The Colours of Love Read Online Free PDF Page B

assist you to retire. I’ll bring a dinner tray shortly, when you are ready. I’ve ordered a light meal, ma’am. Soup and one of cook’s soufflés.’
    ‘Thank you, Mrs Norton.’ Then, as Esther began to grizzle, Harriet glanced at the nanny. ‘She’s hungry. Follow us.’
    ‘I can give her a bottle, ma’am.’
    ‘No – no bottles.’ Realizing she’d been a little abrupt, Harriet smiled as she said, ‘What is your name?’
    ‘Rose Brown, ma’am.’
    ‘Well, Nanny Brown, my daughter was born early and is small, as you can see. She requires feeding every two hours or so, and I happen to believe a mother’s milk is best. Night or day, I wish her brought to me. Is that clear?’
    ‘Of course, ma’am.’ Rose hid her surprise. Well-to-do ladies often had wet-nurses or told the nanny or nursemaid to use pap-bottles, particularly during the night hours when they didn’t want to be disturbed. Mrs Wynford was obviously a devoted mother.
    Theobald had been muttering and cursing as he hobbled across the hall on the arm of the butler. Now he brushed the man irritably away, leaning against the drawing-room door as he growled orders. ‘A bottle of my best malt whisky, Osborne. And I’ll have my meal in here.’ With a cursory glance at his wife, he added, ‘Get to bed and stay there till Dr Martin calls.’
    Harriet couldn’t have argued if she’d wanted to. She felt so shaky that the stairs seemed a Herculean trial. But she was home now, and she had Esther. She was safe. And the baby
did
carry a passing resemblance to Theobald’s mother, funnily enough. She glanced at the gold-framed portrait of her husband’s parents hanging on the opposite wall, and at the woman who stared unsmilingly back from the painting, jet-black curls piled high on her head and her dark eyes set in creamy olive skin. She could easily have been Esther’s grandmother.
    Once in her bedroom suite, the maids helped Harriet disrobe and wash. When she was settled comfortably in bed, propped against thick, soft pillows and with a hot-water bottle at her feet, Rose placed the baby in her arms. Snuggled at the breast, the baby immediately stopped her fretful squawking and began to feed with gusto. Harriet smiled as she stroked the child’s soft cheek. The doctor in Wales had remarked that many premature infants experienced difficulty in feeding, but Esther wasn’t one of them. Of course, she wasn’t as premature as the doctor had been led to believe. Ruth had only been three weeks away from giving birth, whereas Harriet had had two months to go.
    ‘She’s beautiful, ma’am, if you don’t mind me saying,’ Rose murmured when the maids had left the room.
    Harriet looked at the nanny and liked what she saw. They smiled at each other, before Harriet said, ‘Come and sit down and tell me about yourself, and the families you have worked for. How old are you, incidentally?’
    ‘I’m coming up for forty in a week or so, ma’am, and you could say I’ve been responsible for little ones all my life, because I was the eldest in a family of twelve. My poor mother was never well, and so caring for my brothers and sisters fell mostly to me from an early age. Not that I minded that. I’ve always loved children.’
    They smiled at each other again as the fire crackled in the grate, and the baby made little contented grunts every now and again.
    ‘I started as nursery maid to Reverend and Mrs Fallow’s first child, when I was fifteen years old, and they had two more – all boys. When the youngest, Master Stephen, went off to boarding school, I applied for the post of nanny to Colonel and Mrs Smith’s twin daughters, and I was with the family until now. I have good references, ma’am, as you’ll see.’
    ‘I’m sure you have.’
    ‘Thank you, ma’am.’ Rose hesitated. It was a bit early to bring it up, but nevertheless . . . ‘When Mrs Norton engaged me, she said it was on a temporary basis as you hadn’t seen me. She said you would