No Rest for the Dove (14 page)

“From—?” Longfellow inquired.

“From further raids on our forts … or, quite possibly, some new French mischief even closer than that.”

“So the redcoats sit in New York.”

“
Would you prefer them here?
That might be arranged, Richard, if things keep on the way they are headed. Your ruffians take no notice of office or birth—unless it is to spit upon them! They even congratulate themselves that Oliver will not have the courage to accept his announced position as collector, for they believe they have frightened him thoroughly. And he is the brother-in-law of your lieutenant governor!”

“There’s the rub, Edmund. Even the fools among us see he’s an appendage of a far more powerful beast. Some suspect every public office in Boston will soon be in the hands of a Hutchinson, an Oliver, or a Bernard—men already united by marriage many times over. This explains
our growing fear not of your aristocracy, but of one of our own, begun by some fine fellows who are ready to sell away their birthrights! And you seem satisfied to help them do it.”

“Am I to understand that you, too, excuse the actions of this mob?” Montagu asked hotly. Longfellow set his fingertips together, before calmly clarifying his position.

“I will acknowledge, and pay, what this colony’s Assembly asks of me. I also respect Parliament’s right to tax men who are directly represented by that august body, as you in Britain are … but in Massachusetts, remember, we are not. We have long raised our own revenues for the King—gladly! Sam Adams himself has collected taxes in Boston for years, and is no less loved for it.”

“He is loved because, like most of your collectors, he frequently neglects to make people pay what they owe! As for revenues levied upon the rest of us by Parliament, I am sure you will recall our taxes flowed freely to help this place during the late war. Yet can we in Britain be expected to pay for your safety forever?”

“Your generosity, I think, was more than matched by the loss of many colonial lives, while you expanded this new empire run by your own moguls—who do little for us in America! But would you have us believe, Captain, that the proposed stamp revenue is intended only to pay for your redcoats? It is hardly a secret that it would also allow the King to pay the salaries of Crown officials here—even to pay our governors. This would take away any chance of withholding their pay, should the plans of these men go against our interests. That opportunity, you must agree, is a traditional British safeguard—and a useful one. We also hear that under the Act those who object will be tried not by a local jury, but by a vice-admiralty court—where a British judge,
with no jury
, determines the law. Is this not a death knell to the freedom you and I should enjoy
equally, as British subjects? And if Parliament and the King’s ministers can take these rights from us,
who will guarantee your own?
”

“But get on about the tree,” Diana moaned, “so we can have done with it. The ladies here, at least, have lost all patience with your politics—though Signor Lahte may later wish to hear the rest.”

“It seems,” said Montagu, who returned to his story after a long and considering look at his wife, “that the whole town feared to remove the hung effigy, and for the entire day, all going to market were stopped to have their goods jocularly ‘stamped’ in the name of the thing swaying over their heads. The same farce was performed on the Neck, at the town gate.”

“If you would only allow them to see real drama performed, in real theaters,” Diana interrupted again, “as they do in New York, then you would have fewer men and boys wandering the streets looking for mischief, Edmund, as I’ve told you many times before—”

“Diana!” her husband fairly shouted, while his foot slammed onto the floor. When she only looked out the window, he finished grimly.

“Both boot and Oliver were finally taken down by a group of respectable people, who had seen enough. However, others came and paraded their playthings off for a mock burial, carrying them first before the Council as it sat in Town House. They made quite a row with their jeers and cheering, as you can easily imagine. Then, on they went down King Street—well over a thousand now, with new men and fresh plans. They soon destroyed a building Andrew Oliver lately put up on his dock, where they assumed he would sell stamps. After that these ‘Sons of Liberty’ paid a visit to Mr. Oliver’s home. Through good fortune or sense he was gone; but someone told them to leave, in language they found offensive. So, they broke
the man’s windows and much of his furniture, and tore up his garden for good measure. The governor was not able to raise the militia, and in the end the sheriff could do little. No one would stand in the way of these damned blackguards! Bernard has since tried to warn the Council, but most seem to believe, as you do, Richard, that this was not serious—or perhaps they fear for their own safety. Hutchinson himself was treated to a hail of bricks and stones in the street, before the mob visited his house, as well. But they had not the courage to attack the home of the lieutenant governor. Finally, they took their wretched symbols to Fort Hill at midnight, where they ‘stamped’ Oliver’s image to death, before throwing it onto a bonfire.”

“It is the heat,” Diana said to Charlotte, when her husband had finally come to a halt. “That is what causes most of our current distress. Sleep is really impossible until three or four o’clock, and by then, the market carts have begun to rumble in.”

“It is worse than that,” said Montagu. “At best, it is madness!”

“Certainly, Edmund,” said his wife, “men do become overwrought, and unreasonable, for they
will
drink more in the heat than usual—very often more than is good for them.” She then watched her husband toss back his glass of wine, and pour himself another.

Fortunately, before either could go on, the cold cooked lobsters arrived on a large platter. Surrounded by lemons, they were accompanied by bottled sauce from the Indies, flavored with hot peppers. Small pots of melted butter, too, were deftly delivered by Thomas Pomeroy, who kept a solemn face while serving. At his side, the small daughter of Elizabeth the cook struggled with two glazed pitchers of iced cider. In another moment the landlord himself came through the dark doorway at the top of the kitchen stairs, bearing an earthen crock.

“My
dear
Mrs. Montagu—what a very great pleasure it is to see you!” Jonathan Pratt exclaimed. “And your friends, as well. I believe this is what you asked for?” At Diana’s nod, he took a spoon and transferred some of the cabbage onto a plate for her. “But I see,” he continued, “that you have honored us by bringing someone new. A young relation?”

Longfellow gave a brief explanation. “Angelo is the servant and musical accompanist of Signor Lahte. He, too, comes from Milan.”

Jonathan looked the boy over, before indicating the somewhat older youth who waited nearby. “Then he should meet another who is currently in service. This is Thomas Pomeroy. If you are given time off from your duties, young man, you might care to join Thomas for a game of cribbage, or bowls.”

Pomeroy stepped forward with a hand extended, murmuring a pleasantry.

“I am afraid,” Signor Lahte said quickly, “that the boy speaks no English. I must teach him—and he will have little time to spare until he learns. If, that is, he stays with me. Of that, at the moment, I am uncertain.”

“Does he understand French, perhaps?” Thomas tried, but Lahte remained silent.

“I see,” said the landlord. “Well, I’ll go down and look to your next course.” He held the door for Pomeroy and the girl; then, his own substantial bulk, too, disappeared into the darkness.

Longfellow lifted a lobster from its bed of seaweed and transferred it to a plate. Eventually, each person at the table was supplied with a bright red crustacean. “As enjoyment is the object of this particular exercise,” he stated, “perhaps, Edmund, we should forego politics until we have left the ladies. We may then fill Signor Lahte’s head with more of our troubles. Now, I suggest we ask him
to fill ours with something more amusing. I believe he might tell us how the excavations near Naples go. They have discovered some peculiar ruins under the earth, it seems, at what was once called Herculaneum.”

“Ah, yes!” Lahte exclaimed, “Ercolano! In the tunnels are splendid things! And, there is great sadness there, as well.” He went on to describe the statues, frescoes, and other remnants of ancient life that had been found under many feet of ash—which, Longfellow tossed in, had been laid down by the explosion of Vesuvius described by Pliny some seventeen hundred years before.

While he spoke more of what he himself had seen, Lahte’s face turned quite often toward Charlotte; for her part, she listened with rapt attention to his detailed and strangely moving description of a town long dead and buried.

But inevitably, the talk did drift back to politics.

“What,” asked Longfellow, “do you make of Austrian rule in the northern peninsula, Lahte?”

Mrs. Willett had by then finished most of her lobster, though she still sucked gently at its small, flute-like legs. Diana seemed lost in her own thoughts, perhaps wondering how the meal was being received by the new life she carried. Looking further, Charlotte saw Angelo’s eyes meet her own again, from the end of the table. The boy sometimes appeared to be watching her closely, though she could hardly say why. Could she be so different from the women of Italy? Was it something about her dress? Or her manner of eating? His fingers had dealt with the lobster set before him in a knowing way not unlike her own—so fear of social error could hardly be the reason for his study. Angelo returned his attention to his master, as Lahte spoke at length of the joint rule of Maria Theresa and her son Joseph, in the Piedmont and in Austria.

A dish of diced, creamed potatoes with toasted crumbs
was brought in next, with a warm casserole of sliced beets nestled in their greens, nearly covered by curls of fried bacon. Thomas Pomeroy left both dishes by Captain Montagu, who stood and helped the ladies. Thomas then took a spoon and proceeded to serve the boy.

Gian Carlo Lahte stopped in the middle of a sentence, and slowly rose to his feet. His face betrayed no new feeling, yet his stance itself was a warning.

“I think, Mr. Pomeroy, you show my servant
too much
attention. He will take care of his own needs—
after
he sees to mine.”

“Very sorry, sir,” said Pomeroy, although from his smooth tone it seemed to Mrs. Willett that the young man meant nothing of the sort. In another moment, he retreated to the kitchen.

“Charlotte, I saw Lem two or three days ago,” Diana informed her friend, breaking the tension in the room; Lahte lowered himself stiffly into his chair.

“Was he well?”

“He seemed so. He walked by the house with Dr. Warren, and stepped in to speak with me for a moment. He left a letter for you—I have it in my things. I suspect he rather misses life in Bracebridge.”

“I believe even Hannah looks for him each evening, when she leaves.”

“He’ll tire of Boston before long. Countrymen usually do. Unless, of course, he gets caught up in courting a young lady.”

Charlotte thought of Martha Sloan, a girl who had seemed nearly ready to give her heart … but her answer to Diana was delayed by the arrival of a pair of herbed and roasted chickens, and more wine. Again, Thomas Pomeroy was the platter’s bearer. After its delivery he stationed himself in the same corner as before, near Angelo’s chair.
He allowed his eyes to wander inquiringly, even insolently, from the boy’s face to Lahte’s.

A cat may look at a king, Charlotte told herself, but he might also lose a bit of fur for it. For the moment, the dismemberment of one of Longfellow’s favorite dishes kept the room at a simmer. Yet Lahte’s eyes flashed, while Angelo’s upward glances seemed almost intended to spite his master. What, exactly, Charlotte asked herself, did she see here? Jealousy, surely. But what could be the cause—and what might be the outcome? She easily found an answer to the last question: trouble, without a doubt!

Diana began to speak softly again, still savoring a bite of succulent wing.

“He is a remarkably handsome man, is he not?”

“Who?” asked Mrs. Willett, momentarily confused.

“Signor Lahte, of course. He has a gentleness that is rather unusual in a man; but there is also fire underneath, I’m sure! I know a number of ladies who would be happy to serve him dinner, if only for the pleasure of staring into those eyes. As you’ve been doing, Charlotte. I wonder if you might be a little taken, yourself?”

“What?”

“It does look that way to me. And it would hardly be surprising, for you have had so little good company in the last few years, my dear. Perhaps you forget the many ways a man may be of use.”

“I have your brother….”

“Oh, Richard
can
be amusing, but he is often less attentive than he should be—as are certain others! Signor Lahte seems more aware of what a lady likes … and indeed needs. Though at the moment he seems occupied by the surprise we’ve brought him. At least he is not as bad as
some
men, who feel they can leave us to our own devices with no care at all for flattering conversation.”

“But I have heard,” Captain Montagu was going on, “that Frederick of Prussia even now has thousands in his service, whose only business is to bring him information—one reason he was able to outwit the rest of the world so often during the Great War—”

“You do see,” Diana added to Mrs. Willett.

The arrival of a Brown Betty and a jug of cream caused a concerted rising and stretching, before the company’s final attack. During the respite, Edmund Montagu went to one of the large windows that overlooked several thick-boughed maples, and the Boston-Worcester road. Longfellow took the opportunity to sit and talk with his sister, somewhat to her surprise, while Lahte and Angelo put their heads together as well.

Charlotte joined Captain Montagu, and found him glad to share his thoughts.

“Diana seems in good health and spirits, Edmund.”

“She is strong; but her emotions run to extremes these days, and it seems I can do little to help. I should tell you that I haven’t fully informed her about Signor Lahte’s … situation.”