by Mary Balogh
“Oh?” He lifted one eyebrow and clasped his hands behind him. Those two gestures reminded her quite decisively of the fact that they were from two different worlds. He was utterly the autocrat, unaccustomed to having his will so much as questioned.
“I will not live here,” she said. “I will continue to live with my grandparents.”
He regarded her silently for a moment. From very blue eyes. Beautiful, compelling eyes. She wished she had not come. She hoped he would be unable to accept her one condition.
“I can see no serious objection to that,” he said, “though I believe you would be more comfortable here.”
“No,” she said quickly. “No, I would not.”
“Very well,” he said. “You will start next week. At nine o’clock on Monday morning. You will consider your other employment terminated as of this moment. I shall see to it that you are paid for the full week.”
She felt a rush of elation. And then a wave of panic. It all seemed so irrevocable suddenly. And she was still not sure she wanted to come.
“How did it come about,” he asked her, “that you were educated at a private school in England?”
She had not prepared an answer to the question. She stared at him for a moment. “Someone paid for it,” she said.
“Oh?” Again there was that autocratic lifting of his eyebrows.
She clamped her teeth together and stared back at him.
“My curiosity is not to be satisfied,” he said. “But your case is unusual, Mrs. Jones. Are not most people here illiterate?”
The question angered her. It was the old English perception of the Welsh as barbarians.
“Most people can at least read and write,” she said. “They learn at Sunday School as children. Most people would like to learn more, but there are no schools and no money to send their children to school elsewhere.”
“Except for that spent by your benefactor,” he said. “Why did my question anger you? Is it a sore point with you that there are no schools?”
“Perhaps some of the children would prefer an alternative to laboring in the works or the mine,” she said. “Perhaps some of them would like to be clerks or lawyers or—or preachers.”
“I am new here,” he said quietly. “Give me time, Siân.”
She flushed at his use of her name and was aware for the first time that they were quite alone in the room. And what did he mean? Give him time for what?
“How is the boy?” he asked.
It was another reminder of their last encounter. She felt her flush deepen.
“He has been at work,” she said, “though he should not have been.”
“I suspect,” he said, “that his slender, boyish form hides a great deal of courage and stubbornness. Why else would he not have paid his penny? There have been no repercussions? No other threats?”
“No.” She shook her head.
“If there are,” he said, looking at her very directly, “or to anyone else of your acquaintance, I would be grateful if you would let me know.”
No. Oh, no. She almost took a step back but stood her ground. He was not going to be using her as a spy any more than Owen was. She was coming here to teach his daughter.
He smiled suddenly. “You now look,” he said, “exactly as your lover looked when I summoned him here this morning to question him about the Chartist movement and about the Scotch Cattle. I could have sworn through most of our interview that there was no one at home behind his eyes. I am not the enemy, Siân, though I suppose I cannot expect you to believe that yet.”
He had summoned Owen? But he had told her that he intended to do nothing about the meeting he had witnessed on the mountain.
“The Charter has been rejected by Parliament,” he said softly. “Had you heard?”
She closed her eyes and swallowed. Oh, dear Lord God. What now? She dreaded to think of what was likely to follow. She shook her head.
“Siân,” he said, “give him some advice from me. Will you? Tell him not to do anything that will force a confrontation with the authorities. It is a confrontation these men cannot win. There are other slower, more patient ways to go about bringing change. He is a stubborn man. I believe it is a Welsh trait. But give him that advice. Perhaps he will listen to you.”
It was a firm and implacable warning. Quietly and courteously expressed but quite unmistakable. She felt weak in the knees and dizzy for a moment.
“Damn you,” he said more quietly still. “Damn you, Siân Jones. Do you want him in jail? Or dead? I’ll not wait for your answer. You people are expert at giving the silent treatment. Go now—you are dismissed. You will return on Monday. Verity will be pleased by your decision. She said good night to me in Welsh last night. Is it really noster? As in pater noster?
“Nos da,” she said, clearly separating the words.
“Ah,” he said. “Very much more musical than I made it sound. Nos da, then, Mrs. Jones.” He opened the door and gestured to her to precede him through it. He signaled to a servant as she passed him to open the outer doors. He did not say any more but turned to climb the stairs.
It was raining outside—a dreary, chilly drizzle. Siân lifted one fold of her shawl over her head and hurried down the driveway toward the gates. She felt horribly upset. And wonderfully elated. The Charter had been rejected. Owen had been summoned into the marquess’s presence. The marquess had wanted her to spy for him. Damn you, he had said to her. Grandad would have threatened to blacken his eyes for using such language. She had done the wrong thing. She should have said no. She should have kept to the life she had embraced at the age of seventeen.
But she would not have to go down the mine again, she thought, lifting her face to the drizzle. Not ever again. The good Lord be praised, she was finished with the mine.
And the Lord forgive her for being so glad.
8
IT had rained miserably for two days straight, but the clouds were finally breaking up by Sunday morning with the promise of sunshine later or by the next day at the latest.
Siân walked to chapel arm in arm with her grandmother. Mrs. Bevan, their neighbor, walked with them while Mr. Bevan walked behind with Siân’s grandfather. Emrys, as usual, had stayed at home.
Sunday was Siân’s favorite day of the week, with the mine closed down for the day and chapel and singing and the Reverend Llewellyn’s sermon to look forward to in the morning and Sunday School in the afternoon. And then tea at home with the family and Owen. And relaxation—blessed relaxation.
This Sunday was a little different. Owen would not be coming to tea. There was a meeting at his house. A meeting to decide what was to be done now that the Charter had been rejected. There was a movement afoot, centered in Newport, to rally the men of all the valleys in some united action. Siân cringed from the thought and hoped that the very largeness of the idea would make it impossible to bring to reality. The Marquess of Craille’s warnings rang constantly in her ears.
And today was a little different in another way too. Her absence from work in the mine had been noticed and people had begun to ask her about it. Word had begun to spread. She had told her own family, of course, and Gwyn’s. Her grandfather had repeated what he often said, that she did not need to work anywhere outside the home. Her grandmother had cried a little, worried about what would happen to Siân at the castle with the marquess. Gran was the one who had been most hurt by what had happened with her daughter, Siân knew. Emrys had roared and offered to smash the marquess’s nose flat if he so much as looked sideways at Siân. Gwyn’s mother and father had said very little. Mari had been pleased for her and Iestyn delighted—“That is where you belong, Siân,” he had said with his sweet smile. “You are a born teacher. Just a pity it is that he does not have ten daughters. Very happy I am for you.” Huw had called her a fool and had told her that Gwyn would not have stood for it if he had still been alive.
E
veryone else was beginning to look at her with marked curiosity, Siân thought self-consciously. She felt again as if she was something of an outsider and hated the feeling. But oh, dear, she admitted to herself, she had so enjoyed the last three days.
“So, Siân,” Mrs. Bevan said now, “you have had some good fortune.”
“With my new appointment?” Siân said. “Yes, I am very pleased about it.”
“I am sure you will do very well at it,” Mrs. Bevan said. “The Sunday School children all want to be in your class, including our Gwen and Willy. And you have had the schooling, thanks to your dada.”
It somehow seemed ludicrous to hear Sir John Fowler referred to as her dada, Siân thought.
Her grandmother’s lips tightened. “I would thank you not to mentioned him, Mrs. Bevan,” she said. “Hywel is all the dada Siân needs. And schooling can sometimes be the devil’s snare. I will be praying hard in chapel for Siân.”
“Oh, Gran,” Siân said with mingled amusement and exasperation.
Tardiness was not a vice with the people of Cwmbran. Although there were fifteen minutes still to go to service time when they entered the chapel, most of the pews were already full. It was not often there were empty places by the time the service began. Sometimes latecomers—those who came with only five minutes to spare—had to sit up in the loft with the organist or even on chairs squeezed into the aisles. People came for the singing and for the frequently fiery sermons of their preacher—and for the socializing.
Siân always sat two seats from the front with her grandparents, Owen one pew behind, the Joneses opposite. This morning, though, as she was walking down the aisle slightly behind her grandmother, someone in a pew close to the back plucked at her sleeve and whispered loudly to her.
“Mrs. Jones,” Lady Verity Hyatt whispered, and smiled with bright mischief when Siân turned her head in surprise to look down at her. “You are going to be my teacher. We came to the chapel this morning.”
Siân looked past her to see the marquess sitting next to her, looking blond and elegant and handsome and as out of place in chapel as a cat would look in a dog kennel. He also looked a little uncomfortable. He nodded to her.
“Sit by us,” Verity whispered loudly. She still had hold of Siân’s sleeve.
It was one of those moments when there was no time to think rationally. Had she done so, Siân realized later, she would have smiled at the child, told her that she always sat at the front with her grandparents, and reminded her that they would meet tomorrow. Then she would have continued on her way down the aisle, no more than a few seconds having delayed her. But there was no time for rational thought. She felt conspicuous. She felt as if everyone’s eyes were on her—and knew she was not far wrong. She smiled and ducked down into the pew beside Lady Verity Hyatt.
Verity wormed her hand into Siân’s and smiled up at her. “I am glad you are going to be my governess,” she whispered. “I can’t wait until tomorrow. There is only one sleep left.”
“Hush, Verity.” The marquess bent his head close to the child’s and spoke very quietly. “You know we are always as quiet as can be in church.”
“But this is chapel, Papa,” she whispered. “There were only seven people in our church last Sunday, Mrs. Jones, counting Papa and me. It was boring.” She wrinkled her nose.
“Sh.”
This time Verity looked somewhat apprehensively up at her father and hushed, though she did turn her head to smile at Siân again and shrug her shoulders. Siân guessed that for the child this visit to a Welsh chapel was the treat of the week. It was a powerful and painful reminder of her own childhood, when as often as not she had watched from a window of their cottage as the people of Penybont went to their chapel. Sometimes her mother had taken her to the Anglican Church. Yes, she could remember the boredom and the envy she had felt of all the children who would be going to Sunday School in the afternoon. Unconsciously she squeezed Verity’s hand, which was still in her own.
She looked up and ahead to confirm that Owen was indeed in his usual pew close to the front. She wondered if he knew she was there. And she wondered how he would feel about her sitting where she was. And how everyone else would feel. There was an unnatural hush in the chapel, a self-conscious hush. It seemed certain that everyone was aware of the presence of the Marquess of Craille. Usually the chapel hummed with the sounds of muted gossip until the Reverend Llewellyn climbed the steps to the pulpit.
Oh, dear, Siân thought, she should not have sat down here. She felt remarkably uncomfortable.
The singing was not self-conscious. The congregation sang the opening hymn with its usual harmony and enthusiasm while the Reverend Llewellyn conducted from the pulpit. Siân was very aware as she sang of the silent man standing at the other side of Verity. He held a hymnbook open in his hands but did not sing. Of course, he would be unable to, she realized. The words were in Welsh. And the service would be in Welsh. Verity would be even more bored than she had been last week. Throughout the opening hymn she stood staring up at Siân, still clinging to her hand.
The minister noticed the visitors during the hymn. After it he welcomed them in heavily accented English and all heads turned. Including Owen’s. Siân met his eyes before he turned back again.
He had not given her any details of his interview at Glanrhyd Castle. “Bloody Marquess of bloody Craille,” he had said when she asked—her grandfather had not been within earshot to reprimand him for his language. “A fox and a weasel he is, Siân. Dangerous. He is worse than Barnes. You keep away from him, fach. Keep with the child.”
He had refused to say what had given him such an unfavorable impression of their employer. Siân wondered what threats the marquess had made, and which of those threats he would carry out if he found out about this afternoon’s meeting. But the very thought of the meeting set her stomach to churning. She concentrated on the part of the story of Job that the Reverend Llewellyn was reading from the Welsh Bible.
Job had been tested by the Lord, the minister said in his sermon. He had been tested to the limits of his endurance. And ultimately he had passed the test. He had come to see that suffering in this life cannot be avoided. But instead of being destroyed or embittered by his experiences, he had been strengthened and ennobled by them. They all had something to learn from Job.
It was very obvious to Siân as his sermon became more impassioned and some of the members of the congregation, swept along by his rhetoric and emotion, responded to it vocally, that he was talking directly to the Chartists, that he was making his position quite clear. They had done what was their legal and moral right. They had asked for freedom and democracy and the end of oppression. But having been rejected, it was now their task to endure, to be strengthened and ennobled by suffering.
She wondered if the Marquess of Craille had even an inkling of what the sermon was about. Owen, she could see, was sitting with shoulders and head thrown back. Iestyn had his head bowed.
Finally the service was over. Siân had prepared herself for the end. She would smile quickly at Verity, she had decided, and then hurry outside to wait for her grandmother and for Owen, who always walked her home. She certainly did not want to be trapped into leaving the chapel with the marquess and his daughter. Everyone would think she was putting on airs.
But it was not be that easy. Released from the necessity of being silent, Verity caught at her hand again and launched into speech.
“I enjoyed it much better than our church,” she said, “even though I could not understand the words. It was fun with all these people. You have a lovely voice, Mrs. Jones. Everyone in here does. Papa was the only one singing last week. It sounded funny. Tell me who some of these people are. You are going to teach me Welsh, are you not? Maybe next week I will understand what is being said.”
“Verity.” The marquess’s well-manicured hand came to rest on his daughter’s shoulder, and Siân found her e
yes focusing on it and then moving up his arm and shoulder and face until they met his eyes. “Mrs. Jones will be anxious to go home. You will have all the time in the world next week to talk with her—if she is foolish enough to let you get away with chattering.”
“I don’t mind,” Siân said. “Children sometimes need to talk.” Especially when they are lonely, she almost added, but the words would sound impertinent.
She turned to leave, but the Reverend Llewellyn was standing at the end of the pew, right hand extended.
“The Lord be praised that you saw fit to join us in our humble prayers of praise this morning, my lord,” he said.
The marquess reached past his daughter and Siân to shake the offered hand. “We heard the singing from outside during both a choir practice and last Sunday’s service,” he said. “We decided to hear it from the inside this morning. You have a choir to be proud of, sir.”
The Reverend Llewellyn’s chest expanded. “The best male voice choir in Wales we have here, my lord,” he said, “as we will prove at the eisteddfod in two weeks’ time. And the best in Britain or in the whole world, I can say with confidence too. There are no singers like the Welsh. We are not afraid to open up our throats and praise the Lord with the vocal cords he gave us. Are we, Siân Jones?”
The marquess smiled politely while Siân murmured assent. Most of the congregation had already filed outside, she could see. She had not after all succeeded in avoiding being conspicuous.
“And lovely it is to see the little one,” the minister said, beaming down at Verity and resting one hand lightly on her head. “Coming to Sunday School this afternoon, will you be, fach? We will put you in Mrs. Jones’s class.”
“Vark?” Verity wrinkled her nose and looked up at Siân.
“Fach,” she said. “It means little one. It is an endearment.”
“May I, Papa?” Verity swiveled her head to gaze pleadingly at him. “May I go to Sunday School? Please? Please, please, please?”