Page 2 of Impossible
Ada offered the lad—he looked younger than her twenty-five years—an encouraging smile, for he seemed a trifle nervous. Perhaps that was what happened when you worked in a house with an excessively disagreeable employer. “The Primrose Room sounds quite charming.”
Without a word, he picked up her case and gestured straight through the entry hall.
They moved into a large staircase hall, with the stairs climbing from the center to the back wall and then splitting up either side to a gallery on the first floor. Ada preceded him up the stairs. “Have you and your mother been here a long time?” she asked.
“Yes.” The word was so quiet, Ada had to strain to hear it. She glanced back at him to see him staring past her, his features taut.
She very much wanted to put him at ease. “Well, I am here to help if I can. I look forward to my time here.”
He said nothing, and at the top of the stairs merely pointed again, this time to the left. If he hadn’t answered her question a moment ago, she might have begun to wonder whether he could speak.
They moved along the gallery, and she would have kept on going if he hadn’t said, “Here.”
Stopping, she turned back to see him standing in front of a door, which he opened for her.
“Thank you,” she said with a smile, still hoping he might relax a bit—she hated that he might feel nervous around her. Moving into the chamber, she wondered why it was called the Primrose Room, for there was nary a primrose about. “Is it called Primrose because of the yellow?” Bright, cheerful yellow dominated the color scheme of the room. Ada’s favorite primroses were that color yellow.
Timothy’s only answer was to shrug. He set her case down. “Do you need anything else?” His voice was rather small, and it seemed an effort to say so much.
“No, thank you. Very much,” she added with a great deal of warmth and another smile.
He inclined his head, then took himself off. Ada found that she had tensed in his presence—because she’d been unsettled by his nervousness. She hoped she hadn’t upset him somehow. But how could she have?
Ada shook her head. She sometimes worried far too much what others thought or took responsibility for making sure everyone around her felt happy. Or that they were at least positive rather than sad or troubled.
Bother, itwasn’ther responsibility. Still, she couldn’t seem to help herself. Perhaps she’d ask Mrs. Bundle about her son. But then Mrs. Bundle had also seemed beleaguered. Had Warfield cast a pall over his entire household? It seemed possible, if not likely, given all she knew of him.
“Do not assume he has kind qualities or a hidden desire to be happy,” Prudence had warned, though she couldn’t know that for certain because she’d only met him the one time. It was more that she was cautioning Ada not to treat him as she did others, that he wasn’t a typical person who had a bad day now and again. Lucien had made it clear the viscount was disagreeable and surlyeveryday. Or at least every time Lucien made the journey to visit his friend.
Ada realized she was hoping Warfield might be different around her. She did bring out the best in people, or tried to anyway. Her optimism refused to believe she wouldn’t be able to manage it.
She poked around the room, feeling slightly out of place. She supposed she’d expected a room on the servants’ floor, but when Mrs. Bundle had said “Primrose Room,” she’d realized that would not be the case. Still, she hadn’t expected a room of this size, with a beautiful seating area, large four-poster bed with hangings, and a separate dressing chamber where a maid could prepare her garments. As if she had a maid. Ada giggled.
She no more required a maid than she did a husband. Independence suited her quite wonderfully. She’d been on her own for nearly ten years, since a fever had taken her mother, just a few months after her sister had died. And she’d lost her father five years before that. That she retained such a positive outlook after tragedy surprised everyone, but to Ada, it was simply survival. What good would it be to wallow?
Not that she hadn’t spent time wallowing… She pushed those thoughts away. Better to focus on her love of independence, for that was what would keep her strong and happy.
And she was going to need that to get through the next fortnight.
After a solitary dinner served by a silent Timothy, Ada found the library. At the back of the house in the center, it seemed an addition to the original structure. The library’s domed ceiling soared well past the first floor. It was almost cathedral-like with high windows, some of which were stained glass. They were flowers, she realized—a rose, a lily, a dahlia, and even a primrose. She was now curious about the meaning of flowers at Stonehill.
Her curiosity was perhaps second only to her positivity—and perhaps not even that—and it drove Ada through one of the doorways leading from the library. At once, she knew she’d found the viscount’s study.
The scent of leather, paper, and brandy enveloped her as she stepped inside. Meager light from the hearth provided more shadows than illumination, but Ada made out the rich blue draperies cloaking the tall windows that presumably looked out at the rear garden and parkland beyond. Presumably, she thought, because it was now dark, and she couldn’t see anything past the panes of glass.
The remnants of the fire prompted her to wonder if his lordship had been there earlier. A cozy blue, gold, and brown patterned chair sat near the fireplace, providing the perfect place to sit and read or simply contemplate. Ada liked to think, and she could see herself enjoying that spot for just that purpose.
Alas, this was not her place, and she should go. But the same curiosity that had beckoned her inside now pushed her to the desk. Perhaps she could get an early start on the ledgers. She wasn’t terribly tired, despite the day’s journey.
Fetching a spill from the mantel, she borrowed some fire from the hearth to light the lamp on the desk. Finding it still warm, she wondered if Warfield had only recently left.
“What are you doing in here?”
The bellow from the doorway made her jump, and she dropped the spill before lighting the lamp. Muttering a curse, she plucked up a leather-bound volume and slapped it on the smoking spill before it could catch something on fire.
“Are you trying to set my bloody house ablaze?” The large figure moved into the room, but it was too dark to make out his features. She could, however, see that he was quite tall and rather broad across the shoulders.
“No. I was lighting a lamp.”
