"Snow melted on the horses’ necks and tangled their manes with glistening icicles": Read Chapter 1 from "An Independent Heart"

Chapter 1

 

. . . Time calls me to relate 

My tedious travels and oft-varying fate.

Drayton, Idea

 

Snow melted on the horses’ necks and tangled their manes with glistening icicles. The roads were deserted. Waiting for Pepe to range up beside him, Justin reached out and put a gloved hand on his shoulder. “Not long now,” he said in Spanish.

His own weariness and uncertainty stared back at him from Pepe’s hollow eyes. Not long now. Eng­land felt as alien as the moon. Thinking of nursery tales, Justin began to laugh.

“Now what, Don Justín?” Most of Pepe’s face was hidden by the muffler he had wrapped around his neck, but Justin could tell he was grinning.

“English children are told the moon is made of cheese,” he explained.

 Pepe observed that the food situation had cer­tainly improved since landing, wherever they might be. “Although you did not order cheese for our dinner last night.”

“No, and since we had mutton, we must be in England.”

Snow turned to sleet when they reached the squalid outskirts of London. Fetlock-deep in slush, they pressed on to Downing Street to lodge the despatches Justin carried.

“And I thought Madrid was big. Or have you lost our way, Don Justín, and we’re going around in circles?”

“Don’t worry, Pepe, I happen to know this part of the moon rather well.”

He had explored these streets with Stephen, but Stephen was dead. It seemed monstrous that the geography of London should be unaffected, yet so it was. Riding on blindly, he had brought them to Hawksfield House.

Golden seams of light in the windows told him that Lord Hawksfield was entertaining. The public rooms were ablaze with candles behind drawn curtains. As he looked up at the house, one of the windows was fully illumined for a moment. Some-one must have lifted aside the curtain, dropping it again to shut out the light. A pale blot was visible behind the dark pane, a face, a ghostly figure – a young woman.

The world in which young women customarily wore light-coloured dresses still seemed a long way away. Yet in that world, young women did not customarily hide in window-seats, and this was the window of the library. Perhaps the card tables had been set up there, and she was recovering from her losses. Or Lord Hawksfield’s entertainment was not up to much, and she was looking for a book to while away the boredom. From what he remembered of his father’s entertainments, this was likely, although it did not explain her presence in the dark window.

“Is this your house, Don Justín?” Pepe asked in an awed voice. Justin shook his head and nudged his horse into a trot. That other world and its mys­teries would have to wait; he would try Matthew’s lodgings.

“Good evening, Porter. Is my cousin in?”

An uncertain recognition dawned in the porter’s eye. “Viscount Dallington is not at home to visi­tors,” he said slowly. “But I believe he would be at home to Captain Sumners,” he ended on an inter­roga­tive note.

“I’m glad to hear it. Would there be a room in the garrets for my batman?” Justin indicated Pepe, who stood holding the horses.

“Certainly, Captain.” More confident now, the porter added, “Do you go up, Captain, and if your servant is inclined to wait just a little, we will find someone to take your mounts to the livery stable and see the young man housed.”

“And fed, if you please.”

“Indeed, Captain. Clothed, too, if you permit.”

Justin grinned. “I only hope my cousin will do as much for me.” A few quick words in Spanish ex­plained the situation to Pepe. “You’ll be alright?”

“Of course, Don Justín. And you.” His eyes were grave but content, too. They embraced quickly.

The stairs were far too long. When he reached the landing, Justin did not knock but walked straight in, dropped his shako on a chair, crossed the sitting room, and pushed open the folding door to the bedchamber. He found his cousin seated at the dressing table, concentrating on the folds of his neckcloth. Dark-brown eyes very much resembling his own flew to his face; the pupils dilated for a moment, then the eyelids shuttered and a blasé expression overspread the heavy features.

“Good Lord, Justin, where have you sprung from,” Matthew drawled, returning his attention to his dress. “Now see what you’ve made me do.” He unwound the neckcloth and regarded the linen with a dissatisfied moue. “It’s enough to make one weep.”

The peevish tone did not deceive Justin. “Use it to wipe your eyes,” he recommended. “So you’re not at home, Turtle? Listen, my batman is being fed and housed by your porter, but I want dinner and a bed.”

“Dinner! I’m just going out to dinner,” Matthew observed. “How typical. Five years in Spain, seven months missing, and for your reappearance you choose the very day and hour that will most in-convenience me.” He raised his eyeglass and only now seemed to notice how wet Justin was. “You look terrible, and you’re soaked. You’ll catch your death, but then I thought you were dead already.” Although his voice was indifferent, Matthew’s eyes were unnaturally bright.

“I very nearly was,” Justin said gently. He came to Matthew’s side and slid a hand along his jaw, forcing him to meet his gaze. With a sudden move­ment, his cousin flung his arms around him and buried his face in the front of his jacket.

“Hey, Turtle,” Justin murmured, patting the broad back.

After some minutes, Matthew sat up on an in-drawn breath that sounded suspiciously like a sob. “I’ll thank you to remember that I’m not a horse,” he complained.

“Oh, I do. You don’t smell right.” Pulling him into the sitting room, Justin found the lacquer tray with decanters and glasses his cousin kept on the sideboard. “Here, have some brandy.” He poured two stiff tots. “Sorry to burst in on you like this. We should have gone to an inn. You can hand me to your valet, however, and go and meet your social duties.”

Matthew quaffed his drink and set down the glass. “Social duties be damned,” he said loftily. “No inn would admit you, either, looking like a tramp. It’s a good thing you didn’t try Hawksfield House.”

“Lord Hawksfield is entertaining; we passed by the house.”

“The dinner party I’m meant to attend.” With a twisted grin, Matthew added, “At least I’ll no longer have to listen to your father animadverting on your dilatoriness, now that you’re back. The possibility that you might have been killed doesn’t even occur to him. He puts it all down to filial disobedience.”

“Why is he so keen on having such a disobedient filius back, then?” The only reply to this flippant question was a quick, searching look, so he did not follow it up.

Besides, it all seemed very far away, indifferent, blurred, and shapeless behind curtains of snow – sleet – rain. The silk-hung walls of the familiar room receded, Matthew’s bulky figure faded; he was back on a storm-swept hillside, fighting the temp­tation to creep into the undergrowth and sleep. But he could afford to be weak now. Drawing his great­coat more closely around him, he sat down heavily on the leather-bound fender and leaned his head in his hands.

“Justin!” At Matthew’s horrified exclamation, he pulled himself together, looked up into his cousin’s pale, shocked face, and managed a smile. Perhaps it was not the time for weakness after all.

“Sorry. I shouldn’t have had that brandy on an empty stomach.”

“It shan’t remain empty much longer.” Shouting for his valet, Matthew issued a flood of instructions. “Now take off those rags,” he told Justin. “I’ll find you a towel.” He strode into his bedchamber.

In front of the fire, Justin let the wet greatcoat slide from his shoulders and stripped off his green-brown uniform jacket, vaguely inspecting the ar­rangement of knickknacks on the mantelshelf as he undid the buttons. Incongruous among the Dres­den shepherdesses was a sketch of his brother by his own hand. Stephen. He had done it just before embarking; the drawing caught the moment’s wild, effervescent mood. A scrap of printed paper was stuck in the frame. He looked more closely: it was a page from the London Gazette from June 9 to June 15, 1813, which listed among the missing of the general staff one Captain Justin Francis Sumners, 95th Foot.

There was a lump in his throat that had nothing to do with the cold and wet. He dropped his jacket on the floor, considered his shirt for a moment and drew it over his head. Sitting on the fender, he pulled off his boots, the heat warming his back. But in the warmth, his breeches had begun to exude a distinct smell of horse, so he took them off, too, as well as everything else, before he followed his cousin. “Have you some water in that jug? I need a wash. Clean linen, too.”

Matthew looked over his shoulder. “Good Lord, Justin,” he remarked on a subtly different note of consternation.

Justin had to laugh. “You already said that, Turtle, and that I look terrible, I thank you.” He peered into the jug and poured some water into the washbasin. “But at least I’ve got all my limbs, and you’ll notice that all scars are honourably in the front, except for the ones in the back.”

Silence; no laughter. While Justin contended with soap and water, the valet brought another jug, warm this time, and offered to pour its contents over his head. Justin leaned over the basin. “That’s good. Towel, Turtle!” The soft linen smelled fresh and clean. By the time he tossed it aside, a damp ball now, even his ears were glowing. He ran a hand over his chin. “Ought I to shave?”

“You’ll do for tonight.” Matthew cleared his throat. “You ought to put some clothes on, how-ever.” He met Justin’s quizzical look with an angry stare, but when Justin finally tucked in the ends of the borrowed shirt, his cousin picked up his own dressing gown, a voluminous affair of red brocade, and draped it tenderly around his shoulders.

“How splendid. Thank you, Turtle. It’s a shame we’re not of the same size as well as the same colouring.”

“What do you mean, the same colouring?” Matthew said repres­sively. “I declare you’re going white, and you four years my junior.”

On a surge of fondness, Justin replied, “Remem­ber how angry Stephen was when you teased him about his first white hairs?”

“Don’t I just. He dyed his in the end, did you know? Dyeing, Egypt, dyeing.” Matthew threw this out like a good thing at the club, but when Justin caught his eye his gaze fell. “I’m sorry. By God, I’ve missed you.”

“I’m glad you said that, or I might not have no­ticed.” Justin grinned up at his cousin.

Taking him by the neck, Matthew led him into the sitting room. “I hate you, Justin.”

“I’m glad you said that, or – ¡Anda la osa!”

Dishes had appeared on the table, silver and crystal sparkled in the warm glow of candles, and two filled goblets cast red pools of light onto the white damask hanging almost to the floor. The clothes Justin had dropped by the fire had vanished.

“Your batman is partaking of a light dinner in my quarters, Captain,” the valet was saying. “Ac­com­moda­tion for him is being prepared in the garrets, and your own wardrobe will be seen to, in course.”

“Come and eat,” Matthew interrupted. “Not that it’s anything but a paltry repast.”

“Serves me right for arriving unannounced and uninvited.” Justin grinned inwardly at his cousin’s idea of misery. Although he ate hungrily, he soon capitulated – the food was too rich, too plentiful – and began to speculate why Lord Hawksfield had wanted him back so urgently. “You say he wasn’t worried about me getting killed, and I well believe it, so it can’t be concern for the family’s perpetuity.”

Matthew spared him no attention, concentrating on a cold boiled knuckle of veal, so Justin amused himself by advancing several theories of his own, one more absurd than the other.

“But probably this is all rot and there’s no reason at all,” he concluded. “I’ll just have to trust in provi­dence, as the guerrilla do; or if the outcome is not happy, they call it el destino, fate.” He refilled his cousin’s glass. “Is anything the matter, Turtle?”

Matthew looked down his nose. “Well, you are talk­ing a lot of rot, and it’s a dashed bore.” He sipped his wine in silence while the covers were removed and a bowl of walnuts set before him.

Collecting his glass, Justin walked around the table, cuffed Matthew’s head in passing, and made himself comfortable on the fender. “Toss me some nuts, will you?”

Matthew handed him the bowl. “It’s not so much a question of perpetuity as of predominance. You’ll sell out, get married, and secure the family a highly favourable connexion; several, in fact. What you need to do first, however, is do something about your appearance. You need a valet and a new coat.”

It was a masterpiece of evasion. Lord Hawksfield could not have done better, although his failures to explain himself stemmed from his belief that no explanations were necessary: whatever he said or requested must be right. Justin cracked two nuts in his hands. To his own surprise, he found himself near laughter. Five years was a great distance. “Am I to marry several girls, then?”

His cousin had turned from the table and its bright candles towards the fire. In its flickering light, it was difficult to read his face, but there was an unexpected hilarity in his voice when he replied, “In a way.”

Justin handed Matthew the two perfect halves of a nut and threw the shells into the fire. “Perhaps you should marry one of them yourself.”

“I couldn’t do that,” Matthew said heavily.

Justin let the silence hang, wondering if his cousin meant to tell him more or was regretting that he had said this much. “I’m sorry, Turtle,” he said at last. He rose to perch on the edge of the table and put his hand on Matthew’s shoulder. “You haven’t grown out of it?”

“It doesn’t seem to work like that.” Matthew hunched his shoulder and laid his cheek against the back of Justin’s hand in what was surely an in­voluntary gesture. “I’m not the only fellow afflicted in that way.” Then he raised his head and added with a spurt of anger, “You needn’t look like that. Of course it’s all purely Platonic. No one knows but you. And you should know better than to keep fondling me, damn you!”

Justin did not argue. “I’ll keep my caresses for those who want them, then. It’s to be hoped the future Mrs Sumners does, ‘whoever she be, that not impossible she, that shall command my heart and me’.”

“I’ll thank you not to speak of her in that style.”

“No, I’ll raise my glass to her instead,” Justin said. “To Mrs Justin Sumners.”

They drank. “Damn you, Justin,” Matthew said after a while, “Why do I invariably tell you things that I’d rather keep to myself?”

 

~  ~  ~

 

Matthew’s shell was so easily cracked, if only you knew where to knock. Justin lay staring into the dying fire, sleepless despite his bone-deep fatigue, despite the softly cushioned sofa and his cousin’s comfortable snores penetrating through the folding doors. In time, he would know all there was to know, and without wounding Matthew.

Pepe woke immediately when Justin slipped into his room up in the attics, or perhaps he had not slept, either. “What’s wrong?” Pepe asked in Spanish.

“Nothing,” Justin replied in the same language. “Are you alright?”

“I’m warm, dry, full, and could be asleep if it weren’t for you,” Pepe claimed outrageously, then added with a lopsided smile that being safe took some getting used to. “I keep waking up, wondering where I am and worse, where you are, Don Justín. However,” he said when Justin punched him lightly in the arm, “I can see I need not worry.” Fingering the thick brocade swathed around Justin’s shoulders, he concluded, “A life of luxury awaits us.” He lay back on his folded arms and gazed starry-eyed into space. “A nobleman’s personal groom! I wish Mama and Uncle Chicho and Cousin Domingo could see me now.”

“Perhaps they can, Pepe.” Justin sat down on the edge of the bed and tucked his feet under Pepe’s blanket. After a moment he said, “I’m to be married.”

“Certainly you are, Don Justín.” Pepe beamed upon him. “It’s high time you were. You have ex­plained it to me. You are no longer a mere younger son. One day, you will be the head of your family. You are important now to your father.” Justin could not recall explaining matters quite in this way, but Pepe continued, “Do not worry. Your family will find you a suitable girl from a family with which an al­li­ance will benefit your family.” He nodded enthusiastically.

Justin nudged him with his bare toes. “That’s about it. It seems they’ve already found a girl.”

“You do not like an arranged marriage,” Pepe summed up his feelings for him. “Well, the family is more important than the feelings of its members.” He yawned cavernously. “Go to bed, Don Justín.”

As he climbed back under the still-warm covers, Justin thought of a bed warm and soft with a woman’s body, a bed he had shared; another bed, which he had not shared, rejecting the invitation of its owner although he loved her for her courage; a bit of straw on hard ground and his greatcoat and a woman who knew what she wanted and what she was about, a comrade in the day and a companion at night – a form of companionship Matthew might never know. He pummelled his pillow as though it were in some way responsible for his cousin’s predicament. It was hard to tell what was worse – apart from the dynastic difficulties it would eventu­ally cause – Matthew’s inability to feel passion for women, or his being condemned to live a life with­out passion.

A girl who agreed to an arranged marriage should know what she was about. A companion, a helpmate – the homely word made him smile.

 

A bed warm with a woman’s body . . . Federico Godoy Castro, La Toilette (detail), 1899. © Museo Nacional del Prado, www.museodelprado.es

 Enjoyed this? Want more? Read on in Chapter 2!

 Or why not browse around the blog entries relating to Chapter 1, and find out more about the historical background, or listen to the music collected in the Independent Heart soundtrack on YouTube?