Elizabeth Mansfield by Poor Caroline Read Free Book Online

uncomfortable. “I don’t think we should discuss this matter in front of your valet,” he murmured, glancing at Mickley.
    “Mickley isn’t exactly my valet,” Kit said. “He’s special. I wouldn’t be alive if not for Mr. Mickley. You must regard him as my friend, which he is.”
    “Yes, my lord,” the butler said, unmoved.
    “So, you see,” Kit went on, “anything you wish to say to me may be said in front of him. He has my absolute trust. Now, tell us why you feel you must leave.”
    “Because, my lord, it will be impossible for me to run this house properly for you. Not anymore. Not without ... without ...” He paused and dropped his eyes.
    “Without ... ?” Kit prodded.
    The butler looked up and met Kit’s eyes, a look of angry accusation in his own. “Without Miss Whitlow.”
    “Miss Whitlow?” Kit’s brows lifted. “Who is—Oh, yes. You mentioned her before. My uncle’s ward, you said.”
    “Miss Caroline Whitlow, yes. She ran the household for your uncle during all the years he was ill.”
    “I see. But who the devil is she? She can’t be my aunt Martha’s daughter, can she? I didn’t think Martha Whitlow had any children.”
    “No, my lord, she hasn’t. Caroline was Sir John Whitlow’s brother’s daughter—your aunt Martha’s niece by marriage.”
    “Then how is it she became my uncle Clement’s ward? There was no blood relationship between them.”
    “That didn’t matter to your uncle. When she was orphaned and in need, Lady Whitlow asked him to take her in. He grew very fond of her, His Lordship did. She was like a daughter to him.” He paused and pursed his lips. “We are all very fond of Miss Caroline.”
    “Are you indeed?” Kit murmured, beginning to understand. “Is she the one who left today? Was it her ‘departure’ the vicar spoke of?”
    “Yes, my lord, it was,” Sowell said, his tone a distinct reprimand. “Mr. Lutton will miss her. We’ll all miss her. And her little brothers, too.”
    Kit, trying to understand the particulars of what had occurred, ignored the butler’s insolent tone of voice. But Mickley, bristling, took a firm step into the room. “I’d cork up that clapper, man, if I was you,” he barked, fixing the butler with a threatening glare. “I ‘ave no likin’ fer you implyin’ that the lady’s ‘de-par-ture’ was my cap’n’s fault!”
    “Hush, Mick,” Kit said quietly. “Let me handle this.”
    The butler looked from one to the other. Then he squared his shoulders. “If you want the truth, my lord,” he said belligerently, “it is your fault.”
    Kit’s eyebrows rose. “But you’re not making sense, Sowell. No sense at all. How can her departure be my fault when I didn’t know the female existed?”
    “But you wrote that you wanted peace and quiet. Sell their horses, you ordered. Cut down the staff. Take away her bedroom. What was she to think? She took all that to mean you didn’t want her here, or her brothers either.”
    “Aha, so that’s it,” Kit murmured. “You and Lutton and everyone else in this place blame me for pushing some poor creature I never heard of out into the cold.”
    “Three poor creatures, my lord,” the butler corrected. “Three.”
    “Blasted idiots,” Mickley grunted under his breath.
    Kit sank down upon the bed. “Where have they gone?” he asked after a long moment of silence.
    “I couldn’t say, my lord.”
    “Or won’t say,” Mickley put in.
    Kit motioned his batman to silence. “Well, thank you, Sowell, for your frankness. You may go.”
    The butler nodded and bowed himself out. Kit rose tiredly from the bed, went to the window, and stared out. The afternoon had gone. The setting sun was casting long, depressing shadows across the south lawn. “Damn!” he muttered.
    “Curse me for a bloody fool! I should have gone to see the deuced solicitor, as I was told to do.”
    “What diff’rence would that ‘ave made?” Mickley asked.
    “We would have had all this