Flirtation Walk

by Siri Mitchell

  “I studied singing—”

  “I already know how to sing. And don’t you, girls?” Two of them nodded.

  “And French.”

  “But why? Why would I need to know French if I never plan to go to France?”

  “The cadets all learn French.” Phoebe broke into the conversation.

  Class was not going well, and it hadn’t been since I’d first started teaching. Milly had always been so busy watching Ella that I hadn’t realized just how recalcitrant she was. I needed to gain the upper hand in the conversation. “I also learned how to play the piano. And I have a very fine hand at embroidery, if I do say so myself.”

  Milly snorted. “None of that sounds very useful. Did they teach you how to make pies? Or darn a sock? I’m not so good at those.”

  “Well . . . no.”

  “Please don’t let Mama know you’re not going to teach me anything useful!”

  Another of the girls chortled.

  “At least if I’m attending your lessons I don’t have to mind Ella.”

  “I can teach you how to walk.”

  “I already know how to walk.”

  “I’m sure you don’t know how to do it properly. I can also teach you how to talk.”

  “I already—”

  “Politely. Without contradicting everything a person says.”

  “So what are you going to teach us today?” Milly arched a brow as if she knew I was an imposter.

  “There’s . . . comportment.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The way one holds oneself. You shouldn’t ever, for instance, lounge about.”

  “Why ever not?”

  “It’s not appropriate. It’s slatternly. And louche.”

  “Louche! Is that French?”

  “It might as well be.” I spoke the words between my clenched teeth.

  “If I can’t do this.” She slid off her chair and sprawled on the grass, arms outstretched, eyes closed. “Then what should I do?” She cracked one eye open.

  I grabbed her hand and hauled her up. “You must give attention to your posture.”

  “My posture? What about Phoebe’s?”

  Phoebe placed her hands in her lap and straightened her spine.

  “Phoebe is doing quite well. It’s you who worries me.” I pushed her into the chair. “Now then, you’re not to rest against the back of the chair.” I cast an eye over the rest of the class as they adjusted their positions. “Keep yourself at the very edge of the seat.”

  “If we’re not supposed to use the back of the chair, why do we have them? Why don’t we just use stools?”

  “I don’t make the rules, I’m simply telling you what they are. If you want to be a lady, then—”

  “Fine.” She repositioned herself on the chair. “What’s next?”

  “You’ve slouched again.”

  “Have I?” She straightened her shoulders, lifting her chin. Glancing toward Phoebe, she nodded her head. “You’d better pay attention to her. She’s slouching now too.”

  Phoebe straightened as well. “I don’t see why you have to be so mean about it. I’m blind!”

  “And I’m only fourteen. And I’m ornery.” Milly reached over and poked her in the ribs.

  Phoebe was so startled she fell off her chair onto the grass.

  The other girls were looking on, mouths slack with shock.

  Such behavior was unconscionable! “What’s wrong with you? She’s blind! Of all the—!”

  But Phoebe was laughing.

  “Being blind gets her out of all the hard work. It always has. Maybe you could teach me to be blind too.”

  “Milly!”

  “Good grief! You act as if she hasn’t any sense of humor.”

  Phoebe was wiping tears from her eyes. “I haven’t laughed so hard in ages.” She put a hand up to feel for her chair.

  I guided her up and helped her sit.

  Milly was grinning. “See?”

  I shot her a dagger of a look. “All I see is that you’re incorrigible.”

  “And so is Phoebe.”

  “Phoebe doesn’t have anything to do with this. She’s—”

  “She’s just as bad as I am. Admit it! I don’t think it’s fair that you give her special treatment just because she can’t see. She can hear, can’t she? And speak too.”

  “She’s—”

  “You’re talking as if she’s not even here. Phoebe can speak for herself. Can’t you, Phoebe?”

  “I can. Thank you.” She said it quite primly, although her lips were still twitching.

  I glared at Milly. “I don’t think finishing school is the right place for you.”

  “Probably not. Maybe I should ask Mama to find me a starting school instead.” She and the rest of the girls broke out into great guffaws of laughter and collapsed against each other.

  “I can see none of you really wish to learn anything.”

  Milly stopped laughing and took in a deep breath. “We’re not making fun. Honest! It’s just that I can’t see what use all this is. It’s not like some gentleman will ever want to court me. And I don’t think anyone is going to offer for any of us anytime soon and—”

  “Milly!”

  “So why can’t people just let us be the way we are?”

  Phoebe interjected timidly. “At least Milly isn’t afraid to say what’s true.”

  So they were in this together now? “She doesn’t have to say it quite so plainly!”

  “I’ve had people tiptoe about me all my life.”

  “But I’m meant to help make ladies out of you. Out of all of you. And if your mothers don’t see any change in you, then . . .” Then one of the main reasons for my aunt allowing me to stay in Buttermilk Falls was gone.

  Milly sighed. “I’m not completely stupid. Just tell me what to do, I’ll learn it, and then we can go back to having fun. I don’t want to waste this whole hour on a lesson.”

  “I went to school for several years to learn all these things, and you think you can learn it in ten minutes?”

  “Maybe not all of if it. But I’m supposed to have three lessons a week, aren’t I? And I’ve already told you I know how to sing and I don’t need to know French. So what can be so difficult?”

  “Being a lady is not a set of skills you can just learn and then put behind you. It’s a way of life. It’s a way of treating people.” All of which I had managed to learn and then use to extort other people—which was the antithesis of everything a lady was supposed to be.

  I sighed. What I needed was some motivation. Something to offer them to make these classes worth their while. “What if . . .” What if what? What would give them reason to take what I was teaching seriously? Perhaps . . . an opportunity to use the information! “What if I organized a dinner party at the end of three weeks’ time, so that you could put your new skills to good use?”

  That gained the interest of several of the girls. From Milly, however, it only provoked another challenge. “With who?”

  “With whom would be the proper way to ask that question.”

  “Well?”

  “With all of you.”

  “We see each other all the time.”

  That was a good point. “What if . . . I also invited some guests?”

  “Whom?”

  “That would be who.”

  Milly scowled. “What other people would be invited?”

  “How about . . . if . . . I invited some cadets?”

  22

  Seth

  “Careful there. You’re going to rub the shine right off that.”

  I looked up at Deacon from the musket I was polishing on Wednesday morning for inspection. “Why should it matter? It’ll just get me more demerits. Isn’t that a good thing?” It had been tougher than I thought it would be to not be the smartest one in my classes. It was three weeks into the semester, and I’d already been sent back at least one section in all of them. I might be one step closer to retrieving my sister, but I was
that much further away now from ever being assigned to the engineers. Not that I blamed my sister—all the blame fell to Mr. Pennyworth, in my opinion—but it was a blow all the same and made even worse because the blow was to my pride.

  That wasn’t something I was pleased to admit.

  No man likes to admit to finding vice in himself. The people who knew me best knew I wasn’t really an Immortal. What rankled was that I cared so much about the opinion of those who didn’t really know me at all. Why should I constantly have to fight the almost overwhelming urge to explain to them that my sudden lack of effort was for an entirely noble cause?

  “It’s not that we don’t care about your plight, because we do. Each one of us. But personal destruction is not what we’re here for. You’ve got to remember the goal.”

  “Which is?” I worked the rotten-stone powder into the brass with my buff stick to give it a good polish.

  “Which is to get assigned to the cavalry. Can’t do that if you get lost in your own melancholy. That won’t do any of us any good. You’ve got to fail at this with a cheerful spirit. You’ve got to put your heart into it. That’s all I’m saying.”

  “And what good is it that I’m doing for you, Deacon? What good is it that I’m doing for anyone?” And why did my musket have to get so blasted dirty all the time?

  “When we first decided to help you, we agreed that it would be mostly helping ourselves. Purely selfish, you see?”

  “No . . . I don’t.” I picked at some rust with my fingernail to try to scrape it off.

  “Who else gets to pick who they report to? Me and the fellows figure that even out in the territories, you’ll be promoted so fast, it’ll make a hummingbird look slow. To tell you the truth, we’ve always thought you were a decent sort, so if we have to report to anyone, it might as well be you.”

  I put my buff stick down. “That’s actually . . . quite kind. I’m touched.”

  Deke scoffed. “Don’t be. Like I said—purely selfish on our part.” He belied his protests with a wink.

  But I was touched. Moved in fact. It was one thing to be respected, but another thing entirely to be genuinely liked. And not for being best in mathematics or first in natural philosophy. I stepped out into the hall before I let the compliment go to my head. Or my eyes. I took a swipe at them with my sleeve. What was wrong with me these days?

  That evening, I received a letter.

  Deke quirked a brow. “Anything interesting?”

  “Hmm?” It was from Lucinda. Her handwriting looked just the way she did: composed, elegant. Maybe Deacon was right. Maybe I shouldn’t be so hasty in deciding not to see her again. Her uncle wouldn’t have introduced us, wouldn’t have let me spend a Saturday with her, if he didn’t think me worthy of her time. Although he assumed I’d be heading to the engineers. This plan of mine kept getting in the way of everything! “What’s that?”

  “Anything interesting?”

  “It’s from Lucinda. She wants to know, can I come to a dinner party at the Professor’s on the sixth of October.”

  “Better you than me.”

  “And she wants me to bring my friends.” I consulted the letter. “‘That nice Mr. Hollingsworth,’ she says.”

  He grunted. “Nice? I suppose I ought to get to work, then, on not being so conventionally dull.”

  “And she’d like me to invite several others if they wouldn’t mind the favor of indulging her students.”

  “What students are those?”

  “She’s holding some sort of finishing school in the Falls.”

  “She’s got character, looks, and accomplishments? Don’t move too slow or someone’s liable to flank you.”

  “Will you go?”

  “To dinner?”

  “It’s better than staying on the reservation.”

  “And the food’s got to be better than at the mess hall. I’ll make Dandy and Otter come too.”

  By Friday I was less prepared for my recitations than I ever had been before. What’s more, it showed. I’d probably be moved down another section in my classes. And then I’d have to start all over again, forcing my instructors to dislike me, all but insisting they not give me the benefit of doubt.

  Deke clapped me on the back as we left the academy building for the mess hall. Dandy joined us, and we caught up with Otter on the way in to dinner.

  He grinned at me. “I heard some bad reports about you, General. Congratulations. That’s the way to do it!”

  “Listen, fellows. This not studying is not going to work.”

  Deacon didn’t seem overly concerned. “No need to panic. I never said not to study.”

  “You most certainly did!” We sat down together at one of the long tables.

  “Perhaps I did. But what I meant was, don’t only study. If all you do is study, you don’t have time to do other things.”

  “Which is exactly why I used to be at the top of my class! I didn’t have time for foolishness.”

  “And you also didn’t have time to get any demerits.” He sent me a long glance. “There comes a time in any campaign when the days grow long and the injustices begin to chafe and a soldier starts to wonder if the war will ever be won.”

  I couldn’t stop my eyes from rolling. “God save us from poetical men.”

  Dandy raised his fork in our direction. “Hear, hear.”

  “But”—Deacon had increased the volume of his voice and the gravity of his look—“may I remind you gentlemen that the war is won by battles, and not the battle by the war.”

  I had tired of his bluster. “That doesn’t mean anything!”

  “What I’m trying to say is, buck up!” He gave me a shove that nearly knocked me off my chair. “We didn’t take you on so you can sit around like some gloomy Gus and complain about how you’re failing. By failing, you’re succeeding. By losing, you’re winning. Don’t you see? This is all part of the plan. You can’t give up now.”

  “I’m just . . . I’m used to being looked up to.” Somehow, I was shamed by those words.

  “And that’s the beauty of all of this. We’re used to being looked down on. Now you’re looking up to us and we’re looking down on you. Change is good, don’t you think?”

  23

  Lucinda

  I made the girls work hard at their lessons for three full weeks with the promise of a dinner party at the end. Seth graciously agreed to attend and to bring along three of his friends. I’d spent half my waking hours in the kitchen that first week of October, helping to prepare cakes and pies, the meats and other dishes, and now it was too late to do anything else. The girls had gathered, the men had arrived. For better or worse, my dinner party was under way.

  Mr. Hollingsworth was regaling Milly with some sort of tale. Mr. Ames was listening in polite anguish to one of the girls who was trying to say something in French. Mr. Delagarde was . . . Where was he? I glanced about. There he was, sitting on the sofa talking to Phoebe. But he was pale as a . . . Was he ill?

  Seth appeared at my elbow and saw me watching them. “I introduced him to Miss Hammond. She can’t see him, and I figured he’d scare all the other girls away.”

  I touched his arm. “Thank you. For this. For bringing them.”

  He smiled down into my eyes . . . and then reached out to cover my hand with his. When I looked up at him his gaze held a question.

  “Lucinda!” At the sound of my aunt’s voice, I quickly withdrew my hand and turned to see her nodding toward the clock. “It’s time.”

  Phoebe was gesturing wildly in my general direction.

  I walked over to her and took up her hand.

  “Where did Mr. Delagarde go?”

  I looked about for Dandy, but I didn’t see him. “I don’t know. He was just here, wasn’t he?”

  She sighed. “He probably left.”

  “Left? He can’t have gone. I’m sure he’ll be back in a moment.”

  “I don’t think so. He’s like me. He doesn’t belong here.”

  I a
lmost laughed, but I didn’t want to hurt her feelings. “If you could see him, you’d know he’s the one who belongs here the most. They call him Dandy. He’s the perfect gentleman.”

  “Dandy?”

  “It’s what they call him.”

  “That can’t be right. You must mean the other friend. Mr. Hollingsworth.”

  I was about to explain that his name was Deacon, but then thought the better of it. I didn’t have time for Phoebe’s musings. Later, in bed, I’d help her sort all the men out. But right now, I had to give my attention to my charges. “Mr. Hollingsworth is definitely not a dandy.”

  “Describe him to me. Describe Mr. Delagarde.”

  “Well he’s . . . tall. Dark. Very handsome, but in a most intimidating sort of way. Everything about him is perfect. His posture. His uniform. His hair. Not one thing out of place.”

  “Don’t you see? He’s not a dandy. He’s just afraid.”

  “Mr. Delagarde? Afraid? I’m sure he’s not afraid of anything! There’s something . . . something dangerous about him. A disdain that wafts from him. He makes other people afraid. Of him.”

  She was shaking her head quite decidedly. “You couldn’t think that if you would just hear him.”

  “I do.” I had. The few times he’d spoken to me. “I’ve spoken with him several times.”

  “But you didn’t hear him.”

  Sometimes Phoebe was just so maddening! I leaned down to take her hand in mine. “I’m sure he’ll be just fine.” As I glanced toward the center of the room I saw Milly whispering with one of the other girls. “Forgive me, but I have to go.”

  When I got to Milly, she tugged at my arm and leaned over to whisper into my ear.

  I shook my head at her request.

  But Milly stamped her foot and then stepped into the middle of the room. Folding her hands in front of her, she began to address us all. “Ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for coming to our dinner today. In the interest of furthering our finishing, don’t you think it would be best if Miss Hammond tells us all what we ought to do as we go about doing it? That way we might keep from making mistakes in the first place.”

  I looped an arm through hers as a means to secure her person and in hopes of stopping her from saying anything else. “I’m quite satisfied with my instruction. I think you girls know everything there is to know about dining with guests.”