Lady In Waiting Part 21

"Later, though, I suppose," he added, raising a brow as if he truly thought she'd take a roll with him.

"Thank you for the sherry, George," she murmured, then walked across the drawing room to the marble mantel. As she waited for Callum, Jenny turned her body three-quarters to the room-for it was important her gown catch the light properly-while she nervously fingered the plumed hat of the Chelsea figural candlestick.

It was foolish to antic.i.p.ate Callum's appearance so eagerly. It was not as if she had any idea as to what to say to him. Nothing had changed in her situation, or his. Still, she had to speak with him. Had to try to set things to right.

As Meredith played the fortepiano, quite well in fact, Jenny soon found herself tapping her slipper in time.

"Were we in a larger gallery, la.s.sie, I would ask ye to dance."

At the sound of Callum's voice, a thrill trickled up inside of Jenny and she turned her head to find him bowing low to her. He looked wickedly handsome in a dark cutaway coat, which brilliantly picked up a repeated line of azure in an understated dress kilt she'd never seen him wear before. On his lapel was a silver dagger topped with a rather large cabochon sapphire. La, he looked impressive.

Turning more fully to the light, she eased into a curtsy, taking care to tilt her head just enough to send her pearl bobs to swaying.

His gaze darted to them.

Jenny grinned inwardly. Then all at once it struck her that perhaps she was being too forgiving, too kind. Were she a lady true, as he believed her to be, she would be seething about the situation he'd left her in.

She arched an accusing brow. "Have you something to say to me, Lord Argyll, for I should join Meredith at the fortepiano. I've found," she lied, "it exceedingly difficult to play while turning the music one's self."

But when she looked up at Callum, she saw the deep despair in his warm dark eyes. Suddenly she wanted nothing more than to take him into her arms, kiss him, and forgive him anything.

In the brief seconds that this thought breached her mind, it was as if Jenny had accidentally left a door open, a door through which Callum had peered and saw what truly lay in her heart.

And something within him changed... evolved.

It was there in his eyes, in the shift of his shoulders, in the confidence in his stance. All at once, he had come to some decision.

Jenny took a deep breath and held it in her lungs, afraid to breathe or even move.

"Jenny, will ye come with me to the study where we might be alone."

"Oh." Jenny looked across the drawing room at the Featherton ladies.

Lady Let.i.tia was laughing, in her deeply contagious way, while standing in the company of two older gentlemen. But Lady Viola had a distressed expression on her face, one that cinched her thin lips and white brows. With her, stood the widow.

Something wasn't right, and a little voice inside Jenny's head told her to go to Lady Viola, but then she felt Callum's hand brush the top of her glove.

"Please, Jenny. I must speak with ye now."

There was need in his eyes, and she could not refuse. With one last glance at Lady Viola and the widow, she silently followed Callum into the pa.s.sage.

Out of habit, she s.n.a.t.c.hed a candle from a sconce and as Callum opened the door to the study, she hurried around the room lighting the candles, then bent to see to the fire.

Callum reached down and took her hand, and she dropped the candle into the barely glowing embers in the hearth.

"The candle!" Jenny blurted, forgetting momentarily that at this moment she was not a maid concerned with household thrift, but a refined lady.

"Leave it be." Callum led her to the chair before the mahogany bureau bookcase and with a sweep of his hand bade her to be seated. "Please."

As she settled herself in the chair, Jenny searched Callum's eyes for any hint of what he was about. But she could not read what she saw there, for in those swirls of deepest brown lit with flecks of gold was a tumult of emotion.

Argyll knelt on one knee before her. "Jenny, can ye ever fergive me? Ye gave yer love, yer heart, yer body to me-and I thrust it back at ye as if it meant nothing." He took a long cleansing breath. "But being with ye that night, Christ, it meant everything to me. More than ye'll ever know. And I hope to prove that to ye now."

And suddenly Jenny knew what he was about to do. A twist of dread pinched at her.

"Please, Callum. No."

Callum shook his head slowly. "I ken I've hurt ye badly-"

Jenny came to her feet. "No, 'tisn't that at all."

Do it, Jenny! Tell him. Tell him who you really are.

"I-I..." she sputtered. Tell him.

Just then, the door flew open and the Widow McCarthy stood staring at the sight of Callum on bended knee before Jenny.

"Lord Argyll, I must speak with you," the widow pressed.

Callum sighed. "I shall attend to ye presently, Lady McCarthy, but I am indisposed at this moment."

The widow looked nervously down the pa.s.sageway to her left. "I beg you. There is something you must know, and when you hear what I have to say, I believe you will be most grateful for my interruption."

Callum slowly came to his feet and faced her.

The widow lowered her voice almost to a whisper. "I have some information that cannot remain wrongly hidden from you any longer."

The widow looked straight at Jenny. "Will you please excuse us?"

Jenny looked at Callum. "No, Callum, I must speak with you first."

He tried to ease her worry with a gentle smile. "We have quite a lot to discuss, ye and I. But that will take time. Please, let the widow have her say, then I will devote myself to ye entirely."

"But, Callum, you don't understand. I-"

"'Tis all right. Please, go on, la.s.s. I willna be long."

Tears began to burn in the backs of Jenny's eyes as she walked past Callum, the smirking widow, and into the pa.s.sage.

She turned around and looked back into the room as the widow shut the door in her face.

"Lord help me now," Jenny whimpered.

Chapter Fourteen.

Wretched corset! She couldn't get a single bleedin' breath.

Jenny closed her eyes and leaned her forehead against the door. What was she to do? The wicked widow was going to expose her. Oh, why hadn't she told Callum she was a maid sooner? This was all her fault-her own foolish fault!

For a few moments, Jenny paced stiffly just outside the study. The widow was taking much too long. She just had to be telling him something more.

Jenny gasped. No. The tingle cream. Someone must have told the widow about the Lady Eros's cream!

Lunging forward, she pressed her ear so hard to the paneled door that it throbbed as she strained to hear. A murmur of voices, dulled by Meredith's incessant forte-piano playing in the drawing room beyond, was all she could discern.

The tapping of a cane alerted Jenny that someone had entered the pa.s.sage. She swiveled her head and saw Lady Viola staring back at her.

"Oh, my lady. Something dreadful has happened."

"I thought as much." Lady Viola hurried up the pa.s.sage toward Jenny. "'Tis the widow, is it not?"

Jenny nodded feebly. "She's in the study with Lord Argyll."

Her employer's frosty brows shot skyward. "Oh, heavens! Find Lady Let.i.tia and bring her here at once. Do hurry!"

Lifting her hem, Jenny ran down the pa.s.sage and straight into the drawing room, where, heedless of the rankled partygoers she left in her wake, she hurried through to reach Lady Let.i.tia.

Moments later, she and the two Featherton ladies stood poised outside the study door.

"She's telling him who I really am," Jenny whimpered. "What shall I do?"

The two ladies looked quizzically at one another, then back at Jenny.

"No, dear. I do not believe it is you they are discussing." Lady Let.i.tia turned away and took Lady Viola's left hand. "Are you ready, Sister?"

"Yes," Lady Viola muttered, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. "As ready as a body can be in such a situation."

"Well, then..." Reaching her hand slowly forward, Lady Let.i.tia pressed the door latch and released it, allowing the door to inch open of its own accord.

As a unit, the snowy-haired pair moved into the study, positioning themselves directly before Callum.

Jenny slipped just inside the door and leaned against the blue verditer painted wall for bodily support. Oh, how she hoped the ladies were right and the widow wasn't revealing her secret, but what else could it be?

The widow sat in the ribbon-back chair beside the hearth, her face obscured to Jenny by the needlework-embroidered polescreen. This suited Jenny quite well, for the smirk on the widow's face as she entered the room only minutes ago was still vividly emblazoned in her mind.

Callum's shocked face was plainly visible to her, however. His gaze was solemn and unyielding, but to her astonishment, it was not Jenny who held his attention. No, 'twas Lady Viola.

"Why?" he stammered in a voice so wrought with anguish that had Jenny not seen him speak, she would not have recognized it as his own. "Why dinna ye tell me? Why did ye leave me to believe ye barely knew my mother... when all along-"

Lady Viola walked slowly toward Callum and laid a quaking hand to his shoulder. He pushed it away with unnecessary brusqueness.

"My dear boy." As Lady Viola began, her voice shook. "I was unmarried when I learned I was with child. I wanted to keep her, to raise her, but Father would not allow it."

She turned her eyes to her sister, who nodded for her to continue. "In Father's eyes, I had shamed him and the family name. I was sent to live with my cousin in Cornwall. She was barren, and when the child was delivered into the world, she and her husband took Olivia and raised her as their own."

"Please try to understand." Lady Let.i.tia lowered herself to the pet.i.te chair near the hearth. "It was a different time then."

As Jenny stood quietly in the background, listening to every word, she was very confused. Lady Let.i.tia had been right, this wasn't all about her. Lord above, what a blessed relief.

But Lady Viola-Callum's grandmother? She could not have heard correctly. Her ladyship had a child without the benefit of marriage-and she was an earl's daughter. Not a lowly maid, like her. Lud, how could this be?

Still, she could not summon the least bit of happiness at this fortunate turn of events. Not when those she loved were clearly leveled by the widow's ill-timed revelation.

Callum turned his eyes to the frail old woman, and Jenny could see the redness within them.

"Why dinna ye tell me? Ye knew I searched for any news of her... any record of her last days."

The widow stood then and lifted her chin haughtily. "Such an important revelation should not have been left for me to report. But it was, and Lord Argyll is only too grateful that I have come forward with the truth-since evidently you were not about to offer it."

Shooting to her feet, Lady Let.i.tia plowed forward, her cheeks puffing with rage as she grabbed the widow's bony arm and flung her toward the door. "Out! Get out of this house. Have you not done enough damage to this fragile family?"

Recovering her balance, the widow's lips opened wide, and an image of the mouth of a great cave came at once to Jenny's mind.

"I did what was right! I know Lord Argyll appreciates my honesty." The widow's eyes gleamed with fury. "Though the two of you may not."

Lady Let.i.tia glared at the widow. "Jen-Lady Genevieve, please escort Lady McCarthy to the front door."

Jenny instinctively bobbed a quick curtsy and shooed the horrid widow out of the room as her employer had bade her to do. She could feel every skeletal b.u.mp in the widow's lean back as she pressed her forward at near trotting speed toward the front door, where Mr. Edgar awaited with her wraps.

After leaving Lady McCarthy in his capable charge, Jenny dashed back down the pa.s.sageway for the study, for she did not want to miss any part of the unfolding drama.

But by time she returned, clearly the most interesting snippets of conversation had pa.s.sed. Callum stood, his towering frame in complete contrast to Lady Viola's tiny body, which he hugged tightly to him.

"Shhh, dinna cry," Callum said softly into her hair. "Ye cudna have known what happened to me after she left."

Lady Viola tilted her head all the way back to look up into his eyes. Tears cut trails of white through her heavy face powder. "I would have come for you. I swear it. You must believe me."

"I do believe ye. But ye must stop the tears. This day should be joyous, fer today I learned that I wasna alone in this world. I have blood kin. I have a grandmother."

"And an aunt!" Lady Let.i.tia added exuberantly, rushing forward to join her sister in hugging Callum.

Though Jenny had remained in the shadows and had said not a word, Callum seemed to know she was there. He turned around and looked straight at her.

"Jenny, did ye know of this?" he asked her. The two Featherton ladies turned to look at her.

"On my honor, I did not." As soon as the words had sailed from her mouth she regretted her choice. On her honor. Bah. What honor had she? She was living a lie-and enjoying every day of it!

"Come, la.s.s." Callum lifted his hand from Lady Viola's back, releasing her and Lady Let.i.tia as he beckoned to her. "Please, Jenny."

Hesitantly, she went to him and when she stood before him, the two old women drew back, taking Jenny's place in the shadows.