Pumpymuckles

by JayneFresina

  I blame it on the Americans, the Gibson Girl and bicycles. It all started with bicycles and it hasn't stopped rolling downhill since.

  * * * *

  After she'd helped him off with his boots, he poured them both a brandy.

  "I can see you need this. Can't have you catching a chill after our drive," he said, passing her a glass. "No argument. Swallow it down. It won't poison you." He padded, barefoot, around his study. Just like the first day she came there.

  "I think Mrs. Palgrave suspects," she choked out, wincing as the first mouthful of brandy fired its way down her throat. "I've been influenced adversely, it seems, by bicycles and the Americans."

  "Why didn't you let me tell them that we're getting married?" He gave her a sharp look. "Not backin' out, are you? Not changed your mind?"

  "No." Another gulp. She wasn't sure whether the brandy made her feel better or worse."It wasn't the time."

  "When will be the time then?"

  "I don't know," she exclaimed, cross suddenly. She got up out of the chair and paced around it. "Thirteen minutes past seven or something? Why not? Everything else about this is quite insane and irrational."

  "What's got under your corset? Apart from me."

  She shook her head, stopped and took a breath, one hand on the back of the chair. There were many things that had got under her stays, but first..."I think you should get rid of that motor car. It's dangerous. Something's going to happen to you in it. I feel it in my bones." It made it far worse for her, of course, because she could not read his mind. That sly skill eluded her in his case.

  He was squinting at her, his backside propped on the desk, brandy in hand. "Nothing's going to happen to me. What could?"

  "For heaven's sake, Gabriel! Anything might happen! It could run off the road. You could lose control. I don't know. Anything. Can't you see that? You're not immortal."

  Wrong Way No Exit.

  "You're getting yourself in a state of panic over nothing." Calmly he set down his glass and walked over to her. "Palgrave's upset you with all her whittering! She was the same about a telephone. Doesn't like anything new. But she'll come around."

  She felt desperate. "I don't like that motor car." The words fell from her lips like lead weights, thumping into the ground and making a dent. "It's a...it's a monster. I know, because I've seen it before." And she'd always thought the monster was after her.

  He put his hands around her face and said gently, "It's not going to kill me, you daft girl. I won't let it. I'm not going to do anything mad now that I have you, am I?"

  Oh, she wanted to believe it. But her heart was bleeding. She tasted it in her mouth.

  "Now that you're here, everything's different," he said, looking into her eyes."For both of us. We'll keep each other safe. Always. Forever." He smiled. "Like it says on your seahorse brooch."

  "But I can't keep you in a box, can I?" she blurted. "I can't keep you from danger every moment of the blessed day and night. Anything...anything might happen. And I love you. I don't want to lose you. It's too hard. Oh, I don't want to do this! I can't!"

  "Can't what?"

  "Love you! I can't. I won't. It's going to hurt so ...badly."

  His lips parted, and she thought she felt him tremble. "What happened to the woman who welcomes a challenge?" He lifted her face and lowered his own lips to meet hers. Were his lashes damp? Or were those tears her own? "We'll never lose each other again, Ever. I promise you that." As his thumbs wiped away her warm tears, he added tenderly, "When you have love in your heart, that soul stays with you. For always. I ought to know, for you've always been here in mine. I know that now. I understand it. And if I understand it— the thickest feller in England— you certainly ought to understand it."

  She licked her lips, tasting brandy and pitiful tears. Better that than her heart's blood, she supposed. The sickness and panic was subsiding now, but she knew it would remain there, in the background, until she was able to conquer it completely. Bravely.

  "Surely," he added with a playful wink, "you, the Viking warrior woman, ain't afraid of love?"

  After a moment she managed a watery smile. "Aren't," she corrected him.

  "See."

  And while it would be hard to love him and watch him do reckless things as the mood took him, Ever realized that it would be harder still not to love this man. Impossible, actually.

  He took the glass from her hand, set it down on his desk and led her to the hearth. There they sat on the carpet, in front of the fire, and he kissed her again, his lips possessing hers gently at first, then claiming and devouring.

  "Put everything out of your mind," he whispered. "Except the here and now. The most important thing. Me, of course."

  So she did.

  They made love there beside the fireplace and Ever Greene felt herself floating with nothing tying her down at last, as if she hung her head off her bed at home and imagined she lived among the stars. But now she truly did. She resigned herself to the fact and gave herself up to him helplessly.

  It was destiny.

  * * * *

  "I can't say I'm surprised," the housekeeper exclaimed as they sat together in her parlor the next day. "I knew it was hopeless the moment I saw the way he looked at you the day he found out you'd gone walking on the pier."

  Ever felt as if she ought to explain, despite the fact that Gabriel had insisted she had no need to do that for anybody. "I didn't mean for it to happen when I came here. I didn't expect anything like this to happen to me at all."

  "No, but I knew it would." Mrs. Palgrave sighed deeply. "I should have dug my heels in and not let you go to Norwich— after all, you were my responsibility— but 'tis done now. I let you go off with him, straight into his clutches. Not that he gave me much chance to protest, since he told me as you were walking out of the door. Wicked fellow!"

  She smiled. Couldn't help herself. "He really isn't so bad, Mrs. Palgrave. You know that too or you wouldn't have stayed with him so long. And it's not as if he tricked me into it by some foul means. I wanted him just as much. I know it isn't ladylike to admit it, but I do have needs too. Don't we all?"

  The housekeeper looked askance. "I'm sure I don't. Not of that nature. I've got enough to keep me busy on a daily basis without complications of that sort. If you had my back troubles you wouldn't think of it."

  "But you did have those needs once. Gabriel said you're a widow. You must have felt love and passion like that for your husband, surely."

  "Once a month, if necessary, for no more than three minutes at the most. And that's how it should be, young lady. Didn't your mother tell you that?" She picked up and put down her teapot twice, before remembering what she was meant to be doing with it. "Passion, indeed. You're as bad as Mr. Hart. There I was, thinking you a fragile thing when you first came."

  "Looks can be deceptive, my dear Mrs. Palgrave."

  "Apparently so!"

  "I'm quite the wanton underneath. But I didn't know that until I met the master of the house."

  The Master of the House. He was indeed. She had begun to understand all that it meant.

  * * * *

  He made the official announcement on Christmas Day, coming down to the servants' hall as they finished their plum pudding and rum butter. A toast of sherry was ordered for everybody and then, with Ever at his side, he told the staff that there would be a wedding in the near future.

  "Does that mean you're staying put here in this house, finally?" his housekeeper demanded, a little tipsy already according to the tilting nature of her usually tidy hair. "We can stop travelling all the time now?"

  "Yes. From now on this is home. For all of us."

  Nobody else seemed to know what to say, until Bede solemnly offered his congratulations and then the others joined in.

  "But Miss Greene is still my governess," Gabriel explained. "I have a lot yet to learn."

  She wore her silver seahorse brooch again that evening, so it seemed she liked his gift, despite her first strange
reaction to it. Whenever she laughed, the little jet eye of the seahorse shimmered and winked up at him. It was perfect for her, and she was perfect for him.

  Now he just had to break the news to Lucretzia and his other friends. It was a pity, he thought, that his mother wouldn't be there for the wedding, but she'd be watching over him, no doubt. She would have been proud of him for winning Ever Greene's heart. He'd come a long way, just as his mother had always said he could.

  Sometimes, when he looked at the woman who had agreed to marry him, he couldn't believe his luck. Had to pinch himself. He'd put that advertisement in the newspaper a few times, but the letters he got where never the right ones, until he received hers. And he knew at once that this was it. How he knew, he had no idea. Perhaps he'd inherited something from his mother that let him see the future.

  At first he'd known only that she was going to change his world. He hadn't known how, why or whether it would be for the better.

  But soon after she arrived he'd felt himself falling for her, not wanting to let her out of his sight. Wanting to please her, win her smiles and her approval. Needing her hand in his.

  There would never be another woman for him.

  Occasionally his fiancée still expressed her doubts about the Rolls Royce, but she'd get accustomed to it, he reasoned. He'd take her out a few times, drive carefully, show her there was nothing to fear.

  But she preferred to walk, so they went out together for a stroll every day, and just as he was determined to help her conquer that aversion to his motor car, she was equally resolute when it came to overcoming his hatred of the pier.

  "We cannot live here looking at it every day and never walk out on it," she said. "You made me drive with you in that wretched monster of a machine. The least you could do is stroll along the pier with me. Be reasonable, Gabriel!"

  She very much liked this idea of "strolling". Since he really had no argument, he couldn't put it off for long and once the weather improved there was nothing left to use as an excuse.

  "Hold on to me," she said. "And don't let go."

  Arm in arm they walked along the pier under a calm January sky.

  "Still don't like the place," he grumbled. "And don't you dare tell anybody else that I was scared."

  "Of course not. They'd never believe me anyway. But I'm proud of you. And I love you even more because you admitted a weakness to me."

  "You're an extraordinary woman, Ever Greene."

  She rose on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. "Who else could love such an extraordinary man?" Astounding what the kiss of a good woman could do to a man. Or make him do.

  His woman was right, of course, nobody else could love him as she did. That's why he'd waited so long to find her.

  * * * *

  Life continued in his house much as it usually did. Ever kept her own room— insisted upon it until they were married— and each day they resumed his lessons. In the evenings they dined together and talked of plans for the future.

  He wanted thirteen children, as there had been in his own family.

  "We'd better get started immediately," he said. "No time to waste."

  "Perhaps we'll try just the one first, and see how we get on."

  "Ever Cautious. That should have been your name."

  She laughed. "While I appreciate your delight in charging headfirst, with enthusiasm, into everything, don't forget that it I'm the one who must bear these thirteen miniature Gabriels. You are quite enough to manage as it is." And if their children were just as reckless? It was hardly bearable to think about.

  Her moods veered from wildly happy to worrying that something would happen to spoil it. Was this the calm before a storm? Surely there was a darker cloud waiting just over the horizon. She couldn't explain it to anybody, but she knew it was coming. Just as she always knew when Pumpymuckles was about to come for her. The light was changing and her skin prickled with foreboding.

  She wrote to her parents, mystified as to why they had still not yet replied to her last letter and the Christmas card she sent. Was she so far out of sight that she was now out of mind too?

  "If I haven't heard from them by the end of the month, perhaps I should go to Cambridge and make certain there's nothing wrong," she said to Gabriel. "I could take the train."

  But he clearly did not like the idea. The lack of any reply at all from a man who generally had a smart answer to anything was response enough.

  "You know I'll return," she added steadily.

  Still nothing.

  But a few days later they had guests. Signora Brunetti and Max Connolly. The presence of the former did not trouble Ever. She had no insecurities in regard to Gabriel's love for her, even if he had some about hers for him. He would have to get over it. In time, hopefully soon, she could prove her love to him so that he could set his doubts aside.

  Connolly's arrival, however, was another matter. She did not like or trust the man at all. That brief encounter in Norwich had told her all she wanted to know about him. He was loud, crude, condescending and thought that she was nothing more than a temporary fancy in Gabriel's life. In her eyes, Connolly was a far worse threat to their happiness than Lucretzia Brunetti.

  So she put off the trip to visit her parents, knowing that the moment she left, Max Connolly would try to exert his influence. There would be nobody there to stop him.

  "I know Max has got his faults," Gabriel said to her one evening. "But he was with me from the start. Without him I'd still be haulin' boxes at the docks."

  "I'm sure you have repaid him for that many times over. He's only here because he wants you to fight again, doesn't he?" She was sitting at her dresser, taking down her hair. Gabriel always came to her room, once his guests were safely abed and he could creep about unobserved. In another month they would be married and then they had no more need to hide, but tonight a month felt like a very long time away.

  He came up behind her and put his hands on her shoulders. "He's increased the offer. It's a lot of money. More than I ever imagined when I was a lad of sixteen, setting out."

  "But you said that happiness is worth more to you now than money."

  "It is...it is." He bent to kiss the top of her head and then resumed undressing. Ever watched his reflection in the dresser mirror and saw that he was preoccupied, folding his clothes neatly, when he never usually bothered. The sight of his bared chest and muscular shoulders always caused a hitch in her breath. He was splendid to look at. Sometimes, she laid awake in bed and watched him sleep, studied the gentle, steady rise and fall of that powerful chest. Just to make sure he still lived.

  But was it selfish of her to keep him locked away from the world, the way she had been locked away as a child? Ever knew, only too well, how frustrating it was to be kept away from what other folk perceived as dangers. Yet here she was, trying to do that very same thing to the man she loved. The strength of her feelings for him had overwhelmed her when she first let herself give in to them, and she'd reacted instantly with fear.

  Now she finally understood how her mother— who did not have the burden or luxury of being able to read anybody's mind— must have struggled all these years, trying to keep Ever safe, afraid of love because of the pain that could come with it one day. Life among normal people was unpredictable and messy, everything Astrid Greene feared. When she lost her daughter for four months it must have nearly killed her. That's why she was so terrified when Ever came back. Afraid to love and lose her again, because she was aware of what could happen and she had no control over when it might.

  Still watching Gabriel in the mirror, she murmured, "You want to fight again."

  "Nah. I put all that behind me, didn't I?" Running a hand back through his hair, he stood in profile for a moment, never self-conscious about his nakedness and sparing it no thought now as he stared off at the wall, apparently lost in thought.

  "Yes." She stood and went to him. "You did."

  "Besides, I'm thirty-five." His lip curved. "Too old. Some would say."

&n
bsp; "Gabriel Hart, you are full of vigor. Too much of it. You're over-brimming with it. You will never be old."

  She knew that if he fought again it would not be about the money; it would be about his pride. Or because, as Lucretzia had suggested, he was bored with retirement.

  He took her hand and set it against his heart. His skin was warm, firm, the beat beneath it bursting with vitality. "What do you want me to do?"

  "I want you to be happy." Certainly, she never wanted him to resent her for curbing his freedom. "I want you to be yourself."

  With a narrowed gaze he studied her face. "Not a gentleman who holds his temper and pronounces his 'hs'?"

  She managed a smile. "I know you can be anything you want. I believe you could fit in wherever you go. And I have pride in you, whatever you choose. It is your decision to make." Her pulse was racing, but she'd just have to hope he didn't call her bluff.

  Oh, this being ordinary lark was damned hard work. She did not know how people managed it.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Lucretzia was the first down to breakfast, already selecting food from the chafing dishes when he came down the next morning, her plate piled high.

  She took the opportunity, before the others joined them, to corner him about Ever. "I didn't believe my ears when Max told me. I had to see for myself. But you're really going to marry her, aren't you?"

  "Yes," he replied jauntily. "I bloody well am."

  "Why do you suddenly want a wife?"

  He thought about for a moment. "I want her. To have her in my life the way I want her, I have to do the respectable thing and marry her."

  Her brows arched and spread like raven's wings resettling themselves after a strong breeze almost pushed the bird off its branch. "Respectable? How dreadful for you, darling. Shall you wear slippers in the evening and smoke a pipe while she reads to you from the bible?"

  "Perhaps."

  "But you are a wayfarer, Gabriel, like me. You will die of ennui if you stay in one place."