by Carla Kelly
Aunt Shreve was poised to say more in the same vein as they inched along, but the look on her niece's face stopped her complaints. She tapped on the glass and rolled it down as the post chaise stopped.
“Mind that you pause and pull off when you reach the top of this hill, Coachman,” she ordered.
They continued in silence broken only by the squawk of geese in the cart ahead. In a few minutes, the carriage pulled out of the line of traffic and stopped.
“Get out and stretch yourself,” Aunt Shreve suggested “And do go to the top of that rise.”
“You needn't let me slow you down,” Ellen protested. “Surely the view can wait.”
“No, it cannot,” Aunt Shreve insisted. She motioned to the carriage door, where the post boy stood to open it.
Ellen stepped out, grateful—even though she had objected—for the chance to walk about for a moment. She walked to the top of the gently sloping rise, looked toward the east, and loved her aunt all the more.
The sun was going down over Oxford, throwing streams of molten fire upon honey-colored walls and spires. Ellen held her breath at the sight and then let it out slowly, There was Great Tom, and the spires of Magdalen, grace notes to the elegant architectural humor of the Radcliffe Camera, and behind it, the Bodleian Library. The river flowed under bridges as inspired as the buildings that lined it on both sides.
From her elevation, Ellen gazed, hand to eyes, into college quadrangles where the grass was still green, protected by the warmth of centuries-old stone. She clapped her hands in delight. Oxford was a city the color of honey, and a veritable honeycomb itself of colleges, quadrangles, and churches.
The sky turned lavender as she watched and then a more somber purple. We will have rain tonight, she thought, but it will be special rain because it falls upon Oxford.
“Excuse me, miss, if I appear forward, but are you in some trouble with your post chaise?”
Ellen whirled around. Papers in hand, a man sat upon a rock near the crest of the hill where she stood. She had not noticed him in his black student's robe because he blended in so well with the shadows that were lengthening across the copse.
“Oh, no, sir. We are fine,” she said, putting her hands behind her back as though she had been caught pilfering a candy jar. “My aunt merely wanted me to have a look at the city before we drove in.”
The man got to his feet. He was taller even than the tallest Grimsley. His hair was ordinary brown and untidy, and the wind was picking it up and tousling it further. Ellen felt the need to put her hand to her bonnet.
The breeze caught the student's gown and it billowed about him, making him appear larger yet. The wind tugged at the papers in his hand. As she watched, he tore them up and held them in both palms to the wind like an offering. The scraps swirled up and out of sight.
“Good riddance,” he said and came closer.
He had an elegant face, at odds with the untidiness of his hair, with high cheekbones, a straight nose, and eyes as dark as his gown, She noticed that his ears lay nicely flat against his head, and she smiled as she thought of Thomas Cornwell.
“I amuse you?” he asked, giving her a little nod that passed for a bow.
“No, it is someone else. You have excellent ears, sir,” she said and then put her hand to her mouth. “I mean, I was thinking of someone who is not so blessed. Oh, dear, that was a strange thing to say!”
He laughed and tossed away the remaining scraps of paper that still rested in his palm. He gave her a real bow, and he was more graceful than she would have thought, considering his height. Suddenly she felt out of place and much younger than eighteen.
“Do you come up here to commune with nature, sir?” she asked.
He shook his head. “I come here to walk off my letters from home.”
She thought of her own home and found this reasonable. “I expect I would like to do the same thing,” she said. “Do your parents smother you too and worry and prose on and on?”
He gave a shout of laughter, grabbed her hand, and kissed it, bowing again. “Are you a Sybil, or perhaps a Cassandra, to divine this? I would not have thought there were other parents in all of England like my mother, but perhaps I was wrong. James Gatewood at your service, miss.”
She smiled and withdrew her hand from his. “I am Ellen Grimsley, sir.”
“Ellen?” he asked. “Prosaic name, but lovely.”
“I do not mind that it is ordinary,” she replied, twinkling her eyes at him for no reason that she could discern. “It could have been much worse.” She hesitated, looking at the student. Something about his open countenance seemed to invite confidence. “It could have been Zephyr.”
“Zephyr?” he asked in amusement. “Oh, surely not!”
“Zephyr indeed. It happens that a horse named Zephyr won at Newmarket the day I was born. My papa is horse mad, sir.” She sighed, and then grinned as he laughed. “But Mama, who seldom prevails, prevailed from her bed of confinement, for which I am grateful.”
He nodded in perfect understanding. “As it is, I suppose now you have brothers who tease you and call you Nellie, but that must be preferable to Zeph.”
“Indeed, it must be,” she agreed. She looked around at the carriage and made a motion to leave.
He grabbed up his books by the rock, falling in step with her as she retraced her way to the carriage below. She glanced at his books, noting North's Treatise on Government, and a copy of Paine's The Crisis.
He followed her glance. “I should be studying, but it looked like a fine afternoon.”
“And you are ‘a summer soldier and a sunshine patriot,’ when the weather is mellow?” she teased.
He raised one eyebrow. “You are a spy, sent by my don,” he teased in turn, “come to find out why I am not buried in scholarship.”
She shook her head. “I am no spy, and that's all I know of Thomas Paine,” she confessed. “I found the pamphlet at a church rumble sale, but Mama snatched it away and told me it was wicked.”
“And well she did, Miss Grimsley,” he said with a smile. “You might have attempted a nursery room revolt. But wicked? No.”
“You're teasing me,” she observed. “Sir, I do not joke about books.”
“Touché. Nor do I, Miss Grimsley,” he replied. “Perhaps I can loan you my copy. Are you staying in town?”
She nodded. “I will be matriculating at Miss Digman's Select Female Academy.”
“I never heard the word matriculation used in the same breath as Miss Dignam's,” he said. “I had thought the most strenuous course there to be French knots.”
“I am sure it is not so,” she said quickly. “I have great plans.” She was silent a moment. “I have greater plans than my brother, and he is a student here … under duress.”
“That happens to some,” he replied. “And what is this scholar's name?”
“It is Gordon, and he is in his first year at University College,” she replied. “He does not know how lucky he is.”
“They seldom do,” Gatewood murmured. He was silent then as they continued down the hill together.
As they came closer to the carriage, Ellen stopped in confusion. “Excuse me, sir, for being so forward. I really shouldn't be talking with strangers.”
“Neither should I,” he said and twinkled his eyes at her. “But as I did not think you would do me any harm, I chanced it. Good day, Miss Ellen Grimsley. I trust you will find Oxford to your liking.”
She nodded and smiled up at him. “I am sure that I shall.” He continued toward the main road. Ellen looked at the post chaise and called to him.
He turned, a look of interest in his lively eyes.
“My Aunt Shreve was teasing me a moment ago, but tell me, sir, is Oxford really the center of the universe?”
He came back to stand beside her. She noted the shabbiness of his coat under the student gown and his collar frayed around the edges. He did not appear to have shaved that morning, and his eyes were tired. He was silent a moment,
considering her question, and then the good cheer reappeared. He shifted his books to his other arm and touched her arm lightly.
“I will give you an Oxford answer, Miss Grimsley,” he said. “The answer to that question depends entirely upon where you are standing.”
“Well, then, sir, where are you standing now?” she persisted. “I really must know.”
He looked down at her, his expression hard to read. “I would say that from where I am standing right now, yes, and yes again, Miss Grimsley. Good day.”
And then he was gone, taking long strides down the hill toward the town. She thought he whistled as he hurried along.
Ellen watched him for a moment and then returned to the carriage. “I just met the strangest man,” she said to her aunt, who had been admiring the view from the other window. “A student, I think.”
Aunt Shreve turned and followed Ellen's gaze. “That fellow over there? He certainly has a broad set of shoulders to recommend him.”
“Aunt!”
“I may be a widow twenty years and my children grown, my dear, but I can admire,” Aunt Shreve replied. “Come, come, Ellen. You have had your look at Oxford. What do you think?”
“His ears are flat.”
Aunt Shreve stared at her in consternation and then burst into laughter. “My dear, I do not open bottles of Palais Royal for flat ears!”
“I am only teasing, Aunt,” Ellen replied. “I think Oxford is splendid. I also think that words do not describe it.” She leaned forward and touched her aunt on the knee. “Thank you, Aunt Shreve. Even if Papa only allows me to stay here until Horry's wedding, it will be enough.”
As they drove across the bridge, the clouds settled lower, resting on the highest spires as the honey-colored buildings turned gray again. When the cold rain began, Ellen wondered if the tall student had reached his chambers in time. Then she put him from her mind as the magnificence of Oxford surrounded her.
Gordon Grimsley, black-gowned and even handsomer than she remembered, paced in front of the fireplace in Miss Dignam's sitting room. Ellen shook the rain from her cloak and only had time to lay it aside before her brother grabbed her in a bear hug and kissed her soundly on both cheeks.
He had an appreciative audience. As he whirled her around and she shrieked in protest, Ellen made the observation that Gordon Grimsley rarely did anything without an audience.
The sitting room was occupied by young ladies who had all suspended whatever activity they were engaged in to watch—cards clutched tight in nerveless fingers; stitches dropped; pages unturned; words arrested in midsentence. As she stood in the circle of his arms, Ellen Grimsley noted that her brother had lost none of his effect on females, even the select females of Miss Dignam's Academy.
“Gordon, really,” she whispered. “You've never been so glad to see me before!”
He winked at her and nodded to a dry husk of a woman bearing down on them from the other side of the room. He spoke out of the side of his mouth. “I do not think she will suffer me much longer in her sitting room.”
“And no wonder,” Ellen whispered back. “Gordon, you are incorrigible.”
“Yes, thank the Almighty,” he agreed. He turned then and bowed to the lady approaching. The bow was so elegant that several of the young ladies sighed. Ellen put her hand to her mouth to smother her laughter. Trust Gordon to put his best foot forward.
“Ellen,” he was saying, “it gives me great pleasure to introduce to you Miss Dignam, your headmistress. Miss Dignam, this is my little sister, Ellen.”
Ellen grasped the woman's cool, dry hand, opened her mouth to speak, and then closed it when the woman only touched her hand and then hurried past her to embrace Aunt Shreve.
“Eugenia, how long has it been?” she exc1aimed, lips stretched tight over protruding teeth in what must be a smile.
The students in the room continued to gape. Gordon looked at them in amusement. “Perhaps they never knew a dragon to have friends,” he whispered to his sister.
While they watched the reunion, Gordon took his sister by the arm. “I have spoken a meal for the three of us at The Mitre.” He grinned. “Providing you can fork over the blunt.”
“Gordon, it is only just past the quarter. Are your pockets to let already?”
“Always,” he agreed cheerfully. “I was hoping you would be bringing some reinforcements from home.” He looked around to make sure that his aunt could not hear him. “I am planning to toddle over to London this weekend with a new friend of mine.”
“Gordon, that is a long way to go. What about your studies?”
He shrugged and flashed that lopsided grin of his that only made her more wary. “I'll get by.”
There wasn't time for a reply. In another moment, Aunt Shreve, her arm about Miss Dignam, had returned to her side. “Come, my dears,” she announced. “Miss Dignam has given us leave to go to—The Mitre, is it, Gordon? I promised to have you back here by nine o'clock, and indeed, Gordon has his own curfew.”
Again that careless shrug. Ellen frowned, dreading the uneasiness that was already stirring her stomach around.
“I am entirely at your service, ladies,” Gordon said as he made a final bow, to the accompaniment of an entire row of sighs from the students grouped on the sofa.
“Gordon, you are utterly shameless!” Ellen scolded as they bundled up against the drizzle and hurried along the street to Cornmarket. “I think you are a dreadful flirt.”
“I must second the notion,” Aunt Shreve agreed as they entered the inn and surrendered their cloaks to the serving girl. She smiled at her handsome nephew. “And I also must acknowledge that you received an unfair amount of the Grimsley charm.” She took him by the arm as they walked into a private parlor. “I would advise you not to waste it on your aunt and sister. We know you too well.”
The first course was ready as soon as they were seated. They ate in hungry silence and then Gordon pushed back his plate. “Sister, I could not believe my own eyes when I received that letter from Mama, telling me that you would be attending Miss Dignam's Academy. Have you let your brains leak out? If Papa offered me anything I wanted for two bottles of sherry, this place would be low on my list.”
He smiled at the waiter, who set the next course in front of him. “I can't imagine anyone comes up to Oxford without vast coercion, El.”
“You're a dunce, Gordon,” she said without missing a bite.
He slammed down his fork. “Don't keep me in suspense, sister! Did or did not Papa say something to you about my joining that cavalry regiment?”
Ellen stared at her brother. “He did no such thing, Gordon, and you know it. I remember well the terms of the agreement he forged with you when you came up here only one month ago. You are to acquit yourself at Oxford for a year, through all the terms, and then he would think about it.”
Gordon picked up the fork again and dragged it around the food on his plate. “Think about it!” he burst out. “While he's thinking about it, the war will end in Spain and I will have missed all the fun!”
“It cannot be otherwise,” Ellen replied. “Now tell me what you have learned thus far at your college.”
He gave her a blank stare and continued picking over his food, his lips tight together and the frown line between his eyes deeply pronounced.
Aunt Shreve picked up the ball of conversation. “My dears, whenever I see you two together, I am struck by your resemblance to one another.”
Ellen smiled at her aunt and took a closer look at her elder brother. They had the same fair hair and blue eyes, but to her mind, there the resemblance stopped. She observed her brother in profile, admiring the regularity of his features, and wondering why they were so different in temperament, inclination, and goal. I would give the world to walk these halls and quads, and Gordon cannot wait to leave it.
Her own pleasure in the meal dissolved. She ate what was put before her and wished herself elsewhere. Gordon, when he recovered from his sulks, kept up a witty conversation with
Aunt Shreve that earned him a kiss on the cheek as he escorted them back to the school and a handful of guineas.
“Your mother thought you might be in need,” Aunt Shreve said. “She says that is all you will have until the quarter, so practice economy, my dear.”
Gordon grinned and kissed them good night. The bell in Magdalen Tower tolled, and then another and another. “I'll be in touch, Ellen,” he said as his lips brushed her cheek.
Aunt Shreve watched him go. “I worry for him,” was all she said as they opened the door and were greeted by Miss Dignam.
“I will show you to your room,” she said, handing Ellen a candlestick.
“One moment, Miss Dignam, if you please,” Ellen said. She set down the candle and reached in her reticule for the letter. “Miss Dignam, if you please, could I change these classes in embroidery and French for geography and perhaps geometry? I would like that, and I know that I can keep up.”
Miss Dignam blinked. “We do not offer such things here! We find that a little Italian and a little French, and watercolors or embroidery are enough. Geometry? Goodness, child, these subjects are not for females.”
“Do you mean I cannot study them here?”
“Precisely.” Miss Dignam permitted herself a smile. “If you continue with us next year, the older students study the improving poetry of John Donne. But only with their parents’ approval,” she emphasized, “and only if it does not excite them.”
“I had no idea,” Aunt Shreve said in a faint voice.
“Oh, yes, my dear Eugenia. We follow the same pattern with the modern composers such as Beethoven.” Miss Dignam gestured toward the stairs. “Come, my dear, you will have a strenuous day tomorrow. We have been studying the different shades of blue and green in watercolors, and you must attempt to catch up with us. I recommend that you retire.”
Ellen kissed her aunt good night and quietly climbed the stairs behind the headmistress. Miss Dignam opened a door and peered in.
“You are sharing chambers with Fanny Bland,” she whispered. “She is an unexceptional girl, and all that is proper. I believe you are already acquainted?”