Tapestry

by Fiona McIntosh

  ‘Only what everyone knows … that he and his fellow rebels, including your husband, will shortly be put on trial.’ He looked down. ‘I’m sorry for you. I don’t see a happy outcome for my friend or your husband.’

  ‘Don’t say that,’ she begged in a whisper.

  ‘Forgive me,’ he murmured again. ‘I am out of practice at attending to the sensitivities of a gentlewoman.’

  She wanted to laugh. If only he knew. ‘Oh, I think you have been highly sensitive to my situation, and most generous.’

  ‘Because I killed a man for you?’

  She stared at him, shocked, then realised this was wit. ‘Good gracious, Lord Sackville, you made a jest. I admit I was not ready for it.’

  He nodded ruefully. ‘Something else I am out of practice with.’

  She didn’t deny his statement this time, but when he raised a sad expression to meet hers she felt a warmth prickle through her, beginning as low as her lap, where her hands now fidgeted. The heat rose, infusing her, until she was sure she blushed. She hoped that in the flickering, shadowy lamplight of the inn he would not notice, and then realised she was holding her breath. She let it out with an exaggerated sigh. ‘There is still such a long journey ahead.’

  ‘I shall see you safely to London. I give you my word.’

  ‘Julius … er, may I call you Julius?’

  ‘I want you to,’ he said, staring intently at her, and the way he said it made Jane momentarily lose her train of thought.

  ‘Er … thank you,’ she said, hardly daring to look at him. ‘I was going to say that it is not my intention to make you feel in any way responsible for our safety. You have already been a more than generous friend to us both.’

  He continued studying her until his nearness and their silence became unnerving. Just when she felt obliged to say something more, he spoke.

  ‘Friend. I like the way you said that. Thank you.’

  She frowned and gave a small shrug. ‘I just do not want you to feel obliged to help us further.’

  ‘I can assure you, obligation has nothing to do with it.’ He surprised her by standing, surprised her further by taking her hand and, for the first time in her life, Jane watched a ridiculously handsome man elegantly kiss her hand. Except it wasn’t her hand; it was Winifred’s soft, pale skin that Sackville’s eminently kissable lips were gently pressed upon. She watched the scene unfold as if she were outside it, yet felt his warm lips touch the flesh she inhabited. It was weird, it was disarming and if she were honest with herself, it was exciting.

  That last one was hard to admit, but Jane could no longer ignore the fact that Julius Sackville affected her in ways she couldn’t understand right now. That warmth, for instance, which made her feel anxious as he now straightened and prepared to leave her company. She didn’t want him to leave, because she found him compelling; but she wanted him to be gone, sensing a sudden new complication rising on the horizon of what was already a complex situation.

  ‘Good evening, Jane,’ he said politely. ‘I do hope you sleep soundly after your eventful day.’

  She felt a fresh frisson thrill through her at the lingering touch of his knowing gaze, and at the sound of his voice speaking her real name with such intensity.

  ‘Good evening,’ she managed to stammer out, still not meeting his eye.

  ‘We leave tomorrow at dawn.’

  ‘Thank you. Cecilia and I shall be ready,’ Jane said, finally raising her gaze, but Sackville had turned and Cecilia was approaching, smiling at him as he passed and nodded to her.

  ‘A hot bath, a warmed bed and a honey posset will do you a power of good, Win, I’m sure. And I must mend your frock.’

  Jane allowed herself to be led to the chamber that she was sharing with Cecilia and permitted her friend to undress her, feeling a sense of release as layers were stripped away and then the comforting embrace of warm, sudsy water as she clambered into the copper tub.

  She told herself she was experiencing conflicted feelings because she was frightened, confused and completely removed from everything familiar. But now she almost wished that Julius Sackville had not been honourable enough to come back for them. She felt embarrassed by her hyper-awareness of him. For instance, why had she noticed his complexion, devoid of the smallpox scars that even Cecilia possessed? Why had she noticed the way he’d threaded the horse’s reins through his gloved fingers? She could see them now: long, blunt-ended, with perfect half-moons on well-kept nails. Why did she struggle to meet his intelligent eyes, while her gaze focused on his neatly shaped lips and the tiny silver scar at one side of his mouth?

  How did he get that scar? How did his wife die? It suddenly seemed important to know.

  Her thoughts fled to Will, and she wished she had a photo she could look at. She didn’t want to lose the memory of his smiling face, his lean, hard body, his smell, his touch. Will suddenly seemed a long way away and she was struggling to see his features in detail the way she could construct Sackville’s.

  She closed her eyes against the tears that inevitably stung the inside of her lids, and she cast a prayer for Will to hang on, and for Julius Sackville to ignore her tomorrow.

  TWENTY

  The Black Swan Inn where they’d overnighted was a twin-gabled, two-storey structure with a jettied upper floor, and overlooked a water meadow. It had been owned by a merchant, the innkeeper’s wife explained, but was now a meeting point for stagecoaches between London and York. Cecilia had discovered from the staff who had delivered the tub and hot water that the inn was haunted; they intimated that the women should not be overly alarmed to see a man’s pair of legs descending the staircase.

  Perhaps that was why Jane had dreamed that night of dismembered arms floating around Ayers Rock, carrying the head of the Earl of Nithsdale. She woke with a start to the sound of a distant cockerel heralding the pre-dawn. Cecilia stirred next to her, mumbling that the coach was leaving at five, not six, and that they must rise immediately. Dressing swiftly, still yawning, Jane realised she had little appetite, but was feeling brighter than she had in days. The bath the previous evening had certainly eased her aching hips and, strange dreams aside, she had slept deeply from the effects of the brandy-slugged posset.

  Now, with her precious few belongings stowed above, Jane was being introduced to the discomfort of riding in one of the earliest forms of public transport: a stagecoach which she shared with seven others. If she had been asked at this moment whether she would consider swapping the carriage for a horse, she might have said yes, for Mr Bailey, the old man sitting diagonally opposite her, possessed fetid breath that managed to cross the divide and almost make her wish to tear open the window and let the wintry air in. His long, unfashionably curled wig was powdered so heavily that in the right light she could see its dust floating through the space his breath was fouling. His wife, meanwhile, fussed constantly over her husband, the tiny yapping dog on her lap, her cloth bag and her equally unfashionable hair, which was combed to stiff attention, standing high above her forehead. What was more, they were both overly curious about the two women and their male companion, and Jane suspected the wife was a gossip.

  Cecilia, next to her, appeared more adept than Jane at the art of pointless discussion, so Jane feigned a headache and let the dull chatter twitter back and forth between them. Mr Bailey did his best to engage Julius, seated next to him, in the vapid conversation, but Sackville was blunt, repeatedly claiming he had no opinion on anything they were discussing, whether it was the King’s determination not to converse in English, or whether his mistresses — unkindly nicknamed ‘the Elephant’ and ‘the Maypole’ — should be tolerated, or how the rift between the King and his heir, George, Prince of Wales, might affect the throne’s future.

  While Jane refused to show any engagement with the conversation, she was vaguely intrigued by talk of the King. But she noticed that Sackville turned to stare gloomily out of the window as the snow-covered scenery passed by too slowly for both of them. After several h
ours of having Sackville ignore her as studiously as he did their fellow passengers, she felt reassured that the apparent intimacy of yesterday had been in her imagination. That relief, however, came with a twinge of private regret, which she pretended didn’t exist.

  There were two other passengers in the coach: Charles Leadbetter, a middle-aged gentleman, and his young niece, Eugenie, who played with her doll and hummed songs to it. Her uncle took snuff and, after a series of explosive sneezes, returned to reading a battered book — although how he managed to read as they bumped and bruised themselves along the road Jane could not understand.

  The smell in the carriage soon became cloying from Mrs Bailey’s overly sweet perfume, which was sharply at odds with her husband’s sour breath, wig powder, leather, infrequently washed clothes and rank personal odour.

  Jane had achieved a cramp in one leg from having it pinioned in the same confined position for several hours and her teeth were being juddered against each other because the journey on wooden wheels without any suspension smashed into every pothole on this notorious stretch of highway between England’s north-east and the capital.

  When Jane finally looked around the carriage, after hours of watching rural terrain blanketed by an endless carpet of snow, everyone else appeared to have fallen into a doze, including Mrs Bailey’s dog. She could hear the crack of the coachman’s whip above and his muffled curse, now and then, at the horses as he coaxed them through the thick snow drifts. The only other noticeable sound was Mr Bailey’s snores. Sleep evaded Jane, but the relative silence and her sudden solitude did provide the chance for her treacherous gaze to slide toward the one person in the carriage she was keen to surreptitiously study.

  Julius was beautiful in a way that men could be without appearing in any way effeminate. His proportions were perfect — from the length of the legs to the breadth of those shoulders contained beneath the dark frock coat he wore today. He was again without adornment. There was no jewellery, no wig, no frills. His hair was once more neatly secured into a queue with a small black ribbon. Winifred’s memories told her that William Maxwell detested wigs too, but Julius seemed to lurk at the furthest edges of what was acceptable. His hat was in his lap, loosely held by those hands whose warmth and pressure she could still feel beneath the leather of her boots. The disloyal warmth pricked again, low in her belly, and she flicked her gaze from Sackville’s lap to his dark lashes, and thought about the disarming gaze of the dark eyes hidden beneath them. She recalled their previous evening’s conversation and his poignant admission about his dead wife. Jane began to imagine what she might have been like. She no doubt came from a highborn family, and was accomplished in all the same arts as Winifred, the perfect partner for a wealthy landowner. Jane could see the woman in her mind’s eye: ringlets of blonde hair, silk ribbons, milky complexion and dewy eyes, with a soft giggle and an even softer body that yielded beneath his hard —

  ‘Uncle, if we are stopped by highwaymen, do you think they will take my dolly?’ the little girl to her left suddenly blurted out, and everyone stirred.

  Sackville’s eyes opened, his gaze already focused on Jane, but she’d jerked her glance away to the child in time not to be caught staring … and yet she couldn’t shake the suspicion that he could eavesdrop on her thoughts and knew why she blushed. Why was she thinking like this? We come from separate worlds, she assured herself, trying to allay her guilt.

  The uncle looked alarmed at his niece’s sudden enquiry, but tried to disguise his reaction with another pinch of snuff. Its fragrance lent a welcome scent to the air even if the explosive sneeze that ultimately erupted did not. ‘Er, no, my dear,’ he said, dragging a large handkerchief to his nose. ‘Do not trouble your pretty head with this matter.’

  Mr Bailey, awake and straightening his gargantuan grey wig, gave a scornful grunt. ‘The coachmen are armed with flintlocks anyway,’ he rumbled.

  ‘Bandits tend not to rob travellers headed south. The more organised thieves move fast on horseback, usually in pairs, and prefer to dip their hands into the wealthy pockets of hapless travellers headed north out of the capital.’ It was the first words that Julius had spoken in nearly four hours of bruising travel. And he immediately looked away from his fellow passengers, although his gaze brushed briefly over Jane.

  ‘That’s a very agreeable snuff, sir,’ Cecilia said in her easy, conversing way, clearly anxious to get off the subject of highway robbers and opportunists.

  ‘Spanish. The best,’ the uncle replied, replacing the small tin in his waistcoat pocket.

  ‘Cinnamon,’ Jane observed, airing her thought aloud, even though she hadn’t meant to; she’d been searching for the name of the ingredient that was spicing the air so pleasantly.

  ‘Yes, indeed, Miss Granger. Bravo! I have my tobacco sent from a snuffmaker in Seville.’

  ‘I prefer the German snuff,’ Bailey said, entering the conversation. ‘What about you, sir?’ he said, giving Sackville a dig in the ribs. ‘If you were to side with the wretched French, then we could while away the boredom with a debate on the merits of each, what?’

  ‘I don’t partake of snuff, Mr Bailey. It ruins the sense of smell … mayhap you hadn’t noticed,’ he said, his tone innocent, though the wry dig was unmistakable. He glanced again at Jane, who had to disguise her grin. Poor Julius. The smell of old Bailey must be intolerable at such close range.

  The next two days followed a similar pattern: hour after hour in the uncomfortable coach; overnighting at inns with lumpy beds and even lumpier food on offer. Jane and Cecilia continued to share a room to keep costs at a minimum. On the second night, unable to sleep and with her belly rumbling from lack of food because she had not been able to stomach the greasy pork on offer, Jane tiptoed from their chamber, pulling her cloak around her nightgown. She hoped she might steal into the kitchen and find a crust of bread, or perhaps a few cubes of hard cheese.

  She soon found both in the surprisingly silent kitchen, hacking off a modest hunk of cheese that she was sure would barely be noticed. She hurried into the main dining room, where the embers of the night’s fire still glowed and would doubtless be shortly coaxed back into life with fresh logs. She stood as close to the fire’s thin warmth as she could and blew on the dying embers, but no flame erupted as she’d hoped. She swallowed the morsels of bread and cheese, and urged herself to move away from the fire.

  As she turned to begin the draughty journey back upstairs, she saw someone move in the shadows. She gasped, missed her footing slightly and then righted herself, but not without a small stub to her big toe, which hurt like fury. She recognised the familiar figure in the meagre firelight. ‘Julius!’ she hissed, her exclamation intensified by the pain. ‘What are you doing brooding here in the dark?’

  ‘Exactly that, Miss Granger. Standing by the fireplace just like you. If I had announced myself I might have frightened you, and I did not wish that. I thought it best that when you moved, I should too.’ He looked dauntingly large in the dimness. He was still dressed, but the frock coat was gone, his shirt open to reveal a triangle of his chest. She felt her cheeks warm in the gloom, pleased that the light was low. ‘Again I find myself asking for your pardon,’ he continued.

  She cleared her throat. ‘You did startle me. There seem to be ghosts at every inn we pass through.’

  Jane sensed his smile, though she could not know for sure, as he was still couched in darkness.

  ‘You could not sleep?’

  She sighed. ‘No. Rest eludes me.’

  He loomed forward into the soft glow of the fire and she saw that his hair was untied, falling near his shoulders.

  ‘I never sleep easily,’ he admitted.

  ‘You seemed to slumber fairly well on the coach trip yesterday,’ she remarked dryly, meaning it lightly as a parting jest before she drifted back upstairs.

  ‘Did I? Then I was pretending,’ he said, and the look he gave her was unnerving. ‘And what were you thinking, Jane,’ he said, the use of her name maki
ng her flinch, ‘as you watched me feigning sleep?’

  ‘I … er, I wasn’t watching you. I simply noticed that you were dozing. I was pleased for you.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I wished I could switch off from the noises and smells of the others.’

  ‘You simply had to close your eyes and pretend.’

  ‘I am not so adept at pretending.’

  He said nothing, but regarded her with amusement.

  She wanted to stop the words, wished she could remain silent as others did when they felt cornered. ‘I was thinking of your wife, actually,’ she said — immediately regretting it, already knowing she had just opened a box that should have remained closed.

  ‘My wife?’ he said evenly. ‘But you did not know her to think on her.’

  Jane smiled, hoping she could rescue this awkwardness by saying something pleasant and polite and then quickly extricate herself. ‘I just imagined how she might be.’

  ‘And how did your imagination paint her?’

  Jane shrugged, pulling her cloak firmly around her. She glanced toward the door as an indication that her departure was imminent, but she could not be rude. ‘Um … well, let’s see. I imagined her to be statuesque, an accomplished musician, a fine dancer, clever with the needle and beautiful, of course, with a pale porcelain complexion. I saw her with cascading ringlets of golden hair and eyes like sapphire.’ There, she thought, that should speak to his ego.

  ‘She was nothing like that,’ he said in a leaden tone. ‘Your imagination has conjured up society’s image of the perfect woman — one I do not subscribe to, and the likes of which I am rarely attracted to. No, my wife was not statuesque. She was petite and raven-haired, with eyes that looked like wet shingle on the beach … sometimes dark as pitch, sometimes flinty grey. She was Venetian — you might even have described her as olive-skinned — but yes, she was beautiful to me. Exotic, mysterious … even dangerous at times.’ He shook his head as if in private thought. ‘That temper of hers …’ he murmured, then blinked, returning himself to the present. ‘She did not fit the mould of English society at all. She laughed at it, in fact. She did not sew or paint or make great music. She did not come from a grand Venetian household either. She was my translator when I was on a tour of Europe, fluent in several languages, but it was when she whispered to me in our bed in Italian that I loved her most of all.’ Jane felt her colour rising at his sharing of such intimacy, and for a heartbeat felt a prick of jealousy. ‘She made me laugh — a rare talent, as far as I am concerned. And she made me weep. I have neither laughed aloud nor cried since her death, for those two extremes belong to her; they are the parts of me she stole and took with her to the grave.’ Jane hardly dared to take a visible breath while he spoke so passionately.