The summons Lady Artemis Dearing dreaded had come at last.
Scooping up her small nephew, she pressed her lips to his silky hair, which was the same honey-golden shade as his late mother’s. If only she could absorb some of his innocent optimism and headstrong courage! She needed both, desperately.
Oblivious to his aunt’s distress, the child wriggled in her arms, chortling with the simple joy of being alive and loved. For an instant, his sunny spirits made Artemis forget her lingering grief and worries for the future.
With the tip of her little finger, she traced the shape of his mouth and his dimpled chin, which reminded her so keenly of her brother. It comforted her to know that part of her sister and brother lived on in this dear child. She must not fail him as she had failed them.
“Please, my lady,” said the housemaid who’d been sent to fetch Artemis, “the master wants you to come straightaway. He’ll only be in a worse humor if you keep him waiting.”
“Of course, Bessie.” The fragile bubble of happiness inside Artemis collapsed at the mention of Uncle Henry. Having waited fifty years with little hope of inheriting the Bramber title and estate, the new marquis seemed impatient to make up for lost time. “Can you watch Master Lee for me? I daren’t take him with me and if I leave him in his cot, he’ll only cry.”
Cry indeed. He would scream at the top of his sturdy little lungs. He was still too young to understand that such outbursts were unseemly. The last thing Artemis needed during her interview with her uncle was Lee’s piercing shrieks echoing through the decorous stillness of Bramberley.
“But, my lady…” Bessie backed away with a regretful grimace “…I’m that far behind with my work already. The master wants the State Apartments aired and dusted, floors scrubbed and windows washed. How am I to get that done on top of all my other duties when I’m being sent to run messages and pressed into service as a nursemaid?”
Artemis stifled a flicker of vexation. A few months ago, none of the servants would have dared refuse an order from the mistress of the house. Since her brother’s death, so much had changed at Bramberley…none of it for the better.
“Please, Bessie?” Artemis hated to stoop to bargaining, but she had no choice. “I will not be long, I promise. And once Lee is asleep tonight, I will come and help you scrub.”
“That wouldn’t be fitting, my lady!” The offer seemed to shock Bessie into agreement. “Very well, I’ll take him, but I reckon he’ll cry anyway, being away from you. You’ve got him well spoiled.”
Perhaps she did indulge the poor child, Artemis admitted privately, but how could she do otherwise for a tiny orphan everyone but she seemed to wish had never been born? How could she keep from clinging to the last person in the world she had left to love?
“If you take him down to the Green Gallery and let him walk from one chair to the next, he’ll never notice I’m gone.” Artemis gave the child a final kiss, then thrust him into Bessie’s arms. “Just keep a tight hold on his leading strings so he doesn’t fall.”
Brushing past Bessie, she rushed from the nursery. Lee was less likely to fuss if she left him quickly, while Uncle Henry was more apt to fuss if she kept him waiting.
Artemis arrived in the library out of breath with her heart racing. After taking a moment to compose herself, she knocked, then entered at her uncle’s bidding. As she crossed the threshold, she inhaled the dry, musty aroma of old parchment and leather. That smell revived heartening memories of her adored father.
Her two uncles sat in a pair of matched brocade armchairs. Artemis willed her knees not to tremble as she made a respectful curtsy. “You wished to see me, Uncle Henry?”
“I did, my dear.” The Marquis of Bramber pressed his long, thin fingers together and rested his chin upon them. “I have some very encouraging news to share. After the past year of bereavement and scandal, the Dearing family may soon put all that unpleasantness behind us.”
Wrenching as the events of the past year had been, Artemis did not want to put them behind her. That would be like turning her back on the memories of her brother and sister. Since she knew better than to contradict her uncle, she stood in composed silence, waiting for him