Lords of Honor-The Collection

by Christi Caldwell

“Hush,” Claire murmured, stroking the top of the wary dog’s head, and like a sorceress casting her canine spell, he sank onto his haunches.

  Poppy’s sister-in-law cleared her throat. “Mr. Gray,” she said crisply, without her usual charm and warmth.

  Without a word of greeting, Caleb touched his fingertip to his brim in a dismissive exchange before turning to Poppy. “Time’s a-wasting.”

  Claire stiffened. “Forgive me. I’ll leave you to your work.” She tapped her thigh twice and in concert the dogs jumped up.

  “You are certain you won’t join us?” Poppy offered.

  “No. I’d not want to bore Mr. Gray with impressions of my floral arrangements.” With that, Claire marched off; her army of dogs close at her heels.

  “What did you say?” Poppy demanded as soon as the young woman was out of sight.

  He lifted one broad shoulder in a shrug. “You know I don’t lie, princess.”

  Poppy shoved an elbow into his side twice, eliciting the desired grunt.

  “What was—?”

  “The moniker and for being rude to Claire.” Taking the bag from his hands, she grunted and adjusted her grip on the heavy weight of it, and started forward.

  “You hired me because of my plain speaking.” Yes, and after living in a society where all danced around meaning and truths with intricate steps, there’d been something all too refreshing in Caleb Gray.

  “I tried to hire you,” she reminded, not glancing back. “You proved too kind to accept payment.”

  Caleb laughed. “Kind ain’t a term used to describe me. I was impressed by your skill,” he said bluntly. “Had nothing to do with me being nice.”

  Yes, the papers and gossip circulating about the artist new to England had all spoken of his reputation as being an uncouth, unkind, and dangerous American.

  All the reports had proven largely false.

  At least, by way of her experience with him.

  Poppy dropped his bag.

  “Have a care, princess.” He effortlessly hefted the satchel up and swung it over his shoulder before she had a chance to pillage through whatever he’d brought this day. “You’ve an ease in your command of the brush now.”

  She beamed. “Thank you.”

  “That is never a compliment in art.” He started down the length of the ballroom, motioning to the murals she’d completed these past months. “Landscapes. Still-life. Nature,” he continued, his deep voice booming off the walls.

  “You say that as if it is a bad thing,” she noted, lengthening her strides in a bid to match his longer steps.

  “Always,” he said automatically. “If there’s no growth, and no variety, there is no art.” At last, Caleb stopped, and Poppy’s gaze slid beyond his shoulder, to that first rendering she’d ever added to these walls.

  The mural…hers and Tristan’s, nothing more than colors thrown upon the wall, that she’d not been able to bring herself to cover or repaint.

  And she resisted the urge to rub the dull ache in her chest.

  Caleb and his too clever eyes, however, followed hers. “I’m still curious about this one, princess.”

  “Artists must have their secrets. Wasn’t that the first bit of advice you gave me?”

  Caleb grinned, flashing a flawless, even white smile. “That was different.”

  “Why? Because you don’t wish to share?” Poppy winked.

  “Because you were demanding to know about my past.”

  Poppy smiled at his drawl. “I didn’t demand, per se.”

  He snorted. “We’ll not argue history. Our kind have never been on the same side of it.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “And princess?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Don’t think I don’t know that mural there has something to do with your fool of a husband.”

  She frowned. “Tristan isn’t a fool.” He was honorable and proud and, well, stubborn because of that pride.

  “He walked away from you to rejoin the military?” Caleb molded the clay in his hand. “I’ve served in the military. Sane men don’t do that. Especially when they have a wife like you.”

  There was so much contained in his words that she didn’t know which to unpack first. In the end, Caleb diverted them safely back to his lesson. “If an artist isn’t growing, he’s not an artist.”

  “She.”

  “Anyone,” he allowed. This time, he set his own bag down, with greater care than she’d shown that heavy sack.

  Drawn as she always was by the fascinating items he brought for her to explore, Poppy fell to a knee. “What is it?”

  “Ever hear of Jean-Antoine Houdon?” he asked, rummaging through the bag.

  “No.”

  Caleb fished a small book from inside and tossed it at her chest. “Here.”

  Nearly pocket in size, the volume contained page after page of busts and statues. “He’s remarkable,” she murmured, holding the book close so she might better study the images.

  “Houdon didn’t see any use in small, witty pieces for no purpose other than dressing up a fancy lady’s parlor.” Caleb touched his brim. “Present fancy lady excluded.”

  She snorted. “Go on,” she urged, continuing her study as he explained.

  “Houdon saw sculpting for what it should be.”

  Poppy glanced up. “And what is that?”

  “A return to the classical subject matter. Understanding and honoring the human form.”

  Poppy paused on a rendering of a tall, commanding figure; this man a leader, fully clad. “Who is he?” she murmured, turning the book out for Caleb.

  “Washington. The first president of the United States and the reason you and I aren’t both answering to King George now.” Joining her, Caleb slipped the book from her hands and angled it so they might both see. “Houdon doesn’t believe the subject has to be captured in nude to command the strength and beauty of the human form. See here.” He touched a coarse, callused fingertip to the lines of the figure’s stomach. “Fully attired, and yet, he captures the lines. Do you see?”

  “I do,” she said, running her eyes over the elegant specimen. A memory slipped in, as it so often did, of the night Tristan had made love to her in this very room. Splendorous in his nudity. Chiseled perfection represented in coiled muscles and the marks of bravery he wore upon his scarred flesh. And she resented him in that moment, along with her own body for betraying her with weakness…for this hungering to know those two weeks of bliss she’d celebrated in his arms. “One can see every perfection or imperfection of the form,” she said softly as Caleb returned the book to her possession.

  “Exactly. because Houdon knows that one has to have an understanding of the human form before one can effectively celebrate it.”

  Which is what she’d been attempting to do back with her study of Rochford. How naïve she’d been even in her artwork. “You’ve got to stretch yourself, Poppy.”

  She did a sweep of her transformed ballroom. “I rather thought I’ve done just that.”

  Caleb held a finger up. “If you think that, then you haven’t come far enough.” Reaching inside his pack he drew out a folded and wrinkled newspaper. “Here.” He hurled it at her, and Poppy caught it in her fingers.

  “What’s this?” she asked, unfolding the pages of the unfamiliar paper.

  “Left hand bottom of page three.”

  Mouthing those instructions, Poppy flipped through the newspaper. “And here I believed you not one to spend much time on gossip.”

  “It’s not a gossip column.”

  The frown in his voice brought Poppy’s head up. She peeked her head over the top. “I know,” she whispered. “I was teasing.”

  He gave an impatient nudge of his chin, redirecting her back to the matter at hand. “We don’t joke about art.”

  Unlike Tristan, who’d not only been endlessly fun to tease and who’d effortlessly given it right back. Yes, from appearances to personalities, the two men could not be any more different. Th
ere was an icy veneer to Caleb Gray. One that kept all people at bay, which she’d wager was deliberate. For as much time as they’d spent together, he’d been more of a mentor to her than a friend.

  At last, Poppy found it. “Houdon is selecting four women for Académie des Beaux Arts,” she read, glancing up.

  “He’s asked that I help him.”

  “Oh.” He was leaving, then. That was what he sought to tell her. Another loss. Different than Tristan’s but also sharp because of the brief friendship they’d known. Poppy held her hand out. “I wish you the best.”

  He snorted. “I’m not leaving, princess.”

  “You’re not?” Confusion set in as she tried to follow the meaning of the newspaper then. “Then…?” She examined the write-up in the column, when she registered the silence…and its significance. Her head shot up.

  He winked. “It’s my hope that you are.”

  “English women are not permitted to receive free training.” They could view art, sketch their own drawings of the required fruit and flowers, but as far as society was concerned, that was the extent of where artistic pursuits should start and end.

  “I ain’t seen any English woman sporting a pair of trousers.” He glanced pointedly at her legs.

  “That is different,” she muttered, reluctantly turning over the paper.

  “How so, princess? I’m afraid this is another one of those details about the English that my colonial brain can’t make sense of.”

  She felt her lips pull in a smile. “It’s… It’s…” Only, how was it different?

  I speak as though what you do is safe. You’d call me out, and yet, bold and spirited and proud as you are, you’ve hidden yourself away. In empty rooms of your sister’s hotel, away from Polite Society. On your sketchpad… Where no one will ever see your work or know what you do…

  “You worried about your family disapproving?”

  That query snapped Poppy back to the moment. “No,” she murmured, toying with the corners of the page. “Not anymore.” They’d quite come to accept Poppy for who she was. Even when they’d hoped she’d never find herself with a scandal to her name, neither had they sought to stifle her.

  “You worried about your husband finding out?”

  “Tristan?” she asked with some surprise.

  “Aye. The missing man you married.”

  Aside from a question about an irate husband when they’d first begun her lessons, Caleb had not asked again about her husband, nor had Poppy volunteered information about him. Now, she forced herself to consider Caleb’s question. There Tristan was again. Slipping in, as he so often did, when she’d spent weeks upon weeks trying to push the memory of him away. Because it was easier to exist, living under the illusion that their marriage had never happened. “He wouldn’t mind,” she said softly. He’d only ever celebrated her spirit…and then her pursuit of art.

  “I know Englishmen, they always mind about everything.”

  Yes, she’d agree with him on that score. It was one reason she’d always been so hopelessly captivated by Tristan Poplar. He’d not looked askance at Poppy for fishing, or riding astride in breeches, or drinking from his flask. Instead, he’d treated her as an equal. “Not my husband,” she spoke from a place of truth. “We had an agreement.”

  Caleb barked his laughter, his broad frame shaking. “Now, that sounds perfectly English.”

  “What?” she bristled. She’d become accustomed to his frequent disparagement of the British way of life but her marriage was an altogether different consideration. He roared all the louder with his hilarity. “It is really harmless. He agreed that I should pursue art as I would.”

  “And what did you promise in return, princess?”

  “To—” Her cheeks burned hot. For of all he could have sought that day, only one immediate one had come to him…which in itself should have been a harbinger to what a marriage to Tristan Poplar would be.

  Caleb cupped a hand around his left ear, partially deaf from an injury he’d never elaborated upon, he leaned close. “What was that?”

  “Watch his dogs. He wanted me to watch his dogs.”

  Caleb roared again, and she glared at him. “I’m so happy you find my marriage a source of amusement.”

  “Not your marriage, princess, just the foolishness of the men living on this continent.”

  And on that score, Poppy would only ever agree with him. “Even if I wanted to mentor with Mr. Houdon, there is nothing to say he’d wish to work with me.”

  “No.” There was a pregnant pause. “But if he saw your work, then it might at least be a possibility.”

  “Oh, and I’ll simply what? Invite the gentleman to come and view my art?”

  “No,” he said again. “I will.”

  She gave him a droll smile. Only, her heart beat an uneven rhythm…what he was proposing made this, all of this, her art and what she did, all the more real. It removed her from a place of sketching for herself, and instead, guided her work out so the world might view…and judge.

  Poppy pressed her fingertips against her temple. But he was there, as he always was…Tristan and his urgings.

  I’d have you know, your talent, the art you create…it is a thing of beauty and wonder. Don’t hide that. Not anymore. Let the world see…

  “He’ll appreciate it,” Caleb said, bringing her back to the moment.

  “You seem confident.” Which she’d gathered in the time they’d spent together could only come from a people who’d seen the British Empire crushed under the heel of their colonial power.

  “I am. You’ve got talent. You simply were missing something.”

  She puzzled her brow. “And what was that?”

  “Me.”

  Let the world see all of you…

  Poppy drew in a breath. “What would it entail?”

  “What, now? Now, we invite Houdon to a display of your work.”

  Caleb spoke of inviting a world-renowned artist into her home so that he might assess her work and speak to her talent—or lack thereof. All previous excitement left, replaced with nausea. About what he’d say…and the least of which would be the scandal. For if she did this, there’d be no doubting; regardless of her marital state, Poppy’s holding an exhibit of her art work in her household would be met with one outcome—scandal. It would only further deepen the ire of her choleric mother-in-law, who’d remind her all over again that polite English ladies weren’t artists.

  “Very well.” Poppy smiled slowly. “I’ll do it.”

  Chapter 21

  Tristan,

  All these years, I believed I knew you, and yet, I find I’m still learning things new, such as your unexpected fascination with the weather. The skies have been clear here. Often cloudless. Most days there is a light breeze and as so, it is so very easy to forget that I’m in London and not in the country where I once wished…

  Poppy

  Standing in the courtyard of the Royal Barracks, the tall, granite-faced buildings made for an imposing presentation.

  At another time in his life, standing there in charge of the meticulous exercises being carried out would have been met with excitement on his part. Military pursuits had, after all, proven the one endeavor he’d truly excelled in. In the months that he’d been there, Tristan had fulfilled those responsibilities flawlessly: training loyal, obedient, disciplined yet fearless fighting men.

  He’d worked alongside and under officers of elevated rank, gentlemen of the peerage, whose admiration he’d earned, replacing the initial disdain and suspicion that had met him because of the crimes of his family. His name was on the path to restoration; and along with it, his honor.

  In short, he was doing everything he’d set out to do.

  Only to find himself…empty. Because of her. Because he missed her. Because he missed the two of them together.

  In the distance, past the soldiers moving effortlessly through the intricate steps of a march, Tristan’s gaze slid to a field of flowers.

&nb
sp; Poppy.

  Her name was a whisper in his mind, and a yearning in his heart.

  She was everywhere. Every night as sleep eluded him…when he woke in the morn. Every moment of every day, she was there in his mind: smoking away at his cheroot, with a damn-the-world-attitude for all who saw her. Buried under bed curtains she’d been arranging because, in short, there was nothing Poppy couldn’t do. Her standing beside him, reciting her vows, teasing him through the ceremony.

  I want your mouth there…

  And he was gripped by an all-too familiar hungering that entered with the mere thought of her. Like fire in his arms, she’d made love with the same abandon she lived every aspect of her life with.

  And reminding himself that he’d gone for her and the babes they’d one day have…brought no solace. There was no satisfaction in knowing he did this for that future because his now was empty. For she wasn’t in it.

  Thrusting aside his melancholy, he surveyed the men, most ten or more years his junior, as they went through the motions of a drill.

  From the corner of his eye, he caught the approach of his superior officer. The gentleman moved with a slight limp that he disguised nearly perfectly. So much so that Tristan might have missed it…if he’d not remembered Spicer suffering that injury years earlier. “You’ve got them in line nicely,” Lieutenant-Colonel Spicer said, matter-of-fact in that deliverance. He clasped his hands behind him and continued to watch the infantry move through the steps. Five inches shorter than Tristan and three stone heavier, the man inspired fear in all the soldiers, and yet, Tristan had saved the older man from certain death. “They were a disgrace before, Poplar.”

  From the battle-hardened, taciturn lieutenant-colonel, that was praise, indeed. As such, there should be some sense of accomplishment. This is what Tristan excelled at. This is what he wanted. Wasn’t it? “Thank you, sir.”

  “It’s all about breaking them,” his superior said crisply. “Making men into soldiers.”

  “It is about maneuverability, my lord. Well-drilled, they’ll move confidently at speed without their formations and should the situation call for it, break up, and maximize the use of their weapons.”

  “The insolence of you, challenging me, Poplar.”