Rondo Allegro (64 page)

And Anna herself?

There was a secret that Parrette suspected, but she had not
said anything about that, because time would tell in its own way.

She looked about the room, saw everything laid out and
waiting, then stepped to the door again. The music made it clear that their
evening was not ending immediately, and so she gave in to temptation, fled down
the back stairs, barely pausing to grab her shawl and to shove her feet into
the pattens still wet from the earlier journey across the courtyard.

Bareheaded, she hurried back across the court to the stable,
where she saw lights still burning upstairs.

She tapped at the door, her heart in a flurry. It was opened
by John-Coachman himself, his coat pulled hastily over his shirt. Parrette
lowered her eyes, aware that she was blushing like a girl, as she said,
“Forgive me, Monsieur Cassidy, but I have me a terrible problem.”

“Come in, please,” he said. “I trust Polly is not sickening
for something? Shall I summon Peg? She has gone to bed, but I doubt that she is
asleep yet.”

“No, no, do not disturb her, please.” Parrette waved her
hands. “It is Polly, but not sick . . .” And quickly, she told
him.

As she spoke, she was amazed at herself. Even a month ago
she would never have trusted anyone with the truth, much less a man. But as he
drew her toward the fire, his gaze concerned, without shock, anger, or fear,
she found herself having to stop and explain, and backtrack, until the entire
story poured out—everything, right back to the terrible days in Lyons.

He listened, his gaze steady, until she finished the tangle
of past and present, saying, “I was going to tell her. But I was afraid. I
would not have her overset now, especially. Or to ruin the happiness they both
had so long in coming. Yet, I do not know what the widow will do.”

John Cassidy rubbed his raspy chin, then grunted. “If she
has said nothing so far, I expect she will not. For a time. If she acts in this
the way she has in other things, she will sit on the secret, and spring it when
it most suits her.”

“And then?” Parrette asked, her eyes wide. “And then?”

John looked into her anxious face, and understood the real
question. “And then, I truly believe, should anyone accuse his wife of being a
French spy, the baron is going to laugh. The navy has a summary way of dealing
with spies.”

Parrette closed her eyes, the tension going out of her
shoulders. “I know that much! It is the other, the fact that she earned her
wages singing in an opera company. Not low musicians, pah! But she
did
earn a wage. It is not what a fine
lady can be forgiven for doing.”

John said, “Yes, that is the rule of what is called good
society.” He gazed into the fire. “I do not claim to know his lordship as well
now as I did when he was a boy, but I would venture to suggest he will be less
grieved by the tidings that she was a paid singer in a French opera company than
by the fact that she could not bring herself to confide in him.”

“That is my fault.” Parrette clasped her hands tightly.
“Ought I to tell her, then?”

John considered a while longer. “I believe your instinct is
right to wait, at least a little while. Give them their time of happiness, one
might say, their honeymoon.”

“Yes,” Parrette said. “Yes. Thank you.”

She looked up, aware of John standing a little ways away,
and she recollected herself. Suddenly self-conscious, she felt another blush
burning up from her collarbones, pulled her shawl tighter, and whirled away. “I
am sorry to disturb you, Monsieur Cassidy. Thank you.”

“It’s glad I am you confided in me, Mrs. Duflot,” he said
mildly. “Good night. God and Mary and Patrick be with you.”

Parrette muttered a blessing in French, and fled.

o0o

For Henry, everything had changed.

He had promised himself he would never again set foot in
Yorkshire. He had sworn never to marry. He certainly would never have wished to
grope about the world blinded, and yet here he was, walking about the ancestral
home whose smells and sounds brought back so many memories from his boyhood, by
the side of the woman whose touch he could not get enough of, whose voice held
the power to soothe the pain in his head.

With the flourishing of happiness came an increase in
energy, and a sense of purpose. As the days flew by, the affairs of the estate
required Henry to learn a way of thinking that was completely unfamiliar. There
was a set of new terms to put his mind to, having to do with land and its
seasons, but after all, it proved to be no more difficult than the mastery of
the thousands of terms involved with the standing rigging, the running rigging,
and the navigation of a ship.

The smiling, obsequious steward who bowed and flattered
every time he saw Henry, bowed a little less each time the new baron summoned
him to the Manor to answer to the complaints tenants had been making
repeatedly, or to explain figures that did not add up.

Anna sat by her husband, calmly reading off lists that had been
half-buried, which built a grim picture.

With his words stripped of the flattery and prevarication,
it became apparent that this steward had been hired to wring what he could from
the land, without putting a penny back. As soon as Henry, who distrusted the
man’s smooth, oily voice, heard all the reasons why there must be no change—they
must continue on as before—he interrupted the steward’s excuses.

“As well you are not a naval man. I know how to address
humbug when it’s offered to me on my own quarterdeck. The matter is simple. If
you are not equal to accomplishing what
I
ask, then take yourself off.”

The man flushed, bowed jerkily, and left.

As soon as the library door closed, Henry thumbed his eye
sockets and said ruefully, “That sounded a magnificent
coup d’oeil
, but that leaves us more awkwardly situated than
before. I am now a steward short, yet the problems remain.” He sighed. “Well,
Rackham offered to function as sea-daddy. Aubigny as well. I had better take my
hat in my hand and apply to one or both of them, like a scrub of a middie.”

They took the carriage out the next morning, and this first
attempt to gain knowledge failed because he brought Anna, dressed in her
fashionable pelisse and a smart hat.

Mr. Rackham, as pleasant as his wife, treated the visit as a
social call. He could not be brought to discuss the details of land stewardship
before a lady. To him it was not
comme il
faut
, and the habits of politeness were ingrained. They went away having
enjoyed the conversation, at the cost of Henry being as unenlightened as
before.

He mulled this problem for a night, and the next morning, as
Polly laid the fire in her bedroom, he said to Anna, whose head lay on his
shoulder, “I know what I must do. I’ll call on Bradshaw. As I recollect there’s
a parcel of sons, and if the next one down is as smart as my midshipman, I will
take him to clerk if he’s willing.”

Anna smiled; Henry’s hand drifted up her side to cup her
face. “You’re smiling,” he said. “I can hear the alteration in your breathing.”

“No, no. That is, I think it a prodigious good idea.”

“Prodigious! Never change, Anna. But you deflect me. I must
know why you smile.”

She gave in to a chuckle. “I only wonder what names these
other boys have been given.”

“Names?” he repeated.

“Your Mr. Bradshaw was named Beverley. And his brother at
the shop wears the name Endymion.”

“Was he? I know the mids among ’em had a variety of
nicknames. If I recollect, he was Stoat, a fact I probably would not share with
his doting family. Beverley. Endymion! Poor devil!”

And at the end of a long day, when they were alone again,
Henry kissed her, then said, “Hippolyte, Odysseus, and Lancelot.”

There was a hesitation—for her day had also been filled with
activity—but then she recollected their conversation that morning, and uttered
a low, delicious laugh. He joined her.

Then he said, “Odysseus, who writes a fair hand and can
drive, begins work tomorrow. He begged me to call him Bradshaw, but if I must
differentiate him from his father or brothers, to use William, which was his
grandfather’s name.”

o0o

Henry’s new secretary, grateful for his narrow escape from
being put to clerk to an attorney, was a lively young man much like his
brother. He settled enthusiastically into his new position.

Mr. Rackham, presented with an unexceptional secretary
accompanying the new baron, began to initiate them both into the intricacies of
land management.

Over the month of February, which offered a succession
storms followed by relatively mild days, Lord Northcote and his secretary were
seen all over the parish, visiting tenants and fellow landlords. While Henry
was busy with estate affairs, Anna fell into a rhythm of her own: there were
regular calls and callers, the informal dance parties at the Rackhams’, and
social events from dinners to balls. She also learned to drive the gig, a low,
sturdy cart hitched to a single horse.

She continued teaching Eleanor to sing, which developed into
lessons in Italian, the language of music. Justina showed a surprising aptitude
for ballet, and they danced up and down the gallery together. She, too, wished
to prepare a special performance with which to dazzle the rest of the family as
a surprise.

So the lessons continued, though Anna had all but ceased to
sing herself. There was so very much to do, and to think about. In a scarce few
weeks the physician would arrive to oversee Henry’s bandage removal. What if
Henry’s sight was restored?

Naturally she must want that for him, because he wanted it
so badly. Yet her thoughts continued in a discomforting channel. He would not
truly be seeing her, in the sense that there still remained the secret of her
professional life. Every time she gave a slight answer to a question that might
lead to dangerous ground, or avoided the subject entirely, guilt diminished the
pleasure she otherwise felt in her days.

o0o

One Sunday morning late in February, snow softly fell on
the pony trap wheeling down the white road from the Aubignys’ chapel in the
early morning light. Peg had stayed behind, nursing a sore throat, so Parrette
and John-Coachman attended Mass alone.

They rode in companionable silence for a time, until he said
slowly, “We both have a son at sea.”

Parrette was surprised at this statement of the obvious.
They had been talking about their sons, and sharing their worries about the
long silences and the known dangers, for weeks. “Yes,” she said.

“And we were each married the once, you and I.”

She glanced up at his profile, which she could not help
thinking was much finer than any of those statues she had looked upon in Italy.

“But yes,” she said.

“And it’s glad I am that your husband is no longer on this
Earth, or I might have to seek him out to teach him a lesson in manners.” The
deep voice became more Irish.

“But that was long ago,” she pointed out. “And me, I am
sorry that your wife is no longer on Earth, because she sounds like an
excellent woman.”

“And so she was, so she was, God and Mary bless her.” He
lifted the reins briefly as the horses’ ears twitched. But it was nothing but a
snow bird bursting from a hedge, sending a white shower along the edge of the
road. “I dreamed about her last night. Do ye want to hear my dream?”

Parrette discovered her heart beating fast. “I would.”

“I dreamed she looked down upon me from Heaven, and gave me
the eye. ‘Look for happiness while ye can,’ she said. ‘Ye’ll be here soon
enough, now.’ Do you feel the same way I do, Parrette Duflot? Any day you come
to us over the stable is a day for celebrating. And when you are not there, I’m
thinking about you.”

When Parrette was fourteen and thought herself giddy with
love, it had proved to be no love at all. But she had learned something about
love since then. “John Cassidy, you know the reason I cannot say yes as yet.
Once Anna finds her way to telling my lord everything, and they are understanding
one another, then I will know I have kept my promise. And I can look to myself.
Can you wait?”

His slow smile turned her way. “I can wait,” he said.

Parrette returned to the house, her emotions in such turmoil
she felt like a girl again. It was not at all a pleasant sensation. She liked
to think ahead, to be prepared for anything. She was mistress of herself, with
a good brain and a deft hand. And yet, ever since coming to this house, she had
come to see that it was not enough anymore.

Tell Anna, or wait for Anna to trust the baron on her own,
before the poisonous widow could do it for her?

I will wait a bit
longer
, she decided when she crossed the slushy stable yard toward the
house.

Her mood was not improved to discover Polly weeping softly
in the cold, narrow stairway leading up to the servants’ quarters, where
Parrette headed to get rid of her coat and hat. “What is wrong?”

In answer Polly held up the new gown they had labored over.
It was a delicate muslin with a gauze overdress, figured with tiny flowers.
Polly had embroidered tiny gold centers to each flower, and a line of laurel
leaves around the neck and the gather at the sleeves. It was one of their
triumphs—and here it was, ripped all down the front, the material pulled awry
at the high waist. Harriet had obviously been romping in it, and stepped on the
hem. Or someone else had stepped on it.

“
Tiens!
It is not
ruined, this dress. The gauze along the top? Yes. But look. We can cut here and
here, and drape it so, and make it over into a half-dress. High in front, long
in back. I saw a picture just like, in one of the magazines. Come. You must get
ready for church. You know Noll drives very slowly, and you do not want to be
late. I will get started while you are gone.”