Free Carola Dunn by The Improper Governess

effort of holding back tears. Lord Ashe was looking at her oddly, eyebrows raised but concern in his dark eyes.
    “I must have heard the phrase somewhere,” she said weakly.
    “Do you ride?”
    “N-no.” She had not ridden in seven or eight years, so it was not really a fib, though why should she cavil at one minor taradiddle when she was living a lie? She must strive harder to banish the memories which made her life of deception so much more difficult.
    The groom sprang up behind, and Lord Ashe forebore to question Lissa further. She sensed, though, that he was not satisfied with her responses.
    To distract him, to make him forget his curiosity, she commented upon the fine day and the flourishing market gardens on either side of the high road. In truth, it was a pleasure to leave the mean streets behind. For some time, she had lacked the energy to walk farther than she need.
    Lord Ashe, half his attention on the busy traffic, responded amiably to her remarks. When Lissa, exclaiming at the splendid view from Westminster Bridge, mentioned Mr. Wordsworth’s beautiful description of the scene, he quoted the first few lines.
      “‘Earth has not anything to show more fair:
      Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
       A sight so touching in its majesty.’
    You enjoy poetry, Miss Findlay?”
    “Yes. No!” Bother! An actress was unlikely to be acquainted with non-dramatic poetry, yet a governess ought to be familiar at least with the major poets. Oh what a tangled web! she thought, wishing William Wordsworth’s name had never passed her lips.
    “Some poets better than others?” His tone was grave, but the glance he turned on her showed a glint of laughter in his eyes.
    “Yes,” she said, grateful yet uneasy.
    “My sister does not expect you to instruct Colin in the academic subjects, Latin and Greek and such,” he continued, “so much as to provide sympathetic discipline.”
    “Oh, but I...that is, I should be happy to read poetry and other English books with him, as I do with Peter and Michael.”
    “Of course. Your brothers are to be Colin’s companions in study as well as in play.”
    Though nothing could please her more, she was too uncertain to rejoice. Lord Ashe seemed to consider his sister’s approval a foregone conclusion, but as the curricle rolled through the smart streets of St. James’s and crossed Piccadilly, Lissa grew more and more apprehensive.
    Even if Lady Orton succumbed to her brother’s influence far enough to hire an unknown ex-actress, she might well resent his interference. The lady of the house could make a governess’s life miserable in a host of petty ways. Or she might attack Lissa through Peter and Michael. The boys were good-natured and well behaved, but no angels. Suppose her ladyship insisted on their being punished for every minor infraction, perhaps even blamed them for her own son’s misbehaviour?
    There was another worry: Lissa was by no means sure she could manage young Lord Orton. From what her brothers said, the child was more in need of discipline than sympathy, whereas Peter and Michael had needed her loving kindness to soften a harsh discipline.
    “You are very silent,” Lord Ashe observed, drawing rein before a gracious brick house with stone pediments and pilasters. “Daphne is no dragon, I promise you.”
    “What if she does not like me?” Lissa said in a small voice.
    “That is a bridge we shall cross if and when we come to it.”
    His use of we was at once comforting and disturbing. She had never before met anyone who so confused her emotions, but she had no time to analyse the feeling as he handed her down from the curricle.
    Five stories from basement to garret, 39 Dover Street was large for a town house, with two wide, sparkling clean sash windows on either side of the fanlighted front door. Surely there was room enough for three young boys to romp on a rainy day without excessively disturbing the other inhabitants. Altogether the environs