The Captain's Daughter (2 page)

“It is Andrew,
Miss.”

She felt like he
was still mocking her although she couldn’t quite pin down in his attitude what
gave her that feeling, so she just turned around and marched with as much
dignity as she could considering her resemblance to a wet mop, back to Turpin,
who had been taking everything in.

“Turpin,” she
said with command exuding from every pore, “we are going back home, and you are
not
going to give me any trouble.”

Turpin was
evidently impressed, because he meekly let her lead him home. Or maybe, it was
just because he’d had enough fun for one day.

That night,
Brewminster Hall was ablaze with what
seemed like a thousand candles. They sparkled like fairy lights in Amy’s eyes,
and especially in Mattie’s eyes, as they entered the grand ballroom.

Their hostess came over to greet
them.

“Mildred, how wonderful for you to
come, with your lovely daughters.”

“We’re most gratified to be here,
Penny.”

Lady Mildred Sibbridge, Amy’s
mother, and Lady Penelope Brewminster were longtime friends, and living in the
country they usually dispensed with all formalities unlike the more dignified
city folks. Of course, in the countryside everyone, for the most part, had long
known one another and there were no newcomers around to feel left out if they
greeted one another by their first name.

“Oh,” Lady Brewminster said,
looking at the Sibbridges, “Emmaline isn’t with you.”

A country ball was not as age
restrictive as in the city. Among the local gentry everyone attended the balls,
because there weren’t that many folks of the acceptable station in life to
attend.

“Emma’s a little young to attend,”
Amy’s mother replied as she saw out of the corner of her eye when Susan Swindon
grabbed her ten-year-old Elliot’s arm to make him cease using the ballroom as a
race track. “Although the reason we made her stay home this evening is because
she didn’t do her lessons. She was disappointed, but we just had to make her
remain and try to catch up on her studies. I don’t know what to do with that
child. I swear, she just doesn’t want to learn.”

“Emma’s sometimes a little lax with
her studies,” Amy interrupted in her sister’s defense, “but she has an intense
love of knowledge. She is fascinated by science and is forever studying flora
and fauna and would love studying the stars if she can talk Daddy into buying
her a telescope.”

“That sort of thing is for boys,”
snorted her mother.

“We were able to get these
wonderful musicians from Nottingham,” interrupted Lady Penelope who hated to be
present when even the slightest conflict arose in a family. “Mildred Southwark
recommended them. Don’t they sound enchanting?”

“They sound beautiful, Penny. Why
don’t you girls run along and dance.” Lady Sibbridge addressed her daughters.
“There are a number of fine young gentlemen just waiting to dance with you.”

Mattie, who had been craning her
neck to survey the available young men, immediately took the cue and swiftly
joined several girls standing in a group against the north wall while they
exchanged somewhat vapid comments.

The truth was that as balls go it
was no great affair. None of the occasional balls at the few noble houses
around Stockely-on-Arne ever were. In the ballroom there were scarcely a dozen
or so girls and about half that number of males. That is the reason they had
long given up the use of dance cards. Against the north wall not far from the
collection of undanced-with girls three old men sat together talking about the
things old men talk about.

“Why don’t you go and dance with
one of the young men,” said Lady Sibbridge to Amy noticing her daughter was
still there inhibiting her conversation with Lady Brewminster. “Run along now.
Penny and I have things we want to talk about.”

Sometimes Amy’s mother could be
refreshingly frank. Amy indicated, to her mother’s disappointment, that she was
going to inhibit their conversation for at least a little longer.

“I don’t know about my girls,” said
Amy’s mother shaking her head. “Emma seems to think she is a boy, and Amy seems
to have little interest in young gentlemen. Only Mattie is normal. She’s just
like I was when I was her age.”

In truth, Amy was not averse to the
charms of young gentlemen, she just didn’t see any young gentlemen possessed of
charms in the ballroom tonight. One of the defects of country balls is there
are so few families of nobility or breeding around to invite, that the pool of
young people of the desired age seems very shallow and mostly understocked
especially with the masculine gender. And the male fish that are in the pool
have a preponderance towards minnows rather than those of sturdier stock. And
tonight, the better fish were all taken.

So Amy prefered to remain with the
matrons and wait for the London season. They do not have a pond there, it is
more like a lake, and it is often stocked with fish of a worthier kind. Until
then, she would mostly keep company with the older folks, as there was at least
occasional interest in what they had to say. She would actually prefer to hang
around the gentlemen because they generally discussed things of greater
interest to her, but they would be displeased and uncomfortable if a young lady
intruded on their domain.

The best she could do was to sit near
them and eavesdrop, but that usually only lasted a few minutes at the most
before some busybody took pity on ‘poor Amy having to sit all by herself’ and
came to her rescue.

Her mother and the hostess had been
joined by Mrs. Winthrop, and Mrs. Throckmorton and her son Lazarus, who had
just arrived. Seeing Amy, Lazarus, who was a tall gangly youth and much taller
than any of the young gentlemen present kept, casting glances at her. Amy tried
to avoid looking at him after the initial greeting since she could feel the
forces at work inside him striving mightily as he worked up his courage to ask
her to dance.

“Miss...Miss eh
Sibb...Sibbridge...”

She could almost sympathize with
his pain. Almost, but not quite since she was the quarry. She braced herself
and prepared the kindest way she could to turn him down.

“Miss Amy, would you like to
dance?”

“I am really complimented that you
would wish to dance with me, but...”

She broke off with a little squeal
of pain. Her mother had just rammed a finger that felt more like a knife into
her back.

“Don’t hold off on account of us
older folks, Amy, feel free to accept the young gentleman’s offer.” And then
Amy’s mother added to no one particular: “Amy’s such a caring girl she doesn’t
want us to feel abandoned.”

It is likely that the mothers who
were present could see why Amy didn’t want to dance with the gangly,
stuttering, and somewhat incoherent Lazarus, except of course his own mother
who deeply loved her son and saw beauty in him not immediately apparent to
others who did not share her insight and his genetic material. Amy was about to
politely decline once again when another sharp poke of her mother’s amazing
finger convinced her that all things considered she would suffer less damage
dancing with Lazarus than being anywhere in the proximity of her mother.

As she left, Mrs. Winthrop was
telling the other matrons she had heard old George Anstruther had passed away.
She believed he was still in India at the time. Such was the pleasant gossip
the older ladies exchanged with one another. Amy heard no more as she was
promptly out of earshot.

As they danced, or actually as she
danced and he tried his best to do something that resembled dancing, she
noticed that the same girls were still sitting next to the north wall but she
could not see Mattie. Moments later Mattie danced by looking up admiringly at
young James Breverton, whom Amy had to admit was the best of the bunch of young
men at the ball. She also had to admit he wasn’t too bad looking, and was a
nice friendly youth.

After several dances, Amy was
desperately trying to determine how to get out of further torture while she was
still able to walk and in reasonably good health when a stranger arrived at the
ball. Old Peter, Lord and Lady Brewminster’s longtime footman introduced him.
Old Peter was quite tall, very shaky, and his voice had faded from too many
years of riding atop coaches in the chilly wind while trying to converse with
the coachman. At least, that was Amy’s diagnoses. At any rate when he
introduced the stranger she could not make out the name.

Her interest in the stranger caused
her to be a little distracted from her reflections on her present miseries and
thus to an extent mitigated her pain as she tried to catch sight of what he was
doing as well as she could, while gangly Lazarus dragged her around the
ballroom.

The visitor obviously exchanged
pleasantries with the matrons at the front of the ballroom. Then Lady
Brewminster pointed towards the three old men by the north wall, one of whom
was Lord Brewminster. They had either not seen the stranger enter or they were
studiously ignoring him. He walked around the ballroom in their direction.

“Look at them,” Amy rasped in a
loud whisper.

“Huh,” said Lazarus.

“The girls.”

“Huh,” said Lazarus looking around
at the girls in the room and not seeing whatever it was she was seeing.

“They are like little magnets,
trying to attract him while not being too obvious about it.”

“Who?” said the clearly puzzled
gangly Lazarus.

The stranger walked by the girls
sitting next to the wall, nodding to them politely as he did so, and approached
the old men. They watched stiffly as he passed and then their heads clumped
together like a bunch of old hens.

After a brief introductory
conversation while he stood next to the old men, he sat down beside them and
they all seemed to be engaged in a more intense discussion.

“Look at them. Look at the girls,”
Amy rasped again.

Lazarus surveyed the room, still
puzzled. “What?”

The stranger had risen again and
was slowly walking around the ballroom in the direction of the musicians.

“Every one of them is plotting how
she can get to dance with him.” Amy looked up at her tall gangly dance partner
although she was really directing her comments to no one in particular. Was
there drool coming from the left side of his mouth?

The stranger stood and admired the
musicians for a few moments and then continued his circuit of the ballroom.

“They all want to dance with him.
They’re just plain fawning over him.”

“Dance?” This conversation between
Amy and Lazarus clearly didn’t really include Lazarus.

The stranger was slowly strolling
back to the front of the ballroom and was now about even with Amy and her
partner.

“It is so un... undignified,” she
spluttered. “They haven’t even been introduced to him. I would never dance with
a man I hadn’t been introduced to in a thousand years.”

She was facing the north wall and
away from the object of her contempt, when Lazarus looked up with strange
expression, and as they swung around, a polite, firm, and commanding voice asked:
“Excuse me sir, but may I dance with the lady.”

She turned and looked at the source
of the request. Standing there firm and tall was the stranger.

He looked at her with a very
winning smile and asked: “Will you favor me with a dance?”

She was annoyed at herself later,
but she just stammered: “I will sir.”

As they danced, she desperately
tried to decide what to say, when he broke into her thoughts.

“I am sorry for breaking in like
that and separating you from your young man. I was most rude. Please forgive
me. I trust you are not betrothed. I wouldn’t want to separate a young lady
from her beloved.”

“We’re not betrothed,” she said
meekly, hiding the mixture of disgust she felt at the idea of being betrothed
and eventually married to gangly Lazarus Throckmorton, and the guilt she felt
at being disgusted by a well-intentioned if occasionally drooly youth. Amy
often found life confusing.

“I am glad to know that,” he said
with his warm charming smile. Then he looked at her with a puzzled expression.
“Have we met before?”

“I...I don’t think so.”

“Then let me introduce myself. I am
Benjamin Anstruther.”

“I am pleased to be acquainted with
you, Mr. Anstruther. How long are you going to grace us with your presence?”

“Actually, I’m not visiting. I just
inherited some property near here from my late uncle in India. Hillside House.
I came to take a look at it”

“That’s right next to us,” she said
in surprise.

“We’re neighbors? I must pay your
family a visit.”

Amy was a little flustered at the
suggestion, although she had no idea why that would be.

Her rather jumbled thoughts were
again interrupted when he said: “Here, your charming young man is approaching.
I better turn you back over to him. Thank you for your gracious willingness to
dance with me.”

Despite her most valiant efforts,
she danced with her charming young man for three more dances, before she had to
beg off with excuses of illness which was not true, faintness, even though Amy
never suffered from faintness, and that she was about to pass out, even
although she miraculously never did lose consciousness.

For the rest of the evening she sat
near the matrons while they intermittently fussed over her with wet towels,
sips of sherry, and smelling salts. She never spoke to Benjamin Anstruther
again that particular night, although she would have many occasions to do so in
the future.

Her mother who had obviously
absorbed every morsel of gossip available, finally decided to get Amy home
because of her ill health. She protested she was willing to sit there despite
her weakness so Mattie would not be prematurely whisked away from the dance,
but once Mildred Sibbridge made up her mind, shaky as it was, it could not be
changed.

Once home, Amy made a miraculous
recovery. She was feeling very good, which puzzled her a great deal given that
she had spent most of the evening guiding a totally uncoordinated skinny,
immature, and much too tall youth, around the dance floor. She even felt a
little giddy, which was stranger still. After thinking it over she decided it
was the wine and smelling salts that were to blame.