Free Lace for Milady by Joan Smith Page B

And I was the one who wanted this folly stopped.
    He didn’t say a word but lifted his black brows at me and put his two hands around the corners of it and began pulling and heaving. It was awkward to get a good hold on it, because it went right to the floor; it was not on feet.
    “All right. Please stop before you pull it loose from the wall!” I said angrily, for it was perfectly plain that if that ox couldn’t budge it, it didn’t budge.
    “Really, I think the voices came from a place closer to the fireplace,” Slack then said, unwilling to have her moment of glory shortened.
    "I begin to think they emanated from your head, Slack.” I said. She had become so infatuated with her new beau that she didn’t bother to reply, but only smiled at Clavering in a way that said as clear as day, I must humour the moonling.
    Clavering too decided to humour me, and they both took a seat. “Well, I believe the Duke has earned a glass of wine, Priscilla,” Slack told me.
    “I hope a guest in my house doesn't have to earn a glass of wine by rearranging my furniture,” I said, quite curtly, and she was off with a swish of her black skirts to get not only wine but macaroons, nuts, and dried cherries. This was treatment reserved for her special pets. It was not just any visitor—duke or no—who was favored with the dried cherries. Even George in his heyday never got so much as a glimpse of them. They were from her own private store. The nuts and wine and macaroons were household stock, but the cherries were kept in a tin box in Slack’s own room. She must have flown up those stairs on wings of delight, for she wasn’t gone a moment yet had assembled the feast from three different corners of the house.
    Clavering proceeded to put on a performance that was as disgusting as anything I have witnessed in my life. “I am worried about you two ladies alone here and at the mercy of the smugglers,” he said, dipping into the cherries.
    “Officer Smith assures us there is not the least danger,” I told him.
    “Oh, poor Smith. He never catches anyone, so refuses to believe the smugglers are active.”
    “I understand he caught a boatload about a week ago,” I said.
    “Caught them bringing two kegs down from Romney. Some catch! It’s time I replace him.”
    “Have you been put in charge of customs?” I asked him.
    “I have always had a hand in it, and in most local appointments,” was his insolent reply. “I think I shall send two of my stout footmen down here at night to watch over the place for you.” This was said to Slack, intimating no doubt to that besotted ninny that he didn’t want a precious hair of her head touched.
    “We have a butler and two footboys, as well as the groom. Thank you all the same,” I told him.
    “Still, I’ll send my men down to give them a hand. Your butler is old, and your footboys and groom only boys.”
    “I would much prefer it if you keep your footmen at home.”
    Again the two exchanged that smile of toleration for the moonling, and Clavering hunched his hulking shoulders, taking another fistful of cherries. The pair then went on to a discussion for which I can find no other word than flirtation. Before I knew what was happening, Slack, usually so discreet, was telling the private details of her life, which involved in no small degree those of my own. I had the pleasure of hearing that I was not a bad child to mind, though always self-willed and headstrong to an extraordinary degree. I was a quick learner but would not apply myself unless goaded unmercifully.
    “I don’t envy you your task, ma’am,” he told her, and held his glass out for her to refill to the brim. I wouldn’t have been surprised in the least had she dashed to the cupboard for a larger glass. Slack’s pets are force fed. It is the manner in which she shows favour.
    I heard her tell him all the intimate minutiae of our lives, Mama’s dwindling separation from her family, Papa’s summer visits and eventual