Married to a Perfect Stranger (3 page)

Mary lowered her brush, sat back, and sighed. Apparently, she would never become inured to these disturbances. Who could? Yes, she no longer leaped to her feet and ran, heart pounding, to discover the emergency. But she couldn't help reacting when Alice the housemaid screamed. It could only be Alice; past forty, and she still delighted in shrieking at the least excuse. Setting her brush in a glass of water, Mary rose and went to see what it was this time.

She found her Great-Aunt Lavinia, Alice the housemaid, and Voss the aged butler in the morning room, looking down at a shattered vase, a scatter of pink roses, and a puddle of water. The once formidable Lavinia Fleming was wringing her hands and trembling. Humid August air wafted through the open French doors.

“Drat that boy!” said Voss.

Mary didn't question his attribution because…well, there simply was no question about the origin of the disturbance.

“Something must be done,” Voss added, clearly addressing Mary.

Mary looked back at him with wry resignation. When she'd first arrived, into this household that had lost its rudder and fallen into chaos, she'd hung back, of course. She was a guest, and anyway she hadn't known what to do. But then it had risen in her, like a great wave looming from the sea, an irresistible need to set things right. Perhaps it was an inheritance from her mother—not an entirely comfortable thought. But she found she could no more resist than she could alter the deep brown color of her eyes. The household had been like a workbasket jammed with snarled thread. She'd been forced, really, to discover her own way of untangling it. She'd been surprised at her daring and then amazed at how eagerly her intervention was welcomed.

“Ma'am?” said Voss, waiting for her to solve the household's most recent problem.

“I'll go and speak to him,” Mary said, and she walked into the hall toward the front door of the manor.

Outside, she scanned the parkland for her quarry. There was no sign of him on the lawn or in the front garden. Mary turned toward the stables, rounded a corner, and there he was.

Ten-year-old Arthur Windly squatted at the edge of the stable yard, searching for more round pebbles. Here was the one remaining source of mayhem in her great-aunt's household.

She walked over to Arthur, who pretended to ignore her. The son of Great-Aunt Lavinia's supremely competent estate manager, Arthur was a constant conundrum. Mr. Windly was vital to the workings of the manor and must not be offended. He was also a prickly, distant man, especially, Mary had been told, since his wife's death three years ago. Her attempts to speak with him about Arthur had confirmed this characterization. He'd treated her like a nuisance and a busybody, and she was certain he hadn't listened to a word she said. Using her own newly discovered skills, Mary came to understand that Arthur was desperate for his father's attention and that the boy would take a whipping if that was all the notice he could contrive.

Trailing from Arthur's pocket was a length of brown cord with a woven pouch in the center, the source of many recent disasters. The local vicar had taken it into his head to show his young parishioners the instrument that had vanquished Goliath. The man had a passion for practical demonstrations of biblical subjects and seemingly no notion of the havoc a slingshot could wreak in the hands of a mischievous little boy. Mary sometimes thought her great-aunt's entire neighborhood was barmy. She held out her hand. “You'll have to give me the sling, Arthur.”

The boy sprang to his feet and glared at her. “No, I don't.”

“That was our agreement—the last time.”

“I never agreed!” Arthur's lower lip jutted out; his hazel eyes narrowed. Rebellion showed in every line of his skinny little body.

Suppressing a sigh, Mary stood and thought. She could threaten to go to his father, and Arthur would dare her to do it, and they would repeat a cycle of punishment that accomplished nothing. Arthur wasn't a bad child. Still, he couldn't be allowed to break vases, or knock ripening apples from the trees, or crack glass windows on the upper stories. Providentially, a scrap of overheard conversation came back to her. “I understand the hayricks in the north field are infested with rats.”

“What?” Arthur frowned at the non sequitur.

“Still, I don't suppose you could kill a rat with that sling.”

Arthur stiffened in outrage. “'Course I could.”

“Really?” Mary strove to look merely interested. “Your father is desperate to be rid of them. Indeed, the idea of a whole colony of rats…” Her shudder did not require much acting. “But it must be much more difficult to hit a moving target than, oh, a vase or a window.”

“I could, though.” Speculation and hope passed visibly over the boy's triangular face. “I could do it!”

“I'm sure
everyone
would be very grateful,” Mary replied.

Without another word, Arthur rushed from the stable yard. Mary walked back to the house with some bounce in her step and cautious optimism in her heart.

Inside, all was quiet once more. Great-Aunt Lavinia dozed on a sofa, the strings of her lace cap fluttering with her breath. Mary returned to her painting to see what could be salvaged but found herself picking up her sketchbook instead. She wanted to capture the image of Arthur sifting through stones in the stable yard, with his intent expression and irrepressible cowlick.

She opened the drawing pad and came upon a portrait of John, done during their brief honeymoon journey to the shore. For a disorienting moment, memory wavered in Mary's mind. But that was ridiculous. Of course she remembered her own husband. Here he was. Medium height, wiry, with reddish brown hair, a broad brow, straight nose, and crystalline blue eyes. The direct gaze of those eyes had been one of the first things she noticed about him.

She stared at his image. He'd been away longer than all the time she'd known him. And with the great distances involved, they'd had only occasional dispatches to let them know he was alive and well. What would it be like when she saw him again? Mary's heart beat faster at the question. With anticipation, or worry? She felt nothing like the heedless girl who had married him. She didn't know what she felt like as she gazed at the man she was expected to live with for the rest of her life. The rest…that might be forty years, fifty, all resting on one unconsidered choice.

Pushing such unsettling thoughts aside, she turned to a blank page. At once, her fingers itched to draw. Under the golden afternoon light slanting through the open casement, her soft pencil moved over the paper as it so often did, as if it had a mind of its own.

She didn't know why she'd loved to draw since a teacher first put a pencil in her hand and explained some of the principles of art. She didn't know why she had a talent for capturing human figures, particularly faces. Her landscapes were wooden and characterless, her still lifes stiff and uninteresting, while people sprang to life on her pages. The process held a kind of magic that she was reluctant to probe.

Using her pencil and the tip of one finger, Mary shaded and sharpened, added detail, and clarified line. A sharp, foxy little boy emerged on the page, scrabbling for stones to fill his pouch, ready for any sort of mayhem. He looked as if he would leap up in the next moment and set off on yet another escapade.

When she felt finished, she surveyed the result. Arthur's likeness was accurate, the expression true to life. It was good.

Sadness jumped from the page. Although she'd been thinking of the Arthur who continually disrupted the smooth workings of the household, her pencil had found more in the angles and lines of him. The poignancy of the boy's life tightened her throat and stung her eyes. A kindred loneliness plucked at her. It was time—past time—for her real life to begin. But had she chosen the right life? Looking back at the…girl she'd been, she didn't feel as if she'd chosen at all.

Mary set the drawing of Arthur aside, along with the self-pity. Done was done. She'd made her vows. And right now there was plenty of work awaiting her, chiefly readying quarters for the housekeeper/companion she'd hired for her great-aunt. The woman was due to move in next week, and Mary wanted everything perfect for her arrival. Mrs. Finch had seemed the perfect solution to the problem of Great-Aunt Lavinia and all her household. She wanted her to feel warmly welcomed and pleased with her situation.

Alice came in with a letter, brought by courier, she said. Mary opened it quickly, fearing bad news, then caught her breath. “John's ship has landed at Spithead. He's home.”

John Bexley reined in his hired horse on a slight rise and gazed down at the redbrick manor, somnolent under the August sun. Eager as he was to get to London, he'd felt he must detour west into Somerset to fetch Mary. Her family's decision to put her under the care of a great-aunt while he was away just showed he was right to fear that such a shy, quiet girl couldn't arrange a journey on her own. And now that he was here, the sight of this place soothed him; it looked the very essence of English country comfort and peace.

John clapped his heels and rode down the hill. Dismounting, he tied his horse to a shrub near the front door of the house. He'd get someone to take the nag to the stables, and he had no significant luggage. Most of his belongings rested at the bottom of a foreign sea.

John's knock was answered by an aged butler. He gave his name, stepped in, and inhaled the familiar scents of beeswax polish and potpourri. The place reminded him of his own home farther north. Golden light pooled on the wooden floor and gleamed on the stair rail. In the rooms on either side of the entry, the furnishings were classic and inviting. Mary had certainly had a beautiful and serene spot in which to wait for him. “Mary's husband,” he added when it seemed as if the old man didn't know what to do with him. “I believe I am expected.”

“Yes, si—”

A filthy, hysterical chicken shot through the rear door of the dining parlor on his left, skidded in a turn around the table, and raced past him, neck extended, screeching, flapping its mottled wings. A little boy slathered with mud came racing after it, careened off the doorjamb, and staggered across the entryway, leaving streaks and globs of dirt in his wake. The old butler stiffened in horror.

The bird hopped across a flowered sofa in the front parlor, stitching it with muddy tracks, circled the delicate carpet, and looped back toward John. The boy in pursuit slipped, fell, jumped up, and turned to follow. He flapped muddy hands at the fowl in an inept attempt to trap it.

What seemed like a herd of adults jostled into the dining parlor, then surged forward. “Arthur!” snapped a young woman, her voice crackling with authority.

“It isn't my fault,” the boy shouted over the wild squawking. “I pulled her from the mire. Fox was after her. I never shot her or nothing.”

The chicken swerved away from his snatching fingers, bug-eyed and still screeching. The boy lunged, missed, and fell flat. “I was taking her back to the pen,” he said as he scrambled up and continued the chase. “She savaged me right by them ‘French' doors, the devil.” He exhibited a bleeding cheek. “Which shouldn't ought to be left open,” he finished, aggrieved.

As the crazed chicken surged past him, John bent, reached, and snatched hold of its legs. When he straightened, he held the muddy bird upside down, at arm's length, well away from his clothing. It flapped and protested; flakes of dirt dropped to the floor.

“Good!” said the managing female, striding from the dining room into the hall. “Take it from him, Alice, and put it outside at once.”

The middle-aged maid jumped to obey like a subaltern responding to a commanding general. The butler relaxed. The boy stood to attention. “It wasn't me, I swear,” he repeated. “I rescued 'er. I killed three rats as well. Would have been four, but I…”

“Very well, Arthur,” the woman replied. “Go now and get cleaned up.”

The boy finally noticed the mud sliding from his clothes to the polished floor. His face shifted from defensive to horrified, and he slunk out. In the same moment, John realized that the woman with a voice like a sergeant major was his meek little sparrow of a wife. Which could not be. This woman was older than Mary; she must be older. She was definitely taller. Wasn't she? Her face was set in stern lines rather like those he'd seen on…Mary's redoubtable mother. John blinked.

The maid tugged at John's hand. He relinquished the chicken.

“Outside,” commanded Mary.

The chicken lunged, its tiny yellow eyes crazed. John backed up a step as the servant bustled out the front door with the bird. John's unrecognizable wife turned with a wry smile and held out her hands. “Oh, John, what a poor welcome for you.”

Confused, John took her hands. He didn't know what to say. His gaze settled on Mary's mouth. It was still a lovely little mouth, shaped for kisses, not commands. Indeed, this new Mary had a compelling quality, a bewildering allure. But he had no memory of that militant glint in her deep brown eyes or that decisive set of her pert chin.

An old woman entered the parlor. Though beautifully dressed and coiffed, she looked lost, anxious, and vague around the eyes. Seeing John, she stopped short. “Oh…hello,” she said.

“Aunt Lavinia,” said Mary. “Here is John, my husband. I told you he was arriving today.”

“John.” She obviously did not remember. Then her blue eyes brightened. “Have you returned from India so soon?”

“China,” said Mary, as if correcting her elders was an established custom. “John, this is my great-aunt Lavinia Fleming.”

John dropped his wife's small hands. This was the wise elder guardian who had had charge of his wife all these months? He bowed. “Pleased to meet you, ma'am.”

“Has no one offered you any refreshment?” The old woman looked around as if food and drink might materialize out of the air.

“Only an outraged chicken,” said Mary, a laugh in her voice.

The old woman smiled as if she was quite accustomed to hearing incomprehensible phrases. John stared down at the girl he'd married, who'd shown no previous signs of a warped sense of humor.

“Come and sit down,” Mary added. She moved toward the sofa, noticed the line of muddy chicken tracks, and turned. “In the morning room, I think. Voss, have someone see to John's things.”

The old butler snapped to attention.

Half an hour later, John had a glass of Madeira, a plate of sandwiches, and the persistent feeling that he was conversing with a stranger. He hadn't felt this stiff and artless with his wife when they first met, let alone after their wedding vows. To make matters worse, they were interrupted every few minutes by servants with problems or questions about the household. They seemed to feel unable to make a move without consulting Mary. For her part, she rattled off instructions without hesitation, with no reference to her great-aunt, who had lost herself in a plate of cakes.

John's mind reeled. The Mary Fleming he remembered had deferred, quite prettily, to all his opinions and requests on their honeymoon trip. And during his preparations for the China mission, she'd bustled about helping him, doing whatever he asked. As far as he could recall, she hadn't offered a single suggestion. This woman—dominating the household, hostess, and staff—was not that girl. Not by any measure. She sat and spoke and reacted quite differently. The disorientation built in him until words had to escape. “What has happened to you?”

Mary pulled back in her chair. The husband she remembered did not bark at her like an enraged parent. He was polite, quiet, gentlemanly. This John's mouth was hard with authority; his blue eyes bored into her. The planes of his face were harsher. He seemed larger, stronger, taller, though it was hardly likely he'd grown several inches at the age of twenty-six. He was…disturbingly riveting. As far as she could remember, her newlywed husband had never compelled her attention so completely. It was hard to look away from him. What had his travels done to the John Bexley she'd married? “Happened to
me
?” she replied.

“You act as if this were
your
house,” he said. “Giving orders without any reference to…others' opinions.”

With a sidelong glance at Lavinia, Mary said, “My great-aunt is…afflicted…”

John's mind was teeming with recollections of being chivied through his courtship and marriage ceremony by two relentless mothers. He'd let it happen then, but never again! Not in his worst nightmares had he expected to be living with a woman like that. “Nobody likes an encroaching, managing female,” he said.

“Actually, quite a few people seem to.”

John was startled by her wrongheaded notion but even more at Mary's dry tone. She sounded…acerbic, argumentative, and as if she might be laughing at him underneath those alien attitudes. Her pretty chin had come up, and she was looking down her straight little nose with something very like disapproval.

“In fact, they seem only too happy to push their problems off onto someone else,” she added.

More than acerbic, she sounded quite critical. John couldn't believe it. “That's ridiculous. I can't conceive where you got such an idea.”

“From living in a household plagued with upsets like the one you just witnessed,” came the prompt reply.

She met his eyes squarely, no hint of apology in their depths. She seemed to have a comeback for anything he said. Where had she gotten this caustic tone of voice? From nowhere rose the sneering image of Fordyce, on the hunt for ways to discredit him. People said a tactless spouse was death to a diplomatic career. He had to get the old Mary back, at once. “Perhaps we might speak privately,” he said, standing.

“Indeed.” Mary rose as well. She had no wish to talk in front of Aunt Lavinia. Setting aside the rudeness of it, her aged relative had flashes of lucidity, when she suddenly understood far more than Mary realized.

John followed his wife upstairs to an untidy bedchamber. Accustomed to the enforced neatness of shipboard life, particularly once they were all crowded onto the
Lyra
, he found the disarray galling. The silk stocking flung over a chair back and the straw hat in the window seat might have been suggestive under other circumstances. Now they seemed of a piece with the general disruption of his universe. His sweet young wife had kept their quarters in good order. Hadn't she? He couldn't quite recall. He flicked a monitory finger at the litter of papers on the table near the window.

Mary stiffened, then relaxed when he didn't look into the pile of sketchbooks. She started to tell him that she'd been jerked from sleep by one of Alice's ear-piercing shrieks and that everyone had been too occupied since then to straighten the room.

“I hope it is understood that our home must be kept tidy.” He shouldn't have to say it. She should have the habit of neatness; indeed, the wife he'd left behind
had
had it. He was almost certain she had.

Mary didn't respond at once because she was struggling with a surge of anger. She didn't remember being this angry ever before in her life. She felt as if words might erupt from her, like lava spewing from a volcano. It was daunting. She didn't throw tantrums. She never had, not even as a small child. Now, it felt as if her eyes were shooting lances of flame.

John missed them. His attention had been snared by the bed in the corner. Its covers were just slightly rumpled; he could almost smell the lavender scenting the linen. With extraordinary vividness, he saw himself sweeping Mary up in his arms and thrusting her into those fragrant sheets, drowning her unacceptable pertness in kisses, watching the unsettling spark in her dark eyes melt in the throes of passion.

John was so startled by the power of this vision, and by how much it aroused him, that he took a step backward. But the move had no effect on his imagination or on the way his body was responding to the images it conjured. Bits of talk he'd heard on shipboard, in those long, long months at sea, urged him on. He would slip his hand beneath the hem of that pale muslin gown, let it slide up the silk of her leg, finding its way to what one shipmate had called “the key to the kingdom.” John's heart pounded with the thought; other bits of him throbbed in rhythm.

“Ma'am?” called someone from the hallway outside. “Mrs. Bexley, ma'am?”

Mary growled.

No. She couldn't have, John thought. His pretty little wife did not growl like a caged tiger. He would never have married a woman who made a sound like that, no matter how goaded by his family. His mind was playing tricks on him. He was losing his mind. “I'll see to my horse,” he muttered and turned away.

Mary nearly grabbed his sleeve and spun him around to stop him, set him straight. But before she could move, he was gone. She heard Alice give a startled yelp as he pounded down the stairs.

Mary started to follow, paused, and then paced the bounds of the room, her skirts swirling around her ankles, hands clenched at her sides. This was how her husband greeted her after all these months? This was the way he spoke to her? When she'd imagined their reunion, it had included a kiss, an embrace, some sign of affection at least, mention of missing her, an expression of gladness at being reunited. And what had she gotten? Nothing like that! Carping and insults from a man who knew nothing about the situation in this house. Mary pressed her hands to her cheeks. She'd worked so hard to be helpful here; she felt ready to burst at the injustice of John's criticisms.

She looked at the stocking draped over the chair back. She
would
have put it away if she'd had a single free moment today. Alice would have straightened the room if
she
hadn't had one of her fits of the vapors. Aunt Lavinia had been deeply distressed by Alice's weeping. And then came Arthur and the chicken. John simply had no idea.

Mary reached for the stocking…and somehow found herself sitting, sketchbook in hand, the pencil nearly poking through the paper with the vehemence of her strokes.

Quickly, a face emerged under her hand, the one that had gazed at her so steamily a few minutes ago. Mary drew like one possessed. In slashing lines, she shaped and shaded, added detail. The pencil lead broke. She had to scrabble through the pile on the table for another. When at last she felt finished, she threw down the sketchbook and stared at it. Heat flooded her cheeks, washed over her neck and chest, and pooled further down. Her body came to attention like a whole troop of grenadiers. She put a hand to her throat and felt her pulse beat there.