The Wager

The two girls slipped out, closely followed by Judith and her friend, who recognized a golden opportunity when they saw one.

“What are we going to do?” Nedra asked fretfully, looking longingly over her shoulder at the dark walls of the gallery.

“We are going to explore a little of Reading. I can see all the dank, dimly lit rooms I want to back at the academy,” Marianne replied.

“What if we are left behind?” the other girl asked.

Marianne, who did not consider the possibility as dire a one as did her friend, patted Nedra’s arm reassuringly. “You must not worry,” she said, though she offered no reason why not.

Reading was a town accustomed to serving travelers and students, the sort of people looking for inexpensive amusement and food, not necessarily in that order. The walkways teemed with cafés and little shops, selling everything from apples to zebra pelts, though those last, upon closer inspection, resembled nothing more exotic than painted cowhides. Marianne was fascinated by it all, and poor little Nedra trailed miserably behind her, sure that the next store proprietor they passed was going to point an accusatory finger at them and demand to know why they were separated from their group.

In fact, it was Nedra, with her nervous paranoia, who noticed the two men huddled over one of the tables placed on the sidewalk to tempt passersby in the warm summer weather. She drew closer to Marianne, who followed her friend’s suspicious gaze with an indulgent smile on her lips. The smile froze. Marianne stopped suddenly in her tracks and then pulled Nedra to one side, first around two or three other pedestrians and then into the open doorway of a bookstore.

“What is it?” Nedra cried in alarm.

Marianne hushed her and motioned toward the two men at the table. “It is my guardian,” she whispered. “It is both my guardians.”

And indeed it was Mr. Desmond, in consultation with her uncle Horace.

With wide eyes the girls watched the two men at the table. They were in earnest discussion, but owing to the distance, Marianne was unable to determine their mood. Both seemed serious, but if either was expressing more volatile emotions, she could not tell.

In a few moments, Mr. Desmond reached into his coat and withdrew a pocketbook. He opened the purse and extricated a sizeable stack of banknotes. Without counting them, he passed the notes across the table to Carstairs, who snatched them up and immediately began to lay them out on the table, doubtlessly in piles of different denominations.

“What are they talking about?” Nedra asked. “Why is he giving him money? What did he pay him for?”

Marianne shook her head silently, watching the two men with wide-eyed fascination. She was very troubled by what she was seeing. She had allowed herself to assume when she left the dark rooms where Uncle Horace lived that that was the last she would see of him, that their relationship was severed. She knew, of course, that he and Mr. Desmond were acquaintances, but she had not thought they had commerce with one another. She believed she was the only business they had transacted.

Now Mr. Desmond held up two fingers and nodded to one of the waiters just inside the door of the coffeehouse. In a few moments drinks were served to the men. Desmond picked up his glass, said something to Carstairs and emptied it in one gulp. Carstairs smiled thinly and sipped at his drink. He nodded and gathered up the money, placing it in the purse attached to a chain he kept in his pocket. Evidently he was satisfied with the amount Desmond had given him and allowed himself another sip of his drink.

Desmond pushed away from the table, but Carstairs did not offer to join him. The younger man turned from the table and walked away, headed toward the bookshop where the two girls huddled just inside the doorway.

With a gasp, Marianne hurriedly stepped back from the door, pulling Nedra to one side, looking behind her to find someplace they could hide if Mr. Desmond came into this shop.

But he did not even glance in their direction as he passed. Marianne kept Nedra hushed and still in the little store for several minutes, long enough so that the clerk approached and loudly asked if he might help them, in a tone of voice suggesting that if he could not, they should leave.

The girls quickly went to the door, but Marianne peeked out and carefully inspected the street and walkways before she ventured out. Mr. Desmond was nowhere in sight. Uncle Horace had also disappeared.

Now it was Nedra who hurried them back along the street toward the museum their schoolmates were visiting, located near the art gallery they had been in earlier. She kept murmuring, “Oh, please, let them still be there,” and “I promise never to do this again, Mrs. Avery.” She had not enjoyed their little adventure.

Marianne did not say anything, but she had not enjoyed herself, either. Half-formed suspicions were like cod-liver oil, easy to swallow but leaving an abominable aftertaste.

In the same city, but in the opposite direction, Mr. Peter Desmond was walking along briskly toward the stable where he had left his horse. His steps were easy; his shoulders seemed lighter. He had made his final payment to Mr. Horace Carstairs. Desmond had never realized before how much he truly detested the man. In recent years he had been required to court Carstairs’s favor owing to his occasionalfrequent, really—cash shortfalls.

He had cleared such loans with Carstairs before, but he had never before been aware of this sensation, like the lifting of a pall. Usually when he paid off a loan he was aware in the back of his mind that he would be getting more money from Carstairs in the future. Today was different. Desmond had not actually formed his decision into a decree or sacred pledge, he simply knew he would not again go to Carstairs for money. Not only because he did not like the man, but because he was not going to allow his bills and gambling debts to accumulate to the point where such a loan would be required. Already his finances were in better order as he gave up the trip to the Continent he always took at this time of the year.

But his determination not to deal with Carstairs again had even deeper roots. It had to do with Marianne and her former association with the man, and with Desmond’s desire to shield her completely from his influence. But now both of them were free of the moneylender’s tentacles, and Peter began to whistle a jaunty tune as he strode along.

Desmond was not a man of great introspection. He only knew it would be a cold day in hell when he crossed paths with Carstairs again.

There were reprimands when Marianne and Nedra caught up with their fellow students in the Reading museum. Judith and Sylvia had returned in good time, having dared only a brief walk up the street. Mrs. Avery had glared at them reproachfully, but the longer they were returned and Marianne and Nedra were away, the less reprehensible Judith’s and Sylvia’s actions seemed.

As soon as Marianne and Nedra arrived, the outing was summarily ended, the girls herded in the coaches and taken back to Farnham, without the promised stop for refreshments. The reprobates were confined exclusively to their rooms and their classes for a month, which actually was not as severe a punishment as Mrs. Avery meant it to be. It took the full month for the other girls at Farnham to forgive them for marring the expedition.

Marianne was deeply sorry she had insisted on the fateful adventure, not only because of the loss of her teachers’ and her schoolmates’ favor. She was frightened by the obviously close connection between Mr. Desmond and her uncle Horace.

Curiously, however, she found she actually missed Kingsbrook. She knew how beautiful the house and park were in the spring, and she imagined the glories of the fields during the summer months. And summer, it seemed, would never end. First there were the academy classes, then the trip to Reading, then banishment to her room, and still the summer sky unfurled its glorious blue overhead.

One day in September, it abruptly came to an end. The sky clouded over, the temperature dropped and the rain began to fall.

It did not stop raining until all the leaves had been beaten off the trees, all the birds driven from the sky, all the flowers left sagging and bent. The weather did not change until November, when the drizzling rain was replaced by flurries of snow. It was only then that the misadventures of summer were at last forgiven.

Mrs. River wrote to Marianne regularly. In almost every letter she urged her to come down to Kingsbrook for a day, a weekend, a fortnight. Marianne always replied to the letters, but refused the invitations, offering as an excuse her studies, which could not possibly be interrupted.

But time was inexorable. The days marched steadily onward. And in December, it seemed that every girl, and almost every instructor as well, was leaving the academy to spend the Christmas holiday with family and friends.

Mrs. River’s note of December third did not brook any excuse.

Rickers will be down to pick you up next weekend. Kingsbrook is lovely this time of year and we have all missed you. I even have a promise from Mr. Desmond himself that he will not be completely engaged in Reading or Londontown for the entire month, so if you are lucky you may get to see him.

We are anxious to have you here.

Fondly yours,

Mrs. River.

“If you are lucky.” Marianne’s hands started to shake when she read the line, but there was no way to avoid returning to Desmond’s home.

Chapter Five (#ulink_cc11572d-cb67-5af8-bfea-a4ada1462d3e)

Kingsbrook was beautiful.

There was a light dusting of snow across the grounds, but owing to the brook and the protection of the trees, even in the middle of winter the white flakes lay on green undergrowth.

Rickers stopped the carriage at the side entrance this time, where the drive drew closer to the house. Mrs. River, who had been waiting for their arrival, threw open the long French windows of the south sitting room, and even before Marianne entered she could hear the crackles of the fire and feel a soft brush of warmth against her cheek.

“Come in, come in! Well, let me have a look at you. Farnham seems to be agreeing with you, though perhaps not the academy food so much. Let me take your cloak and bonnet. Alice! Al—oh, there you are. Take Miss Trenton’s things. And ask Jenny if she has any of that broth still hot from lunch. Take those bags up the back stairs, Mr. Rickers. Come in. Come in.”

Marianne felt like the prodigal child returning as the housekeeper ushered her in and clucked over her, imperiously directing the disposal of her effects.

“Now let me get a good look at you,” the woman continued, turning Marianne toward the windows in order to catch the full light of the declining day. She shook her head reprovingly. “You only turned seventeen in November and suddenly you are a beautiful young woman. No, no, do not sit down there. Mr. Desmond said you were to wait for him in the library when you got here.”

Marianne was obviously wearied by the ride from Farnham, so Mrs. River did not think it unusual for her to be pale. Heedlessly, the housekeeper put her hand at the girl’s back and propelled her toward the sitting-room door.

“I trust you remember where the library is. Heaven knows you spent a good deal of time in there when you were here in the spring.”

Evidently Mrs. River was not intending to go to the library with her. This was to be a private interview.

“Is…is Mr. Desmond waiting to see me?” Marianne asked nervously.