The Girl in the Gatehouse Page 6

  “But . . . ” Matthew began. “We have met twice now. She did me a good turn at our first meting, and I should like to return the favor. What would it hurt to allow Miss Aubrey to stay as she is? At least until another tenant might be found to pay the higher rent.”

  “It might hurt more than you think. Your reputation, for example.”

  “How so?”

  Hugh eyed him curiously. “What do you know of Mariah Aubrey?”

  Matthew shrugged. “Nothing. Only that she has a way with horses and is a well-spoken young woman.”

  “Then you are correct; you know nothing.” Hugh drew himself up officiously. “But the letting of the gatehouse is not your concern. I need all the funds I can raise at present. She can pay up, or she can go.”

  Worried as she was about the future, Mariah warmly welcomed Jeremiah Martin as he entered the kitchen, still dressed in black. Without a word, he stepped to the kettle on the sideboard and spooned modest portions of mutton and potatoes onto his plate. He tucked fork, knife, and table napkin into his pocket, and then picked up his plate and carried it outside with him. She noticed he had left the door slightly ajar so that he could open it with his hook on the way out, as his lone hand was full.

  When the door closed behind him, Mariah whispered to Dixon, “Did you tell him he could not take his meals with us?”

  “Didn’t have to. He certainly never ate his meals with Mrs. Prin-Hallsey – that I can tell you.”

  “But I don’t mind. I am no fine lady that – ”

  “Of course you are, Miss Mariah. It is bad enough that you eat here in the kitchen with me.”

  It was an argument they’d often had last autumn, until Dixon finally conceded to Mariah’s wishes. How ridiculous Mariah would feel eating alone in the drawing room.

  Mariah stood at the window, watching as Martin placed his plate and himself on the garden bench, spread his napkin on his lap, and set his plate atop it. She wondered how he would manage to cut Dixon’s tough mutton chop. She observed with admiration as he lanced the meat with his fork, propped up the utensil with the inner forearm of his hook hand, and then commenced to take up his knife with his good hand and saw at the mutton with vigor. She wondered why he did not simply impale the meat with his hook, undignified as that might appear. Did he realize she was watching?

  Suddenly self-conscious, she turned her attention to her own bland meal and left him to his.

  A few minutes later, Martin stepped inside once more and glanced about. “Might I trouble you for the salt cellar? I don’t see it.”

  “And why should you need salt, Mr. Martin?” challenged Dixon.

  “Ahh. You see, I am accustomed to food having, mmm, flavor, Miss Dixon. A weakness in my character, no doubt.”

  Dixon frowned darkly.

  Oh dear. Mariah rose swiftly and retrieved the salt cellar from the cupboard. “Here you are, Martin.”

  While her back was to Dixon, Mariah spooned salt into her own palm before handing it to him.

  He gave her a conspiratorial wink. “I shall do the washing up after, all right?”

  “Thank you, Martin.”

  Though Dixon would have scolded had she known, Mariah stayed behind to dry while Martin managed the dishes. His hook seemed to hinder him only when it came to the silverware. These he swished about the dishwater with one hand. Mariah checked each piece carefully before drying it.

  “Did you know our neighbor enjoys a bit of fame?” Martin asked.

  She glanced at him. “Hugh Prin-Hallsey?”

  “I said fame, not infamy,” he huffed. “I meant Captain Bryant.”

  She was instantly alert, though she tried not to show it. “How so?”

  Martin braced a carving knife against the basin with his hook arm and scrubbed at it with the cloth in his hand.

  “Mrs. Prin-Hallsey let me have the newspapers after she was finished with them. I’ve saved all the interesting articles about the navy and the war in general. There were several about Captain Bryant.”

  “Really?” she murmured, hoping to sound nonchalant.

  Apparently she failed, because Martin wiped his hands on the apron and pulled a piece of newsprint from his pocket. “Here’s one that might interest you.” Unfolding it, he read, “ ‘Captain Matthew Bryant, recently of the frigate Sparta, has lately returned to England after an absence of four years. Not only has Bryant achieved the rank of captain at a relatively young age, but he has also made a tidy fortune by the war. The reckoning of his prize money is said to surpass twenty thousand pounds. . . .’ ”

  He read several more lines, but Mariah barely heard them, the staggering figure still echoing in her mind.

  Martin set aside the clipping and picked up his dishcloth once more. “He’s no Admiral Nelson, mind. Nelson made captain by age twenty. Did you know he had his right arm amputated and was back on duty thirty minutes later?”

  Mariah shook her head.

  “Still, Captain Bryant has quite a reputation for determination in battle. He captured several ships, both enemy and merchant, which outmanned and outgunned his smaller frigate. Impressive indeed.”

  Mariah had difficulty imaging such fierceness in the man, when he had seemed timid with a mere horse. But then again, was he not insisting on “prize money” of a sort from her?

  “Sounds merciless, this Captain Bryant,” she murmured.

  Martin lifted the carving knife high to inspect it. In the sunlight streaming through the window, the blade glinted. “I don’t know,” he said. “But I for one would not want to be his enemy.”

  Captain Wentworth,

  with five-and-twenty thousand pounds,

  and as high in his profession as merit and activity

  could place him, was no longer nobody.

  – Jane Austen, Persuasion

  chapter 7

  The navy had been good to him. Not only had Matthew achieved the rank of captain before the age of thirty, but he had also made his fortune by the war. Now, having claimed his prize money of more than five-and-twenty thousand pounds, he was no longer nobody.

  It was time he made this fact known.

  His plan was a simple one: set himself up in a fine estate and enlist the help of his highborn friend, Captain Ned Parker, in reintroducing him to society. After all, it was through Parker that Matthew had first met her some four and a half years before.

  In letting Windrush Court, he had accomplished the first item on his agenda. He had also ordered a gentleman’s wardrobe and had resigned himself to submitting to the ministrations of Prin-Hallsey’s valet, one of the many servants that came part and parcel with the estate.

  Once he grew accustomed to his new environs and mastered the gentleman’s life, he would invite that certain lady and several others of her set to a house party – two or three weeks of shooting, riding, balls, and fine dinners. She would see his success, his transformation, and realize that she had been wrong to reject him, to concur with her father’s assessment that he was beneath her. And Matthew would win her at last.

  Isabella.

  She had been only eighteen when she’d rejected him, and was still young. He had been surprised and relieved to learn that she had not yet married. How he had worried she would. Yes, Parker confided, an engagement had recently been announced. But as long as she was not married, there was still hope – slim though it might be.

  Matthew acknowledged he was likely deceiving himself. That in reality he had no chance. But he could not accept defeat. It was not in his nature. He was determined to wage one final campaign to secure her affections.

  Matthew told himself his plan was not purely selfish. After all, he had written to invite Lieutenant William Hart, who had once served as his first officer, to reside with him. Hart had been injured in the line of duty, and Matthew felt responsible for the man. Besides, he truly liked Hart and looked forward to furthering his acquaintance with his brother officer.

  But first, Matthew hoped to persuade his parents to leave the
ir small, damp cottage and live with him – to allow his mother the comfort and care she so richly deserved after a lifetime of scraping by. That was a selfless wish, was it not?

  Then why did his palms sweat at the thought of presenting the offer to his father?

  Matthew surveyed the small study of his modest childhood home, situated on an unfashionable side street in Swindon. He looked at his retired-clerk father, sitting in his favorite chair, one leg crossed over the other, a book in one hand, pipe in the other, a curl of aromatic smoke rising. In fact, whenever Matthew smelled that sharp sweet smell of tobacco he was instantly transported back to this humble room in which he had spent so many boyhood evenings before leaving for naval academy.

  But instead of being struck with how familiar the scene was, his father in his favorite room, his favorite chair, engaged in his favorite pastime, Matthew was instead struck by how different his father looked. How aged.

  His shoulders were stooped, and the hand holding the heavy volume trembled under its weight. His once thinning grey hair was now a snowy fringe around the back of his head. He still wore long side-whiskers, but these were now white as well. Age spots and wrinkles competed for preeminence over the top of his head, reminding Matthew of the naval chart of a busy trading route. A thick pouch of webbed wrinkles framed each eye, though his eyes at least were as clear and blue as Matthew remembered.

  His mother, it seemed, had fared worse. Her appearance was much the same as ever – cheerful brown eyes, light brown curls threaded with silver, her frame slight but for the rounded middle that evidenced her fondness for sweets. But Matthew had not been home a quarter hour before he realized his mother was not well. Her breathing was audibly labored, as if she had just run in from the rain. There was also a wheezing sound in her chest that alarmed him.

  “It is just the damp, my dear. No need to worry,” she’d replied when he asked. “I shall be perfectly well, now you’re home safe and sound.”

  He took her hand. “I have let a fine house, Mamma. Large enough for all of us and not as damp as this one. I would like you both to come and live with me. It will make a nice change for you, and a change might do you good.”

  “Your mother is fine here, as am I,” his father said. “We are not about to be uprooted at our age. This is our home, Matthew. Not good enough for you now – is that it?”

  Matthew felt deflated and defensive at once. “I did not say that, sir.”

  “You were born and raised here, don’t forget. Our friends are here, our church is here, your brother’s grave is here. We’ll not leave so easily.”

  His mother bit her lip and squeezed Matthew’s hand. “Thank you, my dear. You are very kind to think of us. But you need the society of other young people. People as successful and clever as you are. Not a couple of old fools like us.”

  “Mother, you are not – ”

  “We’re fine, Matthew,” his father interrupted. “We’ve not got one foot in the grave yet.” He rose. “If your mother needs something, I shall be the one to provide it. We don’t need your blood money buying us fancies and dainties.” He strode through the door.

  Matthew’s objection followed him from the room. “Blood money? It is hard-earned prize money from His Britannic Majesty’s Navy.”

  “Don’t mind your father, Matthew,” his mother soothed, patting his arm. “It’s his pride talking – that’s all. Hates the thought of not being able to give me the kind of life he thinks I want.” Tears brightened her eyes. “Without Peter, I can never be truly happy, but I am content, Matthew. Especially now you’re home. And I want you to be content as well.”

  His father reentered the room, teacup in hand. “Setting yourself up in a manor house like some lord, buying dandy clothes, and puttin’ on airs to woo some fickle female? I’ll have no part in that.”

  “John, please,” Helen Bryant said, then turned plaintive eyes toward Matthew. “My dear, if a fine house is what you want, then I am happy for you. But if you feel you need to do all this to earn the affection of a certain lady, as your father says, then I must question whether this young woman is truly right for you. Truly loves you for who you are.”

  Matthew sighed. “In the real world, Mamma, blood and money are all that matter. And if you are nobody by birth, then wealth and connection are all one has.”

  “Nobody?” his father echoed. “You dare sit in my house and call us nobodies?”

  “That is not what I meant, Father. But in society – ”

  “I don’t care a fig about society, nor did I raise you and your brother and sister to do so. Poor Peter would never have chased after temporal success the way you are.”

  A moment of pained and hallowed silence followed, as it always did whenever John Bryant mentioned the name of his deceased son.

  “You’ll be visiting your brother’s grave before you leave, I trust?” he said hoarsely.

  Matthew winced. Had he overstayed his welcome already?

  His mother’s big eyes beseeched his once more. “Do you really love her, Matthew? Or are you out to prove that she was wrong to refuse you before?”

  Matthew rubbed a hand over his face. “Yes. On both counts.”

  A few hours later, Matthew rode to the market town of Highworth, some six miles northeast of Swindon. Once there, he dismounted before a small, tidy cottage near the church. As he tied his horse to the rail, the door burst open

  “Matthew!” A dainty young woman ran to him and threw her arms around his neck.

  “Lucy.” He embraced her, then held her at arm’s length to soak in the look of her. The caramel hair, several shades lighter than his own, the snapping brown eyes so like his, the deep dimples on either side of her grinning mouth. So much the same as ever, but different too. The years they had been apart had been very kind to his sister, and her face radiated joy and confidence.

  He had been away at sea when Lucy was wed, but she had written to tell him of the happy event. He had been glad and relieved to hear of it for more than one reason.

  “How wonderful you look,” he said. “Marriage must suit you.”

  “Indeed it does. You, on the other hand, look awful.” Her eyes sparkled. “I suppose you have been to see Mamma and Papa?”

  “I have.”

  “Then it is good you have come to see me. I shall cheer you!” She took his arm and led him inside. “I suppose Papa was . . . distant, as usual?”

  “Yes. One would think I was just home from prison instead of the war.”

  “He does love you, Matthew. Never doubt it.”

  But Matthew did doubt it.

  While Lucy had not entirely escaped their mother’s endless grief and their father’s detachment, she had borne it better. Her constant cheerfulness and ready smile had garnered their unconscious affection, rather like a charming, obedient pug one mindlessly stroked for comfort. He supposed that was not fair – Lucy indeed brought warmth and consolation to John and Helen Bryant, while his own attempts to offer the same had been soundly rejected.

  “And where is Charles?” he asked, seating himself on the worn but comfortable settee.

  “Away on parish business – visiting the workhouse. I should have gone with him, but I was indisposed earlier.”

  “Indisposed?” He grinned. “You look in perfect health to me. Do not tell me you feigned some passing malady to avoid paying calls.”

  She settled herself in the armchair closest to him. “It is not some passing malady, Matthew. It is a baby.”

  His breath left him. “A baby?”

  “Yes, or it will be, in seven months or so.”

  Matthew felt a strange combination of surprise, pleasure, and unexpected envy. He pushed the latter aside and smiled. “Lucy, what happy news! Still, I must say I am rather put out. It was one thing to marry before your older brother managed the feat. But to have a child before me as well? Unpardonable.” He reached over and playfully tweaked her nose.

  “It is not my fault, Matthew. If you were not so bent on winn
ing the hand of a certain unworthy female . . .”

  “It was I who was unworthy, do not forget.”

  “I do not forget. And what I remember is that she used you cruelly.”

  “Cruel? It was her father who refused my suit.”

  “Which she knew all along he would do. Far better never to offer you hope, to lead you to think she would wed you if only she were allowed. Had she never encouraged you and resigned herself to marrying at her level, you would have given up and fallen for some other girl long ago.”

  Matthew found himself frowning. “Lucy, I prefer you not speak ill of her. She may be your sister yet.”

  Lucy shook her head, a sad look on her pretty face. “The right woman for you is out there, Matthew. And she will not care if you are a baker, a cobbler, or a captain. I would not. Look at Charles and me. Talk about unworthy.”

  “Hush. Do not say that. You, who are suddenly so grown up, and so wise.”

  She smiled, even as tears brightened her dark eyes. “If I am wise now, I came to it late – as well you know.”

  He squeezed her hand. “Let us not speak of it. It is in the past.”

  “Yes.” Lucy exhaled, pressing her eyes closed. “And thankfully so.”

  A few days after Easter, Mariah stood at the window in her bedchamber, staring out at nothing. Seeing nothing . . . except for her mounting problems.

  Still no word from Henry.

  She and Dixon had spent a quiet Easter together. It was the first year in memory Mariah had not traveled to visit family over the Easter holidays. Together the two of them had boiled eggs, saved from Lent, with red onion skins to dye them red. “To remember,” Dixon said in reverent tones, “the blood Christ shed to cover our sins.” Although her stalwart friend had not directed the words at her, still Mariah felt their pinch.

  On Good Friday, they baked hot cross buns, and on Sunday, at Dixon’s insistence, they attended church together in the village. It wasn’t that Mariah disdained or blamed God for what had happened. She simply no longer felt worthy of Him. After the service, they had shared a modest dinner of mutton, turnips, boiled eggs, and left over buns with marmalade. As usual, Martin took his meal outside. No one mentioned the dry mutton. They all knew there was no money for ham.