SEVENTEEN
Because so many of Lady Gravier’s guests were connected to the Royal Navy, Maddie was introduced to a flotilla of those who might have befriended her for the access to the Admiral that she represented. To avoid dangerous entanglements when she lacked the skill to differentiate genuine affection from jobbery, she gravitated to the army officers who decorated the room with their bright scarlet coats and gold lace. The one person Maddie missed was Lucy, whose father was not of high enough rank to merit much attention from the circle in which Maddie moved. It was silly, to create such a vast gulf between brothers. Little wonder that the Ashford boys were not the best of friends like Stephen and Ethan.
In spite of the rebuke he received at the card party, Lord Sunderland continued to hover on the fringes of every gathering. His poor sister was nothing but apologies for days, and it took all of Maddie’s persuasive powers to convince Cecily, Lady Ridgeley, that a friendship would not be broken by her sibling’s disgraceful conduct. To prove her sincerity, Maddie made a point of sitting next to her new friend at the first opportunity, abandoning the Admiral to find his own seat in the crowded music room.
The idyll was sweet but short-lived. Three weeks after his arrival, the Admiral closed up the London townhouse and returned to Spithead, where Maddie would see him off with a smile on her face to disguise her sadness. Bedlam reigned along the wharf that was swarming with officers and pressed men who protested the injustice in vain. Women of all classes took leave of loved ones, while beggars and thieves did a brisk business.
“Heed your uncle’s advice and follow your aunt’s lead, and you shall thrive,” the Admiral said as he bid Maddie good-bye.
She brushed aside his words, refusing to accept the vista that he painted with too heavy a brush. If one thing, or another, if, if, and she would not consider her future or even contemplate his loss. When he asked her to stop crying she ignored that request as well. No happy smile was forthcoming from a girl who had been plucked out of the rice beds, made to shed her old life and don a new one, and now was to consider yet another incarnation. “You will come back and I’ll not hear another word on the subject,” she said.
After all that, it was preposterous for Madame LaSalle to expect her pupil to concentrate on poetry in the classroom. A cloud of dread hovered over Maddie’s head, and there was nothing that the teacher could offer to distract her for more than five minutes. Two good ears had heard the officers discussing a decisive battle, a victory at all costs. What did that mean for the Admiral’s safety? What did it mean for Stephen and Ethan, if England had complete control of the seas? What did it mean for her future if the French proved superior in this final decision?
The stables were Maddie’s refuge, a ride the only escape from the confines of a house that felt more empty than ever. If not for Nipper’s tales of his boyhood in the Low Country, Maddie was sure that she would have ridden on and on, far away, to a place where her dark thoughts could not reach. On horseback, she counted the days until Lucy would return from her round of country house visits. Soon, the air smelled of apples from the cider presses; the leaves tumbled yellow and gold across the lawn. Letters from friends arrived, laden with gossip about predicted engagements and secret courtships. Lady Ridgeley was delighted to inform her dear friend that Lord Ridgeley would not be traveling to India after all, and so she could be on hand to see Miss Ashford through the perilous ritual that was presentation at court. The enthusiasm of the letter was in direct opposition to Maddie’s mood. Too concerned with the Admiral’s well-being, she lost all interest in society.
The letter from the Admiral arrived at the end of October, the first correspondence she had received since his departure. Maddie tore open the seal, scanned the first lines, and her heart sank. “My dearest, the enemy we knew would appear from the southwest has been seen and we expect to engage them within twenty-four hours,” he had written. He included details on wind and weather, which was described as favorable. He meant to keep the weatherboard, pour on the full weight of metal. His gunners were the best in the world, drilled to perfection. Maddie heard his concern in every syllable. This was no ordinary action but something of critical importance. In closing, he kissed her and embraced her, held her in his heart. The date was almost four weeks past. He had met the enemy. He might already be victorious. Or he might be dead.
Without thought, her legs moved, propelled by a tangle of emotion that drove Maddie through the garden, across the lawn to the carriage drive, along the drive and on to the road, to a place that could not exist, where safety and security ruled. She had taken this route before but there was no one to search for her any longer. She was searching. She was lost. All was lost.
Carriages and wagons rattled past, people coming and going while Maddie had no direction. Where did the road lead? To Portsmouth, to Mrs. Powell who might advise her, but of what? A soft mist gave way to an autumn rain of fat, hard drops that flew at Maddie’s face in a biting wind. Dead leaves tangled in her skirts that were soon wet and muddy. It grew too dark to see the road, but ahead she spotted pinpoints of light that hinted at the low-slung cottages of the tenants. There were those within who shared Maddie’s fears, with loved ones on board a warship. Behind closed doors, they rested easy, not knowing of the battle, oblivious. She kept to the edge of the rutted path, turned back to a house that might already belong to Lawrence Ashford, the next Baron Bransmore.
A strange carriage was stopped at the front door, sending a shudder through Maddie. It was not the express rider, she repeated to herself, not an express but a fine carriage. A person of substance had come, to break bad news or reassure her? Davies met her in the entrance hall but she did not stop, running up the stairs to the drawing room, where Lord Sunderland and Lady Ridgeley had been waiting to see her for over two hours.
Cecily embraced her, paying no mind to the dampness of Maddie’s clothes. “Poor, poor dear,” she said, her eyes wet with tears of sympathy. “We only just learned this morning and came at once. You should not be alone at such a time.”
She called for a brandy and water, put Maddie into a chair next to the fire, and rubbed warmth back into the young lady’s hands. Behind his sister, Lord Sunderland shifted a few feet from the mantle towards a chair, then back, unsure of what to do with himself. He was soon pacing the floor.
“There was no news in London when we passed through,” Cecily said. “My brother thought he should remain at the Admiralty, but I insisted that he come with me to convince you to remain here, where a messenger might find you more readily.”
“Spithead,” Maddie said. “The ships will return to Spithead.”
“Then that is the place to go,” Sunderland said. His manner was decisive, as if he were striking an unseen enemy a deadly blow. “I trust that your groom will not argue with me, as has been his habit in the past. When I order your carriage prepared, he should not ask why.”
Making idle conversation while waiting for Maddie’s maid to pack her trunk, Sunderland pondered the audacity of a hired servant to dismiss out of hand an offer to purchase yearlings from the Ashford stable. He found it troubling that a man working in England would dare to imply that Miss Ashford was behind the refusal, that she would not sell a single animal to a British dragoon. “If you wish, I would have a word with him to set him straight,” Sunderland said. “He does not seem trustworthy, in my opinion.”
“My father may lie at the bottom of the ocean at this very moment, and you dare to criticize one of my people?” Maddie said. She was on her feet, toe to toe with a man who had irked her beyond reason. “The insolence. How dare you? I may be an orphan, yet you can think of no one but yourself and your grasping. I would not sell you a horse at any price, and Jim Nipper acts at my direction.”
His eyelids fluttered like a nervous bird taking flight within a confining cage. “My apologies, I have again behaved rashly. My foremost thought was that someone was taking advantage of you in your father’s absence and the idea infuriated me. I meant no
insult, I assure you.” He retreated a few steps, making for the door. “Forgive me. I should, of course, have realized that your groom is accustomed to ways that are also familiar to you. A misunderstanding, then, and if you would be kind enough to share your colonial customs with me, I will endeavor to learn. Indeed, I hear you speak and I find that I cannot help but wonder how my life might have been if my father had realized his dreams. If I were free of the encumbrances of my position, nothing more than an average gentleman like your late father. A horse you would not sell to Lord Sunderland, would you hesitate to sell it to Thomas Parker?”
“Were you to emigrate, I cannot imagine that you would savor an existence as an ordinary gentleman,” Maddie said. “A man’s worth in South Carolina is calculated by what he makes of himself, not a title bestowed by one man wearing a crown.”
“Better an ordinary gentleman with you to share that existence, than remain a peer without you.”
“See to the carriage,” Cecily said, her voice sharp. “And be civil to the groom. You may have forgotten, dear brother, that you would not be elevated very far above him if you were to meet in South Carolina. Talk comes easily to those who do not know of what they speak.”
The Second War of Rebellion Page 24