No Sweeter Heaven: The Pascal Trilogy - Book 2 (10 page)

“But I never intended to marry—”

“Nonsense,” Binkley said, cutting off his objection. “God obviously didn’t want you in His monastery, He wanted you practicing your talents out here with the rest of us. I can’t see what difference it makes how He went about it—you’re here now and you can’t change a thing.”

“In a very odd sort of way, you sound like Father Benetard,” Pascal said dryly, pushing a stray bread crumb about the table with his finger.

“Well, I don’t know any Father Benetard, and I’m sure it’s a good thing, for I’d tell him a thing or two about keeping you in a place you didn’t belong and for much too long.”

“I was not being kept there, I was working for the abbot, Binkley, as you know perfectly well. The gardens had been burned during the Revolution and serious damage had been done to the stock; I was inclined to bring the garden back and stay to see the job through. I must confess I did think about taking vows, but somehow I never quite felt called.”

“I should think not,” Binkley said indignantly. “If God wanted you for Himself, He’d have taken you sure enough, and from the way you were spat out of the sea and onto our doorstep all those years ago, I’d say He wasn’t the least bit interested in you just yet, at least not in that way.” He started drumming on the table again. “Someone needs to set you straight, and his lordship is too respectful of your privacy to do it himself.”

“Oh?” Pascal said, slightly taken aback.

“You might very well say ‘oh,’ for I sometimes think that when God gave you those other things He forgot to include sense. Here is his lordship good enough to legally adopt you, and you are too stubborn to take his name, or a farthing of his money, or his permanent offer of the Close—oh, yes, I know all about it.”

Pascal opened his mouth and shut it again.

“I can understand your reasons for all of that, and his lordship does too, but this is something else again. Now you say you’re not going to take a farthing of what your wife brought to the marriage—your marriage.”

“That’s right, Binkley,” Pascal said, his jaw set. “So what is your point?”

“My point, which even a blind man could see, is that you’re behaving like an idiot and standing on your pride. And stop pushing that crumb about,” he added irritably. “You’re going to grind it into the table and I’ll be days getting it out again.”

Pascal obediently picked the crumb up and put it on a plate.

“What do you think you’re going to do with a rebellious duke’s daughter if you don’t have the first idea of where you’re going to go and what you’re going to do, with no money to do it with, and you say that you cannot stay here? That sounds like the talk of a fool to me.”

Pascal nodded. “I know, and therein lies my predicament. I am a fool indeed, but perhaps not
quite
so much of a fool as you might think, for there is a degree of reason behind my decision. If there is to be any hope for Elizabeth—or for me—it’s only going to be found somewhere as far away as possible from the drawing rooms of English society.”

“Where do you plan to take her, may I ask? Tibet? Or maybe you were thinking of Siberia this time?”

“Umm-no. Not exactly. I need to find a place where we can live simply but with purpose, where such things as money and rank are secondary, if not meaningless.”

“That will be no easy task,” Binkley said, rubbing his ear thoughtfully. “But I believe I begin to see your point.”

“My reasoning is sound, I think.” Pascal leaned forward earnestly. “Look, Binkley, if I use Elizabeth’s money, it will only prove to her that I married her out of greed. I need to work, and Elizabeth needs to see that I’m supporting her, not using her.” He thought for a moment. “I suppose that I also want Elizabeth to learn the value of life—real life. Do you know what I mean?”

“I’m not sure
you
know what you mean. You’ve just come out of a monastery, boy. You can’t call that real life, now can you?”

Pascal smiled. “You do have a way of putting things in perspective, even though I don’t think you know the first thing about life inside a monastery. It’s the sort of thing you have to experience firsthand.”

Binkley grunted, which was as much of a concession as Pascal was likely to get.

“What I mean,” Pascal continued, “is that Elizabeth has a lot to learn about people, about ordinary people who don’t live in castles or stately homes. She’s never been given a sense of anything more than her own status and empty importance. You may think Charlie and the others wild and full of mischief, but you will never find one of them throwing his position up at anyone, and if he did, you can be sure he’d have his ears boxed.” He shook his head. “Elizabeth is something else again. I don’t know how I’m going to manage a lifetime with the woman—not the way she is now.” He scraped his chair back and started to put the plates on the tray.

“Leave it, if you please,” Binkley commanded. “You’ll break something with the angry way you’re going about it.

What exactly are you referring to? Your wife is throwing her position up at you?”

“My God, Binkley, she’s called me things even you wouldn’t believe. She thinks I’m a—oh, never mind.”

“Do you feel inferior in some way to your wife?” Binkley asked, and Pascal nearly choked.

“Good Lord, no,” he said. “I’m answerable to no one but God, and I don’t think that He has any interest in rank—despite what some might like to think,” he added caustically. “No, it’s Elizabeth who thinks herself superior. I may be stubborn, but I have never considered myself a proud sort of person. Still, I confess that she pricks at me, Binkley. In truth she does.”

“Oh?” Binkley asked neutrally. “How is that?”

Pascal sighed. “I can’t seem to hold my temper for more than two minutes when I’m near her, and it’s growing shorter by the moment. I dislike myself even more for responding to her with anger, but I can’t help it. And that is no excuse at all.” He looked down at the table, then up at Binkley, feeling ashamed.

Binkley was smiling with a satisfaction that Pascal could not even begin to understand. “None,” the old man said. “But then no one has ever needed an excuse for being human.”

“Well, Charlie,” Lily called down from her branch, where she had climbed in order to better observe the movement of the river, “I can’t say that I understand why you have caught two fish and I haven’t had even a nibble, but I suppose you must be doing something right.” She peered into the dark depths of the river, wondering how Charlie could possibly see when a fish was coming and know where to cast his line.

“You’ll never catch a fish by swishing your rod back and forth like that, Elizabeth,” he said, looking up at her.

“Oh, do call me Lily, won’t you? It would make me so much more comfortable, and there’s no one else to do it.”

“Not even Pascal?” he teased.

“Especially
not him,” she said with disgust.

Charlie’s winged eyebrows rose. “What do you mean by that?”

“He calls me ‘Elizabeth’ as if the word were poison in his mouth. Personally, I think that poison would be too good for him.”

“Could we possibly be talking about the same person?” Charlie asked, lowering his pole to the ground, his eyes sharpening in interest.

Lily swung one bare foot back and forth. “How many Pascal LaMartines do you know?”

“Only one, and he’s one of the finest people I could hope to know.”

“Then you don’t know him at all,” Lily said, her voice suddenly thick with misery.

“Oh, dear. This doesn’t sound like a marriage made in heaven,” Charlie said with real concern.

“Hell is more like it,” Lily replied over the knot in her throat.

Charlie walked over to the tree and held out his hand. “Here, give me your pole and come down from there. It seems to me as if you need a friend.”

The very words brought tears to Lily’s eyes. She’d never had a friend—other than Jean-Jacques and Coffey, of course. Her father hadn’t approved of such things. He had always said people were opportunists and would only befriend her for her status and wealth, and in any case she ought not mingle with anyone beneath her. The hitch to that had been that there weren’t too many Catholic dukes’ daughters running about for her to mingle with. And now, when she felt more alone than she ever had, to have this nice boy offer his hand in friendship for no reason other than he thought she needed it—it was almost too much.

She blinked her tears away and carefully climbed down.

He gave her a reassuring smile, then picked up the fishing tackle and the fish he’d caught. “Come, let’s go back to the house and have some breakfast. I’m starving, and I can’t possibly talk about serious matters on an empty stomach.”

“But I don’t know if there is anything to eat,” Lily said, picking up her wet shoes and stockings, but not bothering to put them on. “There doesn’t seem to be any staff, and I have no idea if there is even any food in the house.”

Charlie held up the fish. “These will do brilliantly. And if I know anything about it, by now word has gotten around that Pascal is home. There are bound to be offerings outside the kitchen door.”

“Oh,” Lily said, wondering if people left offerings because they knew how impoverished her husband was—although if he was the adopted son of the Earl of Raven, surely he would have money of his own? In which case, why did he need to be a gardener? Her head spinning with unanswered questions, she followed Charlie back to the Close, wondering most of all how she was going to manage to cook Charlie’s fish.

“Now,” he said, dropping the fish on the kitchen table, “you start cleaning them, and I’ll make up the stove.”

“What do you mean,
clean
them?” Lily asked, recoiling from the two very dead trout. “They must be clean enough, having just come from the river?”

Charlie gave a hoot of laughter. “You really are an innocent, aren’t you? No, Lily, I mean you have to take a knife and split them down the middle, then take out their innards.” He grinned wickedly at her look of dismay.

“I … I don’t think I can,” she said, paling.

“Oh, very well, do you think you can start a fire?”

“I—I don’t think so. I mean, I’ve seen the parlormaid do it, but I’ve never paid any attention.”

“Then sit down and watch carefully. Now that you’re married to my brother, you’re going to need some basic skills. Pascal has a habit of taking off to the back of beyond, and you had better be prepared to go with him.”

Charlie lit the fire, then went to the back door and opened it. “Aha!” he said triumphantly, coming back in with a basket of eggs, a jug of milk, a loaf of bread, and a wrapped ball of cold butter in his arms. “As I thought. We will have a feast this morning. Here, at least you must be able to slice bread.” He put the loaf in front of her, along with a knife he found in a drawer.

“Do you really know how to cook?” Lily asked curiously, watching him throw butter into two pans.

He looked over his shoulder. “Naturally. My mother is a brilliant cook—she learned from her mother, who was French. Look. You let the butter melt, like this, then in go the fish.”

Lily managed to look, now that Charlie had done the necessaries to them. Into the pan they went, spluttering in the hot butter, and she watched as he salted and peppered them, then turned his attention to the eggs.

“You break them carefully in half and slide them into the butter. Then all you have to do is watch until the whites are set and the yolks are still soft. Lily, come now, the bread.” He turned to the table. “What in the name of God—oh, sorry—but it does look hacked to death. Oh, well, never mind. Just run it under the fire in that thing there for a moment to brown it.”

“Ouch!” Lily cried, instantly managing to burn herself, and Charlie laughed and took the griddle from her.

“Never mind,” he said, as she sucked her palm. “Next time. All right. You’ll find plates in the cupboard to the far left, glasses next one over, and knives and forks directly underneath in the drawer. Surely you can’t do any harm to them, and I feel confident that you can pour milk.”

Lily did as she was told and soon enough had the table laid. Charlie expertly dished everything out and they sat down to a meal that Lily thought delicious and felt vaguely proud about, even though she hadn’t had very much to do with it.

“I’m impressed,” she said, wiping her mouth.

“How gratifying. You’ll have the hang of it soon enough.” He pushed his plate to one side. “Now. To you and Pascal. I gather this was not a love match?”

“Anything but. In fact, I don’t know why everyone thinks he is such an angel. He’s a black-hearted devil. I am sorry to speak so about your brother, Charlie, but it is the truth.”

“Is
it? How interesting that you should think so.”

“Well, I do. I’ve lived with him for three days and two nights and he hasn’t had a kind word to say to me.” She brushed away a tear. “I don’t think he knows how to be kind.”

Charlie scratched his blond head, looking uncomfortable. “I wonder if you ought not to be having this conversation with my mother.”

“Oh, no,” Lily said. “I couldn’t possibly. It’s obvious that she adores Pascal.”

“That is true enough, and that’s the crux of the matter, for I’ve never known anyone who didn’t. Ah—it occurs to me that this might be one of those things that happens to young brides.”

“Whatever do you mean?” Lily asked.

“Oh, dear. How to be delicate. Well. To be perfectly blunt, I mean because of the necessary marital chores involved.”

Lily frowned. “I can’t think that every bride in the world is forced to cook and clean for her husband.
Most
people have servants to do it for them, you know.”

Charlie grinned. “That wasn’t exactly what I meant. I meant the other side of marital duties, the ones conducted after the lights go out.”

Lily suddenly realized what he was talking about, and her grin matched his. “Does everyone talk in euphemisms, I wonder? You sound precisely like Father Mallet, and you’re the furthest thing from a Catholic priest that I can think of.”

“Thank God for that. I mean—I don’t think it’s my calling. Anyway, who is Father Mallet to be talking to you about such a delicate matter? It doesn’t sound in the realm of priestly things to me.”