Another cruel clock chimed. Now she was a half hour late. Beginning to panic, she lifted up the heavy silk skirts on the outdated but exquisite rose and gold silk gown Polly had brought her and ran like a heather hellion toward the next hallway. She looked in both directions. She could turn left or right, and both were equally long corridors.
"
His Grace likes dinner on time,"
Mrs. Watley had said.
"Precisely at
. A Belmore tradition."
Joy clenched her gown and looked around her…lost. "Why would anyone want to live in a house this big?" She could just see Alec's face, then the image changed to that of Mrs. Watley, her arms crossed over her black bombazine-covered crow's chest, her foot tapping with impatience and her eyes glaring down at Joy. She was late, late, late, and Joy was sure that was tantamount to stealing the Belmore silver.
But, more important, being late was not a good way to start her marriage, especially when she needed to prepare her husband for her confession. Butter him up, so to speak. She stared at the clock. Its hands did not lie. The time for buttering up was past, way past. She chewed on her lower lip.
The hands of a clock? An idea began to glimmer in Joy's eyes. She closed them for a full minute of concentration, took a deep breath, pointed at the clock, and chanted, "
Oh, please listen to my rhyme. Turn back the time on every clock in this home of mine!
"
She slowly moved her pointed finger and the hands on the clock followed suit until it was two minutes to nine. She smiled. It had worked! Feeling incredibly proud of herself, she looked down both hallways and decided it was time for a bit more magic.
Raising her chin and hands high in the air, she closed her eyes, trying to picture a dining room. Unable to imagine what Belmore's dining room would look like, she concentrated on the food—roasted chickens and ducklings, plump roasts of beef and fresh breads, fruits and jellies and platters of delicacies so delightful that her stomach rumbled with hunger. "Oh, magic come and take me away," she chanted, "to the room where Belmore's food lay!"
An instant later she opened her eyes. Haunches of meat and plucked birds wrapped in protective salted cloth hung on hooks above her head.
This was not the dining room.
A sharp pang of ice cold air hit her. Shivering, she leaned one hand against what she thought was a wall and jerked it back.
She was in the ice house. She blinked several times in confusion. The walls were blocks of ice beneath the sacking.
Slowly she found her way to a wide plank door a few feet away. Something caught in her hair. She glanced up and then with a disgusted flick of her hand pushed a dangling chicken head out of the way before opening the door.
She stepped into another dark, dank room, and promptly tripped over a lumpy sack of onions, landing on an equally lumpy mound of potatoes. Attempting to scramble to her knees, she clutched some bound stalks of asparagus, which snapped off with a fresh pop. She dropped the stalks and managed to get to her knees, only to find herself staring at a stack of rugged-looking rutabagas. Behind them was a shelf filled to capacity with jars of orange kumquats, peaches, and marmalade, red berry jellies and deep dark jams. The jars and containers of food went on and on, stacked on labeled shelves that appeared to hold enough to feed the world. The room smelled of the sea, of raw fish, and of vegetables still coated in fresh earth.
Now she was in the pantry.
But, she thought, at least I'm on the right floor.
The door was slightly ajar and she could hear the bustle of the busy kitchen that lay beyond—the sizzle of food cooking, the clatter of bowls, the clink of crockery, and the voices of an army of servants hard at work. No wonder I couldn't find anyone, she thought. Sounds like they're all out there.
Joy struggled to her feet, brushing her hands together to rid them of asparagus tips and dirt. At least I can ask someone for directions, she thought, stepping over another bulky sack and sidestepping a barrel of salted fish so she could open the door the rest of the way. She stepped into the room and stopped.
The smells were heavenly. The rich mouth-watering scent of beef roasting on a spit mixed with that of garlic and lamb and mint. The sharp tang of cinnamon and nutmeg assailed her senses, and her stomach rumbled a protest against its empty state. Joy watched, completely unnoticed, while a dinner the likes of which she had never seen was created of the same stuff that hung so unappealingly in the pantry.
A woman stood about five feet away, kneading some dough at a large worktable.
"Excuse me," Joy said.
The woman glanced over her shoulder, then froze, except for her eyes, which nearly popped out of her head. She spun around, dough in hands, and sank into a deep curtsy. "Your Grace!"
Within about three seconds the room was silent except for the random pop and sizzle of cooking meat.
Every eye in the room was stunned and on Joy.
"I seem to be a wee bit lost, and I—"
An oversized set of double doors swung open, hitting the kitchen walls with a bang. The usually reserved Henson blustered into the room. "All hell has broken loose out there!" he announced. "They've lost the new duchess!" He scanned the kitchen where every servant was looking at one solitary spot in the room. His eyes followed theirs.
Joy raised her fingers and gave him a tentative and sheepish little wave.
"Your Grace!"
Joy found herself staring at his bent head. "I'm afraid I've been lost. Would you show me to the dining room, please?"
He straightened, once again the epitome of the stiff English servant, his shoulders back, chin raised, voice controlled. "Of course. If Your Grace will follow me . . . ”
Joy followed him across the silent kitchen, feeling every eye on her as she did so. A minute or so later at the end of a long corridor, Henson opened another set of double doors and announced, "Her Grace, the Duchess of Belmore."
She took a deep, fortifying breath, raised her chin Watley-high, and walked into the room, where a herd of liveried footmen, Townsend, and Mrs. Watley herself were speaking to the duke. They fell silent and turned toward her, their faces all wearing the same look of disapproval.
They parted like the
Red Sea
. Alec stood there, handsome and broad-shouldered, dressed all in black except for a stark white cravat. His presence was so commanding. He was water to her thirsty eyes. Then she made the mistake of looking at his face—and nearly drowned. His expression was hard and disapproving.
Joy's heart felt as if it were going down for the third time.
The clock chose that exact moment to chime the quarter hour—so much for her witchcraft—and Alec frowned, glancing at the ormolu clock on the fireplace mantel. He gave it a brief look of annoyance.
"That clock is broken. Have it fixed."
"Yes, Your Grace." Mrs. Watley plucked the clock off the mantel, tucked it under one lanky arm, and moved toward the doors.
The duke turned back to Joy. "You're late."
"I was lost."
Mrs. Watley passed by, still shaking her head in reproof and Joy thought she heard her mutter something about desecrating Belmore tradition.
Alec walked toward her. He offered her his stiff arm, but she would have given the world for one wee smile of reassurance.
"In the future, I will send Henson to show you the way."
She couldn't even look him in the eye. She was afraid to, so she chewed her lip instead.
After a tense minute in which she could feel him staring down at her, he added softly, "I suppose, Scottish, that this seems a cavernous old place."
He had made an excuse for her. She released the breath she'd held in her tight throat, and smiled up at him. She was forgiven.
Again his features changed into that slightly confused look. It was as if no one had ever smiled at him before and so he didn't know how to react. He turned away, his face once again stern and his eyes anywhere but on her. Look back, she thought, look back so I can chip away at that wall of ice. But he didn't.
"You will learn your way around in time." He led her toward the table. "A very short time, I hope."
Another command, to which she could only nod sadly, feeling as if she had missed an opportunity. He pulled out a chair for her at the end of a monstrous rosewood dining table that looked as if it could comfortably seat every single servant at Belmore. She sat and scooted forward, expecting him to take the chair next to her. She could not hide her astonishment when he walked down the full length of the table and sat at the opposite end.
It was what the Scots called "bellowing distance" away.
With one wave of his hand—at least she thought it was a wave, although it was hard to tell from this great distance without a spyglass—an army of footmen moved to a long buffet and began to serve the first course. Served on the heaviest, most exquisitely molded silver platters she had ever seen, the dinner went on and on, each cover more elaborate than the last—roast duckling in a silver serving dish with handles shaped like mallards in flight, a leg of lamb in a dish shaped like a sheep's head with silver curved-horn handles, asparagus in lemon sauce with sliced chestnuts on a silver plate with a raised edge of molded spring vegetables. Every exquisite serving piece matched the food that it held.
Of the seven forks, three knives, and four spoons at her place setting, only one—a small spoon placed in front of the creamy bone china plate with its gold Belmore crest design —did not have its own ducal crest stamped into its handle. It wasn't stamped because the crest design—a pair of falcons—was the handle.
Joy stared at all the silverware, then looked at her plate. Now, which utensil was she supposed to use? After a few long and indecisive minutes, Henson's gloved hand surreptitiously handed her the first fork on the left.
"Thank you," she whispered, and then began to eat. As each dish appeared, she managed with only a wee bit of prodding from Henson to move her way from left to right through the utensils.
An hour into the meal, Joy swallowed a piece of rare roast beef in a port wine sauce. The room was so unnervingly quiet that she was sure her swallow echoed like Gargantua's gulp in the high-beamed rafters of the room. She looked around while she silently chewed another piece of something her nervousness would not allow her to taste. She was uncomfortable and suddenly aware of feeling so, so alone.
Fifteen footmen stood along the walls when they weren't catering to her or Alec. Townsend, Henson, and the duke were there, too, and yet she felt isolated in this strange new place. Nothing was familiar. Everything was beautiful, but it seemed cold and stiff because there was no enjoyment of it, no laughter, no music, nothing but the occasional clink of a serving spoon against a priceless piece of silver or the thin tinkle of a knife or fork on fragile china.
But she could enjoy the newness, the beauty, the excitement of this night. Her fanciful mind took over, and warm pleasure spread through her. Her eyes captured the bright gleam on a lovely crystal glass that shimmered in the light of a thousand candles. It was like drinking water from the stars. A huge silver candelabrum with two dozen golden tapers sat in the center of the table, and the light from the flames fairly danced on the crystal and silver tableware. Other candles glowed throughout the room, in sconces, chandeliers, and more candelabra, and the two mirrored walls that ran the length of the room caught the light a hundredfold and gave it depth and glow that made one forget that it was night and that the room had no windows.
Joy stared at the candelabrum on the table. If she moved it just a bit to the right she would be able to see Alec. With a quick glance at the servants lined up near the buffet, their eyes straight ahead like statues, she saw the coast was clear. She raised her napkin, pretending to pat her lips, but instead used it to cover her hand. With one snap and one point of her fingers, the candelabrum slid toward the edge of the table.