Free The Scottish Companion by Karen Ranney

unfeeling?”
    “No, Your Lordship,” she said, wondering howmuch of her honesty he could tolerate. “It makes you sound lonely.”
    He looked at her again. Moments ticked by in silence. Was he going to dismiss her from his laboratory? Or from Rosemoor entirely?
    “Would you like to help me in my experiments?”
    Surprised, she could only nod. “Tell me what to do.” She looked dubiously at the bottle of sulfuric acid. “Will it require working with that?”
    “I have another task.” He reached below the table and withdrew a heavy burlap bag that he placed on the scarred wooden surface. “I am building a larger apparatus, and I need to have each of the silver disks polished. They conduct current better if the surface is clean.”
    She took possession of the disks, a soft rag, and a bowl filled with a blue-tinged liquid. She eyed the solution with caution.
    He pulled up a stool and sat beside her.
    “It’s safe, Miss Cameron. Do you trust me?”
    She nodded, the answer surprisingly instantaneous. For a few moments they worked in silence, she polishing the disks, and the earl occupied with arranging them in their wire cages.
    “What will you do with it when it’s finished?”
    “Prove that it’s possible to generate massive amounts of electricity, and store it as well.”
    “But why?”
    “Can you not imagine, Miss Cameron? Think of a world in which you needn’t be near a river or a stream to mill your flour. Or a machine that provides light and all you must do is simply turn a handle.”
    “No oil? No candles?”
    “None. Simply electrics.”
    His face was animated, the sparkle in his eyes almost mischievous.
    “Can something like that really happen?”
    “It not only will, it must. There are countless discoveries we will make in our lifetimes, Miss Cameron. All things we’ve never thought would ever come to pass.”
    “If you have your way,” she said.
    “If I have my way. I’m a scientist.”
    She didn’t comment. What could she say?
    “How can you bear to spend your time on anything else?” she said, bending forward again to study the apparatus.
    “I have been accused of being too involved in my work,” he said. “Some who don’t understand consider it an avocation or nothing more than a pastime, something to while away the hours between my duties as earl.”
    “It seems to me that it would be vastly more interesting to be a scientist than an earl.”
    “Were you an only child, Miss Cameron?” he asked abruptly.
    She turned to look at him. How very odd that he was even more arresting in the bright sunlight. He probably should have been more handsome in shadows.
    “Why would you ask that, Your Lordship?’
    “To rectify our ignorance of each other.”
    Was that entirely wise? Probably not, but she answered him regardless.
    “Actually, I’m not,” she said. “I was an only child,” she admitted, “for a number of years, until my fatherremarried.” And then their home was suddenly full of children. Six brothers and sisters, all of whom she was responsible for at various stages in their lives.
    “A very close family, I’d wager.”
    She nodded. “My father and I were very close until he married.”
    “And then you had a stepmother.”
    “All girls need a mother to guide them.”
    “Were you guided, Miss Cameron?”
    “In a way, Your Lordship. My stepmother believed I should make an advantageous marriage.”
    “But you chose a life as Miss Fenton’s companion instead?” He looked dubious, but she was not about to illuminate him as to her past. “What do your parents think of your choice, Miss Cameron?”
    She didn’t answer him.
    “Do you not see them, Miss Cameron?”
    Not since she’d been banished from their home, another comment she would not make.
    “Not often, Your Lordship,” she said, lying.
    “Do you miss them?”
    How did he manage to ask the most difficult questions? “Yes and no,” she answered, hoping he wouldn’t demand more of an answer.
    “I miss