Lady of Milkweed Manor Page 23

  His eyes widened in recognition. “That’s right. And has your shoulder recovered from serving as Mrs. Beebe’s pillow?” He smiled his boyish smile.

  “Indeed, there was little recovery needed.”

  “I am surprised to hear it. But don’t let on I suggested Mrs. Beebe has a large head or I shall never hear the end of it. Nor enjoy those apple tarts of hers anytime soon.”

  “Thomas! Thomas, look how high!” Lizzy Cox called from her position up the beach. Her brother turned to look her way. Again he whooped and raised a triumphant hand in the air.

  Charlotte bent to reexamine the wheel. She really should be getting back. Mrs. Taylor might worry.

  “Broke, did it?” With one large step, Thomas drew near and hunched beside her, hands on his knees.

  “I’m afraid so. I feel terrible—it belongs to Mr. and Mrs. Beebe.”

  “Never fear. I helped Mr. Beebe build the wee gig. We’ll have ’er fixed up sharp.” Thomas loped back up the hill, as if the incline were no effort for his long legs.

  A few minutes later, Lizzy jogged over, winding the twine back around its spool. “Thomas can fix anything,” she confided.

  “Did your kite fall again?”

  She shrugged. “No, I reeled it in. I need to finish my work in the garden.”

  “That’s your home there?” Charlotte asked, looking up the ridge.

  “Goodness no. That’s Shore Hill House. Thomas works there.”

  “He’s their gardener?” Charlotte asked, watching Thomas return across the pebbled shore.

  Again Lizzy shrugged. “Gardener, carter, cooper, surgeon, and all around repair boy.”

  “Surgeon?”

  Thomas clearly overheard at least part of their conversation. “Lizzy, don’t abuse Miss Charlotte’s ear so—and you know I’m not a surgeon.” He bent to the task of repairing the baby carriage.

  “Did you not set Johnny’s arm and put a cast on it? And make those poultices for Mother that set her to rights last winter?”

  “Yes, but you’re family.”

  “You stitched up the McKinleys’ dog when it got into a fight last week. And Mrs. Moody says you’re better at getting her boy’s shoulder back in place than that surgeon in town.”

  Thomas looked at Charlotte apologetically. “Not everyone can afford to call a surgeon for every ache and injury.” He shrugged, the gesture charmingly similar to his sister’s. “I just do what I can.”

  “How do you know what to do?”

  “I read a great deal. One of the families I work for—and have for some eight years now—the grandfather was a physician. When he died they gave me a few of his books.”

  Charlotte nodded her understanding, wondering though, what Dr. Taylor would think of an uneducated man setting bones and stitching wounds. Of course she knew there were plenty of men who worked as surgeons or apothecaries who had never read a single book on the subject.

  “The family I work for—the father is a physician.”

  “The family letting Lloyd Lodge?”

  Charlotte nodded.

  “Is he planning to practice here?”

  “I do not believe so. We’re only to be here for a few months.”

  He looked oddly disappointed.

  “But if you wanted to see him for something . . .”

  “I should not like to trouble him on his holiday.”

  She wanted to say more, but Thomas abruptly rose to his feet, and to his full impressive height.

  “There you are, good as new.”

  “Thank you so much. I shall tell the Beebes of your noble service.”

  “Please do—perhaps I shall earn an extra tart from the telling.” He smiled.

  “I should like to pay you something for your time, but I haven’t my purse. . . .”

  He waved her offer away. “Don’t give it a second thought, Miss Charlotte. It’s what neighbors do.”

  “So you do live nearby?”

  “Yes, a modest cottage further inland. About midway between here and Lloyd Lodge, I’d say. Wouldn’t you, Lizzy?”

  “About that, yes.”

  Charlotte began pushing the carriage. “Well, then, perhaps I shall have the pleasure of seeing you again sometime, Lizzy. And Thomas.”

  He smiled again. “The pleasure, Miss Charlotte, would be ours.”

  Mrs. Beebe looked up from the buns she was brushing with egg-water. “There you are, Miss Charlotte. The missus was looking for you.”

  Regret filled her. “I feared as much. Where is she?”

  “She and her maid went into the village to do some shopping, though I don’t suppose she’ll find much there to her fancy. She wanted to take Anne along, but I told her, I did, ‘Mrs. Taylor, I have six grandbabies. So believe me when I tell you, you shall have a much more pleasant outing without a babe in arms.’”

  Mrs. Beebe winked at Charlotte.

  “Thank you.” Charlotte smiled, relieved. She could ill afford to anger Mrs. Taylor. “I happened upon Thomas Cox and his sister Lizzy on my walk.”

  “Did you now?”

  “Yes, I understand Thomas works for several families in the area.”

  “That he does. Does an odd job for Mr. Beebe now and again as well. That boy can fix anything he puts his hand to, whether it be an object or growing things, animals, even people.”

  “Lizzy said he set her brother’s broken arm.”

  “That’d be Johnny, the rascal. Always gettin’ into some mischief or other.”

  “And I’m afraid I broke a wheel of Mr. Beebe’s carriage—but Thomas repaired it.”

  “That’s a mercy. No one likes to see the old man cry.” Mrs. Beebe grinned. “Thomas has the touch, he does. What a blessing he is, especially to his mother—what with the mister out to sea fishing for days on end.”

  “I wonder he’s so much older than his sister.”

  “Than all the others, aye.” Mrs. Beebe looked as though she might say more but seemed to think better of it.

  “Do pass me that sugarloaf, will you? There’s a love.”

  On a fine afternoon the following week, Charlotte again took Anne for a walk on the shore. She looked up hopefully but saw no kites in the sky. She enjoyed the wind—though the arrangement of her hair did not—and she relished the freedom of being out of the cottage and the atmosphere of malaise that seemed to indwell it. So, too, the relief of being out from under the watchful eye of Mrs. Taylor. Her mistress was certainly not cruel, but she was exacting in her expectations of how Anne should be cared for—how she should be dressed, upon which side of her head the bow should be fastened in her small tufts of hair, and so on. It was tiresome to always be on one’s guard against a misstep. And unsettling to realize one’s livelihood and lodgings depended on a mistress who was both particular and changeable.

  “Miss Charlotte!” a voice called down to her from the ridge above. There was Lizzy Cox, in those same trousers, waving down to her. “Come and see!” she called excitedly. “Come and see!”

  Charlotte did not relish the prospect of pushing the baby carriage up the steep incline, so she maneuvered it off the side of the path, picked up Anne, and carried her up the slope. Lizzy met her halfway. “You’re just in time!”

  “For what?”

  “Lambs!”

  She followed Lizzy around a fine house and to a timbered outbuilding. Inside, the smell of hay and grain and animals was strong, but not unpleasantly so. In the straw bed of a stall, Thomas sat cross-legged beside a ewe, on her side breathing rapidly. Thomas held one lamb in his arms, a second draped over his leg. “That’s it, then. Hello, Miss Charlotte.”

  “Hello, Thomas.”

  “Always best to be on hand during lambing. Tend to have trouble, they do. This girl is late—and see how big her lambs are.” He held up the one in his arms for her inspection.

  “She was having trouble at first,” Lizzy said, “bellowing something awful. But Thomas helped her along.”

  “Old Bob is a friend of mine. Ha
d to go to town for his daughter’s wedding, so I said I’d watch this ewe for him.”

  He stuck a piece of straw into the lamb’s nostrils. The lamb sneezed. Thomas wiped at its nose with a rag, then wiped down the rest of the lamb as well. “Sneezing helps them breathe.”

  He offered the lamb in his hands to Lizzy. “Would you like to hold this little lad?”

  “Yes, please.”

  She took the lamb into her arms and held him gently against her chest. “How soft he is.”

  “Would you like a turn, Miss Charlotte?” Thomas asked. “I’d offer to hold Anne for you, but my hands are soiled.”

  “Here, I shall hold her, Miss Charlotte.” Lizzy handed her lamb back to Thomas, wiped her hands on her trousers and held out her hands to receive Anne. Anne, one fist in her mouth, opened her mouth even wider, forming a smile around her hand. Drool leaked out, but Lizzy didn’t seem to mind. She held Anne as if she had held many babies before. And likely had.

  Thomas handed Charlotte the lamb and she held it and stroked it.

  “You’re right, Lizzy. He is soft indeed.”

  Little Anne’s eyes lit up as she watched the baby animal. She babbled happily and reached both hands toward the lamb.

  “Not this time, moppet,” Charlotte said gently. “He’s not to put into your mouth.”

  She handed the lamb back to Thomas, who set it on the floor near its mother, followed by its sibling. The ewe scrambled to her feet and began licking first one lamb, then the other. Stretching their necks eagerly, the lambs began to nurse.

  “They’ll be all right on their own now,” Thomas said, and rose to his feet. Charlotte took Anne from Lizzy, and they all stepped outside into the sunshine. Thomas washed his hands in a bucket and wiped them with a clean rag.

  “I’m off to finish picking the beans,” Lizzy announced, running off.

  “Care to see the garden, Miss Charlotte?” Thomas asked.

  “Very much. I love a garden.”

  They strolled through the gardens inland from the house. In the vegetable garden, Charlotte grinned at the sight of Lizzy, tongue between her lips in concentration, carefully plucking bean pods from the vine. They also toured a kitchen herb garden and several flower gardens, all very well kept.

  She was surprised to spy several milkweeds along the garden wall, near the hollyhocks. “Do you mind if I take some milkweed back with me?”

  He looked at her, an amused grin on his face. “Have a wart, do you?”

  Embarrassed by this, she laughed. “No! But my employer is quite fond of milkweeds—uses them to treat a whole list of ailments.”

  “Does he now? I should like to know the contents of that list.”

  “You shall have to come by the cottage. I know he would be happy to tell you.”

  From the garden, Charlotte and Thomas walked to the top of the ridge, overlooking the sea. “Care to sit for a moment and enjoy the view?” Thomas asked.

  “Thank you.”

  He reached out his hands to take Anne, and Charlotte was surprised when the child went to the big man willingly. Charlotte sat on the edge of the lawn and straightened her skirts around her. Thomas plopped down not far from her, easily holding Anne in the crook of one arm as he did so.

  She lifted her arms to take Anne back, but Thomas shrugged. “I’ll hold her, if neither of you mind.”

  Lizzy bounded up and sat beside Charlotte. “Cook gave me a sixpence,” she said proudly.

  “My goodness. For picking beans?”

  “Well, there were the peas and lettuces this morning too.”

  “What a hard worker you are. So, Lizzy, tell me about your brothers and sisters—three of each, I believe you said?”

  “Right. There’s my sisters: Hannah, Hester, and Kitty. They don’t like the out-of-doors as I do. Then my brothers: Thomas here, of course. And Johnny and Edmund.”

  “Edmund? That is my very favorite name. How old is he?”

  Thomas leaned closer to Charlotte and said in a low voice, “We lost Edmund as an infant, but Lizzy still counts him.”

  Charlotte looked at Lizzy, who was staring down at her lap. Feeling tears spring to her eyes, Charlotte put her arm around the girl’s shoulder and gave her a squeeze. “Of course she does.”

  Lizzy looked up, and Charlotte smiled gently at her. “And so do I.”

  Lizzy smiled shyly in return.

  A few minutes later, Lizzy ran off to find a litter of kittens a mother cat was reported to have hidden somewhere about the place.

  “She’s a lovely girl,” Charlotte said, craning her neck to watch her go.

  “Yes.”

  “Is she the youngest?”

  “No, Edmund would be nearly five now, had he lived. Kitty is seven. Lizzy there is ten. Johnny’s twelve. Hannah and Hester are twins at fourteen.

  “It’s a wonder there are so many years between you and the others.”

  “Not such a wonder, really.” Thomas tossed a twig out over the ridge. “Our mum took me in when I was already a lad of nine. Adopted me as one of her own. Hannah and Hester were but a year old at the time.”

  “Were you relations?”

  “No. My first mother was only a neighbor. Died in childbirth, the baby girl with her.”

  “I am sorry.”

  “Do not make yourself unhappy. I feel blessed to have Rachel Cox as my mother. And these children to call brothers and sisters.”

  “How well do you remember your first mother, as you called her?”

  Thomas’s eyes stayed on the distant sea as he thought. “Quite well, though I cannot recall her features as clearly as I once did.” He picked up a pebble and tossed it as well.

  Charlotte swallowed the lump in her throat. She asked quietly, “Do you miss her?”

  He looked at her, clearly surprised by the question, or her shaking voice. No doubt he saw the tears in her eyes as well. He returned his gaze to the sea. He was silent for some time, picking at the pebbles near his legs, gathering them into his large hands. Finally he said, “I have all I could wish for with my family here. But . . . yes, there is a . . . a quiet longing for her. I am a man of two and twenty but still I sometimes dream of her. In the dreams, I cannot see her face, but I can feel her arms about me.”

  Charlotte nodded, biting her lip. Tears rolled down her cheeks.

  Thomas looked at her, his expression serious and aware. He said nothing but simply waited.

  She opened her mouth then closed it again. Finally, voice quivering, she whispered, “My son . . . is being raised by another.”

  Slowly, he nodded his understanding. “Edmund?” he asked quietly.

  She nodded, and neither said more.

  As soon as Charlotte stepped into the parlor, Mrs. Taylor rose from the settee. “You have been gone a long while, Miss Lamb. I was beginning to fear I would never see you—or my daughter—again.” She smiled as she spoke, but an understandable mixture of relief and displeasure strained her features.

  “Please pardon me, madame. I took Anne for a walk and lost track of time.”

  Only then did Charlotte notice the older woman seated across from Mrs. Taylor, half hidden by the wings of the tall arm chair. The lady appeared to be in her fifties and had a beautiful coif of silver grey hair under an elegant black hat.

  “Mrs. Dillard has been waiting for nearly an hour to meet Annette.”

  “Forgive me. I did not realize you were expecting guests.” Charlotte handed the little girl to her mother.

  “Here she is, Mrs. Dillard. Is she not beautiful?”

  The older woman rose and Charlotte saw that her attire, though practical, was finely made. Mrs. Dillard stepped across the carpet with dignified ease. “Yes, lovely.” She patted the child’s head with jeweled fingers. “Very like you.”

  “Thank you. Please, do sit down again, Mrs. Dillard. I shall call for more tea.”

  But the woman remained standing. “Now that I have met your charming daughter, I really must be going. Ladies’ Charity
meeting begins—” she lifted the watch pendant hanging from a chain at her waist—“dear me, half an hour ago.”

  “I am so sorry to have kept you waiting, Mrs. Dillard.”

  “No need to apologize. I understand how difficult it is to find a dependable nurse.” The woman spoke as though Charlotte were not standing there in the doorway. “My daughter has been through two in the last four months. The first one nearly ate the larder down to the walls.” She pulled on her gloves. “Thank you for the kind invitation, Mrs. Taylor. I do so hope you enjoy your holiday here.”

  Mrs. Taylor’s smile was forced. “You are very kind. Thank you.”

  The woman bid her good-day and Charlotte held her breath, preparing for the worst.

  The door closed, but Lizette Taylor still stared after the woman. “There will be no answering invitation, I can promise you.”

  “I am sorry, madame.”

  “Yes—you did not help me impress the ladies.” She sat down heavily on the settee, jostling Anne, and waved her hand in a fatalistic gesture. “But they would not be impressed in any case. The other two ladies left before tea was even served. They remembered some church meeting they ‘simply must attend.’ I am surprised Mrs. Dillard stayed as long as she did.”

  Before Charlotte could form some consoling response, Mrs. Taylor continued, “They were eager enough to respond to my written invitation. And how they smiled when they first arrived—surprised to find a doctor’s wife so finely dressed, I think. But then I began to speak and how their smiles fell from their faces. When they realized I was French, they could not leave quickly enough.”

  “Perhaps they really did have obligations.”

  Again the dismissive wave.

  “Mrs. Taylor, I cannot tell you how sorry I am. I never considered how it must be for you to—”

  Lizette Taylor held up her palm, ceasing Charlotte’s words midsentence. “I may be a French woman living apart from my country and my family . . . but you are in no position to pity me, Nourrice.”

  Charlotte looked down and Mrs. Taylor followed her gaze, until her eyes widened.

  “Your hands . . . what has happened?”

  Charlotte looked down at her dirt-streaked gloves.