Bride of a Distant Isle (25 page)

There is another way he is like St. Swithin
, I thought.
Perhaps, somehow, he could make me whole again.

“You make me laugh,” Marco said. “And blush. And question things. And see myself differently.”

“That is good?” I didn't truly know.

He nodded.

“Then your ‘English' lesson was profitable today,” I said softly. Clementine quickly approached, rather than waiting for us to greet her.

“It's been a lovely day, Captain Dell'Acqua, and I'm glad you enjoyed your stroll, which I was able to supervise.”

She could not possibly have seen us all the way to the ropewalk.

“And we shall be very pleased to entertain you and your men tomorrow evening for cards, and supper. Until then!”

It was an abrupt send-off but he bowed politely, and I saw that Watts had already called for his carriage.

We rounded up the steps, and Clementine took my arm rather less gently than Marco had.

“We shall say nothing of the walk,” she hissed. “He need not know.”

I nodded and returned to my rooms.

Who was the
he
that was not to know: Edward or Mr. Morgan?

L
ate the following evening, while an autumn storm threw rain against the house, we played cribbage at round tables in the ballroom. Clementine had invited a number of neighbors, now returned from the London season that had been foregone on our end due to lack of resources, so I was able to greet people I hadn't seen in years. The ballroom had been completely undraped; it was now assumed we would keep Highcliffe. I should ask Mr. Galpine, if I had cause to see him, if the advertisements or enquiries about its sale had ceased.

Edward had allowed Clementine to hire extra staff, who circulated around the room under the careful eye of Mr. and Mrs. Watts. Their son, Jack, had come from London to act as valet for Edward until they all returned to London in a few weeks' time. I saw the special look of pride that Mrs. Watts had when her son attended the master of the house; it was the look I'd seen in Clementine's eye when young Albert had scampered down for cuddles before bed to the delight of the visitors, announcing that he'd been named after the prince and demanding of his mother, “Come and tuck me up!” It was, I imagine, the look Edward's mother, Judith, would have given Edward. It was the look my mother, I recalled just then, had for me. I blinked back a tear.

“Have a care with the candle, Annabel.” Mummy and I sat on her bed, turning the pages of a book of fairy tales.

“I'm careful. I'm not a small child,” I insisted. I put my head too near the candle; Mother reached forward and took the candle from me. “It throws light, but it can cause fire as well,” she said.

“It smells good. Like honey.”

She laughed. “Oh, Annabel. My papa always said that the reason he kept bees at Highcliffe was because they brought us two great things: sweetness, in the honey, and light, in the beeswax. You love sweetness, and you bring light. Hereafter, I dub you Princess Sweetness and Light.”

“A princess, a princess!” I jumped on her bed and she put that to a quick stop with a stern look.

“A lady, a lady,” she insisted, patting the bed again. I obliged and sat down whilst she started another story.

I should like to have a child look upon me that way, someday, and have that child respond with unconditional love and affection.

“Miss Ashton?” Lady Somerford rested her hand gently on my arm, bringing me back to the present. “Elizabeth has asked after you,” she said, a strange tone coloring her voice.

“Tell her I am well,” I responded. “And I am looking forward to seeing her at Christmas. I hope she received the watercolor of Pennington I painted and had sent to her?”

Lady Somerford shook her head. “She has not mentioned it. I am certain she would have.”

Edward invited us to the dining room.

Edward and Lord Somerford led the way, unaccountably leaving Lady Somerford quite alone. Marco, a true gentleman, took her arm.

Mr. Morgan took mine. “Henceforth,” he said, “please call me Nigel. And I always shall refer to you as . . . Annabel.”

B
y the time we sat down, Clementine already looked slightly overwrought and emotional. It might have been her predinner drinks, but it probably was also due to the enormous strain put upon her entertaining week after week, knowing that the family's financial well-being depended upon the successful conclusion of Edward's negotiation. For his part, he seemed to be ignorant and unappreciative of her efforts on his behalf.

The first course was brought to the table, a little nest of potato sticks upon which rested a single quail's egg, whole. We were to break the eggs open to eat. I had never seen Chef serve such a thing. I saw a glance exchanged between Marco and Chef—had he talked to Chef?

Marco looked at me, and I saw the slightest smile on his lips. Of course. St. Swithin's eggs, restored. A sweet and unspoken message, one greatly welcomed. I did not eat my egg and allowed it to be removed whole and intact.

The Maltese men admired the art in the dining room; Edward had our most notable pieces hung there, as it was where guests were most likely to join us. I looked up at the beautifully carved plaster molded ceiling, flecked with gilt, cherubs serving baskets of fruit. “Such a fine collection—some masters, of course,” Lieutenant Bosco observed, pointing toward a large portrait behind Clementine's seat, “but also some I have not seen before.” He then pointed to one of a Maltese urn overflowing with Mediterranean flowers.

“Thank you,” I said. “My mother painted that.”

Edward opened his mouth to protest, and then closed it. He'd forgotten that was my mother's work! Bosco tugged on his collar, his face reddening. “There are others, too, which are beautiful.” He followed Edward's eye and landed upon an English landscape. “Such as that one.”

“Painted by
my
mother,” Edward spoke up. The frame was, of course, much richer and more detailed than the one surrounding my mother's simple art. “My mother was quite an artist; she's been hung at many galleries and I intend to have more of her work placed about the house, now we're staying.”

We were staying! Highcliffe was not lost. If Highcliffe could be saved then perhaps so could I.

“I should very much like to show you some of her work before you leave, but I'm afraid it will not be hung before you return to Malta,” Edward continued. “Perhaps . . . perhaps a visit to the attic after dinner. I've been having it removed from storage, taken from the dust covers and wraps, and with some lamps . . .” He looked toward Watts, who nodded.

Lieutenant Bosco tried to smooth over the path by mentioning that English art could not compare in beauty to English women: Mrs. Everedge, Miss Ashton, and of course, Miss Baker.

“Ah yes, Emily Baker,” Edward said. Clementine's face went sour. I looked at Marco, who smiled lightly at Bosco's mention of Miss Baker.

“Miss Baker?” I asked. “I do not think I have made her acquaintance.”

“You should,” Lieutenant Bosco said, but then Marco shifted the conversation toward the ropewalks, and Edward eagerly jumped in with ideas.

Who was Miss Baker?

After the final course was removed, and before the brandy and port, Edward led a few of us up the attic stairs; Lord and Lady Somerford, as well as many other guests, pleaded age and withdrew to the drawing room. The stairs creaked and moaned with the weight of so many replete-with-supper feet, each of us holding a lantern, as though Edward were leading a search party, indoors.

Perhaps he was.

When we reached the top of the stairs we spread out; several stacks of paintings leaned up against load-bearing attic beams. Most had their dust sheets removed. We looked at the first stack—some pretty pictures of Highcliffe, and some of the seascapes nearby. Lovely, but nondescript. There was a little murmuring, but no exclamations of genius. Edward looked eager to find something that would truly impress.

He led us toward the back, to another stack, and one that seemed to have just had the cover removed, judging by the disarray of dust. “Let's try these,” Edward said aloud. With that, he set down his lantern and lifted a portrait toward us.

I gasped. I could not help but display my shock, though I knew it would not help me. In fact, this portrait, of all things, made my position both more hopeful and ever direr.

Clementine's eyes widened, and she signaled to Edward that he should set the portrait down. He looked at her and, instead, turned it round to view it for himself.

“That bonnet,” one of the Maltese officers spoke up. “That is the traditional Maltese wedding bonnet that the captain”—he looked at Marco—“showed us a picture of. The drawing of it on her head,” he added, pointing to me. “He was trying to learn from where in Malta such a bonnet might come.
Ecco
, there it is again—what a coincidence.”

Mr. Morgan looked confused, though presumably he knew what my mother looked like, as he'd seen her portrait in the ballroom, with the hair combs.

Marco looked at me. The woman in the portrait was most certainly my mother, side by side with a raven-haired man, a man who looked, somehow, like me. My mother wore the cap. The marriage cap.

She'd been married, and I was legitimate.

“I
f your mother painted this, she was a fine artist,” Marco told Edward, but I barely paid attention to any conversation as my mind swirled with the implications. Had Judith painted my mother's marriage portrait—if that was, indeed, what this was—while they were in Malta? If she had, she'd known all along that my mother was married, and that I was legitimate. Or was this a rendering done, perhaps, by my own mother? Was it real? Or had she been duped into a sham marriage?

My father had soft, kind eyes and his hand rested against my mother's jaw, tenderly. This did not appear to be a man duping a young lady or a man with no scruples. I was undone by seeing my father, perhaps, for the first time, but I did not have time to gawk and founder.
He looked like me.
“My mother,” I said. “And . . . my father?”

Edward did not answer, but his face had turned to gray. His mind apparently swirled with implications, too. “This painting—it was not here, nor placed here, when I was last up in the attic. I think I could use a sherry,” he said, leading us in parade back down the stairway, to the music room, where he had arranged for someone to play for our entertainment.

Even I took a sherry that night. What could this mean? Mr. Morgan stayed even more closely by my side after the attic discovery. He understood, surely, that if I were to be somehow proved legitimate, I would be the owner of Highcliffe and all the family investments.

If Morgan and I were married, it would all convey to him. I shuddered at the thought. Edward must certainly recognize that as well. Would it affect his rush to see me married to Morgan once investment matters with the Maltese were concluded?