Cherished

by Elizabeth Thornton

  Impatient with both Hester and himself, but for different reasons, he said, “You have made quite a hit with some of the officers at the garrison. Isn’t there a single one who has taken your fancy?”

  She made a moue of distaste. “You know as well as I do, Peter, that most of your young colleagues are here because they are fleeing some scandal at home.”

  “That’s hardly true! There are many fine, upstanding men among them.”

  “Even if that were so, no one has offered for me, so this conversation is pointless.”

  “No one has offered for you because you don’t encourage it. Hester, you mustn’t allow something from the past to cast a shadow on your life. You should have your eye on the future.” Having once embarked on a subject which he knew he would not dare touch upon again, he decided to be completely frank. “This isn’t much of a life for you, always a guest in someone else’s home. I never knew a woman who was more fitted to preside over her own establishment. Your accomplishments are incomparable. You know how to manage a house. You can sketch, draw, sing, and sew with the best of them. If you would only unbend a little, you could have almost anyone you want.”

  Her smile was very tight. “You are forgetting something, Peter. My dowry is nothing to boast about. And the sort of gentleman who would be willing to accept an impoverished wife is not the sort of gentleman in whom I would be interested.”

  “Our sisters married well enough,” he pointed out.

  Hester merely elevated her brows, and after an interval, when he saw that nothing he could say would make an impression on her, he laughed in a deprecating way. “No, don’t get your hackles up. I promise not to interfere.”

  He adjusted his position in the small chair. “Sara and I are deeply in your debt, and I am not only referring to the way you nursed her when she was so very ill. If it weren’t for you, Hester, I don’t know how we would manage. Sara doesn’t know the first thing about housekeeping and so on. She is young and her interests are…Well, as I said, she is very young.”

  Hester’s brows drew together in a slight frown. “Like most girls of her generation, she is frivolous. Their heads are filled with nothing more exalted than parties and ballgowns. Sara has no sense of what is fitting for a lady in her position. Peter, I do think you should put your foot down. People are talking. She is too animated. She flirts outrageously. Since she has recovered from her illness, there is always some gentleman or other calling on her, taking her out in his carriage. I’ve tried remonstrating with her to no purpose. You are her husband. You must be the one to correct her.”

  As was his way, he laughed this off. “Surely any pretty young girl is entitled to think about parties and ballgowns? Didn’t you at her age?”

  “Certainly I did. But I was also raised to know my duty. It’s common knowledge that Rivard’s nieces had the ordering of their own lives from the time they were in the cradle. And it shows.”

  When she paused, he took the opportunity to say, “When I was Sara’s age, I was a drone, a wastrel. I led a life of indolence. You know I did. Yet, I changed.”

  Hester smiled. “That is because you are a Benson, dear. It’s in the blood. There never was a Benson who did not make something of himself eventually. But those Brockfords.” She shook her head. “They were never really good ton for all that they were marquesses. They marry foreigners, they have strange ideas of deportment. Well, just think of the scandal of your own nuptials, and as for Emily…”

  “Hester!” Peter rarely lost his patience. Even now, he softened the reproof in his tone with a strained smile, but Hester knew enough about her brother to be wary of the hard look in his eyes.

  “I beg your pardon,” she said meekly, and fingered the locket at her throat. “You did not seek me out to listen to the ramblings of a lonely old maid. How may I help you, Peter?”

  He felt guilty twice over, first because his sister had confessed that she was lonely, and second because his only reason in seeking her out was not to relieve that loneliness but to ask a favor. With a flash of annoyance, he wondered if women were born knowing how to make a man feel guilty or if it was something they passed on from mother to daughter like a sacred trust in each succeeding generation.

  Hoping to spare her feelings, he said carefully, “It appears to me that if Sara had a little more responsibility, that is, if you would show her what is involved in the running of a house and managing the servants, she would learn very quickly. There are other things I have noticed, trifles that don’t mean much to a man, but which I know weigh with women.”

  She wasn’t giving him the least encouragement, but stared at him with a cold little face. Floundering, he pushed on. “Such as pouring tea for our guests and signaling the servants when to serve the courses at dinner, and consulting with cook about menus.”

  “Has Sara been complaining?” Her voice, so warm with sisterly affection a few moments before, had iced over, matching the look on her face. Before he could think how to answer her, she rushed on heedlessly. “I assure you, Peter, my only wish is to be of service. If Sara wishes…”

  “That’s splendid!” He was on his feet, grinning down at her with that disarmingly boyish grin of his. “I knew I could count on you, Hester. That’s settled then. You have no idea how you have relieved my mind.” At the door, he turned back. “Shall we begin tonight when the tea things are brought in? Let’s make this as natural as possible. You and I shall engage in a very involved conversation so that Sara has no option but to act as hostess. And we shall go on from there, shall we?”

  When the door closed behind him, Hester gave vent to her rage by knocking the silk cushion he had been reclining against to the floor. She felt like screaming, but would never have disgraced herself by indulging in such an unladylike display.

  Frustrated rage brought the hot, salty tears to her eyes. It was happening again. Her usefulness was coming to an end and soon she would have to make a home for herself with another set of relatives.

  Palming her eyes, she forced the unpleasant reality from her mind and indulged in her favorite fantasy. The house over which she presided was as magnificent as Osterley. The children who played on the lawns were her children. The handsome man by her side was her husband. The very things other people derided in her—her devotion to duty, her sense of what was fitting, her decorum—he applauded because they shared the same values. But it was more than that. He loved her. She loved him. Would the dream ever become a reality?

  After a moment or two, she felt more in command of herself. When she opened the ledger to continue with her accounts, her expression was serene.

  On a small rise overlooking the harbor, the riders dismounted and gazed out over the bay. The waters of Lake Ontario glittered like diamonds and the haze out beyond the Peninsula was slowly dissipating as a westerly breeze got up.

  James Fraser glanced at his mount’s mired forelegs and made a small sound of annoyance. “There is something to be said for our long winters. This mud is an infernal nuisance. I’d forgotten that York turns into a quagmire as soon as the warm weather arrives. I shall be glad to get back to Montreal.”

  Leon acknowledged his companion’s words with a vague nod, but his eyes were still on the lake, following the progress of a schooner with white sails which had just left the harbor.

  For a moment or two, nothing was said, then James threw out in a bating way, “So, in the short time you have been here, you have managed to make yourself the most unpopular man in York. Is that wise, Leon?”

  This sally brought Leon’s head round. Smiling faintly, he returned, “When people express inflammatory opinions in my hearing, I see no reason not to correct them.”

  James laughed at this. “To British ears, you are the one who is expressing inflammatory opinions. No, I refuse to be drawn into a debate about American shipping or the rights of American settlers. All I will say is that it’s no bad thing that you will be returning to New York before long. When do you go, by the by?”

  “If I
had my way, we would go tomorrow, but there is no hope of that with the Governor General hosting a ball on the occasion of Emily’s birthday.”

  “It’s a signal honor, you know,” James pointed out, mildly irritated by his friend’s lack of enthusiasm.

  Leon’s eyes held a wicked twinkle. “So I’ve been told by Lady Hester. When she thought I meant to decline Sir George’s ‘magnanimous offer’—her words, you know—she practically read me the riot act.”

  “Lady Hester? You surprise me. I thought she was just the type of female to make you do the opposite of whatever she suggested.”

  “You know me too well! Yes, I admit I was tempted, but I could see that not to accept would have caused considerable embarrassment to my host, not to mention my wife. Let’s walk aways, shall we?”

  By tacit consent, the two friends edged their horses round to face the direction of the town. Their own boots were no less muddied than the prime mounts they had acquired from Peter Benson’s private stock.

  At length, Leon said, “What about you, James? Do you go with the fur brigades?”

  “I may. I haven’t made up my mind,” was the cautious reply.

  Leon’s eyebrows rose but he said nothing, provoking James to demand, “Now just what the devil am I to make of that supercilious look?”

  Unperturbed, Leon responded, “Since you ask, I shall tell you. Sara is not for you. Her marriage may not be a happy one, but she will not enter into an affair with any man.”

  “Did I say anything about an affair?”

  “No, but I know you and I know Sara. She may seem reckless and heedless of decorum, but that is only superficial. Scratch the surface and you will find that she is as straight as a plumb line.”

  James’s look was frankly speculative. “How do you know so much about it?”

  Leon bit down on a smile. What he was thinking was that his sister Zoë had the raising of Ladies Emily and Sara. They might get up to all sorts of mischief, but Zoë had schooled them too well. Flashing his companion a look of mock commiseration, he said, “Sara is like Emily. She would never betray her husband. You will just have to take my word for it, James.”

  There was a silence, then James said, “And if I should prove you wrong? What then?”

  Shrugging indifferently, Leon answered, “Sara has a husband. It’s nothing to do with me. Now tell me about the Indian maid, the one who drugged Sara. You mentioned that you had picked up her trail?”

  James was more than happy to allow the subject of Lady Sara to be dropped and seized on the opening Leon had given him. “What we did not know at the time was that she was married. Her husband is a guide, a free trader and sometime buffalo hunter by the name of Doucette. After she left here, she went to Lachine to wait for him.”

  “Lachine? Are you saying that Doucette and the girl went west with one of the fur brigades?”

  “That’s exactly what I am saying. There’s more. The girl is with child. In all probability, he is taking her to his place in Ste. Marie. He has a cabin there and a few acres of land. I shall know soon enough. If she is there, what do you want me to do about it?”

  They plodded on for some few minutes. Finally, Leon said, “It hardly seems pressing now.”

  “I agree. If you have enemies, Leon, they are certainly not here. There have been no accidents, no attacks for how long is it now—the best part of a year?”

  Leon nodded and James continued. “As for the girl, what I think happened is this: We know that she was stealing things. What better way to evade detection than by ensuring that her mistress was indisposed? Not only did she manage to get Sara out of the way, but Lady Hester, too. Lady Hester was a devoted nurse. By all accounts, she hardly left Sara’s bedside.”

  “Why did the girl run away when she did?”

  “My man Paterson arrived on the scene. The girl must have known the game was up. I expect it suited her purposes very well to go off with her husband into the wilderness.”

  At some unspoken signal, both men mounted up. “Ste. Marie,” Leon murmured. “That’s home for you, isn’t it, James?”

  “It is.”

  “The girl shouldn’t get off scot-free.”

  “Don’t worry, she won’t. When I catch up with her, I intend to throw such a scare into her that it will be years before she shows her face in this neck of the woods.”

  Leon sat back in the saddle, holding the reins easily as he looked out over the bay. When he turned to his friend, he was grinning. “All things considered,” he said, “I think things have worked out very well.”

  They had just turned into King Street when they came upon a carriage stuck fast in the deeply ploughed ruts of the muddy thoroughfare. William Addison was mired to his knees from assisting the coachmen to hold his team steady. The frightened beasts were plunging about, their flailing hooves throwing up mud in every direction. A passing group of officers of the garrison had procured jute sacking which they were attempting to get under the wheels.

  “Leon! James!” Sara waved her lace handkerchief out the window to attract the attention of the mounted riders.

  Sara’s cries brought Emily to her side of the coach. When she caught sight of her husband a smile lit up her face, and she, too, waved a handkerchief to attract his attention.

  “What do you think?” asked James. “Shall we go to their rescue? We could each take one of the girls and ride pillion.”

  Leon’s expression was very bland, but his lips were not quite steady. “I wouldn’t wish to show Mr. Addison in a bad light. He got my wife in to this fix. I have every confidence that he can get her out of it.” And so saying, affecting not to understand Sara’s and Emily’s shrill appeals, he tipped his hat in salute and urged his mount toward Frederick Street. After a startled silence, James Fraser followed suit.

  When Emily and Sara arrived home from their outing, having had to walk all the way from their stuck carriage, both Peter and Leon were on hand in the foyer to greet them. The girls had little to say for themselves. There was no need. Their scowling faces and muddy garments told the tale better than any words. Both gentlemen, who were immaculately turned out, were very careful to keep a straight face.

  Chapter Eighteen

  It was Emily’s birthday. In honor of the occasion, Sir George Prevost, the Governor General, was hosting a ball at Government House. York had never seen its like before. Over a hundred members of York’s select society had received invitations. Every off-duty officer in the garrison was expected to attend as a matter of course. The local tradesmen were all in a flutter. Butchers, bakers, tailors, dressmakers, were inundated with demands for their services. The regimental band was engaged to provide the music. In short, by York’s standards, it was an affair on a par with the celebrations for a king’s coronation.

  As they waited in the receiving line for the doors to open to admit the influx of guests, Emily made some comment in passing about the appointments of the ballroom. Sir George smiled expansively and allowed his eyes to travel the length of the spacious chamber, noting with approval the crystal chandeliers and the banks of hothouse flowers.

  Though he held Lady Emily in the highest esteem, his object in hosting the ball went beyond paying homage to his charming guest. York was the capital of Upper Canada. He aimed to show that York was no primitive outpost but a center of culture and taste. Moreover, Lady Emily was highly connected. Rivard was her uncle. Sir George knew the value of impressing the niece of such a great man. When he was next at court, Rivard would know of him. A career diplomat could never have enough friends in high places.

  “A hundred guests,” murmured Sara, idly arranging the skirts of her pomona-green ballgown and reflecting that one good thing had come of her marriage to Peter. As a married woman, she could now wear the vibrant colors she preferred. “At Carlton House two thousand guests sat down to supper. Good grief! That’s more than twice the population of the whole of York.”

  In his easy, gracious manner, Peter Benson unobtrusively removed the stin
g from his wife’s words. “Lord, yes,” he said. “I remember the occasion well. As I recall, Sara, you decried the Prince Regent’s fête as a vulgar circus, and could not wait to be shot of London and all its follies.” Addressing Sir George over his wife’s head, he winked and concluded, “At heart, Sara is really a country girl.”

  Sir George allowed himself to be mollified, but behind his bland smile he was thinking that of the three ladies in the receiving line, Lady Hester was by far the most stately. Her pale muslins, though fashionable, were less eye-catching than the younger girls’ get-ups. In the best sense of the word, Lady Hester was more truly the lady. As wife to a soldier or a diplomat, she would be a decided asset. How unfortunate that she was so hard to please that few gentlemen could measure up to her standards.

  His unwary stare was caught and held by Leon Devereux and Sir George’s mellow mood suffered a setback. He wondered what mischief the American might be devising to put him out of countenance. Leon Devereux lost no opportunity in making game of his betters. Insufferable fellow! If it were not for Lady Emily, he would have sent the fellow about his business a long time ago. He was here on sufferance. It would take very little to incite public opinion against the man, and then there was no telling what might happen. If war was declared or…

  Whatever Sir George might have thought next was forestalled as two liveried footmen pushed back the glass entrance doors and the majordomo stepped forward to announce the names of the first guests. For the next hour or so, Lady Emily and her party were fully occupied in making the acquaintance of York’s finest.