The Christmas Knot Read Online Free Page B

between governesses. “I am no teacher,” Richard said a little ruefully, but immediately dispelled the mild charm of that statement by a sardonic question. “May I assume you have some experience as a governess, Mrs. White?”
    “You may assume whatever you like,” Edwina retorted, and then regretted her tone. He had just ordered tea for her; it was most unfair of her to snipe at him over nothing. Besides that, he could still throw her into the rainstorm. She wasn’t quite ready to die. “But yes, I have served as governess to two different families, neither of whose children, I may add, were as intelligent and well-behaved as yours.”
    If anything, his mood darkened, but both children grinned, and Mrs. Cropper said, “Lovely children, aren’t they? What a pity their mother didn’t live to see them grow up.”
    “A pity indeed,” Richard said. “Now, if the two of you have finished eating, you may help Mrs. Cropper clean up. I shall show Mrs. White to her bedchamber.”
    He supplied her with a candle, picked up her valise, and accompanied her silently up the wide oak staircase. The elegant carving gleamed in the candlelight. “As Lizzie told you, we don’t use that wing,” he said, pointing to the left and leading her right. He indicated the children’s bedchambers on the way and led her to a commodious room—better than the usual governess’s lot—with a fire sizzling in the grate and sheets airing before it. “I hope you know how to make a bed, for I don’t, and Lizzie has done enough for today.”
    “I’m sure I shall manage,” Edwina said. “I don’t know why you stay in this godforsaken place where your children have to work as servants.” Oh, damn—she shouldn’t have said that either.
    “I have my reasons, none of which are your business,” Richard said, “and if you think paying my children pretty compliments will make me wish to retain your services, you are quite mistaken. I can still show you the door.”
    “And I can still leave of my own free will,” she retorted. “My compliments were sincere, and their mother must have been an angel, for they certainly never got their good qualities from you.”
    “Good night, Mrs. White,” he said, containing his temper better than she—and why not? He must know her threat was pure bravado, whilst his was terrifyingly real. Damn him, was he amused? “And by the way,” he said, “it was only natural that you should learn a little about the sad history of our ghost, but I shall be most annoyed if I find that you have encouraged the children to discuss it. Kindly keep to their lessons and nothing else.”
    Before she could summon a retort, he shut the door and left.
    It was nowhere near bedtime, so once she had unpacked her meagre belongings, made the bed, and dried her hair by the fire, there was nothing to do. She had only the one candle, so couldn’t risk burning it down to nothing—and in any event she had nothing to read and no stitchery to work on. If only she’d thought to ask for some mending, of which there was always plenty in a household with children. She pondered going downstairs and asking Mrs. Cropper, but Richard had so pointedly dismissed her that she daren’t risk annoying him again tonight.
    Which left her with nothing to do but sit in the dark—a melancholy occupation, because all she could think of was her probable fate. In order to stay at the Grange, she would have to kowtow to Richard Ballister, no matter how rude and unkind he might choose to be. As long as she performed a useful service, as long as the children liked her, he might allow her to remain.
    He might even pay her, unlike her other employers. She could only hope. Otherwise, the future was unspeakably grim.
    After a while she heard the children come upstairs to bed. Then there was silence but for the rain on the window panes and a blustery wind. At last fatigue took over from worry. She undressed, spreading her gown over a chair. Her other gown was