Sitting in front of the parlor fire on a cold December Sunday, John Bexley dangled a piece of string, twirling it rapidly to make the end wiggle. The gray kitten in his wife’s lap rose on still wobbly hind legs to bat at it, then tumbled over on its back. Undaunted, he attacked the string with all four paws from that position.
“What shall we call him?” Mary wondered.
“Mouser?”
She laughed. “Mrs. Tanner might like that, though she wanted an older cat who could ‘get right to work.’”
The kitten captured the string in its mouth and worried it with needlelike teeth. John tugged a little and elicited a tiny growl. “Arthur got off with no problems?”
Mary nodded. “We all walked with him to the stagecoach. Even Kate, to my surprise. I spoke to the driver about looking after him. His father will meet the coach at Bath.”
“Has he reconciled to the idea that Arthur wants to study engines and mechanical processes?”
“So he says in his latest letter. I think he’s grateful that Arthur wants to study anything at all. He thanked you for ‘setting the boy straight.’” Mary grinned impishly at him.
John grimaced in response. “An undeserved accolade! Although I still cannot see how Arthur interpreted what I told him as encouragement to join Conolly and Lady Caroline’s…”
“Adventure?” Mary put in.
John shook his head at her, then laughed.
The kitten flopped over in Mary’s lap, wrapping the string around its chubby body. She freed it gently. “It all ended well, after you took him to see that steam locomotive to…redirect his thoughts.”
“And the coin stamp at the mint. Don’t forget that.”
“How could I?” Mary replied, widening her dark eyes. “It sounded so fascinating. Did you know that it has the capacity to…?”
“Stop!” John groaned. “If I had to hear Arthur enumerate the virtues of that machine one more time, I think I would have strangled the lad. I’m sure steam engines are a great invention, but their inner workings are astonishingly tedious.”
Mary nodded, conceding the point. “To us, and not at all to Arthur. It just shows how we all have our own unique talents.”
Their eyes met in a moment of perfect understanding. Smiles full of tenderness lit their faces.
Nancy, the new maid, came in with the tea tray and set it on a small table near Mary’s elbow. “Thank you,” Mary said. She lifted the kitten. “Take…Mouser to the kitchen, please. He will try to climb into the milk jug.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Nancy replied, with a curtsy and a smile.
She seemed quite happy with her position, Mary thought gratefully. And she got on well with Mrs. Tanner, even at the times when Kate visited and stirred things up. Mary poured the tea. “So what are we going to do about Christmas?” she asked her husband. “My mother will make a great fuss if we don’t go.”
“As will mine.” John took the cup she offered and sipped. He’d been able to make certain that George’s nosy friend heard about his commendation from the Foreign Office for extraordinary service. George had been very frustrated when he asked what it was for and was told the matter was confidential. Mary’s part in foiling the assassination attempt, and her new responsibilities, were more secret. Could he bear to see his family treat her carelessly without being able to say anything?
“I was thinking we might spend a few days with each one,” Mary said. “A few days only.”
“They expect much longer visits,” he pointed out.
She shrugged. “Perhaps they must learn to expect something different.”
“We can hope.” He gave her a wry smile as he accepted a macaroon from the plate she held out.
“I thought we might take some special…gifts.”
“Of course we must…” He noticed the spark dancing in her eyes. “What sort of gifts?”
“Wait a moment.” Mary rose and went out. In a few minutes she was back, holding two long rolls of paper tied with string. She carried them to the table under the front windows, where she removed the string and spread them out, one on top of the other. She had to weight down the corners to keep them flat.
John rose to look. Mary had glued together sheets from her sketchbook to form a bigger page. And there she had drawn a group of people, placed as in a formal portrait. A middle-aged couple sat in chairs in the center. Five younger women were grouped around them in a loose crescent. Mary was among them. “Your family,” John said.
She nodded. “I left out my sisters’ husbands because the page was getting crowded. Besides, they are…”
“Negligible?”
She laughed. “Not at all! At least…not in their own homes, where I’m sure they are benevolent monarchs.”
“Only in your mother’s?” John examined the faces. Of course he did not know the Bexleys as Mary did, but like all of her drawings this one revealed much. Her mother was so obviously the center of the family. Something in the way she sat and the lines of her face told a viewer that she organized and ruled this household, with Mr. Bexley’s amiable agreement. And covert refusal to take responsibility, John thought. Here was a man who enjoyed the luxury of blaming the difficult things on his wife. He glanced at Mary. Did she see that in her father? He wouldn’t have liked seeing such a thing himself.
He turned back to the drawing. Mary’s sisters—John had to think a moment to name them all: Eliza, Lucy, Sophia, and Petra—showed varying temperaments. Something deep inside him thanked God he hadn’t been married off to Sophia, sure of the feeling without really knowing why. There was much more to see, but he couldn’t take it all in at once.
“It’s the oddest thing,” Mary said as he gazed. “I realized I had never drawn my mother. Well, not since…”
“Since?”
“When I was eleven, I decided to create a special portrait for her,” she said, her eyes on the page. “As a Christmas gift, actually, I’d forgotten that. I spent hours on it. I took such great care. I thought it would please her…and show her…”
Her voice trailed off. John had an urge to take her hand. “But it didn’t,” he said.
Mary shook her head. “She seemed quite…shocked.”
“I’d give a guinea to know what she saw in it. Some aspect of herself that she didn’t wish to acknowledge?”
His wife turned to stare at him. Slowly, her melancholy expression shifted, and she began to smile. “Perhaps. I wonder if she remembers that?”
“She may have some memory. More than likely it doesn’t match yours. People—families—seem to recall incidents from one’s childhood…quite selectively. In order to fit them into a settled story.”
She looked much struck. “That’s very wise.”
“Wise!” He shook his head.
“It is!”
She thought he was wise. And somehow, with her, through her, he had become so. John felt a bubble of joy in his chest that was becoming familiar but never old. “Dare I ask what is on the page underneath?”
“I think you know.”
He lifted the top page and set it aside. And there was his family, grouped in the same manner, except that it was only his mother in the center of the four brothers. It was sad that Mary had never been able to meet his father. “Do not attempt to argue with Frederick,” he said and was slightly startled at his own words. But it was plain to see that his eldest brother was not open to new ideas. He would never convince him to change his mind. It was amazing that Mary could catch this when she had met him just a few times.
“Roger may not be right. I only spoke with him for a few moments at the wedding.”
Yet she had captured his youngest brother’s insouciance and humor, along with a fierce determination John hadn’t recognized till now. Suddenly, he was convinced that Roger’s ventures in India would be a great success. A little hesitant, he looked at the portrait of his mother. “Disappointed?” he said.
“What?”
“Nothing. I…” What about her life had put that discouragement in his mother’s eyes? He’d thought she was pleased and proud of her household and her sons—most of them. Was it his father’s early death, or…?
“Are you disappointed? Of course I don’t know them as I do my own…”
“No! It was…something I noticed.”
Mary nodded as if she knew exactly what he meant. “Should I not have drawn…?”
“If they are to be gifts, we must have them properly framed,” he said.
“Are they?”
She watched him. He understood the question in her eyes and felt that her answer was the same as his. “Great gifts,” he replied. This time he did take her hand. “We should go to your family first, as it’s farthest away, then stop at mine on the way home.”
“It’s a great deal of traveling for such short stays,” Mary remarked.
He nodded, still a bit preoccupied.
“It’s a pity that we can’t just stay home and invite Caroline and Mr. Conolly for Christmas dinner,” she said.
“They will be with their own families,” replied John absently. He was imagining his mother unwrapping the portrait, George and Frederick looking at it. He would see if he could find something to say to his mother that lightened that disappointment behind her eyes. And if he did, would she begin to see him differently as well?
“They might rather be with each other,” Mary replied. When he turned to look at her, she added, “Caroline and Conolly. I think they are becoming attached.”
“Doesn’t she come from one of those families Conolly spoke of? Who wouldn’t consider him a good match?”
“Caroline’s grandmother would take her part.”
John felt a twinge of concern for his friend. “Her father is the important one in the matter of marriage. And our neighbor may turn out to be more conventional than you imagine.”
“Eleanor wants Caroline to be happy,” Mary insisted. “As do I.” She cocked her head at him. “Mr. Conolly too.”
John’s mind filled with a host of complications. “I don’t think it’s wise to interfere in something so…”
“But I am a ‘managing woman,’” she interrupted.
He nodded to acknowledge that he remembered—and regretted—the phrase. “You are an extraordinary woman, a talented woman, and the love of my life, but…”
“But…?” Her dark brows arched. Her smile was rueful.
He gazed at the lovely figure next to him, dearer than words could express, and thought how amazingly fortunate he had been in the end. His life could so easily have gone otherwise. If he hadn’t been sent to China, if he hadn’t returned changed, to find an entrancing stranger, where would he be now? How drab and pointless his existence might feel. Overcome with gratitude and love, he said, “And I trust your judgment implicitly.”
Fortunately, his cup was nearly empty when Mary threw her arms around him, so only a few drops of tea fell, unnoticed, onto the sofa.
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Charmed and Dangerous
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