Twixt Two Equal Armies

by Gail McEwen

  Looking around for a place to sit, Baugham opted for the armrest of the sofa, since there was no other space left on it — apparently it had been designated as a harbour for Poetry and Verse according to the note sticking up behind the cushions. He crossed his arms over his chest and waited for the tea to be poured. Then he caught a glimpse of Hamish, shyly waiting with his hands grasping the book behind his back.

  “Have you got as far as the Cape yet, Hamish? What an adventure, eh? I think it would be a good idea to try to find Crusoe and the Military Memoirs, too, in this mess before they’re safely stowed away in a Brave New Order of Things.”

  “Hamish,” Holly retorted, “would you kindly inform Lord Baugham of the distinct possibility that until Mr Crusoe is safely stowed in our Brave New Order of Things or anything else than this awful mess, he is likely to remain marooned and alone for eternity? As for Military Memoirs, I ask, what military man worth his training would be satisfied to remain in such disarray?”

  Since Hamish obviously did not care to relay the information to Lord Baugham or hazard an answer to her question, Holly smiled, handed him his cup and plate and nodded her permission for him to go off and read.

  Pouring for his lordship next, she asked, “So, how do you like the jumble we’ve made of your lovely room?”

  He took the cup from her hands and smiled.

  “I like it prodigiously! Very refreshing. And exciting. Although I still worry that you have taken too much upon yourself. It looks . . . well, right now it looks daunting. But I must admit you are doing me a great service.”

  “Oh, it is daunting, and overwhelming, and exciting!” Holly’s eyes sparkled as she spoke, then her face grew softer.

  “But I am finding it curiously peaceful too. To take one small piece of the world, even as small as these few shelves that are sitting empty right now, and bring it from disorder into harmony . . . To make sense out of the confusion . . . ” she smiled, feeling a bit foolish at her Romantic notions. “As you can tell, I perhaps have been looking too much at poetry books today.”

  “Mm,” he looked at her thoughtfully. “Perhaps that is the key. To make sense of the confusion little by little. The temptation is to think one must take it all on at once, isn’t it? One could say my fault has been a misunderstanding of that notion; trying to attack too large a piece at once it leads rather to inaction instead. I have not always been the most diligent servant to my family’s memory and legacy, but this certainly goes some way to what I owe them.”

  His words reminded her of what he had earlier told her of his father, and she felt she must say something to him.

  “My lord, forgive me if I am overstepping my place, but you must know that a proud name and heritage cannot be erased by the actions of just one person. To do such a thing takes the cooperation of several generations. I cannot imagine that you would wish to be cooperative in such an undertaking.”

  He smiled wryly. “I thank you for your concern, but there really is no need for it. I am very happy in my more than privileged life and not such a dour figure at all. You are very right in your assessment, of course. Still, perhaps if you had lived in that world . . . ” He hesitated but then put down his teacup and turned around to browse through the volumes on the sofa.

  “What’s gone and what’s past help, should be past grief,” he said a little wistfully. “That is very true and I believe it.

  “I don’t know,” Holly sighed. “It seems there are some things — or people — that when they are gone, are never past grief. However, as I am discovering, we must can the little piece of life we are given and try to make sense of it as best we can.” She looked up at him. “What else is there for us to do?”

  He still did not fully meet her eyes and seemed preoccupied with the poetry volumes. It was impossible to read from his face what he was thinking and as he put down the books and once more raised his teacup to his lips, his eyes had clouded over and were fixed on his boots.

  “I think you must be right. Some things are worth our grief, and some are not. I should think your father . . . he would have been worth much — if you will forgive me for being presumptuous. I think he would have been very proud of you. But all the same, he would not wish you grief, but happiness.”

  Holly smiled wistfully. “Oh he was always very proud of me, in all of my childish accomplishments. And no, he would not wish me to grieve, and truly I do not all of the time . . . but it is something I will always carry very near, and it meets me in the most surprising places. I don’t know why, suddenly, he is so much on my mind.”

  He looked down, momentarily at a loss for words, but he realised that she was not really expecting a response, so he glanced around him and smiled.

  “Quite a metaphor in action, don’t you find? Demolish to rebuild?”

  Trying to shake off the melancholy mood that had descended upon the library, she looked around and gestured to her handiwork, “I don’t know that I like that term — ‘demolish’ — I prefer to think that I am jarring them out of their complacency and satisfaction with their merely tolerable existence and introducing them to their best destiny as . . . ” she raised her teacup in salute, “a proper library!”

  The smile was back in his eyes. He met her toast and watched her quietly for a moment.

  “I have every confidence that you will do just that, and I am truly most grateful that you accepted this assignment. I wish . . . Miss Tournier, I am hoping you will treat this library, and Clyne, to freely come and go as it suits you. As strange and even unsettling as this room now appears, I am happy you are here. What Mr Darcy would say if he ever returned, I know not!” he laughed. “You might be called upon to defend me against his censure and disapproval at having his favourite chair thus occupied by . . . ” he lifted a volume, “ . . . Mr David Hume no less!”

  He looked at Hamish still absorbed in his book before he turned back to her.

  “Now, if you will excuse me, I will leave you to your work.”

  “Of course. I will finish sorting through this last pile and then I must be going. I should be able to return soon however, perhaps tomorrow.”

  With that Holly recalled Hamish from his adventures around the Cape and they resumed their positions on the floor. Lord Baugham took a last look at the tranquil pair working quietly in the midst of the turmoil that was his library, he bid them a good afternoon and returned to his study.

  The shadows were lengthening by the time Holly tapped lightly on the study door. When his lordship looked up, she quietly said, “I have left Hamish with his book for now. Would you please fetch him in half an hour and send him off? It would not do for him to be late in arriving home.” They both smiled at the image of a boy so engrossed in his reading he would miss supper and risk disapproval to just get through one more chapter. They quietly bid each other a good night and, wrapped in her shawl and bonnet against the cold, Holly walked home toward Rosefarm Cottage and her waiting supper.

  HAMISH WAS JUST RELUCTANTLY DEPOSITING the dashing Captain Bob on the shelf again. He sighed and let his hand rest on the cover a moment before he turned around to find his lordship smilingly watching him from the doorway.

  “Well, Hamish,” he said in a gentle voice, “I think that’s quite enough work and excitement for one day. I am sure you will continue the adventures when you go to bed. Perhaps even challenge a few savages while you make your way home to Nethery. And you know there is more where Captain Bob came from next time.”

  Hamish smiled shyly and nodded.

  “I suspect you enjoyed yourself,” Baugham said. “I am glad. And your supervisor was not so bad, am I right?”

  Hamish looked at his lordship, this time boldly in the face. It was hard to tell in the growing shadows of the library, but he did feel his lordship might have been teasing him. He still decided he should speak his mind.

  “Well, I did, sir. Very much. But I think . . . If ye pardon me, sir, I feel ye are wrong about Miss Tournier. She is very kind and I could nae say th
at she was in any particular mood at all, sir, however clumsy and stupid I surely was about many things.”

  His benefactor was quiet and Hamish began to feel he had perhaps been too bold. But he surely felt this honest and brave stand was what Captain Bob would have done, so he decided to suffer any consequences.

  “Yes,” Lord Baugham finally said in a kind voice, “you are quite right. She is a remarkable woman, is she not? I certainly think so. But I tell you this Hamish, remarkable women are often hard to make out. That is what makes one remark them, after all. Now, you must hop along if you mean to be back here tomorrow, as I suspect you do.”

  After Hamish left, Baugham closed the door behind him and walked back to his library. It was growing dark, but the darkness suited his thoughts. In reality he wanted to take in the chaos that reigned in the room without being obligated to present either a stoic and confident appearance, or being forced to respect the on-going work by keeping his hands off his own books.

  The smell of dust and old paper unleashed upon opening the door was startling in the quiet dark. Baugham lighted a work candle on his desk and shuffled the heaps of volumes around to see what exactly his collection of Classics – Greek entailed. Depressingly little, it turned out, and all of it in disturbing condition. He sighed and let them go.

  His eye was caught by a white piece of fabric lying on top of another pile of books. As he lifted it and made out the smudges on the material, he smiled. She had left his handkerchief on a pile of books after using it. He hesitated. Did that mean she intended to use it again?

  That thought made him break out into a wide grin. How many times had he given his handkerchief to a woman, whether in real need or play? And how many times had it simply been abandoned after having been used? Very seldom, Baugham conceded. A woman of the ton would never simply abandon a gentleman’s extended handkerchief, regardless of the original purpose. She would use it for more than that. She would take it and somehow draw attention to its change of ownership later — publicly or privately. She would give it back, invariably with some elaborate gesture. She would plot and ponder just who should know she held onto it, or she would hide it as a token. But she would never just abandon it where she had used it; strip it of any coquettish or playful meaning and treat it as a mere . . . handkerchief.

  Baugham looked down at the bit of fabric, lightly sliding it between his fingers. He found that he was very content regarding that white piece of cloth as a simple tool of necessity and not as a prop in a game. He suddenly felt ashamed of what he could, and on occasion had, used such an innocent piece of material for. Intricate games, flirtations and clandestine messages.

  This handkerchief — used and abandoned — was neatly folded so that the smudges were left on the inside. It looked innocent and precise, its use nobody’s affair or concern. Was it possible to go back to the time when a handkerchief was just that — a handkerchief? Here at Clyne it was. Suddenly he longed for it to be possible elsewhere, too.

  Baugham put the handkerchief back where he had found it. It was just a handkerchief. If Miss Tournier had further need of it, he had better leave it. If not, Mrs McLaughlin would collect it and see to it. It was as simple as that. He sat a while, surprisingly enough feeling quite content in his present situation. Then he got up, took a last look around in his topsy-turvy library, smilingly fingering the note with Juvenile Literature written on it before he picked up Mr Defoe’s greatest adventure and headed up to his bedroom.

  “THE RIPPET, ROSIE! THE MESS, those old, filthy, tattered books all athort the place! All athort the chairs, tables, sofa! The floor, Rosie! The floor is covered with the things! And not all of them are books either. If I’d hae known it would be coming to this, I would hae thrown those disgusting, smelly things away a long time ago. Laird knows, I nearly fell off the ledder with the chore of dusting them on many occasions!”

  Mrs Higgins, usually more quiet and subservient to her elder cousin’s obvious expertise and housewifely experience, felt Mrs McLaughlin was really being very ignorant.

  “Well, she’s cleaning them up now, is she not?” she tried while neatly stitching through the worn heel of a thick stocking.

  “I’ll believe it when I see it,” Mrs McLaughlin said with disgust. “I don’t know what they’re thinking could be done to it. I’ll wager she’ll suggest they’ll throw out most of it after she’s had a look through. That is if she has any sense.”

  For some reason her cousin’s quick glance at her made her add, “And I know she has sense, Rosie.”

  “Aye, well, some of these people have an odd attachment to any book. Dear things, ye know, and some of them they treat like treasure.”

  “No treasure there, I can assure ye,” Mrs McLaughlin said and bit off her thread. “It’s all what the old Earl left and that’s a paltry lot. Everything he could get any money out of he sold off. Nothing left but novels, I shouldnae wonder.”

  The way she spoke the word made her cousin look up.

  “Novels?”

  “Aye. Although I’m nae saying his lairdship hasnae done his best to get something a bit less vulgar. He reads much poetry. And he likes the travel books. Well, some of the things those savages get up to are no better than reading novels, I know.”

  “Och well . . . ” Mrs Higgins began, not quite certain how she could tell her cousin what Mrs Tournier had explained to her: that novels could be both useful and educational if chosen with care. But Mrs McLaughlin interrupted her.

  “All I’m saying is I hope they dinnae think they can turn the whole household tapsalteerie, just on account of some dirty books. And I know his lairdship feels the same way. I’m sure he doesnae like his peace or ways disturbed and ruined like this.”

  “Well, if he doesnae, why did he ask her to do it?”

  Apparently that was a question Mrs McLaughlin did not want to answer.

  “I need the thread, Rosie. And the thicker needle. If ye please.”

  THE NEXT DAY, HAMISH WAS standing on the soft carpet of the library in a pair of hand-me-down boots Mrs McLaughlin had thrust into his hands the moment he entered the kitchen. It was very quiet and very empty. His lordship was apparently out and Miss Tournier had not yet arrived. Of course, he had left all his chores at Nethery in a hotchpotch as soon as he could, not to be late. His mother had scolded him, but fortunately his father and Duncan were out in the field and had not borne witness to his eagerness to rub shoulders with the Quality up at Clyne.

  His father had had a few choice comments about the summons from his lordship out of the blue three days ago, but his mother had acidly remarked that it was not as if his efforts on the farm provided them with as much opportunity of buying new boots before the winter, and he should just let the boy be.

  So Hamish had run practically all the way today as well and arrived breathless in Mrs McLaughlin’s kitchen. She had looked him over and inspected his hands and nails and given a grunt, which, he supposed meant she approved, given him an apple to munch on while he waited and then sent him out to go and announce himself at the library.

  “Ye work here now,” she said, “and I have no time fer announcing anyone in the middle of me own work.”

  Slowly Hamish slipped the new boots on his feet and wriggled his toes. It felt strange after the summer of bare feet and the memory of his old boots that had grown too small already by May. He took a few steps to try them and smiled to himself. Slowly he made his way to where he had last left his explorations and picked up The Life and Adventure of the Famous Captain Singleton. Perhaps if he just had a little time before anyone joined him, he could have a look at the illustrations of Captain Wilmot’s famous pirates . . .

  UNLIKE HAMISH, HOLLY DID NOT run all the way to Clyne Cottage, but she did walk at a brisk pace. Wrapped up in her heavy shawl and bonnet, she was quite warm and enjoying the clear, crisp late autumn morning. The trees and shrubbery along the road had long ago dropped their foliage and, when no one was around to see, Holly scuffed and kicked through the f
allen brown leaves along her way.

  After arriving on Lord Baugham’s grounds, she entered through the kitchen and greeted Mrs McLaughlin before making her way to the library where she saw Hamish enthralled in his book. Unwilling to interrupt the boy’s raptures, Holly merely watched him, smiling as she remembered how she, as a little girl and truthfully even now, loved to lose herself in a good story.

  Hamish had just immersed himself in the great battlefield scene off the coast of Angola and was unconsciously biting his lip as the savages were resorting to throwing lances at the gallant crew of the ship when he was aware of not being alone. He looked up quite startled and saw Miss Tournier watching him with an amused smile. He jumped up from his seat and slammed the book shut.

  “I beg yer pardon, Miss, I didnae hear ye come in. It’s . . . it’s most exciting, miss. That’s why I didnae . . . I mean, I was jist waiting for ye . . . ”

  “Oh, but I know! It is exciting isn’t it? What part are you on now? The battle? When I read the battle for the first time, I’m sure I missed both my dinner and my tea!”

  She moved into the room to begin another work day and the boy relaxed as he realised he would not be reprimanded and he even ventured a smile.

  Aside from his lordship popping his head through the door a time or two to inquire after their progress and whether they required anything, Holly and her assistant passed the day busily and quietly in work. They stopped only when they noticed the shadows begin to creep into the corners of the room.

  “Well, Hamish,” Holly said with finality, “I think we have done yeoman’s service today and so, tomorrow — ”

  “Oh, miss! Tomorrow is Martinmas!” Hamish interrupted in a rush, but then dropped his eyes. “That is . . . I could acourse come if ye in particular wish me to . . . ”

  Holly laughed.

  “Oh, I had not forgotten about that! How could I? Of course neither one of us will work tomorrow. I’m quite certain his lordship would not even have suggested it. You be sure to enjoy your day off. Now run along Hamish and come again on Monday.”