Read The Horsemaster's Daughter Online
Authors: Susan Wiggs
Tags: #Fiction, #Romance, #Historical, #General
F
illed with bittersweet joy, Abigail scarcely felt the floor beneath her feet as she went upstairs to the parlor. Clutching the envelope to her bosom, she resisted the urge to press it to her mouth.
A letter from Boyd Butler.
Helena hurried after her. “Honestly, Abigail, must you rush so? I haven’t seen you move so quickly since those mussels made you sick at the Spanish ambassador’s house.”
As if Abigail needed to be reminded of that. Helena never meant to be insensitive, although she was often blunt. In fact, that very night it had been Helena who had rushed her from the room and found a spittoon before Abigail disgraced herself entirely.
She led the way into the comfortable morning room and took a seat on the dark green settee. Helena sat in a wing chair opposite her and folded her hands in her lap. “So what does the letter say?”
Abigail took a deep breath, sorting through her feelings. The prospect of a letter from Boyd Butler filled her with delight, even though she understood perfectly that it was Helena he wanted. Why didn’t that fact make her miserable? Because, she realized, this courtship would make her father happy and her sister happy—and two out of three wasn’t so bad.
Helena’s curiosity about Boyd Butler seemed strange to Abigail, for ordinarily she treated all suitors with equal disdain. Perhaps this time things were different. Perhaps she truly did want to be courted.
In a way, Abigail felt she’d been granted a reprieve. No gentleman ever took an interest in her, and Butler’s brief flare of attraction at the wedding—exhilarating as it was—had unsettled her. She didn’t know how she would act if he pursued her. Watching him court Helena was safer than being the object of his desire. This way, Abigail didn’t have to risk making a fool of herself. It wasn’t the same as having a love affair of her very own, but in her own private way, she might find safety preferable.
Or so she told herself as she took her time breaking the seal and opening the envelope. She tried to ignore a twinge of annoyance at Helena, who picked up her petit point and worked a thread through the design. This was the start of a romance, for heaven’s sake. Couldn’t she have a little respect for the weightiness of the momentous occasion? Or at least savor it? Didn’t she even want to be alone to dream about it?
But, as usual, Helena left the thinking to Abigail. It wouldn’t do to point out that the letter was a private correspondence and that Abigail had no right to read it. She and Helena shared everything; they always had. Raised by a constantly changing parade of nurses and nannies, tutors and taskmasters, they had taken refuge in each other. Motherless, and with a father like Franklin Cabot, they’d learned to cling to one another.
She unfolded the message. His stationery bore the embossed gold seal of a naval officer. “He has a fine clear hand,” she said, feeling a thrill ripple through her. This falling-in-love business was heady stuff, like an exotic virus. Even though she loved him from afar, she had not expected the sensation to be so…so physical. She took a peculiar delight in seeing his penmanship for the first time. It was personal and intimate, a glimpse at a facet of Boyd Butler that had been hidden from her until this moment.
“Of course he does,” said Helena. “They train them to do that in the navy, don’t they?”
He probably learned penmanship long before going into the navy, but Abigail didn’t point that out. She took a deep breath and started reading.
“‘My dear Miss Cabot’—” She stopped, feeling a flutter of her heart. She’d never been anyone’s dear. The designation made her want to laugh and weep at the same time. Taking another deep, steadying breath, she went on. “‘They say that Helena of Troy had a face that launched a thousand ships. Dare I say that Helena of Georgetown has a face that could launch the entire United States naval fleet?”’
As soon as she read her sister’s name aloud, Abigail turned into a machine. An armored reptile, impervious to feeling. All along she’d known Lieutenant Butler wanted Helena, but until she actually read the name, saw it shaped by his concise handwriting, Abigail had been able to imagine the tender words were meant for her. Without changing her voice, she read on, but everything inside her turned to ice. This was a
love
letter to her sister. Not even meant for her eyes. “‘I find myself preoccupied with thoughts of you. In the middle of muster drills or morning inspection, every other notion drains from my mind. Should you favor me with the merest fraction of my admiration of you, I would consider myself the most privileged of men.”’
As she recited the words, Abigail sneaked a glance now and then at her sister. In the diffuse light of the late-autumn morning, she was like a goddess from another world, a place devoid of ugliness or infirmity. The polished copper fall of her hair framed a porcelain-perfect face, which was now consciously arranged into an expression of polite interest. Yet her hands stayed busy, working the petit point as though with a will of their own.
Struggling to hold her sick disappointment at bay, Abigail finished reading, though the aching tenderness of Boyd’s closing nearly undid her. “‘You hold my heart, a crystal, within your slender hands….”’ Her voice trailed off into the sunny silence of the morning room. She stared down at her own small, squarish hands until the words on the page blurred, then she blinked to clear her vision and looked up at her sister.
Helena clasped her hands in her lap. “How lovely,” she said. “How heartfelt and delightful.” She frowned at Abigail’s expression. “Are you all right? You look a bit ill, dear.”
“I’m fine.” Abigail folded the pages with a reverence reserved for holy relics.
“Now, who did you say that was from?” Helena inquired, her brow puckered with a frown.
Abigail nearly crumpled the note as she put it back in the envelope. “Oh, for the love of heaven,” she snapped. “Are you so inured to having men’s hearts laid at your feet that you can’t keep track of them all? Perhaps we should keep a book like a star log, listing all your conquests. Or maybe a strategy map such as Father keeps in his study, only instead of voting blocks, we can mark off each—”
“Abigail, please.” Helena took out a handkerchief and pressed it to her cheeks. “I didn’t mean to be flip. Why are you so distraught? This isn’t like you.”
Abigail gritted her teeth and held herself very still. “Of course. And I didn’t mean to—Actually, I did. My frankness is surely the least of my assets. Honestly, Helena, have you truly forgotten which man has pledged his soul to you?”
Helena bit her lip. “It was either Mr. Troy Barnes or Lieutenant Butler. Both inquired about…well, you know.”
Abigail did know. Ever since Helena had come of age and shocked the polite world by not settling down to an advantageous marriage, her sister had received offers with the frequency of honeysuckle attracting bees in summer.
“It’s from Lieutenant Butler.” Abigail pushed the letter into Helena’s lap. “Lieutenant Boyd Butler.”
“Of course. The Annapolis man.”
“The vice president’s son.”
“He dances like a prince.”
“And writes like a poet.” Abigail stood up, pacing in agitation. “You cannot dismiss him, Helena. Not this time. He’s too…important.” She had almost said “vulnerable,” but that would have been too revealing, even to Helena. “You heard Father this morning. An alliance with the Butlers would mean everything to him.”
“Yes, it would, but I’m trying to remember why I should concern myself with pleasing Papa.”
“Helena.”
“That was quite naughty of me, wasn’t it?” Helena lapsed into a dreamy silence, seemingly preoccupied with something important and mysterious.
Abigail held in her exasperation. While she labored in quiet diligence to do the right thing, Helena wavered between daughterly affection and open rebellion. Yet, for both women, the results were the same. Their father was never cruel to them, but he treated them with a remote civility that had a subtle cruelty all its own.
“He wants a reply,” Abigail said, her gaze falling to the letter in Helena’s hand. “He asked—begged—for one directly.”
Helena dropped the envelope on a side table and picked up her sewing again. “Of course. But I could never—Oh, you know me, Abigail. I have no head for such things. The words simply aren’t in me. I need you, dear.” She raised troubled eyes to Abigail. “Would you be so kind?”
Abigail turned to the window so her sister wouldn’t see her face. She supposed she could refuse; perhaps she would. But no. If she didn’t write the letter, Helena would dash off some blunt rejection, dictating it to one of her father’s secretaries who might or might not accomplish the task with tact and discretion. Several years ago, she’d sent an unscrupulous servant to dismiss a suitor, and the story had appeared in the next day’s
Post.
Abigail couldn’t bear to see Lieutenant Butler treated in such a manner. Though she had every right to resent him, she discovered that she could not. Being angry at him for falling in love with Helena was like being angry at the autumn leaves for falling from the dogwood trees that lined the brick streets of Georgetown.
“And what is it you’d like me to say?” she asked her sister.
“Tell him how delighted I was to hear from him. Tell him I share his feelings.”
“But you don’t,” Abigail said. Then a stunning thought struck her. “Or do you?”
“Probably not. But as you said, this is important to Papa. Think how pleased he would be with me if I really did win the heart of Lieutenant Barnes.”
“Butler.” Abigail had thought of nothing else. Could she bear seeing him wed to her sister? “And what would you intend to do with his heart? Add it to your collection?”
“Abigail, you know me better than that. I’m thinking of Papa, and you should, too.”
“Believe me, Helena, I am thinking of Father, too.”
“Then will you do it? You’ll send a letter?”
“I have to go to Foggy Bottom this afternoon.”
“Then do it when you return. Please, Abigail. It would mean so much to me.”
“Very well. But only if you tell me what to say.”
Helena flung her petit point into the sewing basket and stood up. “Oh, how I wish I had your head for words and paragraphs! You’ll say exactly the right thing, I know you will, Abigail. You always do.” She gave her sister a fervent hug and hurried from the room.
Abigail sat alone, pondering her options. She didn’t really have any. There was only one person capable of sending a reply, and being discreet about it.
Unbidden, a memory of the previous night crept into her thoughts. It was something Jamie Calhoun had said to her.
Why do you think they call it falling in love? When you truly fall in love, you’ll know it. You will weep with the knowledge.
Abigail didn’t weep, but she felt like doing so. Perhaps that was what Mr. Calhoun had been trying to explain.
But how could he have known?
P
rofessor Michael Rowan’s face turned red with exertion as he held up his end of the steamer trunk. “What do you keep in here, Calhoun?” he grumbled. “Do you draft legislation on stone tablets?”
At the other end of the trunk, Jamie backed into his room, holding steady as Rowan half lowered and half dropped the trunk. Supporting it with his chest, Jamie set the thing end up and corner-walked it against the wall.
“Just the usual whatnot,” he said in response to his landlord’s question. “I was told to expect a long legislative session this fall, so I came prepared.” Unlatching the trunk at the top and side, he swung open the two halves. Immediately, a stack of books toppled onto his feet. “I had to pack my things in a hurry.”
“You’re a Southern gentleman, a Calhoun,” Rowan pointed out. Extracting a ripe apple from the pocket of his trousers, he took an enormous bite and spoke around the food. “Aren’t you supposed to have servants for this sort of thing?”
Jamie didn’t like the edge of censure in the professor’s voice. “Oh, of course,” he said. “But today I beat my darkies so hard they couldn’t work.”
Rowan finished chewing and sent him a sheepish grin. “I suppose you must get tired of being regarded as a lazy, overprivileged planter’s son with nothing better to do than sit on the porch drinking mint juleps and getting rich.”
“My friend, if I were a lazy, overprivileged planter’s son, why would I have come to the capital to room with a cranky, judgmental Northerner who wears his waistcoat inside out and thinks a Southern drawl signifies a lesser life-form?”
Rowan blinked, then glanced down at his waistcoat. Setting aside the apple core, he retrieved a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles from atop his head and inspected the seams. He switched the waistcoat, then dug into the pocket, pulling out a gold watch on a chain. “I’ve been looking all over for this,” he exclaimed with a short laugh. “Good God, can it really be after three o’clock? I haven’t even had lunch yet.”
Jamie didn’t bother to remind him about the apple.
Rowan put away the watch. “I do apologize, Calhoun.”
“Accepted.”
“Good. I really am a tolerant man,” Rowan said. “And I’ve a few foibles of my own.”
Jamie thought of the cluttered house, the unidentifiable inventions covering every floor and table, the kitchen pantry and icebox stuffed with experiments, the lavatory lined with beakers and glass tubing. He’d even discovered a plump white mouse living in a maze on the mantelpiece.
“I noticed,” he said.
“There’s the door,” Rowan said as the brass knocker banged. “I’ll just see who it is.” As he left, a laundry chit fell on the floor.
The chit was dated two years earlier. Jamie deposited it, along with the apple core, in the dustbin and wiped his hands on a towel. His own foibles included an insistence on neatness and order, but he would have to confine that preference to his own quarters and simply shut his eyes to the rest.
Hearing voices in the parlor below, he went to the foyer and looked down over the rail to see who the caller was. For a moment, he stood unnoticed, watching from the doorway. Abigail Cabot had come to call.
She wore the same plain brown frock she’d had on this morning, but her demeanor had been quite transformed. She’d been amusing, almost playful as she and her sister introduced him to Rowan, and when the letter arrived from Lieutenant Butler, she’d shone like the sun at high noon. Now she was a dark little bird, her gaze darting furtively as she murmured something to the professor. Jamie wondered what was amiss.
“Hello, Miss Abigail,” he said, putting on his best smile and walking down the stairs to greet her. “I was just getting settled.”
She glanced at him, her striking eyes full of woe. But she spoke cordially enough. “That’s good, Mr. Calhoun. I hope you’ll be very comfortable here.”
“Come help me unpack.”
“I’ll do no such—”
“Of course you will.” Ignoring propriety, he took her hand and drew her up the stairs to his chamber. She resisted, stumbling a little on the stair, but he simply slowed his pace and pulled her along. “Rowan was helping,” he explained, “but I have no confidence in his organizational skills.”
A wry smile touched her lips. “It didn’t take you long to notice that.” She stooped and picked up an armload of books, carrying them to the shelves that lined one wall. As she put them away, ordering them by topic and author, her movements became slow and thoughtful. “Plato’s
Republic,
” she said. “I haven’t seen a copy of that in years.”
“Most people I know have never seen it at all,” Jamie said.
“
The Manual of Epictetus, Measure for Measure,
St. Thomas Aquinas, Rousseau, Francis Bacon’s
Novum Organum…
” She shelved more books, rattling off the titles with a growing incredulity that Jamie found faintly insulting.
“Why do you seem so surprised?” he asked. “Is it so astonishing that a man from the Chesapeake low country can read?”
“Not that he can, but that he actually does,” she stated. “Please forgive my bluntness, but the fact is, the legislators I’ve met from plantation society have never troubled themselves to study the issues in much depth.”
“No?”
“They’re more interested in pushing legislation that enables them to carry on as though the South had never even lost the war.”
Jamie’s purpose for joining Congress couldn’t be more different, but he would have to be cautious about revealing it. “Tell me, does everyone in the capital share your view? Does your father?”
She resumed her work with increasing agitation. “If you must know, my father and I share little in the way of political views. I imagine you’re going to go after his support for the Chesapeake railroad corridor, aren’t you?”
He felt a cold dart of suspicion. “Why would you suppose that?”
“My father’s been a senator all my life. I’ve learned a thing or two about politics. The congressmen from the South are after improved and expanded railroads to create even more prosperity. And how convenient for the government to have to pay for it rather than the rail companies, the landowners and those who use the service.”
“Miss Cabot, I didn’t come here for my convenience.” Jamie went about his business, organizing papers and correspondence on the desk in the corner. Going into politics was a bad idea, he decided, but it was too late for regrets. Getting himself elected had been absurdly easy. He was a Calhoun, through no fault of his own, and there had been a Calhoun in Congress ever since the Constitution had been ratified. However, if his fellow legislators regarded him as the knowing Miss Cabot did, he would have a harder time than he anticipated.
“Then why did you come here?” she asked.
To atone, he thought. To fix something that can’t be fixed. Redemption was too much to hope for. He looked at Miss Cabot, who waited for an answer.
“To represent my district,” he said.
She brayed with laughter. “If your district is made up of wealthy white male landowners, I’ll believe that. Oh, the Koran,” she said, losing interest in the conversation as she paused to admire the morocco binding of the large tome. “Some of the most gifted astronomers in history come from Muslim people. And what’s this one?”
Jamie said nothing, but calmly watched her flip open the large, illustrated book. Her jaw dropped, and her cheeks bloomed with color. Just for a moment, true fascination flashed in her eyes, then she slammed the book shut and thrust it onto the shelf.
“That’s the
Kama Sutra
of Vatsayayana,” Jamie said, delighted by her reaction. “A Hindu text on the art of love from the third century.” He pulled the book from the shelf and flipped through the pages. What would it be like, he wondered, to show Abigail Cabot the delights depicted in the intricate woodcut illustrations? To press apart her thighs and stroke her, to watch those midnight eyes grow soft and misty with ecstasy?
Grinning at the fantasy, he replaced the book and selected another. “I also have
The Perfumed Garden,
a manual of Arab erotology. Would you like to borrow it, Miss Cabot?”
“You’re disgusting.”
“And you’re no scholar if you would dismiss a classic text—”
“I said you were disgusting, not the text.”
“Tell me,” he said, “are you always this charming to your neighbors?”
“I am charming to no one at all.” She shoved the volume into the shelf and resumed her work. “But I expect you’ve already noticed that about me.” She dropped a heavy book, letting out a yelp as it landed on her right foot.
Jamie hastened to pick it up. “Are you all right? Is your foot—”
“I’m fine.” She spoke with such venom that he paused to look at her. Color stained her cheeks, but she ducked her head.
Possessed by the urge to touch her, Jamie smoothed his hand down her arm. She was sturdy and wiry, yet oddly vulnerable as she lifted her face to his. “You shouldn’t be so familiar with me. It’s not proper.”
“I rarely concern myself with being proper.” Her lips, he noticed, were lovely when not pursed in disapproval.
She must have sensed the turn of his thoughts, for she stepped back, showing great interest in the book. “This is in the original Greek,” she observed in an obvious effort to deflect his attention from her.
“Is that what all those funny symbols mean?” Jamie feigned a baffled expression. “And here I thought it was an algebra text.”
The color in her face intensified. “I’ve been unforgivably disagreeable, haven’t I?”
“Disagreeable. But not unforgivably.”
“I deserve your scorn.”
“You deserve a spanking.” He laughed at the shock on her face. “And I would delight in administering the punishment,” he added. “However, you’re doing such a good job organizing my books that I’ll give you a reprieve. Carry on. And try if you can to refrain from making any further remarks about my poor benighted intellect.”
A yellowed card slipped from between the pages of Xenophon’s
On Horsemanship
and drifted to the tabletop. She picked it up and studied it. “A photograph,” she said. “Is it yours?”
He took it from her, feeling an immediate twist in his gut—a reluctance to open a private part of his life to this woman. “Actually, yes.”
“Who is it?” Leaning toward him, she studied the small image of amber shadows and pale light. The portrait showed a striking light-skinned Negro man of middle years, small of stature, his patrician African features composed into a calm expression. He wore the silk jacket and cap of a professional jockey, and between his slender hands, he held a winner’s cup.
“The best Thoroughbred jockey in the country. That picture was made at Saratoga Springs.” Filled with bittersweet pride, he propped the photograph on the shelf at eye level, then turned to her. “His name is—was—Noah Calhoun. He was my half brother.”
To her credit, she did not dive for her smelling salts, but regarded him with a clarity of understanding he found both surprising and gratifying. “I see. What happened to him, Mr. Calhoun?”
He wondered how much to tell her. That he had practically been raised by Noah, seventeen years his senior? That Noah had been more of a father to him than his own? That Noah was the reason Jamie had gone into public service?
Jamie and Noah had gone to the Middle East on an adventure, to see the world and acquire horses for Albion’s breeding program. Oh, how he wished he could turn back time, leave Noah safe with his wife, Patsy, at their farm on King’s Creek. But Jamie had insisted he come. What had happened to Noah on that ill-fated journey would haunt Jamie for the rest of his life.
“He died overseas,” he said, deciding not to elaborate. He didn’t want to share that painful episode, least of all with this strange little woman whose probing eyes seemed to see too much of him already.
“I’m terribly sorry. You must miss him.”
“I do.” To change the subject, he said, “On to more agreeable matters. What did your lieutenant have to say?”
Her face fell, and he realized the matter wasn’t agreeable at all. “He wishes to take up a correspondence.”
“But isn’t that what you—”
“With my sister.” She aligned the books on the shelf with obsessive precision. “As I told you last night, this comes as no surprise to me. But it’s troubling….”
“What is troubling about it?”
“She asked me to write the reply for her. My sister isn’t fond of writing.”
Ah. He saw the whole picture now. He understood why she was upset and distracted, maybe even faintly resentful of her sister. “I’d wager you excel at it.”
She shrugged. “It wouldn’t be the first time I wrote something in her stead.”
“You could always refuse to do it.”
“Yes, but—” She bit her lip.
“So why don’t you refuse?”
“I don’t want the lieutenant to get his feelings hurt. He’s a decent, sincere man.”
Jamie resisted the urge to snap at her, to tell her to quit idolizing a dolt who valued beauty over substance. He studied her for a few moments, wondering at the passion that shone in her midnight eyes, and summoned patience. No need to alienate a potential ally. “I suppose there’s nothing wrong with taking care of your sister’s correspondence. Just make sure you understand the risks.”
“What risks?”
“Bitterness and pain, to name a couple.” He smiled as he said it, but a peculiar authority rang in his voice.
“I know that.” Yet she looked a little rattled. “I understand the risks. I know you can’t force someone to love someone else. And believe me, Mr. Calhoun, I’m aware of my own limitations.”
Jamie resisted the urge to pat her on the shoulder. “Look, why don’t you go down to the study and work on it. I’ll finish up here.”
She stepped back. “All right. I promised Professor Rowan I’d do some computations for him as well.” She checked the perfectly aligned books one more time, her gaze lingering on the exotic
Kama Sutra
and
Perfumed Garden.
The color crept into her cheeks again.
Jamie couldn’t resist teasing her a little. He stroked a wicked finger over the agitated pulse in her throat. “Good lawmaking and good lovemaking are not incompatible, you know. In fact, one sometimes leads to the other.”