Read Online Carla Kelly by The Ladys Companion - Free Book Online Page A

his face was bland and smooth again and his dark eyes completely unreadable.
    The wind braced her and woke her up again as they crossed the barnyard and came to the back entrance of the manor, solid stone and hunkered down to outlast any kind of winter thrown at it. I can admire it in the morning, she considered as her mind turned to porridge.
    David Wiggins took off his boots inside the back door, put his finger to his lips, and took her hand. He led her up the stairs and paused outside a door. “I’ll have your trunk here by noon,” he whispered as he opened the door, “provided you’re of a mind to stay.”
    She stood up straighter and glanced over his shoulder at the welcome bed beyond. “I have to stay, Mr. Wiggins,” she said, not bothering to pull hairs with this man. “I don’t have a penny to return to London on.”
    “So we’re stuck with you?” he asked, and it didn’t sound unkind. But how was she to know, with her mind already telling her how good the pillow was going to feel, if only she could get to it?
    “I think so, Mr. Wiggins. Do forgive me for being rag-mannered, but you stand between me and that bed right now, and I wish you would move.”
    He gave another of his oblique smiles, stepped out of her way, and closed the door after him. She didn’t hear him on the stairs, but as she sat in the window seat to remove her boots, she watched him head across the barnyard again. She could see a modest two-story house beyond the barn, but he made for a long building that looked like a succession house. She watched closely; in another moment, a lamp began to glow.
    Don’t you sleep? she thought as she let her dress fall to the floor, and crawled beneath the comforting weight of heavy blankets. The only reflections of any coherence that crossed her tired brain before sleep took over was the odd notion that David Wiggins had been her last thought the night before, too, as he was now.

Chapter Five
    To her continuing amazement, she woke to the thought of David Wiggins. She wiggled her chemise down around her knees where it belonged, wished for the comfort of her flannel nightgown in the trunk beside the inn, and wondered if the bailiff had slept beyond his usual waking, too.
    She looked at the clock, and sat up quickly. “This will never do, Susan,” she said out loud as she looked around her. Lady Bushnell will think I am a dreadful slug-a-bed. She allowed herself to lean back against the headboard, considering whether Lady Bushnell would seriously have a spare thought for her newest lady’s companion.
    Apparently I am only one of many, Susan thought, hugging her knees to her. She stared into the small but sturdy fire in the grate which some kind soul must have lit for her earlier. Lady Bushnell will likely ignore me and wait for me to go away. I shall not. I cannot, for I have no place else to go.
    It was an uncomfortable thought, as soon followed by another one. I have to convince Lady Bushnell that she needs me, and I haven’t the slightest notion how to go about doing that, she reflected as she got out of bed and rummaged around in the mound of clothes she had stepped out of last night as soon as David Wiggins had closed the door. She shook out her petticoat and wrapped it around her shoulders.
    The room was warm enough, so she moved to the window seat, tucking herself into its compact recess and grateful for her own small size. She gazed out the window at a white world clenched tight in the fist of winter. This was no London brown snow, but a white so intense that she had to look away after a minute’s observation. The sky was the cold blue of the bottom of a pond, and the trees skeletal, but overshadowing all was the smooth undulation of low hills that protected the valley. No traffic moved on the road they had traveled last night. They might have been the only manor on the planet, so complete was the isolation.
    But I am warm, she thought, fingering the hem of the petticoat about her