Page 81 of Confounding Oaths
Old aristocratic instincts flared, and Miss Anne huffed. “Captain James is a—”
“Is a man of low birth who rose through the ranks by his own merits and served heroically against Napoleon.” Miss Bickle clasped her hands to her bosom ever so slightly rapturously. “Were I not certain he favours gentlemen I would marry him myself at once.”
This framing forestalled many of Miss Anne’s misgivings about the captain, and by extension validated Miss Bickle’s warnings about the lieutenant. There was, after all, only room for one villain in a story. “So what should I …”
Once again I saw a war raging inside Miss Bickle between the part of her that was addicted to whimsy and the part of her that sincerely wished to advise a young girl well. “Be cordial,” she suggested, “and continue to accept his visitations unless your parents object. But—and I want to make this very, very clear—on no account elope with him.”
Miss Anne nodded. “I shall not.”
“Or go anywhere secluded with him,” added Miss Bickle. “Or accept any letters or tokens.”
Miss Anne nodded again with the conviction of the young and impressionable.
“Splendid.” Miss Bickle beamed her most changing-the-subject beam. “Now, what do you say we go fetch the others, and then Ibelieve Erica might share with us her latest updates toThe Unbelievably Secret Diaries of Georgiana Darcy.”
This notion appealed to Miss Anne very much. It appealed rather less to me. I have limited patience for mortal storymakers. So I took this opportunity to fade into the darkness and attend to other business.
Chapter Seventeen
The damnable thing, reader, aboutcollecting stories from your miserable species is that you have no inherent sense of pacing, timing, drama, or irony. Try as my kind might to educate you better, you persist in making decisions based on trivialities like “convenience” and “comfort” and “survival” instead. I despair of you, I truly do.
Thus the Caesars and their sometime allies moved to a space of waiting. It was, I assume, a strategically wise decision, but from my perspective it was inestimably tedious. Then again, perhaps I am selling the interlude short. One cannot, after all, tell a tale that hurtles pell-mell from incident to incident without wearing one’s reader to exhaustion.
So let us pause awhile and watch the Caesars as they spin on the threads of narrative and fate.
Mr. Caesar still spent much of his time at the Folly, although he (and, perhaps more pertinently, the captain) felt reasonably certain that he was there by election rather than evasion. A man cannot, however, change his entire nature after a single conversation, nomatter how handsome and dashing one’s interlocutor. Thus, he remained ever soslightlygiven to wallowing.
“Have I,” he asked; it was not the first time he asked it, “been aterriblebrother?”
“Probably,” Callaghan told him. “The way my sister tells it, most brothers are.”
Mr. Caesar gave him what he hoped was thefriendlykind of sour look. “I’m not sure that’s a comfort.”
“It should be”—this was Barryson—“we’re all in the same boat where sisters are concerned. Mine never forgave me for not going into the navy.”
“Extremely keen to meet sailors?” asked Mr. Caesar.
“‘You’re a Northman, Barry.’” Barryson’s voice was distant and a little rueful. “‘You belong on a ship. And magic is woman’s craft unless you’re fucking Odin, and you’re not fucking Odin.’ I swear sometimes I think she wants me to sail up the Seine and burn Paris myself.”
Not quite sure how to respond to that, Mr. Caesar gave a noncommittal nod. “It sounds like you have a complicated relationship.”
“Heather’s a complicated woman,” explained Callaghan. “A fine woman, but complicated.”
Still not entirely over himself, Mr. Caesar stared glumly into his drink and said nothing.
From across the bar, Kumar quietly closed his copy ofDe re publicaand looked up. “I suspect our friend is suffering from a classical education.”
“I probably am,” Mr. Caesar conceded, “but I’m not sure I see the pertinence here.”
“An English gentleman”—Kumar was leaning forwards now with an almost schoolroom air—“is taught to see himself in thestyle of the paterfamilias of old Rome. Everything in his household is his and reflects on his personal dignitas. Thus he must extend to each part of it his benevolent guidance, for the prosperity and honour of his least subordinate ishisprosperity and honour.”
Mr. Caesar was about to protest that he didn’t see things that way at all, but it would have been hollow. Never especially attentive to his studies, he would not have used quite so many Latin words as Kumar had, but the sentiment spoke to something deep in the part of Mr. Caesar that was indeed an English gentleman, all while drawing sharp reproof from the part that was not. “When you put it like that, it sounds rather selfish.”
“That’s certainly one way to look at it”—Kumar inclined his head the merest fraction in acknowledgement—“and I’d never call my father aselflessman. I might only say that there are … advantages and disadvantages to his attentions.”
Coming from a world where the space when the other man was speaking was the time to think about what you would say next, Mr. Caesar was not entirely sure how to ask Kumar what he meant without giving offence. Coming from a world where offence is an art form, I was delighted. I was somewhat less delighted when he settled on an artless but acceptable “Oh yes?”
“Few men are educated as we were,” Kumar explained, “and that has given me opportunities many lack. But when last I returned home I found Latin came to me more easily than Hindi or Bangla. You worry about being unable to do right byyoursisters, Mr. Caesar. I can barely speak to mine.” As he had been taught, he kept his upper lip resolutely stiff. “Still, neither I nor my father will let them starve. In that regard we are good Englishmen.”
