The Marquess Finds Romance Page 8

  Hickstrom’s eyes softened when she looked from Rachel to Janie.

  “Thank you for telling me, Rachel. You know that I am exceedingly fond of all of you, but Janie came to us willingly as a guest, and I feel an unusual responsibility for her. I did so hope that she had not used such a disparaging term for my work.”

  Janie’s cheeks burned, and she shook her head silently. She probably had but hoped she wouldn’t in the future.

  Rachel rose and came to kneel at Hickstrom’s feet. Hickstrom’s own face turned rosy when Rachel took the fairy godmother’s hand and kissed the back of it.

  “You know we love you too, Miss Hermione Hickstrom, despite the hardships. You have given Mary, Clara and me the loves of our lives. Your methods may be harsh, but the results are divine.”

  Brilliant unshed tears filled Hickstrom’s eyes, and Janie responded in kind. Mary cleared her throat and took a swipe at her nose with a sniff. A knock on the door startled them all, and Rachel rose when the little serving girl entered under the burden of a large silver tray bearing a tea service.

  Rachel helped the girl settle the tray on the table.

  “Thank you,” Rachel said to the girl. “I’ll serve the tea.” The serving girl left, and the women were silent while Rachel poured. The open sentimentality expressed appeared to disconcert Hickstrom for a rare moment, and she kept her eyes on her clasped hands.

  “Here you go, ma’am,” Rachel said, handing Hickstrom a cup and plate of cookies.

  “Thank you, dear...and thank you,” Hickstrom said in a throaty voice, accepting the tea and cookies. She settled the plate in her lap and drank from her cup, keeping her gaze lowered for a bit longer.

  Mary and Janie took tea and cookies, and Rachel sat down with her own cup. Janie decided to break the silence.

  “So where do you really live, Hickstrom?” she asked.

  “Here and there, my dear,” Hickstrom responded with a resumption of her typically enigmatic smile.

  “Hmmm,” Janie murmured. “Is that England in the nineteenth century or America in the twenty-first century?”

  “I do spend time in both, as you all well know.”

  “Where were you born? You said you had a mother, so where were you born?”

  “What’s this about your mother? Hickstrom!” Mary cried out. “What does Janie know that we don’t? You’ve never mentioned your mother!”

  “Hickstrom’s mother was a fairy godmother like her, wasn’t she?” Janie replied. “She focused on different centuries though. Twentieth-century women to seventeenth-century men.”

  “Really?” Mary asked, her eyes wide. “You come from a family of fairy godmothers?”

  Hickstrom waved an airy hand. “Of course, dear Mary. One does not simply acquire the skill...and vocation. My mother’s sister was a fairy godmother. My mother’s mother was a fairy godmother.”

  All three young women turned wide eyes on the older woman.

  “I didn’t know that!” Rachel said. “How cute!”

  Janie agreed. She couldn’t help thinking about the animated version of Sleeping Beauty with its colorful plump fairies who resembled Hickstrom a bit, certainly in stature and shape.

  “Cute is as cute does,” Hickstrom said with a smile but underlying quiver in her chin. “But enough about me. Janie, may I speak freely?”

  “Have you ever held back?” Janie asked with a lopsided grin.

  “Touché,” she said. “I have never been one to hold my tongue, have I?”

  The three younger women collectively shook their heads.

  “I do not know if you are aware, but I issued a declaration to Lord Carswell shortly after you left yesterday. May I assume that Mary and Rachel are aware of the contretemps yesterday?”

  “Mary knows about it,” Janie said. “I didn’t say anything to Rachel.”

  “I’m all ears though,” Rachel said. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll catch on.”

  Hickstrom returned her attention to Janie.

  “Upon your departure, Lord Carswell turned his boorish behavior upon me, and I simply would not stand for it. I let him know that he had been unkind to you, had spoken indecorously to me, and then I forbad him to ever consider marrying you.”

  “I know,” Janie said. “Lord Carswell told St. John and St. John told Mary and Mary told me.”

  “Hey! What about me?” Rachel teased.

  “So, thank you, Hickstrom. You and I talked about this before. I’m not one of your matchmaking projects—I never was—and you didn’t bring me back in time to marry someone. You’re going to send me home when Clara returns. We agreed on that, didn’t we? I feel like I keep asking you, but I’m never really sure you agree that we agreed.”

  “We agreed you would come for a visit, most certainly, but in my incensed state yesterday morning, I fear I may have inadvertently consigned you to a marriage with a marquess.”

  “What?” Rachel squeaked.

  “Mary told me about that, Hickstrom, because Lord Carswell told St. John. Unless you plan to make me a—” She turned to Mary. “How do you pronounce it?”

  “Marchioness,” Mary said.

  “A marchioness, I’m not going to be one. I’m not marrying a marquess. I’m not marrying anyone. Besides,” Janie crowed, “you don’t even have a story about me in your book of fairy tales!”

  “Oh, Janie, don’t tempt her,” Mary urged.

  “Do not be so certain, my dear,” Hickstrom said. “Have you never heard of revised editions?”

  “Hickstrom!” Janie cried out. “You wouldn’t! You wouldn’t do that to me.”

  Chapter Ten

  “Janie, dear, please do not be so melodramatic. I do not do this to you, but for you,” Hickstrom said with a benign smile. “Your heart is lonely, and it grieves me to see you thus. Mary and Rachel will tell you that I am not a malicious person. What I do for you, I do because I have grown fond of you. Though I strive to keep a professional distance from my charges, I fail every single time, and I form an attachment for each and every one of them...including St. John.” She lifted an eyebrow at Mary, who smiled wryly.

  Janie swallowed hard and looked toward Mary and Rachel.

  “Can she really force me to get married?”

  “Force, indeed,” Hickstrom murmured. “Much too histrionic a word. I never force. I do persuade though.” She sipped her tea.

  “Mary? Rachel?” Janie prompted when it seemed the women didn’t know how to answer.

  “She has a way,” Mary said. “Hickstrom has gotten every single one of us to do what she wanted...in the end. We all kick and scream, but ultimately, she gets her matches.”

  Mary looked at Hickstrom with a wry smile.

  “I shall take that as a compliment, Mary dear.”

  Rachel nodded but said nothing.

  Janie shook her head. “I’m not going to marry a...marquess, Hickstrom. Since you have eliminated the only single man I know—and I don’t know Mary’s footmen and coachmen all that well—then where do you think you’re going to find this marquess? Mary says she doesn’t even know one!”

  “I said only that Lord Carswell would bow over your hand, Marchioness So and So, to be exact. How we shall achieve that remains to be seen.”

  “Hickstrom,” Janie wheedled. “Come on! Look! I’m not even in your book! Don’t you have any other lonely hearts you can drag back here—who have stories in your book of fairy tales?” She turned to Mary and Rachel. “I wish I’d read some of the other stories now!”

  “Revised editions, my dear, revised editions,” Hickstrom repeated.

  Janie sighed. She could have said “You can’t make me read from the book.” She could have said “You don’t even have a copy of the book.” But she noticed that Rachel and Mary had started to fidget, as if they were ready to move on from the subject. Since each had fought their own battles with Hickstrom—and lost, in a good way—Janie presumed they were tiring of watching yet another battle.

  “Okay, lets drop the sub
ject for now, Hickstrom,” Janie said. “I feel like Mary and Rachel have heard all this before. You and I can rehash this another time.”

  “Rehash away,” Rachel murmured.

  “Good luck!” Mary said with an amused smile.

  Janie felt completely disconnected from Rachel and Mary at that moment. She knew full well they had gone through the same thing with Hickstrom. Just because they had given in—or found their true loves, or whatever their situation—didn’t mean that Janie would. And she wouldn’t!

  Janie bit her tongue and said nothing more. Hickstrom and the other two women chatted a bit about the village before Mary rose. Janie noted that Hickstrom looked at her several times given her silence, but Janie had simply run out of words. When Clara returned, she would visit with her best friend and then demand that Hickstrom send her home. Period.

  “We should be going,” Mary said. “Would you like to accompany us, Hickstrom? We’re just going to wander around and look in some shops.”

  “No, thank you, dears. I was out this morning and find myself fatigued. I shall rest.”

  Mary looked relieved. Janie didn’t think Hickstrom looked at all fatigued. In fact, the fairy godmother never looked tired, but that was just as well. Janie wasn’t very happy with the older woman, and she wanted some distance from her—about three thousand miles and several centuries. Janie felt instantly guilty at the thought. She did truly believe that Hickstrom cared about her happiness, but they had different ideas of what would make Janie happy.

  They said goodbye to Hickstrom in her rooms and left the inn. Janie dragged along behind Mary and Rachel, still feeling distanced from them.

  The hustle and bustle of the little village surprised Janie. Men, women moved to and fro on foot—their economic backgrounds obvious from their clothing. Children played in front of cottages near the road. Horse-drawn wagons abounded—some rumbling and creaking down the middle of the road, some parked in front of shops and stores. The occasional rider ambled past, sometimes in pairs.

  One such rider caught Janie’s attention. “You’re kidding!” she muttered, stopping to stare at the back of a tall, erect figure on a chestnut.

  “What?” Mary said, turning around. She and Rachel followed Janie’s eyes.

  “Is that Lord Carswell?” Mary asked. “Well, he didn’t get very far, did he? So he just decided to leave the castle and move into the village?”

  Janie couldn’t speak.

  “Oh look!” Rachel said. “He’s getting off his horse at the Royal Arms. Is he staying there?”

  Janie watched a stableboy take James’s horse and lead it through a horse passage toward the back of a Tudor style two-story inn.

  “I thought he went to London,” Janie said. “Did he already go and is now heading back to his place...wherever that is?”

  “That’s not possible,” Rachel said. “It would take him between six and ten hours to get to London by carriage, depending on any number of things. He left yesterday midday, didn’t he? I have a feeling he hasn’t gone yet. I wonder why?”

  “Not to harp on anything, but I’m wondering why he left the castle just to relocate to the village,” Mary said. “Talk about embarrassing!”

  “Oh, I doubt it has anything to do with your hospitality, Mary. Certainly it’s not the castle!” Rachel said.

  Janie watched James duck his head to accommodate his height as he passed through the door to the inn.

  “What do you think, Janie?” Mary asked.

  “What do I think?” Janie repeated. “I’m sure I don’t know. He’s hardly my concern. Just ask Hickstrom!” Mary wasn’t the only one embarrassed by the sight of James. Mary had told her that she thought Lord Carswell was running away from women...from her.

  “I know,” Mary said. “I was just wondering if you could think of any reason why he didn’t leave.”

  Janie shrugged her shoulders. “Maybe he decided to wait for Clara to come back. Maybe Hickstrom made him turn around and come back. I can’t explain why he didn’t return to the castle. He’s probably just embarrassed.”

  “I’m debating going over there to ask him,” Mary said, her cheeks high with color.

  “Let St. John do that if he wants,” Rachel said, laying a restraining hand on Mary’s arm. “It sounds like a guy thing.”

  “That sounds like a good idea!” Janie volunteered. “Or don’t ask him at all. At any rate, I’ll go find the carriage and wait in it no matter what you decide. I really don’t want to see him.”

  Mary relented. “No, don’t do that. Forget about him. Let’s go into the dress shop. She’s always got some cute new materials in.”

  The women agreed and followed Mary into a nearby shop to roam through swaths of cloth, lace and ribbons. Janie, having no money of her own and no need for more clothing during her visit, positioned herself near the window to keep a lookout for Lord Carswell in case he left the inn. She split her attention between the entrance to the Royal Arms and the ladies in the shop.

  Five minutes later, a familiar stout but tiny figure in brilliant yellow buzzed along the road. Hickstrom had said she was going to rest, but the fairy godmother was hardly resting. In fact, she was moving unusually fast, eschewing a bonnet, as she often did.

  When she stopped at the entrance to the Royal Arms, Janie gasped. Hickstrom disappeared inside the door, and Janie whirled around to beckon to Mary.

  “What is it?” Mary asked, following Janie’s eyes to the window.

  “Hickstrom just went into the Royal Arms!” Janie whispered.

  “You’re kidding! Do you think she knows Lord Carswell is staying there? Did she go see him?”

  “Well, why else would she be there?” Janie’s voice rose, and Mary hushed her.

  “I’m not going to marry him, so she needs to stop this,” Janie muttered.

  “Janie, relax. Remember? Hickstrom told him that he can’t marry you, even if he wanted to. So that’s not a thing, but now I wonder if she’s planning to fix him up with someone else. When she gets a project—one of her lonely hearts—she doesn’t let go. If she’s decided he’s a lonely guy, she’ll probably find him someone. Why wouldn’t she? Besides, we don’t know that he wasn’t in the book. You probably weren’t in the book, but that doesn’t mean he wasn’t.”

  “Wait! So you think Hickstrom is still trying to fix Lord Carswell up?”

  Mary shrugged. “I don’t know. Are you sure you don’t want to go over there and find out? I know I do!”

  “Okay, fine, let’s go see what Hickstrom is up to. If she’s going to find Lord Carswell a lonely heart, I’d like to see her try!”

  Mary gave her a curious look before calling Rachel over. She explained the situation to Rachel in a hushed voice. The threesome left the shop and crossed the street to enter the Royal Arms.

  Much like the St. John Inn, one entered the Royal Arms through the pub, a similarly furnished room of tables and benches. Serving girls in aprons and caps served food and beverages.

  Mary, first in the door, paused to survey the pub. Janie again deduced from the clothing that some patrons were moneyed and others a little less well off.

  Hickstrom’s sunflower gown was nowhere to be seen. A young serving girl dashed up to them and bobbed a curtsey.

  “Do you wish to dine, your ladyship?” she asked.

  She seemed to know who Mary was. Janie wasn’t surprised.

  “No, thank you. We were looking for a Miss Hickstrom. A lady in a yellow gown?”

  “Oh yes. She said she had an appointment with a gentleman upstairs. She was an old lady, so I didn’t think nothing of it. Nothing improper there.”

  Mary covered her face with a gloved hand, but Janie saw her shoulders shaking with laughter. She looked over her shoulder toward Janie and Rachel, her brown eyes dancing.

  “Shall we?”

  Janie’s heart pounded.

  “Why not?” Rachel said. “But I may have to leave unexpectedly. I’m starting to feel kind of weird. Probably the short
bread cookies.”

  “Then we should leave!” Janie said. “Your health is more important than our snooping.”

  The servant girl continued to eye them, almost as if trying to figure out what they were talking about.

  “Shall I tell the lady you’ve come to see her?” she asked.

  “No, I want to hear this,” Rachel said. “I just meant that I might have to run out of the building and wait in the coach.”

  “Rachel, are you sure?” Mary asked.

  “Honestly, do we even care?” Janie asked. Somehow, she no longer wanted to know what Hickstrom’s plans for Lord Carswell were. Well, she did and she didn’t.

  “I’m sure,” Rachel said. “Let’s go.”

  Mary turned to the girl.

  “Please take us up to Lord Carswell’s room. That is whom the lady is visiting?”

  “Yes, Lady St. John. If you’ll follow me?”

  The three women traipsed up the narrow stairway behind the serving girl. Janie couldn’t understand how Hickstrom’s broad hoops allowed her passage.

  Upon reaching the landing, the girl knocked on a door. Janie’s heart did summersaults. She suspected that no matter what, her name had come up in Hickstrom and Lord Carswell’s conversation. Weren’t they mad at each other? Why were they cozying up at an inn?

  Lord Carswell opened the door and almost jumped back at the sight of all the women in the hallway. Beyond, one could see Hickstrom sitting on a serviceable brown settee.

  “Mary!” Lord Carswell said. “Is that you, Lady Halwell? And Janie.” His voice dipped into what sounded like disappointment when he mentioned her name. She ducked and hid behind Rachel.

  “How did you know I was here?” he asked.

  “We saw you,” Mary said, her tone sounding a bit like an accusation.

  “Those are familiar voices,” Hickstrom called from inside the room. “Lord Carswell, do let the girl go and allow the ladies to step in.”

  “The girl” needed no further prodding, and she bolted away down the stairs.

  Lord Carswell bowed and opened the door wider. “Please come in. My rooms are very humble. Do please forgive me. This is all they could offer on short notice.”