“So you’ve given up on me?” Daniel asked, sliding down the stall wall near the mare’s head. She sniffed at his knee and tolerated a scratch to her forehead.
“I hate everything,” Matthias said with less drama, more misery. “I’m stupid and I wish I never had to study anything ever again. Papa says I’ll be the world’s oldest boot boy if I don’t join the N-Navy.”
“Do you want to join the Navy?”
For the first time, Matthias looked at Daniel. “You’d send me away?”
“Never. You are one of my scholars,” Daniel said, resisting the urge to hug the stuffing out of the poor child, “and you are a very bright boy. I simply haven’t found the best way to teach you yet. You should be upset with me, Matthias, not with yourself. You’re trying your very, very hardest, and that’s all God, your papa, or anybody can expect of you.”
Though sometimes a fellow’s best efforts and heartfelt dreams only resulted in a great, stinking muddle.
“I’m good at French,” Matthias said, stroking a hand over the mare’s coarse mane.
He was good at French recitation. “You have an excellent accent, better than any boy I’ve taught your age. You’ve also learned the royal succession more quickly than any other boy.”
“But I’m stupid. Papa says so.”
Always helpful, when a father had nothing but criticism for his son. “I say you’re not. Where are your glasses, Master Mattie?”
The use of the boy’s nickname provoked a brief lift at the corners of his lips, followed by a scowl.
“I lost them. They’re here somewhere, but I hate them too.”
“You’re a man of consistent opinions, then. I think our spectacles give us a scholarly air,” Daniel said, visually searching through the straw. When the child’s temper faded, he’d become hysterical if he couldn’t find his glasses.
“You hardly ever wear yours,” Matthias replied, brushing his hand through the straw near the mare’s knobby knees. “I’m to wear mine all the time.”
“I wear mine only when the lighting is low or my eyes are tired,” Daniel said.
“Because they make your head ache?” Matthias asked. He was on his hands and knees, systematically rifling the straw, while the mare, fortunately, lay contented as a dairy cow at her cud.
“Spectacles prevent my head from aching,” Daniel said, joining the search.
“My head hurts all the time,” Matthias muttered, working out another foot from the mare’s shoulder. “I wake up with a headache, I go to bed with a headache, and then I get a headache in my belly. That’s because I can’t stuff any more lessons in my head.”
Daniel grasped the spectacles beneath the straw. “Found ’em. What do you mean, your head aches all the time?”
Matthias sat back on his heels. “Papa says it’s because—”
“You’re stupid,” Daniel finished. “Your papa is wrong, Matthias, though if you tell him I said that, he’ll accuse me of disrespect and he’ll be right. Does your head hurt now?”
Matthias pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes. “Some. It’s worse if we’re doing lessons all day. I like cricket and riding, though.”
Cricket and riding—when he took his glasses off.
Insight came between one heartbeat and the next.
Daniel held up a hand. “Can you see my hand clearly?”
“Of course I can.”
He passed the boy the dratted, almighty, everlasting glasses and held out a hand again. “Put them on and tell me what you see.”
“I know it’s your hand, but it’s fuzzy,” Matthias said. “Not as fuzzy as the print on a book page, though.”
Well, of course. “Matthias, do you recall when we rode out and you were up on Buttercup?”
The boy patted the mare’s shoulder. “Yes! She was a very good girl too.”
The mare was a saint. “I accidentally kept your glasses until that Monday. Did your head hurt then?”
Matthias’s next pat to the mare’s shoulder was more thoughtful. “No, sir. I thought that meant I was making room for all the lessons in my head, but it didn’t last.”
Daniel plucked the glasses from the child’s nose, for apparently a moment of grace was to intrude on an otherwise hopeless day.
“Matthias Webber, listen to me. There’s nothing wrong with you. The glasses are the problem. You simply can’t see properly with them on.” So simple, and yet so troublesome. Why had Daniel not figured this out sooner? Why had nobody figured this out?
Whatever reaction Daniel expected to his words of absolution, a small, quivering chin wasn’t among them.
“I t-told Papa I didn’t want to wear his glasses, but he said I was ungrateful.”
And told the poor child he was stubborn, pigheaded, and disrespectful too, probably.
Daniel hugged the boy, a swift, tight, half-wrestled embrace followed with a shove to his small shoulder.
“You were right, Matthias, and your papa was mistaken. You can fit as many lessons in your head as any other boy, but you simply couldn’t see.”
Probably couldn’t see his own slate, much less the one at the front of the room that Daniel filled with learned scribblings every day.
“I don’t want to be stupid,” Matthias said, a tear trickling through the straw dust on his cheek. “I want to be a scholar, like the other fellows.”
The mare nuzzled Matthias’s hip, a reminder that the occasional pat or scratch was appreciated.
“You’ll be a fine scholar,” Daniel said, passing the boy a handkerchief Kirsten had embroidered with a pair of doves. “You simply could not see, Matthias. I’ll have a word with your father. You’re to rest this weekend, at least until your head stops hurting.”
Matthias clambered aboard the mare’s broad back and leaned down along her neck, which disturbed the horse not at all.
“You’ve done this before,” Daniel said, “paid a call on Lady Buttercup when your spirits were low.”
“You tell us to visit the stable when we’re not feeling quite the thing, and it works. Buttercup is ever so patient and strong. I visit Freya too.”
Daniel slipped the offending glasses into his breast pocket. “If you don’t mind, I’d like to bide here for a moment. Back to the house with you, and go in through the kitchen door.”
By way of Cook’s belief that biscuits and boys were meant to be together.
“May I attend tea with Lady Kirsten?” Matthias asked, balling up the handkerchief and stuffing it in a pocket.
Tea! Daniel had forgotten entirely about Kirsten’s obligation to the boys. “Yes, you may, but I’m keeping the glasses.”
Matthias slid off the horse and gave her a final pat. “You’ll talk to Papa, sir?”
“I’ll send him a note this evening and ask him to call on me when lessons are over on Friday.” Assuming Daniel still had his post by week’s end.
“That’s all right, then. Thank you, Vicar!”
Matthias pelted out the door, while Daniel remained sitting in the straw next to the mare, studying a pair of paternal spectacles that had nearly turned a smart boy blind, stupid, and hopeless.
* * *
The trays were in readiness—three of them, for six boys could impersonate a plague of locusts—and the teapots were full of a weak gunpowder blend, while Kirsten’s nerves would not arrange themselves in any order at all.
Daniel, her Daniel, the father of her child, was very likely still married.
“Looks very pretty, milady,” the housekeeper said. “You’ll make gentlemen of those boys yet.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Castle, but they already are gentlemen.” That was Daniel’s influence, for manners and decorum were only the outward trappings. The kindness and honesty of a true gentleman were best learned by example.
Ralph tapped on the open parlor door. “B
eg pardon, milady, Mrs. C. The scholars have come to call, if your ladyship is receiving?”
Why wouldn’t—? Oh. Because she’d stormed out of the schoolroom near tears and as upset as she could recall being. Because of Daniel’s dratted, scheming, perishing wife.
“I’m always happy to see our scholars, Ralph. By all means, send the children to me.”
The boys trooped in—hands scrubbed, hair neatly combed—and arranged themselves on the sofas and chairs. None of the usual jostling took place to sit closer to Kirsten, or to the tea cakes.
“Gentlemen, a pleasure to see you again.”
Glances were exchanged among the six boys, but they said nothing as Ralph withdrew.
“Matthias, where are your glasses?” Kirsten asked. He set great store by them and was seldom without them.
“Vicar says the glasses make it harder for me to see. We want to talk to you.”
An expensive, elegant pair of spectacles did not make it harder to see. The boy was confused. Kirsten held out the plate of tea cakes, then recalled she’d told the boys that sandwiches always came first.
Not a single boy reached for the sweets.
“Am I in trouble?” Of course Kirsten was in trouble, in the most vulgar sense and in ways she couldn’t even name. Daniel had needed her support and she’d run out on him.
“We think you have troubles,” Danny said, “but nobody will tell us what they are. Papa went to the stable to visit with Beelzebub. You should go visit your mare.”
“He’s right,” Digby said. “And try not to shout at Vicar, for he’s the best fellow, and he can’t shout back.”
“Because he’s the vicar,” Thomas added. “He mustn’t curse either, unless Beelzebub stands on his foot, which would be an accident, of course.”
“Maybe,” Frank said, nudging the tea cake tray a few inches toward his hostess, “you should apologize.”
“Or you could polish your boots,” Fred suggested.
“I was very upset when I raised my voice,” Kirsten said. “I’m still upset.” But how she loved these boys and their earnest care for her and Daniel.
Matthias passed her a handkerchief that looked quite familiar. A pair of doves cooed along one edge.
“Vicar’s still in the stable, Lady Kirsten. He doesn’t mind when we’re upset.”
Yes, he did. Daniel minded, he cared, he tried to help, and he was still married to that awful woman.
“You’re right,” Kirsten said, rising. “Mattie, if you’d pour out, and, Digby, you can be in charge of the sandwiches. Thomas, you pass the tray of cakes; Fred, you do the plates; and, Frank, you mind the silver and the linen. Danny, you’re in charge of leading the conversation, so try to think of things to talk about besides the weather.”
“We’ll talk about the Acts of Union,” Danny said. “Though they happened more than a hundred years ago.”
Kirsten left the scholars in her mama’s best parlor, six perfect gentlemen, asking one another to “please pass this” or “would you like a bite of that.” She was still crying when she reached Beelzebub’s stall, and descended into open sobbing when she found it empty.
Eighteen
Daniel had never before heard Kirsten Haddonfield weeping, but he recognized the heartbroken lamentation that echoed the misery in his own heart. He left the earl’s mare napping in her bed of straw, brushed himself off thoroughly, and turned Kirsten by the shoulders in Beelzebub’s empty stall.
She sagged against him, her dignity abandoning her utterly. “Oh, Daniel, the b-boys said I mustn’t raise my voice, but you’re married and I love you, and it isn’t right.”
A fair, if lachrymose, summation.
“My dearest lady, please cease your tears. I’d give you my handkerchief but mine has gone astray.” Daniel unknotted his neckcloth—one of the old, soft, mended ones—and dabbed at Kirsten’s cheeks.
“I have your handkerchief,” she wailed, “but I want your heart. I want your future. I want your children and all your rotten, perfect boys. Daniel, I can’t let that dratted woman have you.”
Gone was the pragmatic creature who’d confronted Daniel in the schoolroom, gone was the rational aristocrat who’d briskly ended two engagements. In her place was a woman who loved passionately.
Who was loved passionately.
“I’ll marry you,” Kirsten said, leaning into him. “Let Olivia disport with her cousin, let her pester you for funds as often as she pleases. My settlements are generous, and she can have—”
“No.” Daniel kissed Kirsten’s cheek, tasting the salt of her tears. “Olivia is like a pernicious illness. She starts as a slight ache in the joints, and if you do not rout her at that stage, she soon steals all vitality and will from the patient short of killing him bodily. We cannot be married as long as she can plague us.”
Kirsten pulled away and paced several yards down the barn aisle, turning with a swish of her skirts, then turning again, like a horse pacing her stall.
“Nicholas can likely have her transported,” she said, “and you and I can remove to the Hebrides. Except only Presbyterians can tolerate the northern isles. I’m willing to become a Presbyterian, Daniel, but I cannot abide—”
Kirsten halted, her hems brushing her boot tops, her hands fisted at her sides. “Daniel, I am so frightened.”
He met her in the middle of the aisle, knowing she’d often endured fear, but she’d likely never confided her anxieties in another. Truly, the vows were irrelevant when a commitment of such magnitude had already been made.
“Concern is warranted,” Daniel said, though so was faith, “because we’re opposing a foe without honor, but that might be to our advantage.”
He’d remained sitting in the straw near the big, placid mare, considering every aspect of the situation and mentally refining on boys who spent too much time viewing the world through their father’s lenses.
Where despair had been, determination took root, and hope along with it. Daniel’s situation had merely wanted a change in perspective.
For Papa—stern, rigid, unbending Papa—had been right after all.
“I could call Olivia out,” Kirsten said, her embrace growing fierce. “Women have fought duels over slights as petty as an insult to a lady’s hat.”
The slight Olivia was prepared to deal to Kirsten, Danny, the unborn child, and Daniel far exceeded slander to mere millinery.
“We can send her to the antipodes,” Daniel said, stroking his thumb over Kirsten’s damp cheek. “We can run away to Cathay, we can remove to the wilds of Canada, and I would still be married to Olivia.”
“I want to marry you,” Kirsten said. “I need to marry you, I long to marry you, and I shall marry you.”
Daniel kissed Kirsten’s cheek, for as bleak as their situation was, her outburst vanquished the last doubts he’d harbored about their engagement—about himself. He was not merely an acceptable alternative to a life of spinsterhood, he was Kirsten Haddonfield’s dearest love.
As she was his. A dearest love was worth fighting for.
“I’ve been plagued by snippets of Scripture all week,” he said, shifting Matthias’s glasses from his breast pocket to a side pocket, lest they come between Kirsten and her intended’s heart.
And a little child shall lead them…
“Aren’t you usually plagued by snippets of Scripture?” Kirsten asked, arranging Daniel’s somewhat damp and thoroughly wrinkled cravat around his neck and tying it loosely.
“The occasional passage will occur to me, but this week I’ve been deluged. Elijah, the Gospels, Proverbs… They’ve all been flying at me in odd moments. As I sat among the beasts here in the stable, one passage resounded more loudly than the others, but I’ve only now realized its significance.”
Kirsten’s gaze turned wary. “If it’s the bit about adultery—”
“I don’
t believe in an Almighty Barrister, exalting the letter of the law above the spirit, my dear. An elaborate ruse was undertaken to make me believe I was a widower, and the resulting sin rests with the deceiver, not with the deceived.”
While the miracles were his and Kirsten’s to keep.
An after-shudder from her bout of crying passed through her. “I hate Olivia, Daniel. If you’re preparing to spout pieties about loving the sinner, I will decline your spiritual guidance. Olivia is a menace and a plague and she must be stopped.”
“Ephesians,” Daniel said, love for his intended flooding him. “‘Be angry and sin not, let not the sun go down on your wrath, neither give a place to the devil.’”
Kirsten untied his neckcloth and retied it more neatly. “That’s your great insight? Be angry and sin not? We need a miracle, Daniel, not a sermon.”
What they needed was faith, trust, and a bit of cooperation from their friends and family. Across the aisle, the earl’s mare rose up from her bed of straw and shook vigorously.
“I love you,” Daniel said. “You are my miracle too. I will be married to you and no other, and that’s all that matters. Come sit with me in the garden.”
Daniel’s beloved cast him a look that suggested he was half-daft, which he was. He was also, eternally and entirely, hers, though beyond that, he had few answers.
Kirsten led Daniel out to the gazebo, which was now surrounded by beds of pansies and by rosebushes straining to bloom. The boys were probably plastered to the parlor windows, tea cakes in hand, and that was fine.
Daniel kept Kirsten’s hand in his as they settled on a bench in the gazebo, and Kirsten rested her head on his shoulder. He prosed on about the details of the wedding—a special license would allow them to marry outside the church building proper—and occasionally paused to enjoy the scent of his intended or the exact feel of her silky hair against his cheek.
He did so without an iota of guilt, because Kirsten was, after all, the woman to whom he would soon be wed.
* * *
The parties assembled in Belle Maison’s best formal parlor, each person in appropriate finery and the bride’s siblings looking particularly pleased. The scholars had picked the bride’s bouquet, though they were off enjoying their parents’ weekend hospitality, with the exceptions of Digby and Danny.
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