Mr. Gardiner and the Governess - Sally Britton Page 0,1

an unattractive and severe twist. The ash-blonde curls that escaped the strict style might have framed her face prettily, if not for the spectacles.

“Miss Sharpe.” The dowager duchess spoke, and Alice raised her eyes enough to acknowledge the salutation. “We have decided to take you on at the rate of one-hundred pounds per annum should you adhere to the rules of the household and uphold your promises of education for Lady Isabelle and Lady Rosalind, and you will see after Lord James until he goes away to school this winter.”

Relief and dread mingled together in Alice’s heart. They would not turn her away, yet the weight of the new responsibility nearly made her sag to the floor. The Duke of Montfort had three daughters and two sons. Alice now stood responsible for the three youngest of his noble children, girls as likely to marry into royalty as they were to catch cold, and the younger son.

The eldest son, bearing the honorary title Earl of Farleigh, was not at home. Lady Josephine, the eldest daughter, had left the schoolroom years before.

Alice hardly said another word for the quarter of an hour that the dowager and the duchess laid out their expectations and rules for her. Her behavior was to be as firmly controlled as the subjects she taught the girls, though the more she nodded and promised, the more Alice’s courage grew.

She had always been clever, and she had always enjoyed learning. Thanks to her need to adjust and fit into numerous households and families over the years, she knew herself to be personable as well.

I can do this, she told herself repeatedly during the last of the interview. When a maid came to show Alice to her room, Alice squared her shoulders like a good soldier and prepared for the first meeting with her charges.

Passing through the corridors of the castle, the maid rattled off which rooms they walked by and their purpose. The maid was well-acquainted with the house and had an air of superiority about herself that Society’s matrons would be hard-pressed to match.

Alice smiled to herself. She might not be a princess of any sort, but what girl hadn’t wished to live in a place as lovely as Clairvoir Castle? The libraries and gardens were the stuff of legend, the family with a history reaching back to their aid of William the Conqueror. Few women of Alice’s lower birth would ever walk the grounds, let alone have access to the house and family.

The opportunity thrilled her, as did finally having a purpose.

And yet.

Her gaze wandered to the wide windows of the ballroom as they passed its open door. For a moment, her breath hitched. Dreams of dancing in such a room with a handsome partner were a thing of the past. They had to be.

Governesses were not permitted any sort of courtship. They were almost non-entities.

Swallowing back the bleak thought, Alice gave her full attention to the maid once more. She clasped her hands before her, feeling her father’s ring on her thumb. Though it was beneath her glove, the ring’s presence comforted her.

The schoolroom would be her domain. The ballroom was better forgotten.

Chapter 2

Although most would think it strange to see a grown gentleman laying prostrate in the grass, Rupert Gardiner regularly put himself in exactly that position. At the moment, the majority of his body was pressed into the newly mown grasses of His Grace’s southern gardens.

With a sketchbook splayed open before him, Rupert made note of the colors he would need to render the object of his study in greater detail.

Once he had made the appropriate notations, Rupert slowly reached for the water-net he had repurposed for his work. Water-nets were primarily used to capture smaller creatures from stream beds, but with a little modification, they were perfect for catching insects such as the common blue damselfly in his sight.

Rupert hesitated, however, and considered the speed with which the damselfly normally darted through a garden. The net was likely his best chance at catching it, but he did have his net-forceps, too. Newly ordered from Paris, where the study of insects was more popular than in England, he had only used them on heartier species. Even though the pamphlet suggested the forceps were an excellent way to catch butterflies, he had yet to try them for that.

Better use the net, then.

First, he pushed his black hair out of his eyes. He ought to have it cut but forgot immediately about the issue the moment