‘His lordship would not think of going anywhere without his personal staff,’ Bromley revealed. ‘The same with her ladyship.’
‘Lord Kilraven brought his wife?’ Simon was mildly taken aback. After all of Bromley’s talk about the dangers of the frontier, it surprised him that the lord had brought his lady.
‘His lordship never goes anywhere without her. They are inseparable,’ Bromley informed them. ‘She has been with him to India and Africa, and to the islands of the Caribbean.’
‘I envy her,’ Felicity said. ‘I have always yearned to see more of the world.’
‘Perhaps you will have that chance.’
‘I doubt it,’ Felicity said. ‘I cannot afford to be away from home for more than a week or two at a time. The work would pile up to where I would be swamped when I got back.’
‘You never know,’ Bromley said cryptically.
At that juncture Severn appeared. ‘About time,’ he griped. ‘His lordship is growing impatient.’
‘We came straight away,’ Bromley said.
‘By way of Canada, no doubt. His lordship said he will talk with you later.’ Severn beckoned to the Wards. ‘This way, if you please. As soon as you are seated, Lord Kilraven will join you.’
Simon felt he should say something in Bromley’s defense. ‘We came as fast as the buckboard permitted.’ Without goading the team into a gallop, which he was not about to do with his wife and son along.
‘I am sure, sir,’ Severn said, with a tone and an air that indicated he did not really care.
Simon would not let it rest. ‘Tell me,’ he said, looping an arm around Felicity’s waist. ‘Do you dislike all Americans or just us?’
Severn looked back at them, his countenance sculpted from ice. ‘I have nothing against any of you provincials, sir, other than you are provincials.’
‘Provincials?’ Felicity said.
When Severn did not respond, Bromley said, ‘It is a term some of us apply to anyone from the colonies. It suggests they lack a certain refinement or polish.’
‘I implied no such thing,’ Severn quickly said. ‘I would never presume to insult his lordship’s guests.’
‘You better not,’ Simon said. He had decided he disliked the man, intensely. ‘Or we will take our leave and you can tell Lord Kilraven we left because of your bad manners.’
Severn colored from collar to hair line. ‘I am sorry if you took offense, sir. Again, no slur was intended.’
‘We will overlook it, this time,’ Felicity intervened. She was worried her husband would become mad and want to leave, depriving her of the one and only chance in her lifetime to rub elbows with English aristocracy. ‘But I am puzzled. Why does he call us the colonies? The United States broke away from Britain seventy-five years ago.’
‘Some of us still regard your country as the colonies, Mrs. Ward,’ Severn said with studied politeness. ‘We have always thought your revolution was misguided.’
‘My grandfather fought in that revolution,’ Simon brought up. ‘He always told me it had to be done, that King George overstepped himself. I would not call opposing tyranny misguided.’
Severn made as if to reply, but Bromley hastily said, ‘I doubt his lordship would be pleased by this discussion. Save the politics for another time.’
‘Very well,’ Severn said. ‘His lordship’s interests always come before our own.’
Simon wondered what the man meant by that. He was not given much chance to ponder, as a second later the flap to the large tent parted and out emerged a lovely young woman who had to be all of sixteen years old. Her luxurious black hair was done in lustrous curls, and she wore an exquisite dress that flared wide from her slender waist down. It swished as she walked. ‘Did I hear someone mention politics? I hope not, because I would be hard pressed to think of anything that bores me more.’
Bromley dipped in a slight bow, saying, ‘Mr. and Mrs. Ward, permit me to introduce Lord Kilraven’s niece, Cadena Taylor. Her father is Lady Saxona’s brother.’
‘Lady Saxona is Lord Kilraven’s wife?’ Felicity asked.
Cadena put her hands on her hips. ‘Haven’t you told them anything?’ she demanded of Bromley and Severn.
‘Only what we were told to say,’ Severn replied. ‘No more.’
Scowling, Cadena came over to the Wards. ‘Please forgive their lack of courtesy. Menials can be that way, you know.’ She smiled at Felicity. ‘Yes, Saxona is Lord Kilraven’s wife, and my aunt. She was gracious enough to permit me to come along.’
‘Have you enjoyed your time in our country?’ Felicity asked. She could not get over how magnificent the girl’s dress was, and how beautifully her hair had been done. Suddenly Felicity was acutely conscious of her drab homespun, and how her hair must look in comparison.
‘Oh, yes, it has been quite marvelous,’ Cadena said. ‘The way Americans dress, the way they talk, you are all so natural and uninhibited.’
‘More of that provincialism,’ Simon remarked.
‘Excuse me?’
‘Mr. Severn mentioned that many of your countrymen regard us as provincials,’ Simon elaborated.
‘Mr. Severn should be whipped,’ Cadena said. ‘I prefer to think of your country as possessing a certain charm and vitality.’
From the front of the big tent came an imperious, ‘Is that so, my dear?’ The voice brought to Simon’s mind the image of fingernails on a chalkboard. He turned, along with the rest.
Her posture and bearing positively regal, a wisp of a woman with an extremely pale complexion flowed toward them. Her stick frame was arrayed in the finest dress money could obtain, her gray-brown hair was the height of European coiffure, her shoes gleamed with polish. She held her right hand limply in front of her, as if groping for invisible support.
‘Lady Saxona!’ Severn blurted.
‘You were expecting the Queen, perhaps?’ Saxona bitingly retorted, and wriggled her limp fingers. ‘Off you go. You, too, Mr. Bromley. Cadena and I will attend to our visitors.’
‘As you wish, my lady,’ Severn said, bowing.
Saxona waited until the two men were out of earshot, then remarked, ‘I do so loathe the servile slug, but what is a person to do? The quality of help these days leaves a lot to be desired.’
‘I have never had that problem,’ Felicity joked, and when the other woman looked at her in apparent confusion, she said, ‘I could never afford a maid, let alone manservants.’
‘Ah,’ Saxona said. ‘I have only two maids with me, and they are nowhere near enough.’ She indicated the flaxen-haired woman in uniform at the table. ‘That is Fayre. She has been with me the longest, and is quite good at anticipating my needs. But the other one, Wenda—’ She stopped and shook her head.
‘Now, now, auntie,’ Cadena said. ‘Please don’t start in on the hired help. Our guests will think us perfect bores.’
‘We would not want that, would we?’ Saxona asked, and laughed merrily, much more merrily than the comment warranted. ‘Now suppose we take our seats? My husband will join us directly.’
Simon held out a chair for Felicity and she sat, Peter in her arms. He dropped into the one next to hers. ‘Is Lord Kilraven here to hunt game?’ he inquired of Saxona as she claimed the seat at the end of the table to his left.
‘Oh, no, Mr. Ward. My husband has much loftier ambitions. He is here to find land. A great lot of land.’
Four
As they made more small talk, a distinct uneasiness gripped Simon Ward and would not relent. He could not say why.
Then the tent flap parted and out came their host.
Lord Kilraven was a striking individual. Exceedingly tall, he very nearly rivaled Nate King in height. But where the mountain man was a living wall of muscle, Lord Kilraven was a walking cadaver. Hideously thin, to the point where he appeared to literally be skin and bones, his lordship was further distinguished by a mane of snow white hair. He was not fussy about brushing or combing it, and tufts stuck out here and there, lending him
an unkempt aspect that belied his cultured status. His clothes, as with those of his wife and niece, were the absolute best of the current vogue in fashion. Where on other men his clothes would add to their appeal, on Lord Kilraven the fine knee-length coat and white shirt and striped pants seemed oddly out of place, as if a walking corpse had been decked out for burial.
Kilraven’s face did not help matters. His lordship had a high forehead, bushy white eyebrows that were perpetually arched, high cheekbones, a thin slit of a mouth, and, most prominent of all, a hooked nose that reminded one of the beak of a bird of prey. His eyes were a piercing gray.
A tight smile lifting the corners of his lips, the British peer advanced with a bony hand outstretched. ‘Mr. and Mrs. Ward. It is a pleasure to meet you at last. I have heard a great deal about you and your valley.’
‘You have?’ Simon responded. The strength in the man’s grip surprised him.
Felicity was amused when Kilraven delicately clasped her fingers, bowed, and pressed them to his lips. Their touch was fleeing, and so cold the sensation sent a tiny shiver down her spine. ‘You are the first royalty I have ever met.’
Lord Kilraven assumed the seat at the other end of the table, a chair, Simon noted, with the highest back and the widest seat, and an engraved crest. It made Simon think of a throne.
‘Do not make over much of my status, my good lady. I am a baron, true, but there are big barons and there are little barons, and I am very much of the trifling variety.’
‘Such modesty,’ Felicity said by way of praise.
‘Not really,’ Lord Kilraven said. ‘I am practical by nature, and practicality demands the truth. But enough of me. The hour is late and you must be famished. I propose we eat, then discuss the purpose for my visit to your country, which you will very much want to hear.’ He clapped his hands, and the maids and other servants materialized and began bringing silver trays heaped high with food, and china bowls filled with simmering soups and broths.
It was spectacular, the lengths they had gone to. There was venison, buffalo and elk and grouse, so much they could never eat it all, along with potatoes and vegetables and British dishes they sampled for the novelty, including a pie with meat in it and pudding mixed with bread.
While they ate, the lord talked about life in England, and the voyage to America. He did not eat a lot, himself, which accounted for his cadaverous appearance.
‘I am grateful you accepted my invitation. Please do not be offended, but I have found manners singularly lacking among your countrymen. Proper behavior seems to have fallen by the wayside when America cast off British rule.’
‘We are not sticklers over how to do things,’ Felicity said while eating with Peter perched in her lap. ‘We do them as we please.’
‘So I have noticed, my good woman,’ Lord Kilraven said. ‘As countries go, you are new and unlettered, and that accounts for part of it. But please do not get the impression I dislike America. Far from it. I see it as a land of marvelous opportunity, especially in the making of that which your countrymen esteem above all else.’
‘Money?’ Simon guessed.
Lord Kilraven nodded. ‘I have never been anywhere where money is so coveted. Oh, riches are sought by everyone with common sense, but in America becoming rich seems to be the ambition of every man I meet.’
‘Men long for what they don’t have,’ Simon remarked offhandedly.
‘That they do,’ Lord Kilraven concurred. ‘I can apply that to myself, for I constantly long to better my station financially. You might deem that simple greed, but if I increase my wealth, I can go from being a little baron to a big baron, to being a man of power and influence. That, to me, is the heady wine that makes existence worthwhile.’
‘Power?’ Felicity said.
‘Yes, my dear. You have men of power in this country, do you not? Your president and your senators and what have you. Men who dictate how those under them should live.’
Simon lowered his fork. ‘It doesn’t quite work that way over here, your lordship. They are accountable to the people. We vote them into office and we can just as easily vote them out again.’
‘A quibble, my good sir,’ Kilraven said. ‘For once in office, they can do as they please. And once there, so long as they grease the wheel back home, as a congressman explained it to me, they stay in office for as long as they desire.’ He snapped his fingers and a servant appeared and filled his crystal glass with wine. Raising the glass to his nose, he sniffed, then took a sip. ‘Power is very much its own reward.’
Simon was gazing about the encampment. Most of the men bristled with weapons. Kilraven had brought a small army, enough to discourage most hostiles from attacking. The majority of those not on sentry duty were seated around the campfires, eating and conversing in low tones.
‘There are various ways of acquiring power,’ Lord Kilraven was saying. ‘Power can be inherited, as is the case with many of my countrymen. Or power can be acquired through diligent effort. Or a combination of both.’
‘You seem to be quite fascinated by it,’ Felicity commented, more to hold up their end of the conversation than out of any genuine interest. She had the impression Kilraven was talking down to them, treating them as the provincials Severn had mentioned, and she resented it. She told herself it must be her imagination, that Kilraven was acting as he would with anyone, but his next comment proved her intuition right.
‘I am indeed. I would be remiss were I not,’ Kilraven said. ‘Another reason those in power here find it easy to keep that power, I would imagine, is that those they have power over are ignorant of its subtleties. They can be handled much as a sheepherder handles his sheep.’
‘People aren’t sheep,’ Simon said flatly. ‘If you think they are, then you know nothing about America or Americans.’
Both Saxona and Cadena stirred in their chairs and cast glances at Kilraven but he merely smiled his thin smile.
‘A matter of opinion, I daresay. In any event, the important thing is that power must be wielded with an iron fist or there is no use having it.’
‘King George tried the iron fist on us and look where it got him,’ Simon observed.
Lord Kilraven frowned. ‘He was a fool for letting the colonies slip from his grasp. Had I been in his position, I would have brought the full might of the British Empire to bear to crush the revolution, and I would have sentenced all those involved to the gallows.’
‘You would have tried,’ Simon said.
Lord Kilraven sat back and draped his spindly arms over the arms of his thronelike chair. ‘I do so hope you are not one of those who fancies he can resist the inevitable.’
‘I am a simple man, with simple means, making a living the best I know how.’
Saxona Kilraven broke her long silence with, ‘Your family means a great deal to you, does it not?’
‘My family is everything to me,’ Simon admitted. ‘I love my wife and my son more than anything.’
‘I am happy for you, sir,’ Lord Kilraven said. ‘Although I must confess I find love overrated.’
Felicity was appalled. To her there was no greater emotion. Her love for her husband and her son was the sum and substance of her existence. ‘In what way overrated?’
‘Several ways,’ his lordship answered. ‘For one, it is never as grand nor as glorious as the poets would have us believe. We fall in love, but what is love, really, other than the brief stirring of passion?’
‘There is more to love than that,’ Felicity responded. ‘I love Simon for the man he is inside.’
Simon smiled at her.
‘Oh, granted, that is an element,’ Lord Kilraven conceded. ‘But after a while it tends to wane. Familiarity breeds, if not contempt, then the realization that the one we adore is not nearly as adorable as we first imagined them to be.’
Amazed that Kilraven would utter a comment like that with his wife sitting right there, Felicity said, ‘My husband is every bit as adorable today as he was the day we were wed.’
‘Give yourself a few more years, my dear,’ Lord Kilraven said. ‘But the point I was trying to make is that in the scheme of things, love should not be first and foremost. Love is fragile. Love is uncertain. Only power endures.’
Felicity shifted toward their hostess. ‘And you, Lady Kilraven? Do you share your husband’s outlook?’
Saxona glanced at Kilraven, who nodded. ‘To a degree,’ she said guardedly. ‘Our marriage was what you Americans might call a marriage of convenience. His family and mine can trace their bloodlines back many generations. It was unthinkable to marry someone below our mutual stations.’
‘Are you saying that you married him because of what he is rather than the person he is?’
‘That is exactly what I am saying, yes,’ Saxona confirmed. ‘I would never stoop to wedding, say, a simple stone mason, or a clerk.’
‘I was a clerk once,’ Simon said.
‘A worthwhile profession, don’t get me wrong. But it can hardly compare to the social status of a peer of the realm. Had Laurence not been a baron, I would not have given him the time of day.’ Saxona put a hand to her lips. ‘Oh. I am sorry, husband. I know you do not like having your first name used.’
‘That is all right,’ Lord Kilraven said, his tone suggesting it was anything but. ‘But all this talk of love is straying us off the mark. I would rather discuss why we are here.’
‘Please do, then,’ Saxona said.
Clearing his throat, Kilraven gazed down the benighted valley. ‘As I mentioned a while ago, America is a boundless land of opportunity. There are fortunes to be made here, many and diverse, and I would very much like to make my own.’
‘But you are a lord,’ Felicity said.
‘Implying I should have more money than I could possibly need?’ Kilraven rather sadly shook his head. ‘That is not how it works. Just as there are little barons and big barons, there are rich ones and poor ones. I am, much to my shame, more poor than rich. Oh, I have a large estate, and the trappings that go with my title. But I can barely afford them.’
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