by Lyndsay Faye
When is a butler not really a butler?
Gingerly, I flexed my foot. My experience apart from London and Lowan Bridge School, each savage places, was limited to Mamma’s midnight picnics beneath the rustling leaves. At the thought of a butler ejecting a guest, however, and all the happy times Sardar Singh had sat with Sahjara and me whilst Mr. Thornfield was gone—something irregular was afoot. And what was Mr. Singh, if he was not the butler?
What has Mr. Augustus Sack to do with a trunk missing from the Punjab?
This seemed a rather more dangerous question, but one which required answering—and to that end, I sat upon the edge of my bed and shifted my weight until I stood fully.
“Bugger,” I gasped.
Hobbling as far as my mirror was excruciating; leaning against the edge of the dressing table, I examined myself. At twenty-four, I had not gone far towards matching my mother’s undomesticated beauty, and thus I did not often seek my own reflection. My dark hair still undulated irregularly no matter how much care I took in pinning it up, my eyes were as large as a feline’s but still the same plain brown, and my face still invited comparisons to the enchanted creatures which left England long ago.
I pinched the colour back into my cheeks, as I had no wish to alarm Sahjara further … not when I was so badly in need of answers and she the best purveyor of that precious, perilous commodity. The past, no one knows better than myself, is a silent stalker, and I headed for the schoolroom with the express intention of seeing her pursuer more plain.
EIGHTEEN
“I see, at intervals, the glance of a curious sort of bird through the close-set bars of the cage: a vivid, restless, resolute captive is there; were it but free, it would soar cloud-high.”
Oh, that was so dreadful—and I didn’t understand what Charles meant by joking that you had a knife, but I hope you aren’t vexed.” Sahjara had put on a brave face, but I insisted that we were too rattled for lessons; so we sat in the bow window, pillows stuffed behind our backs, our feet tangled together like schoolmates, gazing at the grounds.
I pulled the small folding blade from my pocket and tossed it once, quickly returning the weapon to its hiding place. “It wasn’t a joke—London is dangerous. As for Mr. Sack, he was most insolent to your guardian.”
Sahjara rolled her head against the wall tiredly. “He is not Sikh like Mr. Singh and Mr. Thornfield and myself, only an East India Company man.”
“I meant to ask whether knives were de rigueur for your people,” I teased.
“Oh goodness, yes! The pure ones wear five articles of faith.”
“Your comb is a religious symbol? And the metal bracelets as well?”
“Yes, these are the kanga and the kara—the comb and the wristband. We’re also meant to wear a short sword called a kirpan, but here in England we find knives more convenient because even though the wars are over, we must remain invisible. And Charles says that if we have to hide in plain sight, then we must make allowances over what will make us look noteworthy to Britons, and fix the symbols to suit us here in England. At first Sardar was a bit uncomfortable over changing tradition, but later he agreed since the kachera—those are our knee breeches—would make us look absolutely ridiculous here, Charles says, and God is in the Guru after all, not in outward forms.”
We must remain invisible, I thought, wondering at her words. We have to hide in plain sight.
“You said five?” I asked aloud.
“Oh yes, long hair—kesh.”
“It looks more natural on you and Mr. Singh than it does on Mr. Thornfield.”
Sahjara regarded me with the eyes of a kitten tracking a string. “I’ve never seen him without it, so I couldn’t say. But I do think Charles handsome—don’t you?”
“He’s everything a gentleman ought to be, I’m sure.” Unsettled, I cast my eyes out at the lingering snowfall, the spun-sugar dust coating the bare limbs of the trees. “Are his gloves also religious, then?”
My charge frowned. “I don’t think so.”
“Perhaps they could hide burns or marks?”
“Heavens, that would be awful.” She shrugged. “I almost forget they’re there. They must look awfully peculiar to an Englishwoman.”
Englishwoman, I thought warmly; now I knew more of their history, the appellation was magnificently sensible, as they all originated in the Punjab and regarded me as the foreigner.
“Mr. Singh and Mr. Thornfield seem like fast friends.”
“Yes, they grew up together!” Sahjara smiled, tapping the edge of her boot against my skirts. “Charles was born in Lahore, you know, and Sardar—well, that isn’t his name, but anyhow—Sardar’s family traded in indigo and jaggery. They were frightfully rich before the wars.”
“Sardar isn’t his name?” I repeated, mystified.
“Oh, no.” Sahjara hopped out of the window, idly twirling her skirts. “All that rubbish Charles was talking about Sardar being incapable of jokes couldn’t be further from the truth. Mr. Thornfield said that for us to live without much remark here in England, he would have to be the butler, and he changed his name not ten seconds later to mean ‘high commander.’ May I just run downstairs and see whether Dalbir’s hoof is any better? Mr. Sack’s visit left me so flustered that I might almost have forgot.”
• • •
This soup is delicious.”
I sat across from Mr. Thornfield in the dining room. After admonishing myself not to gape, I reminded myself you’ve never been here before, and then gaped as I pleased. Every placid English landscape in which the dogs had contemplated the sheep and the sheep contemplated the dogs was replaced with decorative mirrors. There were as many gilt-edged and silver-embossed mirrors as there were days upon a calendar, multiplying us ad infinitum until there were a thousand Jane Steeles and a thousand Charles Thornfields.
“Is it?” he answered.
Mr. Thornfield’s voice, I noted, sounded much the richer for what it did not say. It occurred to me that I wanted to know what his favourite summer had been like, whether it happened in England or the Punjab, hot desert sandscapes versus gleaming green afternoons, and then it occurred to me this topic was egregiously far afield from my true mission.
I waited for him to speak; no overtures were forthcoming.
“I think the weather will hold now the snow has stopped—don’t you?”
Mr. Thornfield chuckled. He wore a swallowtail coat and a thick rust-coloured cravat—which I thought hardly fair, since my best governess disguise was a drab thing of dove-grey satin striped with a cream pattern and topped with a high lace collar, and it is beastly to be seated across from a bluntly handsome fellow when one looks about as captivating as gravel. Had we been in London, and I my nefarious self, I would have found a secondhand dress of rose silk and filled my hair with tiny yellow tea roses.
“Though of course, your estate is charming covered in white—it looks like a fairyland.”
When again Mr. Thornfield said nothing, I smiled, my heart shivering in my chest; was he wary, even angry? He returned the amiable look, however, and I reached for a second helping of the blistered bread Mr. Singh had left.
“I imagined that you would be more talkative since you seemed eager to speak with me, sir.”
“Good Lord, no—that would be dreadful strategy.” Mr. Thornfield poured me more claret. “I’ve a knack for silence. I’ll remain quite closemouthed and simply await developments.”
“May I ask why?”
“Well, I’ve two topics on my mind—but if you truly would rather pretend all governesses carry knives, then I admit England would be the livelier for it. And if you won’t mention the fact that priggish Company executives aren’t often driven out of breakfast rooms with the same weapon, then I choose the topic of soup over snow.”
I wished that I could have been Jane Steele and laughed, and flirted; since I was Jane Stone, however, I chose my words with care. “I cannot explain the latter, but I will certainly explain why I carry a knife.”
Charles Thornfield’s sun-burnished face gave me the sly look of encouragement I have seen many rogues attempt, all having failed miserably by comparison.
I sat forward. “Mr. Thornfield, I am here under false pretences.”
The master of the house angled his bullish chin at me and took a generous sip of wine.
Lies, honest reader, are organic—they can shift from outright falsehoods into half-truths and even truths, generally when you like the person to whom you are lying, in the way wormlike creatures become butterflies out of sudden inspiration. I was inspired on that evening by knives and tiny paintings and the fond glances Sahjara and Mr. Thornfield and Mr. Singh all cast at one another.
“To boot, I am probably not fit to be a governess.”
Mr. Thornfield snorted sceptically.
“My initial letter to you was correct in every salient particular, of course—I attended a school called Lowan Bridge.” My heart beat a hornet’s-wing tattoo. “But I did not mention that, when I was young, I was accosted in an ungentlemanly manner by my cousin. I think his presumptuousness and later our headmaster’s cruelty may have endowed me with a certain fear of men. I go armed due to these experiences. I have been called many things, Mr. Thornfield—pigheaded, wayward, brazen—and yet, no one feels the grievousness of my shortcomings more keenly than I.” Unexpectedly raw-voiced, I stopped.
It was hardly a thorough confession; it was a gift, however, a small piece of my saga. If gaining his regard meant I turned over my entire history, I could never oblige the gentleman—but I could proffer a biography with neither shadows nor colours, a vague outline of the person I wanted him to know but did not dare to reveal. Should I expose all, he would surely hate me, and then where would I find myself?
If Mr. Thornfield was mortified, I never saw it; instead, he shifted with a thoughtful finger edging his temple.
“You’ll want to know about the swearing as well?” I asked timidly.
Mr. Thornfield laughed—the laugh of a soldier who has brushed the sands of the Sutlej from his trousers, told jokes which should have made any woman blush. “Of course I want to know about the swearing—it was damned expertly done.”
My pulse tingled in the tips of my fingers. “When I left school, I went to London because I’d no family who would take me. Have you any experience with distant relations yourself, Mr. Thornfield?” I added slyly, gesturing at our surroundings.
“This place was empty when we took possession, and we should not be here had it been otherwise, Miss Stone.” He shrugged, watching his wine swirl gently. “At the risk of sounding a deuced ingrate, it was a stroke of luck not to have made their acquaintance, if y’ follow.”
“Of course,” I hastened to assure him, fearful of pressing. “I quite understand and meant only that penury requires one to live among coarse people, which is the other reason I carry a knife, and the reason I have an atrocious vocabulary—if you worry that I might endanger your ward, Mr. Thornfield, having already endangered your person, I cannot blame you; but I can admit I am not a typical governess and hope that my present candour brings you some mollification.”
I awaited judgement as if being sentenced to Newgate.
Mr. Thornfield let his spoon clatter to the dish with a ring of finality. “If you think I’m intimidated by your weaponry, you’ve clearly not visited the billiards room. And there are practically stars in the Young Marvel’s eyes when she speaks of you, so … consider me mollified. You must feel odd being the only knife-brandishing governess outside of London?”
I tipped my glass to him, endlessly thankful he could not see my knees knocking.
“Yes, sir. You must feel odd being the master of a Sikh stronghold in the English countryside.”
“Pish—when I feel odd, it’s certainly not on that account, as I’m hardly the master of anything. You’ve ridden Nalin, you know of which I speak. I could threaten to have the whole pack of these lunatics, horse and human alike, sold for glue, and they’d all laugh in my face.”
“And how,” I ventured, my nerves calming fractionally, “did that strange circumstance come to pass?”
His severely arcing brows tensed below the pristine hair. “Frankly, I find myself a terrible topic for conversation.”
“I feel the same about myself, but I’m deeply interested in your household. How did you come to be acquainted with Mr. Singh, for instance?”
The tension in his shoulders melted. “We were practically schoolfellows, before. Shall I be shocking, Miss Stone?”
“Oh, yes, please.”
“Where on earth did she come by the cheek? London alone couldn’t have managed the feat,” Mr. Thornfield muttered. “You are aware from the advertisement I was involved in the Khalsa conflicts. You may know that I was born in Lahore?”
Silence befitted Mr. Thornfield; so I tried it out myself, blankly encouraging.
“Well, how I came to be born there prior to British annexation is brief in telling and rather broad in ripple effect generally, so I’ll out with it: my parents were complete scoundrels, Miss Stone.”
“Mr. Singh said your father was an entrepreneur?”
“So are pirates, according to the dictionary.”
I laughed until I could hardly breathe. Mr. Thornfield rumbled with amusement himself until I had calmed.
“Nathan Thornfield—that’s my father, mind you keep up—started life as a merchant in the loosest sense of the word,” Mr. Thornfield continued. “Genteel as a baronet, all polished monocles and pinches of snuff. But really, he was what romantics call an adventurer and cynics a rapscallion. Travelled like the pox—Australia, China, even America, the daft old crust. The codger ought to have been locked in a cage lined with pillows, if you take my meaning, but instead he made and lost several fortunes before settling in the Punjab with my mother, née Chastity Goodwill, and if that name don’t beat the Dutch, Miss Stone, the Dutch will rule the globe.”
Patience Goodwill and Chastity Goodwill. My pulse thumped against my drab grey dress as I recalled my aunt’s maiden name. Sisters—there is the connection.
“Mum wasn’t quite mad, by the by,” he added wryly. “She must sound so, gallivanting about like that with a complete knave. But the yellow fever had got hold of her altogether, and she was a passionate collector—Chinese vases, Bengali silks. When my father decided that Lahore was absolutely the ticket, I believe he bartered their way into the Punjab with French wine and Turkish opium; the Sikhs were sceptical, and he conducted one or two discussions on the wrong side of a tulwar.* Once he was in, they realised he’d a positive genius for getting them anything they wanted, and the Sikhs ain’t Quakers, mind. A hotter hive of lechery and treachery you’ve not seen since the Vatican.”
“It sounds dangerous.”
“So does war.” This time his words boxed my ears gently. “But people do it anyhow.”
“Were Mr. Singh’s family your neighbours, sir?”
“Indeed so. My family was in the import-export line, and Sardar’s were trading indigo and suchlike.”
“I think he said jaggery?” I lied, for Sahjara had told me.
“Yes! Great brown cakes of sugar and great blue cakes of indigo, and they were so rich they could have used solid gold piss pots if they’d— Oh, I beg your pardon.”
“You really needn’t, you understand.”
Mr. Thornfield coughed, amused. “I am beginning to. Well. We grew up playing at cavalry in the streets of Lahore, daring each other to run beneath the legs of the war elephants when the Khalsa paraded, quarrelling like fishwives over which had to be the villainous Afghan and which the conquering maharajah, manly pursuits of that sort. Sardar would—”
“I’ve been given to understand that is not his actual name?”
“Oh, a snake in the grass! You’ve clearly been pumping the Young Marvel for gossip.”
I might have quailed, but Mr. Thornfield’s tone remained a happy one, a low instrument playing in a major key, as was ever the case when
he spoke of his ward.
“She gushes with the substance when the poor girl remembers anything of those days; but in this case, she is entirely correct. Mad as a crate of ferrets, Sardar, and if he was going into domestic work, by gad, he meant to do it in style. What could I do but shrug my shoulders and call the man Commander?”
“Mr. Singh possesses a magnetic presence. He seems a very decent sort.”
“He’s a saint is what he is, and we were very close as boys, and after I returned to the Punjab, we didn’t fancy the notion of parting. Have you ever had a friend, Miss Stone, and thought that if this particular person were absent, you should forever miss a piece of yourself?”
I remembered my quiet, quizzical Clarke and nodded.
“Well, Sardar may not have always called himself Sardar, but he has always been extraordinarily good to me. He took great pains to see the stuffing wasn’t thrashed out of me when I was a stripling in Lahore—and he has made certain that Sahjara was safe, always, no matter the circumstance.”
“Was it during the wars that Mr. Singh took risks for Sahjara?” I asked with care.
“Yes. We were not at war, however, when he took risks for me.” Mr. Thornfield smirked, tapping the tablecloth with gloved hands. “I’m not certain whether fighting or fornicating is the skill Sikhs have mastered the better, but they work terribly hard at both, y’see, and thus as a young wilayati,* I had plentiful scuffles to survive.”
“Do not Easterners wish to befriend the British in the interests of trade?”
Mr. Thornfield twisted his lips. “Nothing like a friend for a knife in the back.”
“Is that true of Mr. Augustus Sack?”
Mr. Thornfield hesitated; but at last he bit the inside of his cheek, shrugging.
“Fair play, Miss Stone—it’s only proper etiquette to explain sudden confrontations with knives, as you have so kindly done for me. Mr. Sack and our dead friend Mr. Clements and Sahjara’s father, Mr. Lavell, were all Company men when the conflict with the Sikhs broke out. So was I, nominally anyhow. To say the Sikh empire was rich is to say the sun does a jolly decent job at lighting the planet. Mr. Sack figures that some ripe booty which scarpered off God knows where can be found if only he plunders the Young Marvel’s head, and I won’t have it. Neither will Sardar, as you saw. And that’s all I have to say on the blasted subject. Oh, look, here’s Mrs. Kaur with the roast.”