I come home is entirely my own affair, Mr. Holmes. Your friendship with my family does not extend to playing the role of my keeper.” Apparently he offended her so greatly that she chose to abandon her earlier plan of remaining on the moor. She tucked the willow basket and her letter under her arm and strolled off, her bonnet bobbing against the middle of her back as she wound her way back to the village.
He chuckled ruefully. Whatever had that lad who jilted Becky been thinking? The fellow couldn’t be in his right mind. Paul gave Ciro his head and the beast responded with astonishing speed, carrying him over the moor and back toward home with grace and agility. He never really had to think when he was riding Ciro. The horse had such an uncanny sense of timing and pace. It gave a fellow time to think.
But what was there to think about? Becky Siddons wasn’t the only one to receive a horrible letter lately. He, too, had received a terrible missive only a week ago, from Italy. Juliana was dead of a fever. She had died alone. The blighter who carried her away from her family and from England was dead, too, of the same fever. But a few years before they both died, Juliana had borne a child. A child who was now his responsibility.
Juliana was dead. He said the words in his mind but they made no sense. Juliana had a child. Her name was Juliet. And she was his ward. He crammed the rising grief and panic back down his throat and shut the door against his own anguish. ’Twould be one thing if a fellow believed in God or Heaven. There might be some comfort in thinking about Juliana then, if he could believe she was in a better place. But while he wasn’t precisely an atheist, he’d taken no comfort from religion since Ruth Barclay, his fiancée, had passed away. After she died, the cold trickle of doubt had entered his soul.
So there it was. It was never good to dwell on pain. In fact, a fellow shouldn’t even feel any kind of sorrow. He must remain in control, master of all situations. He was the head of his family now. This was his duty. He must attend to anything that required his attention, and later he might have his reward—perhaps a trip to London would be in order. Duty first, then pleasure.
He turned his mind back to the problem at hand. Juliana was dead, and her daughter would be at Kellridge Hall in a matter of days. He had no time or resources to care for a child. His niece was being attended to by a servant, but who knew what kind of servant Juliana had hired abroad? No, she must have a proper English nursemaid. No one at Kellridge could assume that role easily; each servant’s duties were clearly delineated and none of them had time for children.
He could try to hire someone from the village, but that might incite gossip about Juliana and the circumstances of her daughter’s birth and her own demise.
Ciro gathered speed and strength as he tore through the open gate; yes, he knew what he was about. Those gates meant the barn was nearby. Paul quirked the corner of his mouth. Ciro understood his motto, too. Duty first, then pleasure.
The situation warranted someone who had a proper upbringing, who would raise a girl in a suitable manner until she was of age to be sent to school. Someone who wouldn’t gossip, who could be trusted to handle this with poise and tact.
Poise and tact. Just like any genteel young woman should possess.
A young woman like Rebecca Siddons.
Why not? She was aching to get away from the millinery shop. She could be Juliet’s nursemaid and later her governess. Their families were so close; Becky could be trusted not to gossip. And even if she had no experience with children of her own, raising a baby just came naturally to women. It was instinct, pure and simple. She was a romantic, dreamy little thing, but surely she would take to raising a baby as a duck took to water.
That was the answer. He would call upon her tomorrow and ask her.
“Oh, Becky, whatever have you done with the bonnet Mrs. Parker ordered?” Nan poked her head into the sitting room where Becky made use of the early morning sunlight streaming through the window. Such fine stitches needed a lot of good light, and this room was best lit at dawn. “I thought I told you—we cannot afford to use that fine muslin for the brim. We cannot turn a profit if you keep using such expensive materials. Why didn’t you use the cotton I ordered from town?”
Heated words bubbled to Becky’s lips and her fingers trembled as she laid another fine stitch in the fabric. She took a deep, calming breath. If she were to do this for the rest of her life, she must maintain control of her temper. “The cotton is too rough and slubby for a dress bonnet,” she argued. “I only used a small bit of the muslin, and with the ruching I added, I conserved quite a bit of fabric.” There, she showed that she had given cost some thought. That cotton was just so terribly ugly. Why Nan ever bought it was a mystery.
“But I specifically told you to use the cotton, Becky.” Nan strode into the sitting room and cast herself down on the settee. “Honestly, the profit we’ll see on that bonnet is quite slim. The more money we earn on each sale, the more secure our finances. Surely you see that.”
“I do understand,” Becky replied in an even tone. “But the more alluring our bonnets, the more clients we should attract. If we use inferior materials, then we will lose the kind of genteel clientele that will spend a fortune on our creations season after season.”
“Yes, but if our bonnets are affordable and well-made, we will garner loyalty from the villagers—the women who cannot afford something grand, perhaps, but may require a bonnet that is sturdy and hard-wearing. Those women are the bread and butter of our shop.” Nan leaned forward, her mild blue eyes wide and cajoling. “Come, now. Susannah left the shop to our care when she married Daniel. Isn’t it up to the pair of us to see to it that it becomes a successful venture?”
Well, when Nan put things that way...Becky was hard-pressed indeed to think of a retort. To buy some time, she concentrated on another stitch, pursing her lips tightly together as she did so. Of course she didn’t want to see the shop fail. But what was the harm in offering lovely bonnets as well as serviceable ones? “If we restrict ourselves to one kind of trade, surely we chance losing a portion of our customers,” she admonished in as gentle a tone as she could manage. “After all, it was the commissions of three gentlewomen who gave us our start, if you will recall.”
“I know.” Nan leaped from her position on the settee and began pacing, a nervous habit that wore on Becky’s nerves. “But honestly, a simpler style of bonnet is more easily made, and I can train our other helpers to make them quickly. The finer stuff must be left to the two of us, and already we’re stretched thin as it is. The profits we make are higher, and they sell more quickly. And the villagers pay more quickly than gentry. I really do feel most strongly that we should stop making fancy creations and concentrate on the plain and sensible.”
Becky heaved a deep sigh. Plain and sensible. There was little room for imagination and artistry in the plain and sensible, particularly if Nan kept buying such dreadful fabric. She would be chained, for the rest of her life, to stretching scratchy cotton across buckram frames. A vista of ugly, cheap bonnets unfolded before her, and her heart gave a lurch of revolt. True, she was stuck. A spinster forevermore with no hope of marriage to Lieutenant Walker. But did that mean she needed to relinquish any sense of beauty in her life?
“I’m going to see Susannah,” she declared, casting the bonnet to one side and rising from her chair. “She founded the shop. I’ll put my case to her.”
“I shall go too,” Nan rejoined. “After all, I have been seeing to it that the shop is a gainful venture since I took over.”
“Since
