The Captain Read Free Page B

and tied with a matching blue ribbon. She wore the gold locket with two entwined ruby hearts that had once belonged to her mother. It always made her feel as if her mother were watching over her. One glance in the mirror and she knew that the fussy gown did little to improve her looks and that the locket was overlarge for her frail frame. As usual, a gaunt, pale ghost of a child looked back from her glass.
    At six o’clock sharp Trudy led Jacinda down to the great hall, where Cousin Millie was in a heated argument with Mr. Blanchett. The gentleman was elegantly dressed in evening attire, and his brown hair, shot with red highlights, was neatly groomed and gleaming in the candlelight. A riding accident that very week had forced him to use a gold-topped cane, but he’d declared it made him look more the fashionable swell, which always seemed important to the foundry-owner-turned-country-gentleman. To Jacinda’s eyes he was quite a handsome man, even at fifty.
    Aunt Devere, all blond curls and rouged cheeks, was off to one side, listening but not voicing her opinion one way or the other. The widow rarely disagreed with her late sister-in-law’s husband. She would only face his wrath when it came to pleading for him to increase her son’s allowances or begging him to be lenient when Giles had engaged in some folly that displeased Mr. Blanchett. Otherwise, she had little to say to him.
    â€œEnough!” Blanchett roared at last. “I’ll not have you ruining the evening with your sour face and attitude, Millie. You shan’t go.” He turned to Mrs. Devere, who turned her back to the gentleman’s and gave a shake of her head. He shrugged, then looked at Nurse. “What is your name?”
    The young servant quaked, but she curtsied. “Trudeau, sir. Aggie Trudeau.”
    â€œYou’re old Ben’s daughter?” When the girl acknowledged her father had been the gentleman’s head groom before his death, Mr. Blanchett nodded his approval. “Your father was a good man. Well, Trudeau, you will be Jacinda’s companion this evening. Go find a wrap.”
    Without a word, Nurse hurried up the stairs even as Millicent Markham began a new round of haranguing the gentleman. “This is beyond foolish, sir. The child has only just recovered from an inflamation of the lungs and you intend to take her out into the night chill.”
    He searched his daughter’s gaunt face and saw nothing worrisome. “That was two months ago, and she will never regain her strength locked forever in her rooms. She looks fit to me; therefore, she shall go.” His tone brooked no further argument, even from Millicent.
    They stood in strained silence until Nurse returned, then Mr. Blanchett softened his attitude, turning on his charm. “Take heart, Millie. We won’t be late. I shall have Jacinda home before eleven, I promise. Then you may cosset her to your heart’s content.”
    The lady’s lips pressed together in a grim line and she made no comment other than to remind her niece to heed her manners. In frosty silence, the spinster marched up the stairs in a huff.
    Millie’s display of pique did little to deter Mr. Blanchett. He ushered his daughter outside with Nurse on their heels. Her father directed that a small leather-bound chest be put in the carriage. The trio climbed into the large family coach and traveled the five miles to Rowland Park, which lay beyond the small village of Wookey. All the while her father kept telling her that one day she would be thankful for what he was doing.
    The only thing of note about the evening was Andrew Morrow’s absence. His father made excuses about a prior engagement, but even Jacinda’s father seemed skeptical. For Jacinda it was simply an excessively long, boring night with bad food and no real company while the gentlemen retired to the library to transact their business.
    At nine o’clock, Jacob Blanchett