Page 38 of The Duchess Debt

Alice glanced warily at Helena, who leaned over his shoulder and taped the page of the book with her finger to bring his attention back to the story. Heavens! At this rate, Nanny Potts would have to consume an entire tray of sticky buns in order to stay away until they had finished.

“‘The king said to the miller, “That is an art which pleases me well.”’ Of course it does,” Gabe muttered. “Show me a king who doesn’t want even more gold, and I’ll show you a—”

“A fairytale?” Helena interjected, her patience wearing thin. “Yes, I would very much like to hear one,ifyou don’t mind.”

Alice said softly to her doll, “I don’t remember the story going like this before…”

Standing beside his chair, Helena prodded him in the shoulder.

Gabe read on,finallymaking it through the story to the daughter’s imprisonment in the tower with a spinning wheel, a pile of straw, and royal orders to spin it all into gold or be put to death in the morning. Helena looked away, not daring to look at him for fear of what his pro-republican sensibilities would say aboutthat.

Another page passed, and Helena’s shoulders sagged with relief when the odd little nameless man magically opened the tower door and offered to help the miller’s daughter in exchange for—

“Her necklace?” Gabe looked up at Helena and blinked. “If the miller has enough money to buy necklaces for his daughter, then how poor can he truly be? Why not just sell the necklace, buy gold coins with the proceeds, and then tell the king she spun it so—”

“Because that would be a lie.” Helena darted her gaze in Alice’s direction and said pointedly, “And it’s not good to tell lies.” When Gabe opened his mouth to counter that, most likely with some barb about Parliament, she repeated firmly, brooking no argument, “It’s not good to tell lies.”

Taking the hint—thankfully—Gabe returned to the story and read about how the odd little man wove all the straw into gold, saving the miller’s daughter.

Gabe flipped through the pages. “What—does it end that soon?”

“No!” Alice laughed at his silliness, thinking he was just playing.

But Helena knew better. She crossed her arms in frustration. Someone was going to be punished for bad behavior tonight, and it wouldn’t be Alice.

The little girl pulled her doll tightly against her chest and explained. “The king makes her spin more straw the next night! And the man comes back—Rumthelthimthkin—” Alice lisped out his name in a loud whisper, knowing she wasn’t yet to give up that secret at this point in the tale. “And he spins it all up for her again!”

Gabe frowned. “But she already paid her necklace to—”

“She has a ring!” Alice interjected with glee at knowing the story better than her father.

“She also has a ring?” He stilled in mid page-flip to look up at Helena. “What’s she keeping up her skirt to hand over next—the crown jewels?”

Another convulsion of laughter gripped Alice, this time so fiercely that she rolled around on the bed and tangled herself in the covers. “No! The king offers her marriage!”

“I’d hope so,” Gabe muttered and flipped through the page. “After all, he thinks she’s able to spin straw into gold. Given the size of a king’s stables, Parliament would never have to raise taxes again.”

“Enough!” Helena tossed up her hands. “You are incorrigible.”

“Am I?” Gabe said that to Alice. Then he leaned over conspiratorially. “What do you think, poppet? Am I really that bad of a storyteller?”

In answer, Alice let out a peal of giggles so loud she shook the bed. He slid off the chair and onto the mattress with her, then tickled her until her braided hair came undone in a frizzy tangle. She gasped for breath from all the laughter.

“What a silly story that doesn’t make sense at all.” He tossed the book onto the foot of the bed and pulled Alice into his arms. He looked down at her. “But you like that kind of thing, do you?”

Alice held up her doll. “Beatrice does.”

“I see.” He tugged gently at the hem of the doll’s dress. “And what exactly do you like about those stories, Miss Beatrice?”

Alice held the doll’s little face to her ear for a moment, as if it were too shy to speak aloud and could only whisper. “She said she likes stories about palaces and princesses and carriages.”

“And do you, too?”

Her face lit up as she nodded.

“Then let me tell you a better story than that hay-weaving one.” He tucked her into the crook of his arm between his shoulder and chest and pulled the blanket up to cover both her and the doll. “Once there was a little girl named Rose who lived in a grand palace beside the sea. But she wasn’t a princess. She wasn’t even the daughter of a duke or an earl. She worked in the palace kitchens because she didn’t have a necklace or ring to use to hire strange, nameless men to spin gold for her.”

Helena rolled her eyes and sank onto the chair with a long sigh of surrender. She only prayed this story wouldn’t stray into a lesson about imperial misrule and the benefits of a free market economy.