Victoria’s mouth gaped open, but otherwise she did not respond. Andrea decided to strike while the iron was hot. “I was always taught that a woman’s virtue is presumed until the contrary is proved, but, frankly, the appearance you present is rather, well …” Andrea paused and waved her hand in the air. “La, never mind. I believe I’ve gone and answered my own question.”
She barely had time to finish and lean back contentedly in her chair before the room erupted into a scene of pandemonium. Victoria looked at Alex in horror and then shrieked so loudly the chandelier overhead rattled and jingled like a wind chime.
Andrea thought for a delightful moment she was going to faint dead away—as a true, quality-bred lady probably should. Instead, she got a little of the uncivilized hellcat about her and reached for the vase of flowers on the table. Andrea ducked when the heirloom sailed in her direction and crashed into splinters when it hit the fireplace mantel behind her.
Hunter, on the other hand, stood in a rush, apparently afraid he was going to have to catch a swooning Victoria. The movement sent his chair skidding across the hardwood floor where it crashed with the sound of a massive explosion against a small serving table, sending both pieces of furniture plunging to the floor.
Meanwhile Izzie, who was a little skittish anyway, saw the coming tempest, and in attempting to make her escape before the full storm hit, ran headlong into Mattie, who was coming through the same door in a hurry to see what the commotion was about. Dishes and food went flying, some of it landing in Victoria’s hair, thereby causing her to scream all the more hysterically.
A darker shadow of tumult could hardly have fallen on the domestic tranquility of Hawthorne had the enemy opened fire with a full battalion of artillery. Andrea sat gazing straight ahead, her hands folded on her lap, her eyes unblinking. She tried to suppress any indication that she had been the cause of this macabre disturbance, but failed to control a twitch at the corner of her mouth when she thought about the simplicity of it all. Oh, the power of words.
But her triumph was shortly erased. As Hunter helped a bawling Victoria from the room—so pale, so pathetic, so hysterical—Andrea let out a sigh of relief. The displeasing evening had at last come to an end. She waited until Hunter and Victoria were at the threshold before she stood to take her leave.
“Don’t move!” Hunter’s voice from the doorway sounded so authoritative, so very convincing, Andrea deemed it advisable to comply with his command.
And so she sat and listened to his retreating voice trying to calm the insensible and inconsolable Victoria. From what Andrea gathered from the vociferous howlings emanating from above, the gallant Hunter was having little luck soothing his fair maiden’s nerves.
Andrea tried to initiate a conversation with Izzie and Mattie as they cleaned up the mess on the floor, but to her great surprise, they avoided her side of the room as if she had just been stricken with some fearfully contagious disease. Occasionally they threw anxious glances in her direction as if to see what other calamity she was going to impart on their beloved master, but mostly their looks consisted of angry glares and apprehensive scowls.
So Andrea sat pouting, her elbows on the table in a most unladylike fashion, waiting for her host to return. Her mind began to wander and her lips to twitch into another smile, and she feared she would not sleep a week for the satisfaction of the whole blessed affair.
Those thoughts were forgotten when it suddenly grew quiet upstairs. Andrea stirred uneasily in her chair, finding the silence more disturbing than the noise. When she heard the unmistakable fall of Hunter’s heavy boots coming down the stairs, she decided there was something infinitely worse than the silence. Izzie and Mattie apparently had the same evaluation and made a mad rush for the kitchen door.
Andrea held her breath as Hunter paused at the door behind her, presumably taking in the scene of destruction. She felt his eyes penetrating the back of her head and wondered if the intensity of that glare would blind her if she turned around. She did not have the nerve to find out.
“Miss Evans,” he said, striding across the room in his usual dashing style. Andrea noticed he had removed his coat in his absence, and was now rolling up his sleeves and shaking his head, the way men often do when they are anticipating a long, drawn out battle.
“Yes, Major?” She gazed up at him innocently with her chin planted on her hands.
“Tell me, is this your idea of a truce?” Hunter’s eyes flashed with a look that could halt a lightning bolt in mid-strike.
“She fired the first shot.” Andrea focused her attention on a painting over his shoulder.
“She fired the first shot?” Hunter hit the table with his fist so hard it made Andrea jump and caused the chandelier to jingle again. “Had you a gun in your hand in place of your wicked tongue, I’ve no doubt not a soul in this room would have been left standing!”
The thought of such a scene tickled Andrea so that she snorted trying to suppress a laugh. She covered her mouth with her hand to hide her amusement from his gaze.
“This is a monstrous affront to my hospitality!”
“Hospitality? I thought I made it clear I would prefer crawling into bed with a nest of rattlesnakes than accept the invitation.”
Andrea again tried to conceal a grin with her hand, but the attempt did nothing to screen her mirthful eyes.
“You think this is great fun, don’t you?” Hunter waved his hand at the mess. “Is there no deviltry to which you will not stoop? Are you driven by some mad inner force to do whatever you should not?”
Andrea looked around the room and surveyed the devastation. “One would not think such carnage could be created without gunpowder, would one?”
“And yet you are no doubt proud to have created such havoc armed only with your wit and tongue!”
“I am not proud. I simply attacked at the weakest point, which is to say her mind … a strategy with which you are not altogether unfamiliar, I am sure.”
Hunter scowled at her attempt to be clever. “This is an outrage! We had a truce. How dare you disobey!”
“That is not true.” Andrea’s smile vanished in an instant. “You demanded a truce. I did not submit to it! I would never submit to a truce with a conniving, manipulating she-Rebel. Did I not warn you that this was the inevitable outcome of your ill-conceived scheme?”
“Warned me? I do not believe I was forewarned of a major engagement in my dining room!”
Andrea sighed and gazed around the room. “I was not desirous of bringing on a general engagement, but please, sir, the battle was inevitable. Alone as I am on enemy soil, I am obliged to defend myself, am I not?”
Hunter seemed for a moment almost devoid of speech. “Defend yourself? Can you not curb your propensity for warfare for one evening?”
“I believe I showed great powers of restraint,” Andrea said with a toss of her head. “And as for warfare, surely you cannot believe I’d attend here tonight, outnumbered two to one, without anticipating and preparing for premeditated malice from the enemy.”
“This was no occasion for hostilities,” Hunter said in a voice that trembled with anger. “You could not have done more bodily damage had you beaten her with a horsewhip.”
“You are much deluded if you believe that to be true.” Andrea failed to suppress a grin. “Yet I would be willing to test your theory.”
“Don’t trifle with me, Miss Evans. Since you have been here this home has been the scene of perpetual turbulence, a cauldron ever ready to boil over.”
Andrea smiled gleefully and then pretended to cough when he fixed his eyes upon her.
Hunter gazed at her sternly. “Will you not try to get along?”
“Frankly, sir, I’d be more inclined to watch her Rebel carcass being picked clean by the birds of hell.”
“Good God, Andrea!” Hunter pounded his fist on the table again to gain her attention.
Andrea looked up at him curiously when her first name and the Almighty’s rolled off his lips lik
e they were both old acquaintances whom he had addressed as such a thousand times. Yet she could not recall him ever calling her anything but Miss Evans, and was fairly sure discussions with his Maker were even more infrequent.
“You are greatly mistaken, my dear, if you feel my leniency with you will last forever.” Hunter started to walk toward her side of the table, causing Andrea to retreat to the other.
“I believe leniency has been reserved for Victoria and well it should be. One shouldn’t be too hard on someone who wouldn’t know a rock from a ramrod. Surely, even you must find her obtuseness tiresome.”
“On the contrary. Sometimes I believe she has infinitely more wisdom than you.”
Hunter’s words had the effect of a match to gunpowder. “Retrieve that,” Andrea screamed, seizing a knife on the table and slamming it down so that it stuck upright on the table. “That is an unpardonable insult!”
“She is not to blame for your constant discontentment, nor is she in anyway responsible for the circumstances that brought you here,” he said calmly. “That is the fault of no one but yourself.” He paused but only for a moment. “I must ask that you apologize. She has requested such.”
Andrea had, at that moment, been taking a drink of water. Only with the greatest effort did she manage to swallow, rather than discharge the fluid in her throat. She whirled around and glanced at the table, obviously looking for something to throw. But what was not already lying smashed on the floor had been cleared, save the knife, which Hunter snatched and placed out of reach.
“Hang me if I will! Andrea paced erratically for a moment, then took a deep breath for control. “Major, I would tell you what else I think of your suggestion, but fortunately for you, I’m a Christian lady.”
Hunter laughed. “I do not know from what great nation of Christendom you hail, but you’ve never concerned yourself with holding your tongue in check before on that basis. In fact I dare say I’ve heard you say some things that would blister the lips of a sailor on shore leave.”
Andrea studied her fingernails to show she had no interest in continuing the conversation. “She has but to stay out of my way and no further transgressions shall occur. Perhaps you can persuade or coerce or convince her to comply.”
“Tell me this,” Hunter said, leaning toward her. “Are you even now? Has the appropriate justice been meted out?”
“Sir, why must you place the blame on me? Why do you not place the blame where it belongs—on her distemper and wickedness?”
“I do place the blame where it belongs—on your defiance and rebelliousness!”
“I take issue with that. Rebelliousness is an admirable trait when associated with the men of your Command, yet an offensive one when linked with my … free will.”
“Free will? Is that what you call your intolerable, insolent behavior?”
Andrea closed her eyes until there was barely a slice of green to be seen. “I cannot help but find it quite fascinating, sir, that you are determined to defend and support such a supremely selfish, notoriously insincere and disgracefully vain woman, who would sell her sense of honor, which I fear is not of much value, for influence and power.” Andrea raised her eyebrows to their highest elevation. “One can only speculate as to your motivation.”
Now it was Hunter’s turn to lose his temper. “You may speculate all you want, young lady,” he said, shaking his finger at her. “And I’ll determine it my justifiable duty to put you in your place.”
Andrea’s eyes narrowed. “She is the one who needs put in her place. Did you not notice that she attempted to insult me tonight?”
“You are too obstinate to be insulted,” he said, throwing his hands in the air. “Your behavior today is most certainly only going to fuel her fires!”
“If I were you, I’d counsel her to the contrary. Nothing in her life could become her like leaving it.”
Hunter leaned forward with his hands on the table. “Is that a threat?”
“Take it as you may,” she responded coolly. “And pass it on.”
“Do you believe that comment will go unavenged?”
Andrea recognized the limit of his patience and felt the color drain from her face. But much to her surprise, the cause of the evening’s disturbance became the source for her escape. Victoria’s shrill voice pulsated through the room, causing Hunter to cast an eye to the room above them at the sound of his name.
His gaze fell again upon Andrea, and it was one that caused her insides to writhe. “This conversation has come to an end.” He strode to the door, then turned and looked her dead in the eye. “But that does not mean I’m through with you.”
Chapter 40
“Wisely and slow; they stumble who run fast.”
– Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare
Andrea eased herself into the chair with her book just as a loud knock sounded at the door. She cringed, knowing Hunter had returned, and that they had not yet finished their last conversation.
“Yes?” She attempted to keep her voice from shaking.
Hunter walked in buttoning up the coat of a dress uniform she had never seen. He wore a look of deep concern that surprised her. “I’m having some guests this afternoon.” He gazed at her with his head cocked to one side, apparently testing her reaction to his words. “It’s a business meeting. And it is imperative that everything goes smoothly.”
“And you’d like me to stay out of the way?”
Hunter, who had been staring over her shoulder, brought his eyes back to hers in obvious surprise. “Yes. I’d prefer that you stay out of sight.”
“Well, I’m just about to start this book, so you’ve nothing to fear from me.”
Hunter studied her another moment, nodded his head, and disappeared out the door.
When Andrea heard the clatter of hooves in the turnaround a short while later, she could not resist the urge to look out the balcony door. The sight that greeted her caused the book to fall forgotten from her hand. She watched in awe as a four–horse team of perfectly matched dappled grays drew toward the house. Hurrying to the balcony, she leaned over the railing to get a better look at the steeds and the elegant conveyance that approached the front door directly beneath her.
“What you doin’, Miz Andrea?” Izzie stood behind her.
“Oh, Izzie. Look at that coach-and-four. I simply must see those horses!”
Andrea leaned farther over the railing, but the team was now hidden from view. She straightened and turned to Izzie. “And you’re going to help me.”
“Why you want to see some ol’ horse? They’s horses all over dis place.”
Andrea ignored her, and limped out of the room to stand at the top of the stairs. She heard greetings being made and saw two well-dressed men—or the bottom halves of them anyway—following Hunter into his library. Finally, the door closed.
Andrea motioned excitedly for Izzie. “Come on,” she said, taking her by the arm and thrusting her down the stairs. “Go down and make sure no one is about. I’ll run straight through the foyer and go out the kitchen side.”
“I dunno,” Izzie protested. “Ole Him ’bout as happy as a buzz saw today. And I don’t wanna go messin’ with no buzz saw.”
“Go on, hurry.” Andrea pushed her again. “I don’t know how much time I have.”
Izzie crept down the stairs and looked cautiously both ways, then motioned Andrea to proceed. Just as she reached the bottom step, the door to Hunter’s study opened. Knowing she would never make it back up the steps in time, Andrea decided to make a run for it. She limped after Izzie, who had already skedaddled across the foyer and disappeared.
Andrea took only a few running steps before colliding with a man hurrying out of the library. The resulting collision was swiftly followed by the appearance of Hunter, whose fury was evident, though he somehow managed to control his tone.
“I see you’ve made the acquaintance of my houseguest,” Hunter said to the man who stared down at Andrea while holding her securely in his arms.
“Yes.” Hunter strode across the foyer and picked up Andrea’s cane, which had clattered to the floor. “John Paul Clarke, may I present Miss Andrea Evans.” He thrust the cane at her so she could step away.
John Paul Clarke reluctantly released her and made a sweeping bow. “I apologize for my haste and clumsiness, Miss Evans. I had no idea Mr. Hunter had a houseguest. It is indeed a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”
That the man failed to use Hunter’s military title when he referred to him did not escape Andrea’s notice. Nor did his mocking tone of voice elude her. She studied his face, which was strikingly handsome, yet the soft feel of his arms when he grasped her detracted from the image.
“John Paul was on his way to get some papers from his carriage.” Hunter’s tone made it clear to Andrea that he wanted her to depart the room.
“I’m sorry. I was actually … I mean … it appears you have a very nice team,” she said to John Paul.
“They are a sight, are they not?” John Paul strutted over to the window and looked outside as if to remind himself just how perfect the four horses really were. “Well, come then,” he said, holding out his arm. “You simply must accompany me to get a better look.”
Andrea glanced at Hunter and saw him scowl as she linked her arm in the stranger’s. When Victoria cleared her throat from the stairway to catch everyone’s attention, Andrea was almost certain she heard Hunter groan.
“Land’s sakes, Alex. How many more beautiful women are you hiding at Hawthorne?” John Paul asked, as Victoria descended the stairway.
“Oh, John Paul, stop.” Victoria elbowed Andrea out of the way, then giggled and kissed him on each cheek. “What are you doing here?” Then she turned to Hunter. “Why did you not tell me John Paul and his father were coming?”
“We’re here on business,” John Paul said, nodding toward the other man who stood in the doorway of the library. “Horse business.”
“Oh, please, no.” Victoria waved her hand in the air. “That’s all you two ever talk about!”
Shades of Gray: A Novel of the Civil War in Virginia Page 31