“Jasper, are you feeling well?”
“Yes, thank you.”
I searched his placid, unreadable features for hints. “Has something happened?”
“Yes, sir. It appears that Nanny Foster has given her notice.”
“Notice?”
“She’s going back home to live with her sister. Something about frigid winters, spoiled children, and tea.”
“Tea?”
“I’m sorry, lord. She didn’t elaborate.” He cleared his throat. “She’s leaving in the morning.”
“But she’s only been here six months.” I said this knowing Jasper was quite aware of how long this latest nanny had been employed. We should have known better than to hire her in the summer when the skies were a brilliant blue and birds sang from trees and everything smelled of pine needles and wildflowers.
“I’ll contact the agency back east to see if we can find someone suitable,” Jasper said.
“Yes. I suppose that’s our only option.” I rubbed my forehead, hoping this wasn’t a foreshadowing of what would happen with Miss Cooper. Would she be able to withstand the winter and such a difficult assignment? Would she miss city life in Boston? I had already seen the sadness on her face when she talked of her family.
“Lizzie and Merry have both offered to help with the children,” Jasper said. “But with a new houseguest, they’ll be stretched a little thin.”
“It’s kind of them, but I agree. Are you sure there’s no one in town who would be qualified?”
“Absolutely not.”
I smiled at his horrified expression. Jasper was alternately appalled and fascinated by the lives of the women of ill repute and the rough men who closed down the saloon every night. He wanted me to round them all up and send them away. I’d tried many times to explain to Jasper that I was not allowed to dictate the lives of others, regardless of how much money I had.
“Jasper, do you think the children are spoiled? Is this the problem with the nannies?”
Jasper’s brows lifted. “Absolutely not. They’re precious children. Nanny Foster doesn’t seem to understand that children have a need for exercise and games, not just sitting still for hours looking pretty.”
“All right then.” Jasper’s quick defense and loyalty to my children never ceased to both amaze and warm me. “I worry. Since Ida…” I trailed off, unable to explain and knowing Jasper understood anyway.
“The children will be fine,” Jasper said. “They’ll be going to school now that Miss Cooper’s come. All but Fiona, who can keep Lizzie company in the kitchen.”
“Speaking of Miss Cooper. She’s agreed to teaching a night school several evenings a week.”
Jasper frowned. “May I speak frankly, sir?”
“Of course.”
Jasper coughed before speaking. “Given her appearance, I’m worried about this idea. Will she be safe?”
“I share your concern. One of us or Harley will have to accompany her.”
He nodded, obviously satisfied by my answer. “Will you need anything else, sir? I’ve prepared your room.”
“No, thank you. That’ll be all for the night.”
“Good night, my lord.”
It was nearly nine. Time for my nightly habit of checking on my offspring. I’m not sure what it was, but I liked to see them snuggled into their beds. I took a lantern and walked up the stairs. As was my routine, I checked on the girls first, setting the lantern on the table by the door so I could get a good look at them. They slept in twin beds lined up in a row. Cymbeline slept on her stomach with her arms flung out to the sides. She’d managed to kick off her quilt. I tucked that around her as best I could without waking her. If she woke, it might be hours before she fell back to sleep. My tempestuous, sassy Cymbeline, as turbulent and untamed as the mountains that rose above us. She was as tough as any boy and her competitiveness unparalleled, other than in her brother Flynn. They could make a game out of any situation and then try as hard as they could to win. Like Flynn, she seemed made of this place.
Fiona, with her dark lashes splayed against her full cheeks, slept on her back with her arms around Teddy. My baby. The only child of mine who had not known her mother. Ironically, given what had almost happened, she was the only one undamaged by Ida simply because she never knew her.
I kissed Fiona’s forehead and stayed for a moment, begging my memory to remember her exactly this way. What I knew about fatherhood could be boiled down to two things. My heart was forever changed the moment I first held baby Josephine in my arms, and their childhoods went way too fast. The passage of time for a bachelor sifted through fingers like sand. Shoes and clothes outgrown, fat baby cheeks that turned into cheekbones, first words that became sentences and then paragraphs, made the constant movement of time impossible to ignore.