An Earl Like No Other by Wilma Counts Page A

minds.
    â€œWell, this one certainly does,” Nurse Cranstan confided. “Why, just getting her dressed of a morning is a chore.”
    Kate looked more closely at Lady Cassandra’s dress. It was an elaborate pink affair with a high ruffled neck and a profusion of ruffles and ribbons. She wore fancy slippers. The little girl looked uncomfortable in garb that could hardly be considered standard schoolroom or play attire.
    â€œIs something special planned for her ladyship’s day?” Kate asked.
    â€œOh, no,” Cranstan said with a note of superiority. “I always try to dress her properly, though.” The nurse snatched up a porcelain doll with yellow hair and a dress similar to the one worn by the child. Cranstan thrust it toward the girl. “Here, darling. Go and play now.” The endearment seemed forced.
    The girl took the toy and retreated to a window seat, where she sat looking disconsolate. Kate, feeling sorry for her, followed her gaze to a high shelf on which sat a rag doll dressed in an outfit Kate thought must be some sort of American Indian clothing.
    Cranstan noted the direction of their attention and gave a mild snort. “Can you fathom that? She’d rather play with that filthy rag than the beautiful doll his lordship brought back from London for her. Had a devil of a time getting that—that thing away from her.”
    Kate surmised that it was not a new housekeeper’s place to correct the child’s well-established nurse, but her instant fury at the woman’s obtuseness would not allow her to remain silent. “Perhaps it is merely a matter of wanting to cling to something familiar,” she said.
    The nurse sniffed. “She needs to get rid of her heathen ways and learn to be a proper English girl, though how she will ever be accepted in polite society with those Indian features is beyond me.”
    Kate bit her tongue and exited the nursery along with Nell.
    Immediately the maid seemed more at ease. “Nurse Cranstan, she’s pretty strict.”
    â€œIt would appear so,” Kate said.
    â€œMiss Mortimer recommended her to Lord Kenrick’s attention,” the girl said.
    Kate did not want to encourage gossip among the servants by asking who Miss Mortimer was and why his lordship had given such credence to her recommendation, but she left the nursery with a much lower opinion of her employer than she had heretofore entertained. How could the man subject that beautiful child to such a rigid, restrictive atmosphere?

CHAPTER 5
    J eremy watched his new housekeeper leave the library. What on earth had possessed him to hire a woman whose appearance and demeanor recommended her more for a ballroom than a stillroom? An apron about her waist emphasized delectable feminine curves, and that ridiculous mobcap did little to hide the soft, wispy curls about her face. He shook his head in self-disgust. He supposed he had been thinking with some part of his anatomy other than his brain. And that line of thought would not bear pursuing at all. She was, he reminded himself, an employee—and this Lord Kenrick, unlike his predecessor, would not be dallying with the help! Three months. In three months, perhaps Margaret could find him a proper housekeeper.
    â€œWell, Aunt,” he challenged. “What do you think?”
    â€œYour new housekeeper sounds efficient. Young, though. Is she pretty?”
    â€œPretty?” He feigned disinterest. “Yes, I suppose she is—for whatever that matters.”
    â€œOh, it could matter,” his aunt said sagely. “Time will tell.”
    Jeremy snorted. “The vicar’s wife is reading novels to you again, isn’t she? The two of you—filling your heads with romantic nonsense.”
    His aunt laughed merrily. “You, my boy, could use a bit of romance in your life!”
    He heaved an exaggerated sigh. “Finish your nap, Aunt Elinor. I have work to do.”
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