“A viscount can have another job as well.”
Justin paused in his digging to look up at him hopefully. “I can?”
“Perhaps if it’s one of the honorable professions,” Phoebe interceded gently, “such as diplomacy or the law.”
West sent her a sardonic glance. “His grandfather spent years running a gaming club in London. As I understand it, he was personally involved in its day-to-day management. Is that on your list of honorable professions?”
“Are you criticizing my father?” Phoebe asked, nettled.
“Just the opposite. Had the duke allowed himself to be hamstrung by the expectations of nobility, he probably wouldn’t have a shilling to his name.” He paused to adjust the pile of stones as Stephen stacked another one. “The point is, he ran the club, and ended up a duke all the same. Which means when Justin comes of age, he can choose any occupation he likes. Even a ‘dishonorable’ one.”
“I want to be a geologist,” Justin volunteered. “Or an elephant trainer.”
Phoebe looked at West and asked indignantly, “And who will look after the Clare estate?”
“Perhaps Stephen. Or you.” He grinned at her expression. “That reminds me: tomorrow I have to do some bookkeeping. Would you like to take a look at the estate account ledgers?
Phoebe hesitated, torn between wanting to chide him for putting ideas in her son’s head, and wanting to accept the offer. It would be enormously helpful to learn the estate farm’s accounting system, and she knew he could explain it in a way she could understand.
“Would we be alone?” she asked warily.
“I’m afraid so.” West’s voice lowered as if he were relating something scandalous. “Just the two of us in the study, poring over the lascivious details of income and expenditure estimates. Then we’ll move on to the really salacious materials . . . inventory . . . crop rotation charts . . .”
The man never missed an opportunity to mock her.
“Yes,” Phoebe said wryly, “I’ll join you.” She pulled two handkerchiefs from her pocket. “One for Stephen’s hands,” she said, giving them to him, “and one for Justin.”
“What about me?” West asked. “Don’t you want my hands to be clean?”
Phoebe fished another handkerchief from her bodice and gave it to him.
“You’re like a magician,” he said.
She grinned and returned to Nanny, who was tidying the interior of the pram. “We’ll go back to the house now,” she said briskly. “Don’t fuss when you see the boys: they’re both filthy but they’ve had a splendid time. Did you happen to see where the cat went?”
“She’s under the pram, milady.”
Phoebe crouched to look beneath the vehicle and saw a pair of amber eyes gleaming in the shadows. The cat crept from beneath the pram with the toy horse in her mouth and came to drop it in her lap.
Phoebe was amused and a bit touched by the cat’s obvious pride in the offering. The toy was no longer recognizable, the leather shredded and most of the stuffing removed. “Thank you, my dear. How very thoughtful.” After tucking the toy in her pocket, she picked up the cat. For the first time, there were no needling claws as the creature settled in her arms. “I suppose we’ll have to keep you until we leave Hampshire. But you’re still not a house cat, and you can’t go to Essex with us. My plans are fixed . . . and nothing will alter them.”
Chapter 17
“There’s nothing wicked about you, except your kisses.”
Ever since Phoebe’s astonishing whisper in his ear, West had been in a most peculiar state. Happy. Miserable. Off balance, fidgety, hungry, hot. He woke repeatedly in the middle of the night, his blood clamoring for morning.
It reminded him of the days when he used to drink himself into a stupor and regain consciousness in a dark room, bewildered and groggy. Not knowing the day, the time, or even where he was. Remembering nothing, not even the pleasures of gross self-indulgence that had put him there.
He sat at the long table in the oak-lined study, with stacks of ledgers and document folios in front of him. It was one of his favorite rooms in the house, a compact rectangular space lined with bookshelves. The floor was thickly carpeted, the air agreeably scented of vellum, parchment and ink. Daylight poured through a large window filled with a multitude of glittering antique panes, each no bigger than his hand.
Usually he was happy to be sitting here. He liked doing the accounting; it helped him understand how the estate was doing in every aspect. But at the moment his usual interest in the world around him—people, land, and livestock, the house, the weather, even food—had narrowed down to Phoebe.
He needed to be either right next to her or very far away from her. Anything in between was torture. Knowing she was in the same house or somewhere on the estate, somewhere reachable, made every cell in his body ache to find her.
When West had seen her so unexpectedly yesterday morning, he’d been jolted with an intense feeling of happiness, pleasurable on the surface but painful several layers down. She had been so beautiful there by the stream, as flowerlike as the wild irises on the banks.