by Karleen Koen
"Never mind Lady Alderley. There is always shouting when Lady Alderley is about. Tell me of Lord Charles."
"Well, he came to see Madame Barbara. And I go to the gallery, and they do not see me, and they are kissing. For a long time. And I try to go before they see me, but Madame Barbara, she sees me, and she tells me not to leave her. To stay. And Lord Charles is angry. At me. At her. I see his face. And he tells her she can run away, but that when he chooses, he will come and get her—Thérèse! Stop! Ouch! Stop!"
"Big mouth," Thérèse hissed in French. "Traitor."
Hyacinthe stared up at the Duchess. She shook her head. "You did the right thing. Go and tell Annie to give you a licorice. Tell her I said so." The Duchess watched him run from the room. She looked at Thérèse, who was staring once more down at her shoes, frowning.
"You have nothing more to add?"
Thérèse shook her head emphatically.
"You keep your mouth closed. I like that. It is a rare and valuable trait in a lady's maid."
Thérèse looked up at her, and her dark eyes were flashing.
"I love her too," the Duchess said. "Even more than you. Go away, now. I want to be alone."
* * *
Lent was sliding into Easter, the ceremony, the rite of resurrection and rebirth. First came Mothering Sunday, when the servants left to visit their mothers, carrying small presents they had made, as well as gifts of food from the Duchess. Sir John Ashford rode over from Ladybeth to tell them Jane had been safely delivered of a boy, which they were naming Harry Augustus. Damned if I understand Gussy, said Sir John, for it is his idea. Damned if I would do it. But Barbara and her grandmother smiled at each other. Harry Augustus. Gussy had not feared the man, and he did not fear the memory. It was a kind thing. We shall send apostle spoons (spoons with the heads of the apostles carved on the handles) to his christening even though we are not his godparents, said the Duchess to Barbara. Palm Sunday came, and Hyacinthe worked into the night fashioning tiny willow crosses for each person to carry into church, and then Good Friday, when Cook baked hot cross buns, and the Duchess sat in the churchyard watching the villagers and neighbors and servants tending the graves in the graveyard of Tamworth church. All must be free of weeds, and the crosses whitewashed, and the gravestones limed and straightened for Easter. The church altar must be decorated with flowers, as well as Richard's chapel, and the large white Pascal tapers lit to signal the Easter vigil. The news from London was that Sunderland had been acquitted, and the city was near riot. South Sea director Caswell had been found guilty, and postmaster general Craggs had died, of suicide it was whispered, rather than face questioning about his own part in the South Sea downfall. It goes on and on, thought the Duchess, watching Barbara pull weeds from a grave, touching all our lives. Barbara, she had noticed, received letters from Montrose about the estate. None from her mother, and none from Tony. And a letter had come in a bold handwriting which the Duchess did not recognize, but Annie had happened to see a signature. Charles…who had said he would come after Barbara when he chose….Mary's husband now….Abigail must grieve Roger's passing as deeply as Barbara. She stood up, leaning on her cane, and Tim came to help her to chapel. She sat on her marble bench and conferred with Richard, who had no answers for her. She stared at the flower–bedecked bust of Roger Montgeoffry, stared at it for such a long time, without moving, that Tim shook her roughly by the shoulders, and when she tried to hit him with her cane for it, stammered that he thought she had died.
* * *
She and Barbara sat under the shady oaks on the small hillock, enjoying the smell of the wood violets, and the sight of the daisies' pert white faces growing wild at their feet. Above them, blackbirds and thrushes sang.
"What do you hear from Montrose, Bab?"
"No decision yet on the estate. It will be May or June before it is decided. Robert delays it in Parliament, thinking time will cool tempers and leave more for me. Dear Robert. Montrose thinks they will sequester only that acquired after December 1, 1719, but the committee haggles with Roger's solicitors over how to separate the buildings from the property. Mr. Jacombe, with his banker's heart, has suggested Devane House be torn down, dismantled and sold piece by piece, leaving the property free and Parliament's fines paid."
"Barbara," said the Duchess quickly, squeezing her shoulder.
Barbara pulled away from her. "It was never mine. It was Roger's." She plucked a daisy fiercely from the ground, staring at its yellow center, its clean white petals. "It was such a lovely thing," she said softly.
The Duchess bit her lip and watched a blackbird fly to his nest with a piece of dangling straw in his mouth. His mate greeted him cheerfully and they began to work the straw into the nest.
"Estates," the Duchess said vaguely, "can be such a bother. I, too, have decisions to make about my estate. "
Barbara looked up from the daisy whose petals she had been shredding. "About Tamworth? What decision do you need to make about Tamworth?"
The Duchess sighed, a large, heaving sigh. "My other estate." She let the words drift off.
"What other estate? I thought Tony inherited all the Tamworth property."
"Not this. This came later. Much later; it is not part of the entail."
Intrigued, Barbara waited.
"Decisions…" said the Duchess, drifting.
"Grandmama!"
"What? What? Did I doze off again? My mind—"
"What estate do you need to make a decision about?"
"Oh! Oh, yes. I must make a decision whether or not to sell a plantation in Virginia."
Barbara stared at her, her mouth open. The Duchess smoothed back a wisp of hair which had come loose from her lace cap.
"Harry left it to me. When I lent him money in the summer, he deeded it to me as collateral. I forgot all about it—you know my mind these days, Barbara, and now it seems the cousins of the original owner are interested in buying it back. I do not know, I have not seen it. I do not like to sell something sight unseen. That is bad business."
"Where on earth is Virginia? And what is a plantation?"
"A farm. They grow hemp—no! Tobacco. Yes, they grow tobacco. It is across the sea, a colony in the North Americas. I have a map." She saw the interest and curiosity in Barbara's face and went on as if she had not seen it. "I do not know whom to send. I cannot go myself. There is no one—" She stopped and clapped a hand to her breast and looked at Barbara, amazement crossing her face. "Bab! You could go for me! You have no ties. You could go and act as my agent and look at it and tell me what to do—" She stopped at the expression on Barbara's face.
"Go across the sea to some place called Virginia and inspect a plantation for you?" Barbara repeated slowly.
"I thought…I thought it might be worth keeping. It might be well to acquire other properties there. I have funds made from South Sea, and they sit idle at Hoare's bank, drawing interest. And you might like it there well enough to oversee it for me—"
"You are jesting!"
"Am I?" snapped the Duchess, suddenly sitting up straight, while a butterfly perched on her cap. "And have you any better offers?"
"Indeed I do!" Barbara, snapped back. "I can become Charles's mistress, or the Frog's. And there is always Mr. Pendarves, if Aunt Shrewsborough does not scratch my eyes out first. Have I told you of Pendarves? He is Mother's latest candidate for my husband, and a far cry from Roger Montgeoffry, let me tell you. As far as one can go."
"Never mind," said the Duchess, slumping down, looking tiny and frail again. "It was a madness on my part. I am old, after all. At times, I do not think properly. I can send someone else. Or simply sell it."
"It was a madness," said Barbara firmly.
* * *
Barbara laid a bouquet of meadow daisies and bluebells at the base of Roger's bust and sat down on the marble bench, her hands twisted together in her lap, as she remembered not only Philippe's words, but many other things. I loved you so, she thought, looking at the bust. Since I was
fifteen my life revolved around you, hating you, trying to hurt you, hurting only myself, nursing you, burying you, planning your memorial, and now it all is done. You are gone from me, and the core of me is empty. Unfilled. I love you, Charles writes to me, and his letter is ardent, but never as beautiful as yours were. I could love him, Roger, but I do not want to be his mistress again for reasons other than Mary, yet Mary is reason enough, and I know if I see him again what will happen. We will quarrel, and we will kiss, and we will bed. It is inevitable. The desire between us is so strong. Was it that way between you and Philippe? Love, Philippe said, it was love. I knew it, and yet I had never heard the words from your lips. Remember in Paris how you refused to speak to me of him, and so there was always the faintest of doubts to hold on to, to cherish. It hurts me, Roger. It takes my grief for you and makes it harder to bear. There is so much of you that I did not know, that I cannot now understand.
She waited, almost as if the bust would open its cold lips and reply, and after a moment, when she realized what she was doing, she shook her head. I am too young to ape my grandmama, she thought, talking to a tomb's statue, loving a portrait. Standing up, she walked restlessly about the chapel, stopping before each tablet, reading the names, touching some of them with her fingertips, as if she could touch the person whose name they spelled out, but she touched only cold. She leaned her cheek against the bronze of Harry's tablet. I miss you so, she thought. The silence of the chapel answered her. I am alone, she thought. Truly alone.
* * *
A few days later, she strode into the Duchess's bedchamber, the dogs swirling and barking at her feet. Dulcinea leapt from the bed to attack the dogs and the three animals went whirling under the bed, snapping and growling at one another.
"How much do you know of this Virginia?" Barbara said abruptly.
The Duchess tried to think above the sudden roaring in her ears.
"I have books and maps—"
"May I see them?"
She managed to wave casually toward her crowded bedside table. "Look there. Or there. They are here somewhere. Perhaps there."
"Have you ever heard of a place called Virginia?" Barbara asked Thérèse as she brushed out her hair. The windows were open to the night, and Tamworth's night sounds came in through the window, crickets' cries and gate creaks and branches rubbing together, as did its smells: fresh dirt plowed up in the fields, dung from the stable horses, perfume from the flowering vines.
Thérèse's brushing stopped. Harry had won a plantation in Virginia. In the early summer, after three days and nights of card playing in a back room at Young Man's tavern, and the loser had gone back to his lodgings and blown out his brains with a pistol. Or so Harry had said. She had not known whether to believe him or not, his eyes were so teasing. Come with me to Virginia, he had said, taking her by the waist and holding her close. Come live with me and be my love. And for a moment, they had laughed and dreamed a little, of the journey, of how they would live. But Harry went on to another day, and it was not mentioned again, and she forgot it easily, never taking him seriously.
"I have heard of it."
"Well, Grandmama has asked me to go there. Harry left her a plantation, which is a—"
"Farm."
"Yes, a farm, and she wants me to go over and see it to decide if she should sell it or not."
Thérèse heard the underlying excitement in her voice, but she did not quite comprehend all the words yet. The Lord moved in mysterious ways…Virginia yet again….Barbara stood up and ran to the window, her body rail–thin in her nightgown. She sat in the open window like a gypsy.
"At first, I said no. I thought the idea mad. And then, the more I have thought about it, the more I think, Why not? There is nothing here for me, Thérèse. I have no ties. Montrose can handle the details of the estate, and there are people I do not want to see. And it might do me good—" she paused and smiled, "—to have an adventure."
Thérèse held her hands together so that Barbara should not see their trembling. "It is across the sea."
"Yes. Six weeks' journey, I understand." She stared out the window into the night. "What would you do if I went?"
"I…I could find another position. Or stay and work here, perhaps. Or go back to France."
"Would you come with me?"
Thérèse stared at her. Barbara smiled, and she reminded Thérèse of a little girl, a bad little girl up to mischief. Jane's Amelia had nothing on Barbara at this moment.
"It is craziness," said Thérèse.
"It is madness," agreed Barbara.
"We might die in a shipwreck."
"There are savages there. They might eat us."
"What would we do with Hyacinthe and the dogs?"
"Take them, of course. More for the savages to eat."
Thérèse began to smile. "You are mad," she said to Barbara.
Barbara jumped down from the windowsill and ran across the room and whirled around and around in its center, making Thérèse laugh.
"I am mad. And I need an adventure that hurts no one, just one tiny adventure," she sang. "Then I will be good. I promise."
* * *
She sat on her grandmother's bed, Dulcinea and the dogs wedged between them, while she and her grandmother whispered together like conspirators.
"I will want to know everything," said the Duchess. "What the property yields, how fertile its fields are, the crops grown, the profits, the losses. If I should buy other properties. What I should pay for them. You may hate it once you are there, but I expect you to do your work before you come home to me. You see if that property is worth keeping. Visit the other landowners. Look at their fields. Ask their yields. Their problems. Find out where they are buying land. There might be money to be made, and part of whatever I make will be yours. If you are careful, Bab, you could build up another estate."
Barbara's eyes shone suddenly.
"Caesar will handle the travel arrangements for us," the Duchess continued. "You should leave from Gravesend and not London." Barbara did not ask why. She knew Gravesend was farther from London, closer to the sea. There were those in London who must not know.
"Montrose will need to know," she whispered back. "As my agent of business."
"Can he keep a secret?"
She nodded, beginning to feel greatly excited. She and Harry and Thérèse and Hyacinthe and the dogs had journeyed across France to Italy, and they had loved it, the exhilaration of travel, of motion, of new sights, overcoming even the discomfort.
"Are you certain?" whispered her grandmother.
She nodded her head and then shook it.
"Good," said the Duchess. "At least I am not sending a fool to tend my business."
* * *
"A cow!" Barbara stared at her grandmother, "I am to take a cow?"
The Duchess's lips worked stubbornly. "And chickens."
"Surely those things are already there."
"It is my plantation, and you are acting as my agent, and I wish it stocked with Tamworth's finest."
Barbara stared at the stubborn set of her grandmother's face. "But what if I decide the plantation should be sold?"
"It will fetch an even greater price with Tamworth stock on it. And if we do not sell it, we have eliminated the need of your sending for stock."
Barbara stared at her grandmother, wondering for a moment what was in her mind, truly.
"Richard," said the Duchess. She gasped and closed her eyes, and her voice as quavering. "Is that you?"
Barbara turned away. "That will do you no good. I will take the chickens but not the cow."
"You will take the cow. She has mated with my best bull, and if she calves, you will have the best stock in Virginia. Why, we could make a fortune off mating fees alone. You will take the cow."
"Richard," said Barbara, imitating her grandmother down to the quaver in her voice, "she will not take the cow."
Someone burst out laughing. The Duchess turned swiftly in her chair to glare at Tim. He sobered a
t once.
"Another sound out of you, and I will send you across the sea with her."
"Oh, no, ma'am. Not me. I leave adventure to Lady Devane and Robinson Crusoe."
"You will take the cow," said the Duchess, turning back around.
"Annie," she said later, when Tim had carried her to her room, and Annie was rubbing liniment into her legs. "She looks better. I see it. I do. She always was ripe for an adventure. Do you remember when she made Harry run away with her to Maidstone—"
"Hush," said Annie. "You need to rest."
"Is Thérèse copying the recipes? There are so many. How will we know what she will need over there? There is a great wood of trees there, endless, Annie, and a river as wide as the sea—"