Betrayed Countess (Books We Love Historical Romance) Page 7

  “Who did you say he is?” Bettina asked in a whisper after he passed.

  “Everett Camborne, the local quality. I told you ’bout him.”

  “Tell me more about him.” Bettina couldn’t help glancing back to keep the man in sight.

  “It be claimed he killed his own wife in that manor house up the hill behind us. Heard she be a woman fond o’ sleeping in beds that weren’t her own, if you know what I mean.” Kerra gave a careless laugh.

  “I think that he watched me one day on the trail. If he killed someone, why is he not in prison?”

  “They couldn’t prove nothin’. But his wife disappeared all of a sudden, and he said she just left. But the girl who worked as their chambermaid told everyone he choked her and buried her in Bronnmargh’s cellar. Heard him threaten to do it herself, she swore.”

  Bettina wondered if this small community had blown a lurid tale out of proportion. “How long ago did this happen?”

  “’Bout three years. Now no one bothers with him, and he ain’t got no use for us neither.”

  “And the maid, what became of her?” Bettina persisted. The horse rolled in his slow gait between her thighs, and she wished again she had the decency of a sidesaddle.

  “A saucy wench, that’s what Old Milt called her.” Kerra laughed louder. “Name was Vida, and she left a few days after the magistrates went up to nose around. We never heard from her again. Say, fancy that, Camborne might’ve done her in too.”

  * * * *

  Bettina posed on a stool in the kitchen as Maddie measured and pinned. To save a seamstress’s fee, Maddie offered to sew her a plain, wrap around bedgown common to the working woman. “I’ll make the bodice higher than’s usual. Confounded revealing these styles. Ain’t practical. But this wool will keep you warm. Better than that trifle you come in.”

  Bettina relished the clean feel of the material, if a little itchy through her threadbare shift, but was embarrassed that anyone would wear a dress called a “bedgown” in public.

  On the following Saturday evening she wore her new gown in the taproom, happy she no longer resembled a bag of rags on feet. If she’d only had the money to buy new shoes.

  “Has Newlyn spoken to you yet?” Kerra passed her with a tankard of ale.

  Bettina bustled by with a tray of drinks, anxious for the evening to end, barely noticing the young man who slouched at a corner table.

  “I have no interest in this Newlyn,” Bettina said when they returned to the kitchen. She put more bread, cheese and pungent onions on a tray.

  “Why ever not? A girl has to be aware of her prospects.” Kerra grinned and nudged her, then grabbed two bottles of Canary for Maddie.

  Toward the end of the evening, Kerra dragged Bettina over and introduced her. Newlyn stood and smiled shyly, more intent on staring at his feet. He had blunt features, with heavy-lidded eyes and a pasty complexion. He stank like hay and manure.

  “’Scuse me, Miss.” He wrung his hat in his hands, dropping his head even lower. “Would you care to go … to a dance?”

  Bettina forced a kind smile. “No, I do not think—”

  “’Course she does.” Kerra’s voice cut through the smoky air. “You need to go out, be sociable. Newlyn, is your brother Charlie going to the dance?”

  Newlyn shrugged. “Next Saturday, round seven?” When Kerra nodded eagerly, the young man bowed and shuffled back to his chair.

  “Kerra, you are impossible. I have no need to go to this dance,” Bettina said when they were back in the kitchen.

  “It’s our Michaelmas dance. We have it every year—impressive for a village our size. September 29th be rent time for the farmers, but they dance to spite the landlords.” Kerra scoffed at Bettina’s upset. “Wish Charlie Tremayne would ask me, I’d be in a fit o’ pleasure.”

  “Ma foi, I would rather go with him. This is a terrible idea.” Bettina simmered with her own spite. The eldest of the three Tremayne brothers, Charlie, stood tall and shared Stephen’s defined features. But Charlie’s manner seemed gentle, and he acted as if he had some intelligence.

  “He’s quite the catch, so Dory says. ’Course, she ain’t managed to snare him. I’ll just have to be juicier bait.” Kerra twirled her skirt around her skinny legs. “Truth be told, one of the village boys asked me to this dance, but ain’t goin’ with the likes of him. I do have a bit o’ pride. Now you go and enjoy yourself for us both.”

  “Does my pride not matter?” Bettina sighed. She just wanted to concentrate on earning money, saving it to liberate herself. The idea of that slouching farm boy only filled her with distaste.

  * * * *

  Immersing herself in the warm water of the metal hip bath, Bettina leaned back and closed her eyes. She’d sprinkled in chamomile, which Maddie promised was calming. Tonight was the dance, and she still didn’t want to go.

  “Takin’ another bath?” Kerra’s voice pierced her reverie. She’d opened her door and peered around. “Maddie says you waste too much soap. Gonna scrub your skin off.”

  Bettina hugged her arms over her bare breasts. “If I may please have some privacy.”

  “Come out, it be time to get ready.” Kerra turned her back, her skinny frame taught with impatience. Bettina climbed out, toweled off and dressed. She followed Kerra up to her attic room.

  “Sit here.” Kerra dragged out a spindly chair from under the eaves. “I has to corral this hair o’ yours.” She brushed, pulled and twisted Bettina’s hair into two plaits.

  “Who will be my chaperone?” Bettina winced at the jerks, watching her friend’s ministrations in a pitted looking glass. She tried to comfort herself that this fete would be a rare change in her life of late. “I cannot attend such a dance alone.”

  “You ain’t alone … half the area will be there. An’ Newlyn’s gonna escort you. Fie, you be having too much hair.”

  Bettina flinched as Kerra jammed another pin into her unruly mass. “I don’t even know this young man. Maybe I should not be on my own with him. He has not spoken a word to me since the invitation.”

  “I told you he’s a good fella. You have to get out an’ be social, no excuses. I need more pins, confound it.” Kerra opened a drawer in her scarred dressing table and rooted around.

  “My mother would not care for any of this. You English are very tolerant over breaches of etiquette. Or do you simply choose to ignore them altogether?” She slumped in the chair, her reluctance making her irritable.

  “There’s another of your fancy words … etiquette. We be as etiquette as anyone. And you was travelin’ with no companion when I met you.” Kerra stood back to survey Bettina’s hair, her mouth in a twist. “Here, let me put on the chip hat, that’ll hide most of it.”

  Bettina rubbed her beleaguered scalp, adjusted the hat, and returned downstairs, hoping the young man didn’t show himself.

  However, Newlyn waited at the inn door, shoulders hunched, head down. She joined him, now ashamed of her hope, and they walked together through the village. Strolling beside the silent young man, Bettina glanced around, mouth dry. She fingered her shawl and felt unprotected in the company of a male stranger. He exuded no charm; in fact, he exuded nothing at all. But she took a measured breath and reasoned he might be nervous.

  The dance, held in an old barn to the south of the village, already overflowed with people. The stench from rarely washed bodies swirled inside. Waves of participants, loud and raucous, stomped their feet and clapped their hands. Three fiddle players supplied the lively music in this rustic contrast to her memories of musical evenings in France.

  Bettina recognized a few patrons from the taproom at the inn, and they, in turn, stared at her. “Didn’t think you had it in you, Newl,” one man shouted. “And that one, of all girls.”

  Newlyn cringed and Bettina felt heat rise in her cheeks. She watched the dancers in their worn, drab clothes, as they stepped in and out in a fast, jaunty gait. They kicked up dust with their shoes, but their faces spread with smiles in the lante
rn lights.

  “Newlyn, I have never danced these dances,” she said as they pressed against the wall, people twirling past them. “They are neither the minuet nor the gavotte.”

  “Just be country dancing.” Newlyn continued to resist meeting her eyes as he fidgeted with the collar of his frayed homespun shirt.

  “We can try, can we not?” Bettina grew eager to be involved now that she’d come. The fiddle music and foot stomping vibrated the ground beneath her. “I do like the music, if it is a bit fast.” Motioning with her hand, she coaxed him onto the dirt floor.

  Newlyn jerked his feet in hobnailed boots, off rhythm to the musical beats. He stumbled closer to Bettina and crunched on her toes. “’Scuse me, ’scuse me, Miss … so sorry.”

  Bettina winced in pain and shuffled her feet away from him, but still tried to match the steps of the other dancers. A man bumped into her, his grin suggestive, rubbing his leg along her hip. She hopped out of his way and wished for the wide panniers of the French Court.

  Newlyn crushed her toes again and she swallowed a cry. She limped to the wall, curling her smarting toes in her slippers.

  “Criminy, Newl, show the girl a better time.” His brother Stephen barged up to them, a tankard of beer in his hand, his smile broad. “Nay, best that I show her.” He reached over and ran his fingers down Bettina’s arm.

  “I asked you never to touch me.” She jerked aside. Newlyn remained slouched over like a wilted scarecrow, saying nothing to this challenge.

  Stephen clasped her wrist, his arrogant dimpled chin thrust out, shoulders thrown back in defiance. “I’ll dance with you, Frenchie girl. You just need to get used to me. With all that black hair, seems you be a girl from India or someplace else savage. Not that your country don’t behave like savages.”

  “Please leave, I am with Newlyn.” Bettina snatched back her hand. “I will not dance with you.” Unsure of her position with Newlyn, she still didn’t wish to humiliate him.

  Suddenly the boisterous crowd stopped circling and straggled to the sides. A chubby young man walked into the center of the floor and thrust up the worn cushion he carried. “Harkee now, the cushion dance!”

  He pranced around the room with this item, until he again paused in the center. “The dance I can no further go,” he sang out.

  “I pray ’ee, good sir, why to say so?” the fiddlers replied in chorus.

  Bettina had wanted to return home, surprised she thought of the inn as home, but this development caught her interest.

  “For Jenny Toliver will not come to.” The plump youth broke into nervous laughter, his cheeks scarlet.

  “She must come to, whether she will or no.” This reply from the fiddlers sent a stocky girl in the crowd to giggling. The young man sprang forward and placed the cushion at her feet. The girl slowly kneeled on it. The man bent low and kissed her.

  Bettina flushed at so public a show of affection, but the others merely applauded. When the girl hopped to her feet and called out a boy of her choice, Bettina gaped.

  Stephen turned to Bettina with a leering grin, his elbow digging into her side. “You be next, Frenchie. I’ll dance the cushion to you. You’ll have to ‘come to’.”

  “Newlyn, it is time for us to leave.” Bettina whirled around and squeezed through the people, toward the barn entrance. As she expected, Newlyn trailed after her like a beaten puppy.

  Men leaned against the wall outside. Pipe smoke drifted in the crisp air. Bettina hurried past them and prayed Stephen stayed inside.

  She slowed and Newlyn almost bumped into her. “Please, see me home now.”

  As Newlyn walked with her across the field and through the village bathed in sunset, Bettina pitied him, saddled with such a brother. His silence also vexed her. “Your brother is very rude. It is good you are not like him.” Newlyn didn’t reply. They walked on. She glanced back to make certain no one pursued. When more silence followed, she strained for a subject that might interest him. “What is it like living on your farm? What type of crops do you grow?”

  “It be tolerable.” He shuffled along beside her, never looking at anything but his scuffed boots. “Don’t grow much … some potatoes, some turnips.”

  “D’accord. I see.” She bit down on her bottom lip and pulled her shawl closer around her shoulders. As they passed the blacksmith’s, his mongrel dog growled. “Kerra says you have three sisters, what are they named?” She waited for Newlyn to mumble another evasion.

  Footsteps rushed up behind them and Bettina spun around.

  “Newl. I be walking the young lady back now.” Stephen elbowed his brother aside, then caught him and jiggled his shoulder. “You asked her like I wanted, good job. Now you can go.”

  Newlyn started to tremble. “I … can’t … can it wait till…?”

  “You encouraged him to ask me?” Bettina glared at them both.

  “I knew you’d never go with me,” Stephen snickered, his eyes appraising her.

  “You are right, I would not have.” Bettina shook with anger and stalked off through the cool evening. When she turned to make certain Stephen didn’t pursue, she saw Newlyn stumble after her.

  Stephen grabbed his shoulder again and shoved him. “I said go home. You already fouled up by not keeping her at the barn.”

  Newlyn swung his arms for balance as he tripped over his own feet.

  “Stop treating him like that. What kind of brother are you?” Bettina cried.

  Newlyn shrugged, mumbled goodbye as if he never expected better, and lurched off down the road. Bettina, mortified at being duped by these farm boys, hurried toward the inn.

  “Wait, I said I’d take you.” Fast on her heels, Stephen caught her arm, dragging her to a stop. “A lady deserves a strong man by her side, now don’t she?” He gave a derisive emphasis to the word lady.

  “I do not need an escort, I can go by myself.” She jerked from his grasp. Then she felt a prickle of uneasiness as she noticed the street was deserted, except for someone on horseback in the distance. “You do not know how to respect anyone, so please leave me alone.” She resumed her brisk walk.

  “Respect?” He kept pace beside her, his smile mocking. “Coming from your heathen country, you think you’d be bolder. You be wastin’ time on my little brother. I just asked him to smooth the way. I know exactly how to respect a girl like you.”

  Bettina bristled at his goading. The inn waited several yards ahead, the dusk creeping its shadows over the buildings. “You know nothing about me.”

  Stephen loped in front of her, forcing her to stop again. “You work in a taproom. I know how to satisfy a brew wench with my stiff pudding.”

  “Affreux!” Bettina recoiled from him. “You are … a rutting pig, and have no reason to say that to me!”

  He grabbed her upper arms as she tried to shove past him. His bared teeth turned him wolfish, wiping any attractiveness from his features. “A pig, am I? I’ll show you a pig, froggie!”

  “Let go of me!” She struck and pushed at him with her fists. But the harder she struggled, the more he laughed.

  Stephen hauled her to his chest, then brushed his damp lips on her jaw when she whipped back her head. Bettina wrenched up a hand to scratch his cheek. He growled, his fingers digging into her flesh. She shrieked for help as he slammed her body once more into his.

  A horse clopped up. Someone dismounted, jerked Stephen around and punched him in the face.

  The young man sprawled on the ground, kicking furiously at the dirt. “Damme! Who the hell—oh!” He staggered to his feet and sped off into the twilight, his footfalls echoing across the cottages.

  Bettina froze, her hand at her throat, heaving for breath. Facing the person who came to her aid, she took in a tall figure in cape and hat silhouetted against the darkening sky.

  “Are you all right, young woman?” The man spoke in a deep, resonant voice, his tone aloof. The clean, faint scent of spice floated around him.

  “Yes … merci,” she uttered through quive
ring lips.

  “Then if you don’t live far, you had better proceed home.”

  Bettina didn't wait for more and hurried up the road. Once she reached the inn porch, she looked back to see the man mount his horse and ride away. With a ragged sigh, she brushed tears from her cheeks. She’d little doubt she just came face to face with the nefarious Everett Camborne.

  Chapter Seven

  “Those Tremaynes are not to be trusted. Stephen is dangerous, and Newlyn … he just does as he is told. I want nothing to do with any of them.” Bettina stared up at Kerra as she sat on her bed mending her stockings the next morning. Her arms ached and she’d noticed ugly bruises from Stephen’s rough ‘escort’.

  Kerra leaned in the doorway and gave her nose a disdainful scratch. “Won’t never find no husband if you be too choosy. I only wish Charlie would pay court to me.”

  “I do not want to court yet.” Bettina never imagined courting to be so blunt. In France, in the old days, she might have been betrothed to someone she barely knew in an arranged marriage, but with the niceties observed at all times. “Why do I need a husband?” She stabbed the needle through the thin material and considered herself above that boy and the others in the village. Soon she’d return to her former life, the problems in France couldn’t last forever.

  “Every girl needs a husband. You wanna end up a spinster like Maddie? You be wishing you had someone to snuggle up to when winter comes.” Kerra adjusted the ribbon on her straw hat that she’d tucked with pink meadowsweet, a pleasant wintergreen and sweet almond fragrance. “I’m off to visit a recent widow, since Charlie might be takin’ his mamm an’ sisters there … in her time of need.”

  “I want to straighten out my own life before considering anyone else.” Even as she said this, Bettina swallowed a sigh and thought of her rescuer from last night. She experienced a strange spark of warmth. This mysterious gentleman from the manor began to fascinate her.