Winter Is Past

by Ruth Axtell Morren

  He could see her hesitation at the last remark. “You know about those?”

  She looked down at her hands. “I—I was looking for something in the library one day and came across them. I’m sorry.”

  “It’s quite all right. Feel free to look for anything you might need in the library.” He gave a rueful smile. “Unfortunately, as you heard over dinner, my writing does not find favor in this household. The only true scholarship for the Jew is to spend his life pouring over the Torah. My life as a Torah scholar reached its zenith when I received my Bar Mitzvah at thirteen. A few short years later I was sprinkled at the baptismal font at St. Michael’s.”

  “Why ever were you baptized?” she asked curiously.

  He regarded her through his oval spectacles. “I was the sacrificial lamb, you might say. Haven’t you gathered from my father that he desires to wield power in both worlds? A Jew has no rights in the Gentile world. Our only dominance comes through money. Filthy mammon, didn’t your Jesus call it?

  “Well, money certainly has its advantages,” he continued, his gaze straying to the singers, “but it also has its limitations. The English pride themselves on regarding family name and Church higher than money. They refuse to admit that money is the driving force behind the two.

  “My father, in his wisdom, looked around to see how he could improve his family’s lot in this land they had adopted a few generations back. It wasn’t enough that he’d doubled his father’s wealth. He wanted entry into the more rarified spheres of influence. So, he looked at his prime resources—his four sons.” He gazed at Althea sardonically. “What is one among so many? He could spare one to the Gentile world, even though that would mean that in the eyes of the Jewish world the son would be declared dead.”

  “How could your father contemplate doing such a thing?” she whispered.

  “The Sepharad has a long history of playing a double game. We learned to feign conversion in medieval Spain, yet continue to practice our religion in secret. Do you find that distasteful?”

  She looked down again so he could not read her expression. He wondered why he was telling her the most shameful things about his heritage. Why not regale her with stories of the great scientists, philosophers and sages the Sephardic people had produced?

  “The consequences must have been dire for someone to deny his faith,” she said quietly.

  “It was either baptism or death at the hands of the good Spanish friars. There were hundreds of thousands of these ‘conversions.’ Many of our kin rose high—it is even said one of the popes was of Marrano stock.

  “In time, to make sure our conversions were genuine, the Catholic Church instituted the Inquisition. Of course, it was no coincidence that the Marranos held great wealth, and once they were exposed, the state had a right to all their properties. Convenient, wasn’t it?

  “It was a great sport for a churchgoer to come to an auto-dafé—an ‘act of faith’—and watch one of these counterfeit Christians burned at the stake after a confession had been extracted.

  “Unfortunately, the Spanish Church found there were simply too many of us. They hit upon an easier method—simply expel us…after forcing us to leave behind our gold and silver and jewels, naturally.”

  Simon smiled at the look of growing horror in Althea’s eyes. “So you see, we are used to surviving. It should, therefore, not surprise you that my father knows how to play the game.

  “His only dilemma was, which son could serve as a Marrano here in England, where there are no auto-da-fés, but where few doors are open to the Jew?” Simon nodded toward his eldest brother. “Well, not Daniel there, the firstborn. As you could perhaps gather from our dinner conversation, he will step into my father’s shoes. Already he manages most of the factories we have accumulated during the war years. And what about David there? He doesn’t have enough imagination and flair to enter the world of politics. He does have a mind brilliant in finances, so my father put him in charge of our growing banking concerns. Besides, both of my elder brothers are Jewish to their very core, appearances notwithstanding. They easily rub shoulders with their Gentile equals in the world of commerce and finance, but in their private lives, you see for yourself, they are most at home in their ancient culture.

  “Then came the third born, myself.” He inclined his head. “A skeptic almost as soon as I could read the Scriptures, and with a wit and irreverence that was the bane of my Hebrew tutor, but which my father soon found a way to exploit. I was the one chosen to receive baptism and catechism in order to grant me entrance to the finest schools of Britain.

  “First Eton, then Cambridge, the place where statesmen are formed. Then to find me a borough where I could be guaranteed election. You’ve heard of the ‘rotten boroughs’?”

  Althea nodded. “They are the areas where there are very few votes needed to become elected to Parliament, are they not?”

  “Do you know I sit for a borough in Surrey which comprises only one vote?” At her amazement, he repeated, “A total of six houses, and only one vote.”

  “Only one person was responsible for electing you to Parliament?”

  “That is correct. And how difficult do you think it would be to buy one vote? You heard my father over dinner—he bought my seat in the House, and now he expects his return.”

  “You mean someone agreed to vote for you for a price?”

  “You think they would vote for a Jew—albeit a Christianized one at that? But who is fooled by a skin-deep conversion? My father, the banker, found his price—the man, as a well-respected member of the landed gentry, was up to his neck in debt, and in danger of losing the property that had been in his family’s hands since the days of Charles the First.” Simon smiled thinly. “All it took to pay off his debts was his vote. One tiny vote.”

  He watched Althea digesting the world of politics and money, while he tried to fathom why he was exposing himself to her. It really was quite sordid when boiled down. “Have I shocked you, Miss Breton?”

  “You have, indeed. I was aware of the rotten boroughs, but not—not—”

  “Not face-to-face in all their rottenness, is that it?”

  She looked at him as if at a loss to respond.

  At that moment, the singing ended, and Simon’s grandfather was handed a large thick book. He opened it and began to read in that foreign tongue.

  “He is reading from the Me’am Lo’ez.”

  “It’s not the Bible?”

  “You might say it’s our Bible, that of the Sephardic people. It’s written in fifteen volumes,” Simon explained. “It’s an accumulation of legends, histories and wisdom of the ages. You must get Grandfather to tell you our own family’s history sometime. Do you know he still has the key to the family’s old house in Toledo?”

  Althea’s eyes widened. “How many years ago did your family leave?”

  “This year we celebrate our three hundred and twenty-fifth year of exile from Spain. We left the same year good Columbus sailed for the Americas. The last boatload of Jews was forced to leave the port of Cádiz in the year 1492.”

  “Where did your family sail?”

  “Not many countries would accept our detestable race in those days. Some went to the Levant, quite a few started a colony in Salonika, which began to thrive. My own ancestors chose Holland. We lived there peacefully for more than a century until Oliver Cromwell once again allowed Jews to settle in the British Isles. Then a great-great-grandfather decided things might be more favorable in the city of London—and here we are, the ancient family of the Aguilars. Not a pretty story, is it.”

  As Althea turned her attention to his grandfather’s mellifluous voice, her expression as fascinated as if she understood every word, Simon felt a curious release.

  Despite having regaled her with his family’s greed and ambition, he felt no scorn from her. Instead, there was a bond of understanding.

  That night Althea went to sleep with much on her mind. Rebecca went to bed tired but happy, talking of her cousins
and her puppet show.

  Around midnight Althea was awakened from a dream about leaving Spain in a big ship, while the cries of a little girl left on land reached her on the deck. She awoke to realize it was Rebecca crying.

  Through the haze of a deep sleep, Althea pushed aside her warm covers and faced the cold air. Reaching for her wrapper and shawl and pushing her feet into her slippers, she gradually became fully awake. She stumbled toward the doorway, her heart constricted as always by the girl’s cries.

  Seconds later she was by Rebecca’s bedside, turning up her lamp. She smoothed the girl’s hair from her forehead.

  “Althea, I feel so much pain. My belly hurts.” Rebecca doubled over.

  “Maybe the food was too rich. Let me go down and make you some tea.”

  “No! Don’t go away. Don’t leave me alone.” Rebecca began to cry and reached for Althea’s hand.

  “I won’t leave you. Here, let me rub your belly.” Softly Althea began to croon in her ear as she rubbed her hand against the little girl’s stomach.

  After a few minutes of tranquility, Rebecca doubled over again. “Oh, it hurts.”

  Althea retrieved the chamber pot and held it by the bed. “You’ll feel better if everything comes out.”

  The girl continued to whimper in pain, Althea patting her back as she held her over the pot. Finally she heaved and threw up her dinner. Althea brought a wet washcloth and glass of water to her and helped her erase all the traces. “Now, let me dispose of this, and get you some chamomile for a cup of tea. I shall be right back.”

  “I don’t want to be alone.”

  Althea was in a dilemma. “Do you want me to call your papa?”

  “Oh, yes, please call Abba.”

  Althea stirred up the embers and added some coal. Then she filled up the teakettle she kept on the hob. “There,” she said, brushing off her hands, “I’ll leave that heating while I go down a minute.”

  “Is Abba coming?”

  “Yes, let me just get him.”

  Althea went out into the corridor, realizing she was not sure which room was Simon’s. She looked at the door directly across the hall, deciding he would most likely be as close to his daughter as possible. She rapped lightly on the door. A second later she tried again, this time a little harder.

  “Yes? What is it?” came the muffled reply.

  “It is I, Althea, Mr. Aguilar. It’s Rebecca—”

  Simon was already opening the door. “What is it, what’s wrong with her?” His hair was tousled, his eyes sleep-filled as he tied the belt to his dressing gown.

  “I’m so sorry to disturb you. Rebecca had an upset stomach. She’s better now, I believe, but wants you. I need to go downstairs to get her some tea.”

  “Of course,” he said as he rubbed the sleep from his face. “I’ll stay with her. You go down.”

  When she returned, she found Simon had parted the curtains on the far side of the bed and now sat on its edge, singing softly to his daughter. It sounded like one of the haunting melodies his sisters had sung earlier in the evening.

  Althea went about making the tea. When she finally turned toward the bed with a tray in her hands, she could see that Rebecca had fallen asleep. “I don’t think she’ll be needing this,” Althea whispered as she placed the tray on the bedside table. “I fixed you a mug, as well. I didn’t mean to get you up from your bed.”

  “As long as you drink the other cup,” he said, taking the cup from her.

  Althea sat on the chair beside Rebecca’s bed. The two sipped in silence.

  “You said she threw up her meal?”

  “Yes. Maybe she had too much excitement this afternoon.”

  “Undoubtedly. She is no longer accustomed to her boisterous cousins.”

  “But she was enjoying herself so much.” After a moment, Althea added, “At least we didn’t have to give her more laudanum. She seemed to feel better right away. I’m sorry I woke you—it was just that she didn’t want to be left alone.”

  “Call me whenever she needs me.”

  The two were silent after that. Althea mused that many were the sickbeds she’d sat at over the past few years, but she’d never quite imagined the scene she found herself in at the present. A little girl, her wealthy Jewish father, in an area of London she never imagined she’d live in again.

  She swallowed a sip of tea, then held the hot mug in her lap, wrapped in both hands. “I woke from a dream that I was leaving Cádiz on that last ship in 1492. A little girl’s cries turned out to be Rebecca’s.”

  Simon chuckled. “My stories made an impression on you. Did they dispel or merely confirm your opinion of my people?”

  She shook her head in the dark. “I knew little about your people, and I admit what little I knew was mostly hearsay. Well, not quite all. I have met some Jewish moneylenders firsthand in Whitechapel, and their conduct is not flattering to your race.”

  “I can well imagine.” He took a sip of tea. “I hope you understand that their predominance in the moneylending field has little to do with choice. They have been denied entry into most professions in Christian Europe since the Middle Ages.”

  “I begin to better understand that. I also know there is greed and avarice in every culture. It is not limited to the few Jews I have seen in the East End.”

  Rebecca mumbled, and Althea leaned forward. But the girl resumed her quiet sleep.

  This time Simon broke the stillness. “Now that I have given you an outline of my family’s history, as well as my own infamous journey into Parliament, why don’t you give me a little of Miss Breton’s history? Why she is here, nursing a sick child, instead of being in the thick of a London Season.”

  His question paralleled her own train of thought of a moment ago. She smiled in the dim light.

  Before she could formulate a reply, he said, “Your brother didn’t speak of your past, he only spoke your marvels. I received the impression you’d practically resurrected him from the dead.”

  “The Lord brought my brother back from near death. When he returned from the West Indies, he had a recurring fever. It nearly killed him.”

  “He said you were the only one able to nurse him back.”

  She smiled slightly. “The Lord sent me to him.” She paused. “I—I had been estranged from my family for some years on account of my faith. But I felt a tugging to go to him, felt that he needed me at that time. It turned out that he was very ill.” She took a careful sip of her tea. “The Lord led Tertius out of the darkness into the light. His healing was an added blessing.”

  Simon made no comment. After a moment he brought the conversation back to his original question. “So, why aren’t you enjoying the London Season instead of sitting here in obscurity, little better than a low-paid menial servant?”

  She looked down into her tea. “I have had my share of London Seasons.”

  “Oh? You don’t look old enough to have already reached a point of satiety with all that society offers.”

  “I am twenty-six, long past the age of London Seasons.”

  “Then, why are you not enjoying the role of young matron among the ton?”

  “As your father said, married and producing an heir?”

  “I apologize for my father’s ill-timed and ill-judged remark. Women have a narrowly defined position in our culture.”

  “As they do in fashionable society. In any case, you don’t have to apologize for your father. He merely spoke his mind.”

  “As I will mine—why aren’t you married with an heir or two? Though I still maintain you are not so old as to be completely on the shelf.”

  “Oh, quite on the shelf by society’s standards.” She rubbed the rim of her cup with her fingertip, wondering whether to proceed. Something about the night and the hour gave her the courage to speak. “Well, to be perfectly honest, I had only one offer during my two London Seasons.”

  “Oh, come, Miss Breton, that I don’t believe. I know how these things work. Marriage is arranged by title
and portion, both of which you had. It is not so very different among my people. My marriage was arranged from the time I underwent my Bar Mitzvah.”

  “You were promised to your wife when you were thirteen?” she asked in wonder.

  “Oh, yes. My father and Hannah’s father saw it as a mutually profitable alliance. Her family was in iron and steel, ours in cotton mills and finance. We were in the middle of the war. We quadrupled our fortune between orders for armaments and uniforms for soldiers and loans to the Crown.”

  “I see.” Although she knew well how marriages were arranged, it sounded so cold-blooded, pairing a wedding with a war.

  “So you can’t convince me you had only one offer, Miss Breton. I know your world doesn’t operate so very differently from mine. And that is aside from the obvious considerations—an attractive, personable young lady of good birth.”

  Attractive, personable—was that how he saw her? “You are correct when you say our worlds are not so very different. Where you miscalculate is the part about my good birth. You forget I was Lord Caulfield’s illegitimate daughter.”

  “But Tertius made it very clear you are his sister. If your father brought you up in his home, he must have acknowledged you fully.”

  “No.” She hesitated, looking down at her mug. If his entry into Parliament was ignoble, it was no less so than her own history. “You see, when I was brought to live in the marquess’s household at the age of two, I was acknowledged only as Lord Caulfield’s ward. No one, except Lord Caulfield himself, knew my origins. To Lady Caulfield and her two sons, Edmund, the eldest, and Tertius, and to the vast troop of servants and retainers at Pembroke Park, I was Lord Caulfield’s ward. I grew up believing I was the orphan child of his good friends across the Channel who had died in the Terror of ’Ninety-three.”

  “And what was the truth?”

  “What I have told you.” She took a sip of the now lukewarm tea. “I was the result of Lord Caulfield’s indiscretion with a chorus member of the French opera.”

  “Ah!”

  She smiled at his shadowy figure across the bed. “You see?”