The Baron's Bounty by Elizabeth Rose Page B

manner. She’d always acted more like her cousin’s handmaiden, and had never been treated half as well as she’d already been treated here. Back home, her friends were mainly the servants.
    “Lady Rose?” She rapped her knuckles softly against the thick oak door. Not hearing an answer but instead continuous crying, she boldly turned the latch to find it unlocked. So she entered the room.
    Sure enough, the girl she’d seen yesterday lay fully clothed atop her bed, crying into the pillow. Her handmaiden was nowhere to be found. Isobel walked over to the bed and put her hand on the girl’s shoulder.
    “Lady Rose?”
    “Oh!” The girl jumped up to a sitting position on the bed, holding her hand to her heart. “You scared me.”
    “I’m sorry,” she said. “I heard ye cryin’ and wanted te make sure ye were all right.”
    “You’re that – that lady my father is marrying, aren’t you?”
    “I’m no’ marryin’ him – no’ really.” She sat down on the edge of the bed and made herself comfortable.
    “You’re . . . not?” Rose wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. She was a small girl for twelve years old, and from what Isobel could tell – acted more like a child than the young woman she really was. Isobel reached over and patted her hand.
    “I’m only a proxy.”
    “A . . . what?”
    “I’m standin’ in fer me cousin, Lady Catherine, who is the one really marryin’ yer faither.”
    That didn’t seem to sit well with the girl and she started to cry again.
    “What’s the matter?” Isobel asked. When the girl didn’t answer, she suddenly understood why the baron wanted to get married so quickly and right there on the beach at Great Yarmouth. “He didna tell ye he was betrothed, did he?”
    “Nay,” the girl admitted, and Isobel’s heart went out to her. She spied a washbasin across the room and got up and wet a cloth and wrung it out in the cool water. She hurried back and handed it to the girl.
    “Wash the tears outta yer eyes and let’s talk aboot this.”
    “I – I’d like that.” Rose gingerly took the rag and wiped her eyes while Isobel sat back down on the bed.
    “I heard aboot the deith o’ yer mathair and I’m sorry. But Rose ye need te understand thet it isna right fer yer faither te stay single so long.”
    “He has me,” she said, looking up with wide eyes the color of the sea. “He doesn’t need another wife.”
    “O’ course he does,” she said, getting up and grabbing a boar’s-bristle brush from the table and walking back to the bed. “Ye see, a man needs a lassie – a grown-up lassie, in his life too. And jest becooz he’s gettin’ married again, it doesna mean he stopped lovin’ yer mathair.”
    She ran a brush over the girl’s hair as she talked.
    “It’s my father’s fault that my mother died.”
    She stopped brushing and sank down onto the bed next to the girl. “How could ye say thet, lass?”
    “Because it’s true. I wanted to stay here and help my mother through the birth of my baby brother, but my father took me away instead. If we had been here – he could have saved her and my brother. I know he could. But we weren’t here and so they died.”
    “Blethers, thet is the silliest thing I’ve e’er heard. Yer faither isna a healer is he?”
    “Nay,” she answered, playing with the cloth, looking downward. “He’s a puppet of the king.”
    Every word out of this girl’s mouth seemed to surprise her. She reminded Isobel a lot of herself at that age. “Now what kind o’ talk is thet?”
    “It’s true. He puts the king first and does what he wants. His loyalty lies with him, not me.”
    “Thet is his job, Rose. He is a Baron o’ the Cinque Ports and many men answer te him, and in return he answers te the king. Thet’s the way it works. I’m sure ye ken thet.”
    “His job is to be a father as well, yet he is never here for me. And every time he returns from overseas, he brings me a gift, thinking it’ll make it all