Miranda Jarrett - The Duke's Governess Bride

Except that sitting at the red-covered table was Miss Wood, as unexotically English as any woman could be.

‘Good morning, your Grace,’ she said cheerfully, rising to curtsy. ‘I’m glad you chose to join me for breakfast.’

Glowering, he chose not to sit. ‘There was no choice involved. You bullied my manservant, and refused to let him do his duty towards me.’

‘What, Wilson?’ She raised her delicate dark brows with bemusement. ‘Your Grace, you grant me supreme powers if you believe I ever could bully Wilson into doing—or not doing—anything against his will.’

Richard’s scowl deepened. She was right, of course. ‘Are you saying that he chose to disobey me?’

‘Oh, no.’ Her smile became beatific. ‘Rather I should say that I am most honoured that you have chosen to join me for breakfast in the Venetian manner.’

‘This is not as I wished, Miss Wood,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘Not at all.’

‘Oh, but it is, your Grace,’ she said. ‘Last night you hired me to act as your guide while you were visiting this city, and to teach you what I’d learned myself of Venice. This is our first lesson, you see, to experience how a Venetian gentleman begins his day.’

Richard looked down at the array of dishes laid out on the table before her. There was a plate with paper-thin slices of ham arranged to overlap like the petals of a flower, and an assortment of fancifully shaped bread-stuffs. Beside her cup was a chocolate-mill and a smaller pot of hot milk.

‘Please, your Grace,’ she coaxed, turning the armchair beside her invitingly towards him. ‘As you see, everything is in readiness for you.’

Everything, hah. He retied the sash on his dressing gown more tightly with quick, disgruntled jerks, and sniffed while trying still to look unhappy at being crossed. He couldn’t deny that the rich assortment of fragrances that had first drawn him were tempting, or that his empty stomach was rumbling with anticipation. But likewise he liked his habits, his routines, and a breakfast that lacked eggs, strawberry preserves and well-roasted black coffee was not part of his habit.

‘Miss Wood,’ he began, determined to steer things between them more to his liking at once, before they’d escaped too far beyond his control. ‘I know you mean well, Miss Wood, but I am afraid that—’

‘Oh, your Grace!’ She was staring down at his bare feet with the same horror that most women reserved for rats and toads. ‘Oh, your Grace, your poor feet! These stone floors are so chill on a winter morning. Come, sit here beside the kachelofen and warm them at once while I prepare your chocolate.’

She bustled forwards, taking him gently by the elbow to guide him to the chair with such concern and efficiency that he could not shake her off without being rude.

‘Here now, I’m not some greybeard to be settled in the chimney corner,’ he grumbled, even as he let her do very nearly that. ‘And what the devil’s a kachelofen? ’

‘This,’ she said, pointing to an ornate object behind the table. He’d thought it was a tall cabinet or chest, but now that he was closer, he could see that it was made not of painted wood, but of sections of porcelain, fantastically moulded and glazed with curlicues and flowers. He also realised that the thing was giving off heat most pleasantly, far more than the grate in his bedchamber had, and automatically he shifted closer to warm himself.

‘A kachelofen ’s a kind of stove, much beloved by Venetians,’ she explained, holding her palm over the nearest surface to feel the heat for herself. ‘They claim a good kachelofen will warm a room better than an open fire, require less wood and be safer as well.’

‘Safe, you say?’ he asked, not because he really wished to know, but because it seemed rude to her not to make an enquiry or two.

‘Oh, yes,’ she said eagerly. ‘For a city surrounded by water, the Venetians are powerfully afraid of fire. Only the glassmakers are permitted to keep furnaces, because it is necessary for their trade and therefore necessary for the economy of the city.’

‘You’re full of useless information for so early an hour, Miss Wood,’ he said, though the pleasing warmth from the whatever-it-was-called was easing his temper.

Nor was she offended. ‘There is no such thing as useless information, your Grace. Only information whose usefulness is yet to be revealed. Consider how useful a kachelofen would be in the north corner of your library at Aston Hall. You could set the fashion in the county.’

‘What, for foreign kickshaws and foolishness?’

‘For efficiency, your Grace, and being clever and forward-thinking,’ she suggested. ‘The people here do understand how to make their lives more agreeable, and there would be no sin in borrowing the best of their notions. But then I would imagine your Grace has already considered it, yes?’

‘Ahh—yes, yes, of course.’ He studied her with fresh surprise. His recollection of Miss Wood with his daughters was of her being reticent, speaking only when first addressed. He’d never heard her be quite so…loquacious before. More surprising still, he realised that he rather liked it.

In fact, he liked sitting here, wearing his nightclothes in cosy domesticity with his daughters’ governess, in a room too lurid for most London bagnios. He suspected he was called many things about the county at home, but ‘clever’ wasn’t a word he’d heard often, and to his surprise, he rather liked that, too.

‘Perhaps one of these would be of use,’ he said, regarding the kachelofen now as an ally. ‘It does keep off the cold better than a grate.’

‘Indeed it does, your Grace.’ She returned to her own chair, and began to busy herself with the chocolate-mill. ‘Now that you’re warming yourself from the outside in, we must see to warming you from the inside out as well. This, your Grace, is how every proper Venetian gentleman begins his day, and likely the improper ones as well.’

He watched her briskly twisting the rod back and forth between her palms to mix a froth into the dark mixture, her little hands moving with confident dexterity. He wished she hadn’t mentioned those improper gentleman, considering how improper his own thoughts were at the moment.

‘Chocolate’s well enough for those fellows,’ he said finally. ‘But I’d as soon have Wilson fetch me my usual coffee.’

She paused, and glanced up at him without raising her chin. ‘You could, your Grace. You could. But if you did, it would be disappointing.’

It was the evenness of her voice that stopped him. No fuss, no excess of emotion, only that quietly stated disappointment.

‘Would you be disappointed, Miss Wood?’ he asked softly. Now with the idle pleasantries of the kachelofen done, he found he cared more about her answer than he’d wish to admit. ‘If I chose my old ways, would you be disappointed?’

But instead of answering, she lowered her gaze back to the mill. ‘I ask only that you try it, your Grace. This chocolate is far different from that served in London. Cocoa, sugar, cinnamon, vanilla. You will taste the difference at once.’

‘How did you come by all this knowledge of yours, eh?’ he asked, still sceptical. ‘You’ve not been here so long yourself.’

‘I listen to whomever will speak to me, your Grace, and I learn wherever I might,’ she said, carefully filling a second cup for him. ‘Signora della Battista and her cook. The gondoliers who pilot the gondolas and the old monks who show me the paintings in the churches. Here now, take care, and do not burn your tongue.’

She set the little cup before him, and Richard looked down at it so glumly that she laughed.