Lady in the Mist - Laurie Alice Eakes [15]
He retrieved a stack of table linens from the worktable, where the laundry maid had left them for him to collect. Before stacking them in the sideboard, he must inspect each piece for wear or tear, fray or stain. Kendall expected his tablecloths and serviettes to be as pristine as his shirts and cravats, as white as his butler’s hair. Dominick had never known his parents’ stiff-necked butler to stoop to such menial tasks—he probably gave the chore to his army of footmen. Dominick didn’t possess such a luxury.
Of course, Dinah and Deborah might oblige. They greeted him with enthusiasm when he returned to the house.
“I’ll get the door for you, sir.” Dinah bounced to her feet, allowing a shower of peelings to cascade onto the floor.
“I’ll pull out the drawers for you.” Deborah followed with a little more decorum.
“You will return to your chairs and finish scraping the vegetables,” Letty commanded. “Mr. Cherrett, you will see to the linens yourself.”
Did the woman read his mind?
“But I was so hoping for some company in my lonely task.”
“It must be lonely, being the only manservant in the house,” Dinah said. “Surely I can help, Letty. It’ll take only a few minutes.”
“It’ll take less time if you both help,” Dominick suggested.
“No, you will do your own work,” Letty admonished. “Alone.”
“And here I thought the butler directed the servants.” Dominick sighed gustily enough to flutter the serviette on the top of the stack.
The scent of starch wafted into his face stronger than the stewing game, and he screwed up his features in an effort not to sneeze.
“I’ve been here longer.” Letty wiped her hands on her apron and took two cloths off the top of the stack. “I’ll need these to wrap the bread rolls for dinner. Mr. Kendall is entertaining, if entertaining a newly widowed man is the right term.”
“Newly widowed?” Dominick arched one brow in query. “Mr. Wilkins, is it?”
“Aye, so you know of that.”
“I heard through the dining room door when Miss Eckles told Kendall of the loss.”
“The poor man,” Dinah cooed. “All that lovely money of his, and he’s without a wife to enjoy it.”
“Or heir to inherit it,” Deborah added.
“He won’t be looking to either of you for solace,” Letty snapped. “Get your minds off of men and onto your work. You’re both too young for Harlan Wilkins.”
“He’s no more than thirty,” Dinah pointed out. “That’s young to be a widower.”
“Isn’t the midwife a bit too young to be a widow?” Dominick asked.
“She’s not a widow,” all the women chorused.
“The women in her family have been midwives for generations,” Letty explained. “She used to simply work with her mother and grandmother, but when they died, Miss Tabitha took on the work alone. She’s the closest medical person we have since the apothecary died last year.”
“Then the death of a patient must be even harder on her.” Dominick gazed through half-lowered lids at the bundles of herbs hanging from the ceiling. “I wonder if she needs comfort.”
“She’s so old,” Dinah and Deborah protested.
“All of four and twenty.” Letty banged a lid onto a pot. “And you steer clear of her. She’s had enough grief in her life, and Harlan Wilkins may make more for her.”
“Will he blame her for his wife’s death?” Dominick asked.
“Most likely. He’d never think it has to do with his neglect of that poor young lady he married.”
“You have a poor opinion of the man,” Dominick mused.
“No less than I have of any gaming male.” She gave Dominick a pointed glance, then yanked open the door of the oven set into the hearth. “I expect you gambled your way into servitude.”
“I didn’t gamble away my future,” Dominick shot back, then, for a chance at honesty in an existence that owed little to truth, he added, “not like you think.”
Gaming establishments hadn’t been his downfall. No, he’d taken a different sort of gamble and won at a price he still didn’t know if he could pay.
“You don’t fool me.” Letty stalked to the table and began to inspect the vegetables the girls had peeled. “Nothing else brings a gentleman down like the cards or the dice or females.”
“Not me.” Dominick