk,” Sassy said and smiled
back at the girl ruefully.

Molly chuckled. “She’d like that even less. Why, what
a figure she would cut, letting one of her teachers walk all the
way to parish while she drove in comfort?” Molly shook her head.
“Neither one of ye will enjoy it, but there it is.”

Molly had told Sassy that the headmistress was in her
office. Sucking in air and picking up her blue redingote and chip
bonnet, she went and knocked firmly at Miss Sallstone’s office
door.

“Y-es?” Miss Sallstone called out irritably.

Disheartened, Sassy’s shoulders drooped at the
thought of having to endure even a twenty-minute ride beside the
woman. She identified herself, and a moment later, Miss Sallstone
appeared before her looking somewhat haggard. She wore an ensemble
of brown and yellow, complete with a dark brown velvet bonnet
trimmed with enormous yellow flowers and a yellow bird.

Sassy could not help the blink but restrained the
giggle as Miss Sallstone said, “Miss Winthrop, what is it you
wish?”

“I am so very sorry to inconvenience you, ma’am, but
I have missed the school chapel service and was hopeful of
accompanying you to the parish church, which I am told you attend
every Sunday.”

The headmistress’s eyes narrowed, but she managed an
insincere smile. “Ah, I see. Well, I suppose I have no choice, do
I? However, I should like to caution you that this is not something
I shall look on with compliance in the future.”

“Thank you, ma’am,” said Sassy dryly. “It is
something I shall try to avoid, I do assure you.”

The angle to which Miss Sallstone put up her chin
told Sassy that her meaning was not lost on the headmistress. “Come
along then, Miss Winthrop … don’t dawdle.”

Sassy neither dawdled or hurried but walked at a
decorous pace some ten feet behind the headmistress until they
reached the front courtyard, where a small and well-sprung, if
somewhat dated, carriage awaited them.

An elderly groom held the door of the carriage open
wide, and Sassy followed the headmistress into the carriage and sat
opposite her.

Facing Miss Sallstone was not something Sassy
relished, but the knowledge that the headmistress was just as
uncomfortable made her sense of humor tickle her sense of the
ridiculous.

They rode in silence until Miss Sallstone picked an
imaginary speck off her skirt and said, “Dr. Bankes advises me that
you have already made some very notable acquaintances in the
vicinity.”

“Oh?” Sassy returned, careful to maintain a
non-committed tone and expression.

“Now, what sort of reply is ‘oh’, Miss Winthrop?”

“Simply the sort of reply your statement required,
ma’am,” Sassy said quietly.

“It wasn’t a statement, it was a question,” Miss
Sallstone returned, frowning.

“I mistook it for a statement.”

“For the love of—you are the most exasperating young
woman, Miss Winthrop. Are you deliberately avoiding the
question?”

“Of course not, ma’am. I hadn’t realized you were
questioning Dr. Bankes’s word.”

“I was not!” the headmistress returned, a scratch
away from a shout. “I was merely …” She took a deep breath and
calmed herself with obvious restraint. “I was merely trying to make
idle conversation with you, as you must admit having made a
conquest of the Marquis of Dartmour is a topic of
conversation.”

“Conquest?” Sassy shrugged her shoulders with a short
laugh. “Fustian! Oh, do excuse me, ma’am, but really! The marquis
is not the sort one makes a conquest of. He is far too hardened a
flirt.”

“The doctor seemed to think the marquis looked as
though he were interested in you.”

“Did he? Things are rarely what they appear,” said
Sassy.

They sat in busy-minded silence, and Sassy felt as
though the air they shared were peppered and difficult to swallow.
At long last, their driver pulled up to the church.

Sassy alighted after Miss Sallstone was helped out of
the coach by the driver, and no sooner had her dark boots touched
the sandy earth than a musical voice brought both their heads
around to Miss Delleson’s pink and white prettiness.

“Miss Winthrop—how delightful. Oh, Percy, do look who
is here,” Sophia Delleson said, taking up Sassy’s gloved hands in
her own and squeezing them as though they had been friends
forever.

Mr. Lutterel tipped his hat, and although Sassy
smiled a welcome, she found her gaze shifting past him in search of
a certain marquis.

What sounded like a very unladylike, albeit very
quiet, oath brought Sassy’s attention back to the woman at her
side. Miss Sallstone’s face was a storm of emotions, and Sassy
would have at that point introduced her to Miss Delleson had she
not turned on her heels and stomped off towards the church’s open
doors.

“Miss Winthrop, allow me to introduce you to Lord
Grey,” Sophia continued, drawing forward a young man whom Sassy
judged to be no more than twenty years of age though he looked
fifteen.

Lord Grey swept Sassy an exaggerated bow, both
practiced and overdone, but as he came up from this, he looked
towards Sophia and saw that not only had she placed her gloved hand
on Percy’s arm, but that her twinkling eyes were looking up at
Percy’s face. He sought to repair that situation and thrust himself
with some force between the couple.

This struck Sassy as so comical it was all she could
do to stifle the giggles that rose to her throat. It was at that
moment her eyes found the marquis’s blue and laughing orbs. They
exchanged a ‘look’ and silently laughed together.

“Miss Winthrop.” Sophia escaped both suitors, took
Sassy’s arm, and sighed. “What is your given name, for it is
nonsense for us to continue to be formal when I know we shall be
great friends.”

“Shall we?” Sassy teased.

“Yes, for I know I was horrid to you yesterday early
on, but I was in a terrible mood, and you are not the sort to hold
a grudge. You must call me Sophy, what shall I call you?”

Sassy smiled and said her name softly, careful to
avoid the marquis’s penetrating gaze.

“Sassy? What is that for?”

“Sassandra.”

“Why—how divine, and how wretchedly jealous I am, for
how can my insipid name compare to such as that?” she complained,
half in earnest.

“Sophia is a lovely name,” Percy said at once and
most sincerely as he came to take his place beside her once
more.

Not to be outdone, Lord Grey jumped to the occasion.
“Exquisite name, Sophia—soft and bubbling.”

“Oh mush!” Percy exclaimed. “Must you go on so,
puppy?”

“I thought his compliment extremely gratifying,
Percy, and do not appreciate you referring to my being called soft
and bubbling as mush!” the lady in question complained with a
pout.

Again, Sassy’s eyes found the marquis’s blue one, and
again amusement was shared. What was she going to do?
He was
the man of her dreams. She knew that, for whatever reasons, he had
been chosen by her inner magic to be her mate. Would he feel the
same about her? She was so completely mesmerized by him, but was it
real?

Suddenly Sophy took Sassy’s arm and pulled her aside.
“Come, Sassy, let us leave these awful men and sit comfortably
together.”

Sassy allowed herself to be guided down the aisle
until they arrived at an empty pew. Sophie pulled at her sleeve and
said, “Here.”

It seemed an age, but at last the sermon, which Sassy
thought dull and uninspired, so very different than her father’s
sermons, was at end and the congregation began filing outdoors.

During the long monotone Sassy could not stop
thinking about her father and how much she missed him. Unbidden, a
tear formed and fell, and for one moment, Sassy’s composure was
threatened.

She felt alone, so totally alone. Feeling thusly, she
inched away from Sophia, who had become involved in the bantering
between her two admirers at her back.

“Miss Winthrop.” His voice was low, deep and
concerned, as he took a seat beside her.

When she turned her face to him without thinking, he
frowned and said, “Why, Miss Winthrop, it is as I suspected, for I
could not help but note that something was amiss.”