Almost a Gentleman (39 page)

"And your dinner with Viscount Granthorpe, John?"

The admiral looked surprised for a moment. "Ah right, young Alec Hervey, you mean."

He smiled. "You know, sometimes I can hardly believe that he's not still the little chap who sailed his toy boats with me on the lake at Linseley Manor.

"Dinner was very nice indeed. Conversation very pleasant, very amiable, though from time to time the boy would become a bit scattered: he supposes himself in love, you see, and I'm afraid that his young lady is leading him a merry chase. Not only that, but her brother likes to gamble at Vivien's and has been taking Alec along with him.

"He'd have been better off in Lincolnshire. He'd have had to sit through the Plough play, of course, but he might have done well to signal the lady that he had more to do than dance attendance on her."

"He has a romantic nature, then, like his father."

"Very like him, though Alec's a bit of a scholar as well. But just as bad at gambling, I suspect."

Kate shook her head in mock solemnity. "Of course, it's a simple matter for such wise and temperate types as ourselves to pass judgment upon the rest of the world's folly."

He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it. "Our behavior was
anything
but temperate two nights ago, my lady."

"No, I suppose it wasn't. It was very… agreeable, though."

"
I
thought so."

"But John…"

"Why did I suspect that there would be a
but
somewhere?"

"I have no
buts
about
us
, John. But I have been thinking."

"Not about the hate letters again."

"I'm afraid so, dear."

"And…"

"Well, I've read all of them now. And I don't believe it's Lord Crashaw who's been sending the pasted-together ones. I don't think our culprit is any of the gentlemen who felt wronged by Phizz Marston—wronged by him and attracted to him at the same time. The tone is entirely different. There's no sport in the pasted-together ones. No sense of guilty pleasure. There's simply hatred."

She bit her lip and looked away.

"You have something else to say, Kate. What is it?"

"I think it's someone who hates Phoebe and not Phizz."

"But who then?"

"I don't know, John. I wish I did."

The gentry of David's neighborhood were no better and no worse than the usual run of such characters, Phoebe thought as she went down to breakfast on Plough Monday. In fact they'd turned out to be remarkably like the people she'd grown up with: sedate, country gentlemen and ladies whose staid behavior and predictable conversation she'd been mad to escape from as a girl but now found rather comforting. During the introductions David had made the preceding afternoon, she'd been a bit relieved but not terribly surprised to see that the ladies were obviously less aware of the three-seasons-old cut of her dress than Alison Cockburn had been.

Fat old squires had tried to flirt with the pretty Miss Browne, while disapproving ladies and their disappointed daughters had nodded stiffly; even after so many years, the earl of Linseley was clearly the prize catch of the neighborhood. People had inquired politely about her connections: luckily, no one seemed to know much about Devonshire so she'd been able use the real name of her tiny village as well as some details from her childhood.

As Phizz, she'd learned how useful it was to salt one's deceptions with an occasional carefully selected truth. A little veracity went a long way; she was a bit disconcerted to see how easily it came it her now, and a bit chagrined when she noticed that David was listening in.

"Never been married, eh, Miss Browne? But what a misfortune for the male sex. And where has such a pretty woman been hiding herself?"

The obvious best thing to do in such a case was simply to sigh and roll her eyes a bit, hinting at a sadness too deep for polite conversation.

Well
, she tried to signal to David,
what
would
you have me do in such a situation
? He nodded and looked away, the corners of his mouth twitching.

Her one misstep had been to confide to a Miss Finchley that it was she who'd baked the delicious pie they were eating, horrifying that young lady as thoroughly as she would have done any member of the Claringworths' London set. In order to atone for her lapse, Phoebe had forced herself to lose repeatedly at cassino after dinner.

"You showed great restraint," David had whispered to her in bed later, "not to have fleeced Miss Finchley at least."

She'd laughed. "I don't beat people at cards unless I need the money or they need to be taken down a peg. Your neighbors are all right. Even Miss Finchley."

"But," she'd arched her back as he'd moved his mouth down between her breasts and nuzzled her belly, "if you'd like to make me a bit of a prize, by way of… of…
consolation
… yes, David, don't stop. But a bit more slowly, darling… yes, like that,
exactly like that
.. ."

How delightful to say
exactly
what it was she wanted in bed, she thought now as she paused at the door of the breakfast room. And how compliant David had been: what a patient, obedient mouth he had; what a light, delicate tongue. Of course—her face and neck flushed a bit—the rest of him had been gratifyingly
impatient
afterwards, which had also been quite nice in its way…

"Ah, how do you do, Miss Browne, and a very good Plough Monday morning to you."

"Quite well, thank you, Colonel Colton, and a good Plough Monday to you as well. But you must excuse me. It seems you caught me woolgathering."

"Hmm, woolgathering seems to agree with you—either that or you've slept wonderfully well in our fresh country air. Here, allow me to open the door.

"Of course, we must eat sparingly this morning, to leave room for the feast. Lord Linseley promises that it will be the best banquet ever, due to some unusually fine kitchen help this year."

The villagers and farmhands, as they began to arrive sometime after noon, were a more varied and interesting group. Each person was dressed in some sort of pieced-together finery, and everyone seemed quite at home milling about the Great Hall and greeting the earl. David, devastatingly handsome in formal black and white, shook hands, clapped people on the shoulder, and accepted hugs and kisses from old ladies.

The cloths had been laid, with fine pieces of plate and goblets, and a boy on a tall ladder had almost finished lighting the eight hundred and thirty-six candles, whose reflections twinkled in the plate. Stevens led a small army of footmen from table to table, setting out the pitchers of drinks.

"How pretty you look, dear, all in your red and white." Mrs. Goulding was resplendent in a bonnet with a slightly battered peacock plume crowning its brim. "And aren't you proud of our Billy and his new position?"

She was indeed, and delighted to see how well he could walk on one crutch; he'd tossed the other away, he told her, and was getting around the barns perfectly well on only one. His bruises were beginning to fade and Phoebe thought he looked as lovely as before, the color of his eyes exactly that of his new, sky blue neckcloth. He seemed to have made some friends, too, particularly among the village girls.

Children darted about everywhere, bright-eyed and mischievous, daring each other to peek down the hallway where the actors and dancers were having their last rehearsals. A small gang of boys chased each other through the crowd. "Beggin' your pardon, Miss," one called as he careened against her legs and ran on. She saw David knit his brow and prepare to chastise the child.
Let him be
, she signaled him a shrug. It was a holiday, and anyway, the boy was just about the size that Bryan would have been. Let him be and let him enjoy his day.

It took some time for everybody to find a seat at the tables. She sat at the very edge of one of the long benches, closest to where the players would be, with David at her side.

The maids and footmen began bringing out the roasts and pies, stews and stuffed geese. A general sigh of pleasure and anticipation arose, to be followed by vigorous eating, prodigious drinking, and contented murmurs and belches afterward. David told everyone at their end of the table about Miss Browne's pies and—not a bit horrified by the information—everyone complimented her upon the fine texture of the crust.

There had been toasts before dinner. They were repeated now, sometimes a bit more slowly and drunkenly but just as heartily. To the cook. To the earl. To the land. To the harvest, and speed-the-plow.

And finally to the players, who marched in now and made a little procession about the hall, accompanied by drums, horns, and the beating of kettles.

Phoebe was suddenly aware of a small shadow at her elbow. It was little Susan, who seemed to have forgotten where it was she'd been sitting. She'd wandered over to Phoebe's place, evidently enthralled by Phoebe's red shawl, its gold thread glittering in the candlelight. And now, Phoebe thought, she stood directly in the path the actors would have to traverse in order to finish up their parade.

"Move down a bit, please," Phoebe said to David, who stared with surprise as she reached out to the little girl, drew her to herself, and quickly lifted her onto the end of the bench.

Well, she thought sternly—as though someone had challenged her—
someone
had to take care of a child who'd wandered from her place. Susan's granny had probably been called back to the kitchen to deal with some minor mishap. It wouldn't do for the little girl to be trampled, would it?

"Now let's see what this play is all about," she whispered. Susan nodded with wide eyes as she watched the actors circle round to their end of the Great Hall.

Of course it was hardly Covent Garden or Drury Lane, Phoebe decided quickly enough. Still, the actors, dressed in top hats and smocks decorated with ribbons and other shreds of colored cloth, recited their rhymed couplets with a vigor and directness that made up for their lack of subtlety.

The announcer, Tom Fool, introduced each stock character: the Farmer, the Farmer's Man and his Lady (played by a young man who'd let his golden curls hair grow long for the occasion), a Recruiting Sergeant, Saint George, Old Dame Jane, Beelzebub, and—oddly, Phoebe thought—a quack Doctor. It was the Doctor who drew the most applause and the loudest catcalls; he was clearly a gifted actor, though in an ancient, naive style that a London audience might have found a bit embarrassing.

He was also clearly the leader of the troupe: inspired by his aplomb, the rest of the actors threw themselves into their simple roles with added vivacity. Not that they had to worry about missing a line, for if one of them hesitated, the audience would supply the necessary words quickly enough. The audience supplied the stage directions, too, along with running commentary. Everyone yelled encouragement when Beelzebub and Dame Jane battled each other with frying pans and everyone booed when the Recruiting Sergeant marched the Farmer's Man off to the wars. Many people warned Tom Fool not to threaten Saint George, and a few called "I told you so" when the Saint ran Tom through, leaving the golden-haired Lady desolate and despairing.

Serves her right, Phoebe thought, for being so fickle. After the Farmer's Man had been dragged off by the Recruiting Sergeant, the Lady had quickly given her heart to reckless Tom Fool, who now lay supine on the stone floor—though occasionally winking at the audience, who had begun to call for his resurrection.

"Don't worry," Susan whispered. "The Doctor will help."

He did, too, though only upon having exacted an enormous fee for his services, the Lady fairly staggering under the weight of the bag of coins she gave him. Still, here was Tom Fool, jumping to his feet and hugging and pinching his sweetheart. Cured, quite cured of everything, including death. No wonder the Doctor was the favorite character in this play, Phoebe thought—for an instant it had seemed to her that he
could
cure death.

For an instant it had seemed that way to everyone in the audience, she realized, though of course everybody knew better, especially those among them who'd lived the hardest, poorest lives. Perhaps because of their own experiences, they were grateful for the momentary illusion. And now, as the actors smiled and took their bows, the audience leaped to their feet, yelling and stamping their approval.

"He could help
you
not be sick anymore, too," Susan whispered, as Phoebe tried not to shudder.

But what was that?—a quick shadow, a rush of air as a candle blew out, a sudden slight change in the light… she'd suddenly become aware of a set of signs that were too subtle to be interpreted, but that somehow had caught her fencer's reflexes and signaled danger.

"Out of the way," she yelled, grabbing up Susan into her arms and somehow managing to move a few crucial feet to the left—just before the chandelier that had been swaying above their heads came crashing down, right onto the bench where she and the little girl had been sitting.

There were screams, jostling, and absolute chaos for some minutes. Miraculously, no one was hurt in the brief melee that ensued and then died down, everybody becoming quite silent and serious as they began to realize what had happened.