A Gentleman Under the Mistletoe (The Lord Julian Mysteries #7)

Chapter 14

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Aunt Bertha, like an artillery crew firing off a shot to gauge wind and range, embarked on her usual carping over the Sunday afternoon roast.

“Not to state the obvious, but potatoes are a pedestrian accompaniment to a decent cut of beef. I’ve always said so, and while I know root crops are an inevitable penance on winter menus, carrots are more colorful and nutritious.”

Mrs. Gwinnett’s version of mashed potatoes included sour cream and grated cheese as well as chives and dashes of subtle seasonings. I had hallucinated about her potatoes when in captivity, and the generous portion I’d put on my plate was nearly gone.

My experience in the churchyard had left me chilled and frustrated, and my obligations since divine services had included a mandatory session of throwing a ball for the rubbishing Spaniel puppy. I had not ridden Atlas in days, and a light snow had begun to fall as we’d sat down to our weekly feast.

I could not and would not tolerate disrespect toward Mrs. Gwinnett’s potatoes.

“I invite the company to play a game with me.” Because I tended to hold my peace at meals, my announcement earned the attention of the whole table. Even Healy hadn’t dodged the Sunday repast, and Aunt Crosby was still in her seat halfway through the meal.

“Games at a formal meal are ill-bred,” Aunt Bertha observed. “Not done, even during the holidays, which have not officially commenced.”

“This is a family supper,” I countered. “Far from formal, and you will lead us in this game, Aunt Bertha. The rules of play are simple. We each say something nice or mention one thing for which we are in that moment grateful. I am grateful, for example, for Mrs. Gwinnett’s luscious, steaming-hot, hearty, exquisitely flavorful potatoes. ” I took a bite while the whole table watched.

“Delicious. I learned this game,” I went on, “when I came home from Waterloo and all my good spirits felt as if they’d expired on the battlefield with so many of my friends. When I’d despair, which was moment by moment, I would challenge myself to think of one thing that was good, wonderful, sweet, and positive. I would write it down. By the end of the day, I’d have quite a list.”

These people, most of whom I considered family, were looking at me as if I’d put forth a decree that we must all take ship for Cathay.

“You all recall the state I was in,” I said. “Jumping at shadows, unable to appreciate a decent meal, my conversation a procession of gloomy monosyllables, when I could converse at all.”

I hadn’t intended to remind anybody of the poor condition I’d been in a scant year ago. Kerrick in particular was watching me closely, as was Hyperia.

“Go on, laddie,” Kerrick said, winking at his wife. “I know certain exhausted parents who could use a few rounds of this game.”

“I’m fond of dogs,” Pettigrew said. “I am grateful, rather, for the old hound who kept me company when Mandy went off to East Anglia. Beast went with me everywhere, and I admit he heard a few unrepeatable sentiments from me. Never told a soul. Bertha, you are to lead us in this game, I believe.”

“Yes, Bertha,” the duchess said. “Give us an inspiring example.”

Bertha picked up her fork and considered her plate. If she managed to turn this simple exercise into another vehicle for her complaints, I’d toss her out into the snow.

“I am grateful,” she said at length, “for memories. For some memories.” When she raised her gaze to Pettigrew across the table, she was neither smiling nor frowning.

“I can second that,” Healy said before Pettigrew could respond. “Grateful for memories of the holidays with my parents, who were particularly fond of Yuletide. I’m also grateful for the footmen who keep the library so toasty. Aunt Crosby?”

“How can you be grateful for a hound, Mr. Pettigrew?” Crosby asked. “Smelly, loud creatures with invariably muddy paws. Their tails alone leave a path of destruction, and when they bark, half the shire hears their incessant noise. Cats are so very much more dignified.”

“Now, Crosby,” Bertha said reprovingly. “Follow the rules. I did.”

“Very well, then. Shawls,” Aunt Crosby said, gathering both of hers closer. “At this time of year, I am exceedingly grateful for shawls.”

“Teething babies,” Ginny said. “A teething baby is a healthy little creature embarking on the important business of growing into a rambunctious child. I am grateful for teething babies, also exhausted.”

Kerrick lifted his glass in her direction, and so it went on around the table. Aunt Bertha refrained from further fault- finding, and we even managed our mince pies without hearing criticism of the spices, the presentation, the sherry folded into the whipped cream, or the recipe used to concoct the dish.

Healy offered to read from Twelfth Night for the elders in the library—an acceptable diversion even on the Sabbath—and Hyperia and I slipped off to her parlor.

“How far have you read?” she asked as I tossed a square of peat onto the fire.

“Through university and into Harry’s careening-about-London phase. Harry has made the decision to join up. He’s dithering between a captaincy and a major’s post, and finding something to dislike about every regiment that has available openings.”

She rearranged pillows on the sofa. “You suspect he truly did not want to serve?”

“I suspect he was waiting for me to finish my studies, because he knew that I, as the extra spare, would be expected to buy my colors. He waited until I’d made my choice, and then he followed suit so to speak.”

Hyperia wrapped her arms around me. “It all grew complicated, didn’t it, when he died? The motives and the memories?”

I held her familiar shape and warmth, breathed in the floral fragrance she favored, and was comforted.

“Complicated, and also simplified. Harry is gone. Nothing I can wish, pray, promise, or do will change that. Rereading his journals makes me miss him, but also reminds me that Harry and I were very different creatures, and that difference was sometimes a burden for both of us.”

Harry had not, in fact, evidenced as much liking for me on the pages of his journal as I had attributed to him. Though he was the spare, he grumbled frequently, as an older sibling would, about his juniors. Resentment sat just beneath the surface of what he admitted, and yet, he’d gone to Spain in part to protect me, as I had gone to protect him.

I searched through the shelves for the next volume of his memoirs, the one that chronicled Harry’s transition into the military, his officer’s training, such as it was, and his first experiences of battle on the Peninsula.

“Sometimes,” Hyperia said, tossing a pillow into a wing chair, “I didn’t like Harry very much. He had a bit of Aunt Bertha’s ability to see what could have been improved, in his never-very-humble opinion.”

“He had all sorts of ideas for how I could have been improved.” I found the journal I sought, the penultimate in the series. Once Harry had begun spying in earnest, he’d resorted to a cryptic personal calendar and ceased journaling.

“One does not improve on perfection,” Hyperia said, appropriating a corner of the sofa and fishing in her workbasket. “I shouldn’t say this, but I have wondered if Harry even knew how to be happy. Jolly, yes. Flirtatious and boisterous and funny, but his happiness was always a question, in my mind.”

The discussion was unusually frank, even for us, and both a relief and a sadness. “Harry made a hash of matters with Leander’s mother,” I said, taking the place in the middle of the sofa. “He died knowing the child had not been well provided for, and he died having disobeyed orders and knowing that because he’d done so, I had as well. I contemplate his death with a great deal of guilt, but also… puzzlement. What the hell was he doing? He had a child…”

Perhaps this was the question at the root of all my investigating: Why had Harry left camp that night? What had been so important that he’d abandoned the safety of the camp, abandoned me , and all but invited the French to take him prisoner?

And as far as I knew, Harry might have left behind half a dozen children, five of whom were now struggling in abject poverty. I had not known my brother as well as I’d thought I did, and that gave his absence a fresh coat of sorrow.

Hyperia extracted her embroidery hoop from her workbasket. “Jules, do you ever wonder if Harry was working for the French?”

“Yes.” The admission was disloyal, also honest, and with Hyperia I had vowed to be honest. “He was as fluent with languages as I am, cannier about people, charming and bold, like Uncle Thomas. Bold to the point of risking his life.”

“All soldiers risk their lives.” Hyperia smoothed her hand over satin rose petals and shiny green leaves. “I am angry with Lord Harry. For his sake, you risked your life and your honor. For his sake, your reputation has taken numerous beatings. I’d say that evens the score between you and his memory.”

I wrapped my arm around her shoulders. “Harry would understand your ire. If he was a double agent for the French, I don’t want to know about it. More likely, he was involved in some bit of intrigue that made for strange bedfellows.”

She took up her needle, which sported golden thread. “Such as?”

“We always knew who the enemy was in a general sense, but in specific instances, pragmatic considerations sometimes prevailed over politics. Wellington’s soldiers were not paid timely, and thus the sums owing grew to enormous proportions. The French wanted the lot of it when the pay wagons finally rolled, while Spanish Bonapartists and royalists alike wanted English soldiers to get their packets.”

“Because that coin would be spent in Spanish taverns, brothels, and markets, while the French army survived by pillaging.”

“Bonapart called it foraging, but yes. In that instance, Spanish guerrillas distracted the French patrols looking for the paymaster’s convoy of wagons, and Spanish Bonapartists let the distractions serve their intended purpose despite being tasked with thwarting the guerrillas.”

That was the tale as far as I and my fellow intelligence officers had made it out. The men had been paid at long last, the French frustrated, and the Spanish of every loyalty indirectly enriched.

“Then Harry might have been following some obscure set of orders when he left camp?”

“Possibly.” But not likely. He would have warned me of his departure, however vaguely. I considered the journal in my lap and opened it to the first page. A folded sheet of paper slid out, the late duke’s handwriting in evidence.

“What’s that?” Hyperia asked, poking her needle up through the fabric.

“One of His Grace’s letters, probably from Harry’s university days. Papa was forever exhorting us about diseases and drunkenness. His advice was sound, and he applied it with a light hand.” I tucked the letter between the pages of the journal. “I don’t feel much like reading more of Harry’s commentary just at the moment.”

Hyperia put aside her embroidery between one stitch and the next. “You were telling the truth at supper, weren’t you? You made lists, every day, moment by moment, and read them over and over.”

My eyes had been worse then. I’d had to print the words letter by letter, using the light of only two or three candles in a darkened room. “I still have my lists.”

We stayed like that, half embracing on the sofa, while the snow came down, the day darkened, and I pondered my brother’s demise. Harry had not resisted capture, but had, in fact, wandered straight into a French patrol’s waiting guns. By design? Because he’d sensed I was on his trail and about to blunder into the same patrol? He’d left camp for a compelling reason.

Why, Harry? Old Jules, in his dogged, dull, and dutiful way still wanted to know why.

I slept badly that night and woke up cross—more cross than usual.

I rose on Monday, the twenty-third of December, annoyed with the late Lord Harry, annoyed with Arthur—a less conscientious duke would have had far less mail—and annoyed with myself. I had been putting off an inevitable if somewhat difficult conversation, and needed to address the oversight.

“I intend that you shall have your own mount,” I said to Atticus as I tossed the ball for the puppy. The creature gamboled across the trampled snow—I had appropriated the yearling paddock for this discussion—and, ears flapping, tail wagging, the puppy brought back the ball.

“I have me own mount,” Atticus replied. “Nobody else rides Ladon, and he’s only driven to market if Halifax needs a rest.”

“Ladon has been a good teacher,” I said, tossing the ball yet again. “You’ve done well with him and learned a lot from him. You nonetheless need a steed who can manage a course of jumps and canter more than fifty yards without getting knackered. Ladon’s getting too old for such expectations.”

Atticus climbed the first fence rail and watched the puppy root about in the snow. “Ladon’s younger than you, guv.”

“In horse years, he is much my senior. The truth is, I have on my hands an excellent mount for a half-grown boy and nobody to put him to use.”

“Give him to Leander. Lee’s always bangin’ on about the cavalry and his papa were a soldier. You won’t get him off that pony except to pee or play with his puppy.” No rancor colored that observation, no jealousy. Atticus was simply sharing the wisdom of an older child regarding one of his juniors.

“I had intended this pony for Leander, to be honest, but somebody has provided another mount, smaller, better-suited to Leander’s shorter legs and uneducated seat. I’m giving you my first choice, though the beast would have been largish for Leander’s present dimensions.”

“You’re going toplofty on me, guv. Lee will be tall, like his sainted papa and you and the duke.”

The little dog found his treasure and came trotting back as if he’d located the crown jewels beneath the snow.

“I am not giving you Leander’s castoff, Atticus. I could have sold this pony for a goodly sum, could have turned him over to the grooms as Ladon’s understudy. I am giving him to you in fee simple, absolute.”

Atticus pretended to make a swipe for the ball in the puppy’s mouth, and the puppy dodged away. “What’s ’at mean? Free, simple, resolute, or whatever?”

“This pony will not belong to the estate, or to His Grace, or to me. He will belong to you, not only to ride, but also to own.”

Atticus pulled off a glove and dangled it before the puppy, who dropped the ball at the sight of a possible new toy. The glove, of course, went back on Atticus’s hand, while the ball was neatly snatched from beneath the canine’s nose.

“Why?” Atticus asked, tossing the ball straight up into the bright morning air and catching it, while the puppy parked on his haunches and watched intently. “Why give me a valuable creature?”

Because I’d fallen asleep wondering how many other by-blows Harry had left behind to fend as best they could in a mean and contrary world. Because I’d claimed to want children, and here was a child in my care whose prospects I could improve.

Because no little boy, no child of any description, should feel as if he was a tolerated happenstance rather than a treasured boon from heaven.

“I’m giving you this equine as a challenge and an inspiration. You will be expected to look after him, to groom and feed him most mornings, muck out his stall, and keep an eye on his health.”

“I do that now with Atlas, though sometimes he won’t lift his feet for me to pick out his hooves. What aren’t you tellin’ me, guv?”

Canny little blighter. He fired the ball across the paddock with particular force.

“The rest of the offer goes like this: Once you’ve broken your fast and tended to your responsibilities in the stable, you will spend some hours in the schoolroom. If you want a gentleman’s education, I’ll see that you get it. French, Latin, ciphering, and history, for a start. Botany, Greek, and literature can come later, and you’d do well to take an interest in the pianoforte. If you’d like, we can also arrange some drawing lessons, but one can only learn so much in the course of a morning.”

The puppy was tiring. His explorations were less energetic, and when he found the ball this time, he brought it back and dropped it at Atticus’s feet.

“And how to shoot,” Atticus said, stroking the dog’s head. “You said when I have the English and French well in hand, you’ll teach me how to shoot.”

“I did say that, and now I’m saying you’ll have professional instruction, if you wish. Tutors, a music master, a drawing master, and so forth.” To impose a governess on the boy was an outlandish notion, both because he didn’t need one and because he’d be insulted by the very thought.

Another hard toss, with the puppy trotting after it. “But no pony, unless I take up with the tutors?”

“The pony will be yours regardless of your decision regarding educational opportunities. The pony is also not your Christmas token.”

Atticus squinted up at me. “Ruddy big not-my-token, guv. What are you playin’ at?”

He asked the vernacular form of why , again. “I could tell you that you’ve been a good boy, but it’s more that you will be a good man. A good man with some means and education can have a greater impact on the world than a good man without resources.”

“Here’s a pony, and I’m welcome in the schoolroom? What’s the rest of it?”

I heard in his tone that I’d blundered tactically. To him, a lad who’d survived the poorhouse on native vigor and the occasional slice of buttered bread, the schoolroom was not a purgatory to be endured, but a privilege reserved for his supposed betters.

A gift horse in addition to a gift pony aroused Atticus’s considerable capacity for suspicion.

“Why does there have to be a rest of it?” I asked as the puppy found his ball, bounded a few steps in our direction, then slowed to a tail-wagging walk.

“There’s a rest of it,” Atticus said, “because you think like that, guv. I think about what’s for nooning, and you think about the week’s menu. Maybe intelligence officers have to range wide in their pondering, or half dukes do.”

And yet, Atticus was asking me what the true price of his pony would be, a question that looked far beyond his next meal.

“You will still have a great deal of liberty, particularly in fair weather. Liberty to read, to roam, to ride, or to study what catches your interest. I’m told most boys go through a phase of collecting bugs, but I never felt the need. You will no longer have responsibilities belowstairs, if you embark on the course I propose. You will have your own quarters in the nursery suite. The tutors won’t hover over you every minute, and I will expect some independent scholarship of you. You might eventually decide that you’d like to try German or Italian, for example.”

“You’ll make a gentleman of me?”

“Would that be so bad?” We were lobbing the why questions back and forth, and I had a premonition that this graduate of the poorhouse might make a formidable solicitor.

“Just doesn’t make sense,” Atticus said. “I’m good with the horses. Daughtery said so.”

“I am good with horses myself, as is His Grace. That did not mean we were to be grooms.”

I was being logical, and logic was not always the most convincing argument. “I want you to have options, Atticus. His Grace, the duke, grew up knowing he was bound for the title—nothing he could do about it. Lord Harry was the spare, and again, that precluded him from many avenues that might have made him happier. I went for a soldier, as Harry did, my other choices being diplomacy, letters, or the clergy, and I was suited for none of the above. You, my good fellow, will have far more numerous options.”

“Jamison would tell me to stop frettin’ and be glad I don’t have to clean any more muddy boots.”

“There’s a bit more to it than muddy boots, young sir. If you attend to your studies now, you will have more freedom for the rest of your life.” Freedom to make his own way not just in name but equipped with the resources to make that freedom meaningful. Freedom to starve had been his from birth, poor lad.

I could certainly do better by Atticus than that, and yet, he hesitated.

“Jamison will still give you advice if you become more of a scholar.” Though Atticus apparently perceived that his change of station would have repercussions. “He might, in fact, give you more advice. Daughtery will still correct you if you leave a lead rope on the ground, and Mrs. Gwinnett will still turn a blind eye when you purloin the occasional biscuit.”

What I could not explain was the urgency of the situation. If Atticus declined my offer now, then season by season, trading the lot of a junior groom for that of informal ward would become harder and harder, not only because Atticus would fall further behind the expected gentlemanly curriculum, but also because his loyalties to the other grooms and staff would bind him ever more tightly to his muck fork and boot polish.

“May I think about it, guv?”

May I , not can I . A few months ago, he’d had no idea of the distinction.

“The morning after Twelfth Night, I want an answer. You can continue on as you have been, as my tiger and a junior groom, complete with your own mount, or you can embark on a proper education.”

He tossed the ball to me, though the puppy continued to watch him. “Don’t tell anybody, guv. I want to think in private.”

And he wanted to think at length. A barrister, then, rather than a solicitor. A lord justice eventually, perhaps.

“One sympathizes with the need for quiet reflection. We’d best return the puppy to his blanket.”

“I’ll be sure he has fresh water.” Atticus picked up the panting little Spaniel. “Happy Christmas, guv.”

He did not sound particularly happy, and maybe that was for the best when confronted with such profound change. It occurred to me to remind him of what would remain the same.

“Atticus, when I go investigating, I will still expect your aid and support, just as I rely on Miss Hyperia to aid and support those ventures.”

“You’ll need a tiger?”

“On occasion, or a charming boy to fly a kite with me when I need an excuse to spend an hour in Hyde Park, or a lad to accompany me on what appears to be a quiet hack. One cannot be specific, but I’d be a fool to give up such a valuable ally in the face of pressing riddles.”

He brightened somewhat as the puppy tried to lick his chin. “You’re not a fool, mostly.”

“Such lavish praise will give me the flutters. Get the dog inside and think about what I’ve said.”

He saluted and marched away, the puppy in his arms.

Atticus would doubtless consult with his familiars, and they would give him wise and kind counsel. Between now and January seventh, the boy might change his mind several times, but I was hopeful that he’d choose the schoolroom over the stable.

The choice had to be his. That mattered to me.

I returned to the Hall, my eyes already protesting the day’s sunny outing. The day’s correspondence awaited.

“Lord Sisyphus,” I muttered. Atticus would love the mythological tales, and he was such a gifted mimic, he’d learn languages more easily than most.

As I settled myself in Arthur’s chair and did an initial sorting of the pile of letters stacked in the middle of the blotter, I realized that for the first time that holiday season, I had offered a gift to somebody that had not immediately been rejected, topped, or rendered irrelevant.

I had finally won a round against the mysterious benefactor—and a very important round. Feeling somewhat cheered by that observation, I got to work wielding the figurative muck fork for which my education and station had suited me.