“Did you—” Motherly delicacy and faith kept her from finishing the sentence.
“I was to receive some money from Nathaniel Chandler once we reached Epsom safely. Sir William disliked this private arrangement. He found it to be untrustworthy.” That was not the whole truth. But it wasn’t a lie either.
That had been the whole cursed problem from the start: Rosalind had sworn she wouldn’t lie. Not to Sir William and—she thought—not to anyone else. But she had, especially to herself. You can tell Nathaniel about yourself without giving too much away. Especially not your heart. Why, secretaries don’t even have hearts.
You can take what you need and then leave.
Saying good-bye won’t hurt. You’re used to it.
But she wasn’t used to it. She was used to slipping away in secret, not to leaving after a kiss that rocked her senseless.
And she was certainly not used to falling in love.
“How much money, Rosie?” Mrs. Agate ventured.
To her mother, the money to pay off her debt would seem a fortune. Just as it had to her. “No money, Mama. I received nothing.”
“Then surely you did nothing wrong. Not if you were still doing your work properly. If you just explained to your baronet, maybe he—”
“The more I explained, the less good came of it.” The letter of reference, still sealed, was sharp in her bodice within her stays. The same place she had always stuffed her letters from or for Anweledig.
She’d had plenty of time on the way back from Epsom to work out the words that would convince her parents to let her stay. But they still cut, too sharply true to be easily spoken.
And it cut too to excise Nathaniel from her explanation. I wanted to stay with him so badly, Mama, that I almost risked Carys’s safety.
Her mother knew nothing of Tranc. Of the debt held by Rosalind and the sainted Aunt Annie. And Mrs. Agate didn’t need to know about that. The top layer of honesty was enough. Bad enough. “I no longer work for a baronet. I am sorry, Mama. I know you were proud of that.”
“Oh, Rosie.” Mrs. Agate collected herself, drawing her plump little form up straight. “Did he give you a character at all?”
The reference, she meant. “Yes. Of sorts.”
“Then you’ll find a new post soon enough.” Her mother enfolded Rosalind in a quick embrace. One of transition rather than comfort, with no mother song. “Until you do, you must stay here.”
A shout came from the public room, and Mrs. Agate looked over her shoulder. “That Mr. Elton. Drunk off his feet every time he comes in. I’d best go see him out, since your father’s still out in the stables. You take your things on up to Carys’s room, all right? You can carry your own trunk up?”
These sounded like questions, but they weren’t really. Mrs. Agate was trundling away without waiting for an answer.
Rosalind heaved her trunk onto one end and dragged it. First toward the stairs, then up. Bump. Shove. Thud. Bump. Shove. Thud.
Maybe if she made enough noise, one of her brothers would come help her.
But Mrs. Agate reappeared first. “Rosie!” She called from the edge of the public room, peering up at the stairs. “Carys isn’t in the same room you might remember. She uses the chamber you once did. So that’ll be nice, won’t it? Familiar?” Again, she was off before Rosalind could reply.
Familiar indeed. This had been the way of her childhood: a parent or older brother swooping in with quick words about something that needed doing or correcting. And then off again; there was always more work than time or hands to do it.
Bump. Shove. Thud. She made her way up the remaining stairs to the first floor, then dragged her trunk to the back stairs and bumped it up to the top story of the Eight Bells. The family chambers were the least desirable in the building, small and plain and high up. Rosalind’s brothers had crammed themselves three and four to a room. Rosalind had always shared a chamber with a maid or two, while the younger children like Carys slept in little bunks in a room not much larger than a pantry.
Now three of her brothers had grown away from the inn. There were no more small children. The sleeping pantry was locked, probably used now to store bedding.
Carys had left her chamber not only unlocked, but also untidy. The bed in which Rosalind had slept a decade before was unmade, its sheets and coverlet tumbled. The wardrobe door hung open, as did two of the drawers of a tallboy between the room’s two beds.
Across the top of the plain wooden tallboy were scattered glass vials of scent, all nearly empty. Jars of cosmetics that were—Rosalind checked—yes, also almost used up. Necklaces with broken clasps. A brooch missing its pin and one of its paste gems. Carys must persuade the lady’s maids of the Eight Bells to give up their mistress’s exhausted trinkets. An eager, pretty face was difficult to deny.
Sharing a room with Carys, Rosalind could make sure that nothing happened to her carefree sister. Better me than someone else.
Rosalind smoothed the unmade bed’s sheets and coverlet into place, then shifted her trunk to the end of the second bed. She wished she could change into one of her own gowns, now that she had her things with her. But she couldn’t reach the buttons of this one. Even trying would enrage the tight skin of her right arm and back and set up an uncomfortable ache in her elbow.
That was that, then. She was settled back at the Eight Bells.
For now.
The room now neatened, she shut the door behind her and descended the stairs. First, she needed to find Aunt Annie. And then, until and if she found another post, she needed to find something of use to do.
Some task that would help her forget all she’d left behind—not only in Epsom, but year after year. If such a task existed in the world.
* * *
Ten days until the Derby, and Nathaniel took Dill’s place on watch that night so the servant could pursue the arrogant barmaid at the King’s Waggon.
It didn’t help. All Nathaniel did was stare into darkness, remembering how Rosalind hadn’t even looked back over her shoulder when she climbed into the hackney in Button’s company.
He wanted her to stay with him of her own accord. But he just wasn’t that important to her. And so he did the thing he was good at, which in this case was saying good-bye with a smile and pretending like it was fine, completely fine, to see the person to whom he’d hoped to prove himself worthwhile cast him aside.
If Sheltie had been here in the cozy brick stables of the King’s Waggon, he’d have settled into straw beside her and leaned against her warm swayback. Instead, he kept a hand on his pistol and listened for other sounds besides the shifting of animals and Lombard’s snoring.
Nine days until the Derby, and their jockeys arrived in Epsom to exercise the horses. Nathaniel spent the day on a training course, eyes bleary as he watched horses move over the long sweep of green. He glanced at his pocket watch, about which a second hand swept, but was unable to keep numbers in his mind to time the fast-moving animals.
Eight days. Another night watch.
Seven, and more exercising. Button returned from his journey to the Eight Bells with a shrug and an assurance that Miss Agate had arrived safely. No, he bore no note from her.
Nathaniel’s throat felt dry—the sort of dry that only a sharp, biting liquor could ease. He gritted his teeth and went back to work.
Six days until the Derby; again, the training course. Five, again. And four, and three. Keeping watch on the jockeys, Daley and Pring, as well as over the horses. Pale Marauder and Epigram looked stronger and fitter every day.
Nathaniel supposed he ought to be pleased. He’d manage it someday when he allowed himself to have feelings again.
The city was beginning to fill now, the wide streets cluttered by everything from shining carriages and new-fangled velocipedes to rough-wheeled boards on which lamed former soldiers rolled along. Innkeepers were shoving in guests four and six to a room. Many of Epsom’s homes let rooms to race-day visitors. Some people slept on the pavement or in t
he street. Tents popped up like wild mushrooms all over the green sweep of the Downs.
Sir William’s private parlor-turned-bedchamber remained inviolate. Graciously, the baronet offered to let Nathaniel share his space.
“I’ll sleep in the stable,” was Nathaniel’s reply. Though he left his trunk in Sir William’s room under the baronet’s lock and key.
There was little else for Nathaniel to do besides keep watch at night or walk to the track during the day. Ordering the servants? Done by Sir William. Arranging care for the carriage horses? Ditto, ditto. All the milkmaids of travel were shackled and sent away, and Nathaniel had too little to do.
Why had he been foolish enough to think a trip to Epsom would accomplish something? It was an ending. An end, probably, to Sir Jubal’s hopes of a double champion; an end to this stolen time with Rosalind. An end to Nathaniel’s hope of regaining Sir William’s trust.
Even if a horse ran his heart out, anything could keep him from winning. A careless jockey, a false stride, a collision. Victory was unlikely at the best of times.
Potential was so sweet compared to reality.
And on every corner, in every inn, were bottles. Tankards. Flasks. Wine and gin and ale and brandy and God only knew what else. Buoying the raucousness of the ever-growing crowd. Tempting him with their jewellike wink.
The day before the Derby, he could bear it no more. He fumbled through the taproom of the King’s Waggon, squinting to hide the sight of the bottles and glasses that held forgetting. Probably he looked drunk, but drunkenness was common enough today, and it raised no notice. A shoulder slammed into the door of the private parlor, and he reached for the handle.
Unlocked. Oh glorious day.
Of course, the reason it was unlocked was because Sir William was inside it. Nathaniel’s eyelids sprung open as soon as he realized. “Beg pardon, Father.”
“Not at all. Join me.” Sir William’s brief surprise had vanished in a flicker.
He had transformed the parlor into a tolerable bedchamber. Sofa and table were pushed to one side, and a pallet of mattress and sheets had been made up on the floor. His trunk and Nathaniel’s were tucked into the corners. Through the middle of the room, the wood floor was smooth and clear. The inevitable path for the wheeled chair.
“I was just about to have brandy.” The baronet sounded doubtful. The small bottle on the room’s table was still sealed and the tumbler empty.
One sealed bottle. That was fine. Nathaniel was used to the ritual of brandy. “One-half inch,” he said. “Do you want me to pour it out?”
“No, no. I will.” The wooden wheels made a sleek ticking sound as they rolled over the floor. Sir William eased himself into place before the table. His hand reached for the bottle—then stopped. “Did you know, Nathaniel, that I don’t like brandy?”
“Ah…no. Why do you drink it every day?”
Cheering and shouting leaked beneath the door. Edged around the lace-edged draperies hung at the window. Racegoers, happy as drunken lords.
Sir William’s voice cut low beneath those sounds. “Because I cannot do without any drink at all. And it is too easy to take more than one ought. The brandy reminds me of that.”
Nathaniel’s chin drew back. For a moment he could only stare. “You…you have it too. This craving for drink.”
“I have it too. I wish you had inherited anything else from me.” Sir William’s palms were flat on the table, ready to push himself away.
The brandy was a daily test, not a daily reward. “How long do you have to test yourself with it?”
“Every day. Forever. Until I know without question I would pass.”
“Huh.”
As usual, there was no place to sit in the chamber. The cut-velvet sofa was almost hidden beneath the decorative detritus of the room, plus an unrolled shaving kit.
So Nathaniel perched on the edge of the table, one boot braced on the floor, half expecting his father to say Off. Off the table as he always did in his study.
Instead, he was the one to speak. “I hated you for leaving us.”
Sir William’s hands spasmed, but he said nothing.
So Nathaniel explained. “We were no more than half-grown when Mother died. We were sick with the loss of her. We needed you to tell us everything would be all right, that there was still someone who cared for us.”
Instead, Sir William was gone more than ever. As if with his wife dead, there was no reason to stay in Newmarket. As if his children were nothing.
Jonah had turned inward. Abigail married horribly young. Hannah, sweet of heart, had latched on to Nathaniel and Sheltie and the grooms. Out of such inadequate substitutes had she made partial parents. “I was the only one who told you the truth, Father: that you had abandoned us. I know you only came home because you were ill. You would never have come back if you’d had legs to walk away from us.”
The words flowed so calmly, so readily, that Nathaniel realized he’d been waiting to speak them for quite some time. They had lined up and marched forth, presenting themselves like soldiers for inspection.
Pushing to his feet, he paced across the room. Two steps before he was halted by the pallet. “I was horrid to you. I know that. And I’m sorry for the way I acted. It was wrong of me. But after all this time, I wanted you to know why I’d done it.”
He turned his steps toward the doorway, but Sir William held up a hand. “Wait, Nathaniel.” Back and forth, he rolled the empty tumbler between flat palms. When he spoke, the words seemed unearthed with great effort. “I had no idea how to be a father without a mother. But I knew how to travel and connect. I could turn conversations into contracts, and contracts into coin. I was fooling myself, I know, to think that piling up money would be enough for you all.”
He sounded bitter, so Nathaniel said, “It was certainly better to have it than not, if those were the two choices.”
“I hated you too,” added the baronet mildly. “At least I hated that you spent your days in a bottle. Not even old enough for Oxford, and you were pickling your healthy body. No help when I tried to learn to walk again, or when I realized I never would.”
Nathaniel leaned against the door frame. He felt time like a distance, as though they were talking about people so far away they could not be seen clearly anymore. “Did you want my company? Or did you only think I owed you?”
Smack. The tumbler slipped and skidded across the tabletop. “Both, if I’m honest. Both of those things. Even before your mother died, I made a comfortable home for all of you. Traveling about to the races and the sales, earning money. So often absent that I was never able to be a part of my own family.”
Nathaniel had never considered that before, that his father had felt pushed to the side in his own home. Taken for granted. Pressured to provide.
“You were a good provider,” he said. “We never doubted that. I should have told you.”
Sir William waved this off. “Your mother told me. She told me she missed me, and she wrote me letters about what you children were doing, and…” His hazel eyes seemed to be looking at those faraway figures. “In truth, I wanted to be that person she made me feel I was. I wanted to be indispensable.”
Nathaniel had to smile at this. “You never really wanted my help, did you?”
“I have never wanted any help. From anyone. But sometimes I have needed it. And when I came back from Spain you made clear to me, with your drinking and scorn, that I would not get it from you.”
This was so deep a wound, Nathaniel realized, that it had never truly healed. It had scarred, closing with a tight wariness that made Sir William tense every time something approached that tender spot.
“I am sorry, Father. I wish I could undo that old selfishness and give you the help you needed.”
Sir William shook his head.
And Nathaniel knew that this apology could never be adequate. Nothing could make up for the years of hurt on both sides. Of wanting the other to say, Be there for me, and of wanting the other to
have been present.
But an apology was all he could give.
And then his father pushed back from the table to face him and smiled, an expression so halting that Nathaniel hardly recognized it for what it was. “You gave it now. That’s enough.”
Nathaniel slid down the door frame about a foot before his knees remembered to hold him up. “What?”
“I asked Lombard about the… What do you call them? Milkmaids? Yes, right. All the milkmaids you’ve encountered since leaving Newmarket. You handled them well.”
“Milkmaids love being handled,” Nathaniel mumbled.
“You hid from me all the good you could do. Have done all these years to help the family. Or maybe I didn’t want to see it.” The hazel eyes, so unlike Nathaniel’s in shape or color, held an expression he understood well. “I’m not sorry I came along to Epsom. I’m only sorry I didn’t come on a journey with you long ago.”
They would have fallen into silence, but a round of drunken cheers erupted from the taproom, making them both smile. “Are you going to place a bet?” Sir William asked. “Only one more day to enter your wager.”
“I don’t know. The turf has never seemed the sort of place I might find victory.”
What form would his own victory take? He had once thought he would find it in Epsom. But now a future without a bronze-haired, wry woman at his side seemed incomplete.
And he remembered—yes, he needed to place a bet for Rosalind. “Father. Yes, I do want to wager on the race. Do you know the odds on Epigram?”
The baronet scratched his head. “Fifteen to one at noon today. Prince Paul is the favorite, going off at eleven to five.”
“As though I’d bet on a prince when I’ve seen how good a knight and a baronet’s horses can be,” Nathaniel scoffed. “Have you a bookmaker you trust? Oh, that’s good. Will you place a wager for me?”
He pulled notes from his waistcoat pocket. Day after day, he’d kept them with him like some sort of talisman of Rosalind. “Place it all on Epigram. One hundred pounds.”
Sir William took the money slowly, smoothing the notes out flat. “Is some of this for her?”
A Gentleman’s Game Page 22