Chapter 8
The storm had given her a brief reprieve from the cipher, but it was never far from Elise’s thoughts.
Misfortune could uproot trees, fling roof tiles far across gardens and tear gates from hinges, but it could not scatter fear.
Fear lodged in the bones as tenaciously as ivy clinging to ancient stone.
She moved through Belair House with a steadiness she did not feel, directing girls to tasks, reassuring Cook and soothing the nervous smaller children, but through it all her mind circled the same thought:
Someone was using Charles’s cipher, and someone was asking questions.
She must not speak carelessly around Mr. Leigh—not when Blake’s safety hung on silence, and not when her own knowledge could place her in the very danger Charles had sought to prevent.
Yet it was difficult to remain suspicious of a man who worked so hard, so quietly, and with such competence that half the school already adored him. Elise herself was not immune to the effect—not entirely.
More than once she caught herself watching him: sleeves rolled to the elbow, hair wind-tossed, back bent as he hauled away rubble or righted a fallen shutter.
When he straightened, she saw the controlled power of a man accustomed to command, yet here he performed the labours of a farmhand without complaint.
He was dangerous, she reminded herself firmly.
A man like that could lower defences without ever intending to, and yet…
he was astonishingly easy to talk to. Too easy, in fact.
His quiet manner invited conversation; his replies were thoughtful, sometimes dryly humorous, and always just warm enough to unsettle her.
She must mind her tongue. She must not let him draw her into candour.
She must not—must not—allow herself to feel the faint pull she experienced whenever his eyes met hers.
Charles had been gone for some time now, and the emotions were eliciting a strange sensation within.
It would come to nothing, of course, but it was the first time she had even had such a thought.
With a determined breath, Elise took up a tray of broth and bread rolls Cook had prepared and climbed the stairs to call upon the Admiral.
She knocked softly on the guest-room door.
“Enter!”
He sounded more robust than she had expected. She pushed the door open.
The Admiral sat propped against pillows, wrapped in blankets like a venerable sea captain enthroned upon the quarter-deck.
His white brows furrowed as he examined the bandage around his wrist, and Mrs. Grealey hovered at the bedside with the expression of a general defending her post, and she ran to take the tray from Elise.
“Mrs. Larkin!” he boomed when he saw her. “Ah, my dear! We are survivors of a naval calamity—Leigh and I weathered the night like two mariners lashed to the mast!”
“I can quite believe it,” Elise murmured. “How do you feel, sir?”
“Older,” he said frankly. Then, with an approving glance at his surroundings, “And vastly comfortable. Your school is a fine ship, ma’am—solid walls, warm fires, well-trained crew. I am half-tempted to move in permanently.”
Mrs. Grealey sniffed. “Do not speak nonsense, sir. You will go home as soon as the roof is mended.”
This brought the Admiral’s worry to the fore. Elise saw it flicker across his face even before he spoke.
“My house,” he murmured. “My poor cottage. It has stood since Queen Elizabeth reigned, and that great wretched oak cut it near in half.”
Elise sat beside him, adopting the gentle manner one used with the very young and very old. “It will be mended, sir. The roof can be rebuilt and walls repaired. Your home is not lost.”
He shook his head. “Brick and timber, yes, but the memories—Charles spent a fortnight there before joining the Neptune. Your husband was like a son to me.”
The mention of Charles hit her like a soft blow: warm, painful, tender.
“I know he admired you greatly, sir,” Elise said.
The Admiral’s eyes softened. “A fine man. The Navy lost more than a sailor when it lost him.”
The truth of that made Elise’s throat thicken.
She set out the bowl of broth and helped him to take a cautious sip.
“It will take time to repair your cottage,” she said, “but you may stay here as long as you like. The girls adore having you. They are already arguing as to who shall read aloud to you this afternoon.”
He perked visibly. “Aha! I shall enjoy being fought over.”
Mrs. Grealey humphed. “You always did.”
Elise smiled. “Rest now before supper. Afterward, we shall gather in the drawing room. Mr. Leigh has promised the girls a story.”
The Admiral brightened immediately. “Ah, yes! The man tells a surprisingly good tale.”
Elise inclined her head politely, though privately she resented how readily her pulse quickened at the name Leigh. She had invited him into the drawing room out of courtesy—and necessity—and yet some part of her… anticipated the gathering.
She rose. “I shall leave you to your rest.”
The Admiral caught her hand briefly. “My dear, you run this place with the precision of an admiral yourself. Charles would be proud.”
The words both warmed and wounded her.
She managed a smile. “Thank you, sir,” she said, quickly leaving before her composure faltered.
The lamps were lit, casting warm golden light over the familiar room.
The girls, a dozen of them, piled onto stools, cushions, footstools—wherever they might perch without appearing impolite.
The storm had shaken their nerves badly, and Elise thought they would enjoy an evening of calm entertainment.
Mr. Leigh stood near the hearth, speaking quietly to Jane. He looked surprisingly at home: his coat freshly brushed, his hair tamed but still bearing that unruly curl at the temple, his manner respectful but relaxed.
Elise’s stomach dipped without permission. Ridiculous. She crossed the room. “Mr. Leigh, thank you again for all your toil today.”
He bowed slightly. “I have merely done what I could, ma’am.”
She raised a brow. “Such modesty, sir—I fear the girls will hear none of it.”
At this, several of the girls giggled, and one whispered (far too loudly), “He lifted a whole barrel by himself!”
Mr. Leigh coloured faintly, clearing his throat. “It was not full,” he murmured.
Elise hid a smile. “Regardless of that, the assistance was appreciated.”
He met her gaze. She looked away quickly, irritated by the heat in her cheeks.
A soft shuffle sounded in the hall, followed by a firm, familiar tap-tap of a cane.
The Admiral appeared in the doorway, descending under his own power with grim determination.
Mrs. Grealey hovered a pace behind, ready to intervene.
“You see?” the Admiral declared, as if the sight of him upright were a public lesson.
“A little storm cannot keep a man of the Service in bed.”
Elise rose at once. “Sir—you ought to have taken your supper tray.”
“I did,” he said promptly, as if to forestall Mrs. Grealey’s inevitable reprimand. “I ate every morsel. And now I require company. One cannot convalesce in solitude.”
Mrs. Grealey muttered something about stubborn old sea-captains and the folly of stairs, but the Admiral only waved her down and took the largest chair with the air of a monarch reclaiming his throne.
Jane nominated Mr. Leigh, and the girls seconded it with dangerous enthusiasm.
Thus caught, the poor man had no choice.
He began, however, not with a schoolboy prank, but with a stiller sort of tale, and the room altered at once.
“There is a peculiar thing,” Mr. Leigh said, his voice lower than before, “that happens among men who have been obliged to trust one another without question.” He did not look at Elise when he spoke—perhaps he knew he ought not—but his words seemed to settle on her all the same.
“In London, men measure one another by name and consequence. In the field, those distinctions dissolve. You are reduced to what you can do, and whether you will do it when it costs you.” The girls had gone quiet.
Even Lydia, who could usually find humour in anything, stared with round eyes.
“I once saw a man,” he continued, “give away his last dry shirt to a stranger, because the stranger shook with fever and the night promised to be bitter. It was not charity as the sermons describe it. It was simply… fellowship. A recognition that tomorrow might require the same of you.”
The Admiral made a small sound of agreement, not quite a cough, not quite a sigh; his gaze, suddenly distant, seemed fixed on some horizon only he could see.
“It is an odd thing,” Mr. Leigh went on, “to return from such places and be expected to be amused by drawing-room trifles. One feels—” He paused, as if searching for a word he did not wish to confess to a room of girls.
“One feels out of joint with the world.” Elise felt something in her chest tighten.
Out of joint. Yes. That was precisely it.
She had thought the sensation peculiar to widows and to those who lived with ghosts.
Yet here was a man who spoke of it as if it were a common injury.
He let the gravity hang only a moment longer, and then, as if he regretted having allowed himself any earnestness at all, his mouth twitched.
“Which is why,” he said, “it is a mercy that Providence provides compensations—such as foolish boys at school who believe themselves invincible.” The girls released their breath in a collective rustle, and laughter—tentative at first—returned to the room as he shifted into the promised tale of a clock tower, a forbidden rope, and a dog whose loyalties were entirely mercenary.
When he described the moment the rope snapped and he tumbled into a duck pond with the offended bird pursuing him like an avenging spirit, Harriet laughed outright, Lydia shrieked with delight, and Clara pressed her hands to her mouth as if laughter might compromise her dignity.