He inclined his head, and then without waiting to see whether she followed, started from the room. Jane hurried after the older servant. Joseph moved at an unexpectedly quick clip for one of his advanced years. Every so often, his left leg hitched. That halting movement allowed her to fall into step beside him.
He grimaced as though in pain.
A twinge of sympathy tugged at her heart, and with it an equally strong loathing for the marquess, who’d not permit this man a deserved retirement. She opened her mouth to assure Joseph that she was not in need of an escort, but then he shot her a challenging glance. Jane promptly closed her mouth. Too often she’d been the object of people’s pity. She’d not subject the kindly servant to that emotion.
She would, however, use the opportunity to find out more of her employer and his willful sister. “You have been in the marquess employ long, Joseph?” she asked as they moved down the thin-carpeted corridors.
“I’ve been in service to the marquess and his family for forty years, Mrs. Munroe.”
Was it loyalty to the man’s father that kept him here? Periodically, Joseph motioned to a room—a parlor, a study—acquainting Jane with her new, temporary, but hopefully not too temporary residence. “And His Lordship requires you to continue at your post?”
He shot her a sidelong look. “The current Marquess of Waverly has offered me my retirement. I choose to continue in my role,” he murmured. Before she could ask the questions that sprung forth to her lips, he motioned to a closed door. “The library, Mrs. Munroe.”
It did not escape her notice that he sought to divert her questions away from the Marquess of Waverly. Hmm. The man inspired loyalty in his servants. She furrowed her brow and considered how such a rigid, unbending, and unfeeling man could rouse anything but fear and annoyance in a person. It mattered not. The person who would ultimately decide her fate was none other than the gentleman’s sister. As they turned at the end of the corridor, Jane put another question to the servant. “And what of Lady Chloe?” she asked. “Is there anything you might tell me of Lady Chloe?” Anything that would prove useful in winning over the likely spoiled, young lady.
A frown tugged his lips downward. The kindly gentleman grew a good deal less kind when presented questions about his employer or the man’s kin. “She is an honorable, spirited young lady.”
Spirited. There was that word again. And honorable. Together, two unexpected words assigned any of Mrs. Belden’s former students.
As they moved through the house, Jane committed the long halls and corridors to memory. Having been employed in the homes of other powerful nobleman, she’d learned to appreciate possible paths of escape. What seemed an interminable amount of time later, they reached Jane’s chambers. “His Lordship would likely afford you the use of the rooms, Mrs. Munroe.” She highly doubted that. Not when he was likely plotting, even now, the most efficient way to have her removed from his home.
With a murmur of thanks, Jane stood staring down the hall, long after Joseph had taken his leave, wondering at the austere nobleman who commanded such loyalty.
Chapter 6
Gabriel stood at the corner of the darkened library, his gaze turned out to the quiet streets below. The half-moon that hung in the sky cast a soft glow upon the cobbled roads, illuminating the deep puddles left after days of cool, London rain. He looped his hands behind his back, following a lone, slow moving carriage as it rattled past. His sister still lay abed, incapacitated with her megrims. Oftentimes, the episodes would last the course of a day. In rare cases, they would last longer. Through each, he suffered the blame that came from his sister’s suffering.
He laid his forehead against the cool windowpane and took each lash of guilt. What manner of brother did not stop vicious attacks upon a mere child? The honorable one, the younger one, nearly took their father apart with his bare hands. What had Gabriel done? Nothing that mattered. A hungering thirst for a drink filled him, consuming and desperate. He strode over to the sideboard, made his selection, and decanter and snifter in hand, he then carried them to the leather winged back chair set up in the corner of the room. Gabriel claimed a seat and shifted the burden in his hands. He filled his glass to the rim and set the decanter at his feet.