Beckman: Lord of Sins (12 page)

“As are we all.” She worried a thumbnail then stopped herself.

“Will you come to Portsmouth with me?”

She knew what he was asking and what he was offering. She’d all but accepted, but he wanted to hear the words from her.

“After planting, we really must tend to the shopping, Beckman, and if I go with you, I don’t want to tarry. I’ve not been away from Allie for a night before, and I don’t want her to fret.”

Maternal fretting he could understand—up to a point.

“Polly and North will look after her, and you have a couple of weeks to accustom her to the idea.”

Sara nodded but took to staring at her tea as Beck passed her another half of a muffin slathered with butter, holding it out to her and waiting for her to take it from his hand.

“Sara?”

Her chin came up, as if prepared for confrontation.

“I will not force my attentions on you,” Beck said. “Not ever. Going to Portsmouth, sharing a muffin, even sharing a kiss, does not obligate you to anything more.”

She took the muffin.

He did not smile, but the moment was sweet. “I’ll arrange for our trip in a couple of weeks, and you and Polly should finish up your shopping lists. I already have Allie’s.”

As a change of topic, as a distraction, that apparently served well enough. “Allie made a list?”

“I asked her to, and, Sara, there is not one damned thing on that list for the girl herself. She wants me to get you some dress fabric and two new bonnets, the same for Polly. She says North needs a new set of farrier’s tools and two new shirts, as well as winter stockings. For Hermione, she wants harness bells, and for Hildegard, she wants one of Mrs. Radcliffe’s novels. She claims the pig ate such a book last year then had thirteen piglets.”

“Even North laughed when Polly pointed that out.” Sara smiled in remembrance.

“As did Mr. Hildegard, no doubt.” Beck smiled as well, glad for the lighter mood. “You have to believe you’re doing very well with Allie, Sara, and I would like to buy her some paints and books on art when we’re in Portsmouth.”

Sara’s smiled faded into a staring contest with her last bite of muffin. “Is it important to you?”

“I think it’s important to her,” Beck countered. “If something important to her is denied by her elders, it will eventually foster rebellion in the child. I don’t gather any of the Hunt womenfolk are possessed of malleable spirits, and talent like Allie’s isn’t simply going to fade.”

“We’re not weak spirited,” Sara agreed, reluctantly. “We haven’t had that luxury, in any case. Just don’t…”

“Don’t what?”

“I don’t want Allie’s art to consume her, to sweep away her common sense and put her in the path of licentious, profligate dilettantes who think a little art excuses a lot of immorality.”

He didn’t ask—Is this what befell you and Polly?—but he would ask, eventually.

“Forgive me.” Sara rose and picked up the tea tray. “Again, I blunder onto difficult subjects, and it’s growing late. My thanks for the muffin, and I will look forward to seeing Mrs. Grantham on Monday.”

“I’ll walk you to your door, unless you want me to casually tuck Hildy in and shoo your sister back to your worried arms first?”

“That won’t be necessary. I’d like to send Hildy to go shoo my sister inside, because Hildy is a very conscientious and forceful parent. Polly is an adult, though, and Gabriel is a gentleman, but he’s going to leave, isn’t he?”

“Why do you say that?” When she set the tray down, he slipped his arm around her and began walking her toward her apartment.

“Because for two years Gabriel has hidden his regard for Polly from all, including himself sometimes. He arranged to spend time with her tonight, privately, and at some length. I can’t imagine him permitting himself such a liberty except in parting.”

“If he is leaving,” Beck said as they reached her door, “I am sure he has been absolutely honest with Polly about his plans, Sara. Maybe she can permit herself to acknowledge their feelings only for the same reason.” He knew far too well the emotional dynamics of leave-taking. Beck wrapped his arms around Sara, held her for a moment before kissing her on the mouth and stepping back. “Sweet dreams, Sarabande. I’ll see you in mine.”

“Good night, Beckman.” She rose on her toes and brushed her lips across his. “I’ll dream of shopping with you in Portsmouth.”

In the kitchen, Beck poured himself another cup of tea and wondered if he would wait up for Polly—or North—had Sara not expressed concern. He appropriated pen, ink, and paper from the library and started on a list of his own. A good hour later, he heard Polly’s voice in the back hall, followed by the less distinct rumble of North’s baritone.

About damned time.

North ambled into the kitchen, clearly having sent Polly to her bed. “You’re still awake?”

“Making my list.” Beck pushed the teapot toward North. “How’s your back?”

“Aching.” North lowered himself to a chair—slowly, slowly. “Thank God it’s merely aching, not cursing and making me wish I were dead.”

Beck put his pen down and considered his companion. North’s saturnine features held the usual complement of banked suffering. “Does it really hurt so much?”

“The physical pain is only part of it.” North stirred a little sugar into his tea, sipped, then added cream. “I know that’s likely temporary, and can cope with it. The indignity, however, remains intolerable even as it becomes mere memory rather than fact. But I suppose your golden life has not taught you this, yet anyway.”

Beck took off his glasses and waited until North was done stirring his damned tea.

“My brother had to carry me, bodily, covered in my own filth, from an opium den in Paris, and I fought him to my last breath to be left where I was. I cannot recall a great deal about months of self-indulgence in the same spot, but I can recall clearly the look on Nick’s face when he realized which bag of noisome bones was what was left of his little brother.”

North picked up Beck’s glasses and started polishing them on his handkerchief. “One would find that a tenacious memory.”

“He cried,” Beck said. “They weren’t tears of disgust or rage, though they should have been. They were tears of relief, because I was still alive.”

“Beckman…” Some of North’s characteristic gruffness slid away. “It isn’t that I’m ungrateful… I had last rites in Spain, you know, twice. It’s just I’ve made a muddle of things, and one grows… weary of one’s situation.”

“So you hare off,” Beck finished for him, knowing exactly the terrain North called home turf. “You leave, and you hope the change of scenery or people or horses or whatever helps, and it doesn’t.”

“We’ll have to see about that, won’t we?” North poured more tea for them both.

Beck waited while North appropriated the cream and sugar. “Sara worries about Polly and Allie, but I worry about you.”

“You needn’t.” North rose very slowly with his teacup. “I’m fully breeched, and I’ve made my bed, Haddonfield. One copes.”

Beck slid his chair back to look up at North. “Tomorrow one is going to cope by making a visit to the springs, and in the light of day, before the temperature drops back down to nippy, North.”

“Not a bad idea.” North sipped his tea and aimed a look at Beck. “Did you mean to kill yourself in that opium den?”

“I thought I did. I’d tried running and drinking and stupid risks and all manner of idiot means to deal with the low cards I’d found in the hand life dealt me, but I also made halfway sure Nick knew where to find me, and eventually, he did. Part of me just wanted to know somebody would try.”

North set his mug on the counter. “When I leave, you needn’t engage in such heroics, Haddonfield. I have a trade, and some means, and will land on my feet. But as for you…” He turned to go. “I’m glad this brother of yours found you in time.”

He left before Beck could reply, while Beck hoped wholeheartedly that there was a brother out there looking for North.

“North is leaving.”

The studied calm in Polly’s voice didn’t fool Sara for an instant. She put aside the pinafore she was mending, and put aside the urge to give Gabriel North a stern talking to as well.

“Why now?”

Polly sank into her rocking chair and sat still. “He says he must, that it’s a family matter, and that Three Springs will come around in Beckman’s care. I’m not to worry.”

So much had been taken from Polly, it seemed wrong that North should try to deprive her of her justifiable concern too. “He didn’t ask you to go with him?”

Polly shook her head once, a gesture of defeat and heartache.

“What will you miss the most?” If Sara didn’t ask, then Polly would bottle all the misery up inside, making extravagant desserts out of it, and subtly spiced dishes fit for the Regent’s pavilion in Brighton.

The kitchen would be spotless—more spotless—and there wouldn’t be a weed within ten yards of the spice garden.

“I’ll miss his voice. I love Gabriel’s voice. I love the way he cleans his plate at every single meal. I’ll miss the way he talks to Hildegard as if she really were some society dowager. I’ll miss the way he and Heifer commiserate without a word.”

Polly turned her face away, as if the darkness beyond the window held some consolation.

“When Beckman goes,” Sara said, “I’ll miss his scent.”

Polly glanced at her. “Bergamot and some other notes. It’s… soothing.”

“I’ll miss the way he puts his hands on me, like I’m precious but not fragile—even if he’s walking with me in the garden, he handles me confidently. I adore that.”

Polly’s lips quirked up in a sad smile, and both sisters spoke in unison.

“Men.”

***

Monday arrived, bright, mild, and more May than April, much to Beck’s relief. He’d marched North to the springs the previous day, and the soak had done them both good, but North was still in no shape to man a team of draft horses.

A half-dozen men showed up from Sutcliffe Manor, five of them in a farm wagon and one driving a dray, a willowy blonde on the bench beside him.

“Mrs. Grantham.” Beck assisted her to the ground. “I’m pleased you could call. The Hunt womenfolk are much in need of company. I’ll show you to the house while North gets the men sorted out.”

Beck had escorted his guest to the front door, an entrance he hadn’t used since arriving at Three Springs weeks ago. The front approach, he realized, was neglected. Weeds cropped up through the crushed shells in the driveway, bushes sprouted willy-nilly much in need of pruning, and flower boxes sported nothing so much as robust… weeds.

When he introduced Mrs. Grantham to Sara and Polly, it took about two minutes to realize he was
de trop
. The ladies launched into an intense discussion of the best layout for a spice garden, so he returned to the barnyard. North had a harrow hitched up behind one of the Sutcliffe teams and the second team standing in the traces waiting for its harrow to be secured.

Beck sidled up to North. “It’s killing you, isn’t it? To send others out to do the heavy work?”

“Not killing me, exactly. I’m just used to doing it, is all.”

“Mrs. Grantham says you were born to give the orders, not take them.” Beck patted the leader of the second team.

“Susan Grantham is one to talk. This team is ready to go.”

Beck stepped back, and the second harrow scraped and dragged its way out of the yard. The next task was loading some barley and spring-wheat seed into bushel baskets, so it could be sown broadcast in portions of the field not congenial to the seed drill Beck had borrowed from Sutcliffe.

The third and final harrow, owned by Three Springs, was hitched up behind a team Beck had brought down from Belle Maison, and one of the rangy, muscular Sutcliffe plowmen took up the reins.

“Mind the ladies bring us some nuncheon,” the fellow cautioned. He signaled the horses to move out, and soon another piece of heavy equipment was bumping and dragging its way toward the field.

Only to come to an abrupt halt before even gaining the farm lane.

“What’s amiss?” Beck hustled over amid the plowman’s cursing; North followed more slowly.

The plowman hopped around, shaking one heavily booted foot. “The bedamned, blighted harrow is come undone.” He wrapped the reins, fanned himself with his battered hat, and pointed at the harrow. “If we’d been in the field, this would have taken m’foot clean off.”

“The bolts are loose,” North growled, squatting carefully beside the heavy iron frame. “Those two sheared just now, and the rest are likely to at the next bump or rock. God above, I should have checked this over. I should have seen this.”

“Good thing yon beasts is well trained,” the plowman said. “If they weren’t so quick to mind, they would have pulled me along, regardless.”

Beck knelt to examine the problem. “Can it be repaired?”

“It will be a damned pain in the ass.” North rose stiffly. “We’ll have to get the parts in to the blacksmith and hope he has the means to weld and bolt on hand, then get the whole business back here somehow.”

“It can wait,” Beck said. “We’ve two in the field, which is twice what we had on hand, and Sutcliffe can spare the help.”

North gave a terse nod but gestured with his chin to indicate they needed some privacy.

“Is your foot all right?” Beck asked the plowman.

“Right enough. It got a good stubbing, but no real harm, thank the good Lord.”

“Unhitch the team, and you can assist with the seeding,” Beck said. “We’ll switch teams at midday to rest the horses.”

“Right, guv.” The man moved to the horse’s bridles, pitching his voice to the horses as he did. Beck accompanied North to the side of the barn and waited, because clearly, North had something to say.

“I did check that equipment,” North began in a low, angry rumble. “I work largely alone here, and I don’t relish the thought of bleeding to death trapped beneath a faulty piece of equipment. I checked that thing over before I put it up last spring, and I checked every piece of equipment on the property as part of the winter inventory. I checked it again when we finished plowing.”

“What are you saying, North?”

“Somebody broke our damned harrow. It’s the only one on the property still functional, and the repair will take at least two weeks. Even if you went to Portsmouth for a replacement, by the time you got one here, you would have lost several weeks of spring growing.”

“I believe you, North, but who would have had access to the harrow?”

“Any damned body in the neighborhood. The hinges on the sheds and barns are so rusty a determined old woman could get into any building on the premises.”

“Or she could just peel off the rotten shingles and drop down from the leaky roof. Who would be motivated to do such a thing?”

“Anybody who wants to buy the place,” North said. “Anybody with a grudge against me, Lady Warne, or the Hunts.”

Beck eyed the steward thoughtfully, because this was the first time he’d seen Gabriel North truly upset. “Are those lists long?”

North glared back at him. “How the hell should I know? I have no enemies here that I know of, but perhaps you have an enemy. Three Springs has been rotting on the vine for years, but malicious mischief passed us by until you showed up.”

“True enough.”

“Hell and the devil, I didn’t mean that the way it sounded, it’s just… who would think it amusing to take off a man’s foot?”

“I don’t know. We’re going to have to have a frank talk with the women, and with Allie in particular, North. If there are vandals on the property, that child cannot be scampering around unsupervised.”

“Holy Infant Jesus.” North closed his eyes and marshaled his temper with visible effort. “Polly and Sara don’t need this, but it makes the prospect of hiring help more urgent.”

“I thought we’d start with your friend Lolly. Maudie is a maid of all work, but there’s enough for her to do just in the scullery. Three Springs could use another maid, and those boys of hers could be put to use all over the property.”

“They eat a lot,” North said. “Polly will like that.”

“We need some men, though, and good labor is in short supply.”

“Will Sutcliffe let you keep some of his for a time?”

“I suppose. We have walls to mend, roofs to repair, hay to take off soon, more sheep to shear and dip, and God knows what else.”

“My back is protesting the mere recitation. You’re right. There’s plenty enough work, if you’ve the coin to hire the labor.”

“Three Springs has the coin,” Beck clarified. “If Sutcliffe turns us down, we have other options.”

“Such as?”

“Portsmouth, if not in the village. I meant to tell you last night I’ve secured Sara’s agreement to accompany me there on a shopping expedition when the planting is done.”

“Are you sure it’s a good idea to leave the property with this going on?” North gestured toward the broken harrow.

“If everything stays quiet for the next week or so, then yes. We need more than the village can supply, North. Shingles, hinges, locks, lumber, nails, paint, you name it, if it goes into the building or maintenance of a structure, we need it.”

“Suppose we do. The ladies are looking forward to putting the house to rights, too.”

Beck sent a wary glance toward the house. “One shudders to think of disappointing them. Which reminds me, we need a gardener as well.”

“Can’t you buy one of those in Portsmouth?”

“I intend to try, preferably a very fit, muscular specimen who has a way with a rose bush and a blunderbuss.”

“My thoughts exactly, and I hate to say it, but a footman or two wouldn’t go amiss.”

“I’ll write to my sister at Belle Maison and send word to Nick. They’ll likely have a few stout fellows to spare, at least for the summer.”

“I’d write to Lady Warne,” North said. “This is her damned property, and lady or not, it’s her interests that will be affected if we can’t get a crop in.”

Interesting that Beck turned to his siblings for help, while North pointed out the more appropriate choice. “We’ll get a crop planted. One piece of broken equipment won’t stop a Haddonfield from his assigned task.”

As the week progressed, the weather held, and they did get the crops in. Through correspondence with Baron Sutcliffe, Beck gained permission to offer employment to two of his farm hands, both stout, reliable fellows. Lolly and her two adolescent omnivores were recruited from the village, and letters went out to Belle Maison, Nick’s London townhouse, and Lady Warne’s residence.

While Polly reveled in the need to keep more mouths fed, Beck set Sara to taking the gardens, lane, and porches in hand. Lolly’s sons were put to use as undergardeners, pulling weeds, rebuilding flower boxes, and putting in a huge kitchen garden in the field closest to the barns. With her mother’s help, Allie proved surprisingly willing to tear into the challenge of setting the front beds and main approach to the house to rights. She divided irises and daffodils, pruned roses, moved daylilies and daisies and heaven only knew what according to some design she carried in her busy head.

Sara had been mindful of the need to keep Allie close to the house, leaving Beck a little concerned when he didn’t see the child puttering away in the front gardens on Friday afternoon. It wasn’t sums day or wash day, and for most of the morning, Allie had been planting her posies in the flower boxes on the side terraces.

She wasn’t in the lower reaches of the house, so Beck made his way to the third floor, finding Allie in her studio of choice, much to his relief.

Beck ambled into the room, knowing Allie when sketching was an absorbed young lady indeed. “I had wondered where you’d gotten off to.”

“I’m hiding from those odious boys.” Allie’s tongue peeked out the side of her mouth.

Beck lowered himself to sit on the day bed beside her. “They might be odious, but they plant an impressive kitchen garden.”

And they made for good sketching subjects, Beck saw. Just as she’d done anatomical studies of the filly—Miss Amicus, by name—Allie was visually taking apart Lolly’s sons, piece by piece. The odd quality of the adolescent male wrist was drawn from many angles and positions. Unruly boyish hair stood up in a dozen different inelegant coiffures; strangely graceful, young male hands grasped this or that tool, or flattened Heifer’s disgruntled ears in a thumping pat to the cat’s head.

“I could plant the kitchen garden,” Allie said, putting the finishing touches on an image of a long, dirty boy-foot toe-scratching at a skinny boy-calf.

“But then you’d still be outside, hands muddy, covering up potato sprouts or pulling weeds,” Beck pointed out. “Not honing your craft.”

“Mama says it’s a hobby,” Allie countered, considering her final effort. “But is it a hobby if it’s something you simply
must
do?”

“I don’t know.” Beck chose his words carefully. “My brother must build a birdhouse every so often, but he would say it’s a hobby.”

Allie considered the boy-foot. “He’d say it’s a hobby because he’s a man and all grown up, and a gentleman cannot work with his hands in any case. I am not a gentleman.”

Beck flicked her nose with the end of one of her braids. “For which we are all very grateful.”

Allie didn’t dimple and giggle as Beck had intended. “If I were a boy, I’d be getting art lessons again, and there would be talk of apprenticing me.”

“You really love to paint and draw, don’t you?” Beck asked, eyeing her work.

“More than anything. Mama says I get lost when I do, but I feel like it’s when I get found. It isn’t that I forget time or where I am, it’s that I’m where I’m supposed to be.”

Beck slid a large hand down Allie’s back, feeling the sharp little bones of her shoulder blades. “Sometimes, princess, you have to allow for people not understanding you, even though they love you and you love them.”

Sometimes, you have to let them send you away, because they love you and you love them.
Beck thought of his father, his brothers, his sisters…

“You mean like Mama?” Allie tucked herself a little closer to him. “That’s the thing, though. She
does
understand, not about painting, but about art. She used to play for people, for important people, and they would pay her money, make her do three encores and everything. Now she doesn’t play, and she forgets. I think it’s my fault.”