Carla Kelly (4 page)

“How long since you have eaten?” Nez whispered.

“
Ven acá,
Juanito, we have more dishes,” Liria said. Interesting, Nez thought. She speaks to him in a combination of English and Spanish.

“Si, Mama.”
Juan returned to the sink and took another cup from the many that were draining on the counter.

Nez cleared his throat, hoping he would not startle her. “Excuse me, Miss Valencia?” he said when he was much closer.

She gasped, and he wished he had not surprised her. Maybe I should have tripped over a chair or something, he thought, uncomfortable with her reaction, but not surprised. He remembered her hesitation when he approached her in the rain. “Forgive me for startling you. I, uh, do you have a moment?” Now, that was stupid, he thought. Are we at a garden party?

She dried her hands then reached for her son, touching his hair and resting her hand on his shoulder. Does she think I would harm him, or her, for that matter, Nez thought.

“Say, now, I have a request of you,” he told her. It came out more abruptly than he would have wished, but he plowed on. “I cannot manage Sophie. Will you help me? I will pay you, of course.”

She indicated the dishes. “As you can see, I am occupied right now, my lord.”

“But I need your help!” He hadn’t meant to plead; he hadn’t thought he would need to. “Just leave these dishes and help me!”

She released her hold on her son and whispered to him. He turned back to the sink for another cup and began to dry it. “Perhaps I can help after these dishes are done, and my son has eaten. But if the mail coach comes . . .”

“Oh, hang the mail coach!” he exclaimed. “Sophie is ill.”

“I know, but did I not see a physician go upstairs, and then an apothecary? Surely they told you what to do.”

He registered her words, and something else that puzzled him, even beyond his current dilemma. You aren’t speaking to me as a lesser one speaks to a greater one, he thought. Either you know little about the height of my title, or you have a greater one. He dismissed the idea as stupid beyond belief as soon as it poured into his brain. “
Óigame, dama,
” he said. “The doctor told me what to do, and the apothecary brought a huge flagon of . . . of some pink lotion. I am to daub it here and there. Miss Valencia, I don’t want to daub it here and there! We . . . we need a woman’s touch.” There. You can hardly misunderstand me, he thought. And if you still do, I can probably remember enough Spanish to say it in Spanish. He came closer to her, noticing, even in his distraction, that she took an involuntary step backward until she was up against the sink.

“How’re them dishes coming?”

Annoyed, Nez turned around to see the landlord standing in the doorway. “See here, sir, I need this woman to help me with my niece, who is ill.”

To his extreme exasperation, the landlord seemed unmoved. He folded his arms. “And I need them dishes done.” He gestured with a toss of his head to Juan, who stood close to his mother. “And the little’un wants to eat the meal you sent back.” He grinned. “You ask his mama which is more important: his meal or your niece.”

He didn’t have to ask, not the way Juan was looking at the food. “It’s been a while, laddie, hasn’t it?” he asked, softly, then looked at Liria. “You may be wondering if all Englishmen are as rude as I have been.”

“You are concerned about your niece.” Liria held out her hands. “My son must eat, and I gave my word to the landlord that I would do these dishes.”

Your word, he asked himself. Well, I’m certainly diddled. He took another step. She couldn’t move closer to the sink, but she did incline herself away from him slightly. “You have given your word.” He looked at the landlord. “I will offer you five or ten pounds to release her from this task.”

“You could, m’lord, but I still need them dishes done more than I need your blunt right now. And the little’un.” He looked significantly at Juan. “Are you on a fallow pasture, laddie?”

The boy didn’t answer. Nez knew he couldn’t understand the question, and he felt his anger growing. Even I would not bully a child with food, he thought. He opened his mouth to speak, just as Liria stepped away from the sink. As he watched, she clasped her hands together and seemed to will herself taller. The effect was something magnificent and unexpected, and almost painful to watch because he could see how she shook.

“Sir, my son and I are doing the best we can,” she said, looking at the landlord. She turned to Nez. “I will help your niece after the dishes are done and my son is fed. I gave my word and nothing will change this.”

The landlord laughed, and she jumped a little. Nez felt an absurd urge to reach out and clasp her to him, just to stop her trembling, but he stood there, knowing better than to touch her.

“Well, then, my lord, I reckon you must wait,” the landlord said.

“I reckon I must,” he replied. I could buy this whole inn with the money in my luggage, you blue-bottomed baboon, he thought, but you have checkmated me. “Very well, sir. May I suggest this? You let the lad eat now—that roast of beef is not getting any younger—and I’ll wash dishes, too.”

“You, my lord?” the man exclaimed.

“Yes,” he replied, hoping to match Liria’s dignity. “One never knows what skills one might need, does one? Do find me another towel. I would hate to ruin a perfectly good shirt.”

Laughing, the landlord opened a cupboard and tossed him an apron. “I’d like another one for Miss Valencia,” Nez said. “You didn’t think to give her one.”

“Didn’t think she used the same tailor you do, my lord,” he said, but obliged with another apron. “Do them dishes up nice-like, now. Liria will show you. Go ahead and eat, laddie.” He laughed and turned back to the public room.

“Well, here we are,” he said, marveling at his inanity. “Allow me, Miss Valencia.” He started to undo the knot that held the dish towel around her waist.

She moved away from him quickly, clutching the towel as it fell into her hand. “I can manage,” she said. She went to the table, and called Juan to her side. He sat down, his eyes bright, and she tied the towel around his neck. In another moment she had arranged the half-eaten meal on a plate and kissed the top of her son’s head. “Go ahead, my dear.”

He watched them. “You could eat, too,” he said. “I’ll just carry on here at the sink.”

“Oh, no,” she said quickly. “I can wait.”

“You’ve been hungry before, then?”

“I’ve been hungry before.”

And will be hungry again; just a common drab, he reassured himself as he removed his coat, tied on the apron, popped off his cuff links, and rolled up his sleeves. Still, she was magnificent a moment ago. Of course, Spanish women are like that. I was forgetting.

He looked over his shoulder. Juan was steadily working his way through a plate of veal that Sophie had so tearfully rejected, and wonder of wonders, Liria Valencia was seated beside him, intent on a plate, too. I suppose we all hit low tide sooner or later, he thought. I seem to be coming about, and maybe Liria will, too, in her own way. I wonder where she is heading?

I could ask, he thought, then reconsidered. He dipped a plate in the rinse water. Where she and her boy are bound is really none of my concern. He set the plate on the drying rack. But wherever it is, Libby, I promise to pay her enough to get there without having to wash dishes in some bully’s kitchen. They deserve better than that.

After arranging some almond cream on Juan’s plate, Liria joined him at the sink. She watched his own awkward progress for a moment, then cleared her throat. Nez laughed and handed her the scrub brush. “I’m not too good with this, am I?” he asked.

She took it. “Let us say that I have washed more dishes in recent years than you, and the necessity here is speed, if the Empress is as uncomfortable as you say she is. You may dry.”

She worked efficiently, intent on the dishes before her, with a glance now and then at her son. When he finished and was rubbing his eyes, she took him to a corner where there was a pile of sacking, kissed him, and left him there to sleep.

She was scouring the last pot when Nez heard the skinny wail of a mail coach horn. Liria paused and looked at him, uncertainty on her face. “I do not have enough money for another ticket,” she told him.

He could tell that it pained her to make such an admission. You’re a proud one, for a servant, he thought. “I meant what I said,” he replied, taking the pot from her and dipping it in the rinse water. “I will pay you for your help, and you will have enough to buy another ticket. Where are you going?” There, he had asked. It was rude, but he wanted to know.

“Huddersfield,” she told him. “I think it is only another day’s travel.”

“And a little more. I believe you will have to change to a smaller coach line at Drumlin.”

“Oh, dear. They didn’t tell me that,” she said, and frowned into the dishwater.

Who didn’t tell you, he wanted to ask. Why are you going to Huddersfield, he wanted to know. To his knowledge, it was a mill town with nothing to recommend it beyond sooty buildings and a sky to match. Was she going to seek work in a factory? Surely not. Would Juan have to work there, too? He looked at the little boy, curled up on the sacking and sound asleep. He can’t be more than four or five, but I hear the mills like them young. A pity.

“I assure you that I will pay for your transportation, food, and lodging between here and Huddersfield,” he reminded her. “Is . . . are you expected at a certain time there?”

She shook her head. “I suppose a day or two will not matter.”

“And I am a desperate man,” he joked. “Even more desperate than the landlord!”

The coachman’s horn sounded again, and she listened to it, her hand to her hair. He could see that she was wavering. She sighed, and looked at her son.

“Please, Liria,” he said. They could hear the coach stopping in the inn yard now.

“Very well,” she replied, decisive now. She took off her apron, folded it neatly, and set it on the table, then went to the pile of sacking.

He was there before her, and scooped up Juan, who only stirred and resettled himself. “I can carry him upstairs for you,
dama.
”

She paused, and he knew she wanted to ask him why he called her lady. It was good that she didn’t; he couldn’t have told her, himself. As long as she does not think I am mocking her, he thought, as he carried the sleeping child upstairs to his own room and put him on his bed.

“We can find a blanket for him in the corner,” she said quickly, standing in the doorway, and not entering his room.

“No need. He doesn’t take up much space.” Quickly, Nez took off the child’s shoes: muddy, broken affairs too large for his feet. He has so little, Nez thought, covering the boy with a blanket, and yet, I have rarely seen a more cheerful child. He looked at Liria in the doorway, standing there so calmly with her hands clasped in front of her. He has a good mother. It may be that I must revise my estimation of the Valencias.

“This way,” he said, and opened the door to the next room. Luster, the portrait of distress just barely under control, sat awkwardly with the Empress on his lap. Nez knew he hadn’t been gone the better part of an hour, but Sophie’s face was even more inflamed with the shiny blisters of chicken pox. When she heard them enter the room, she opened her eyes and burst into tears.

The tempest was of short duration. Speaking in a voice so low that Sophie had no choice but to stop her sobs in order to hear, Liria told his butler to summon a maid from belowstairs. In mere moments, a tin tub stood before the hearth. He watched in growing admiration as the Empress allowed Liria to help her from her dress. In another moment she was close to bliss in the tub, while the woman gently washed her body.

“Amazing,” he said.

Liria rolled up her sleeves a little higher and shook her head. “It is only what her own mother would do, if she were here.”

Nez chose not to disabuse her of that notion, even though he knew Augusta would have been at least as useless as he was. I am in the presence of female competence, he marveled. God bless the ladies. “Is there anything I can do?” he asked, compelled by a gentleman’s manners to ask.

“No, my lord. You may retire now. I will take care of your niece.”

It was music to his ears. He nodded and tried not to stampede to the door in his relief. “If you would just ask the landlord to have a cot put into this room for me,” she said.

“Immediately,
dama,
” he said.

“My son will not trouble you tonight,” she added as she dripped warm water on Sophie’s poor arms. “If he should wake up, sing to him.”

“I can’t sing!” he replied.

“Of course you can,” she said. “He likes ‘The British Grenadier.’ Good night.”

He delivered her message to the landlord, who eyed him strangely for a moment. “You’re certain it’s not the plague, my lord?” the man inquired, standing well away.

“I have seldom been more certain about anything,” Nez replied.

Relief covered him like the contents of the calamine lotion bottle when he returned to his private parlor and collapsed on the sofa. “There are times when being an uncle is exhausting,” he told Luster, who sat quite still in a chair. He glanced at his butler, then stared at him. “Luster, have you looked in the mirror lately?”

“No, Your Grace. Is there a need?”

Oh, Lord, why me? Nez thought. “Luster, think a moment. Do you ever recall having been afflicted with chicken pox as a child?” The question was almost as hard to ask as it was to imagine that his butler had ever been anything but a butler.

“I . . . I do not recall, Your Grace,” he said finally. “Your Grace, are you trying to tell me . . .”

“Welcome to the pesthouse, Luster.”

Chapter Three

Considering that he had never slept with a child before, Nez spent a surprisingly comfortable night. After he had assured Luster that he really could find a nightshirt all by himself, and then helped the man, who apologized with every step, to a cot in the dressing room, Nez took himself to bed. Juan did nothing more than sigh, and cuddle close, which turned out to be a blessing, because the night was cool. I should be worried about this dreadful situation, Nez thought as he relaxed. Churl that I am, I will let Liria worry about it in the morning.

Sleep came closer. It should be a sad reflection on the state of my mind that I am so willing to turn my troubles over to someone else, he considered. The only place where I couldn’t do that was the Peninsula, and wasn’t that an uncomfortable state of affairs for a man of indolence? The idea made him smile in the dark, because he knew how little indolence had ever entered his mind through Portugal, Spain, France, and ultimately Belgium. Libby is right, he thought; I could be redeemed.

Tentatively, Nez stretched out his arm and allowed Juan to settle into the hollow of his shoulder. He knew that women fit so well there; apparently children did, too. Little fellow, your mama must be missing you right now, was his last conscious thought of the evening.

***

Liria did miss her son. She woke once or twice to check on Sophie, and then returned to an empty bed. The cot was soft in the right places, but it felt like a bed of rocks without Juan. Not that there would have been room for him on the cot, she reasoned. He was five now and tall for his age, tall despite poor food and a rackety life that she could never have imagined for a child of hers.

I wonder if he takes after his father in height, she thought, then dismissed the matter. Best not to dwell on it. That’s what Sergeant Carr would have told me. She curled herself into a ball out of habit, then made a conscious effort to draw herself out to her full length and lie on her back, something she did seldom, even now when she could. She remembered those strange dreams after Juan’s birth, when she woke in a panic because she could not find his small body there on the camp bed beside her. I would sit up and pat the covers until the sergeant told me to lie down, that Juan was in the ammunition box, his first crib. “My ma used to do that, too,” he whispered to her from his cot on the other side of the tent. “Da told me she did that for each of us, and didn’t he laugh? Go to sleep, Liria. He’ll wake you up soon enough.”

She wished she had not thought of the sergeant, because she felt tears prickle her eyes. You would like me to remember that I am still alive and I have a son to raise. People depend upon me.

She contemplated the man in the next room and his butler. I do not even really know his name, she thought. I know he has a title of some sort; perhaps it is even exalted. He did appear startled when I addressed him as an equal. “But you are, sir,” she said softly, “even if you have already judged me and found me wanting. I wonder if you have moments that you prefer not to remember? Do you judge yourself with so little information?”

She woke early, dressed, and went to the window and peeked out on a glorious day, something rare in her brief tenure in England. She had suffered through a long gray winter with one or another of Sergeant Carr’s relatives, shunted from house to house as they tried to oblige his final plea, then gave it up as a bad business. His last wish had been that she be taken care of. “Liria, they have farms in Suffolk,” he had told her, before the infection from his injury took over his mind, turned him inward, and then killed him. “I will write them a letter that you will take to them, and they will be kind to you and Juan.”

They weren’t. For two years they merely suffered her presence. The last relatives—cousins of some degree, as she was sent farther and farther down the family tree—did attempt to find her a situation in Huddersfield. They tell me the mill owner is kind, and there is a school for the young ones, she thought. Perhaps we may even stay together. Her next thought was the relentless one: and if we cannot? What then?

Sophie stirred then, and muttered in her sleep. Liria touched the child’s head, grateful for the distraction, and yet not entirely able to put the other matter from her mind. She observed Sophie in her careful way and saw no hurt beyond the temporary discomfort of chicken pox. You will feel better soon, she thought, and climb those trees on your uncle’s property that he promised would wait for you. I wonder, do you have a mother? And if you do, how could she allow you to leave her?

She heard footsteps outside the door, and then the knock she had been half expecting. Liria opened the door on the man whose butler rescued her from a long walk yesterday in the rain. “Good morning, sir,” she said, keeping her voice low. “Do come in.” She ushered him into the small sitting room, amused at his appearance. She had already decided that he was not a man who stood much on ceremony, and who was probably the despair of his tailor, if he employed one at all. He had stuffed his nightshirt into his breeches, and possibly run his hand through his hair; she could not be sure. He had pulled his shoes on without the benefit of stockings, and hadn’t bothered with the detail of lacing them.

“‘I see before me a desperate man,’” she quoted in Spanish before she thought.

It was from an obscure comedy by Cervantes, and he astounded her by replying in the same language, “‘. . . and he is ready to throttle old ladies,’” continuing the line of the story. She stared at him in surprise.

He held up his hand. “I spent one winter convalescing from a pesky fever in the house of a merchant near Ciudad Rodrigo who adored Cervantes, and thought I should, too. Amazing way to learn Spanish, won’t you agree?”

She nodded, too surprised to speak.

“The Gypsy Priest?”
he asked.

Liria nodded again. “Your butler is ill,” she said. “He did not look well last night.”

“How did you know he had the chicken pox?”

“I took a good look at him last night,” she said, then wondered if she had angered him, because he was silent for a long while.

She must have had a wary look on her face, because he clapped his hands on his legs. “Oh, bother it,
dama!
I was going to come in here and complain and whine because my butler had the temerity to throw out spots and blight my life. Your expression tells me rather that I should be concerned about him and not me.”

She had no idea that her expression told him anything of the kind. “As you say, sir. At this nasty turn of affairs, I would recommend tea.”

“For him or me?” he asked quickly, then smiled at her. “There I go again!”

“Actually, sir, I think
you
should have the tea,” she replied, mystified by his quickness of mind, something she did not expect from one who seemed so proud. “I have been long enough in the company of English to observe that it cures all ills, real and imaginary.”

“Except chicken pox, eh?” he asked, and she knew he was joking this time. “Shall we give’um a good gargle of calamine lotion and direct that they take up their beds and walk?” He seemed to hesitate. “Miss Valencia, I must continue to throw myself upon your mercy. Would you help me with my niece
and
my butler?”

He did mystify her. “I told you last night that I would help. Adding another patient does not require a new contract,” she assured him. “I will insist that you help me.”

“
Claro que si, dama.
Only command me. Huddersfield can wait, although I am puzzled why such a town is an attraction.”

I need employment, she thought. Have you never . . . well, no, I suppose you have not. “It can wait,” she agreed. “Please summon the landlord and request tea and toast for the sufferers, and how did you say? Plenty of calamine lotion to gargle.”

***

I will have to write to Tony and Libby and tell them that I continue to lead a charmed life, he thought later that afternoon as he sat beside Luster’s bed—he had given him his own—watching his butler. I am a man most fortunate to have fallen into the clutches of a woman born to command.

He had always thought his skills in command constituted his only virtue, but after a fruitless waste of time in trying to convince Luster to abandon the cot in the dressing room for the more comfortable bed, he had whined to Liria, who was giving his niece a sponge bath. “He won’t do as I request,” he complained.

“Oh, he will not?” she murmured. She worked swiftly, patting Sophie dry, applying more lotion, then whisking her back between clean sheets that the landlord’s wife had furnished. Does this woman command us all?

“I will see Senor Luster now,” Liria declared. When Sophie started to whimper, she turned back to the bed. “My dear, your uncle will sit with you for a few minutes and then I will return,” she said, and touched her forehead to Sophie’s.

“Your forehead is pink now,” he said as she turned around. With a slight smile, she pulled up the corner of her apron and wiped her face. “My butler is wondrously stubborn, Miss Valencia,” he warned her.

She merely looked at him, her eyes open no wider, her expression scarcely altered. Maybe it was the way she raised her chin, or that barely perceptible squaring of her shoulders, but he decided not to waste his breath. “I will sit with my niece,” he said hastily, and felt a momentary pity for Luster. Serves you right, you stubborn old man. He nodded to Juan, who sat on the floor and drew in what appeared to be an artillery ledger book. “Do
you
ever argue with her, lad?”

Juan gave him a sunny smile and returned to his drawing. Nez glanced at the page. “My carriage?” he asked, and Juan nodded.

He leaned close to Sophie. “Chicken pox doesn’t last forever, Empress,” he said. “Soon we’ll be at Knare, and they’ll be on their way to Huddersfield . . . oh, now, why the tears?” He wanted to leap up and drag Liria back to his niece’s bedside.

“Uncle, she is so good to us,” Sophie said, and then sniffed back her tears. “We do not wish her to leave our presence.”

Well, at least you have some of your humor back, he thought. “But I think Miss Valencia is rather a martinet, Your Spotted Highness,” he replied.

Sophie nodded, and then smiled, which amused him, because her face was so dotted with calamine. She indicated that he lean closer. “She touches us, and we like that.”

Oh, this is a sad reflection on my sister, he thought. “My dear, it is nice to be touched, isn’t it? Well, er, perhaps we can find you a governess who does just that.”

Sophie shook her head. “Liria,” she said, and closed her eyes.

Well, well, he thought. A commander who is gentle, and disguised as a rather broken-down servant. At least I will not be bored for a few days. He gazed at Sophie, hesitated, then put his hand on her arm. She opened her eyes, smiled, then returned to sleep. He watched her, then looked at Juan, who had moved closer even as he continued to draw in the ledger. The boy has an eye for detail, he thought, admiring the way a few sure strokes turned into trees, and then a road, and then rain. Nez doubted whether he had ever drawn as well as the youngster who sat next to Sophie’s bed, his tongue between his teeth as he concentrated.

The door opened and Liria stood there. She beckoned to her son, who put down the ledger and tiptoed to his mother. She handed him a bundle of sheets. “Take these downstairs,
mijo,
” she whispered. “
La dama de casa
will have more for you.” Juan took the bundle and hurried away.

“Did you convince my stubborn servant to take my bed?” Nez whispered.

“Did you doubt I could?”

“Not at all,
dama,
” he replied, amused. “I think, even though our acquaintance is short, that I would have been more surprised if you had not succeeded.”

“Pues claro,”
she said finally, and closed the door. He laughed softly, pleased with himself. He returned his attention to Sophie. Her skin was dry and warm under his hand, but not feverish. Gently he turned her hand over so it was lying palm-up on the sheet, and pressed his fingers onto the pulse at her wrist, not for any need to check it, but to feel the calm rhythm of her heart. It soothed him better than tea.

In another moment he released her wrist and leaned back in the chair. He knew he should be out of sorts and fretful about this delay to his plans, but a moment’s reflection reminded him that he had no plans. What a pleasant toil is leisure, he thought. He followed it with the sure consideration that he would be busy enough this summer. I will see to the health of my land, and find me a wife, he told himself. The former will please me, the latter, my sister; and so it goes.

He was about to close his eyes, when his attention was caught by the ledger book lying on the floor where Juan had left it, to run his mother’s errand. Talented child, he thought, and picked up the book. Perhaps I can find some scrap paper for you at Knare that is larger than an artilleryman’s notebook. Out of curiosity, he turned to the front of the ledger, and there it was: Richard Carr, Battery Sergeant, 19th Battery, in the precise handwriting he expected. Funny thing about artillerymen, he considered. I never knew one to be slipshod in his records.

He thumbed the pages, knowing he would find a careful record of the guns Carr served and died for: where they were forged, precise dimensions (each gun was ever so slightly different, he knew), how many grains of powder per charge, trajectories, azimuths, arc, torque, and vectors. It was all there. Brighter than me, sir, he thought, as he turned another page and saw a long list of names, each followed by a date, and the word “letter,” in Carr’s careful script. “And what have we here, Sergeant?” he murmured.

He knew he was no genius, but only a moment’s perusal of the chronology told the story. This list was Coruña, then a pause, then Torres Vedras, and Ciudad Rodrigo twice, and Badajoz, and Salamanca, and smaller engagements he did not recognize—Campofino, Frontera, El Paso. A shiver ran through him to know that he was looking at Sergeant Carr’s butcher’s bill through the length and breadth of Spain and Portugal. He turned the page. And Toulouse. “So you wrote a letter to each family, did you, Sergeant?” he asked. “I wonder if your battery commander knew it.”