An Unexpected Pleasure. Candace Camp

Thisbe.”

      Megan swallowed her irritation at the interruption and walked with him to the elegant staircase. She studied the woman coming down the steps.

      She was tall and slender, as the duchess had been, but her hair was the rich black of Theo’s, and her eyes were an equally vivid green. Small spectacles perched on her narrow nose. She was dressed plainly in a dark skirt and white shirtwaist. Megan noticed that one cuff was ink-stained, and there was a smudge of something greenish on the blouse. She wore an abstracted look, but it vanished as she saw Theo, and she smiled broadly, her face lighting up.

      “Theo!” She held out both her hands. “I haven’t seen you in—” she frowned “—well, in a long time.”

      “That is because you have been locked in your shed out there for the better part of two days,” her brother replied teasingly, taking her hands in his and smiling down fondly into her face. “What have you been doing?”

      “Experiments,” she replied. “I’ve been corresponding with a scientist in France regarding the effects of carbolic acid on—”

      Theo raised his hands as if in surrender. “No. Please. You know I won’t understand a word of what you say.”

      “Heathen,” Thisbe retorted without heat.

      Theo turned toward Megan, saying, “I am the only member of my family who dislikes education.”

      “No, not education. You merely dislike books,” Thisbe put in. She smiled at her brother and then at Megan. “And writing. He is the most dreadful correspondent—which is really quite horrid, as he is off traveling most of the time.” She extended her hand to Megan. “Hello, I am Thisbe Robinson, Theo’s twin.”

      “I’m sorry,” Theo said. “You can see that I am equally abysmal with social skills. Thisbe, please allow me to introduce you to the twins’ new tutor, Miss Henderson.”

      Thisbe looked faintly surprised, then pleased, and shook Megan’s hand heartily. “What a splendid idea. I am sure that a woman will deal much better with the boys. Have you met them yet?”

      “Yes.” Megan smiled at Thisbe. She could not help but like the woman, whose candid, unaffected manner was very refreshing, especially compared to the other upper-crust women whom Megan had met, both English and American.

      Theo let out a chuckle. “Actually, she met them in a typical situation. They let loose some mice on Lady Kempton and her daughter.”

      “I am sure no one deserved it more,” Thisbe commented dryly. She turned to Megan to say earnestly, “There is no harm in Alex and Con, really. They are merely—”

      “Lively?” Theo supplied. “Isn’t that how you described them, Miss Henderson?”

      “Yes. There is nothing wrong with having energy,” Megan said stoutly. “It simply needs to be directed.”

      “Quite right, Miss Henderson.” Thisbe beamed at her. “I say, I think you will deal nicely with the boys. Desmond—that is my husband—and I are always happy to help in the scientific areas. I find traditional texts quite lacking in that field.”

      “As are my skills, I am sure,” Megan replied honestly. “I would welcome any help you could supply.”

      No answer could have pleased Thisbe more, it seemed, for she seized Megan’s hand and shook it again with enthusiasm, promising that she would meet with her soon regarding her lesson plans. Then, with a quick smile for her brother, Thisbe was off down the rear hall, almost instantly deep in thought again.

      “She and Desmond are excellent teachers in all things scientific,” Theo told her. “It is only with such small practical matters as remembering supper that they have problems. So if you want her help, I feel sure you will have to seek her out. The twins can show you where her laboratory is located—it is at the back of the yard, since she set fire to her first one and not only alarmed the servants but did some damage to my father’s workroom.”

      “Your father’s workroom?” Megan asked, puzzled. She wouldn’t have expected a duke to have a workroom. She could not have said what she thought a duke did all day, but she would have supposed it involved anything but work.

      “There are those who would call it a junk room, I imagine,” Theo explained. “It is a shed where he keeps his potsherds and the other artifacts he is working on. He sorts and identifies them, restores them if it’s possible. The more important pieces, of course, he puts in his collection room in the house—he has one here and one at Broughton Park—but the overflow is consigned to shelves in his workroom.”

      “I see. He is interested in…antiquities, then?”

      “Yes. Though only Greek and Roman. I am afraid he finds the rest of the world of little importance—the same can probably be said of everything since, oh, the time of Nero, as well.”

      “I see.”

      “Now, Uncle Bellard is interested in much more modern times—even as recent as the Napoleonic wars.”

      “Uncle Bellard?” Megan repeated.

      “Great-uncle, actually. He lives here, too. But it will probably be some time before you meet him. He is somewhat shy and usually sticks to his rooms in the east wing.” He grinned down at her. “Don’t worry, that’s about all the people present here at the moment. We are rather down from most years—we usually have a surprising number of relatives pop out of the woodwork when the season arrives. Fortunately, Lady Rochester has decided not to grace us with her presence this year—she chose to torment her daughter-in-law instead—or I would have to warn you to avoid her at all costs.”

      Megan could not help but chuckle. There was something infectious about Theo’s smile. She looked at him and once again felt that strange tug inside her. The feeling was bizarre and unsettling, and she could not understand why she was experiencing it. She was not even sure what the sensation was.

      However, she was sure that she should not be feeling it for this man. He was her sworn enemy, the man she had hated for ten years.

      She put her hand to her midsection, as if to quiet the tumult there.

      “I’ll take you up to the nursery,” Theo said. “It’s something of a climb, I’m afraid. In general, Mother has never approved of the notion of sequestering children away in the nursery. However, given the twins’ collection of animals, it seemed the most logical thing to stick them and their menagerie at some distance from the rest of us. So they are up on the third story.”

      Megan, never having lived in the sort of wealthy household that had a separate nursery area for the children, was not sure exactly what to expect. From tales she had heard and read, she half expected some sort of gloomy area tucked away under the eaves, but when they reached it, she found that the Moreland nursery was a pleasantly sunny place with a large schoolroom and several smaller rooms leading off from it.

      Shelves filled with toys and books lined the two long walls of the rectangular room. Four desks lined up back to back stood in the center of the room, and at one end of them stood a large globe on a stand. A chart of the solar system and an astronomical map of the night sky were pinned to the wall, as were several smaller maps of England, Europe and the world. The world map, Megan noticed, was dotted with pins of various colors, the predominant ones of red. Along the far wall, in the sun streaming in through the windows, were several cages containing animals.

      The twins were engaged in feeding their various animals, the dog, Rufus, beside them, gazing hopefully into the cages. Con and Alex turned at the sound of their entrance, and broke into smiles when they saw Megan and Theo.

      “Theo! Miss Henderson!” they chorused.

      Alex set the cup of fruits and nuts inside the large birdcage and closed the door, and the boys approached them.

      “We’ve already fed the boa,” Alex said apologetically. “I’m sorry. If we had known you would come up here, we would have waited.”