A Matter of Principle (50 page)

“
Even so!” Davy lifted his glass in a toast. “To the candidate with the biggest balls!”

Nehemiah chimed in, “And the strongest—”

“
Thank you!” Nicolas interrupted. “Just remember me when you go to vote, eh?”



“
There you are!” Sydney exclaimed when Nicolas opened the apartment door. The low golden-orange sunlight slanting through the window signified the approaching sunset. “You cannot imagine what it has been like here!”

“
I might have an inkling,” he began.

“
I’ve been guarding the door,” Leif interrupted. “So many people want to talk to you!”

Nicolas glanced around the room. “Where is Vincent?”

“
I sent him to bring dinner.” Sydney crossed the drawing room and pushed the curtain aside. She looked outside. “I was not sure we should go out tonight.”

Nicolas shook his head. “No, that is exactly what we should do, Sydney.”

She spun to face him, eyes widened. “What?”

Nicolas strode toward her and grasped her hands. “Do you know that it took me nearly three hours to walk here from the newspaper? Men, and women, kept stopping me to tell me how much they liked what I said!”

“
Truly?” A smile spread over her countenance. “They liked it?”

“
More than I could have ever imagined,
min presang!
I have never felt this way!” Nicolas had the need to move. The apartment was far too constricting, and his body far too large. “Come with me, wife!”

Sydney grinned at his boyish demeanor and sat to put on her shoes. “Where are we going?”

“
To talk to my people!” Nicolas bellowed, laughing with arms thrown wide.

Her gray-green eyes twinkled. “They are
your
people now, are they?”

“
Might I come, too?” Leif asked.

“
Where are we going?” Vincent stood in the doorway holding a covered tray and a basket.

Nicolas inhaled the yeasty smell of fresh bread. He grabbed the basket by its handle, set it on the table and dug for the loaf. He pulled it out and broke it in half.

“
Does anyone else want some?” he asked before taking an enormous bite out of one piece. Leif reached for the other. Nicolas pawed through the victuals until he found a chunk of cheese. He unwrapped it and bit into it.

“
Ready?” he said through the food.

Sydney jumped to her feet and grabbed Nicolas’s wrists. She pulled the hand holding the cheese down to her mouth and took a large bite. She did the same with the bread.

“
Ready!” she answered. Her cheeks puffed out like a successful squirrel.

Nicolas began to laugh so hard, he had to sit down. The floor was the most efficient place to land. He rested there, red-faced and shaking, whooping and wiping tears on his sleeves. Leif rescued the bread and cheese before Nicolas dropped them. Vincent set the tray on the table. He surveyed Nicolas and Sydney’s hilarity and scratched his head.

“
What on earth transpired while I was gone?”



Nicolas walked through the gradually darkening streets of St. Louis, a modern-day Pied Piper. But instead of leading thirteenth-century rats, he led an ever-changing pack of nineteenth-century Missourians. They were attracted by his appearance and his words. After a long hour, an exhausted Sydney sat to wait on a bench. Vincent stayed with her, but Leif continued with Nicolas.

Over and over again the people asked about bits of his speech. Did he really do this? Was he really like that? For those who were not present in the square and only heard about it later, he repeated portions and explained his meaning.

Not everyone was impressed, however. Mutterings erupted around the edges of the crowd. Occasionally the gauntlet of an inquiry was thrown.

“
How’d yer wife kill that lady?”

“
The woman was already dead. My wife cut her open to save the child.”

“
She cast a spell? I heard she’s a witch!”

“
She is not a witch. She doesn’t know any spells.”

One man pushed his face in front of Nicolas’s. “So this is what a prince looks like, huh?”

“
No. This is what
I
look like,” Nicolas retorted.

“
I fought agin Fat George!” one elderly man shouted. “We don’t take kindly to royalists out here!”

“
My father fought against him as well!” Nicolas countered.

“
Aw, what does that prove?”

A refined voice called out, “Missouri is a slave state, sir. You are sensible of that, are you not?”

Nicolas turned in the voice’s direction. “I am keenly aware.”

“
Then why do I get the notion you’ll be wanting to change that if you are elected?” A well-dressed dandy cut through the crowd like the bow of one of Beckermann’s ships.

Nicolas recognized him. He worked for Beckermann. “The terms of statehood cannot be undone,” Nicolas said. “But there are decisions to make which might ease the plight of our dark brothers.”

The unexpected impact against the back of his scalp snapped his head forward. Something fell to his shoulder, and then the ground. Wetness dripped into his collar. Stunned, Nicolas reached for the spot and pulled damp fingers away. Brown pulp. He smelled the too-sweet rot of the overripe apple.

“
Careful who you claim as brother!” a voice snarled. “I am no black savage and neither are my kin!”

“
Nor I!” a woman yelled. “Stinking animals can’t even talk!”

Leif grabbed Nicolas’s elbow. “I think we should go.”

Nicolas edged sideways. He did not attempt to draw anyone else into conversation. Honesty, it appeared, was not always well received. The sun had fallen below the buildings a half hour earlier and the sky was fading. Lamp-lighters worked their way down the street adding yellow balls of luminescence to the colorless gray scene. One hand gripped him and spun him around.

“
Are you running away, Hansen?” the accoster sneered.

“
No. My beautiful wife awaits and we have supper plans.” Nicolas smiled and tipped his hat. “Good candlelighting, sir.”

Leif and Nicolas walked away from the crowd with long, even strides. One rotten apple smashed on the street beside him, but the second caught his shoulder. He did not look back.

May 18, 1822

St. Louis

Sydney stretched and squinted at the bedroom curtains. Morning light glowed soft pink around their heavy brocade edges. The sun was not yet up, but soon would be. Nicolas snored softly beside her. She curled on her side and pressed her back against him. Without waking, he rolled toward her and tucked his knees behind hers. His arm draped over her. He sighed deeply.

Nicolas’s speech was to be printed in this morning’s
St. Louis Enquirer
. Yester evening’s mixed response had caught them all off guard. Printed word seldom had the same impact as spoken word; would Nicolas be understood? Sydney wondered if Beckermann’s speech would be printed as well. It occurred to her that none of them stayed behind to hear what he had to say.

Today they would return home to Cheltenham. Sydney smiled, then. She could barely wait to see their children, sleep in their own bed, and eat Anne’s home-cooked food. She longed to put on her breeches, saddle Sessa, and ride through the wooded estate without caring about anything else. She would give the mare her head and let her run at her own pace. Sydney imagined the wind on her face. She felt the sun on her cheek.

Tomorrow, they would once again attend church as a family. Father Mueller’s down-to-earth homily would teach them about some Biblical edict, there would be singing, and perhaps communion. Sydney and Nicolas had not found a church in St. Louis where they felt comfortable attending only sporadically. So, as those things go, they had simply not attended at all, using Sunday mornings to recover from multiple Saturday night political soirees. Sydney sorely felt the lack; the rosary on the bedside table had felt her touch more often in these last three months than in the last three years, she reckoned.

And come Tuesday, Nicolas would cast his ballot, along with every male landowner in St. Louis county. By the end of May, the results would be published.

Try as she might, Sydney could not fall back to sleep. She was too excited. Easing herself away from Nicolas, she slid from the double bed. Silently, she began to pack.



Nicolas never expected to be the sort of man who was run out of town.

“
It’s not that bad!” Sydney chided, laying the newspaper flat on the table.

“
Well, there may not be any more rotten apples thrown. But once people read Beckermann’s comments, I’ll consider myself lucky if that’s the worst that transpires!” Nicolas sipped his strong, black coffee. His fork poked holes in a sodden stack of half-eaten pancakes, the island in a shallow pool of molasses.

Apparently, Winston Beckermann had authored an article for the
St. Louis Enquirer
which methodically attacked each point of Nicolas’s speech. For each rhetorical question Nicolas asked, Winston had a derisive answer. Beckermann’s article was printed right below the transcript of Nicolas’s speech.

Vincent looked stricken. “I suppose I should have anticipated this!” he moaned. “That Sam Stafford is a wily fox. I am so very sorry, Nicolas.”

“
I should have listened to the both of you,” Nicolas responded. “But I didn’t believe that Rodger would attempt to undermine me again. We seemed to have reached an agreement.”

“
Perhaps it wasn’t Rodger,” Sydney suggested. “Perhaps the editor—what was his name?”

“
Van Doren,” Nicolas grumbled.

“
Van Doren may have been the one to plan this. He might have even asked Beckermann to write the thing.” Sydney tilted her head. “Are he and Beckermann friends?”

“
Winston Beckermann has the entire city of St. Louis in his pocket, from what I hear,” Vincent commented.

“
Well there you are. And stirring up the pot this way will certainly sell more newspapers, will it not?” Sydney pressed.

“
Yes, I suppose it will. It’s the end of the week before the election, after all.” Nicolas felt he had swallowed a stone. A big hot one, that resided in his belly. “Nonetheless, this is rather devastating.”

Sydney rested her hand on his. “People will remember all the other things you said.”

“
I confess I don’t have much faith in that,
min presang
.” Nicolas shook his head. “After this, I fear all my campaigning will come to naught.”

“
It had better not!” Vincent stated. “We worked far too hard.”

“
When are we leaving?” Leif stumbled from his room rubbing his eyes.

“
When we have finished packing,” Sydney answered. “Do you require my help?”

Leif shook his head and slumped into a chair. He watched Nicolas mutilate the pancakes. “Are you planning to eat that?” he queried.

Nicolas shoved the plate toward the teen. “How much time do you expect it will take you, Sydney?”

“
I should be ready by noon, if not before.”

Nicolas nodded his approval. “We shall load the carriage, have dinner across the street, and then be on our way.”

Two hours later, Nicolas stood in the hallway, over-stuffed leather satchel in each hand and saddlebag over one shoulder, and frowned down the stairs.

“
Is something amiss?” Sydney paused in her packing. Folded bedsheets partially filled a small wood chest, and she was trying to fit a quilt in as well.

“
There is a mess of correspondence on the floor under the mail slot.”

Sydney peeked around the doorjamb. “Oh, my Lord!”

There were at least a hundred folded parchments of various sizes tumbled into a precarious mound on the floor of the entry. Nicolas descended the stairs and picked up a couple of the missives.

“
They are addressed to me.” He looked up at Sydney, surprised.

“
All of them?” She hurried down the stairs, grasping a handful when she reached him. As she flipped through them, Nicolas’s name was on every one. She looked up at her perplexed husband.

“
I’ll get something to put them in.” She rushed up the stairs, calling back over her shoulder, “We can read them on the way home!”

Nicolas set his bundles down and opened one letter.

Go back to the country where you belong. We don’t need no darky sympathizers making our laws.
It was not signed.

Nicolas pulled a heavy sigh. “At the least we’ll have tinder for the fire,” he muttered, and stuffed the paper into his pocket.

Chapter Thirty Eight

May 19, 1822

Cheltenham

Sydney was so very glad to be home; even if the bulk of Nicolas’s second evening was taken up with Rickard, Ashton Caldecott, John McGovern and Nathan Busby. The sheriff greeted her warmly and apologized red-faced for having to be the one to incarcerate her. Sydney graciously accepted his apology, and then Nicolas and his committee took up residence behind his closed study door.