Holly and Hopeful Hearts

by Caroline Warfield

“Ahasuerus,” the man said, looking directly at her.

  Ahasuerus. The Persian king who chose a Jewish bride and loved her enough to help her people. A Jewish bride. Esther.

  Lights danced in front of her eyes, and for a moment, Esther thought she might faint. She gripped a waist-high urn full of ferns as the man walked toward her and made a deep bow. Whispers flowed in waves around the room, and though she didn’t listen with her ears, Esther’s heart knew they concerned her and the story of the king.

  “Will you walk with me, my lady?” the man asked in a familiar voice.

  Adam’s voice. He had come.

  When she put her hand in his, he held it high in a courtly manner and began to promenade around the room, nodding as a gracious king might do to the curious and amused onlookers. He promenaded past the grinning Grenford brothers, Hythe in his Tudor tights, and the duchess dressed as Catherine the Great. He promenaded past the entire company and walked her out the door, down the hall, and into a small withdrawing room. Esther moved along beside him, stunned into inaction.

  Before she could register that he had closed them in alone, he tore the false beard from his face—wincing a bit when the adhesive stuck to his skin—tossed it aside, and took her in his arms with a predatory gleam in his eyes. She couldn’t move while his mouth descended toward hers. She wondered distantly if she ought to refuse his kiss, but no power on earth could make her do so. The moment she had dreamed about, longed for, and denied since the moment he came to work for her father three years before had arrived.

  She leaned into it, and curiosity gave way to wonder. His mouth felt warm and firm against hers. He began to move, and warmth filled her too, fire bursting forth deep inside her. Then his tongue touched her lips, and her knees gave so that he had to pull her against his body until they touched, shoulder to knees, and she thought she might melt. What could she do? She responded in kind, tongue to tongue, and gripped him in return.

  They both were panting when he pulled his mouth away and cradled her head against his shoulder. “Will you listen to me now, Esther?”

  * * *

  Adam tried to gather his scattered thoughts from the fog of lust. Her response had been much more than he dared hope. He set her firmly on her feet and slid his hands down her arms, putting a few inches between them.

  “We need to talk.” But how to start? Her deep brown eyes boring into his didn’t help. He kissed her again.

  When she groaned against his mouth, he put her away from him and walked toward a shuttered window on the other side of the room. “When you look at me that way, I can’t think,” he said.

  “You think too much,” Esther replied with a sly smile, stepping toward him.

  He let his head drop back. “I need to tell you I was wrong. It isn’t easy for me.”

  She stopped and rocked back on her heels, eyes wide.

  He let it all out in a rush: Rochlin’s friendship, Sarah’s Hebrew, and Rebbe Nahmany’s advice. “‘Keep an open heart,’ he said. I didn’t understand what he meant at first, but he was right. You were right. I need to trust, to give people and ideas a chance.”

  “Ideas?” she murmured. She looked baffled by his jumbled words.

  “We can value our traditions without becoming so hide-bound we can’t allow change. We can hold onto our own customs and still value our friends.”

  She scrunched up her face in an adorable expression as though she was hard at work sorting his words. “What was it you said about Sarah Nahmany?” she asked.

  “She reads Hebrew. Her father has begun to teach her, alongside her brothers and—”

  Esther’s expression stopped him. She almost glowed in wonder. “Would you teach me, Adam?” she whispered.

  “Yes. And our daughters, too.” She was in his arms before he could add, “If we have any.” Before he could ask her to marry him; before he could warn her about her father’s plans. The intensity of her response almost shredded his last self-control. It might have, if the sound of scuffling and laughter outside the door hadn’t startled both of them.

  They leaped apart, Esther with one hand to her lips, Adam still holding the other. The intruders moved on.

  “We have to go back. They’ll all wonder—I’ll be a disgrace,” Esther exclaimed, sinking to her knees and looking for the remnants of his costume beard. She rose with most of it in a triumphant gesture.

  His opportunity had passed. He helped her restore her hair where it had come loose from her headdress and cupped the side of her face. “You go, Esther. I’ll stay here for a while, so we don’t go back together, but we must talk. Will you come for a walk with me in the morning?”

  She punctuated her agreement with a swift kiss on his lips and left in a flurry of skirts. He crushed the false beard in his hand. The costume had done its work. He had no desire to wear it again and less to face the revelers or watch Esther dancing and flirting.

  He would see her in the morning.

  Chapter 13

  The sunlight shimmering across the carpet looked as bright as Esther felt. She was bursting with impatience while Reba helped her dress.

  “Hold still,” the maid said. “Stop dancing around the room if you want me to get this done.” She tied the ribbon around Esther’s bodice in the back and gave it a pat. “There. A lovely bow.”

  Esther danced away and made a pirouette.

  “Miss Esther! Your mother says—”

  “This morning, I don’t care, Reba!” Esther went to the window, leaning on the sill to look out over the lane. “Isn’t it glor—”

  “What is it, Miss Esther?”

  “Papa,” she whispered, staring out the window. “What is he doing here?”

  Far below, the familiar figure of her father stepped out of the Baumann carriage. Footman swarmed around to help, but he turned back to the carriage and handed down another passenger. Even from her second floor room, Esther could see it was not her mother. Mama wasn’t well enough to travel in any case.

  The woman, stout and past middle age, wore an unfashionable bonnet and colorless clothing. Esther recognized her at once from temple as one of those widows active in charity, active in community events, and active in everyone’s business. The matchmaker. Her heart sank. Papa had made a match for her. She watched the carriage with eyes so sharp her head hurt, but no one else emerged.

  She turned and marched into Aunt Dinah’s room. The woman lay in a bed jacket, sipping chocolate, the gray kitten curled up next to her.

  “Did you know my father planned to come?” Esther demanded.

  Aunt Dinah blinked back. “What? No? What has gotten in to you? Nathaniel is here?”

  “He brought the matchmaker,” Esther said sourly.

  “Good. It is time he made a match for you.”

  “I don’t… That is, I hoped… Oh!” She stamped her foot in frustration and left the old woman to her chocolate.

  A pounding on her door made her cringe. “Is Papa demanding to see me already?” she moaned.

  Reba went to the door and reared back in outrage. “Mr. Halevy, you cannot come in here! It isn’t proper.”

  “Esther,” Adam called over the maid’s shoulder. “Your father is here. I have to talk to you.” He went around Reba and took Esther by the hand. “He’s early.”

  “You knew he planned to come,” she accused, pulling her hand away in outrage.

  “Yes, but I thought I had another day or two.”

  “What do you mean?” Outrage gave way to puzzlement.

  “Esther, I need to know if you want me. The matchmaker will put the question. If you’re going to reject me, I’d rather you do it now. I won’t let you be forced into something you don’t want,” he said fiercely.

  “You won’t?” she murmured. Puzzlement gave way to hope.

  “Of course not. These aren’t the Middle Ages, and I’ll not have a wife who was forced to do something she doesn’t want,” he replied, stiffening. “What you must think of me!”

  Her naughty thou
ghts about him did not bear saying out loud. Joy bubbled up from deep inside. “Wife, Adam?”

  “What do you think I was trying to tell you last night?”

  “As I recall, there wasn’t lot of talking involved,” she replied, growing warm at the memory.

  He ran a frustrated hand through his hair. “I’m making a mess of this. Will you marry me, Esther? I can’t promise we won’t quarrel, but I’ll do my best to listen to you.”

  “To keep an open heart?”

  At the sweetness of his smile, she almost capitulated. “Yes, that,” he said.

  He reached for her then, but she put out a hand to stop him. Hope had given way to joy, yet she needed to hear the words.

  “But why? Why do you want to marry me?”

  “Why? Being near you drives me mad. I love you, Esther. That has to count for something.”

  “Oh, yes,” she said, closing the distance between them. “It counts for everything.”

  “Miss Esther! What would your mother say? A lady—”

  Esther lost herself in Adam’s kiss. For once, she didn’t care what a lady might do.

  * * *

  They faced her father together. From the force with which Esther gripped his hand, Adam knew she felt less confident than she pretended.

  Baumann had been shown into the breakfast room along with Mrs. Lipson, the matchmaker, who sat fanning herself and looking rather like a bedraggled sheepdog.

  Baumann stiffened at the sight of them. “You’re making free with my daughter’s hand, Halevy. She isn’t yours yet,” the old man said to the amusement of several young ladies who watched them avidly.

  “I was just suggesting to Mr. Baumann that business might best be conducted after a good breakfast,” the Marquis of Aldridge drawled, saluting Adam with his coffee from his seat at the head of the table.

  “An excellent suggestion, my lord,” Esther said primly. “Mr. Halevy, would you kindly obtain a plate for me?”

  She gave her father a swift peck on the cheek and took a seat far from Mrs. Lipson. Unfortunately, that put her next to Aldridge and brought a frown from her father. Adam didn’t much like her sitting next to London’s most notorious rake, either.

  “Do you plan to break your fast, Papa, or have you already done so? And tell me how you came to arrive so early in the morning.”

  Baumann sat next to his daughter. “We stayed at the Rose and Rooster last night. We had a bit to eat there,” he said, accepting coffee from a footman.

  From the way Mrs. Lipson tucked into coddled eggs and kippers, it must have been a small bit.

  Adam watched his love manage her father, who was obviously torn between amusement and concern. No doubt she will manage me as well. He looked forward to it.

  She hadn’t told him what she wanted to eat, so he gave her a bit of everything. When they married, he would learn her likes and dislikes. He smiled to himself and took a seat next to Aldridge. The humor lurking behind the marquis’s attempt at a bland expression sent his appetite to perdition. He settled for coffee.

  “How did you leave Mama?” Esther asked. Adam suspected another question, why did you leave her, lurked beneath her words.

  “Worried about you,” her father answered, glancing over at Aldridge. “Of course your Aunt Dinah is here. Where is Dinah?”

  “Taking chocolate in her room. She has enjoyed her stay,” she answered sweetly before peppering him for gossip, asking after his painful knee and tossing in some shockingly shrewd business questions.

  Baumann murmured replies until he reached his limit and pushed himself up. “Enough, Esther. I need to speak to you,” he pinned Adam with a look, “and Mr. Halevy, if the marquis would be so kind as to direct us to a private room.”

  “We will need witnesses,” Mrs. Lipson piped up from the other end of the table, waving a spoon in the air. “Best call Dinah down.”

  “A moment, if you please, Baumann,” Aldridge said, rising. “Perhaps while we wait for Miss Dinah Baumann to be summoned?” He gestured to a footman and sent him after Esther’s aunt.

  Adam glanced over at Esther when her father and the marquis stepped out into the hall. She merely shrugged as if to say she had no idea what business they might have. Aldridge then leaned in and said something that seemed to please Baumann.

  The men sipped their coffee until a servant entered and whispered something to Aldridge. The marquis looked at Esther and, seemingly satisfied with what he saw, suggested they follow him to a room arranged for her father’s purposes.

  Esther looked more confident than Adam felt when he helped her rise. Baumann glared at him until he dropped his hand from her waist and offered his arm properly. They all waited while the matchmaker put both hands on the table and pushed her bulk up, muttering irritable remarks about failure to “do it properly” and young people in general. Esther smiled up at him; they would be as proper as the occasion required, as long as he got what his heart demanded in the end.

  Chapter 14

  Someone who didn’t know Adam might see a young man overflowing with confidence. Esther knew better. She could feel the tension in his arm and see it in the tight smile he gave her. He probably thought she needed reassurance. Dear sweet idiot.

  When they followed Aldridge into a second floor sitting room, Aunt Dinah fluttered in one corner in diaphanous shawls, but the woman in the center of the room would have reassured Esther things would go well, if she weren’t already perfectly certain she could manage Papa. The Duchess of Haverford took both Esther’s hands in hers, examined Esther carefully, and smiled warmly. “I’m to wish you happy?” she asked.

  Esther nodded, a lump in her throat making speech impossible for a moment.

  After much bowing and greetings, Mrs. Lipson clapped her hands. The woman knew her business. All eyes looked her way.

  “Miss Esther Baumann, it is my pleasure to announce that your father has arranged a most advantageous marriage for you to a fine Jewish man of excellent family.”

  Esther looked up with narrowed eyes at Adam standing next to her. He shrugged. Of course he spoke to Papa first. She couldn’t hold that against him.

  “I assume you agree to this match.”

  “Yes,” Esther murmured.

  It seemed to be enough. The matchmaker went on without waiting, “Mr. Halevy, I assume you will agree to a traditional ketubah with amounts agreed to between you and Mr. Baumann.”

  “Wait!” Esther exclaimed. She frowned. “Traditional? May I see the wording?”

  “What is a ketubah?” the duchess asked.

  “It’s a marriage contract,” Adam explained, “for a woman’s protection. The husband agrees to provide her with food, shelter, and—” He colored and looked around the room.

  “—and her marital pleasure,” the matchmaker finished, “as is a wife’s right.” She gave a firm nod.

  “Quite so,” Adam said. The look he gave Esther almost melted her toes. He would have no trouble fulfilling that obligation. Esther's imagination ran away with her, momentarily distracting her from the question.

  “A contract to protect wives,” the duchess declared. “How enlightened.”

  “A promise of pleasure,” Aldridge murmured. “Very enlightened.”

  “And he agrees to a sum put aside for her should he put her aside or die before her,” the matchmaker explained.

  “Like marriage settlements?” Aldridge asked.

  “Exactly like marriage settlements,” Adam said.

  “But not, I suspect, enforceable in law.”

  “No. Secular legal settlements will be required,” Baumann said. “Halevy and I have yet to negotiate the details.”

  The blasted men talked about Esther’s future as if she wasn’t there. That snapped her out of her distraction.

  “I want to see the wording,” she demanded, “of the ketubah and the settlements.”

  All three men turned to look at her with astonishment. Her father looked outraged, Aldridge amused, and Adam? She couldn’t d
ecipher his expression. It was almost as if he was frustrated that he had missed a particularly important point in his studies.

  “The wording is traditional,” the matchmaker said, pulling a rolled up paper from her sleeve, “although some men feel the need to add clauses. I don’t approve.”

  Esther took it from her. “This isn’t Hebrew,” she said.

  “Aramaic,” Adam said, looking over her shoulder. “Legal language. Shall I read it?”

  She handed it over with a glare.

  “Shall I teach you Aramaic, too?” he asked with a smile that almost chased her annoyance away.

  “That’s it?” she asked when he finished. “You’ll provide a house, feed my children, and, um, otherwise care for me? Can we add to it?”

  “No,” the matchmaker said.

  “Yes,” Adam said at the same time. “What would you add?”

  “I want to add that all our daughters will be educated as well as our sons,” she said, raising her chin.

  That statement provoked a strangled noise from her father and applause from the duchess.

  “What nonsense!” Aunt Dinah and the matchmaker exclaimed simultaneously.

  “I agree,” Adam said at the same time. Their eyes caught, and for a moment, the others might as well have been in the Antipodes.

  “It also says you will pay two hundred pieces of silver to buy me,” she whispered, still staring into his eyes.

  He blinked and ran a hand across the back of his neck. “The silver is traditional, and it isn’t for purchase! The money is put in escrow for your protection in case something happens to me. The amount is negotiable.”

  “The settlements?”

  He nodded.

  “Very well. You and my father may draw up the first draft of settlements, but I want to review them before you sign—and I want an English translation of the ketubah as well. If I like what I see, I’ll marry you.”

  Against a background of gasps and a few chuckles, Adam drew back at first, but then he smiled and leaned forward until their foreheads touched. “You will like what you see, or I’ll make it right. I promise.”