Strathmere's Bride

by Jacqueline Navin

  Sometime later, he realized how foolish he had been to think it would be so easy. Miss Chloe and the two girls marched across the front lawn, Miss Chloe calling out commands as the children highstepped in time. The last thing he heard was her exclaiming something about a herd of elephants ahead of them, and the trio went screaming down the hill and disappeared.

  Presumably, he thought wearily, to the duck pond.

  In the garden that night, the air was wonderfully cool. Jareth liked it thus. He had removed his jacket and turned up his shirtsleeves clear to his elbows.

  This garden, this place that had been his nightly refuge as a child and now as a man, brought him the peace of mind he needed so badly.

  He fiddled with the calibrations of the large telescope he had dragged out with him. In his youth, when the desire to study star patterns began to become an obsession, he would spend many a night out here, gazing upward and marveling at this particularly magnificent wonder of creation.

  Adjusting the angle of the delicate instrument, Jareth bent over and peered in the lens.

  A shadow crossed the verdant path, blocking the moonlight.

  “Good evening.”

  The voice was so unexpected he started, straightening to face this intruder. Chloe smiled at him. He was surprised to note it was a warm smile, full of genuine greeting. A fleeting thought passed through his mind that not even his own mother looked happy to see him anymore. Her features were always strained in lines of concern, and she seemed, whenever in his company, more relieved that he was finally present to air her assorted worries than pleased to be sharing his company.

  “Hello, Miss Chloe.”

  “What are you doing?” Without waiting for his answer, she sidled around to stand beside him, her eyes never leaving the strange contraption he had set up before him. “What is this?” she asked in wonder. She touched a black knob.

  “Please,” he said, taking her slim fingers in his and guiding them away. He was surprised she didn’t snatch her hand back, at least not right away. Her skin was cool, the contact pleasant. Then he remembered how unseemly it was to have skin-on-skin contact with any woman. He was not, nor was she, wearing any gloves.

  He released his grip.

  Her heavily lashed lids slid over her eyes and she glanced away. “I am sorry, I am intruding. I shall leave you,” she said, and had already turned to go when Jareth heard somebody say, “Wait.”

  It was a heartbeat or two before he realized he had been the one to speak.

  She looked at him and blinked those wide, stormyblue eyes at him. “Yes?”

  He held out a hand to her in invitation. “I did not mean to frighten you away.”

  Ah, she was predictable. Her chin came up and she said, “I am not frightened.”

  In a conciliatory tone, he said, “Come and take a look.”

  She hesitated a moment—perhaps she was a little frightened—before coming to stand before him. “Your grace?”

  In the moonlight the gray-blue of her eyes gleamed pale. They were wide with genuine interest and a touch of apprehension.

  Pointing to the viewing lens, he said, “Look through there.”

  She struggled to focus through the awkward angle. “What is that?” she asked.

  “What does it look like to you?”

  “A dragon,” she replied.

  Puzzled, he said, “What?” She straightened, and he stepped up to have a look for himself.

  “How do you see a dragon? That is Piscis Austrinus. The heavens do have a dragon, but Draco is farther north, on the other side of Polaris.”

  Turning, he was just in time to catch her shrug. “You asked me what I see. I only can say what it looks like to me. A dragon.”

  He let out a sigh. “You do see the strangest things, don’t you, Miss Chloe?”

  Her smile was brilliant. “Merci beaucoup!”

  Shaking his head, he chuckled. “And you always mystify me.”

  “It is good not to be predictable, oui? Surprise makes life fun. But too much, it can disturb. We need to know the same things are always there for us. To depend on. Otherwise we grow anxious and our moods grow poor.”

  “This is a side of you I never thought to see. You are quite the philosopher.”

  “Do you think so, your grace? They are just my thoughts, you see.” She shot him a mischievous glance. “I do have thoughts.”

  “I never doubted it. It is just that they rarely agree with my own.”

  “Ah,” she said, nodding wisely. “It is true. But which one of us is in the right? Is it always you? Is it always me? I think neither, though we are both too stubborn to admit any such thing.”

  “Why, you amaze me again.”

  “And another wonder to speak of is the fact that we have something in common, eh? You come to the garden to enjoy the night.” She swept her arm skyward like any prima ballerina. “And I, to walk the garden paths. It is where I gather thoughts.”

  “So this is where you get all those ridiculous ideas.”

  A wry smile and the slightest of giggles were his reward. “Among other sources.”

  She tilted her head back to view with her naked eye what his telescope had just given her a glimpse of. “Without the tube it just looks like a blur of light. I think I like it better like this. It leaves more to the imagination, n’est-ce pas? One looks at the stars and sees the patterns and dreams of heroes and deeds of magic and bravery and perilous quests, of fortunes and wars and all other manner of glories to be won.”

  Jareth angled a glance above him. The majesty of the clear night had always inspired him, and Miss Chloe’s poetic statement caught fire to the tendrils of his imagination, filling him with heady vision. “It is a fabulous stage, upon which countless dramas are played,” he agreed.

  “See, there.” Chloe pointed excitedly. “Does that not look like a snake?”

  “That is Lacerta.”

  “It does not matter what some ancient man named it or what tradition holds it to be, but what your imagination can conjure. I see a snake.”

  “Do you always disapprove of tradition?”

  “No,” she answered, squinting at the sky. “Do you always adhere to it?”

  “No.” Looking upward, he was disturbed to note that the pattern of stars she had indicated did indeed appear to resemble a snake.

  “And there,” she cried, pointing in the direction of Pegasus, “it is a woman leaning over as if working in a garden.”

  “Impossible. I see no such thing.”

  “Yes, there. The form of her hunched over, the drape of her skirt.”

  Jareth angled a look at her skeptically. “You are making this up.”

  “Non”! It is true. It is a story, you see. The woman is working in the garden. She is a poor woman, scratching out a meager life from the earth.”

  Jareth looked up at the heavens, his features full of doubt.

  Chloe continued, “Her young man is gone, and she is grieving her loss.”

  “How can you tell that from the stars?” he demanded. “I don’t even see the woman and you can see all that?”

  “Bien sûr,” she exclaimed. “Do you not see her tears?”

  “This is ridiculous,” Jareth murmured.

  “And so the snake comes upon her and bites her in her foot and she dies.”

  “How utterly morbid.”

  “No, it is romantic!”

  “You call that romantic?”

  “Have you never read the great tragic loves—Arthur and Guinevere, Tristan and Isolde?”

  “Horrible stories. But they do teach a good lesson. Guinevere betrayed Arthur, and so she was condemned to death. Likewise, Tristan—”

  “Non, non, et non. Guinevere was saved from the fire by Lancelot”

  “Ah, yes, now I remember. But didn’t she go to a convent and pine the rest of her days for her fatal error in judgment?”

  Chloe crossed her arms over her chest and shook her head stubbornly. “No, again. They lived happily.”
She steadied her gaze at him meaningfully. “In France.”

  “Miss Chloe, you contradict yourself. At one moment you are arguing the attraction of doomed lovers, and the next you are saying that they didn’t really find disaster in the end.”

  She shrugged a bit sullenly, completely unconcerned that she wasn’t making any sense. “Sometimes the whole romance is the ill-fated aspect. Like Romeo and Juliet.”

  “Italians are rash and hotheaded.”

  “It teaches a moral,” she corrected patiently. “That to judge another because of their name, or nationality, or social rank, is wrong. Did you never read Capulet’s speech at the end?”

  “Kindly explain the moral of your tale of the weeping lady. No, no. Allow me. Never garden without proper shoes.”

  Chloe laughed, a loud, gusty, infectious laugh that spread out over the night, a sweet and utterly tangible thing. He smiled. She looked so radiant, her head thrown back, her straight white teeth flashing in the moonlight, and that wide, full-lipped smile stretching her mouth in a way that was captivating.

  He laughed, too. He hadn’t meant the comment to be comical. He had—he was not proud to admit in retrospect—intended to be a bit snide, but it really was funny.

  “Eh, bien, monsieur. I believe we shall leave the mythmaking to Homer and his friends.”

  “It would be a relief, I assure you.”

  “You did not like my story?” Her mouth puffed into a delectable little moue.

  Jareth felt a tightening low in his gut at the sight of it. “Mademoiselle, you have too much imagination. It is pickling your brain.”

  “Yes, yes, it is true.” She reached out and touched her fingers to the telescope in a gentle sweep that was almost erotic, more so for its casual innocence. “But you are not so lacking in it yourself as you would wish others to believe, I think.”

  He pretended to be offended. “I’ll have you know that astronomy is a science.”

  “Science and art, sometimes they are the same.” She turned, then hesitated, twisting her head so that perfectly pointed chin was directly over a slim shoulder. “And any scientist worth anything is a dreamer. If not so, we would make no progress. How is one to have vision if one cannot dream?”

  He didn’t answer. She smiled at him and went on her way, leaving him to ponder that thought.

  In the silence, he stared at the telescope. He angled a doubtful eye at the heavens and squinted. Did she really see a woman with the soft folds of her skirt outlined in stars?

  After ten minutes, he gave up, reasoning that the little minx had made up the whole thing to devil him. But when he hoisted the telescope onto his shoulder and carried it back into the house, he was still chuckling.

  Chapter Seven

  “So what did your papa say?” Mary asked.

  “Hmm?” Chloe was watching the clouds, her mind lost in other matters. Namely, that it was Thursday, and an outing with the children had not been “approved.” She thought that perhaps she was being a bit absurd to worry so. Surely, the duke wouldn’t mind them stepping into the small walled yard off the kitchen—he himself had suggested it once as a play area.

  Except he had also said that Thursday they were to remain indoors. It had been his expressly stated wish.

  Command.

  She tossed the thought off with a flick of her hair. “Papa? Oh, his letter, oui. He has a new love, I think. He is letting me know little by little to see if I object.”

  “Do you? Who is it?”

  “A widow who lives in our village. I like her, and I want Papa to have someone to love.” She paused, considering this. “Non. He will never love like he did Mama. That was a beautiful love, the kind that comes only once in a life.”

  “My mother and da fight every day. But still, I think they love each other,” Mary said. “What was it like to have parents who were so happy all the time?”

  Chloe looked surprised. “I didn’t say they were happy all the time. I know they were not always in agreement. When they fought, there were large arguments with yelling and stomping and banging, but afterward there were hugs and tears and kisses and so much joy. They loved each other, and so when they were unhappy, they found their way back together.”

  “Oh,” Mary said with a protracted sigh. “So beautiful. Do you think…?” Her question trailed off as her hands wrung the starched apron on her lap.

  She didn’t say it, but Chloe knew what she was about to ask. She had asked herself the same question countless times. Is such a love possible for me?

  It was what every girl asked herself, yearned for, hoped for. Papa told her there would be such a love for her. Someday. He told her to wait and listen to her heart, and she would know it when it came. Of course, he had been dismally inept at describing “it.” He said it was peaceful and restless and hungry and completely satisfying all at the same time. Then he had colored a deep, ruddy red and pressed his lips together, patting her hand and refusing to say more.

  Similarly, the conversation with Mary dwindled into silence. After a while, Mary said, “I completely forgot! I heard something very interesting the other day. About the duke.”

  Chloe clamped an iron will over the instinctive reaction of rabid interest. “The duke?”

  As if cued by the confidential tones of the adults’ voices, Rebeccah’s head came up. She and Sarah were digging in a dirt pit. They had constructed a fairly decent tower and were working on its twin. Sarah’s little tongue jutted out from between her lips as she concentrated on piling up shovelfuls of earth, but Rebeccah looked like a rabbit who sensed a hunter nearby—alert and all ears.

  “Come,” Chloe said, tugging Mary toward the hedgerow bordering the kitchen garden, where they would not be heard.

  Mary cast a worried glance behind them at the two children covered in filth. “Aren’t you concerned the duke will be angry when he sees them like that?”

  “The duke and his mother are visiting friends. We have hours before they are due to return.” Waving her hand airily in the air, Chloe spoke with confidence. “The children shall have their baths and be safe in the nursery before the carriage even turns up the drive. Now, tell me what is your huge secret?”

  Mary darted a glance at the children. Rebeccah had gone back to her digging. “It is wrong to gossip, I know.”

  “Gossip? We never gossip.”

  Mary was vexed. “But I should not carry tales.”

  “Well, is it unkind?”

  Mary thought for a moment. “Not at all.”

  “Good, then it is not gossip. So, tell me.”

  This satisfied Mary, who sat forward eagerly. “I was talking to one of the grooms and he said old Jarvis was once head groom and he knew the duke and his brother from when they were boys. He was telling him—my friend, that is—that he remembers the duke as a delightful lad, and everyone loved him.”

  Chloe scowled. “Why is that such a huge secret? The duke was once human. Surprising, oui, but hardly something to shock.”

  Mary shook her head. “No, no. That is not the amazing thing. Jarvis said that once the duke—the old duke, Charles, that is, the elder brother—well, they were out on the lake in a boat and the boat capsized and Master Jareth—the duke, the new duke, I mean—”

  “I know who you mean! Now, what happened?”

  “Master Jareth saved his brother and Jarvis came upon them on the bank, sopping wet and bawling like a pair of babes, and Charles—the duke—was saying how he wished Master Jareth hadn’t done it. He kept saying, ‘Why didn’t you just let me drown? I hate it.’”

  Chloe’s eyes opened as wide as they could go. “Why was he saying that?”

  “Jarvis told my…the groom that Charles hated being duke. His mother always kept him inside, studying his lessons and talking with the solicitors, and he and Master Jareth, they loved to be outdoors. Master Jareth—I mean the duke—was even allowed to play with the village children on occasion, though no one ever forgot who he was for a moment. The two brothers were as close
as two boys ever could be. They looked out for one another, but it was the younger son protecting the elder. The more experienced brother sheltering the poor young duke, who was put on such a tight rein.”

  The words were true, Chloe recognized that in an instant. The something unnamable she had known about Jareth Hunt, Duke of Strathmere, was the boy he had been, still inside him somewhere, staring out of those large, soulful eyes with all the sadness of the world. The boy who had frolicked with village children and saved a brother who would, at that time, rather have died because the burden of being duke was too unbearable.

  Poor Charles, to feel such despair so young. “How horrifying he wished to die,” Chloe said, surprised to find tears of sympathy for the youth she had known as a man. Charles had been a good husband to her cousin, a good father, a good son and a good duke. He had seemed, all the times that she had seen him, as if it were all part of his nature, as easy as breathing, to wield the power and serve the obligation that came with his station. Who would have guessed at what cost such competence had been gained?

  “Jarvis told us…that is, told the groom who told me—”

  “Wait one moment, Mary,” Chloe said with a delicate lift of her brows. “Why do you seem determined to hide from me that you have a man?”

  Mary stared back, horrified. “I…” Her shoulders sagged. “You won’t tell, will you?”

  “Of course I shall not if you forbid it, but I cannot understand why you should wish to keep it a secret.”

  Mary wrung her work-roughened hands as she fretted. “The duke saw us, you see, down by the stables. That is how Jarvis came to tell us the tale. You see, my man, Danıel, he was one of the village boys who used to play with his grace, and we got to talking about him after he…well, he saw us.”

  “He saw you?” Chloe repeated. “Saw you what? What were you doing?” Horrified at the possibilities, she held her breath.

  “It was a stupid thing to do. I don’t know what got into us, but we were…well, we were very…um, close. Do you know what I mean?” Her color deepened to an alarming crimson. “We were…kissing.”