Earl's Well That Ends Well

by Jane Ashford

  The earl took his dismissal with bland grace.

  Worse and worse, thought Teresa. Such smooth surfaces concealed deceit. It was much easier when this sort of man was cutting and cold. But no matter. She wouldn’t ever see him again. There was no cause for concern. “Good day,” she said again. And walked rapidly away with her lumpy bag of produce bumping at her knee. Though she could feel his eyes on her back, she did not rush. Prey ran; she was not prey. She would never be prey again.

  “Who in the world is she?” Arthur asked Tom when the lady was gone.

  “Like I said, a neighbor.”

  “In your lodgings?” Arthur had never seen her on his visits to Tom.

  “No, she has her own house just down the street from my rooms.”

  “With her family? Her husband, perhaps.”

  Tom gave him a sidelong glance as he began to walk along the cobbles again. “No, just her and a servant girl. I think her family all died in the war. She doesn’t speak of them. Turns the subject right quick if anyone asks.”

  “Ah.” The war against Napoleon had caused a great deal of displacement on the Continent, and the Iberian Peninsula had been particularly affected. “So she lives here in London now?”

  “Aye. I reckon she has a bit of money. She seems to be able to please herself.”

  A small income would sustain an individual in this part of town, Arthur thought. “You say she paints scenery for the theater?” He still found this odd.

  “That’s where I met her, at the workshop,” said Tom. “She can make the flats look real as real. Like you was…were looking out over a regular vista.”

  “An artist then?”

  “Learned watercolors as a girl, she said.”

  One of the accomplishments of a lady, Arthur thought. He had no doubt she was one. Was it her fall in status that made her so prickly? Or did she blame him, as an Englishman, for the depredations of the war? That seemed petty and unfair. “And who is this Dilch?”

  “Him.” Tom sniffed. “Our local bully.”

  “He hurts people?” Arthur grew concerned for Tom.

  “Mostly he blusters,” the lad replied. “When it starts to go beyond that, the people hereabouts band together against him. No need to worry, my lord.”

  Worry was only a part of what Arthur was feeling. He was remarkably unsettled, he realized. Señora Alvarez had roused and interested and annoyed him. How long had it been since he’d felt such tumult? Longer than he could recall, he thought.

  He ought to simply dismiss her from his mind. She’d clearly had no interest in him. Indeed, she’d seemed eager to get away. But he did not deserve her abrupt dismissal. That was what rankled, Arthur thought. He was a…worthy person.

  His face heated as he acknowledged the pomposity of that phrase. Yet it was true. Many people thought so. And for some reason, he felt a strong urge to show Señora Alvarez that she’d misjudged him. After that demonstration he would probably never see her again. They obviously did not move in the same circles.

  But how then to speak with her? He couldn’t call on her, a woman alone in a part of London where he didn’t fit. He would be noticed; eyebrows would be raised. He had no wish to cause her difficulties. A thought occurred. Perhaps Mrs. Thorpe knew the señora? His friend seemed to be acquainted with nearly everyone in the theater world, no matter how tangential. That was it. At the first opportunity, he would find out. Mrs. Thorpe could even vouch for his character to the señora, since he seemed to require such bolstering. His brain shied away from asking whyever this should be the case.

  “My lord?” asked Tom. The lad had walked on a few steps and now turned back with a quizzical expression.

  He’d been standing in the middle of the street like a moonstruck calf. “Coming,” said Arthur and hastened to catch up.

  Two

  Teresa Alvarez de Granada tipped a handful of olives that she’d walked a good distance to purchase from a Levantine vendor into a shallow dish, discarding the twist of oily paper that had held them. She picked out one, closed her eyes, and bit down. The taste brought back the sunshine of her youth, the scent of lemons, the whisper of vine leaves stirring on an ancient pergola. Gone forever, but still remembered. She chewed memories. If only the good ones could be separated from the bad and kept like a casket of jewels to be taken out and admired at will.

  Teresa spit out the olive pit and put it on the edge of the dish. Her eating habits were strange to many of the English. She didn’t much care for meat, certainly not the thick, bloody slabs of beef they enjoyed. A perfectly roasted chicken now and then perhaps. And she was fond of vegetables, both raw and cooked, which many of her new countrymen disdained as fodder for animals. Fortunately, she could make her own choices in this regard, as in all others now, gracias a Dios.

  She looked around the front room of her tiny house. Her refuge was comprised of one fair-sized chamber downstairs with an extension behind for the kitchen and a place for her maidservant. A respectable woman couldn’t live all alone, here or anywhere. And she had become a respectable woman. Who would want to be solitary en verdad? She was no medieval hermit.

  A little walled yard at the back contained the privy and a coal bin. She hoped to take up some of the cobbles in one corner for a small garden eventually.

  A single bedchamber upstairs had slanted ceilings under the roof, two dormer windows, and space for little more than a bed and a wardrobe. But she owned the place; that was the important thing. And it was in good repair. The furnishings were scant but adequate and might be augmented in time. She’d managed a bit of color in the parti-colored shawl laid over the back of the drab settee and one of her own watercolors hung over the small hearth. She gazed at the sun-drenched landscape in the picture. She’d had ranks of rooms to wander through as a girl, before war came roaring over her land. If she’d known life would come down to this, she might have savored that space more.

  Her home was far from the fashionable haunts where people like the Earl of Macklin attended glittering parties, Teresa thought. The tall nobleman young Tom had introduced would not find her here. He would disappear back into the ranks of English society. She’d glided through such opulent festivities in her time, long ago. She’d also had a surfeit of pain and terror—days when she had no money for food, when she had to cower in ruins to evade marching armies. She’d done things she despised. But she refused to be ashamed. She’d survived, as others had not. A plain, quiet life was just what she wanted now. It was such a magnificent luxury—that no one could give her orders or make demands.

  Teresa turned away from the bitter recollection of some of those and glimpsed a flash in the mirror hanging beside the front door. Her earrings had caught the light and flung it back. She shook her head to admire the effect in the glass. Tiny sprays of emeralds glinted from chains of delicate gold filigree suspended from her earlobes. She had designed this pair herself, as she often did, and had them made, taking jewels that evoked old bad memories and turning them into something of her own, something she could cherish. Her collection of earrings was both an indulgence and a way to easily transport wealth when one might have to pick up and run without warning. Too many times she’d been forced to do that.

  Those years showed in her face, Teresa thought. There were faint lines now, hints of deeper wrinkles that would come with time. Her hair was still black as night. Her figure was good. Men had called her beautiful, and that had been as much a curse as a boon. What had this Macklin thought when he looked at her?

  She turned away from the mirror, rejecting the question. Whatever he had thought, she didn’t need to consider it. Gracias a Dios once again. An earl and his opinions and whims had no place in the frugal life she’d established for herself. No man did, she repeated to herself. That was over. She was safe. She had enough set aside to live on and could make her own choices. Did she propose to forget that this was far more than she’d hoped
for in those dreadful years? Ciertamente no! There were no reasons, no grounds, for self-pity. Only gratitude.

  “Eliza,” she called. “I am going to the workshop.” The Drury Lane Theater was preparing for a new play, and they wanted backdrops that showed a vista of mountains. Teresa, who was more than familiar with such scenes, had been engaged to paint them through the good offices of Mrs. Thorpe.

  The meeting with that gracious lady had been a true piece of luck. One did not expect to encounter such a presence in this part of London, or find that she was a friend of young Tom.

  The maid appeared in the kitchen archway. Teresa had hired a sturdy, taciturn young woman to help her. Eliza offered few words but a solid presence, which came in handy when Teresa went beyond her own neighborhood. She could walk by herself in certain areas. She knew them and didn’t stray into places where she might find trouble. If she had to roam farther, she took Eliza along, as well as a parasol with a stone knob well able to double as a club. Teresa’s demonstration of this function a few months ago had elicited one of the maid’s rare smiles.

  “I’ll be back in the afternoon,” Teresa added. Eliza nodded and returned to the kitchen. Teresa put on her bonnet and gloves and set off.

  The theater’s busy workshop was nearby. She heard the pounding of hammers before she entered the large open warehouse where carpenters constructed the flats that created the illusion of landscapes on the stage. The smell of paint enveloped her as she went inside. In one corner, artisans produced the smaller objects needed for the drama, such as bottles that broke over heads without injury. Seamstresses worked in a room at the back, though most actors wore their own clothes in the plays.

  Workers called out greetings, and Teresa acknowledged them on her way to her area, where a partly painted scene waited. This shop was separate from the hectic world of the stage, and a different kind of camaraderie reigned here, that of craftsmen proud of their skills. There was some rivalry, but not the inflated self-regard and indulgences of temperament Teresa had seen in the casts now and then. Not all actors were as serenely confident as her new acquaintance Mrs. Thorpe.

  Tom waved a hammer from the other side of the space. Teresa waved back as she removed her bonnet, gloves, and shawl and set them aside. She tied a long apron over her gown, which had short sleeves so as not to trail in the paint. She went to the table at the side where her brushes had been left clean and ready, opened paint pots, and set to work.

  She had loved painting from her earliest years, and her favorite subject was sweeping scenes—mountains, castles, gardens, wide lawns or fertile fields, even opulent rooms. Animals too—herds of sheep or cattle, foxes peeking from the undergrowth, a dog or cat sitting to the side. The vistas sometimes included human figures in the distance as well, which was no problem. But Teresa didn’t do portraits. This was less from a lack of ability than a distaste for the process of reproducing human faces. One had to gaze so deeply into near strangers. And who knew which could be trusted? Or what incorrect message they might read into her gaze? She went back to the crag she’d begun sketching out the last time and immersed herself in the work. As usual, it occupied all her attention.

  The theater provided bread and cheese and ale from a local inn around midday, which the workers supplemented with their own food. Most chose to eat in an oblong space behind the building, too rustic to be called a courtyard. It was rather a bit of ground left vacant when four buildings were constructed around it, a forgotten scrap of weedy grass. But the enclosure held the sun’s heat, and on an early spring day it was a pleasant place to sit. The artisans had painted country vistas on the blank walls, and someone had planted flowers and climbing vines. A motley collection of tables and chairs were scattered about.

  Tom joined Teresa for the informal nuncheon, as he often did, and she was glad. She couldn’t remember when she’d met anyone easier to be friends with. He was so generally cheerful and interested in nearly any topic one could name. Surprisingly informed sometimes as well, considering the unfortunate life history he’d confided. Teresa sipped at the ale, preferring it to the thin, sour wine that could also be obtained. She knew where to procure good Spanish vintages when she wished to indulge, which was very seldom. She despised drunkenness and the disasters that came with it.

  “This new play’s got camels in it,” Tom said.

  “Does it?”

  “A caravan from the mysterious East,” he intoned. Tom read all the plays they worked on, and he often had comments about the stories. “You ever seen a camel?”

  “Never. Except in pictures.”

  He nodded. “You reckon they’ll dress up some actors? Front and rear, like they done for the elephant last month?”

  “I suppose so. If they have the costumes.”

  “Huh. They’d need a few more this time. How many camels in a caravan, do you think?”

  “An actual one? Many, according to paintings I’ve seen.”

  Tom nodded. “Might need a deal of players then. I reckon I could be a camel.” He grinned. “Leastways the back part.”

  Teresa laughed as he bit off a large hunk of bread and cheese.

  “Mebbe I’ll ask if I can,” Tom added when he’d swallowed.

  “Why not? I expect you’d be good at it.”

  “You ever wanted to be up on the stage, ’stead of just painting for it?”

  She hid a shudder. “Never.” The thought of all those people staring at her—ogling—was repellent.

  “His lordship says it never hurts to try a thing. If you don’t like it, no need to go on.”

  The advice of a man who had always had free choices, Teresa thought. Typical of the aristocrats’ view that the world belonged to them, to pick and choose as they pleased. But here was the opportunity she’d been looking for. “How did you come to know an earl?” she asked.

  “I was walking south from Bristol when I came on a little boy running away from home,” Tom replied.

  As he told the story of meeting Lord Macklin and traveling with him for some months, Teresa watched Tom’s face. This earl seemed to have treated the lad well, at least as far as Tom could see. There might well have been slights he didn’t notice, since Tom always seemed to expect the best. Clearly, he admired the older man. It didn’t occur to Tom that he had been a mere amusement, used to alleviate aristocratic boredom and continually at risk of being cast off. He had been fortunate; he’d found his own way out. Still, she felt protective. “People of that class put their own whims above all else,” she said.

  “Class?” asked Tom.

  “The nobility.”

  He looked back at her with the acuity that flashed in his blue eyes at unexpected moments. “I ain’t seen that, but I reckon you would know better than me.”

  “What do you mean?” She heard the sharpness in her voice.

  “Well, I would have said you were nobility yourself, señora. Begging your pardon.”

  “Don’t be silly.” She looked away. This was not a subject she would discuss. She wished she’d never mentioned this earl, particularly since it seemed there was no need to warn Tom off him.

  “Lord Macklin’s coming by next week,” said Tom. “I told him about that thunder machine we’re building, and he wanted to see it.”

  This was not good news. “Which day?” Teresa asked.

  Tom gave her a sidelong look. “He wasn’t sure. He has lots to do.”

  Or, he was an earl and saw no need to consider others. He would come when he pleased, and the rest of them must adjust. Well, she would avoid him. She could do that now. She didn’t have to observe every nuance of another’s moods and adjust her behavior in response. She’d been purposefully becoming more of a nobody for years, and she was comfortable with obscurity. Delighted with it. When Macklin appeared, she would slip away until he was gone. It was as simple as that.

  Three days later, Arthur walked into the the
ater workshop and stopped near the door to admire the controlled rush of activity. He greatly respected the work of skilled craftsmen, and this was evident all around the huge room. And women, he noted, seeing Tom’s Spanish neighbor painting a landscape at the back.

  He was here to visit Tom, of course, but he admitted now that he’d also hoped to see her again. The effect she’d had on him lingered in vivid detail. He couldn’t remember when he’d met a woman—or any person really—with such presence. Nor when he’d been so definitively rejected for no reason at all. A spark of resentment rekindled at the memory of their encounter.

  He’d made some discreet inquiries in diplomatic circles, and discovered no information about a woman called Teresa Alvarez de Granada. But that meant nothing. The long war against Napoleon had dislocated countless people, and not all were known to the embassy. Indeed, one of his contacts had suggested that this sounded like an assumed name. Arthur felt certain that her nom de guerre disguised a noble lineage. The lady’s stance, her voice, her gaze had proclaimed it, even as she made no claims. That modesty had clinched the matter for him, actually.

  He’d timed his visit for early afternoon. Tom had told him how the days went here, and he knew there was a pause for refreshment. He’d also brought a large box of Gunter’s lemon tarts to share out. It occurred to him now that they were a lure for a lady, like setting out bait to trap an elusive wild creature. The idea made him smile, and as he did, she turned and met his eyes. She went still, her brush suspended in one hand. The same shock as before ran through him. What was it about this woman that stirred him so? Her gaze was certainly not welcoming. In fact, she looked quite unhappy to see him.

  Tom came over to greet Arthur and led him toward the back of the workshop. He gathered up Señora Alvarez as they moved past her, even though she made an evasive gesture, and Arthur wondered at this. At both of them, really. Tom’s twinkling sidelong glance was no help. They passed through a door at the back of the building into a small open space. “Ah,” Arthur said. “One would never know this was here.” Despite the shabbiness of the surrounding buildings, it was a pleasant area. Unmatched tables and chairs were scattered about. Tom took them to a table shaded by climbing vines and went off to fetch supplies.