The Rebellious Ward

by Joan Wolf

  “Catriona,” said her great-grandmother, and all the eyes in the room swung her way. “Where have you been? Your cousin has been waiting to meet you.”

  “She’s been sneaking a holiday,” said a beautifully timbred voice that was colored with amusement. “I don’t blame you, cousin. Who wants to be indoors on a day like this?” The ducal fingers were extended, and Catriona put her own grubby little paw into his. “How do you do?” said this surprising young man. “I am so pleased you have come to live with us.”

  “How do you do,” said Catriona and stared at him. He stared back, and the amusement spread from his voice to his eyes. They were very large, luminous eyes, of so dark a gray they almost seemed black. His lashes were as long and thick as hers, and his hair was soot-black. He did not wear a glass.

  “Well?” he said, and she became aware that she was staring. She Hushed and took her hand from his.

  “You—you don’t look at all like I’d imagined,” she said with candor.

  Edmund’s amusement deepened. “What did you think I’d look like?”

  “Well,” said Catriona doubtfully, "I'd heard you were a very great scholar.”

  The gray eyes danced. “And you were afraid I'd be stuffy.”

  Catriona’s own eyes began to sparkle. “Well, Grandmama did say ...”

  Two winged black brows rose. “What kind of impression have you been giving Catriona, Grandmama?” he asked the duchess.

  His grandmother chuckled, “The child has been thoroughly regaled with a history of your prizes, my dear. I had no idea she was intimidated.”

  The duke looked appraisingly at Catriona’s face. “I don’t think anyone could intimidate a girl with cheekbones like those,” he said objectively.

  She grinned, an urchin’s grin, white teeth flashing in her olive-toned face. “You’d be surprised,” she said.

  “I already am,” he answered and infectiously, charmingly, he smiled back. “I think I am going to like having a cousin Catriona,” he said. And Catriona laughed.

  Everything in the house changed once Edmund was home. All of a sudden the various and complicated doings of the household had a focal point; Evesham Castle had a master once more. And there was no doubt at all in anyone’s mind that this young man was indeed the master. Technically he had only reached his majority a few months earlier, but in actuality he had been making his own decisions since his father’s death had left him, at age seventeen, the duke. His Uncle Henry had never been more than a nominal trustee.

  The estate of Evesham Castle covered 30,000 acres of woods and 15,000 acres of farm and pasture land, half of which was rented to farmers. The duke’s own farms grew barley, wheat, and hay. He had two hundred milk cows and several herds of sheep. An enormous number of people depended upon him, in one way or another, for their livelihood. He had great responsibilities and he discharged them meticulously. It was not long before Catriona decided he was like a great clan chieftain of the old days before Culloden.

  Catriona was blessed with a naturally joyous spirit and had all the adaptability of a young child. She had been sure she would hate England and had been determined to have nothing to do with the Sassenach foreigners. But as time went on she discovered that the Sassenach were just people, just like Angus and Donal Og and Mairead Cameron at home. Everyone was most wonderfully kind to her. And the kindest one of all, to her mind, was her cousin the duke. He was such a grand and important person, yet he went out of his way to become acquainted with her and be her friend.

  He made the first overture a few days after his return home. The day was cloudy and overcast, and Catriona escaped from the schoolroom with a fishing pole and made her way to the lake. She was sitting on a rock, happily fishing, when the sound of a branch being trodden on caused her to look around. It was Edmund. He was wearing a well-worn shooting jacket and old buckskins, and in his hand he held a pole that was the twin of hers.

  “I decided to play truant too,” he said. “Do you mind?”

  “Of course not. How did you know I was here?” she asked curiously.

  “I saw you running across the lawn.” He came to sit beside her. “You run like a deer,” he added.

  “I know,” returned Catriona with pride. “I could beat all the boys in Ardnamurchan.”

  He laughed and, instead of putting his line into the water, he turned to look at her. “Are you happy here at Evesham, Catriona?” he asked.

  She leaned her chin on her hand and stared into the lake water. “Yes, I am. I didn’t expect to be. I didn’t want to be. But”—she shook her head in bewilderment—”I am. I miss Ardnamurchan, of course. It is the most beautiful place in all the world. But it wouldn’t be the same without my grandfather. And it is nice to have a family.” She looked at him. “Everyone has been very good to me. You must have loved my father very much.”

  “We did,” he answered gravely. “There was no one like Diccon.” He reached out and tilted up her chin so that he could look into her face. “You have his color eyes. And you have his love for people as well, I think. It didn’t seem possible that he could die. He was the best person I’ve ever known.”

  “How old was he?” she asked curiously.

  “He was twenty-two. Just out of Cambridge. He and a friend had gone on a walking tour of Scotland, which is how he came to meet your mother. I am morally certain, Catriona, that he never meant to desert your mother. By the time he got home, however, he was very ill.”

  “Yes,” said Catriona in a low voice. “Grandmama told me.”

  “He was my first cousin,” said Edmund, “and eleven years older than I. But he was like a brother to me. I missed him very much.” He added quietly, “I still do.”

  He put his line into the water, and they fished together for a while in companionable silence. Catriona got a fish on her line and after she had landed him with casual expertise she said, “John said he would teach me to ride if it was all right with Cousin Henrietta. But she said she would have to ask you. Has she talked to you yet?”

  Edmund frowned. “Who is John?”

  She looked at him in surprise. “Why, he is one of the head grooms. He answers all my questions and is one of my best friends. Please do say I may learn.” She didn’t know what to call him and so studiously refrained from calling him anything at all.

  “Have you never ridden?” he asked in surprise.

  “No. But I should so love to learn.” She looked at him hopefully.

  “Of course you must learn to ride,” he said decisively, and her whole face lit up. “And never mind this John,” he went on; “I will teach you. That way I’ll know you’ve learned properly.”

  “Oh,” she said, as if he had given her some fabulous present, “that would be excellent! Thank you!”

  “Thank you, Edmund,” he said.

  She grinned. “Thank you—Edmund.”

  Chapter Three

  The following year Frederick Talbot died, and Ripon Hall passed to his eldest son, George. George was still at Eton, however, as was Henry, and Edmund was named guardian of all three Talbot children. Margaret, the youngest, came to live at Evesham Castle to be brought up with Catriona. Edmund engaged an agent to look after the estate for George, and both boys spent their holidays at Evesham as well.

  It was a noisy schoolroom group, and Catriona and George were the leaders. During the long summer holidays they were always out on the downs, either with the horses or the dogs, or climbing trees and building forts in the woods. All the children, but particularly Catriona, were a familiar sight on the farms and in the stable. Edmund had given Catriona a beautiful chestnut pony whom she loved passionately, and every chance she got she would be out on Caprice, cantering and galloping along the fifty miles of rides that Edmund’s great-grandfather had laid out through the 30,000 acres of his woods.

  During the winter, while the boys were in school, Catriona and Margaret studied as well. Though Catriona dutifully fulfilled the tasks Cousin Henrietta set her, there was only one subje
ct that inspired real interest in her: astronomy.

  It began when she learned that Edmund was being awarded the Copley Medal by the Royal Society. According to Cousin Henrietta, this was an unprecedented honor for so young a man, and Catriona was intensely curious as to what it was all about. And so she asked him.

  It was a winter’s afternoon, and she had accompanied him on a ride to visit two of his tenants. Edmund had been greeted like royalty, Catriona like an old friend. She knew all the children, Edmund noted. She even knew the names of the dogs.

  When his business was finished, the duke and his cousin started back toward Evesham. It was getting dark; the early-December days were very short.

  “Edmund,” said Catriona suddenly, “what is this Copley medal you received last month?”

  “It’s an award for scientific discovery,” he answered tranquilly.

  “But what did you discover?”

  “I discovered a’ method for tracking the orbits of comets.”

  “Comets,” she repeated blankly. “Do you mean the things that streak through the sky?”

  “Yes,” he answered, amusement in his voice. “That is precisely what I mean.”

  “Do they have orbits?” she asked with interest.

  “They do. But they have always been a great puzzlement to astronomers. It occurred to me that by using a certain mathematical formula one ought to be able to determine the whereabouts of a comet when it is not visible in the sky.”

  “And you did that?”

  “Yes. It has proved quite satisfactory, I think.”

  She looked at him wonderingly. “Have you ever looked through a telescope?”

  “Many times. Cambridge has a famous observatory.”

  Catriona’s eyes were shining. “I should love to look through a telescope,” she breathed. “I don’t find mathematics very interesting, but the stars ...”

  He looked for a minute at her face as they rode through the deepening dusk. “I’ll take you over to Oxford to their observatory one night,” he offered.

  Her green eyes flashed at him. “Will you, Edmund? Really? Do you promise?”

  He laughed. “I promise.”

  “When?”

  “You do pin one to the wall, don’t you.’ he complained good-humoredly.

  Her face fell. “You were just being polite.”

  “I was being polite,” he returned imperturbably. “I am always polite. But I meant what I said. We’ll go one night next week, before the Christmas crowd descends upon us.”

  “I can’t wait,” said Catriona.

  “You will have to,” replied her unruffled cousin.

  He was as good as his word, and the following week, after an early dinner, the Duke of Burford took his young cousin on a visit to the Oxford Observatory. She was absolutely fascinated. And in listening to Edmund converse with the Observatory director, she felt herself to be frivolous, superficial, fuddled, ignorant, and abysmally young.

  “That was wonderful,” she said to him as they drove home together in the coach through the cold and starry night. “I wish I could understand more about it.”

  “If you wish to understand things, you must first apply yourself to your studies,” came the cool voice beside her in the dark. “It doesn’t seem to me that you have ever exhibited much application, Catriona.”

  “No,” returned Catriona glumly. “I’m afraid I haven’t.” She heaved a mournful sigh. “It just doesn’t seem very interesting, Edmund. I really don’t care what King John did to his nobles hundreds of years ago. William Bowty, the blacksmith, is far more interesting.”

  “I see. And do you feel the same way about geography? You really don’t care where India is?” She had recently horrified him by indicating that she thought India was off the coast of China.

  She slumped beside him on the seat. His voice was perfectly pleasant, but something about it was making her very uncomfortable. “Mmph,” she said.

  “I am afraid I did not hear you.”

  She sat up a little straighter. “I’m sorry, Edmund. I’ll try to do better.”

  “If you will promise me to apply yourself to your studies,” he said slowly, “I will teach you a little about astronomy.”

  “Do you mean that?” she demanded.

  “I believe we have been through this before,” he complained. “I always mean what I say.”

  “And I mean what I say,” said Catriona stoutly. “I will study like a demon, I promise.”

  “That’s my girl,” said her cousin. “It is very important, you know,” he went on in hushed accents. “Have I ever told you what happened to the girl who didn’t know where India was?”

  Catriona’s eyes began to shine. “No,” she said. She loved Edmund’s stories. They were always outrageously inventive and hilariously funny. “Tell me, Edmund, please.”

  He did, and then Catriona, thinking furiously, told him one about a mad astronomer. By the time the coach pulled to a stop at the front door of Evesham Castle, they were both flushed and weak with laughter. “I love you Edmund,” Catriona said and kissed him on the cheek before she went upstairs to bed.

  Catriona did pay more attention to Cousin Henrietta, and as she was naturally quick, she was easily able to satisfy that lady’s relatively undemanding requests. In return Edmund kept his word as well, and Catriona spent many happy hours with him in the library, listening to his extremely simplified discourse about the solar system -and the stars. For her thirteenth birthday he bought her a telescope, which he had mounted at a window on an upper floor. She adored the cold, clear nights when she would stand next to Edmund and gaze at the stars.

  All in all, Catriona’s life was extremely pleasant. She had a far stronger personality than Cousin Henrietta, and that lady was securely under her thumb. Her great-grandmother loved her very much and thought everything she did was perfect. Margaret looked up to her and tried to imitate her in every possible way. In the duke’s absence Catriona was in a fair way to ruling the roost at Evesham Castle.

  Edmund spoke to his grandmother about this situation one August when he came home from a stay of some months in London for the Season. “You are all of you in danger of spoiling Catriona to death, Grandmama,” he said to her sternly after he had been home a week. “She is simply allowed to go her own way with no one at all to check or to guide her.”

  “The child hasn’t done anything wrong, has she?” his grandmother asked anxiously.

  “I suppose you don’t call it wrong that she is allowed to run wild all day with no thought to improving her mind or her talents? She spends her time hobnobbing with the stable boys, the farmhands, and the squire’s boys. I looked at her schoolwork this morning.” He looked very disapproving.

  “Henrietta has always told me she is bright.”

  “She is bright, which is why it is a disgrace that she is not being made to perform to her capacity. The sort of thing Henrietta is doing may be very well for Meg, but it won’t do for Catriona. She can think rings around Margaret. Around Henrietta too—which is the problem.”

  “Edmund, my dear,” his grandmother said softly, “Catriona is a girl not a boy. It is not necessary for her to be a scholar.”

  “I don’t ask that she be a scholar,” he replied evenly. “I do ask that she be given some sense of self-discipline.”

  The duchess sighed. “I don’t know, Edmund. There is something so—shining—about Catriona. She is so joyous. So giving. I’ve felt twenty years younger since she came to Evesham. She is so full of life, Edmund. How can we confine her to the schoolroom?”

  “I understand what you are saying, Grandmama,” he said patiently, “but you are doing Catriona a great disservice if you do not set some bounds for her. She will not be a child forever.”

  “Oh, Edmund,” his grandmother said sadly. “I hate to think of her growing up.”

  “Well, someone has got to think of it,” he returned grimly, “and I suppose it’s got to be me.”

  Chapter Four

&nbs
p; As he promised, Edmund clamped down on Catriona’s freedom. He gave her a list of books to read and he mercilessly quizzed her on each one as she completed it. He insisted that she practice her music. He forced both her and Margaret to speak French with Henrietta.

  “Only savages,” he told them bitingly, “know no language but their own.”

  Catriona’s life became far more structured when Edmund was at home. He was the only person at Evesham Castle who saw faults in her; certainly he was the only one who told her of them. She ought to have dreaded his being home and been glad when he was away; in fact, the reverse was true. There was nothing she loved more than being with Edmund. She didn’t mind if he disciplined her and scolded her and made her use her brain. He could also make her laugh as no one else could. And there was a stability in his nature that gave a sense of security she got from no one else. When Edmund was home, Catriona’s world was in place. When he was gone, everything was slightly awry.

  He was gone for at least half the year. In April he went up to London for something called “the Season,” which as far as Catriona could discover was a long series of balls and parties. She thought it sounded marvelous. In the fall he went on a series of visits to other great estates, or he would entertain a house party at Evesham Castle. In the winter he stayed home, looked after the enormous responsibilities of his estates, and hunted. And all year long, whether he was in London or in the country, he was engaged in scientific and mathematical inquiry. There were long periods of time when he was abstracted and difficult to talk to. These were the times when a particular theory or idea was germinating in his brain. Catriona called these periods “the tunnel,” because it seemed as if Edmund was far away.

  “Edmund’s in the tunnel again,” she would report to Meg. “He probably won’t be hunting tomorrow; he’ll be in the library.” She knew the signs and she was always right.

  Catriona had been allowed to hunt when she turned fourteen and she loved it above everything in the world.

  "I was born to hunt!” she announced joyously after her first chase.