Page 10 of The Governess and the Rogue (Somerset Stories #6)

Chapter Eight

“M r. Dimsdale said that? ” Pearl was aghast. “And it was Mr. Beresford who?—”

“ Colonel Beresford.” Dousing the lantern, Bea crawled into her berth. Her heavy cotton nightgown and thick wool socks did nothing to dispel the lingering gooseflesh on her skin. She was chilled to the bone. She must be. Why else was she still trembling? “And yes, on both counts.”

Pearl climbed down from her upper berth in the darkness, landing on the gently rocking floor of the ship with a soft thud. She relit the lantern. Half-asleep when Bea had entered the cabin, she was now wide-eyed and alert. “You can’t leave it at that!”

Bea sat back against the wall, curling her legs beneath her. “What else is there to say?”

Pearl fetched a shawl. She drew it around her nightgown-clad figure before joining Bea in the lower berth. “Are you sure he said his name was Beresford?”

“Of course, I am.”

“The son of the Earl of Allendale?”

“That’s what he claimed.”

Pearl shook her head, unable to believe it. “And on this ship the whole time? If he’s telling the truth?—”

“I don’t know why he wouldn’t be,” Bea said.

Even as she uttered the words, a small voice at the back of her head reminded her of what had really transpired this evening.

As if Bea could ever forget!

Jack hadn’t just rescued her. He’d proposed to her. And not a real proposal, either. Bea had never been so fortunate as to receive one of those. Instead, he’d had the temerity to suggest that the two of them pretend to be engaged to each other.

It was a scandalous notion, and one that revealed, more than anything, Jack Beresford’s cavalier attitude toward the truth.

Pearl would certainly be fascinated to hear of it. But Bea had no intention of sharing the story. Jack’s proposition had been too shocking. Too…

Oh, Bea hated to admit it to herself, but it was too ridiculously precious. Just the sort of vaguely romantic secret an old maid might keep under her pillow during all the lonely years of her life.

A depressing thought.

“Was he outrageously handsome?” Pearl asked.

Heat crept up Bea’s throat. She prayed Pearl wouldn’t notice it. “Not outrageously,” she said. “But… Yes. He is handsome.”

Pearl snuggled beside her. “Colonel Beresford was outrageously handsome,” she said.

“I saw him once in Delhi. It was when he first met the Farradays. He was in company with some General Sahib, surveying the troops. He stayed for over a fortnight. All the ladies were beside themselves. There were dances and dinners, and a flurry of new gowns made with the finest silks and lace. Mrs. Rawson was often called upon to provide introductions.”

“Mrs. Rawson is acquainted with Colonel Beresford?”

“No, but she met his oldest brother once, many years ago, at an assembly in Bath. She still talks about it.”

“I’ve never heard her.”

“You never hear anything. You’re forever off with the children. But I remain with the ladies. I hear everything .”

Bea hated that she was curious. “Is there so much to hear?”

“Oh yes.” Pearl drew the coarse blanket up over them in the berth.

“According to Mrs. Rawson, Colonel Beresford fought in the Crimea before coming to Delhi. But India didn’t sit well with him.

He left shortly after for Persia, and from there to Egypt on extended leave.

Mrs. Farraday found out he would be staying at Shepheard’s Hotel, and arranged that she and her daughter would be there too. That was when she nearly caught him.”

Bea felt a sharp twinge of pity for Jack. Goodness. He really had been pursued. “Fortunately for him, he managed to get away,” she observed dryly.

“It wasn’t the first time he’d been chased, I don’t wonder,” Pearl said. “He returned to fighting in Persia before Mrs. Farraday could play her final card. When she heard he was badly injured in some battle in the desert, she feared he’d been killed and that she’d lost her chance forever.”

“But he didn’t die,” Bea pointed out. “Obviously.”

He’d said that his horse had fallen on him, and that he’d had several surgeries to repair the damage. That admission too had been exceedingly cavalier. Still…

Bea had sensed there was something more behind it. Regret, bitterness, possibly even anger.

“Which was splendid news for Mrs. Farraday and her daughter,” Pearl went on.

“Once she learned that he’d survived, and that he’d returned to Cairo for surgery, she made inquiries at all the local hospitals, but was unable to find him.

Mrs. Rawson claims that Mrs. Farraday would be there still, searching the four corners of the city, if her money hadn’t begun to run out. ”

Bea swallowed the acrid taste in her mouth. Jack Beresford was more than capable of taking care of himself. Even so, she hated to think of him lying injured in a hospital bed, barely conscious after surgery, a helpless victim to any scheming, marriage-minded mama who was determined to capture him.

“I hadn’t realized Mrs. Farraday was so ruthless in her efforts,” she said.

“Any mother might be,” Pearl replied. “Colonel Beresford is a prize.”

“Nonsense. He’s no trophy for Mrs. Farraday to hang on her wall.”

“No, indeed. She intends to hang him on her daughter’s wall.”

“Really, Pearl,” Bea chided.

Pearl giggled. “When she discovers that he’s on the ship?—”

Bea shot her a sharp look. “You mustn’t say a word.”

“They wouldn’t listen if I did,” Pearl said. “To them, I’m invisible.”

Bea was immediately chastened. Her problems were nothing in comparison to the trials Pearl must have endured as a servant of mixed heritage. “I’m sorry,” she said.

“I’m not.” Pearl’s smile turned impish. “Invisibility has its benefits. You would do well to cultivate it if you mean to remain in your position.”

Bea feared that ship had already sailed. “It’s too late for invisibility where I’m concerned,” she said. “Whatever happens to me tomorrow, I have a sinking feeling that everyone on this ship is going to hear about it.”

* * *

“The day you’ve long been awaiting has finally arrived, Maberly,” Jack said on rising the next morning. He passed his batman the shaving razor. “Shear me.”

Maberly accepted the implement with a look of skepticism. “Are you in earnest, sir?”

“I’ve never been more so.” Jack sat down in the wooden chair near the washstand in his cabin, his injured leg stretched out before him. If he once again had to be Jack Beresford, he intended to be him in every way. And Jack Beresford never sported a beard or mustache.

Maberly got straight to work lathering the shaving soap. “And your hair?”

“Trim it,” Jack said. “As of today, you and I will be joining the rest of the passengers.”

Maberly stilled. “What about Mrs. Farraday and the other ladies?”

“It will doubtless be unpleasant,” Jack allowed. “But it’s out of my hands now.”

Maberly looked at him in question.

“I revealed my identity to someone above deck last night,” Jack said.

The batman’s eyes darkened with disapproval. “Not that sad governess who works for those loud colonials?”

“No.” Jack frowned. “And she’s not a ‘sad governess.’ She’s rather resilient, in fact. A survivor.” He leaned back in the chair as Maberly stropped the razor. “Did you know she’s had over two dozen postings?”

“Is that meant to be impressive?”

“She’s been in India less than a decade. It equals out to nearly three postings per year.”

“So,” Maberly mused. “She can’t keep a job.”

“It seems not. Which goes a long way to explaining how she ended up working for the Dimsdale family.” Jack’s frown deepened. “It was he who I revealed myself to last night. The Dimsdale fellow.”

Maberly lathered Jack’s jaw. “Unwise, I’d have thought.”

“But necessary.”

“If you say so, sir.” Maberly began to shave him. “Don’t change the fact that it will set those Farraday women to chasing you again. And if I may point out?—”

“As if I could stop you.”

“—you ain’t as fleet of foot as you once was.”

Jack closed his eyes. “No. I’m not. But I am happy to be leaving this cabin, whatever the outcome.”

“Still, it ain’t going to be easy going for the rest of the voyage.”

“No,” Jack acknowledged grimly.

Relieved as he was to shed the confines of his self-imposed exile, he didn’t much look forward to the social interaction that would inevitably come with it.

He’d have to be on his guard at all moments, wary of every trap and snare.

It promised to be an exhausting business.

Possibly a futile one too, given the determination of Mrs. Farraday.

As Maberly scraped the beard from Jack’s face and throat, Jack brooded over how much easier it all might have been if only Bea had been willing to tell the others that they were engaged.

Granted, she had agreed to think about it, but even if she did, Jack held out little hope that she’d change her mind. She was too sensible, that was the trouble. Too cautious.

Too scared.

It was that which troubled him. Knowing that she was frightened of being sacked, and left without a reference. That, absent his support, she’d be forced to face the consequences of Mr. Dimsdale’s actions alone.

And what could Jack do about it? Nothing at all. Not without a formal claim on her. And he couldn’t very well force her to pretend that he was her fiancé, could he?

Perhaps it had been a foolish idea anyway. Especially given the unsettling flashes of attraction Jack had lately been feeling for her.

A short time later, he emerged from his cabin, clad in a well-cut black coat and gray flannel trousers, his face cleanshaven and his hair combed into meticulous order. Breakfast was already being served in the dining saloon. To get there, Jack had to pass through the grand saloon on the main deck.

He heard the shrilly raised voice of a woman well before he arrived there.

“—unable to manage the slightest thing, and forever complaining to me, and now to my husband!” The harsh words rang down the hall. “Oh yes, he informed me of your disrespect. I daresay you thought it would go unpunished, dependent as we are on you to look after the children.”

“ My disrespect?” Bea’s voice echoed. “It was your husband who behaved disrespectfully, ma’am. He was well in his cups, and made overtures to me of an inappropriate nature.”

Jack flinched at the brutality of Bea’s unapologetic honesty. Good lord, so much for throwing herself on her employer’s mercy! Somewhere between the anguished tears she’d shed last night, and facing Mrs. Dimsdale this morning, Bea must have decided it was as well to be hanged for a sheep as a lamb.

“How dare you!” Mrs. Dimsdale cried.

“As for my complaining,” Bea continued sharply, “I wouldn’t have to if your children were possessed of a shred of basic good manners.”

“Insolent jade! I won’t hear another word?—”

“There’s a reason you’ve been unable to keep a governess for them. And it’s got nothing to do with those governess’s failings, and everything to do with your failures as a parent.”

“Hateful creature!” Mrs. Dimsdale’s reply vibrated with fury. “First you malign my husband, and now my sons and my innocent daughter? Be grateful I’m only dismissing you. I could just as easily have you arrested for fraud and for obtaining this position by false pretenses!”

Jack’s blood ran cold. Could she, by heaven? He would see about that.

Tightening his hand on his cane, he limped into the saloon. Bea stood at attention in front of an expensively clad, red-faced lady seated in a tall-backed chair. Mrs. Dimsdale, Jack presumed. Her chin was wobbling with fury.

“For that’s what you did, I vow,” she went on scathingly.

“Accepted employment with us purely to secure your passage. You had no intention of doing the work for which we hired you. And you shan’t do it now.

I’ll have no devious slatterns in my household.

As to the monies you owe us for your board and fare?—”

“Good morning, ladies,” Jack said suavely.

Bea’s head turned with a start. Her blue eyes widened, taking in the whole of him—from the close-cropped layers of his golden-blond hair to the polished sheen of his boots—in one arrested glance.

Mrs. Dimsdale did the same, yet nowhere near as discreetly.

Her eyes bulged and her mouth fell open.

She stared at Jack for a full five seconds before closing it.

“I declare—it can’t be, can it?” She moved to stand.

“Upon my soul, but it is! Colonel Beresford, a passenger on the Pera! Why did no one tell me of this?”

“You have the advantage of me, ma’am,” Jack said. “You know my name, yet I have no recollection of meeting you.”

Mrs. Dimsdale hurried to greet him, the lace trimming on her morning gown rustling loudly in the sudden silence of the saloon.

“We were never formally introduced. But I was in Delhi when you visited with General Havelock.” Stopping in front of Jack, she dropped him a deep curtsy.

“You might remember my husband, Mr. Dimsdale. He often played polo with the officers.”

“In fact, I met your husband last night,” Jack said. “An encounter I’m not likely to forget.”

Mrs. Dimsdale’s smile wavered at the lack of warmth in Jack’s words. She shot a look at Bea, as though she were to blame for it.

Bea remained standing by the chair. She was wearing one of her plain wool dresses again, but there was nothing else plain about her.

Not today. Rather than looking cowed or fearful, she appeared as formidable as a diminutive Amazon, with bright eyes and cheeks flushed, not with blushes this time, but with something approaching anger.

Jack’s heart performed a disconcerting somersault.

“I must apologize,” Mrs. Dimsdale said to him. “You’ve caught me in the middle of a minor domestic matter. That person is a former servant of mine who I’ve been given cause to discharge.”

“Can I be of assistance?” Jack inquired.

“How very gallant of you to offer,” Mrs. Dimsdale replied with a girlish titter. “I would be?—”

“I wasn’t asking you, ma’am,” Jack said. “I was asking Miss Layton.”