Chapter Five #2
“I did. I am willing to accept a straight mast as preparation for a straight letter.”
Declan murmured, “A ship needs a mast.”
“Then Lady Mary may draw one mast, provided she writes four words beneath it.”
“What words?” Mary asked.
“The ship sails west.”
Mary wrinkled her nose. “That is dull.”
“Then improve it after you have written it correctly.”
By midday, the ship had acquired three masts, a flag, and the words The ship sails west because east is stupid. Petalia accepted the sentence for its legibility and declined to debate the merits of the compass.
The schoolroom settled more easily than it had the day before.
Mary still tested boundaries, but with less certainty that they would collapse.
Declan answered three questions without being asked twice.
He also corrected the position of a creek on his island map with an earnestness so grave that Mary forgot to be jealous and called him insufferable.
“He is always insufferable about maps,” she said over luncheon.
“Maps must be correct,” Declan replied.
“People still get places when maps are wrong.”
“Not the right places.”
Petalia poured water into Mary’s cup. “There is a moral in that somewhere, but I am too hungry to extract it.”
Mary laughed before she could prevent herself. The sound surprised all three of them. She frowned immediately and applied herself to her bread with great severity.
In the afternoon, the tea was late.
Petalia might not have noticed if she had not been tired enough to want it. The hour came and passed. Mary asked twice whether Cook had forgotten them. Declan pretended not to care and looked at the door whenever footsteps approached in the corridor.
At last, a young maid Petalia had not seen before entered with a tray held too carefully in both hands.
“Begging your pardon, miss,” the girl said, setting it down. “Mrs Holroyd says I am to apologise. The tea is late on account of the errand boy losing his way between the cooper’s and the milliner’s, though how any boy born in the village can lose his way between those two is not for me to say.”
Petalia moved a stack of copybooks aside. “No apology is necessary. Was something needed from the village?”
The maid looked briefly uncertain. “Tea, miss. A different sort. His Grace said this morning that the household stock was unsuitable for some of the staff and that better was to be sent for. Mrs Holroyd said I was not to spill it, on account of it costing more than the usual.”
Mary looked instantly interested. “Papa ordered schoolroom tea?”
“Not schoolroom tea, my lady,” the maid said, then seemed to realise she had no idea what distinction she meant to make. “Only tea.”
Declan watched Petalia over the top of his book.
Petalia lifted the lid of the pot. The leaves within were not the dark leaves Mrs Holroyd had sent up the previous day. These were paler, finer, giving off a lighter fragrance that did not carry the same heavy bitterness.
“How curious,” she said.
Mary climbed onto her knees to see. “It looks like grass.”
“Many excellent things look doubtful before water is added.”
“May I have some?”
“A little, with milk.”
“Declan?”
He looked at the pot as if it were evidence in a case. “Yes, please.”
Petalia poured three cups. The colour was wrong for Bohea by every possible measure. She tasted hers and found it delicate, almost sweet after the tea of the night before.
Mary took a cautious sip. “It is not horrible.”
“Praise indeed,” Petalia replied.
Declan set his cup down. “This is different.”
“It is.”
“Papa changed it?”
The room became very still for a moment.
Petalia kept her expression composed. “So it appears.”
Mary’s eyes widened. “Papa changed your tea?”
“Someone was kind enough to notice it did not suit me.”
Mary looked delighted by the evasion. “Was it Papa?”
Petalia lifted her cup. “I am not acquainted with the full chain of command governing schoolroom tea.”
Declan did not accept that answer, but he did not challenge it. Mary looked delighted by the mystery and offended by being excluded from it.
“Papa does not change tea,” she said. “Papa does not notice tea.”
Petalia looked into her cup. “It appears His Grace notices more than he announces.”
“He notices when I break things,” Mary said.
“That may be because broken things announce themselves loudly.”
“Do you think he noticed my ship?”
The question was too quick and too quiet. Petalia understood then that Mary’s destruction was not always rage. Sometimes it was a bell rung in a house where the person she wanted did not come.
“I think,” Petalia said carefully, “that if you wish His Grace to notice your ship, it might help to show it to him before adding ink, tearing, or rebellion.”
Mary frowned. “I was not going to add rebellion.”
“Then you are already progressing.”
Declan lifted his cup again, his face half hidden behind it. “Robinson Crusoe had no tea.”
“No,” Petalia said. “But I suspect he would have made a very careful list of it if he had.”
Mary looked at the pot with sudden interest. “Then I shall have more.”
“You shall have more milk with a little tea in it. We are not provisioning an island before supper.”
The day ended more quietly than the previous one. When the children were taken upstairs, Mary paused at the door and looked back.
“Will the different tea come tomorrow?”
“I believe so.”
“Because Papa said?”
“Because someone ordered it.”
“Papa,” Mary said with stubborn satisfaction, as if she had solved a puzzle and meant to keep the answer.
After they had gone, Petalia remained at the table. The empty pot sat between the copybooks and the repaired map. The fire burnt low. Outside the windows, the garden had already disappeared into evening.
His Grace could be rude in person and considerate by proxy. It was an inconvenient combination.
Petalia turned the cup in her hands and allowed herself no further conclusion than that something had been said.