Not Quite Married (23 page)

Sixteen

THE LADY’S SECRET
DOCKED in Boston on a bright spring afternoon. It was not long before Brien’s message to Silas Hastings bore fruit in the form of an enclosed carriage dispatched to greet her. As she stood at the midship railing and watched a tall, gangly figure in a dignified frock coat descend from the coach and head toward the gangway, a sense of loss swept over her. The voyage was over and she was leaving behind
The Lady’s
Secret
and all of its haunting associations.

Resettling the hood of her cloak, she refused to look around the deck for Aaron. She had scarcely seen him for the last three days.

As if by unspoken agreement, he had stayed on deck most of the time and she had remained below in the commons and her cabin.

Now that the moment of departure was here, she was torn between wanting to see him one last time and wanting to spare herself that longing and confusion.

She squared her shoulders and focused on the angular, graying fellow hurrying up the gangway. He wore a pair of divided spectacles and Brien was struck by the oddity of their appearance. Only then did she recognize Silas Hastings—plus fifteen years.

“Lady Brien! I can hardly believe my eyes!” he called, seizing her hands in eagerness. “I saw you last as a bright and inquisitive six-year-old. What a beautiful young woman you have become.”

“And you, sir, were a clever-minded and tolerant clerk. You managed to conduct business and occupy my father’s ‘shadow’

at the same time.” Then she realized Silas had transferred his attention to someone or something behind her and turned a quarter turn.

“Aaron Durham.” Aaron stood behind her, extending his hand toward Silas.

She bristled. “This is the captain of our ship.” She managed to keep most of the irritation out of her voice. “Weston Trading’s agent here in Boston, Silas Hastings.”

“Durham? Then you’re the one,” Silas declared, giving Aaron’s hand a vigorous pumping. Seeing Aaron’s frown, he clarified:

“Your ship—she’s all that Harold Caswell can talk about.”

“Harold, yes. You know him, then.”

“We dine together whenever I am in New York. He swears you hung the moon.” He glanced past Aaron to the sleek hull behind him. “Do you think I could have a look at your ship myself . . .

see how she’s built, firsthand?”

“Only if you promise not to hold me accountable for Caswell’s boasts.” Aaron straightened his already officerlike posture and smiled. “I would be pleased to show you my ship, sir.”

“Shall we say, this Saturday? Saturday afternoon?” Silas’s enthusiasm carried the moment. “Then you can come home to dinner with me. My wife Helen will be delighted to have something to take her mind from . . .” His eyes widened and he turned back to Brien. “She would have come with me to greet you, my lady, but she will soon come to childbed and I insisted she stay at home and rest.”

“Goodness.” She flicked a faintly hostile glance at Aaron. “Then I cannot imagine she will be up to entertaining dinner guests on Saturday.”

“Oh, no.” Silas laughed and looked to Aaron. “Entertaining is Helen’s passion. We have one guest already . . . I’m sure she would say it will be no trouble at all to set another place for dinner.”

“In that case”—Aaron smiled with a trace of defiance—“I am pleased to accept.”

“Excellent!” Silas tugged the brim of his hat. “Until Saturday, then.”

As she strode down the gangway, Brien’s thoughts were consumed by the fact that she would be stuck across a dinner table from him again . . . having to contend with him in the New World as she had in the old. So much for the fresh start she had intended to make as she set foot on American soil.

Her trunks and Jeannie’s and Dyso’s bags were soon loaded on the carriage and they were on their way through narrow cobbled streets that hummed with activity. Brien watched the city from the carriage window, leaving her annoyance behind and growing absorbed in the activity and surprised by the familiar scenes and dress of the people. She had expected more exotic sights and now had to admit the wisdom of Aaron’s statement that the two countries had too much in common to be separated by petty grievances.

“So much activity.” She glimpsed the pride in Silas’s face. “It’s wonderful.”

“I thought you would enjoy it. I was not terribly shocked when your father wrote that you were coming as his partner. Even as a child you had a head for business. We were devastated at the news of your bereavement, Lady Brien.” He squeezed her hand gently, heedless of the familiarity of the gesture.

“Life goes on, Silas. Father and I have become much closer of late. I plagued him mercilessly to make me his protégée. Now I must not let him down.” She grew serious. “Tell me, do you think we’ll be able to find a buyer soon?”

Studying the head of his cane, Silas smiled. “On that issue I do have a bit of good news. The details can wait, but a Dutchman named Van Zandt has recently made inquiries. He is a wealthy man, shrewd in business. I have shown him the warehouse and shops, but have delayed any discussion of price until you arrived.

He is interested in the lot, but I’m told he drives a hard bargain, Lady Brien.”

“‘Brien’ will be fine, Silas.” She flashed him a dazzling smile. “I have it on good authority that titles mean little here now.”

Silas’s three-story brick house was not imposing from the outside, but had a pleasing solidity about it. Inside, it seemed much larger, more comfortable, and was tastefully decorated with fine fabrics and furnishings culled from some of England’s finest cabinetmakers.

Helen Hastings hurried into the front hall from the parlor, arriving pink-cheeked and out of breath. Her middle bulged so that Brien marveled that she could walk at all. At first glance of the woman’s pretty round face, glowing with welcome, Brien liked her.

“Oh, Silas, is this your Lady Brien?” Helen took her hands and squeezed them. “She’s lovely!”

“Brien, this is my Helen,” he said proudly, putting an arm around his wife.

“I fear I have come at a most inconvenient time.” Her eyes lowered to Helen’s middle.

“Heavens, no!” Helen waved her concern aside. “This is our fourth; I’m an old hand now. And I’ll be glad of the company.

This last bit of waiting is the hardest part.” She turned to give the servants orders as to the trunks and rooms and then led Brien in to the parlor.

The room was bright in the filtered late afternoon sun and Brien suddenly felt more at home here than in her own chambers at Harcourt. Helen sat down heavily on the stout sofa and sighed with relief as she propped her feet up on a stool. A stout, older woman entered with a tea tray just then, and Helen gave orders for a bath to be drawn for Brien.

Brien’s face grew wistful. “A bath. I’d be so grateful. After so long at sea, I can think of nothing I’d like better than a long, soaking bath.”

Helen smiled warmly and nodded.

“But before you go upstairs”—she stretched heroically but ineffectually toward the tray—“would you mind pouring the tea?

I’m afraid I won’t reach.”

At breakfast the next morning, Brien met Helen and Silas’s three children. All three had curly brown hair and clear blue eyes. The youngest, Robert, climbed onto Brien’s lap as soon as she was seated. Despite his mother’s remonstrations, he would not be dislodged, and in the end, took his breakfast on the fairest seat in Boston. Brien chatted with him through breakfast, finding him a talkative and precocious three-year-old, then hugged him affectionately before sending him off to play in the garden with his brother and sister.

“Helen, your children are wonderful.”

“Thank you, Brien. But you must not indulge Robert too much.

He already thinks rules were made for other people.” She smiled wanly. “He is in for a surprise when this babe arrives. He won’t be the center of the world anymore.”

Silas laid his large, thin hand over his wife’s smaller one. “He’ll adjust, I’m sure. The others have had to.”

Brien thought how lovingly Silas looked at his plump wife. It was clear Helen adored her tall, rail-thin husband, whose graying temples told of a difference in their ages. They were the personification of domestic happiness.

Helen turned to her husband. “Why don’t you take a day or two to show her some of the city? Then later, she can return to visit places that interest her on her own.” She glanced toward the kitchen and the hulking servant undoubtedly taking breakfast there. “She’s brought her own protector.”

Brien smiled. “I suppose you must wonder about him. Dyso was my husband’s servant. He is mute, but hears well and speaks with his hands.” She lowered her eyes and voice instinctively. “The night of the fire that claimed my husband, Dyso carried me from the burning building. He has been with me since. He will be glad to help you in any way he can while we are here.”

“Brien, what was your husband like?” Helen’s face was wistful as she raised one hand to silence Silas’s objection before it was pronounced.

“He was the third son of the French marquis de Saunier. He was dark and quite charming. My father found him a promising student of commerce.” She paused to word the next part carefully. “We were barely . . . we were married only a month.”

Helen dabbed at her eyes. “And not even a child to comfort you.”

Brien squirmed slightly. “Time heals such sorrows. I have decided to devote myself to my father’s business and to charity work.”

“Ah, but you will surely marry again,” Helen declared.

“I fear not, Helen.” Brien intended to forestall any attempt at matchmaking. “I will not ever marry again.”

“Not marry? Ever?” Helen was incredulous. “Oh, no, Brien. You cannot mourn such a short marriage forever.”

“Helen!” Silas cried in exasperation. “Brien has candidly informed us of her reluctance to marry, and we will abide by her wishes.” He waggled his finger at her. “No prying and no plotting!” He turned to Brien with an unaccustomed redness in his face. “Helen is loath to let any unmarried person pass under our roof without attempting to remedy what she considers to be God’s great oversight.”

“Silas!” Helen scowled.

“It’s true, Brien. I maintain she could find no one to pair me with and so she married me herself so as not to spoil her record.”

BRIEN MARVELED LATER that Silas and Helen were so unlike and yet so well suited to each other. Her early impressions of America were the same; many people, quite unlike in dreams, background, and aims, yet living together as though they belonged here.

The sights and smells of the city were a blend of the familiar and the foreign. Just when she would find a street that she vowed to be the duplicate of a Bristol lane or a Cambridge street, she caught a glimpse of a deerskin shirt or heard a rolling accent that reminded her of the new edge of the civilization here. She was in a different country now, but it was tantalizingly easy to forget.

The next day she talked Silas into stopping by the warehouse and stood in the middle of the main floor staring at a hundred barrels of whale oil, a few hundredweight of raw sugar, several hundred bales of wool, a hundred barrels of crockery and household goods, and dozens of crates of metal tools and implements wrought in Sheffieldshire forges. She had never seen this side of the business; most of the decisions involving a direct inspection of cargoes or warehouses, the earl had undertaken himself. Now she felt a shiver of excitement at discovering, learning yet another aspect of Weston Trading.

The place was a fascinating jumble of smells and sights.

Workmen bustled about moving crates and barrels on small-wheeled lorries. She paused to ask questions about the contents of an exotic-looking crate or barrel, or to seek the market price of a given commodity. Her thoughtful gaze and penetrating questions fully engaged Silas, who proved a worthy source for all her inquiries.

In the warehouse offices, Silas presented her with tally sheets and manifests, and pointed out the salient features of their record-keeping system. By the time they were finished, Brien had a fair appreciation of their predicament. Silas had done everything possible to forestall the inevitable, but in such a hostile political climate, there was nothing for them to do but sell.

Only two things remained to be settled.

“What will you do when it is sold?” she asked Silas. “Work for Van Zandt?”

“I don’t fancy working for another this late in life. Helen’s father left her most of his estate and we’ve made prudent investments.

Over the years I have gleaned my share of Weston Trading’s profits and have put them to good use. We’ll be well fixed, no matter what comes to pass with this business. My only regret is that it must be sold to strangers. If I could have put hands on all my investments, I’d have purchased it myself. I’ve put so much of myself into it.”

“You’ll receive a share of the price it brings.” She raised a hand to forbid a protest. “That is our wish—father’s and mine.” Her smile grew a bit pained. “Now, down to the numbers. What price shall we ask for your life’s work?”

“The whole lot for thirty thousand sterling—not a whit less. It would be a bargain for any buyer at that price.”

“And what will this Van Zandt offer?”

“He is shrewd, by repute. He might begin as low as twenty thousand. I’m told that bargaining is first his sport, then his livelihood.”

“And is he trustworthy?”

“I have heard nothing to say he is not. But I know he is not a well-loved man, for all his money.”

“Arrange a meeting for us next week if possible. And cross your fingers.”

AARON AND SILAS had arrived for dinner when Brien swept into the drawing room of Hastings House that Saturday evening.

Aaron was leaning a shoulder against the mantelpiece, engrossed in conversation with Silas. Helen had said nothing about other guests and Brien had been reluctant to ask, lest she seem overly anxious.

“I hope I haven’t kept you waiting,” she said, greeting Helen and Silas warmly.

“No, Brien dear, not at all.” Helen patted the settee beside her and Brien sat down.

“For such a delightful vision we would gladly have been kept waiting,” Silas said, watching Aaron watching Brien.