Fortune's Mistress (6 page)

“
Perhaps, but I am afraid I shall soon test her patience. Some years ago, I tasted an Indian dish called curry. I did not care for it at the time, for it is quite fiery you know, but I find myself unaccountably longing for it now.”

“
Another reason to celebrate Dr. Venables’s return, Mrs. Glencoe. I seem to recall he has traveled in the East—perhaps he will have an idea of how it is made.”

“
Ah! But is the gentleman to be trusted?” Marianne asked with mock incredulity. “We must not forget poor Rapunzel’s mother.”

Mrs. Waller looked at her blankly.

“Surely you remember the old tale,” Marianne said, a little chagrined at having spoken her odd thought aloud. “The queen, who was with child, found herself suffering a formidable hunger for rampion— which, as luck would have it, grew only in the garden of a neighboring witch. The bargain they struck is not one I would care for.”

“
Of course, the rash promise! I had forgot all about that story,” her new friend laughed. “But I hardly think the doctor will demand your firstborn child in exchange for a dish of curry. I cannot guarantee, however, he will not seek to enlist your help in one of his many charitable projects.”

“
What do you mean?”

In the distance just then, the unhurried
clop
and
whir
of a horse and curricle could be heard drawing near.

“
I believe that may be the doctor now,” Mrs. Waller announced. “I shall call to him—then you may see for yourself.”

Mrs. Waller approached the fence and, leaning over it, waved a hand. “Dr. Venables!” she cried. “Do stop a moment with us.”

As the curricle slowed to a halt, Marianne stepped back, feeling suddenly and unreasonably shy. It was foolish, she knew, but the notion of slipping silently and quickly away appealed to
her enormously. She had not felt thus when she first met the Reverend Waller and his wife, but the nature of that acquaintance could remain as distant as she liked. With a doctor it would necessarily be different. Regardless of the man himself, the inevitable relationship between patient and doctor was sure to encompass an uncomfortable combination of emotional distance and invasive physicality— very like those connections which had ruled her life these last years. Taking a deep breath, she made a deliberate effort to fold her hands calmly in front of her, and assume at least the appearance of composure.

“
Good morning, my dear Mrs. Waller!” the doctor’s voice came through the shrubbery. Marianne felt her pulse race as she recognized the voice. Her gentleman of the stone circle and the doctor were indeed one and the same. But how could that be? Vanished were the visions of the venerable, gray-bearded physician, but how might the gentleman who had flirted and spoken of fairies step into that rigid role? It did not seem possible.

“
You look very like a blossom, Mrs. Waller, peeking from among those blooms,” the doctor went on. “Be careful of those who would gather you up!”

“
And a very odd sort of blossom that must be,” Mrs. Waller replied with tart good humor. It seemed she was accustomed to his flirtatious manner. “Perhaps you ought take to spectacles before long. But come, you must make the acquaintance of our new neighbor, Mrs. Glencoe.”

Mrs. Waller turned and took Marianne by the hand, leading her to the gate, just as the doctor came through it. He surveyed her with sparkling eyes, and a smile flooded his face, hiding his scar in its creases.

“My pleasure, Mrs. Glencoe.”

Marianne nodded mutely as he took her hand in his and pressed it warmly. For a fleeting mo
ment, she had expected him to bow over it, but the gallant gentleman of yesterday had, it seemed, assumed country manners.

Though the doctor released her hand almost at once, his eyes caught hers in a clear, direct way and held them. Immediately, she felt as if she were being studied in these new surroundings, assessed, though she knew not quite how. Perhaps he was casting her in another light, as she was
him, in the face of reality.

“
I had already planned to call here today or tomorrow,” he said with a smile, “for I must look in on your Annie, but I am glad to be made known to you.”

She noticed he avoided saying he was glad to
“make her acquaintance,” for that would have denied their former meeting. Mrs. Waller would never know that they had previously encountered one another, and for some reason Marianne was glad of it.

“
So, you have been returned but a day and already the local gossips have been hard at work, doctor,” Mrs. Waller laughed. “London will not have prepared you for these parts, Mrs. Glencoe. I would not be surprised to learn Doctor Venables not only knew which of his patients is employed in your household, but has also heard a variety of appraisals of your own situation.”

Marianne looked at the doctor curiously.

“I am afraid Mrs. Waller has the right of it, Mrs. Glencoe,” he said, shaking his head ruefully. “Indeed, I had not been one half hour in my own parlor before three worthy ladies had called to advise me that I must look in on you before long. I hope you are not offended by their forwardness?”

“
Not at all,” Marianne was able to reply after a moment. “It is true, I am used to living a quiet sort of life, quite unremarked on by my neighbors— but I am sure it was very kind in them to show interest in a solitary widow.”

Something in the doctor
’s gaze forced Marianne to avert her eyes at the untruth of her statement. No one else had questioned her veracity— why should he? Oh, how she would like to remain unremarked upon the rest of her days! How odd if anyone should discern that these last weeks had been the happiest, most serene she had experienced in many years. However, the less said, she decided, the fewer suspicions raised.

“
And have you been well?” he asked, still studying her face.

Indeed she had been for the most part, but now that Marianne had used the excuse of ill health to avoid Mrs. Waller
’s invitations to attend services, she hardly felt she could say as much in the lady’s presence. Still, it would never do to tell such an untruth to the doctor, for who knew what odd remedies he would insist she imbibe?

“
Well enough,” she replied in tones she hoped, rather wryly,
Mrs. Waller would interpret as long-suffering. “It is good of you to concern yourself with Annie, when you are so recently returned, doctor. Perhaps you will call again when you are more at your leisure?”

The doctor glanced quickly in the direction of Mrs. Waller,
then smiled again at Marianne. “I must own my schedule is quite full today, and it will grow dark sooner than I would like.”

So, the gentleman
’s intuition was not to be faulted. How singular! “Thank you,” she murmured.

“
Tomorrow afternoon will do very well, however,” he continued, “if it will not interrupt your household schedule. Annie is a particular favorite of mine, and I have found something I think will alleviate some of the distress of her infirmity.”

It seemed odd that one of his
class should interest himself in a servant. She hoped indeed it was no more than professional concern, but her past had made her distrustful of the motives of all men. Bereft of a likely excuse, however, she could not but agree to his proposal, and breathed a sigh of relief as the conversation returned to other subjects. For the next several minutes, the doctor and Mrs. Waller engaged in a conversation of inconsequentials, for little of note appeared to have taken place since last these two met, and it was not long before Marianne was left once again with her friend.

“
It seems I have escaped my first encounter unscathed,” Marianne commented as they returned their steps toward the house. Mrs. Waller looked at her narrowly. “From your earlier warning, I had thought to be embroiled in a dozen worthy projects by now.”

“
Perhaps I exaggerated a little,” Mrs. Waller replied with a smile, “but did you not note the appraising eye with which he observed you? To be sure, he is already formulating questions to ask when he calls tomorrow, which will ascertain the best use of you in his charitable undertakings.”

Marianne raised her eyebrows.
“Are not such things more rightly your husband’s concern?” she asked.

Mrs. Waller sighed.
“Enos is a good man,” she said quietly, “but his interests are . . . intellectual. I am sorry he did not find a living which placed him close to a university. His mental powers, I am afraid, are frustrated here. There are few to appreciate his fine sermons; poor Enos had far rather delineate fine points about the nature of God than puzzle long over the nature of man in this world God made.”

From where they stood in the garden, they could see Reverend Waller bent over the book he had brought with him, oblivious to his sur
roundings.

“
Do not mistake me,” Mrs. Waller continued hastily. “I do not mean to criticize my husband. He is who he is, and I make amends where I can for his lack of interest in the village. I merely feel sorry his life fell thus. And for his people, too. They are not ...” She paused a moment. “They are not well suited, he and they.”

The nature of God and man.
The duties of each person toward his fellows. These were questions Marianne had pondered very little during her youth, and assiduously avoided in her adulthood. The one thing her darker musings had led her to believe, however, was that if there were in fact a God, he had no love for women, and little for any other creature. She sighed. Another thought she must keep to herself.

* * * *

Although weariness settled over her like a heavy cloak, Marianne found that when the night came, it brought her little sleep; when she did from time to time drift off, the events of the previous days wound themselves into a tangled skein of odd annoying dreams. She found herself entering a ballroom, dressed in her widow’s weeds; Reverend Waller sat at the pianoforte where he played a rambling tune with one hand, and held a dusty philosophical work in the other. Her parents were there too, somehow, sitting at the edge of the room in high-backed chairs; when their eyes met hers, they smiled at her and nodded impassively, as if she were merely another stranger. Perhaps, as such, they would accept her. She approached and dipped in a low curtsey, bowing her head before them.

“
Come, girl,” she heard her father say gruffly. “There is no call for this sort of formality from one who was never born!”

Turning s
adly away, she perused the dance floor. There she spotted her sister Olivia, twirled through the crowd by a masterful hand, her white gown swirling and fluttering like a blossom on the breeze. Marianne’s heart froze. Olivia was dancing with the Marquis de la Roche. She must stop them, save her sister. She pushed forward, and those gathered about began to laugh and whisper to one another. A woman’s voice drifted to her, “What a singular
creature!”

From the edges of the dream, Mrs. Waller hurried to her side, whispering,
“Really, Mrs. Glencoe, what on earth can you be thinking of? How can you go about wearing such a thing?”

But why not?
she wondered. Did no one remember she was in mourning? Then she looked down, only to discover she was wearing, not the black in which she had entered, but her maiden gown, white and silver, hanging in shreds over a thin chemise.

* * * *

Marianne sat up in bed and pressed her hands to her cheeks. Her old nurse had always held that in dreams lay hidden messages and portents. Did this dream prefigure the exposure she feared? Or did it merely reflect her uncertainties? Probably the latter, she felt sure, for she had taken great care to achieve and protect her facade.

She shook her head in
the darkness. Her sister would not give her away, she knew, and only the oddest twist of fate could bring about disclosure now. But what if she had overlooked some small thing, any clue which might betray her? No, she told herself sternly. She had been over every detail, time and time again.

She turned about restlessly in the tangled sheets. It was no good. Though sleep might come in fragments, it would not bring repose. Pulling back her bed curtains, she spied the first gray light of dawn outlining the windows. Arise, she thought, and greet the day betimes. Lying abed fretting would achieve nothing.

It was the doctor, her stranger in the circle, she decided, who had so unsettled her. The echo of the
ton
in Venables’s voice, his manner, both yesterday and in their previous meeting, must have unnerved her more than she imagined. In a single moment, the world she had tried to escape walked calmly into her little haven and fixed her with a speculative gaze.

It was not merely the doctor, however. She knew it had been a bad idea to open that trunk, that Pandora
’s box. A swarm of stinging memories were unleashed and still buzzed about her head. A foolish, foolish notion to think she could bear the past. She would have the trunk stored away in the attic after all.

Sighing heavily, she swung to an upright po
sition, but was forced to sit still a moment, clutching the edge of the bed, as the room spun about and her stomach lurched. It would pass in a moment, she knew, but muttered an oath nonetheless that she should once again have forgot to arise slowly. She sat quietly, counting to ten, waiting for the floor to solidify beneath her feet, for the rising ache of sickness to dissipate. Gone were her idle dreams of the previous week.