Strands of Bronze and Gold (8 page)

I awoke with a jolt. My face was burrowed into something silky—M. Bernard’s silver satin waistcoat.

I sat up abruptly, sweating, my heart racing.

“What is it,
mon bébé
?” he asked, concerned.

“I had—I had a bad dream.”

“Tell me about it, and I will make you see that all is well and that no terror may touch you when I am here.”

And so I told him.

He nodded. “Those nightmares, where you do not actually know what you fear, are horrifying. I have them quite often, strangely. I have been through true danger, but that unknown dread is far worse. From the corner of my eye, I will glimpse something shapeless and shadowy struggling to take form just behind me. And I run because I cannot bear to see what it truly is, once the darkness has writhed into a shape.”

I shuddered and rose shakily. “I’d better go to bed.”

“I will walk you to your door.” He took my elbow. “But I assure you, you need not depend on your brothers for rescue. If ever you are in trouble, I will do the rescuing.”

No worries over nightmares plagued me on my second morning at the abbey.

It was a “misty moisty morning,” in the words of the nursery rhyme. The fog softened all lines and lent a dreamlike quality to my meanderings. It didn’t seem quite day or quite night. With no sun, I allowed my hat to hang by its ribbons from my neck.

The grounds were magnificent and very European-looking. With their crisply carved hedges, statues, and fountains, they resembled illustrations I had seen in books. It was hard to believe we were here in Mississippi. The gardens had been laid out with an artist’s eye, which I assumed was my godfather’s, so each vista seemed more lovely, inviting me on and on to the Italian garden and shrubbery, the rose garden and knot garden and herb garden.

I met Willie, the head gardener, out clipping away with his shears at the legs of the elephant topiary. He was small and very dark, with a grayish tinge to the wrinkles in his face and with white, cottony
hair. He was the husband of Daphne, the flower fairy. Particularly fitting, since he made me think of a gardening gnome.

“They’re spectacular,” I told him, gesturing at the sculpted shapes. “And do you clip them all yourself?”

He grinned and looked down at his boots (which were large for his small frame, making his shape resemble a capital letter
L
). “Yes, Miss,” he said shyly. “I does.”

“How do you think of the forms? Do you have a book?”

“No, Miss. When I was a young’un, back in the old place, before I come here, I saw them beasts. Them I cuts from memory. Them others”—here he indicated the geometric or fantastical shapes—“I cuts how my eyes likes them to be.”

His voice was soft.

As I continued my exploration, I wondered at the work it must take to fight the quick-springing Southern weeds and many insects. Even the outbuildings appeared charming and immaculate. Pear and plum trees were trained against the walls of the carriage house, and a profusion of yellow roses clambered over the stables. I thought of the words of the noted author Hannah More, when she wrote of Hampton, “So clean, so green, so flowery, so bowery.”

Only two details seemed neglected. One was the misshapen oak tree in the front. It was so ugly and out of place; why did M. Bernard not have it removed? The other unkempt spot lay past the orangery, where a brick wall surrounded what appeared to be a crumbling medieval chapel.

Above the top of the wall I could see that vines rambled, the roof sagged, and the upper windows were boarded over. Exuberant ivy and wisteria and the cruelly thorny vines I later heard Willie call
“devil’s gut” shrouded the walls. It took me some time to discover the entrance. When I did lift choking vines to find the gate, it was firmly locked and barred.

A stone angel atop a pillar stood guard nearby. She was covered with splotchy lichen and moss, but that didn’t change her graceful beauty. For a moment I could only stand motionless, spellbound by her expression—infinitely sorrowful and wise and compassionate. I touched her stone foot just as a groundsman passed by.

“Why is this place locked?” I asked him.

He squinted down from beneath his straw hat. “Master, he say it be unsafe. He don’t want no one getting hurt in there.”

Why had M. Bernard brought the chapel here to begin with, if he was only going to let it fall into ruin? Maybe even my energetic and wealthy godfather couldn’t make all renovations at once. It must cost a fortune each month simply to keep this place running, and the expense of the east wing renovation was surely immense.

I headed out across the lawn, and soon my boots and the stockings inside were wet with dew. I roamed through the peach orchard and pecan grove and on to a little hill where rose an odd structure. It was built of some sort of pinkish sandstone mixed with blue-gray seams that lent an ethereal look, as if it were floating enchanted in the pearly mist. As I drew closer, I guessed the building mimicked foreign ruins. Or maybe it was authentic foreign ruins since one couldn’t be sure with my godfather. Great blocks of stone covered with a filigree of vines lay tumbled around, and sculpted, grotesque figures, meant to be monkeys, leered and grimaced from above.

I poked about, searching for the entrance, which seemed to be concealed. Of course, if I found it, it would probably be locked
anyway. This building, like the chapel, certainly appeared to be in dangerous condition.

I had just detected a hairline crack, which might be part of a secret door, when a snort sounded from behind me. I whirled around.

M. Bernard loomed above me on a sleek gray Thoroughbred (the source of the snort). The Irish wolfhound who had snoozed in the library the day before came loping up. The horse tossed its head and pranced.

“Heel, Finnegan,” M. Bernard ordered. The dog immediately obeyed.

I shrunk against the stone wall. The horse’s eyes looked wild.

“Aramis will not get too close,” my godfather said. Surrounded by gray mist, the bluish sheen of his beard was more pronounced. He might have been some spectral knight in an Arthurian tale. “He obeys me absolutely. He is a handsome brute, is he not?”

“Indeed, sir, he is.” I forced myself to reach up and stroke Aramis’s velvety shoulder. I withdrew quickly when the beast flared its nostrils and blew.

“He came to me a wild creature,” M. Bernard said. “But I worked with him and cowed him into submission until he is as you see him, gentle as a dove.”

“You have him under control, but I shouldn’t like to meet him without you holding the reins.”

“And I would never allow that to happen. I am too careful for your welfare.” He patted Aramis’s neck. “I have purchased a mare for you—pure white; her name is Lily. You may have her saddled whenever you like.”

“Do you mean it? I can ride now? Today?” My eyes widened at the prospect of a horse of my own.

“You know it is my pleasure to make you happy. My only stipulation is that a groom must accompany you on all jaunts. There is wild country here. I wish I could attend you myself, but duty calls. Do you admire my folly?” He cast his eyes over the ruin.

“Folly? Is that what it is?” I had heard of these buildings, constructed purely for decoration by the wealthy to represent Egyptian pyramids or Tatar tents or other interesting edifices. Perhaps ruins created deliberately explained in part the ruined chapel left in disrepair. To my godfather, maybe, they were quaintly scenic—even the horrid monkeys.

He nodded. “I patterned it after the remains of a temple I visited in northern India and filled it with rare and intriguing statuary and art similar to the original.”

“May I go inside? I thought I found a concealed door.”

“You are astute. There is indeed a concealed door, and the interior would interest you a good deal, but you must not enter without me.”

“Will you come now?”

“No, I am afraid that pleasure must wait. Someday I will show it to you, but I have other things to attend to. Later we shall have all the time in the world for such adventures together.”

I opened my mouth to say I wished he could put off his business and spend the day with me, but I closed it again. He was a busy man with “solemn duties,” and I would sound selfish and childish. “Then I’ll go introduce myself to Lily,” I said instead.

“And I will see you tonight.”

He lifted his top hat and cantered away. I had to agree with Mrs. Duckworth that he did indeed have an excellent seat on a horse, and the sight made me draw in my breath a little, he appeared so distinguished. How well we’d look riding together.

I hastened to the house. Without a maid’s assistance, I dressed in a riding habit from my wardrobe and headed out to the stables.

The chief groom, a man named Garvey, sauntered out to meet me. He was a tall, well-built, good-looking black man. I might have been inexperienced in a broad range of real, live people, but “the rake” was a stock character in the romance novels I had devoured. From his manner, I assumed he wreaked havoc among the housemaids. When he spoke, I could smell whiskey on his breath. Perhaps it was the whiskey that gave him his oozing confidence. I wouldn’t have thought slaves would have access to alcohol, but then, I didn’t know much about such things.

He tipped his hat and smiled ingratiatingly. “So, little Miss, you come for a look at your mare? She’s a right pretty thing.”

“More than a look, I hope,” I said, speaking coolly, for I didn’t like this man’s demeanor. “I should like to take her out right now, if there’s a groom to accompany me.”

He tossed the harness he was holding to a young boy. “Oh, I’m fixing to go with you, Miss. It be my pleasure.”

“Very well.”

He went to fetch Lily.

My horse had great, limpid eyes and a gentle manner that caused me to wrap my arms around her head. “You darling thing,” I whispered. She rubbed herself against me.

Garvey helped me climb up before mounting another steed.

I hooked my knee around the pommel, spread my skirts, and was off.

We left the tended gardens behind and soon were trotting over uneven ground, with swampy patches and clumps of trees. I could sense Garvey’s hot brown eyes on my figure as I rode.

I urged Lily into a gallop across the parkland. I had never before ridden in such a place—so open, so free. The steamy heat of the horse added to the sticky, cloying heat of the air. Still I loved this, with the wind whipping my cheeks and hair and the feel of Lily’s long stride beneath me. I hoped Garvey was left behind, but he overtook me in only a moment.

He pulled in his reins and looked me up and down. “You quite the rider, Miss. The master be glad of that. He likes a quick gallop hisself.”

We stood upon the fringe of the woods. “I’m going in there,” I said, pointing into the trees.

“Better not, Miss. There be low-hanging branches and roots to trip up your mount. We wouldn’t want a pretty lady like you to take a tumble, now would we? Not to mention the steel traps the master has set out for poachers. But there’s a right fine view up on top of that hill. It goes on for miles.”

For a moment I considered ignoring Garvey and plunging into the forest anyway—he had that effect on me—but the fact that his words actually made sense stopped me. I would never purposely do anything that might hurt Lily.

We rode to the glorious outlook he had indicated. The fog had burned itself away, so now I could make out the church steeples of Chicataw above the distant treetops. I recognized my favorite
church from when I had driven through town. It had been of yellow brick, with a sunny, peaceful, daisy-dotted churchyard, where, it had seemed to me, only the contented might sleep.

For some reason I was glad to know where the town lay.

Garvey returned to the stables and I returned to the house an hour before time to dress for dinner.

A voice said from behind me, “Did you enjoy your ride, Miss Sophia?”

I jumped. Ling certainly moved silently. “You startled me!” I cried, twirling around. “Yes, sir, it was a pretty day and a pretty place and a pretty horse.”

He bowed and withdrew.

I stood still, watching him melt into the shadows. I wondered what he thought of me. Usually I could tell if people liked me or were indifferent or found me annoying, but I couldn’t read Ling’s face. I was anxious to know—his good opinion would be valuable.

I shrugged and ran up the stairs, two steps at a time, swinging my hat by its ties.

Before I reached my bedroom, I paused in front of a marble-topped credenza in the upstairs hall. On it stood a framed daguerreotype of M. Bernard that I looked at every time I passed by. He sat in a velvet armchair, his head slightly bowed and his eyes half closed, as if lost in thought. Probably it was the only stance he could maintain for the long time required to take the picture, but he appeared to be meditating deeply. I picked it up and carried it into my bedchamber, placing it beside my mother’s miniature. When I got up the nerve, I would ask my godfather if I might keep it there.