my lord. Recently widowed and eager for the job. She’s worked as a housemaid for many years, and then as a housekeeper in a smaller household.”
“While married?” Winn asked. It wasn’t entirely unheard of, but it was unusual.
“Her husband was in the army, my lord, and they had no children,” the footman-turned-butler explained. “He died nigh on ten years past.”
“Right. Send for her. I’ll meet her tomorrow morning promptly at ten and we’ll decide from there whether or not she will suit.”
John Foster nodded vigorously. “Certainly, my lord. I’ll send her a note round now… then I’ll find the master list of the silver and compare it to what’s left behind so we can let the proper authorities know precisely what’s been taken.”
“I’m the proper authority, Foster. I may hire a runner but, for now, I just want to know what that bastard absconded with.”
“Yes, my lord.”
With that, Winn walked away, feeling marginally more in charge of his household. Or at least he did until he heard the shouting from the garden. Cursing under his breath, he took the shortest route outside and found the children hanging from tree limbs like monkeys. All of them so high up it made his heart leap straight to his throat and then drop back down into his stomach.
Rather than tell them to get down, he walked over, placed his hands on little Charlotte’s waist and lifted her down. Once her small feet were firmly on the ground, he went to Claudia and handed her down as well. William had already begun to climb down but was still high enough that he and Winn were eye to eye. “Your job, William, is to protect your sisters. If they are engaging in a behavior where they could be injured, you should try to stop them, not indulge in it yourself.”
“Claudia is the oldest!” he protested.
“So she is, and she should have known better, as well. But little Charlotte is only three years old,” he said.
“I’m six,” the little girl protested.
“You’re four,” Claudia corrected. “You’re four, William is seven and I’m ten. If you really cared for us, you’d be able to remember that!”
Winn sighed heavily. “It isn’t about caring, Claudia. It’s about walking into this garden and seeing the lot of you risking life and limb by doing the very thing you’d been expressly warned against. All of you are to go to your rooms and remain there until the dinner hour.”
“Fine,” Claudia said, and spun around, her skirts swishing about her shins as she marched into the house. It seemed females of every age had mastered the trick of making an exit.
Turning to little Charlotte, he saw her eyes welling with tears. Then her thumb popped out of her mouth and she began to wail. Loudly and enthusiastically. After only a moment, she turned and ran after her sister. William followed suit, stomping after them until Winn was alone in the garden.
Alone. It seemed that he was forever winding up alone to clean up the messes left by others. The fewer people he allowed in his world, the fewer people he would have to clean up after. Unsettled by the maudlin turn of his thoughts, Winn shook his head to clear it. He was tired. More than simply tired, in fact.
Exhausted beyond measure, infuriated by his brother, his former butler, his former governess, his housekeeper and even the children who were now upstairs plotting his downfall, he sank onto a nearby bench and put his head in his hands. He wanted to drink enough brandy that he wouldn’t be able to speak coherently for three days. But he wouldn’t. Because he couldn’t. Because like always, it was on his shoulders to be the responsible one, to be the one who cleaned up his brother’s messes. Damn, damn and double damn.
Chapter Two
“T hat is a very unorthodox solution. Typically speaking, we provide governesses in residence,” Miss Euphemia Darrow said. “Though, I daresay that under the circumstances, it is the best option for everyone involved.”
Calliope recalled the moment in the drawing room when the Earl of Montgomery had shaken her hand. It wasn’t the best option. Not in the least, but she couldn’t say that. Admitting to such wayward thoughts and feelings for a man she’d just met, a man who’d been interviewing her as a prospective employee as much as she’d been interviewing him as a prospective employer, well—it was hardly the sort of thing one admitted to their mentor and idol. What on earth