Whiskey Island (31 page)

“To the manor born,” he said softly.

“Pardon?” Nani said.

“To the manor born. Born to riches. A gentleman from the start.”

“Yes? I am not so sure.” Nani stopped so that all of them could complete their visual review of the structure in the distance. “Mr. Simeon, he didn’t come to this world a wealthy man. This man, he is no gentleman. I may be from a poor village in a far country, but this I know.”

“And what would the difference be?” Lena asked. “All men eat, drink, sleep and a few things besides. Is a man a gentleman simply because he need not work?”

“That would have not a thing to do with it.”

“Then it’s his manners?”

“The poorest man from my village can learn manners.”

“What is it, then?”

Nani fell silent, but Terence was so busy taking in the sight of the house that he hardly noticed.

To Terence’s uneducated eye, the dark stone house resembled nothing so much as a medieval fortress, with stone battlements, deeply recessed doorways and a roofline that suggested the hidden presence of archers. Every detail, while impressively complex, also seemed menacing, as if the architect’s sole source of inspiration had been an embittered Camelot setting about to defend itself.

And yet here, surrounded by gentler, more delicately wrought homes, the Simeon house was outstanding in both its power and scale. It was a home built to intimidate and challenge. Even the forest of huge native trees leading nearly to the front door did nothing to diminish it. It might have risen from the netherworld, stone upon stone, exactly as it was.

Nani interrupted his thoughts. “You see, I think the way that he treats people tells a story. A gentleman understands who he is. He has no need making others understand.”

Rowan encouraged her. “And Mr. Simeon does?”

“He is never cruel, but he is there. Can you see? He is always watching, always making certain everything is…perfect.”

“Then you must be particularly proud that you’ve stood the test,” Terence said.

She laughed, and the sound broke the peculiar tension that had gripped them. “I will stay always there because of Mrs. Simeon. She needs the friends she can gather around her.” She paused. “And I am paid so much, there is little I could not bear to help my family.”

They continued their stroll, but just past the drive up to the house, Terence looked over his shoulder for one more glance. He saw that Lena was doing the same.

“Now, would you look at that?” Rowan said a few minutes later, when they had come nearly to the end of the sleighing route.

Terence turned. “What exactly should we be looking at?”

“Why, a nearly empty sleigh just ahead.”

Terence peeked down at Lena, who was frowning.

“And why should that be worth your notice?” she asked.

The sleigh in question was parked on the opposite side of the Avenue, just before Case Avenue, where all the sleighs turned for their races.

“There’s a driver, but it looks to me as if it might need a rider or two,” Rowan said.

“Well, certainly not the likes of us.” Lena went to the curb and peered across the street.

“I was thinking
exactly
the likes of us,” Rowan said. “Shall we ask the driver?”

“You don’t know what’s in the pot till the lid is lifted,” Terence said. “I’ve heard that often enough from Katie.”

Lena held him back. “Terry, surely the sleigh belongs to someone, and they won’t take kindly to us riding in it, even if the driver says we might.”

Rowan took her other arm. “I believe he’ll more than take kindly to it, darling. The ride’s been promised to me, you see. The sleigh belongs to my captain, and it’s the return on a favor I did for him.”

In actuality, it was payment on a bet Rowan had made and won. Terence knew the whole story.

“Nani, did you know?” Lena asked her new friend.

“Not until this moment!”

“Have you been in a sleigh before?”

Nani clapped her hands. “Not until this moment!”

“Time then,” Rowan said. “Come, ladies, let’s have our ride before the snow melts.”

They crossed the street, and the men helped the women inside. The sleigh wasn’t as large as some they’d seen, but the four of them fit snugly on the opposing seats. There were buffalo robes to snuggle under, and charcoal foot warmers padded with heavy rugs.

Lena’s face was so radiant with happiness that Terence was nearly blinded by it. He took her gloved hands and warmed them under the robe between his. She would remember this for the rest of her life. Even if the fates were kind to them, even if someday money flowed easier and luxuries like this were commonplace, Lena would always remember this moment.

The horses, one gray, one chestnut, but both sturdy and game, set off, the sleigh gliding behind them. The sleigh was anything but fancy, with none of the ornamentation of most they had seen. The horses weren’t matched; the robes weren’t sealskin or fox. But Terence had never felt happier.

They turned and began their journey up the north side of the street, moving slowly at first, then picking up speed. They slowed again as a shiny black sleigh sporting a gold insignia on the door pulled out in front of them from one of the Avenue houses. Terence realized it was the Simeon house just as Nani spoke.

“Mr. Simeon, he is driving. What will he say if he sees me?”

“He’ll think you’ve found a friend to take you for a ride,” Rowan told her. “It’s your afternoon off, Nani. He has no right to tell you how to spend it.”

She seemed placated, but she lowered her voice. “He will be gone before we catch him. His horses, on the Avenue, they are the best. And his sleigh? Designed in New York, for him only.”

“Then he’ll be far ahead of us before long.”

Terence looked over and saw that this wasn’t yet true. Simeon himself might be driving, but just like this one, the sleigh held four passengers, three women and an older man. Simeon was clad in fur and a beaver hat pulled low over his ears.

The other sleigh didn’t surge ahead, as Terence expected. Instead Simeon pulled up on the reins until they were abreast. He turned and viewed their sleigh, and Terence got his first good look at him as Simeon called to their driver. He was a striking man, with sharp features and oddly pale skin. His brows were heavy and black, and his mustache swept nearly to his chin.

“Not much for looks, but the design is game enough,” Simeon said.

“Nothing swell about her or the horses, either,” their driver, who’d been introduced as Shep, called back. Shep had been a driver for more than a handful of Avenue families in his day.

“They can run, though, can’t they?” Simeon shouted.

“If I let them.”

“Why not let them? Mine are itching for a race.”

Terence frowned. The ladies in Simeon’s sleigh were trying to get his attention. One, a wisp of a woman with strawberry-blond hair, had covered her mouth with her hand. Instead of looking at them, Simeon, who was keeping perfectly apace, swept his gaze over the occupants of Terence’s own sleigh. A warning flashed in Terence’s mind when he saw the man’s eyes linger on Lena.

A second passed, then another. Finally Simeon continued on to Nani. He nodded in recognition before he turned back to Shep. Nani’s cheeks reddened, and she lowered her eyes in humiliation.

“If you’re afraid you’re not up to it…” Simeon smiled pleasantly.

The harness bells were jingling faster now, beating a frantic rhythm as the horses picked up their pace.

Rowan leaned forward. “I don’t want to frighten the ladies,” he yelled to Shep.

“I’m not frightened!” Lena sat forward. Terence saw that her eyes were glowing brightly. “Oh, let’s race. Not far, not fast. But a real race!”

“You heard the lady,” Simeon said. He lifted his whip and cracked it over the backs of his gaily decorated team, which were as black as his sleigh. The horses shot forward.

Terence held his breath, not sure whether Shep would take the challenge. There were others ahead who were more equipped to race Simeon, others in sleeker sleighs drawn by long-legged Thoroughbreds. But Shep shrugged his shoulders and drew his whip. In a moment the gray and the chestnut were racing forward.

“What have you done!” Nani cried.

“Oh, hang on and enjoy it. We’re flying!” Lena cried.

Rowan began to laugh helplessly. “She’s your wife,” he shouted to Terence. “And you’re welcome to her.”

Terence had felt a jab of anger at Lena’s rash behavior, but it dissolved now, and excitement took its place. They were gaining on Simeon. The horses’ noses were nearly at the door of the sleigh. Then they had stretched beyond it, and farther beyond, until they were even with the driver’s seat. And still they gained until, despite what seemed like an honest effort on Simeon’s part, they were neck and neck with his blacks.

“That was only our warm-up,” Simeon shouted. He cracked his whip again, and the blacks shot forward.

Terence fully expected Shep to pull back. They’d had their fun, and Shep had acquitted himself well. But Shep slapped his reins against his horses’ rumps, and they surged ahead, too. In seconds the horses were neck and neck again.

There was slower traffic ahead of them, pulling to the side to let them pass. Terence felt a thrill of alarm when he realized that Simeon had no intention of slowing down as a small yellow cutter painted with flowers struggled to get out of his way. Shep’s path was clear, but Simeon’s was blocked until the last possible second. As he pounded forward, the cutter that had been in his path managed to pull just far enough to the side to avoid a crash, but the driver shouted curses as they passed.

“That’s enough, Shep,” Rowan called sharply. “You’re scaring the ladies.”

Terence could see that the lady beside him wasn’t scared, but exhilarated. “It’s grand, isn’t it, Nani?” she called.

Nani’s face was whiter than the snow spraying in plumes all around them. She rested her face in her hands, as if she might be sick.

“Slow down, Shep!” Rowan ordered, his voice as stern as Terence had ever heard it.

Shep did at last, pulling back on the reins until Simeon’s sleigh was a length ahead of them. Terence thought from his own view of the old man’s face that Shep was probably wondering what had come over him.

Simeon slowed, too. In the sleigh behind him, the pale-haired woman was wailing uncontrollably.

“That will be Mrs. Simeon,” Nani said from behind her own palms. “Sleep she will not tonight. I will be up with her. All night long.”

“Courage, Nani. You probably wouldn’t have slept, either, after that ride,” Rowan said, taking her hand and forcing her to look up.

Simeon allowed them to draw even. He took off his hat to Shep. “Another day, perhaps?”

“Not if you don’t care who you run into,” Shep said gruffly. “That’s not sportsmanlike, now is it?”

“I didn’t run into anyone, did I?” Simeon switched his gaze to Lena, bypassing the others entirely. “And did you enjoy the race, madam?”

“I did,” she said in a high clear voice. “But I’d have enjoyed it more if we’d had the proper chance to beat you.”

He laughed, a strange, rusty sound that rubbed along Terence’s backbone.

Simeon tipped his hat to her, as he had to Shep. “We’ll have to arrange that opportunity, then. Anything to please a beautiful lady.” He put the hat back on his head and pulled ahead of them. In a moment he and his passengers were nothing more than a cloud of hoof-disturbed snow.

The passengers of the sleigh were silent. Finally Lena spoke. “An odd man, that one. Is he always that odd, Nani?”

“It’s what I told you. He wants everything to be perfect. He will do whatever it takes to make this happen. He would have run over that poor tiny sleigh.”

Lena settled back against Terence, and he put his arm over her shoulders. She looked up at him, her eyelashes dusted with snowflakes. She smiled warmly, and the stab of jealousy he’d felt at Simeon’s words ebbed away.

She touched Terence’s cheek. “I prefer a man who wins what he has the fair way. Even if everything he owns could fit into the pantry of the Simeon mansion.”

They made love that night with a sweetness that touched Lena’s heart. She knew what it had cost Terence to give her this day. He had one day each week to rest from his labors, and he had sacrificed it for her. She showed him in every way she could how grateful she was and how much she loved him for it.

He fell asleep in her arms, and she refused to move, even when one arm began to grow numb.

By the time he rose and dressed the next morning, she had warmed the kitchen and set a hearty breakfast of eggs and potato cakes on the table for Rowan and Terence. They ate as she began her preparations for soup and multiple loaves of oat bread to take to the docks for dinner. She wasn’t tired, but invigorated from her holiday, the sleigh ride and the fact that her bleeding still hadn’t commenced.

“I’ll be going to the market after I return from the docks,” she told them. “There’ll be a good supper waiting for you tonight.”

Terence smiled at her. “I’ll have that to look forward to, then.”

They finished their meal in silence, still waking and preparing for the day. When he’d finished, Terence pulled on his coat and cap, and stopped for a kiss on his way out the door. Rowan followed soon after, smartly attired in his uniform.

Lena had a list of plans. Monday’s washing to be done. A visit to Katie and baby Neil on her way to the docks. A stop at St. Brigid’s on her way to the market. A search for a cut of meat she could afford to serve Terence and Rowan that night. Soup to a neighbor who was ill.

She organized her thoughts as she worked, to guarantee that everything would be finished in time. She planned with a light heart, the memory of yesterday brightening even the least attractive chores.

She was well on her way to completing them when Seamus Sullivan appeared at her door just minutes before she was to set off to see Katie, the dinner cart nearly full.

She had been warm and happy, but the sight of Seamus’s drawn face turned her limbs to ice. For a moment she couldn’t speak. Then she forced out a word. “Katie?”

He shook his head. His tongue seemed frozen, too.