Armand’s First Letter. Amelia’s First Letter. Cathy’s First Letter.
10 May 1024, Bois-de-Bas
Oh, Amelia,
I am so scattered I hardly know what I am writing. I have been writing you letters in my head every night as I fall asleep—for I have had no time to put pen to paper, for I am busier than ever. But am I so happy!
I am still in Bois-de-Bas, still living with Armand and Amelie. They have given me Annie and Margie’s bed, which is too good of them, while the girls sleep in Armand and Amelie’s room.
I spent the first day after I came here crying in my room, helping Amelie in her shop, and praying in the church (the latter rather to my surprise) wondering all the while whether His Napes would come to see me that evening. And wondering all the while how I could have been so blind.
Before I came to Bois-de-Bas I had known two men well: my father, taken from us too early, and my brother John. I had been acquainted with your Maximilian, and other young men of the town, of course. And with poor Bartholomew, whom I used so disastrously. But I did not know them, had spent but little time with them, had admired one or another of them, I admit, but none of it came to anything.
And then, after years of seclusion, I came to Armorica, and to Bois-de-Bas, and to the Two Sloops, and—to him.
We each did our work, our paths crossing and recrossing throughout the day, each crossing noted with a comment or just a smile. And then each evening we would pause at his desk, and share a wee dram and a bit of a chat about the day that grew and grew into quite a long chat about everything.
Almost everything.
I did not realize it until that moment in the hall, that overheard word, that your brother and I had become—friends. I had not know that a man and a woman could be friends. I had known that I did not want to leave the Sloops. I had not known precisely why. And then, in a moment, everything shifted.
And then, nothing would do but to get out.
I don’t know if I can make you understand. But I threw myself at Bartholomew, compromised myself—and him—by urging him to take me off to London. I did not, would not, marry him, not after my bid for magic was revealed as a cruel hoax; but that was not Bartholomew’s fault, for he was as taken in as I. And then I left him in a position where in honor he could do no other than marry me. It is little wonder he cursed me.
I could not throw myself at Jack. I could not. He may have me, for all of me, but I will have no one say that I compromised or entrapped him. I could not bear it.
Amelie was quite calm about the whole affair all that day.
“You make it tres difficile, but it is a thing of the most simple,” she said. “Let me tell you how Armand and I came to marry.”
Perhaps you have heard this story, Amelia, but here it is, in a nutshell: Amelie’s father was dying, and she needed a husband. Armand was here, and well liked, and needed a more fitting station than tending the goats for Marc Frontenac’s uncle. The ladies of Bois-de-Bas arranged to throw the two of them together, with her father’s agreement—and then for Armand to be stuck at the shop over night during a blizzard. After that they had to marry.
I didn’t understand all of the reasons for doing it this way; but somehow while being highly improper on the face of it it preserved all the village proprieties. And Armand walked into it eyes wide open, so Amelie tells me, for the two of them had discussed how it would happen beforehand. They were and are well-pleased with how it worked out.
I begin to think that His Napes and I have been similarly managed.
After supper on that long, confusing day I waited in the parlor, all alone, writing to you; and of course he came.
He gave me a broad smile as he entered the room, and waited for my gesture to sit across from me.
“Here am I, darlin’,” he said, “presumption, conceit, and all.”
I am afraid I blushed. “I may have said things I didn’t mean,” I said. “I was quite taken by surprise.”
“And now, darlin’?”
“Please don’t call me that. I—”
“My darlin’?”
And then I blushed even more deeply, which I would not have thought possible, and I looked away, though I could not help smiling, and then he came to sit next to me, and that is all I shall say about that.
He stayed with me for an hour, and before he left I asked him, “Why hadn’t you said anything?”
He grinned. “I’ve done a lot of hunting in my time,” he said, “some in Wickshire as a lad, and more for the pot as a soldier. A wounded animal makes a fair meal, but it’s pretty poor sport.”
I admit it, I was stung. “What, you regard me as sport?” I said, with no little heat.
“There’s my darlin’!” he said. “Thought I’d lost you for a bit. No, not sport, my darlin’, but maybe as a trophy. Any man would, any man with sense. Even your lieutenant.”
“Oh,” I said. A trophy? Me?
Then he grew serious.
“Cathy, when you first came to me you were very like a wounded creature. I soon came to value—but we can speak of that another time. But I know what being wounded is like,” he said, indicating his peg leg, “and I wanted to give you every chance to heal. I wanted to wait for you to find out what you wanted once you were whole.”
I will pass over the next few moments.
And then he rose to his feet. “I’ll see you at the Sloops tomorrow morning?” he asked, raising an eyebrow.
“I’ll see you here tomorrow evening?” I rejoined, raising mine.
“Oh, yes, that you will,” he said.
“Then so will you,” I said.
And so he did, and so I did, and so it has been all week: I rise in the morning, return to the inn for breakfast and the day’s work, and after supper I return to Armand and Amelie’s…and a little later so does he. For an hour.
He has not proposed, not yet, but he is leaving for Mont-Havre with Captain Grier in the morning. “Got a little business to attend to,” he said, with a wink.
Cathy
Next letter
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Zymurgia House 