Miss Bluestone set a deft stitch. "Perhaps you have noticed, my lady, that these small affairs of the
heart are comic to observers but the stuff of tragedy to the participants."
Though there was no censure in the governess's mild voice, Elizabeth flushed. She had spent a
miserable summer in the not-distant past mooning over Tom, and Miss Bluestone had comforted her.
Elizabeth bit her lip. "I shan't laugh at them. At least not in their presence."
Miss Bluestone smiled. "I place too much reliance on your good sense to apprehend any such
blunder on your part, my lady."
Nevertheless, Elizabeth was troubled. She had found Owen Davies ill mannered, conceited, and
thoroughly charming. He was a double for the statue of Apollo Belvedere she had seen in the papal
collection--clothed, of course. She wished Davies were still a callow undergraduate afflicted with
spots.
* * * *
For Jean the first days of Owen Davies's residence at Brecon spellt pure enchantment, though she
hugged her feelings to herself. The only flaw in the reverberating crystal of her delight was her failure to
confide in Maggie. Always before, she had poured out her sentiments to her sympathetic twin, and Maggie
had always entered into her feelings exactly. There was no reason for Jean to keep her passion from Maggie,
but such was the intensity of her emotion she
could
not speak of it.
Every morning after breakfast the two girls met with the poet in the newly dusted bookroom. He
was an exacting taskmaster, keeping them to their chores until midday.
Because Jean wrote a clearer hand--so he said, but she thought he meant to keep her near
him--she made a list of the books Maggie fetched to the larger of the two refectory tables. The poet examined
each tome, taking note of its author and contents, the probable date of its publication, though a surprising
number of works contained no date, and the condition of its binding. Sometimes be would lose himself in
the work as a stack of calf-bound volumes mounted on the green baize.
He read snatches of poetry aloud. Some of the works were in Latin, which the twins had studied
briefly, or in Greek. They knew no Greek, but Jean thought his voice conveyed all the music of the Aegean.
She could have listened forever as he recited the long mellifluous lines of Homer's
Odyssey
. He
read from Chapman's English translation of Homer, too, but when he read in Greek Jean could concentrate
on the beauty of his voice and dream unhindered.
When he forgot to replace the books in the order Maggie had brought them from the shelf, they
would have a game of hunt-the-fox, chasing after the elusive volumes amid much laughter. He teased
Maggie, who had warmed to him, but it seemed to Jean that when he read, he read for her alone.
They took their nuncheons with Elizabeth, of course, and made up the numbers of Elizabeth's
quiet dinner parties in the evening. A few months before that would have seemed an enormous treat, but
Jean was growing rather blasé about small social privileges. The February weather was
foul--snowing and blustery. Often enough Elizabeth seated only Mr. Davies, Jean, Maggie, and herself at dinner.
Miss Bluestone rarely ventured from the Dower House in the icy wind, and no one came to visit from
farther away than Earl's Brecon.
Once Elizabeth sent her carriage for Mr. Davies's parents, but the evening went slowly, all parties
stiff with constraint. It was clear that the Davieses regarded their son with baffled admiration. His feelings
were less clear.
The Sunday after he arrived, a snow-laden gale blew in off the North Sea. No one went to church,
and they were quite without guests at dinner, so Elizabeth persuaded the poet to read from his
works.
Jean knew she was incapable of judging the quality of his poetry. His voice rang so sweet in her
ears that he might have read a list of dirty linen and still transported her. She knew that and it didn't trouble
her. He read from his odes, and he touched on all the proper subjects--mutability, nature, the sublime. She
thought his tropes particularly elegant, but she might have said the same had he recited Crabbe or
Thompson. He seemed to prefer the Spenserian stanzo.
It was after this session, when their abigail had gone and they had scrambled into their
nightclothes in the chill of their room, that Maggie finally forced her twin's confidence.
Jean tucked her red curls into her nightcap and leapt into the warmed sheets.
Maggie stood on one bare foot before the sea-coal fire. "You're mad for Owen Davies, aren't
you?"
"What?"
Maggie cat-footed across the polished boards and jumped into her side of the four-poster. "You're
in love with Owen Davies." She snuffed the candle and the room darkened, the only light a dancing red
glow cast by the fire on the hearth.
"What if I am?"
"I don't know." Maggie's voice was muffled. She had yanked the eiderdown up to her chin. "I just
wondered."
"He has a beautiful voice."
Maggie said nothing.
"He does, Mag. And he's so...so beautiful." Jean felt her cheeks go hot and was glad of the
darkness.
"D'you think so?"
Jean sat up. "Do not you?" She squinted down at her twin.
"He's good-looking, and I like working with him in the bookroom, but he's not very
organised."
Jean groaned and flopped back against the pillows. "What does that signify?"
"Nothing. Are you in love?"
"Yes... Oh, yes, Maggie--fathoms deep."
"
As You Like It
," Maggie said drowsily. "That's all right, then. I thought you were but
you didn't
say
."
"Oh, Maggie, I'm sorry. It was so strange, as if something constrained me to keep my sentiments
to myself. But I do love him. His voice is like...like an aeolian harp." Jean had never heard an aeolian harp,
but she wanted to. "And his eyes!"
Relieved to have the ear of her lifelong confidante once more, Jean spoke at length of the poet's
brilliance, beauty, and charm. It was only as she began to evaluate the quality of his verse that she realised
her sister had fallen asleep.
The grand old Duke of York
He had ten thousand men.
He marched 'em up
to the top of the hill
And marched 'em down again.
Johnny was finally finishing volume one of Richard Falk's history and the old jingle kept running
through his head as he transformed Falk's scrawled words into his own neat copperplate.
Somewhere in the middle of Bavaria Johnny had lost interest in the War of the Spanish
Succession. That was not the fault of Colonel Falk's handwriting, which was abominable, nor yet of his
prose, which was lucid. Perhaps if Johnny had been reading neatly printed folio pages at his usual breakneck
pace, his enthusiasm would not have flagged, but there was something about syllable by syllable
transcription of dead bivouacks, dead skirmishes, dead battles, that rendered them very dead indeed.
Oh, when you're up you're up,
And when down you're down,
And when
you're only halfway up
"You're neither up nor down," he sang mournfully.
"It can't be that bad."
Johnny finished the last scrolled letter, sanded the sheet, and regarded his hostess solemnly.
Emily Falk set a nuncheon tray on a chair by his daybed "What a beautiful hand you write.
Richard's publisher will have palpitations." She peered over his shoulder "You're finished!"
Johnny flexed his fingers and grinned "Absolutely. Except for Volumes Two and Three."
"Murray will have to be satisfied with Volume One for the time being. You need a holiday." She
flitted to the foot of the daybed and twitched the eiderdown over his legs "Richard will be delighted."
"
Aux anges,
" he said dryly "In transports."
She looked at him, blue eyes serious. "He will be enormously relieved, Johnny, and grateful to
you."
Johnny sighed. "And he'll say, 'Handsome work, Dyott. Pity it's such tripe.'"
"Is it?"
"Of course not. It's clear and accurate and gracefully expressed."
Her face fell. "Oh, dear."
"It will probably run through two printings in a quarter." He wasn't sure what he'd said wrong.
He hadn't meant to intimate he found the history dull. Its dullness was probably an illusion. "Really, ma'am,
it's a solid piece of historical writing."
She looked as if she might burst into tears.
Alarmed, he struggled to a more upright posture. "I
like
it," he lied, gasping because he
had jarred his splinted leg.
Emily Falk sniffed and gave him a watery smile. "It's kind of you to say so, Johnny. Now, let's
move the manuscript out of the way so you can eat in peace." She squared the sheets of foolscap and carried
the neat stack to Falk's desk. Falk had gone off for the day to see his sister.
"I wish you'd tell me what I said wrong." Johnny handed Mrs. Falk standish and pen and watched
as she tidied the lap desk that also served him as a table.
"It wasn't what you said." She handed him a warm, damp cloth from her tray and he swabbed the
inkstains from his hands. "I was just remembering Don Alfonso."
"Is that Colonel Falk's novel?"
She gave an exasperated cluck. "You're an ignorant jackanapes and don't deserve Mrs. Harry's
burnt sugar custard. Richard has writ five novels dealing with the adventures of Don Alfonso." She arranged
his cutlery and served him boiled chicken, fresh sliced bread, and preserved cherries, placing the custard
and a glass of white wine whey--the last a medicinal draught--artistically on the tray. She was neat-fingered
and her place settings always looked good enough to eat.
"I ought to read them one of these days." He spread the heavy linen napkin over his chest.
"Not until you've finished copying the history."
"Why not?" He cut a bite of savoury chicken.
"Because the contrast would throw you into the glooms. It's bad enough having Richard in a
green-and-yellow melancholy. Two gloomy men I refuse to abide."
Johnny chewed. "I know Colonel Falk prefers the novels."
"Anyone with a sense of humour and a modicum of intelligence prefers the novels. I do wish he
hadn't agreed to write this dreary history..." She bit her lip. "It can't be helped. Richard will return around
four in a foul mood. We might as well prepare the manuscript. If he doesn't want to send Volume One off
today he can always undo the parcel."
She whisked out the door, and Johnny fell upon the chicken. It was excellent, as usual.
* * * *
Richard did indeed return at four and, while his mood was not precisely foul, he did look gloomy.
His mother was ill.
"How is she?" Emily had spent an hour in the nursery and had just retired to the withdrawing
room to collect her wits.
"Sarah says failing."
"Oh, my dear, I'm so sorry."
He shrugged. "
Anno domini
."
"For the love of God, Richard."
"Do you want me to mouth conventional phrases? I do not know my mother, Emily, by her
choice, and I have no intention of pretending to sentiments I don't feel. I'm sorry she's ill. Robert has the
gout. I'm sorry for that, too, but there's nothing I can do to amend either condition."
Emily blew her nose. "Allow me a conventional sniffle. I liked her grace on the one occasion I
met her, and I am
very
sorry for Sarah's distress."
"There is that," he agreed wearily. "Sarah sends you her best. She'll call on you when the roads
are passable. Has the post come?"
"Yes. Three for Johnny, one perfumed, another from Tom. Go find out the latest Town
gossip."
"Gossip! Lord Clanross is a leader of the Opposition, ma'am, hot a mere gabblemonger. Show a
little respect."
"He hates it, doesn't he?"
Richard considered. "Tom regards politicks with the same enthusiasm I feel for three-volume
histories. Hatred is too passionate a word."
Emily said seriously, "Why don't you give it up, my dear? You should be writing what you wish
to write."
Reserve closed Richard's face like a shutter. "Perhaps I'll take up sonnets. 'Fair matron,'" he
declaimed, hand on his breast, "'when I gaze upon thy face
"'Adust with flour like a bannock bun...'"
"Do I have flour on my nose again?" Distracted Emily made for the kitchen where Mrs. Harry
assured her she was neat as wax and did the colonel fancy a bit of cod with the roast veal?
"Drat the colonel," Emily said crossly. She was worried. Sooner or later Richard would have to
sort out his feelings toward his mother. He might pretend indifference, but the anger beneath the mask had
been smouldering for twenty-five years. It prevented him meeting her grace halfway. Though Emily
understood his reasons, she thought he would find pride a sorry comfort when his mother had gone beyond
earthly reconciliation. Richard was on good terms with his half-sister, Sarah, but that was more Sarah's
doing than his. Sarah's and Emily's. Emily wished God had given men common sense.
* * * *
After dinner, when the children were abed and Richard writing, Emily kept Johnny company for
a while.
"Lady Clanross writ me a long letter," he confided.
A pity. Emily had rather hoped the perfumed letter was from an amour. "Are her ladyship and
her sisters well?"
Johnny's brow clouded. "Very well, I believe."
"But...?"
"Clanross has sent Owen Davies to Brecon," he blurted. "To catalogue the library. You've
probably not heard of Davies, sir."
Richard looked up from his letter. "Can't say I have."
Johnny drew a breath. "I was at university with him. He's a poet."
Mercy,
thought Emily.
How improvident of Tom.
"A good poet?"
"Clever enough," Johnny said glumly. "A mad Radical and full of nonsensical quirks. He was
rusticated once for writing a parody of the chancellor's peroration, and he despises what he calls the
medieval trappings of rank."