Eleven

The hard fact was, Michael had no idea how to teach someone to read.

He woke just before dawn with that thought stuck in his mind. His only experience of such things were the lessons he'd taken as a boy, and that ordeal had consisted mainly of repetition and pain, with great emphasis—in his memory at least—on the pain. His tutor, Mr. Lance, had been particularly fond of the ferrule, using it alternately on Michael's knuckles and palms when he stumbled or balked at a word.

Then there had been the time young Michael, not more than six years old, had been unable to recite the correct conjugation and mood of the verb to be . Mr. Lance's face had turned purple with rage. He'd forced Michael to extend his arms and hold three heavy tomes for a full half hour without flinching.

Michael could still see the man's ruddy countenance looming over him, could still feel the shaking and burning of the muscles in his arms as they threatened to give way. Though it was all overshadowed by the terror of what Father would say when he found out.

What had Father said? The memory was hazy, mixed up with all the other scenes of himself trembling before Father's big desk. Indeed, such interactions were all Michael had known of his father as a boy. He hadn't yelled, of that Michael was sure. He never yelled. He'd simply stared at his son, his blue eyes burning into him, and explained just how disappointing a son he had turned out to be . . .

"Do you want to be an even worse earl than your uncle, boy? Because that's where you're headed. A dimwit." Father's eyes narrowed. "An embarrassment."

The words landed on Michael's chest like blows, though somehow, even as a young boy he'd learned to hold himself stiff, to feign indifference.

Father pursed his lips in loathing. "Get out of my sight."

But Michael was already going, darting through the door into the corridor, his facade crumpling as the tears broke loose—

Bah. Michael pushed the thin blanket off. It would be a hot day, and he was already sweating.

No, there was nothing in his past he could use to teach Mrs. Blackwell. And anyway, what reason did she have to know the first perfect tense from the pluperfect? All she needed was to be able to read a contract, and to write passably.

If he only had a first reader. He should have thought of getting one when they were in town yesterday, but he'd been too preoccupied with the other business.

She had paper and ink in her husband's office, at least. He could write out the alphabet. That was a start.

But there was another problem. Mrs. Blackwell herself. As he'd proved quite deftly the night before, getting too close to her was a dangerous thing. He winced at the memory. What a beetle- headed fool he'd been. Not just the antics with the spill, but his pathetic retreat afterward.

The room was growing more stifling by the second. No air at all came through the open window.

Mrs. Blackwell was his employer. He must do right by her, and that meant teaching her to read. Not ogling her and fumbling about.

The magpie began to sing again just outside the window. So bloody loud—it must have a nest near the house. It sounded so pleased with itself. How could a dumb creature like that hold so much joy? What did it have to be so happy about? All it would do in its short life was eat, fuck, build a nest, and raise its brood. What sort of existence was that anyway?

It wasn't unlike the life Davey lived with Emily. So dashedly content.

Goddamn bird.

Michael growled into the gray light. There would be no more sleep this morning.

He rose and stalked into the kitchen. The room was still, the air already heavy and hot. He cocked his head, listening. Only the sound of the blasted bird filtering in from outside. Nothing from Mrs. Blackwell's chamber. She must still be asleep.

He might as well get breakfast.

Thankfully, the sound of the back door opening and closing sent the bird soaring away over the barn. Michael washed his hands and face with water from the well. It was blessedly cold, though he was hot again as soon as it dried. Then he drew a pail for the cooking. Back inside, he put the kettle on, poured a bit of maize and water into a pot, and set it over the cold hearth. Now to stoke the fire. It was an easy thing to do: dust off the white layer of ash that coated yesterday's coals, then feed a few twists of straw and dry sticks to the warm embers. A bit of breath, taking care not to blow ash everywhere, and the straw ignited. He stirred the pot a few times as the new flames licked around it, yellow and bright. When they began to die down, he added thicker sticks and a log, then left the lot to cook while he skimmed some cream off yesterday's milk and set the table—the honey pot, the pitcher, the teapot, two cups, bowls, and spoons.

He stood back, surveying his work. It would do. Then he returned to the hearth. The porridge was beginning to thicken, so he stirred it while adding a quick pinch of salt.

He breathed in the rich steam, and his stomach growled. There was something satisfying about the mindless routines of a kitchen. He'd discovered this when he'd lived with Davey in Sydney. Before that , back at home in London, he'd never even set foot in a kitchen. Why would he? The only reason Father would have tolerated was to annoy the maids, but Michael was never one for such things.

Except for that time in Darnalay . . .

Bah. That was a memory better left alone.

But in Sydney, with Davey, it was either live in a filthy house and eat the greasy meat pies sold in the tavern across the way or to learn to cook and clean. And so, as Davey had seemed quite content with the meat pies and the mess, Michael had learned.

He'd been surprised when he hadn't minded it. It wasn't merely the routine, but the contentment on his friend's face when he enjoyed a meal, the satisfaction that came from making something dirty clean again. Of doing something worthwhile. Something he could see .

Of course, Father would have hated knowing that he'd lowered himself to such tasks. That fact brought a certain kind of satisfaction in itself. The man hadn't spared a second thought for the servants, much less considered the worth of their labor . . . but then, Father had been wrong about a good many things. Everything, as far as Michael could tell.

If only he'd learned that sooner.

"Good morning."

Startled, Michael looked up from the pot. Mrs. Blackwell stood at the door, her elbows jutting back awkwardly as she tied her apron strings. She was the epitome of neat and tidy, her hair freshly pinned, her clothes clean—a sky blue dress Michael was coming to recognize—her face rosy and freshly washed. But her expression . . . it was undone somehow. Soft and open and unwary, eyes bright and still a bit puffy from sleep. She hadn't yet donned the mask she wore in her daily life.

He only stared a second or two, but Michael felt as if he'd been caught at something completely untoward. He grunted, then quickly looked back to the steaming pot.

All too soon, he felt her presence at his back. Close. "I'm never again goin' to cook breakfast in me own house, am I?" she teased.

He kept his eyes on the maize as it bubbled stiffly in its iron pot. "Do you want to?"

There was a pause. "I do not. I've never liked cooking much. Or cleaning. I'd rather be outside in the garden or in the barn."

Michael turned to collect the bowls from the table, only to find her halfway out the door.

"I'll be back in two shakes," she called over her shoulder.

And she was. He'd just finished spooning the porridge when she returned, clutching a handful of odd, bright yellow, orb-shaped flowers.

"Billy buttons." She held them up with a grin, then dipped a tin cup in the water bucket and stuffed them inside. "I don't grow flowers, but these come up each year by the back of the barn. Pretty, aren't they?" She set the bouquet on the table, then stood back and smiled approvingly. "There now. ‘Tis perfect."

Michael felt the sudden urge to retreat, just as he had the previous night. But instead, he held his placid expression in place and passed her a warm bowl of porridge.

She accepted it, walked to the table, and sat down. Once she was settled, he moved to take the chair opposite, taking great care not to look her in the eye. A deferential servant. That's what he was. Nothing more.

She spooned in a mouthful, swallowed, and to his relief when she spoke again it was as a master to a servant. "I'd like you to write that letter this morning while I work with the men."

Michael nodded through his own mouthful of porridge.

"Then we'll have our first lesson. This afternoon." She smiled, clearly anticipating it.

"Of course," he managed. He'd never dreaded anything more.

"I thought we'd begin with the letters. Do you know any of them?" Dunn trained his gaze on the piece of paper between them, which he'd covered in script.

Caitlin squinted at the marks he'd drawn out, but they meant nothing to her, so she focused on his bowed head instead. She'd decided to take her lessons in the sitting room. It was brighter here than in the kitchen, and with the windows open and the front door propped, the heat was bearable. They sat in chairs on opposite sides of the small end table. Dunn's fine curls shone in the early afternoon light. So soft . . . She yearned to touch them, to run her fingers through them, to feel the stark contrast between his locks and his cheek with its stubbly shadow of beard. From this angle, she had a view of his lashes, which she'd never noticed before. They were as blond as the rest of him, fanned out thick against his cheek as he cast his eyes down.

She stared intently at them, willing him to raise his gaze. She counted in her head. One. Two. Three. Look at me, Dunn .

But he just sat there, head down, waiting for her to answer.

Caitlin exhaled and looked away. She was beginning to doubt this plan. Dunn had been the perfect servant all day. He'd made her breakfast and written the letter to London as she'd asked. He'd done a good job of it, from what she could tell. He'd made the farm sound like an inhospitable backwater, not worth anything. Still . . . There was no sign of the man who'd looked at her over dinner yesterday. He'd retreated into his hard shell. Perhaps she'd imagined his interest, after all?

Anyway, bedding this man—or any man—wasn't the important thing, was it? Learning to read was. She was being incurably silly.

She pressed her lips together and forced herself to focus on the page. He'd asked her a question. About her letters.

"I don't know any of these, but I know a few," she offered. "The ones in me name."

Still not looking at her, Dunn took up the quill from the ink pot at his elbow, tapped it against the edge with a practiced motion, then began to scratch something out on a fresh sheet of paper. When he was finished, he blew lightly on the page and turned it so she could see. "You can tell me what these are, then?"

Caitlin stared at the unrecognizable marks. "I—" She looked up, finally meeting the blue of his gaze, but not in the way she'd hoped. She felt anything but desirable. She was a clod. "That's not me name. Is it?" She despised the weakness in her voice.

Dunn's eyes flicked down to the paper. "Blackwell. B-L-A-C-K-W-E-L-L. Have I misspelled it?"

"Oh." Of course. She felt her lips curve into a smile. "Not Blackwell. O'Keefe. That was me name before. There were papers to sign in court, you see, in Cork. And the matron at the gaol taught me. I believe she hoped I'd learn to read the bible, but I shipped out before we got that far."

"I see." Dunn cleared his throat. "O'Keefe, then." He turned the paper back to face him and once again poised the pen above the page.

" Caitlin . O'Keefe." She watched his hand intently, anticipating the familiar letters.

"Caht-leenn." Dunn spoke slowly, drawing the sound out as his quill flowed across the page. Caitlin's scalp tightened at the sound of her name on his lips. Gruff, yet somehow tender. John had called her by her given name, but he'd intentionally said it wrong—using the sharp, grating English pronunciation rather than the Irish, as if she and her Irishness weren't worth anything. But Dunn drew out the soft, lilting Irish sounds as if they were treasures.

She felt herself relax as she recognized the marks.

He looked up to see if she was following, and their eyes met for a second. Then his gaze darted away again.

But not fast enough. She'd seen it, that flash of desire behind the hard shell.

He cleared his throat as he finished writing her surname and turned the page around to face her. "Now, tell me. What letters do you see?"

She glanced up, but his eyes stuck steadfastly to the paper once more. Better to try a different tack. She moved her hand to point at the letters he'd written, intentionally brushing her knuckles across his, gentle as a feather.

He stiffened at the touch, then quickly jerked his hand away. The paper dropped to the table.

Caitlin felt her cheeks heat. For shame . What was she doing? Trying to seduce a man who clearly did not want to be seduced, that's what. Even if, deep down, he did want her, he obviously had no intention of acting on it.

And that was his choice, was it not?

She forced her attention to the page, grinding her back teeth together. Concentrate, Caitlin. You're here to learn, not to lure a man into bed.

The letters he'd written were smoother and more graceful than the ones the matron had scratched out for her, but she could recognize them. The old woman had made her repeat them over and over again until she knew them by rote.

"C." She pointed to the elegantly curved letter he'd penned. He'd put a little loop at the top and bottom, a luxury of ink. "A - I - T - L - I - N."

"Very good. Let's ignore the surname for now." Dunn seemed to have regained his composure. He spoke as a tutor might, brisk and authoritative. He turned the paper around, wrote something beneath her name, and presented it to her. "And what do you suppose this word might be?"

She glanced at the page, then back up at him. "I've no idea. I—"

"Look at it." His blue eyes met hers, and this time, there was no heat at all, only a raised brow and a command. "What are the letters?"

She looked. Squinted. "Well, that's a C, surely. Then A and T. She pointed to each in turn. But I don't know what—"

"In your name." He interrupted. "What sound does the C make?"

She hesitated. It seemed too easy an answer. " Kuh ."

"Yes." He nodded approvingly, then pointed to the A. "Now, A can make several sounds, depending on the word, either ay , as one might say with the English pronunciation of Caitlin, or ah , as you say it in Irish, or a , as in apple . Does that make sense?"

"I—I think so."

"In this particular word," he pointed to the word he'd written, "it uses the a sound, like apple or fan ." His cheeks were flushed. It was a hot afternoon, and the breeze seemed to have died. "Then this last letter—"

"T," she finished.

"Yes. T. What sound does that make, in your name?"

"Cai-t-lin." she recited under her breath, then gave him her answer. " Tuh ."

"Precisely." He raised a brow in challenge. "So, what's the word? String the sounds together."

Caitlin drew a breath. "C-ay-t—"

"No. This is a , as in apple, remember? Or after ."

"Right." She shook her head and turned back to the page. "Cuh-a-tuh. C-a-t." She blinked up at him. "Cat?"

A grin, a real grin that lit up his eyes and yielded a sunburst of creases in their corners spread across his face. "That's it exactly. Cat ."

His smile and her own satisfaction . . . a sudden flutter of happiness rose in her chest. Seduction be damned. This was better. She'd just read a word.

"Give me another." She flipped the paper back toward him.

Somehow, without much prompting on Caitlin's part, Dunn agreed to join her on the verandah again that evening. Perhaps it was the coolness of the night air after the suffocating heat, or perhaps it was the success of their first reading lesson—Caitlin had read every word he'd made from the letters in her name, and each had come quicker than the last. Cat. It. At. Tin. Lit. Ill. Nail. Tail. Then they'd moved on to the letters in O'Keefe. Tomorrow, they'd start on the alphabet proper.

She couldn't wait. The excitement of making sense of letters on a page, paired with that smile he'd given her each time she worked out a word . . . It was like the buzzy warmth one got from just the right amount of grog. But better.

She had planned to speak to him of an affair tonight, but as she sat in the dark and waited for him to appear, she found herself doubting the idea. Attraction aside, he was obviously not interested. If she'd held any doubt, it had been banished when she'd stupidly tried to caress his hand. He'd recoiled faster than a scared rabbit. The rest of the lesson had gone so well, though. To push him into a conversation he so clearly did not want to have . . . it wouldn't be right.

It was better to leave things as they were. He, the servant and tutor. She, the master and pupil. To add lover to that list would only complicate things.

At last, Dunn appeared at the door. He stopped just inside the threshold and peered out warily.

No. There would be no talk of bedding tonight. She'd be lucky if she could get him onto the verandah at all.

"I moved your chair." She spoke as carelessly as possible, waving a hand toward the second chair, which she'd put on the other side of the table to give him just as much access to the flame as she had.

He nodded almost imperceptibly, then pulled a folded newspaper out from under his arm. "I thought I might read to you. If you'd still like me to."

"Of course. Come. Sit."

Silently, he went about the business of lighting his pipe. She couldn't see much of him in the darkness, but she smelled the smoke as he puffed the clay to life, then came the stiff sound of the paper being unfolded. He moved the lantern to reflect light on the print.

"Anything in particular you want to hear about?"

"I don't think so." Caitlin had never read a paper, nor had one read to her. "Just start from the beginning, I'd expect."

"Very well." Dunn was quiet a moment, then he began. "It's the Australian , from a week ago—Friday, November the third, 1826." He cleared his throat. "Enquiry de lunatico . An inquisition took place on Tuesday in the court house, King Street, in pursuance of a writ de lunatico inquirendum , in the case of Mrs. Johnstone of Annandale. The enquiry was commenced on—"

"Johnstone," Caitlin couldn't help but interrupt. "That's Esther Abrams, is it not? Johnstone's mistress."

"His wife now, or widow, I suppose," Dunn confirmed.

"Please, continue."

Dunn began reading again, and with each word the excitement she'd felt at hearing Esther's name dropped farther into the floor. Mrs. Johnstone was accused of lunacy by her own son, it seemed, in an attempt to divest her of her farm. Annandale, the place she'd called home for over thirty years, and which her late husband had lawfully bequeathed to her. The article laid out these facts, then recounted a series of witnesses brought against her.

"Dr. Bland, cross-examined by Mr. S. Stephen," Dunn read, "has known Mrs. J. upwards of twelve years, a great part of that time intimately so. She is a woman of rather eccentric habits, hasty in her temper, and has an abrupt mode of expressing herself. He does not ascribe this to want of education, but allows that she is an illiterate woman. He does not consider such mode of expression to be the effect of insanity, but that such habits would be very likely to merge into insanity. And he admits the justice of the adage that passion is a temporary madness—"

"Enough." Caitlin couldn't listen to any more of this. "Skip to the end. What happened? Did she win?"

Dunn hesitated, and Caitlin was just about to repeat the command when he looked back down and skimmed ahead with his eyes. "Her lawyer called several witnesses in her defense, then . . . Ah, here." He began reading again. "The jury retired at a quarter to five o'clock, and after a lapse of one hour, during which much anxiety pervaded the auditors, returned into court, finding that Mrs. Esther Johnstone is not of sound mind, nor capable of managing her affairs."

Dunn stopped, and a deafening silence filled the void as his words reverberated in Caitlin's mind, drowning out even the grating din of the crickets. Eccentric habits. Illiterate. Not of sound mind, nor capable of managing her affairs. "So—she's lost Annandale then?"

"W-well—" Dunn stuttered. "It doesn't say exactly, but it seems so, yes."

"Even though her husband, one of the most powerful men in the colony in his day, gave it to her. In his will?" Caitlin swallowed. A bitter film coated the inside of her mouth. She took a quick drink of the rum to wash it away, but she could barely taste it.

"Yes," Dunn answered in a whisper.

"The poor woman." But that wasn't it, was it? Sympathy for Esther Abrams—or Johnstone—wasn't the cause of the dread that tugged at Caitlin's thoughts. For at least Esther had other children and some standing. She'd get by. But Caitlin—Lord help her. If she lost the farm . . . what else would there be? Brothel work? Service? Marriage to a sod like that dirty trader, Staples? And if Esther could lose it all so easily . . . What chance did Caitlin have?

All she could do was pray that the heir in London wouldn't want her farm. And wait.

She clenched her teeth hard, but it wasn't enough. She needed to get up. To move. "I—that's enough for now. I'm tired." She rose and tapped out her pipe.

"Mrs. Blackwell." Michael stood, concern creasing his face. "Just because Annandale was lost doesn't mean—"

"Please, Dunn." Caitlin held up a hand to stop him talking. "I know." And she did know. Chances were, everything would be fine. But . . . it wasn't impossible that she'd be turned out. Not impossible at all. "I'll see you in the morning."

And this time, instead of Dunn making his escape, Caitlin did.