Under a Gilded Moon(48)

“Be assured I’ve had to wrestle with my conscience in order to do just that. I trust they will indeed follow up.”

In love with the same woman.

Kerry dragged her broom across the stone, but the words reverberated inside her head.

Brutality, someone had said in Bon Marché. Of John Cabot from, apparently, a few years ago. Could those same instincts have shown up again in a jealous rage at the train station?

“And regarding the second item: About your reasons for coming here. I want to offer my help. Truly.”

Still clutching the broom, she crossed her arms over her chest.

“I’m aware how difficult it must be, a young woman in your position. Forgive me, but I took the liberty of asking Mrs. Smythe about your situation when I saw you seeking employment and then appearing here at Biltmore. If I may say so, I was startled that so well-spoken a young woman would—”

“Work as a kitchen maid?”

“Well, yes. After finding a life in New York. Suddenly dragged back. It speaks well for the stock you come from—the strength you’ve shown.”

A tremor went through her. And perhaps he saw it—that his compassion had struck a chord.

“Thank you, Mr. Grant.”

She felt his eyes on her. Heard the way the words came from her own lips just now. Sounding very much—too much—like some sort of yes.

Grant followed her gaze out to the rolling waves of gray and black. “I like to think, Kerry, I’m contributing something of significance to this world—in my law practice, my wildlife work, land preservation.”

He paused as if she were meant to comment. She swept harder.

“But particularly in my work that will have lasting impacts on the future of humanity. It’s within our power, you know, to annihilate inferior traits and breed desirable, superior ones.”

Startled, Kerry paused in her sweeping. Surely she’d misheard. “I’m sorry. Did you say annihilate, Mr. Grant? And breed?”

“If one is willing to root out the laziness and criminality we see quite starkly in particular nationalities. While propagating the industriousness and intelligence in others.”

Kerry stared at him. “Surely you don’t mean . . . ,” she began.

“One of our leading researchers has shown how the poorer classes of people, particularly in the slums of London, were also of a lower intellect—nationalities we know to be genetically inferior. Here in the Appalachians—”

Kerry held up a hand. “You’re probably not accustomed to having your ideas challenged, particularly not by someone holding a broom. But surely you’re not suggesting people are poor because they’re genetically inferior.”

He stepped toward her again, voice smooth. “Your intelligence and your industriousness, I must tell you, are tremendously appealing. And evidence of your Nordic stock.” Before she could jerk away, he ran a hand down the line of her jaw. “As is your striking beauty.”

“The porch,” she said, momentarily paralyzed, “is finished.”

He reached to lift a stray lock of her hair.

Her feet moved at last. She whipped toward the loggia’s far door.

Grant’s voice hung in the air, hazy and soft as a patch of poison ivy catching fire and turning to smoke—and as lethal, Kerry thought.

“Remember, Kerry, I’d like to help you.”

Stay around to inhale that—she broke into a sprint toward the stairs—and it’ll blister your insides.





Chapter 19

Dusting inside George Vanderbilt’s office, which was tucked into the southwest corner of the library—its door nearly invisible in the woodwork—Kerry heard her name. And a scattershot round of bickering. She stepped closer to the door. If Mrs. Smythe had complaints about Kerry’s work, she needed to know. Tully was right: this job of Kerry’s might be their last chance.

“What bloody business of ours would it be, I ask you now? Away and bile your haid.” That was Moncrief. Only the impenetrability of his Scottish brogue must be saving his life—Mrs. Smythe must not have made out what he’d said: boil your head.

“I’ll thank a footman to keep his temper in my house.”

“Your house, is it, now?”

“My house to run, it is. I wasn’t brought across the Atlantic to sit idly by while the upstairs and down mix into proper gruel.”

“By which you’d be meaning?”

“I’ll not pretend to be blind when Biltmore guests are seduced by a maid.”

Kerry felt the blood rush to her face.

Moncrief guffawed. “I’ll not be an auld clipe—I’ll not be a snitch—but I can tell you this much: it’s not that direction the burn has been flowing.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning that not every lass as bonnie as her is a wee nyaff—”

“A what did you say?”

“A nuisance—by distracting the lads. The lads ken—they know—how to hunt on their own.”

“Still, a young woman such as that can cause problems.”

“Aye. And was there yet a young man who wasn’t naught but a problem with a leg on each side?”

Mrs. Smythe’s answer came clipped. “I’ll thank you, lad, to watch your language.” Then she sighed. “I confess I like the girl. Although it’s a proper stew of motives even the nice ones can have. I shall speak to her myself of the dangers of moral turpitude. Even a bright young thing can be thick when it comes to the attentions of a rich man.”