Page 3 of The Incident at Ingleton (Beau Monde Secrets #3)

W hen she reached her guestroom, Hester’s first instinct was to ring for her maid. But of course, she did not have her lady’s maid here. At home, she shared a lady’s maid with her younger sister. Since Julia had stayed in London for the rest of the season, the maid had naturally stayed with her. Here in the vicarage, the upper housemaid served as lady’s maid when necessary, though Hester had gathered the impression that Rose often dressed and undressed herself.

Or maybe Frank undressed Rose , a wicked thought whispered. Hester shoved the intimate image out of her mind as quickly as possible. She did not want to contemplate the private details of her brother’s marriage. Ugh! Bad enough that everyone knew they were having a baby.

One of the housemaids had filled the ewer on the dressing table with fresh water. After she washed her face, Hester dampened a face flannel, then lay down in bed and covered her forehead with the wet compress. It only helped a little, and she lay awake for an eternity while her head pounded and her thoughts spun around in circles.

In hindsight, Hester realized she ought to have excused herself from tonight’s dinner party. Her sick headaches left her in no fit state for entertainments, even small country dinners. But Frank had been eager to introduce her to Lady Inglewhite, who apparently was their late uncle Alistair’s only child, born on the wrong side of the blanket. This made Lady Inglewhite Hester’s and Frank’s cousin by blood, if not by law.

Hester hated to disappoint her brother, the more so as she knew Frank and Rose were both worried that she would find life in the country dull. And it was true that Hester worried that she’d be bored living in a tiny town, with no visits to the opera, garden parties, or routs to keep her entertained. But she also felt relieved to be far from London. Far from handsome cavalry officers whose gambling debts forced them to marry an heiress, or gossiping tabbies who influenced everyone’s guest lists. Far from Mama’s disappointment or Julia’s astonishment at Hester’s behavior.

Frank and Rose must know why Hester had been exiled to Lancashire, but they hadn’t said a word about the scandal. Initially, Hester appreciated their tact, but now she wondered if it would have been better to sit down and explain everything, so they’d know her side of the story. She could have explained about Simon: the love-tokens, the secret letters, the kisses and caresses they’d shared behind closed doors when they met at parties. That might have been better than them knowing only the disgrace of Hester having been caught kissing a married man in a dark corner of the Duke of Creighton’s garden.

As it was, she had no idea what Mama had told Frank and Rose when she made arrangements for Hester to visit them. According to Mama, Hester was here to look after her sister-in-law as her confinement drew near. When Hester wrote her apologies to her friends in London, she’d cited her frequent megrims as a reason for leaving town in the middle of the season. Surely country air and simple, farm-fresh food would be better for her health than smoke and fussy gourmet cuisine.

So she’d hoped. But she was confined to bed with another sick headache. Worse, she had the vague sense that she’d somehow managed to offend Mr. Haworth. Because he was Rose’s cousin, he was in some sense part of Hester’s extended family. (Was there such a thing as a cousin-in-law?) She hadn’t wanted to insult him at all, but it was hard to act the part of a witty conversationalist when she was in agony.

That was what other people seemed not to understand about her headaches. When wealthy young ladies claimed to “have the headache,” everyone tacitly understood that such headaches provided an excuse for avoiding unwanted social encounters. When Hester told people she was subject to frequent headaches, they assumed she meant no more than that. No doubt Mr. Haworth thought so, too; it would explain his criticism of valetudinarianism.

Hester’s headaches were no mere excuse. They disrupted her life, thwarted her plans, and forced her to spend hours resting when she’d rather be living the way other people did. After the incident with Simon, she’d resolved to behave with circumspection, so that she would be a credit to the Bracknell name rather than a disgrace. Unfortunately, it was hard to make a good impression while experiencing disabling pain.

As she lay in bed trying to ignore the pulsating agony in her skull, Hester lost track of time. She had no idea how long she’d been lying in the dark before Rose gently tapped at the door.

“Are you quite all right, Hester? Can I get you anything?”

“If you could send up another cup of that medicinal tea, that might help,” Hester suggested. The apothecary in Rocheford St. Peters, the nearest market town, sold a “headache” blend that used willow bark as the base and peppermint for flavor. It worked about as well as most treatments did.

“Very well,” Rose said. “I’ll have Hannah bring you another cup of that tea. And if you need anything else, let me know.”

I need my head to stop pounding! Hester kept that thought to herself, because there was little her sister-in-law could do to help. The combination of her headache tea and a good night’s sleep might help. Sometimes she went to bed in agony and woke up in the morning free of pain.

Unfortunately, this megrim was not so easy to shake. She woke up the next morning with a dull ache in her head, promising more pain if she moved around too much, ate the wrong thing, or ventured out into the bright sunshine. Instead of taking country walks or helping Rose in the garden—physical exertions that would only make a megrim worse—Hester spent most of the day in the parlor with all the curtains drawn.

The day after that, however, Hester woke up to find her pain gone and her appetite fully returned. Just in the nick of time, too, because Lady Inglewhite had family visiting the castle, and she invited the residents of the vicarage to come up and spend an afternoon with them. Frank excused himself on account of a vestry meeting, but Rose and Hester took advantage of the offer to use the luxurious Inglewhite carriage.

In truth, Hester would rather have skipped this visit. She found it difficult to keep straight the names of the two young Inglewhite girls, daughters of the previous earl. The elder was a girl in her teens who looked to be fast approaching the end of her time in the schoolroom. Hester understood why a girl so close to adulthood to be allowed to socialize with the adults, but the younger Selwyn daughter could not have been more than nine or ten. Hester was surprised to see her allowed to take tea with her mother, her aunt, and the guests from the vicarage.

Stranger yet, the young heir to the Inglewhite title was allowed to roam loose about the room, making jabbering sounds that were almost, but not quite, words. Little Lord Elston toddled up to Hester and handed her a half-eaten biscuit. She stared at it, baffled. She had no idea what etiquette called for in such a situation, so she thanked the child and placed the soggy biscuit on the nearest table.

“I’m sorry if he’s bothering you!” Lady Inglewhite swooped in with a handkerchief and quickly scrubbed Lord Elston’s grubby hands.

“Is there no nursery in the castle?” Hester watched Lady Inglewhite’s face fall, and immediately realized she’d said the wrong thing. “I mean no criticism,” she clarified. “I’m just not used to seeing young children playing with the family.”

“You must blame the Haworth side of my family for that.” Lady Inglewhite sounded a bit sheepish. No doubt she knew how unusual this approach to parenting was among the aristocracy. “My grandparents liked to have children about the place, rather than confining them to the nursery. That is how Uncle and Aunt Rufford raised us too, isn’t it?” She smiled at Rose.

Rose pulled a face. “What they may have done when you were young, I know not,” she told her cousin. “But I very clearly remember being allowed to sit in Mama’s boudoir and watch her dressing for dinner parties or balls. And I know we rambled all over the manor in our games.” She turned to Hester and smiled. “Papa must have been unusually tolerant towards children, because I even remember playing in his study while he signed letters.”

“Oh, I remember more than that,” Lady Inglewhite put in. “I distinctly recall you spilling ink all over his correspondence. On more than one occasion, I might add.”

Rose giggled. “I am sure he sometimes regretted his leniency, but I loved being able to spend so much time playing by his side.”

“Oh, I see.” Hester blinked, not at all sure how to respond. “How charming!”

She supposed it was charming in a way, but it was so vastly different from how she had been reared! At Bracknell Hall, the children stayed in the nursery or schoolroom until they were old enough to display good company manners. Growing up, she’d spent far more time with her nursemaid and her governess than with her mother. As for Papa, he used to spend every Parliamentary session in London, so she had sometimes gone months without seeing him.

But of course, that much was true of Lord Inglewhite’s family as well, since he also held a seat in the House of Lords. “You must miss Lord Inglewhite,” Hester said to Lady Inglewhite. “I am sure it is hard to stay behind when he is in London.”

Lady Inglewhite’s smile wilted. “Yes, I do miss him. I do not think it is good for Robbie to be apart from his father so long. But Richard and I both agreed that London is no place for so young a child, and—” she hesitated, then blushed. “The truth is, I am in the family way again, and I would not like having to navigate another London season at a time when I might often be indisposed.”

“Yes,” Rose agreed, “those early months are so exhausting.” She flicked her eyes towards Hester and smiled wryly. “But we are probably boring you with all our child-rearing talk. I promised Phoebe that we’d play hide-and-seek. Would you like to join us, Hester?”

“Ah... of course, I’d be delighted.” Hester glanced at Lord Elston, who was happily pushing a wooden horse back and forth over the carpet. “Can a child that young play hide-and-seek?” she wondered aloud.

“Not very well,” Lady Inglewhite said. “But in any case, I’m afraid it’s time for his n-a-p. Say good-bye to our guests, Robbie!”

“Bye!” Robbie yelled over his shoulder as he ran towards the waiting nursemaid. His mother followed in order to scoop him up, kiss his cheek, and hand him to the nursemaid, who carried him away.

So, Lady Inglewhite did sometimes let her servants care for the children. But surely other parents in the ton did not spend so much time with their children. Did they? For the first time, Hester realized she had little idea how other families lived in the privacy of their own homes. For all she knew, her family might be the exception rather than the rule.

She resolved to ask Frank about it when she got the chance. He’d traveled more widely than she had, and as a clergyman, he moved in a wider range of social circles. He probably knew better than she did what was and wasn’t the norm in tonnish households.

For now, though, she set aside the question to play hide-and-seek with the Selwyn girls. At first, she felt self-conscious, afraid it demeaned her to play like a child. But soon, she became caught up in the challenge of the game. Hide-and-seek was much easier to play on familiar territory. If she’d been in Bracknell Hall, on the second story, she would’ve known all the good places to hide. Selwyn Castle, being almost entirely new to her, presented a greater challenge.

Before everyone scattered to find hiding places, Lady Inglewhite (the current countess, not the dowager) insisted on a few rules. Only the ground floor and the first story were fair game; the second story and the attics were off limits, as was any room in which servants were working.

“No hiding in the kitchen or the servant’s hall,” Lady Inglewhite explained. “I don’t want you getting in anyone’s way. And no trying to open locked doors.”

“We wouldn’t do that!” the older Selwyn girl insisted. She turned to her sister. “Isn’t that right, Phoebe?”

Hester bit back a laugh when she saw the younger sister hide her hand behind her back and cross her fingers. For a moment, she wondered if she had a duty to warn Lady Inglewhite that at least one of the children did not intend to follow the rules.

No, she decided. That wouldn’t be sporting. Besides, how likely was it that a child of ten knew how to pick a lock, anyway? It seemed an unlikely talent for the daughter of an earl to have picked up.

Rose and the younger Lady Inglewhite played too, though the dowager retired to her own chamber to rest. Hester was relieved not to be the only adult involved in the game. If nothing else, it should give her some competition. Lady Inglewhite probably knew the castle better than anyone else.

For the first round, Phoebe was the seeker. While she closed her eyes and counted, the other players scattered. From the banging and crashing of doors, Hester guessed that the older Selwyn girl planned to hide in a room on this floor rather than the ground floor.

Lady Inglewhite slipped away through a narrow wooden door that blended in with the paneled corridor walls. Curious, Hester peered through the open doorway and saw a servant’s staircase. Wasn’t that breaking the rules, though? They weren’t supposed to enter any rooms where servants were working! On the other hand, this was Lady Inglewhite’s home. The servants would not be surprised if the countess appeared in the offices.

Hester thought Lady Inglewhite had the right idea in heading to the ground floor, but since she had no desire to get lost in the castle’s back hallways, she took the main staircase instead of the servant’s stair. She slipped through the first doorway she passed and found herself in the library. It was a handsome, well-appointed room, with wooden settles framing the fireplace, walls lined with bookcases, and—window seats! Perfect!

Hester sat in the nearest window seat and pulled the drapes shut. She tucked her legs underneath her and leaned against the glass of the bow window, smirking to herself. It would be a long time before anyone found her here!

To her dismay, the door opened, and footsteps clipped against the hardwood floor. Then the door swung shut. Someone else was in the room, but those were not a child’s footsteps. They sounded much too heavy. Who was in here with her?