Mending Horses

by M. P. Barker

  “Muh-muh-muh,” he said, his panicky eyes fixed on Billy’s face. He took a shuddering breath, then finally managed a word—Margaret—before dropping back to the pillow. “Su-su-such dreams I’ve had . . . ter-terrible dreams.” Billy flinched as Fogarty’s right hand tightened on her sleeve, his left hand closing and opening in spasms around the sheet. “Margaret, could—could you sing me to sleep, love?”

  Billy cast a frightened glance at Liam, who merely shrugged.

  Daniel stared down at his feet, keeping his own face passive. He’d expected—what? A deathbed reconciliation, like a scene from one of the treacly moral tales in Mr. Stocking’s schoolbooks? He’d been a fool to have imagined such a thing. Fogarty would die as blind as he’d lived, his mouth full of excuses and lies. If Billy turned her back now, who would blame her?

  Siúil, siúil, siúil a rúin

  Siúil go socair agus siúil go ciúin

  Siúil go doras agus éalaigh liom

  Is go dté tú mo mhúirnín slán

  [Go, go, go, my love

  Go quietly and peacefully

  Go to the door and flee with me

  And may you go safely, my dear].

  Billy’s singing was thin and quavery at first, a candle struggling against the breeze, but still it made the hair prickle at the back of Daniel’s neck. Next to him, Augusta drew in a sharp breath and turned her face away. Although Liam’s mouth remained set in a hard, angry line, his eyes still fierce beneath knotted brows, he sat on the bed and took his father’s other hand.

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Sunday, November 17, 1839, Springfield, Massachusetts

  It had been weeks since Daniel had sat down to a dinner as tasty as the one Mrs. Warriner and her nieces and hired girls had laid out in the tavern’s private dining room. And yet the ladies might as well have made salt pork and hasty pudding for all that Daniel could appreciate it. At the head of the table, Mr. Chamberlain presided like a squire. On one side sat Liam and Augusta with Billy between them, and on the other sat Mr. Stocking and Constable Ainesworth, with Daniel at the foot.

  “All’s well that ends well, eh, Daniel?” Mr. Ainesworth said, raising his glass. Expecting to escort Daniel and Billy to safety at the Taylors, the constable had come north to Springfield immediately upon receiving Mr. Stocking’s letter. He’d arrived on the heels of Mr. Chamberlain’s Peripatetic Museum, only a few days after Liam and Billy had buried their father.

  “Aye, that’s what they say,” Daniel replied, though he wasn’t looking forward to this particular ending. Nor, apparently, was Mr. Stocking, who pushed his food around his plate, eating little. Daniel told himself that he should be glad Billy was returning to her rightful home, but instead he felt a terrible gnawing at the pit of his stomach. He should be following Mr. Chamberlain’s example. The conjurer had every right to begrudge Billy her happiness, as he’d be losing one of his star performers. Yet he had generously organized this special dinner in her honor. Surely Daniel could muster a bit of joy for the lass.

  Dressed in a blue-flowered flannel gown, Billy somehow looked even more un-girlish than ever she had in trousers and vest. The blue ribbon wrapped around her short blond curls was as incongruous as the pink ribbon Phizzy wore in his tail for his Learned Horse routine. She fidgeted with her skirt, as if the fabric scorched her.

  “I’d like to propose a toast.” Mr. Chamberlain rubbed his hands together and stood. “We’re here to celebrate our two young artistes surviving an adventure every bit as perilous as those performed in our hippodramatic pantomimes.” He acknowledged Daniel and Billy with a nod and a wink. “Sir, mademoiselle, I salute you.” He downed his ale, then set his glass on the table. He placed his palms together as if in prayer and bowed low so that his forehead brushed the tips of his long fingers. “As does Prince Otoo Baswamati,” he added in the elegant, cinnamon-flavored tones he used for his East Indian mystic role.

  Billy made an odd sputtering noise, and Daniel realized that she was trying to choke down a mouthful of ale rather than spray it across the table.

  “Thank you, sir,” said Liam. “It’s kind of you, indeed, to host this grand dinner for us.”

  “Not at all. It’s the least I could do to ease your parting.”

  “Aye,” Liam agreed. “She tells me she’s made some good friends among you.” He nodded toward Mr. Stocking and Daniel. “And we’re grateful to you for taking care of her. I’ll make sure she writes to you as often as she can.”

  Mr. Chamberlain cleared his throat. “You misunderstand me, young man. It’s you she’s parting from, not us.”

  “What?” The word flew from every mouth at the table.

  “There’s still the small matter of Jonny’s two hundred dollars.” Mr. Chamberlain told Liam. “When your father took Jonny’s money, he bound Billy out as sure as if he’d signed an indenture. Seems to me she belongs to Jonny.”

  “You’ve no right,” Liam said, rounding on Mr. Stocking. “You’ve no papers on her. She told me so herself.”

  “Just the other day I read in the newspaper where a judge declared a lack of papers makes no difference in deciding whether a child is properly bound out. But if you want to spend the money to take it to the courts—” Mr. Chamberlain shrugged as if it were no concern to him. “It could take months. Or you could buy Jonny out, which I am fully prepared to do.”

  Mr. Stocking pushed his chair away from the table and rose up angrily. “Now, wait a minute, Fred. I’m not holding her to any indenture.”

  “Not even for a quarter interest in the show?” Mr. Chamberlain raised an eyebrow.

  “You trying to bribe me?” Mr. Stocking asked.

  “One third, then.” Mr. Chamberlain’s lips curled into that sly conjurer’s smile that he used when he was attempting to probe someone’s thoughts. “One third interest”—Fred paused, slowly arching his other eyebrow—“and six dancing ponies.”

  “This is madness!” Liam slammed a fist down on the table and put his other hand on Billy’s shoulder. “You’re talking about me sister like you were trading a horse.”

  Augusta laid a hand over Liam’s, encircling Billy between them. “How can you think of taking her away after all she and Liam have been through?” she said.

  “I’m not,” said Mr. Stocking. “Don’t fret about it, Liam. There’s not a thing Fred can do to take Billy from you.”

  Daniel looked to Billy, who was uncharacteristically silent. The tablecloth in front of her was deeply creased, and he realized that she was keeping herself still by clenching the linen as hard as she could. How long would it be before she’d burst?

  “That’s fine.” Mr. Chamberlain shrugged and put his thumbs into his vest pockets. “You and your horse boy can go back to peddling tinware and wooden nutmegs. It’s all the same to me.” He waved a hand vaguely in Daniel’s direction, though the stare that pinned Daniel was anything but vague. “I’m sure I can find another Professor Romanov somewhere.”

  Daniel felt as if he’d been punched in the chest. To lose the ponies—his ponies. To see them in the hands of some stranger who might undo all the good work he and Billy had done with them . . .

  Mr. Stocking flung his hands into the air. “Dammit, Fred, don’t use them ponies to threaten us. It’ll be your loss, not mine, if you toss Dan’l and me out of your show. Find yourself another songbird. Billy’s staying with Liam.”

  “And who’ll be liable for her expenses?” Mr. Chamberlain said.

  “What expenses?” Mr. Stocking said. “I’m the one paying her room and board.”

  “With whose money?” Mr. Chamberlain said.

  “You paid me the share we agreed on,” said the peddler. “No more.”

  “Funny, I don’t recollect signing any papers on it.”

  Daniel winced. Since they’d begun traveling with the show, Mr. Stocking had been badgering Mr. Chamberlain to formalize their terms with a written agreement, but Mr. Chamberlain had always put him off, promising to draw up the papers later
.

  “Then there’s the small matter of her education in the gymnastic, equestrian, and thespian arts,” the conjurer continued. “That kind of training don’t come cheap. Seems I’m owed some compensation if she abandons the show without earning back the cost of her learning. I seriously doubt Mr. Fogarty could afford—”

  “You can squeeze me all you want, Fred,” said Mr. Stocking, “but you’re not blackmailing me into taking her away from Liam.”

  “Of course,” Mr. Chamberlain continued as if Mr. Stocking hadn’t spoken, “all that is trivial compared to the question of whether a lad of—how old are you, anyway, Liam?”

  The color drained from Liam’s and Augusta’s faces.

  The conjurer smiled slyly and drew a segar from his pocket. He took his time about lighting it and letting out a satisfied puff of smoke. “Now, far’s I know, it’s not properly legal in this state for a boy under the age of twenty-one to have guardianship of a minor. S’pose I was to go poking around in the record books. Wonder what I’d find? S’pose I was to find someone lied on his marriage papers? Wonder what’d happen to his sister then?”

  The conjurer put Daniel in mind of a spider trying to weave a web around a fly. Each time one thread broke, he cast out another. It seemed he’d saved his strongest thread for last.

  “What difference does it make how old he is?” Mr. Stocking said. “No court in its right mind would appoint you guardian, Fred.”

  Mr. Chamberlain squinted at Jonathan over his segar. “Guess they wouldn’t. Guess she’d just have to go to the almshouse. Or maybe become a ward of the state. Who knows where she’d end up then? Don’t s’pose you got any idea what the law is around here in that regard, do you, Ainesworth?”

  “This isn’t my jurisdiction,” Mr. Ainesworth said. “And I’m no lawyer.”

  “Then I guess I’d better seek one out tomorrow,” said Mr. Chamberlain, settling back into his chair. He nodded toward Liam and Mr. Stocking. “No telling what might happen, should I start asking questions.” Laying his segar down in his saucer, he changed his face into what Daniel imagined was meant to be a regretful frown. “Would be a powerful waste, all that talent locked up in the almshouse.”

  The conjurer had to be bluffing. Daniel looked to Mr. Stocking, who knew Mr. Chamberlain best. The peddler’s face was a sickly greenish gray, and his mouth worked as though he couldn’t find the words to fill it.

  Billy’s cheeks were crimson, and her grip on the tablecloth tightened enough to send a shiver through her glass and plate. She looked as though she wanted to upend the table and start shouting at them. Shouting what, though?

  “What are you saying, Mr. Chamberlain? If you can’t have the girl, then nobody can?” Mr. Ainesworth said. “I may not be a lawyer, but I know what’s right, and this isn’t it.”

  “Aye, sir, none of this is right.” Daniel stood up slowly, squaring his shoulders. It surprised him how much taller he was than Mr. Stocking. “Seems to me you’re all forgetting something.” He turned to the peddler. “Aye, even you, sir. I hear a lot of talk about who owes money to who, and where Billy belongs, and what Mr. Chamberlain can give or take if he don’t get his way, but there hasn’t none of you thought to ask Billy what she wants.”

  “She wants to stay with her family, is what she wants,” Liam said.

  “She’s told you so herself, then,” Daniel said.

  “Aye . . . well . . . not in so many words, but I know she does.” Liam looked down at Billy.

  She was still twisting the hem of the tablecloth in her hands. “You never asked me, Liam,” she said, without looking up.

  “I didn’t think I needed to,” Liam said. Billy shrugged Liam’s and Augusta’s arms from her shoulders as if throwing off a cloak. Liam rested his hand on the back of her chair, as if to let her know that he still offered his protection in spite of her rebuff. “All right, Nuala. I’m asking now. Will you come home to live with me and Augusta?”

  Mr. Chamberlain folded his arms across his chest. “My offer still stands, Jonny, if you’re willing to see reason.”

  “Damn your offers and your threats, Fred. Well, Billy?” Mr. Stocking said. “You’ve been steaming away like a teakettle fit to boil.”

  Billy pushed her chair back. The tablecloth was gray and ridged in tight wrinkles where she’d clutched it. “You’re squabbling over me like a pack of chickens cackling over a juicy wee grub.” She looked sideways at her brother. “Aye, even you, Liam.

  “But all these months Daniel’s been on at me to not be always thinking of meself, and Mr. S. has been trying to learn me—teach me to keep me temper and mind me manners, so I been trying to hold me tongue.”

  “Well, now’s your chance to speak, lass,” Daniel said. “And don’t you be letting Mr. Chamberlain’s bluster scare you into doing something you don’t want to do.”

  “I don’t bloody well know what I want!” Billy shouted. “I want to stay here with Liam and Augusta. I want to ride Phizzy and the ponies, and I don’t want Mr. C. to throw you and Mr. S. out of the show.” She turned to the peddler, her lower lip trembling. “I want to be singing with you.” She tore the bow from her hair and flung it down onto her plate, where it sank in a pool of gravy. “And I don’t want folk to be talking about me like I wasn’t here,” she snapped. “Well, damn you all, and damn me, too, for no matter what I choose, it’ll be wrong!” She shoved herself away from the table, knocking over her chair, and bolted out the door.

  “No,” Daniel said, as Liam rose to chase after her. “Let her go think things out by herself. And when she comes back, we got to abide by her choice. All of us,” he added, with a pointed look at Mr. Chamberlain. “You can play all the games you like, sir, but you’ll not be keeping Billy long if she doesn’t want to stay. Isn’t that right, Liam?”

  Liam sighed wearily. “Indeed. No one’s ever had much luck at making Nuala do what she doesn’t want to.”

  Mr. Chamberlain opened his mouth to retort, but Daniel cut him off with an impatient hand gesture. “As for you, sir, if you do aught against her brother, then you’d best be sleeping with one eye open, for she’ll be taking her vengeance on you one way or another. And I’ll be right alongside her.”

  “And so will I,” said Mr. Stocking, putting a hand on Daniel’s shoulder.

  “All right, then,” Mr. Chamberlain said. “But she’d better not come running to me when she gets tired of her brother and his vermin-infested little shack.”

  Augusta had to hold fast to Liam’s arm to prevent him from striking the conjurer.

  As the diners left the table, Mr. Ainesworth drew Daniel aside. “I’ve never seen or heard the like. Asking a child to make such a decision? I can’t believe they agreed to it.”

  “I don’t know as they have. But they have agreed on one thing,” Daniel said, feeling the weight of Liam’s and Mr. Chamberlain’s angry glares. “They’ve agreed to leave off hating each other and start hating me instead.”

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  It was hours before Billy returned. Deciding that it would be better to do something other than sit in the tavern or pace the dooryard, Daniel groomed Ivy and polished her tack, while Mr. Stocking went to the wagon shed to inventory his wares, or so he said. Since the peddler had no tin and few notions left, Daniel suspected he would do little more than move things about and write meaningless notes in his ledger while he fretted over Billy’s decision. Meanwhile, the Fogartys waited on the settee in Mr. Warriner’s sitting room, when Liam wasn’t pacing. Mr. Chamberlain headed down to the show lot to supervise preparations for the next day’s performance. Mr. Ainesworth had joined him, expressing curiosity about the museum, although Daniel guessed that the constable was more interested in making sure that the conjurer wouldn’t follow Billy and try to influence her decision.

  It was an unseasonably mild afternoon. Daniel took a stool out to the barnyard to work in the thin November sunlight. He polished and repolished metalwork and buffed saddle and bridle until his arms ached an
d Ivy’s tack looked almost new. He was just shining up the stirrups and buckles for the third time when someone hissed at him from the barn.

  Billy lurked in the shadows, gesturing for him to join her. He felt an unexpected surge of delight that she’d sought him out first. The delight quickly faded at her words.

  “Where’s Liam?” she asked in a hoarse whisper.

  So she’d decided. Daniel’s stomach clenched as tight as it would if someone had taken Ivy away. “In the sitting room, last I saw him,” he replied gruffly. Avoiding her eyes, he gestured with his polishing rag.

  Billy trotted toward the hotel, her arms swinging and her shoulders hunched forward like a boy’s. Her new gown was already torn, mud and grass staining the pale blue flannel.

  Slowly, Daniel hung the saddle in the space Mr. Warriner had allotted him. When he turned, Mr. Stocking was standing in the barn door, a canvas sack in his hand.

  “I saw her come back,” the peddler said, setting down his sack. “She nipped into the barn when I turned to watch her, like she didn’t want to be seen.”

  Daniel nodded. “It’s Liam,” was all he needed to say.

  Mr. Stocking winced. “That’s as it should be.” He took his spectacles off and blinked hard a couple of times. “That young man has had sorrow enough.” He took a long time wiping his glasses with his handkerchief and putting them back on. “Well, that’s it, I guess.” He gestured with his chin toward the sack. “Will you see she gets that? It’s the rest of her clothes and her books. Not that she’ll have much use for ’em. Augusta’ll probably trim her out in dresses and ribbons, and she was never much of a one for books.”

  “Won’t you want to be giving ’em to her yourself?”

  Mr. Stocking shook his head. “I can’t.” He moved farther into the barn. “I . . . um . . . I need to confer with Phizzy for a while.”