The Tutor's Daughter Read online

  “I hid.”

  “Where?”

  Adam glanced over to a long-skirted table against the nearby wall, upon which a row of marble busts was lined.

  “I see.” Henry winced at the increasingly irritating repetition of the off-key middle C. He asked gently, “It’s out of tune—is that it?”

  Adam nodded and struck the key again, ear bent near.

  “You have a good ear, Adam,” Henry said. “I shall ask Mr. Davies about arranging for a piano tuner, shall I?”

  Suddenly Lady Weston’s voice slapped the air. “Well. That was the outside of enough.”

  Henry turned, steeling himself and telling himself to remain calm.

  She stood inside the door, hands on her hips, in high dudgeon. “I asked you to keep him out of sight for two days. Two days. And you cannot even manage that.” She looked past Henry toward the pianoforte. “Where has he got to now?”

  Henry looked at the empty bench, then glanced at the skirted table. The curtain ruffled slightly, but he made no comment.

  Lady Weston pointed an angry finger at Henry. “Tell me you did not arrange this little drama to vex me—to scare away Miss Penberthy. The most eligible young woman any of you are likely to meet.”

  “I did not.”

  “It was bad enough last night with that infernal crying and banging. Fortunately I had arranged to put the Penberthys as far from that room as possible. And though I feared otherwise, they both assured me they enjoyed an undisturbed night’s sleep. You see, when I manage something, it is done and done correctly.”

  Henry gritted his teeth.

  “I told you we ought to have locked his door,” she continued. “For all our sakes. That way there would have been no chance of our . . . inconvenient . . . secret coming to light, today of all days.”

  Righteous indignation boiled through Henry’s veins. “He is not some dirty little secret, Lady Weston—not an unwashed stocking to be kicked under the bed when polite company arrives. He is a human being. And he has done nothing wrong nor hurt anybody. I will not stand by while you speak of locking him up as though he were a criminal. Do you understand me? Adam is my brother. My brother.”

  Sir Giles strode into the room, followed by Phillip.

  “I say, what’s all this, then?” his father asked, looking from his wife to Henry.

  Henry inhaled through flared nostrils. “Lady Weston is upset because her precious friend got a glimpse of Adam. She had hoped to keep him hidden until after the vows were said.”

  “Vows? What vows?”

  “Aren’t you keeping up, Father? Lady Weston plans for Phillip or me—it doesn’t really matter which—to marry Miss Penberthy. And only after it is too late will the poor girl learn that we all have deceived her by keeping this particular member of our family secret.”

  Phillip, still standing in the threshold, said nothing, but with a glance over his shoulder, he discreetly shut the door.

  Lady Weston lifted her chin. “Why does she ever need know? You’ve never told any other young lady you admired, I don’t imagine. Why should now be any different?”

  “Because I didn’t know before. That’s why.”

  Lady Weston barely blinked. “Once he is installed with a replacement guardian, all shall be as it has been for the last twenty years. Why should things change now?”

  Sir Giles must have seen the dangerous fire in Henry’s eyes, for he wisely steered the conversation to safer ground. “My dear. Henry. Let us not be at one another’s throats. Please do remember, Henry, that Lady Weston deserves a respectful tone from you, even when the two of you disagree.” He laid a hand on Henry’s shoulder. “Your mother and I did what we thought was best for you. For everyone.”

  “For me? It’s my fault somehow?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. Of course it’s not your fault. You were only a child. But we were worried about you—and Phillip. How living with such a . . . different . . . boy might affect your development, your intelligence and learning. And we feared keeping him here would put you both in danger. He was so changeable. His fits, so violent.”

  “So it was all for us.” Henry could not keep the sarcasm from his tone. “Not to avoid embarrassment on your part?”

  “Of course we were embarrassed,” Sir Giles snapped. “Our firstborn son. Not right. How we thanked God when you showed no signs of the same. How we prayed for you.”

  “Did you pray for him too?” Henry challenged.

  Sir Giles frowned. “Why are you so angry, Henry? I might understand if Adam resented us, but why should you feel this so personally, so intensely?”

  “Because you sent him away. Let me believe he died.”

  Sir Giles raised a finger. “I never said he died.”

  “‘Gone’ was the euphemism you used, Gone and not coming back. What else was I supposed to think? I was too young to press you. Too young to doubt my own father.”

  “That’s right—you were young,” Lady Weston interjected. “Too young to remember.”

  Henry clenched one fist but kept his gaze trained on his father. “I remember I had a big brother.” He clapped his other hand to his chest. “Not clearly. But enough to know I have missed someone all my life.”

  “You’re thinking of your mother, surely.”

  “I miss her, too, of course. But no, it was Adam I’ve missed all these years.” Henry shook his head. “All these years thinking he was dead, and there he was, living not twenty miles away from us the whole time.”

  “Oh, come now.” Lady Weston huffed, gesturing emphatically. “You were only—what?—four at the time? You no doubt forgot all about him until you read that letter.”

  Henry’s voice quivered in anger. “Do not presume to tell me what I do and do not remember, madam.”

  She continued undeterred, “I still don’t understand what you were doing poking about the estate ledgers in the first place, not to mention reading your father’s correspondence.”

  Phillip sent him a beseeching look, but Henry ignored it. “What I was doing, madam,” he ground out, “was trying to make sense out of this family’s precarious financial situation.”

  “I did ask him to take it in hand, my dear,” Sir Giles swiftly added. “The tangle was beyond me, and he agreed to do so, when he no doubt had plans of his own that had to be set aside.”

  She sniffed. “Be that as it may, I still maintain Henry is making too much of this. Why could he not leave well enough alone?”

  “Well enough? Well enough!” Henry’s voice rose. “Adam’s guardian dead, left in that damp cottage all alone . . . If I had not gone and fetched him when I did, who knows where he would be by now?”

  “Anywhere but here would have been preferable these last two days.”

  “The workhouse would be preferable?” Henry thundered. “For Father’s eldest son?”

  Lady Weston shook her head. “I don’t mean the workhouse, of course. But he does not belong here, as I—”

  From under the skirted table rose a muted litany, “No, no, no. . . .”

  What a fool I am, Henry chastised himself. He’d forgotten about the very person he’d been trying to defend. Of course harsh words and arguing would upset him. A very real storm in the room he occupied as unwilling witness.

  Henry hurried to the table, lowering himself to his haunches. He drew the curtain aside, revealing Adam in a fetal position, cradling his ears, and repeating his chant of distress.

  Lady Weston took one look at him and threw up her hands. “Oh yes. Ready to meet the queen, he is.” She stalked past Phillip and out of the room.

  Henry turned back to Adam. “Sorry about that. We are all through arguing. All done.” He heard his father’s footsteps retreat as well.

  Henry ignored the sting of rejection and continued, “All is well. Shhh . . . You are not in any trouble. You’re all right,” he said, grimly determined to make certain that was true.

  Phillip followed along as Henry escorted Adam upstairs to his room a few m
inutes later. When they reached the north wing, Phillip preceded them down the corridor and opened the door for them.

  Inside, Henry led Adam to his favorite chair while Phillip stepped to the washstand and poured a glass of water. When Adam was seated, Henry laid a lap robe over his knees and Phillip handed him the glass of water.

  “Thank you,” Adam whispered, his chin still quivering.

  Henry noticed Phillip staring at his eldest brother. A person he had never seen in his life before returning from Oxford.

  “I still can’t quite get over it,” Phillip said. “That there is another Weston. Another son of our mother and father.”

  Henry nodded. “I know.”

  Phillip’s gaze remained on Adam. “His features are so familiar. His eyes are like mine, are they not?”

  Apparently aware of their scrutiny, Adam’s innocent blue gaze skittered from one to the other before landing on a book on the side table. He picked it up and placed it in his lap, running his hands over the cover again and again as though drawing comfort from its texture, its familiarity.

  “Yes,” Henry acknowledged. “You look more like Adam than like me. Lucky devil.”

  Phillip did not acknowledge the compliment. He was busy staring at Adam. “He looks so . . . normal.”

  “I know,” Henry agreed. “When I look at him, I see a little of you, a little of Father, and now and again, in one of his rare smiles . . . a little of our mother.”

  Phillip said quietly, “I don’t remember her.”

  Henry opened his mouth to reply, but Mrs. Prowse knocked and entered with Adam’s dinner tray. A second plate—hers—joined his. The kind housekeeper often shared her mealtimes with Adam. It warmed Henry’s heart to see it. He owed the woman so much.

  They greeted her, thanked her, saw the two of them settled contentedly together, and then Henry and Phillip excused themselves.

  Together they retreated slowly from the north wing. As they reached the main corridor, Henry glanced at his younger brother. “Phillip, I’m sorry. I know I lost my temper downstairs.”

  “No need to apologize to me.”

  Henry shot him a look. “If you’re hinting I need to apologize to Lady Weston, that will need to wait. I am not yet calm enough to attempt it.”

  “No doubt. I haven’t seen you that upset since they announced you were being sent away to school.”

  Henry snorted. “Remember that, do you?”

  “Impressed on my ten-year-old mind forever.” Phillip shuddered theatrically, then sobered. “It still bothers her, you know.”

  “What does?”

  “That you’ve always refused to call her Mother.”

  Henry expelled an exasperated breath. “Everything I do, or don’t do, seems to bother her.”

  Phillip continued as though he’d not heard his protest. “Is it because you remember our own mamma?”

  “I suppose so. That and the fact that Violet Weston and I have never liked each other.”

  “I don’t think it’s so much that she does not like you, Henry,” Phillip said quietly. “It’s that you never let her forget she is not your mamma and never shall be.”

  His brother’s words, gently spoken, stung Henry’s heart with conviction. He wanted to dismiss them but could not.

  When they reached the top of the stairs, Henry turned in to the alcove and stood before the portrait of their mother.

  Staring at it, Phillip inhaled deeply. “I wish I did remember her. How weak you must think me for trying to gain Violet Weston’s affection all these years.”

  His brother’s downcast expression stung Henry’s conscience once more. “Not at all, Phillip. Good heavens, you were only a toddler when Mamma died. Of course you needed a mother.”

  “And you did not?”

  Henry looked away from his brother’s knowing blue eyes.

  Phillip let the subject drop. “Father used to tell me Mamma called me her ‘little pip.’ But when I try to remember, all I see is this portrait of her, with the mouth moving and father’s voice speaking in falsetto, ‘my little pip.’”

  Henry chuckled. “I know. I can’t remember her voice either. And her face . . . The older, dearer face I knew is fading more and more into this”—he nodded toward the portrait—“less familiar one.”

  Phillip looked at him. “What do you remember about her?”

  Henry thought. He did not remember her sending Adam away. Had he so idealized her as the perfect person no one was? He said, “I remember her reading to me. And her sad smile. Her large, kind eyes. The way she smelled—like lily of the valley. But of course that memory has been renewed by the occasional sniff of her old perfume bottle.” He glanced at his brother sheepishly. “And now you will think me the weak one.”

  “Never.” Phillip paused. “I don’t suppose I might take a sniff?”

  Henry’s lips parted in surprise. “Of course. It has recently gone missing, I’m afraid. But as soon as I find it again, I shall bring it to you. How selfish I’ve been to keep it to myself. I didn’t think you’d remember.”

  “I don’t,” Phillip said. “But I’d like to.”

  We have this comfort, he cannot be a bad or a wicked child.

  —George Austen (Jane Austen’s father) writing about his son raised elsewhere.

  Chapter 15

  The next afternoon, Lizzie found Emma in the schoolroom just after the boys had been dismissed for the day. She held a battledore under her arm and a shuttlecock in her hand. With her free hand, she thrust a second racquet toward Emma. “Do say you’ll play, Emma.”

  Emma stared down at the offered racquet with resignation but little pleasure. She had refused the girl too many times to do so again. Besides, the thought of fresh air and sunshine appealed to Emma more than usual. She was eager to leave behind the tense confines of the manor and her relentless questions about Adam.

  “Very well. I shall.” She accepted the battledore. “But I warn you—I play very ill.”

  At least Emma assumed she did. She had not played in years but accepted the fact that she was not athletic in general. She had long avoided any activity involving fast-flying objects.

  After Emma retrieved bonnet and gloves from her room, the girls went downstairs and outside. As they walked to an open area of the lawn, Lizzie asked, “Did you hear what happened yesterday, after most of us left the music room?”

  Emma shook her head. “No.”

  Lizzie explained, “After the Penberthys departed, I asked Julian what all the fuss had been about. Apparently Miss Penberthy saw a stranger playing the pianoforte, but Lady Weston passed him off as a distant relative. Like me. Really, it was a fifth Weston brother. They’ve been keeping him in the north wing!” Lizzie shook her head in wonder. “It was the first I’d heard of him. I told you they don’t trust me to keep a secret.” She looked at Emma accusingly. “I suppose even you knew about Adam Weston before I did.”

  Emma soothed, “I only learned of him Saturday night. I heard him cry out during the storm.”

  Lizzie nodded in relief. “I went up to see him this morning.” She darted a sly smile at Emma. “He is quite good-looking, isn’t he, for all his odd ways?”

  “Yes, I suppose he is.”

  Lizzie stepped several yards away and faced Emma, shuttlecock held in her fingertips over the battledore, poised to serve. “I wonder about Henry. If he’ll still be heir and all. Julian says they’ll likely have Adam declared incompetent to inherit or something like that.”

  “I wouldn’t know,” Emma said, though she imagined Julian was probably right.

  Lizzie struck the feathered shuttlecock, and it lofted in the air in Emma’s general direction. As Emma tried to follow it, the sun got in her eyes and she blinked. The shuttlecock fluttered to the ground.

  “Sorry.” Emma bent to retrieve it, tried to mimic Lizzie’s method of serving, missed the feathered object altogether, and had to retrieve it once more.

  She groaned. “I told you I was out of practice.”


  Unconcerned, Lizzie said, “Lady Weston is sorely vexed. She fears Adam has spoiled their chances with the Penberthys.”

  Emma swung hard, sending the shuttlecock high. Too high. The wind caught it and carried it far out of Lizzie’s reach.

  “Sorry!”

  As the girl hurried after it, Emma thought back to the ball. If she had read Miss Penberthy correctly, the young woman preferred Phillip. Though it was less easy to tell if either Phillip or Henry admired her. Emma found she felt no jealousy where Philip was concerned. For all his warmth, Emma had come to realize he felt only platonic friendship for her.

  When Lizzie returned and prepared to serve, Emma asked, “Do you mean that Lady Weston hoped for an attachment between Miss Penberthy and Phillip?”

  Lizzie snapped her head up. “Why would you say Phillip?” She frowned. “Why should it be him and not Henry? He is the eldest after all, if one doesn’t count Adam, and Lady Weston certainly does not.”

  Emma felt her brow pucker. Had she misunderstood Lizzie’s declaration of love for an “older Mr. Weston,” or had Lizzie changed her mind? She sputtered, “I don’t know. I—”

  Lizzie smacked the shuttlecock hard and it flew right toward Emma’s face.

  Emma squealed and ducked. When she looked up, she saw Lizzie roll her eyes.

  Emma picked up the shuttlecock and positioned it. But a glance told her something else had caught Lizzie’s attention from across the stable yard.

  Head turned, Lizzie said, “Here come Phillip and Henry now. They went to interview another possible guardian for Adam, I believe.” She slanted Emma another of her sly looks. “Or so I overhead.”

  The two brothers came striding across the lawn, coattails billowing in the breeze. Henry wore his customary intense look, topper pulled low. Phillip’s sat a jaunty angle, but even he appeared uncharacteristically sober.

  Lizzie hurried toward them and thrust her battledore at Henry’s midriff. “Henry, do be a dear and take over for me with Miss Smallwood. I need to ask Phillip something.”