own, as well as their late father’s. She and Cynthia also had the same dark blonde hair and jawline—a legacy from their late mother. “I know we said to meet today, but if you’re busy getting ready for the trip—”
“I’ve time for you. I always do.” Jess stroked her hand down Cynthia’s cheek. “Besides, I’m leaving tomorrow, and if I’m to get everything ready before Lady Catherton and I leave, it’s got to be now. But do you mind if I pack whilst we talk?”
“Whilst?” Cynthia snorted. “Aye, now you’re talking like a toff, too. The Wiltshire’s gone from your voice.” Cynthia’s own words were spoken in the broad vowels of the West Country, the same accent Jess had heard and spoken most of her life.
“The more Wiltshire in my voice, the less I get paid.” Jess had listened closely to the way in which Lady Catherton and her friends conversed, and had spent many nights practicing talking to herself in the mirror, until only a hint of the West Country was left. “So . . . do you mind if I pack?”
“That’s our Jess,” her sister said with a fond smile. “Can’t do only one thing at a time.”
“There’s just so much to do.” After hugging her sister, Jess pulled her battered bag out from under her bed.
“Still reading the papers, too.” Cynthia held up one of the half-dozen newspapers that were spread across Jess’s bed. She peered at one sheet of newsprint. “Marking up the Money Market section, just like always.”
“Lady Catherton gets them from London. No need to sneak them from the public house like I did back home.” This was one of the advantages to working for a wealthy peer—access to daily newspapers that contained not only the latest goings-on politically and socially, but, most significantly for Jess, financially.
At the end of her day with Lady Catherton, after her employer had gone to bed, Jess would pore over the papers and dream of other things for herself and her family—bigger things.
She shook her head. Now was about staying a step ahead, not brooding over fantasies of what might be. She opened the minuscule clothespress that held her equally minuscule collection of garments, and deposited a stack of clean shifts into her bag.
“Soon,” Cynthia said in wonderment, “you’ll be living in Paris, and Berlin. Rome, too?”
“Possibly. Her ladyship said she wants to keep her dance card free to go wherever she pleases, whenever she pleases.”
“Ah, the excitement of it! You don’t seem glad about it, like.”
Jess paused in her packing. “I’d be more pleased if I knew I was leaving the business in a better state. If only she’d given me more notice about this plan to live abroad.” She clicked her tongue. “I’d have gotten McGale & McGale back on its feet.”
“You, me, and Fred are all trying to do that.” Cynthia’s reproof was gentle.
“But I’m the eldest,” Jess pointed out. “When Mother and Father passed, it fell to me to look after you and Fred. Me, to keep McGale & McGale going. And what a fine job I’ve done of it.” She threw up her hands.
“Firstly,” Cynthia said as she rose from the bed, “Fred and me weren’t in cradlehood when they died. It was but a year ago, and last I checked, we’d left our leading strings long behind us. So the burden’s all of ours. Secondly,” she continued, placing her hands on Jess’s shoulders, “you didn’t light that fire that turned a third of the farm to ash. None of us could have known of that disaster.”
Jess exhaled. Vivid memories of the blaze flashed, how she’d awakened with a sense of something profoundly wrong, and how out her bedroom window the flames had turned the night sky a sickly red. She’d sent Fred into the village to summon the fire engine, but by the time it had arrived, some of the farm’s buildings had completely burned. The heat from the flames seemed permanently part of her now, no matter how cold the day or room might be.
In the wake of the calamity, the three McGale siblings had been forced to seek outside work, with the hope that they’d earn enough to rebuild.
Jess’s employ as a lady’s companion had been the most profitable. Then Lady Catherton suddenly decided to live on the Continent for the foreseeable future—taking Jess away from the family’s efforts to make repairs. Jess could try to find another position, but the countess paid well, and it would be foolish to