by Poppy
"Of course, of course." Poppy pushed the heavy hair back from her forehead. "I don't wish to stay here. Of course not."
"When will it be convenient for you to leave, ma'am?"
The woman's animosity, her dislike that was out in the open now that Jeremiah was not there to curb it, pulled Poppy to her feet. She looked around her, the daze clearing from her eyes. "All these things," she murmured.
"They can be packed and sent wherever you like."
"No, I couldn't live-I mean, I'll need only my clothes," Poppy said and then sharply, "Is there a bill owing?"
Some secret triumph flickered back in the cold eyes. "I can make up my accounts and communicate with your lawyers."
The woman hated her and literally could not endure her presence under this roof, Poppy realized. She had been right. There was some old association between Jeremiah and Mrs. Stander. They were of much the same age and, now that she thought of it, they had much of the same rigidity of manner and speech, and secretiveness about their pasts. She would never know what it was, and she did not care. She only wanted to be away from this place and its memories of misery and degradation.
"I'll have to see about other accommodations," Poppy said.
"Mr. Wilton and his lady have twice left cards and inquired when it would be convenient for them to call."
"Was I told?"
"Mary brought up the cards."
Mary had brought up many cards from calls of condolence, and she had barely glanced at them. She did not think Mary had delivered any special messages, and she wondered at the omission. "Please find a messenger to take a note and return with an answer. I am asking Miss Phillipa and Mr. Wilton to tea and will require a suitable collation."
"Yes, ma'am, thank you, ma'am," Mrs. Stander said, almost openly mocking now. "Immediately, ma'am."
Poppy pulled back the heavy curtains and had Mary run out and find flowers to freshen the room. Now she was once more almost herself, though she was surprised to find she was unsteady on her feet.
When Phillipa walked in, her face rosy under the frame of her fur bonnet, exuding an atmosphere of fresh cold air and happiness, Poppy flung her arms around her. "How good to see you," she cried. "How good of you to come, And you, Mr. Wilton, too."
Over her teacup, Phillipa spoke of the thing uppermost in her mind. "Mr. Wilton says he won't wait a year for you to be out of mourning, Poppy."
"For your wedding? Of course not. That would be nonsense."
"I should think it would be quite proper for you to attend," Mr. Wilton said.
"As a guest at the church, if I slip in quietly and leave again before the festivities, yes," Poppy agreed.
"I had so hoped for a state of perfection," Phillipa sighed.
For the first time since her return, Poppy smiled. "Not in this world."
"If you are there, where I can see you, I think I can go through with it in a mode designed not to disgrace Mr. Wilton," Phillipa admitted, long lashes fluttering.
"Of course you can. When will it be?"
"As soon as possible, within the month," Mr. Wilton said.
"I must find other quarters," Poppy said.
"Of course." Mr. Wilton looked around him with distaste. "Old associations, tragic memories, Mrs. Stander," he murmured.
"What do you know of Mrs. Stander?"
"Only that I understand she and Mr. Dunbar arrived in San Francisco together, and there was a distant but definite familial connection," Mr. Wilton said, raising an eyebrow. "You did not know? I could be mistaken."
"I knew there was some old association," Poppy nodded. "Distant. Not of importance now."
"Decidedly not," Mr. Wilton said. "Where do you propose to live?"
"I have a house," Poppy said. If Maurice had called and left a card, she had brushed it aside with the others. "It may be rented."
"Have you consulted with Mr. Dunbar's attorneys about your circumstances?"
"Mrs. Stander mentioned them, in connection with her bill, but I don't even know who they are."
"Let me inquire and send someone to you. You should talk to them before you make definite plans."
"Yes, please," Poppy said gratefully. "And soon?"
Mr. Wilton gave her a sharp look. "Very soon. Tomorrow, if possible."
As always, Mr. Wilton was as good as his word. A young attorney, a junior member of the firm, arrived before lunch, and after he had explained the basic facts, left a sheaf of papers for Poppy to study further. In answer to a message, Maurice called on his way to the Palace and spent an hour. After she was alone, Poppy realized her choices had narrowed and simplified. Maurice had good tenants in the house, a dealer at the Palace and his wife, a clever little woman who had made a new position for herself, one that left The Boss shaking his head and smiling with satisfaction at the same time, that of housekeeper for the Palace. It did shine these days, Maurice said. When it came to housekeeping there was nothing like a woman's touch. He urged her to keep them as tenants. They paid well and regularly. She agreed.
The sheaf of papers the lawyer had left required more thought. Jeremiah had spent money as if he had large funds at his disposal, but he had few assets, small pieces of property here and there, sure to grow in value, but they did not represent wealth. The lawyer frankly did not know the source of his income, although he was certain some of the money represented funds given in hopes of future political benefits.
She could live modestly on the rents from the various properties, Poppy decided. But she was not a woman of wealth. She would have to take careful thought to the future of herself and her child.
She was sitting by the fire, head bent over the papers, when someone knocked on the door. It burst open, and Phillipa stood there, glowing with happiness.
"Oh, Poppy, this is schoolgirlish of me to come without sending a note," she babbled. "But tomorrow, could you-would you-would it be proper for you to come to some of the shops with me?"
"Come in. Take off your coat. Let me ring for Mary to bring us some tea. Now what is this about the shops?"
"I need you," Phillipa said, throwing off her coat and bonnet. "I've looked and looked, and I know what I like but, Poppy, without you, I don't want to choose definitely. I'm not sure what's right." Her eyes grew wide with remembered dismay. "Like the blue dress."
"I think it would be quite proper," Poppy decided. "After all, I must select at least two mourning outfits for myself."
"Only two? But you'll be in black for a year."
"I needn't buy them all at once," Poppy said lightly. Because, she thought, the clothes she bought now would not fit her in a few months.
"We have it settled," Phillipa confided. "Mr. Winton talked to the minister about the arrangements for the church today, and he'll have one of his clerks send out the invitations. Isn't it good of him to take care of things that other men put as a burden on the bride?"
Because he knows you could not do it, Poppy thought fondly, and if he hoped I could, he knows I have my own arrangements to make now. Though he cannot guess the whole of it. "He is very good," she agreed. "When is the date?"
"In three weeks," Phillipa said. ''We have a choice of two steamships for our trip. Mr. Wilton will decide. We will be away a month."
Two months before they returned from their honeymoon. She would be five months pregnant, and everybody would know. If she had rejoined Jeremiah, people would have accepted a premature baby. But they would not accept one born so long after she had lived with her husband. That was obvious, but she had been too shocked and dazed to think of it until now.
"By the time we return, the ships from Europe should have brought the stained glass and marble Mr. Wilson ordered," Phillipa said. "The house will be so grand, with a ballroom and picture gallery. Even the servants' rooms upstairs are big as a house by themselves. Do you know there are fifteen bedrooms?"
"You told me when we were talking about sheets. A dozen for each room."
"Oh, Poppy, sometimes I can't believe it."
&n
bsp; "I can, and I know you're going to be the happiest couple in town."
Though she said nothing, she knew her decision by the time Phillipa left. For the first time, she finished everything on the dinner tray Mary brought her. Then instead of Mary, Mrs. Stander knocked and came in. She stood looking down at the empty dishes.
"You are feeling better now that you have seen your mends."
"And decided what I am going to do," Poppy said. "I'll be leaving here tomorrow morning." She would be comfortable at the same hotel as Phillipa.
"You talked to the attorney?"
"Of course."
"It's all satisfactory?"
"I think I understand the situation, the various properties Mr. Dunbar held."
"You have the list there?" The woman's hand quivered toward the sheaf of papers Poppy had left strewn on a table. "Everything?"
"I hope so." She owed this woman no explanation. Yet perhaps something, because of the past, her clouded association with Jeremiah, should be said, and the truth could do no harm. "Four small properties, probably shanties from the size of the rents, and six or eight, I've forgotten, vacant lots. I've not seen any of them."
"That's all?"
"No debts, at least," Poppy said. "Or small ones only. Like yours. Do you know of anything else?"
"Nothing." The woman's face was radiant with relief for a moment and then darkened with suspicion. "Nothing about me?"
"You expected a legacy?"
"Nothing about me?"
"No, nothing."
''Then it's finished, it's finished," Mrs. Stander said and looked around the room as if saying goodbye to something, before she turned to Poppy, eyes hot with contempt. "For the suspicions I've seen in your eyes, I'll give you something to chew on. Jeremiah and me, we grew up together, I was trained to run a fine house in the hopes I'd make a good marriage. My part of the family had no money. Jeremiah, he was to have it all the fine education, everything. We were too distant to be raised equal but too close for marriage. But when Jeremiah's folks died, he said goodbye to all that education and the rest, and we came out here with his money. He had his scruples about marriage. T'ain't good for the children to marry relatives, they say. Instead he built this house, and he swore it was in my name, and with the money it made, he built his career. If he hadn't decided he had to have a pretty doll, and things started going wrong from the day he saw you, he would have been one of the great men in this state. Great, the greatest. Maybe in the country!" Her voice had risen almost to a wail.
Poppy tried not to shrink back. The woman sounded half mad. So she might be, momentarily, grieving for the loss of the man she had loved all her life, and doubly bitter because she could not acknowledge it openly.
"I can see why you want me out of here," Poppy said quietly. "I can pack my clothes, that's all I'll be taking, and be out of here in the morning. I'll be staying in San Francisco only for the Wilton wedding. Then I'm sailing for England."
Part Nine
London
Summer 1853
Chapter Forty-seven
POPPY maneuvered her heavy body down the narrow stairs of the cottage at Pallminster Lane, burst into the living room, and threw herself into Jack's arms. He hugged her gently, then held her off and looked at her and shook his head.
"Widow's weeds and the child not yet born. Oh, Poppy, what tragedy is this?"
She could not dance a jig of impatience, but she settled herself in a chair and motioned to Jack to take one opposite her. ''The tragedy is months past. Please respect my sensibilities and do not ask me to tell you everything. I have newspapers you can read if you must know the whole."
"I only want you to forget all unhappy things. You are here now. My carriage met you and brought you safely from the ship?"
''Thank you, yes, dear Jack. We were lucky we spotted that fast clipper two weeks back and were able to send letters to precede us to England. But I also wrote to Daisy. And why this house? And when did you get back? And where is Andy? I am yearning for news of everyone."
Jack held up a cautionary hand. "Gently, gently."
Poppy tapped her toe and tossed her curls. "I am in splendid health. Will you answer my questions before you drive me into a decline?"
"You wrote that your husband was killed in a political feud, and you wish to be with your mother at-er-at this time," Jack said fondly.
"I made a long, harsh trip to be here with her," Poppy sighed, eyes modestly lowered, and then flashed, "So where is she? And why is this house still furnished and in use with Mr. and Mrs. Peters still employed?"
"Your mother and her husband are entertaining in the country, a large party, including some minor royalty. You understand, she could not leave? She hopes to join you here Wednesday or Thursday."
"She wrote to you and not to me?" Poppy cried, outraged.
"Our places in the country are close. When your letters were forwarded to us there, I rode over to Red-ferns at once to see her. We agreed I should come to town and make arrangements for your reception."
"This house, this house?" Poppy demanded. "Mrs. Peters will say nothing. She regards me still as a jeune fille, supposed to eat my nice porridge and ask no questions."
Jack's mouth twitched slightly. "Perhaps she regards the subject as delicate. Since her marriage, your mother has interested herself in good works."
"Good works?"
"With fallen women. She feels she understands their difficulties."
"I see," Poppy murmured.
"Many fine, sincere, eminent men are engaged in urging such women off the streets," Jack said earnestly. "But that is only the beginning. They must have a haven while they are prepared to return to a self-respecting life."
Poppy nodded vigorously. "Of course."
"For a while, your mother considered the country air conducive to such a course. Unfortunately-" Jack did not seem to know how to phrase the matter-"Venus was too often in ascent for the experiment to be a success."
"Venus?"
Red-faced, Jack took the plunge. "Many young gardeners and stable hands are employed at Redferns and nearby houses. At one time, of the twenty young women your mother had there, half were found to be breeding."
"Oh, no," Poppy cried and giggled helplessly. "Oh, no. Venus indeed."
"Your mother still had this cottage, and she decided that Mr. and Mrs. Peters were in need of occupation. What better occupation than to house the young ladies here and have Mrs. Peters instruct them in the skills needed to go into good service?"
"Now that is sensible," Poppy cried. A girl who could go into service in a good house, prepared to be something more than a kitchen maid, was indeed better off than on the streets. "But where are they?"
"Temporarily, as long as you are here, I have lodged them in the servants' quarters of our townhouse. Your mother agreed to that."
"Oh, Jack, you are good," Poppy cried and looked at him, long and seriously. "Your skin is still darkened. You have not been back long? You did get to China?"
"And back again. All I ever dreamed it could be and more, a fascinating country, and if I were free I would return again and again."
She could not help him in that. He was an heir. "And Andy?"
"He is at the moment at our place outside Edinburgh with my old tutor."
Poppy felt shocked. "Daisy did not forgive him? She did not accept him back? Or is her husband difficult?"
"Sir Edward is amenable to all his wife's wishes," Jack said stiffly.
"Is he?"
"My family put forth that we had a prior claim," Jack said, and added hastily, "Without elucidating any details that might perturb Sir Edward. He could see for himself that Andy and I had developed a brotherly relation-ship during our years, yes, years together."
"I think you had better elucidate the details to me," Poppy said.
"He really is my brother."
"This is an old history."
"For some weeks yet, I have only to sit and wait. And listen."
"My
next older brother was no happier to leave the Army than I was to leave the Navy," Jack admitted slowly. "The news he must throw up his commission hit him hard. He was for some months in London, in a mood of deep despair, before he could bring himself to it."
"He rode a horse with four white feet?"
"The description, the markings, were well known. The same he was riding when he was killed."
"Then I can understand the resemblance between you and Andy."
