Curse of the Gypsy (26 page)

She paused, and Osei remained attentive but silent. “That part was easy, finding an assistant for Mr. Destry, but it still leaves me with the problem of Papa’s secretary. It will be a more difficult task to find a suitable gentleman. What I have to ask is, would you consider staying here for a month while I find someone? You have rejuvenated my father,” she said, glancing over at him. “Finding a kindred spirit has made him so happy.”

He took a moment to collect himself, then said, “My lady, your father understands my quest for knowledge in a way I have not yet encountered. Such learned men as are at Oxford,
that
is what I imagine they would be.”

“I think you’d be disappointed in the fellows of Oxford,” Anne replied. “From rumor, I understand that much of what goes on there is drinking, gambling, and whoring.” She colored at her own frank language. “What do you say, Mr. Boatin? Will you stay here for one month while we find someone for my papa?”

“I could not stay,” he said.

Anne read the regret in his voice and hope filled her. She knew his concern. “If I asked Tony myself and he said it was all right, would you
then
consider it? Just for one month. I’m asking you to consider only your own inclination in this, Mr. Boatin.”

“If it were just myself? I would stay, my lady, for your father and I have begun conversations on my language; he is interested in producing a written form of it using the Roman alphabet to replicate the words as best as I can. In one month we could make much progress, then when I left, I would know enough about your father’s methods that I could continue.”

“Would you then write the stories from your grandfather?” Anne asked, genuinely curious.

Light sparked in Osei’s dark eyes. “I would.”

Anne furrowed her brow, distracted for a moment by an odd thought. “This is a question I have never thought of: do you think in English, Mr. Boatin, or in Fante?”

He frowned and said, “Are dreams really about any language, my lady? In my day-to-day life I think in English, I believe, though Fante words are close to the surface of my mind and fill my heart. But when I dream … ah, that is different, is it not? For our dreams are from the heart, I think. When language is necessary, when I hear my grandfather’s voice, and that of my sister, I dream in Fante. I dream of the hot African sun and running on the plain after the hunt, and sitting on the ground in front of my grandfather’s hut, listening to his stories.”

Moved by his sudden animation, she put one hand over his, where it rested on Irusan’s shaggy head, and said, “If you wrote those stories, I would read them with great joy.” She paused, then said more briskly, “Do we have an agreement, then?” He nodded. “Let me speak to Tony tonight,” Anne said. “If you stay, then I can be sure there was someone looking out for my father.”

“Looking out for him? Do you mean other than yourself?”

She hesitated, but then plunged ahead. “I’m thinking I would like to go north to … to see Lydia again. She writes such pathetic letters.”

“You do not need to explain why you would want to go to Darkefell, my lady.” He said no more, but smiled faintly.

Her cheeks burned, for she suspected that he knew what she and Tony had done together. Taking in a few deep breaths, she concentrated on calming her fluttering stomach and thudding heart. “I plan to go to Hawk Park, and if Lady Darkefell is there, we could travel north together.” Anne shuddered. “As unpleasant a journey as that seems to me.”

“She is a difficult woman to get to know,” Osei said gravely. “But I have always thought there is something there, something the marchioness is hiding, and it makes her wary and bitter.”

“What do you mean?” Anne asked. Osei knew the marchioness better than she; could what he thought be true?

“I do not know what else to say.” He shook his head. “She dislikes me, but I am not sure if it is just an instinctive revulsion on her part—some of your people find my skin offensive—or if it is my person that offends her.”

Anne, shocked by the fellow’s words, said, “You are the most gracious man I have ever met, Mr. Boatin, and certainly the most fastidious. You are the epitome of what I believe a gentleman should be, and certainly have better manners than your employer.”

“What is proper for me and what is proper for his lordship are vastly different, my lady, given our differences in station. I must cultivate humility and deference in my position.”

“True.” She watched him, trying to imagine him as he would have been without the trappings of an Englishman. It was impossible, of course, for she had no idea what his native dress would look like, nor his homeland. “I have a sense that even without the mantle of humility you wear for your position as a secretary, in your proper role as a princely fellow you would still be as polite and courtly as you are this moment. Nothing you have ever said or done is remotely offensive, so whatever Lady Darkefell’s problem is, it has not been engendered by you.”

“Thank you, my lady, you are very gracious. Meeting you, I feel I have met what I imagine as the perfect picture of an English lady.”

She laughed and said, “I wish my mother could hear you say that. I am far from what is considered ideal, Mr. Boatin.”

He hesitated, but then launched back into speech, saying, “I am now going to perhaps destroy all of the good opinion you have of me by being impertinent. But I cannot help myself; my lady, I wish to tell you that I have never, in my years in his company, seen the marquess so happy. But then, I have never seen him in love before.”

Anne colored, and could not speak. She looked down at her hands.

But he was done on that subject, and changed it, saying hesitantly, “Excuse me for asking, but would his lordship the earl, your esteemed father, consider a young lady as a fit secretary?”

“Do you have someone in mind?” Anne asked.

He paused, ordering his thoughts, perhaps. “When Lord Darkefell brought us—the former slaves—back to England, it was a puzzle what to do with all of us. The danger was, if we left England, would we be seized and thrown in chains, claimed as escaped slaves? In light of the Somerset case, which only protected us in England, it was a possibility, especially with Hiram Grover still attempting to enforce his claim to us.”

“The Somerset case,” Anne said, remembering hearing about the case years before of a slave who claimed freedom from being on British soil. “It is still being used as legal precedent, I understand.” Osei, though freed from slavery by virtue of his unique situation, was still not free in the proper sense. If he went to Jamaica or any of the other English colonies to try to trace his sister, he could be taken back into slavery if the ownership question arose. It was still a thorny legal issue. But what did that have to do with the original question of finding a suitable secretary for her father? “Please continue, Mr. Boatin.”

“When we arrived, only I and one other among the rescued slaves could speak rudimentary English,” Osei continued. “I had learned some from being in the company of Lord Darkefell on the voyage back to England. It was a problem, for the others did not even speak Fante, so I could only understand some of what they said. Lord Darkefell took us to a school in London where a young woman of African origin resided, having begun as a charity student and working her way up to be an instructress.”

“Really? What is her name?”

“Miss Clara Simmons. The school was run by the Quakers, and they welcomed us warmly. I have corresponded with Miss Simmons for years now, and she has kept me abreast of the progress of the others Lord Julius and the marquess rescued. They learned, each according to his or her abilities, and found work. One of the young ladies is even now a companion to a young Quaker woman of wealth. But Miss Simmons has lately been made unhappy by … by the attentions of the new headmistress’s son. The school passed into other hands, for the Quaker proprietors sold all and went to Upper Canada to help in the abolition movement there. Miss Simmons confided in me and asked my advice, but I fear she could not await my answer, and has fled the school rather than suffer dishonor at her tormentor’s hands.”

Fury at the young woman’s situation rose up in Anne like a wave, but she tamped it down. Most important was to establish what was being proposed. “Are you asking if this young lady would be acceptable as a secretary to my father?”

“Yes,” he said simply. “She is working as a laundress, but it is not right for her. She has not the strength bodily for such an arduous task, and her learning is wasted.”

“Do you think she would suit?”

Osei frowned and was silent for a long few moments. At length, he sighed and said, “I believe so, but I cannot judge. Your father should have the opportunity to meet her, at least. Would that be suitable, do you think?”

“She would have to give up her laundress position, though, to come here on a trial basis. Would that be fair?”

“My lady,” he said with deep feeling, “she needs respite from the physical nature of her position. In her last letter I noted a tone of despair.”

“Despair? She won’t—”

“No, oh, no!” he said, putting up one hand. “She would never do away with herself, for she is far too strong in her heart. Also, she has taken the Quaker religion to heart. I think she would be admirably suited to the work of secretary to a scholar, but where could she find such a position? It would have to be with someone exceptional, like your father, who would look past her sex to her mind and heart. She taught me much in the one month I spent in London when we arrived back in England, after the rescue. And in our correspondence since, I have ever only seen a delicacy of mind and an inquisitiveness of nature that would be admirably suited to your father’s research. She speaks French and Italian, for she first learned French from her life in—”

“Osei, you don’t need to convince me,” Anne said. “I trust your judgment. Please, write to her and send her enough money to come here. Or … if I decide to go north with his lordship and Lady Darkefell, I’ll send Sanderson and a maid to collect her. That may be best.”

A rare smile wreathed his lean, faintly pocked face. “Thank you, my lady. I will send a letter of introduction along with Mr. Sanderson, if you make that decision. Or I could go with Mr. Sanderson myself to collect her, for London is not so far from here.”

“But send a note by post tomorrow, first, to introduce the idea.” Anne had a momentary qualm. “I suppose I should speak to Papa about it first, hadn’t I?”

He smiled again. “Yes, my lady. If you are arranging for a possible secretary for your father, it may be best to consult him.”

She detected a twinkle of humor, and knew he was teasing her about her domineering nature. “Do not laugh at me, Mr. Boatin. If I was not the way I am, Lord Darkefell and I would never suit, as you have noted yourself. Apparently our relationship is to be a series of negotiations, like the endless debates between the French and the English. Now, run along, young man,” she said with a mocking ferocious look, “and tell the others I am just speaking to my father for a moment, and we’ll be down to supper directly.”

He rose with a smile and deposited a disgruntled and sleepy Irusan on the chair he vacated. “Very well, my lady.”

Eighteen

Her father, as she expected, was delighted by the idea. He was an unusual man, in that he was not in the least threatened by a woman of learning and ambition. When she was just nine, she had convinced him to dismiss her horrid governess, and had learned everything at his knee and from books in his library. He never once said some topics were not suitable for a woman to learn, and so in addition to the classics, languages, and geography, she had a good sense of anatomy (male and female), reproduction, and even the latest from science concerning the female mind, most of which she thought was balderdash. The most eminent scientists in the land sounded like fools when speaking to other men about women.

The earl said that Miss Simmons would suit admirably if she had half Osei’s intelligence, but by Mr. Boatin’s reckoning, as her student, she and he were equals intellectually. Anne now had only to approach Darkefell about her proposal that Osei should stay in Kent for a month, while the new secretary was trained. Mr. Boatin thought that as Mr. Posthumous Jones, his estate steward, was back at Darkefell Castle and could handle most secretarial duties in a pinch, the marquess might allow it.

Especially if it was she who asked. And so to dinner, Anne thought, as she descended the stairs.

“My lady, one moment, if you please,” Epping said as she descended.

“Yes?”

“In the normal course of events I would have given you the mail the moment you arrived back home, but given the … ahem, the … er …” His broad face was suffused with red and shiny with perspiration; he clearly knew not how to raise the topic of the prisoner in the shed, the marquess and his twin, all the events that had shaken the placid world of Harecross Hall in the last week.

“Never mind, Epping. Given the extraordinary events of the day and that we had just come from a most unusual situation and I was tired, and dirty, you decided to delay the mail. I appreciate that.” She took the letter from the silver tray he held out. It appeared to be the reply she was expecting from Mrs. Noonan’s brother, and she nipped into an alcove off the hall to read it in the light of a branch of candles. She read it, then she reread it. Rising, she slipped it through the slit in her gown into her pocket and advanced to the drawing room, where the others awaited her.

From the doorway she viewed the scene. Tony and Julius were, of course, together talking earnestly by the fireplace. Mr. Boatin was doing his best to speak with a distracted and pale-looking Mrs. Noonan. Anne now had a good idea why she had behaved as she had lately, but would take it up with her later. Anne heard a noise from behind her; it was her father. She entered the drawing room on his arm, leading him to the two handsome men by the fireplace.

“Papa, this is Lord Julius Bestwick, Lord Darkefell’s brother.”

***

Darkefell was at his leisure during dinner because Lord Harecross, having learned that Julius had been in Upper Canada, was busy asking numerous unanswerable questions about the dialects and languages of the natives. Julius grew more and more bemused and confused, while the earl soldiered on, visibly irritated by Julius’s vague answers, which were mostly that he learned a little of the various dialects, but could say nothing beyond a few commands and rudimentary pleas for food and shelter.