“If you insist, then. I do appreciate it.”
He boosted her into the gig and glanced at the sky in silent thanks. If there was one thing he did not regard as a productive use of his time, it was arguing with a strange woman in the street while a blizzard bore down on the city and the baby in his arms grew closer to that moment when…
“My goodness.” Miss Windham wrinkled her nose where she sat on the bench. “Something…”
“Not something.” Vim handed her the baby. “Someone. He ate, he burped, and now he must treat us to a demonstration of the health of the other end of his digestion.” He climbed into the gig and unwrapped the reins from the brake. Beside him, Miss Windham was holding the baby slightly away from her body.
“I say.” She frowned at the child. “I do say. You’re sure they do this regularly?”
“With appalling regularity, if you’re lucky. I’d guess the boy’s getting some solid food too, which will make his situation a great deal easier if you can’t locate the mother.”
She didn’t ask him how he came to such a conclusion, though the evidence presented to Vim’s nose was unassailable. A child subsisting exclusively on mother’s milk wasn’t half as odoriferous as Kit had just been.
Vim flicked the reins, and the chestnut behemoth in the traces moved off. “Where are we heading?”
She rattled off an address on one of the great squares of Mayfair, prompting Vim to wonder just whom he was escorting.
Sophie Windham was well spoken, but she was also driving herself around London in the dead of winter. Her clothing was well made but not fancy enough to suggest wealth. She had the brisk competence of a housekeeper, and a position in service would explain her lack of familiarity with child care, as domestics seldom married.
“You were traveling today, Mr. Charpentier?” She’d relented and was holding the child against her body, despite the baby-stink emanating from the bundle in her arms.
“Heading to the family seat for the much-vaunted holidays.” The family seat, such as it was, for the holidays, such as they were. His tone of voice must have given him away, for she shot him a look. He could feel her scrutinizing his profile and see her female brain choosing the most delicate way to frame an awkward question.
But she said nothing.
“What about you?” He glanced over at her. “Is London home, or should you be traveling somewhere to join your family for Christmas?”
“My brothers are coming through Town later in the week. We’ll journey to Kent together, assuming they all arrive safe and sound.”
“How many brothers do you have?”
“I had five. Thanks to consumption and the Corsican, I now have three.” Her voice hadn’t wavered, hadn’t revealed any particular sentiment, but she cradled the child closer.
“I am sorry for your losses.”
She was quiet for a moment, while around them, the flurries were becoming a light, regular snow. She spoke just when he’d thought the topic closed. “My brother Victor died this time of year. I don’t think my parents will spend another Christmas in Town for some time. We’re still trying to find our balance with it.”
He had no idea what to say to that. The lady fell silent, as well, suggesting the admission wasn’t comfortable for her either. “This is a fairly recent loss?”
She nodded. “You can turn up that alley there; it will lead to our mews two blocks up.”
Not surprisingly, the alley was relatively free of snow. The neighborhood was such that droves of servants would be available to move snow, to dig out the stables, to shovel off and then sweep the walks and garden pathways.
“My father died at Christmas, as well,” he said as the horse trotted along. “He was not a well man in my lifetime. I think my mother was relieved to see him at peace.” The baby fussed, which provided a distraction. “Try patting his back.”
She did, gently and awkwardly.
“You aren’t accustomed to children, are you?”
She paused in her attention to the child. “I am an aunt, but it’s hardly a role that prepares one for…” She wrinkled her nose tellingly.
“Dealing with a baby is usually a matter of trial by fire. Is that your mews?”
The stable doors bore an emblazoned crest, something with a unicorn and a lot of vinery, which again tickled the back of Vim’s memory. A groom came out amid the thickening snow to slide the stable door back so Goliath and the gig could be parked right in the barn aisle.
Vim brought the horse to a halt and alighted, turning to take the baby from Miss Windham’s arms. “You’ll want to be seeing to his nappy.”
She opened her mouth as if to say something, then drew her brows down. “His nappy?”
The wizened little gnome of a groom looked up from where he was coiling the reins then quickly went back to work.
Vim brushed a finger down his own nose. “His nappy. I can show you if you would like.”
The offer was made before his brain had a chance to truss up his idiot mouth. The baby made another fussy noise, blinking up at Vim owlishly. So little, and the boy’s mama had just abandoned him. A clean nappy wasn’t too much of an imposition, really.
Miss Windham’s expression had cleared. “Higgins, Goliath stood for a bit in the cold. Perhaps he should have a bran mash?”
Higgins paused in the unbuckling of the harness straps to pat the horse. “Of course, Miss Sophie. Nothing’s too good for our lamb.”
“Precisely.” The smile she sent the groom would have felled a brace of sober stevedores. Holding the baby just a few feet away, Vim watched as her mouth curved up into the very arc of sweetness, her eyes lit with warmth, and her whole countenance beamed appreciation and approval at the groom.
Or perhaps at the horse.
She petted the gelding on his tremendous stern then moved toward to the animal’s bow and planted a kiss on his enormous nose. “Thank you, precious. Stay nice and warm tonight.”
The horse blinked at her or perhaps batted its eyes. When Miss Windham straightened, she wasn’t smiling.
“I suppose we should get the baby out of this weather. Higgins, you’re settled in for the night?”
“Right and tight, Miss Sophie. Any word from your brothers?”
“They’re due any day, though the weather might slow them down. Thank you for asking.”
She swept past Vim, so he fell in step behind her. Miss Windham did not float nor mince, as a society lady would have. She clipped along, all business, until she got to the barn door, where she stopped so abruptly Vim nearly collided with her.
“This snow means business,” she observed. “It will be difficult to send anybody out to search for Joleen as long as the weather is so foul.”
“Are you sure you want to do that?”
She moved off again, casting him a curious look over her shoulder. “She fell prey to a footman, Mr. Charpentier. Joleen was old enough, but she was innocent and not overly bright. I don’t hold it against her that she gambled her heart on a losing hand.”
She clearly held it against the footman, however. Vim pitied the man if Miss Windham ever laid eyes on him again.
They passed through a gate into a walled garden that backed up to nothing less than a mansion. In some parts of the city, the old great houses built in the reign of the last king had been broken up into multiple dwellings, each with its own narrow strip of back garden.
This house took up roughly half the block, with no divisions of the back lots to suggest it had been split into rental properties. There would be a ballroom in a dwelling this size, parlors, music rooms, and enough cheery fires to keep a baby nice and warm.
The baby squirmed in Vim’s arms just as both wind and snow became more intense.
“This way.” Miss Windham led him to a back door. As soon as Vim stepped inside, he was hit with the scents of clove, allspice, cinnamon, and yeast. A wave of nostalgia for Blessings up in Cumbria, with its big kitchens and familiar retainers, passed through him as the child began to squawk in earnest.
“He is telling us he has been patient as long as he’s going to be, Miss Windham. We’ll need clean nappies, a clean flannel, and some warm water.”
She paused in the act of hanging her cloak on a hook. “The fires in the nursery have likely been allowed to go out because Kit was to have been on his way south by now.”
“A servants’ parlor might do.” If any room in the house was kept cozy this time of year, it was the servants’ parlor.
“Follow me.”
She led him through a spotless kitchen and down a short, dim hallway that looked to be lined with pantries. The servants’ parlor at the end of the hallway was indeed snug and comfortable and enjoyed a view of the snowy back gardens. A fire burned cheerily in the hearth, though the room was with without occupants. The cradle sitting near the hearth suggested Kit had already spent a substantial amount of time here.
Vim spoke to his hostess over the baby’s increasingly loud fussing. “This will do. If you’ll bring flannel and warm water, I’ll get him unwrapped.”
She withdrew a little quickly, her expression suggesting a distraught baby unnerved her every bit as much as it did Vim.
“We can get down to business,” Vim informed the child. “But I need to get you unswaddled first, so be patient.” As soon as he set the baby down, the little fellow started kicking his legs out and waving his arms around.
“Getting bored, are we? Flail around all you like, little man. You’ll be off to sleep that much sooner.”
The habit of talking to people too small to join in the conversation was ingrained. Babies liked being talked to, just the way they liked music boxes and twittering birds and running water. In some ways, babies were the easiest people to like.
But as the warm air in the parlor picked up the scent of soiled nappy, Vim revised his judgment: clean babies were easy to like. He tossed his coat on a chair, slipped his cuff links in a pocket, and started rolling up his sleeves.
He soon had the child naked on a blanket before the hearth, the dirty nappy neatly folded and tucked aside. Fortunately, the mess was minimal.
At the soft click of door latch behind him Vim glanced up from where he knelt on the floor. Miss Windham stood there, some folded cloths in one hand, a steaming bowl in the other. Her eyes went to the baby, surprise registering at the child’s state of undress.
From her expression, Vim considered that the baby on the floor was very likely the woman’s first encounter with a completely naked male.
Two
Sophie Windham frequently described herself as a well-read, intelligent woman in an age when neither attribute was much encouraged among her peers. Coming upon the scene in the parlor, all that came out of her mouth was, “My goodness!”
And then… nothing. She frankly gaped at the tableau before her: the baby naked on a nest of rugs and blankets, cheerfully kicking and squirming at nothing in particular, and the great golden length of Mr. Charpentier, curled indolently above the child, long, elegant fingers playing with the child’s feet.
Sophie did not know how to change a diaper.
She did not know how to comfort a fussy baby.
She did not know the particulars of feeding such a small child.
But she did know that these matters were the province of women, a fact of which Mr. Charpentier was apparently ignorant.
“Is it good for him to be… unclothed like that?” she asked.
The man rose smoothly to an imposing height—he was every bit as tall as Sophie’s brothers—and cocked his head at her. “Be a little difficult to get him cleaned up otherwise, wouldn’t it?”
Stupid, stupid, stupid. Sophie felt a blush rising up her neck. “Suppose it would. So how does one…?” She gestured with the clean nappies at the baby.
“It isn’t complicated.” He took the cloths and basin from her. “I shall demonstrate. By the third one, you’ll be an expert. The trick is to be fast and calm, as if you were dealing with a nervous horse or an injured cat.”
He folded himself down to his knees, leaving Sophie no choice but to join him and the baby on the floor.
“Why does he kick and wiggle about like that?”
“Because he can. My guess is if we put him on his tummy, he’d be just about at the stage where he’s getting up on all fours and rocking but not quite crawling yet.” As he spoke, Mr. Charpentier wrung out a cloth in the warm water and started using it to tend to the child… who was quite completely and utterly naked.
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