Stunned into silence, Stephen looked tearfully into the man’s smiling blue eyes.
“Poor chap,” West soothed. “How dare they offer you a toy when you had a perfectly good rock to play with? It’s an outrage . . . yes it is . . . an atrocity . . .” To Phoebe’s amazement, Stephen’s temper subsided as the “stranger” continued to coddle him. He put his hand on the West’s cheek, exploring the bristly texture. In a moment, West lowered his face and blew a rude sound against the baby’s tummy, making him convulse with giggles. He lifted him in the air and began to pitch him upward repeatedly, eliciting squeals of delight.
“Mr. Ravenel,” Phoebe said, “I’d prefer you didn’t toss my child about as if he were an old valise.”
“He likes it,” West replied, although he gentled the movement.
“He also likes chewing on discarded cigar butts,” Phoebe said.
“We all have our bad habits,” West told the baby kindly, lowering him back down to his chest. “Justin, come—we have work to do.” He bent to pick up a stick the length of his forearm.
Phoebe’s eyes widened. “What is that for?”
“We’re clearing the area of crocodiles,” West informed her, and handed the stick to Justin. “If one comes close, beat him off with this.”
Justin squeaked in excitement and followed at his heels.
Although Phoebe was tempted to point out there were no crocodiles in England, she only laughed and watched as the three adventurers set off. Shaking her head, she went to sit beside Nanny.
“There’s a lot of man in that one,” the older woman remarked.
“There’s too much man in that one,” Phoebe said wryly.
They watched West stride off with the boys, still holding Stephen in one arm. Justin reached up with his free hand, and West took it without hesitation.
“They speak well of him in the servants’ hall,” Nanny ventured. “A good man, and a good master, who should have a household of his own. Well favored in looks, and the right age for fathering, too.”
“Nanny,” Phoebe said, giving her an amused, incredulous glance, “he’s only half tame.”
“Fie, milady . . . there’s not a man alive who’d be too much for you to manage.”
“I don’t want a man I’d have to manage. I’d like a civilized one who can manage himself.” Phoebe reached over to a patch of wild chamomile and plucked a blossom. Rubbing it between her thumb and forefinger, she inhaled the sweet apple-ish scent. Glancing sideways at the other woman, she added quietly, “Besides, you haven’t forgotten what Henry asked of me.”
“No, milady. Nor have I forgotten that he asked it when he was in his last fading. You’d have promised anything to ease his mind.”
Phoebe felt comfortable discussing Henry with his old nanny, who had loved him from the first day of his life to the last. “Henry gave careful thought to my future,” she said. “He saw the advantages of a match with Edward, who has a fine reputation and a gentlemanly nature, and will set a good example for the boys while they’re growing up.”
“A fine shoe often pinches the foot.”
Phoebe gathered more blossoms to make a tiny bouquet. “I’d have thought you would approve of a match between me and Henry’s cousin. Edward is so very like him.”
“Is he, milady?”
“Yes, you’ve known him since he was a child. He’s very much like Henry, only without the quirks.”
Despite Edward’s relatively young age, he was a gentleman of the old school, courtly and soft-spoken, a man who would never dream of making a scene. In all the years of their acquaintance, Phoebe had never once seen him lose his temper. She wouldn’t have to worry that he would be unfaithful, or cold, or thoughtless: It simply wasn’t in him.
It wasn’t difficult to envision being content with Edward.
The difficult part was trying to imagine sleeping with him. Her mind couldn’t seem to conjure it except in an unfocused way, like watching shadow puppets.
When it came to West Ravenel, however, the problem was exactly the reverse. The idea of sharing a bed with him made her mouth go dry and her pulse race with excitement.
Troubled by the direction of her thoughts, Phoebe wrapped a stem around the little chamomile bouquet and gave it to Nanny. “I should go see what Mr. Ravenel and the children are doing,” she said lightly. “He probably has them playing with knives and sulfur matches by now.”
She found West and the children on a low bank of the stream, all three of them muddy and disheveled. Stephen was perched in West’s lap, his white linen smock positively filthy. They appeared to have made a project of stacking flat river stones into towers. Justin had used his stick to dig a channel in the sandy silt and was transferring water from the stream with his cupped hands.
Phoebe’s brows flew upward. “I took a rock away from the baby,” she asked West, “and you gave him a dozen more?”
“Shhh,” West said without looking at her. A corner of his mouth twitched as he continued, “Don’t interrupt a man while he’s working.”
Stephen clutched a flat stone with both hands, guiding it to a stack with wobbly determination. He pressed it on top of the other stones and held it there while West gently adjusted its position.
“Well done,” West said.
Justin offered Stephen another stone, and Stephen took it with a grunt of enthusiasm. His small face was comically serious as he maneuvered the stone to the top of the stack. Phoebe watched intently, struck by how excited and interested he was in the project.
Since the death of the father who’d never seen him, she had sheltered and coddled her youngest child as much as possible. She had filled his world with soft, pretty objects and endless comfort. It hadn’t occurred to her that he might want—or need—to play with rocks, sticks, and mud.
“He’s going to be a builder,” West said. “Or an excavator.”
“Lucky Stephen,” Justin said, surprising Phoebe. “I wish I could have a job someday.”
“Why can’t you?” West asked.
“I’m a viscount. And they won’t let you quit even if you want to.”