Twixt Two Equal Armies (58 page)

“Your work ethic is admirable. However, I know that you have been diligently listing your ideas since you first began this job. Why it should cause you such struggles now, I cannot fathom. Unless it is something
else
about his lordship’s library that has been giving you trouble.”

Keeping her eyes resolutely away from her mother’s, Holly concentrated on her ‘list’, hoping she sounded composed when she asked, “Why should his lordship’s library give me trouble?”

Mrs Tournier narrowed her eyes. It was too good to miss and she was feeling highly irritated at such nonchalance.

“Why, one would think perhaps the dust, or the climbing on high ladders or, knowing you, even the neglect and carelessness could give one cause for anxiety.”

“Not at all, Maman, things are coming along nicely.”

“Well, I’m glad to hear it. So, if past injustices or his lordship’s library are not to blame, what is the cause for your moods then?”

Holly put her work aside and started toward the door.

“I am sure I am not having any moods, Maman. You are angling where there is no hope of a catch. Now, why don’t I get you some more tea? And isn’t it time for another dose of Agrimony? Is the fire warm enough? Maybe I should go fetch some more wood . . . ”

“Ah, killing me and my misgivings with kindness, are you, dear? Well, it only adds fuel to my flames. You know, if I am wrong, all you have to do is tell me so. There is nothing one can argue against there, but this evasion is highly suspicious and, for an old bulldog like me, highly tempting.

“Oh, and you really must develop some means of disguising your feelings if you wish me to ignore them. After all, I am your mother.”

Holly became uncharacteristically snappish with her, “Since you are such an expert on my feelings, why don’t you share your vast knowledge . . . then we both will know what they are!” and she flopped back down in her seat.

Mrs Tournier cocked her head to one side and watched her fuming daughter.

“Now that is exactly what is so infuriating in this equation, is it not? Something is obviously wrong — that is easy to read in your countenance and air — but what that something specifically is, cannot be read in the same way. One could hope you would develop a sign language of some sort to make my task easier. As it is, I am reduced to coaxing, threatening and goading to satisfy my curiosity and maternal compulsion.”

Holly straightened her posture and tried to regain some degree of composure and dignity.

“Maman, you may give your curiosity and your compulsions
and
your imagination a rest. I do believe your cold has made you feverish . . . Are you sure there is nothing I might get for you?”

“I might very well be feverish. It would only be from boredom, after all. And to relieve it I need entertainment and stimulation, which you have not provided me with in any form except as an object for scrutiny. And that pursuit is turning even more tedious than my ailment.

“Oh, if you don’t want to speak of it, you will not, I know. But I wish you
would
tell me what is bothering you so that I might help you and not be forced to tease it out of you. I can’t very well lie back and be meek and quiet. That kind of behaviour would seriously alarm you, and no doubt persuade you I am mortally ill and, however wicked I am, I could not do that.”

Holly hated being in this situation and had just about exhausted her attempts to re-direct her mother’s questions without again resorting to dishonesty. Before he had . . . before that day, she had never found herself in a place where she did not feel she could confide completely in her mother, but to tell her what had happened in the garden was an impossibility.

There was no predicting how Mrs Tournier would react to the intelligence, and more to the point, as she had discovered when she tried to write to Elizabeth, there was really nothing to say. No beginning, no conclusion to the story — he had kissed her and then . . . nothing. How does one confess such a thing without dissolving into humiliating admissions of one’s own feelings about it?

She blinked back the tears that were just beginning to gather and raised her head to face her mother.

“Maman, I am sorry but I have nothing to tell you that would provide you with entertainment or stimulation. You have my word that there is nothing bothering me and so you may cease your scrutiny.”

“Well,” Mrs Tournier said dryly, “if that is the case, I beg you would invite his lordship over for tea tomorrow. He has not been by in quite some time and you may tell him that I miss his company.”

Holly tried to hold her gaze after her last act of defiance, but found she could not. She dropped her eyes to her hands clasped tightly on her lap, “Yes, Maman.”

T
HE
C
ALEDONIAN
T
HISTLE WAS A
strangely bustling place for a blustery weekday evening, but driven out of doors by an unceasing restlessness, Baugham decided to stay. He found an empty place at the bar and accepted the mug that was immediately drawn and placed before him. He was not in a mood for socialising, so he sat back and let the voices and conversations flow over and around his own scattered thoughts.

“Hey Joe, you leavin’ that bride o’ yours home alone fer once? How’d you get her to let ye out o’ the house?”

“Aye! She’ll make him pay well enough once he gets home fer cockin’ the wee finger here wi’ the lads!”

Joe sat smugly, smiling into his drink, “Aye lads, say what ye will, but my lass is a damn sight prettier than any o’ ye.”

Across the room another man was bragging on his young son’s prowess in learning to shear sheep
and another man was taking a ribbing from his companions upon sharing the news that his wife was expecting their first child.

They were conversations centred around day to day domestic life, some good natured, some serious, and Baugham was just thinking how different it all was from the gossip and tittle-tattle of Town, when Mr Robinson leaned across the bar toward him.

“If ye don’t mind my askin’, m’laird, how are the ladies from Rosefarm faring these days?”

With a look of confusion, his lordship said, “They are well as far as I know, Robertson. Why do you ask?”

The proprietor looked slightly embarrassed. “Well now, it’s just that the missus is friends wi’ their Mrs Higgins and yer Mrs McLaughlin and they been talkin’ and such . . . and after seein’ that scoundrel Pembroke last week, I’ve been wondering . . . ”

“Pembroke?” Baugham broke in. “He was there again?”

“Nae, he didnae stay, just come through on his way, but then when I heard what he was doing about their rent . . . well, the ladies have been here long enough that we almost think o’ them as one o’ us, ye know, but it’s nae so easy to ask it o’ such proud women, so if there be anything we can do t’ help them, m’laird, we’d be pleased if ye could let us know. The missus and me, that is.”

Baugham was stunned and, despite his natural curiosity and professed fondness for gossip in general, he was torn between a need to know more and a curious sense of protectiveness. Nevertheless, he tried to press Robertson gently until he was able to discover what one housekeeper had said to another and then passed on to the postmaster by way of his wife.

A short time later he found himself riding down the lane leading to Rosefarm Cottage. Night had come early, a cold wind was blowing and the sky was spitting snow. He pulled his horse to a stop outside the gate and then simply sat there. He could see the parlour window glowing with a warm light, and shadowy figures moving behind the lacy curtains on the window. It was an inviting sight and in his thoughts he could hear the crackling of the fire and informed opinions, he could smell the fragrance of the unconventional teapot. His mouth watered when he recalled the sharp taste of all the honey-sweetened, herb-stretched cups he had partaken of in that room. There was no use denying it or excusing it away, the truth was he wished he was in that warm parlour as well. Immediately following that thought was the realisation that he had no rights to ever be in that parlour again, no rights to concern himself with their struggles, no rights to even be in possession of knowledge about their situation.

He was not sure how long he sat there on that road, in the icy wind and spitting snow, but eventually his horse’s restless movements brought him back to the present and he turned the beast around and spurred him back towards home. Tomorrow would be another day of strained politeness, of avoidance and pretending that, wherever he was in his house, his thoughts were not always centred on what was happening in his library.

“
A
ND . . . IS HE
very rich, ye say?”

Mrs Higgins gave her cousin a smiling look of the knowing and turned to their friend, Mrs Campbell.

“Och aye! Ten
thoosand
a year!”

“And a great estate down south in Derbyshire!”

“And such a handsome gentleman, too. But I will say Miss Bennet is every bit as gentle and fine as he is and she deserves him very well.”

“Aye,” her cousin chimed in, “Miss Bennet will be just the wife for him. A very charming and fine lady she is.”

“And did ye see them often together then?” Mrs Campbell said, clutching her basket, a little warily in the face of all this praise.

“Well . . . ” Mrs Higgins said.

“Ye only needed to take one keek at them together to see how it was,” her cousin said staunchly. “Wouldn’t ye say so, cousin? I seen it as soon as I set eyes on them.”

“Aye. Aye, I did that, too. Did I nae tell ye so, cousin?”

“Right well ye did!”

“So . . . ” Mrs Campbell took a step closer and lowered her voice to a dramatic whisper, “it was . . .
love
?”

Mrs Higgins cast a glance at a farmer’s wife behind the stall who was suspiciously arranging her turnips as close to them as possible. Mrs McLaughlin sent the woman an unfriendly eye and looked back at Mrs Campbell.

“Aye,
love
to be sure. And something else, an all, I daresay!”

Mrs Higgins smiled in understanding and Mrs Campbell was pleasantly scandalised.

“Ooh,” she said blushing with excitement, “what a fine thing! And to think, here in Clanough!”

All three women nodded their heads in agreement.

“And what a fine thing for Miss Holly,” Mrs Campbell continued, eager to add to their delicious speculations.

Mrs Higgins looked surprised. “Miss Holly? How so?”

“Well, such a good connection in the family! And his lairdship such a near friend! And as she is now employed in his library . . . ”

Poor Mrs Campbell! Her eager partners in speculation vanished and were replaced by incredulous females instead. Mrs Higgins looked sour and turned around to give the turnips another look. “Och, well, as fer that . . . ” Mrs McLaughlin raised her eyebrows at the audacity and looked around for Mr Scott and his promised fresh eggs. “Ay, well, I dinnae think . . . ”

Of course, both Mrs Higgins and Mrs McLaughlin had each privately entertained exactly the same train of thought, but since neither of them had yet to mention it to the other or consolidate their opinions as experts in the matter, they certainly were not about to let Mrs Campbell rob them of making their own novel deductions together in private when they were ready to do so.

“Miss Tournier is a fine and upstanding lady,” Mrs McLaughlin said.
. . . but surely she couldnae be setting her sights ‘that’ high,
she thought.

“Oh, indeed!” Mrs Higgins said, “A real lady.”
And much too good for anybody as flichterie as he. Even if he is a laird an all.

Longbourn
Hertfordshire

My Dearest Sister Arabella,

I just had to take this opportunity, when I found that Mr Bennet was writing to you about your travel arrangements, to add my own entreaties for you and my niece to come and witness the happiest day of my life as I am certain he did not stress that point nearly as much as he should have! Three daughters married, and such fine and well-to-do husbands! God has been very good to me although I do worry about poor Kitty and Mary, too, now since Lydia has gone away. I don’t know that Jane and Lizzy listen to me at all when I talk to them about their sisterly responsibilities. I can only do so much myself, you know, and they should care for their sisters’ futures, not to mention my own!

But can you imagine, dear sister? My dearest Lizzy and Mr Darcy! He is very rich, you know, and has a fine estate and Lizzy will be as good as a Baroness, or something! Well, I suppose you can imagine it since I am told that much progress between them was accomplished while Mr Darcy was visiting his fine friend and my dearest Lizzy was with you in Scotland. I will, of course, be forever grateful for your hospitality to her now that everything turned out so well.

You must tell me what you know about Lord Baugham for I’m sure you did your best. Dear Lizzy tells me you are quite fond of him, but I do hope you do not intend on being selfish or scheming about it. Mr Darcy tells my dearest Lizzy that his lordship is to be here for some time before the wedding itself, and I have high hopes that my Kitty may catch his eye, since I am determined to keep him far away from those scheming Lucases. It would suit Lady Lucas very well I am sure, to have Maria married to a Lord, as well as having Charlotte as the Mistress of Longbourn after your brother is dead. Some people are only out for what they can get.