Chapter 22
During the two months that followed their prolonged visit with Lord and Lady Halverton, the earth softened and greened.
As the air warmed, a contrary coolness settled between Peter and Margaret.
In the evenings, he joined her household for supper.
Those affable, happy meals surrounded by others dispelled the disquiet hanging between them to a degree.
Half the day, Peter experimented in the dyehouse, which meant Margaret shouldered his responsibilities.
Unfair to Margaret and his other apprentices, the habit must break; but he was afraid of spending time with her, afraid he would reveal his secret, afraid he would not.
Forgetting the reasons he did not tell her he was her valentine, he avoided her.
He could not forget the rightness of her body against his, the way she had pulled him to her, seeming to want him as much as he desired her.
That response to his kiss—proof she returned his feelings—should have propelled him into confession.
He decided nearly every day to admit the truth, but when her eyes met his, he lost his nerve.
And he’d lied. When faced with her direct question, he’d laughed and deflected, and then he’d gone and bloody kissed her. He had hidden behind the impropriety of the arrangement as though propriety governed his feelings for her.
The falsehood sat like a bone in his throat.
He had chosen cowardice over truth, not because the lie protected her but to protect himself from the risk of her rejection, from the awkwardness of a master confessing to his apprentice, from the terrifying possibility that she might look at him differently.
His father would have told her. His father, who broke with his family and his guild for the woman he loved, would have taken both her hands and said the simple, devastating thing. Peter had inherited the old man’s trade but not his courage.
With these troubling thoughts, he entered his kitchen after a day’s work and found a valentine had been slid beneath the door.
Their correspondence came in starts and fits, at times three times per week and at others a full week passing with nothing.
In this case, it had been nearly ten days since she’d written.
Dear Valentine,
My house is full of women, a novelty for me. I predicted that I would not like the company, but I do. The chatter and gossip from the two women under my roof amuse me and prove I did not know I was lonely.
Did you see the sunset yesterday? If I could paint as well as you, I would have captured it.
To answer your questions: I like sweets but rarely. I prefer cats to dogs because they are useful where mice are concerned. My favorite color is purple—is that garish? I cover my hair because it is a nuisance.
I have questions of my own: What is your name?
Or at least the first letter of your surname.
How old are you? Why do you keep yourself a secret?
Are you married or betrothed? Are you a beast?
Pardon the question, for I recently finished Madame Barbot de Villeneuve’s Beauty and the Beast. Are you a gentleman or do you have a trade?
Farmer? Poet? Artist? Butcher? Baker? Candlestick maker?
The mystery of you has intrigued me so that I fear I may be making more of your letters and gifts than you intend. Knowing who you are would set things on equal footing and ensure I lend proper weight to our interactions.
Yours, etc.,
Margaret Cooper
Peter took up his pen.
Dear Margaret,
I am young, but not so young as you. Though I am neither married nor betrothed, I cannot risk telling you my name or any letters contained therein.
I safeguard my identity because I must, but I hope to inform you in time.
I try not to be a beast, but I am not a gentleman.
I know that does little to help you discover who I am, but anonymity is best for us both.
I did see the sunset, far more beautiful than I could capture, but I will try.
Dare I confess my friendly feelings are expanding? You may assume more significance than I have betrayed.
Your Valentine
He considered throwing away the note. The final lines, written with a trembling hand, assumed more confidence than he felt.
Instead, secure in anonymity, he withdrew watercolors and fixed the bottom of the page with a dark silhouette of Stroud bathed in gold, peach, coral, and red, reminiscent of the way the light caught in her hair.
He wished to sit beside her, teach her dressmaking, watch her measure, cut, and stitch.
More than that, he wanted to state his feelings, allude to their kiss.
He set aside the letter to dry, unable to keep from laughing at himself. He was smitten, wasn’t he? At least he could admit that to himself, if not to her.
Peter watched from the shop window for Miss Cooper to emerge from her home. It was Saturday—she would not stay indoors forever.
Finally she stepped into the street. Already dressed, he dashed out his front door.
“Good morning, Mr. Sloan.”
“Good morning. It’s a beautiful day for a walk. Mind if I join?”
She adjusted a piece of linen over the contents of a basket on her arm. This was not the first time she’d been suspicious over the insides of a basket. Her eyes held the same wariness they’d displayed on that early morning so many months before.
“Of course not.” But her smile was stiff.
“Allow me to carry that.” He reached for the basket, but she pulled it from his reach.
“I can manage.”
The comings and goings of her household lay on open display from Sloan Tailoring.
Often, women came in and out bearing packages, the sight causing a worming unease through his chest. He wanted to trust her.
The idea that she might hide something from him was more painful than allowing the moment to pass.
“Where are you going?” she asked, pushing aside his lingering doubt.
“The sun drew me out. I have nowhere to be.”
“You tore yourself from the dyehouse. Well done.” They fell into step.
“You disapprove of my endeavor?”
“Not at all. Your expertise is most valuable in design and early fittings. Any one of your apprentices can stitch. In the London tailor shops, the tailor spends most of his time managing clients and supervising apprentices. You might give the apprentices more responsibility and make even more time for your dyehouse.” Her smile glowed into his chest. “It is none of my concern.”
“Isn’t it? You’ve infiltrated every corner.”
“Only the dusty ones.”
They shared a glance, for a moment at ease. Silence fell between them for the space of a few minutes.
“I have a confession.” Something in her tone spoke a warning. “I have made a thorough study of your books, spanning several years. Your business is not dying, but…”
“It requires more of my attention.”
“The numbers showed me when your father fell ill.”
“And you are telling me to spend more time in the dyehouse?” He laughed, trying to make a joke of it.
“Perhaps not right away, but with good management, eventually you might create chintz and sustain Sloan Tailoring.”
“Painting fabric is compelling.” The idea almost sounded plausible to him when she described it.
Perhaps he would think on it later in private, but for now a change of subject was in order.
“Lucius brought me more cotton yesterday. He said the guild hounds him endlessly, but they can do nothing as wool weavers.”
“Are you trying to tell me he’s my valentine? I received another letter yesterday. Perhaps he delivered it when he visited you.”
Peter laughed because she spoke in her old, familiar way.
“He refuses to give me any hint of his identity. I know that he is in trade, close to my age, and unattached, but too many fit that description.”
A wistful smile played over her lips and drove him mad. Was it possible to be jealous of himself? He must bide his time. When her apprenticeship ended, he decided, her valentine would gift her chintz, and she would know.
“He painted a sunset,” she continued, “at the bottom of the page.”
“Well?”
She met his look. “It is from our street, a silhouette of town as seen from outside our doors.”
A hot panic seized Peter’s heart. “And what does that tell you? Other than the fact that he knows where you live.”
“True, but he must be familiar with the area. He could work on this street or have reason to visit often.”
“Does that narrow it down for you?”
“Declaring it aloud feels a step too far.”
“But you have your suspicions?”
“I know you do.” Her eyes sharpened their focus on his face.
It almost felt as if she knew and was attempting to extract the truth.
He could tell her, confess his feelings, be done with the charade.
Take her into his arms, press his lips to hers.
How simple, how easy to open his mouth and say, “I am your valentine.” His heart began beating in his throat, confining the words to his chest. His mouth grew dry, but he opened it—
“I have calls to make and must leave you here. Good day, Mr. Sloan.”
He watched her knock on a cottage door and disappear inside. The moment suspended, his body feeling the cool absence of her before he registered what had happened. His mouth was open, ready with a confession. Like a soldier readied for a battle that never came, he stood motionless.
“Ah,” he groaned aloud, spinning away. He had wasted a moment he could not retrieve.
This error was entirely his own, wholly preventable, and entirely a matter of nerve.
He kicked a rock down the street and watched it tumble between the uneven cobblestones.
How his father would chide him, and how Peter wished that man still could.
He wandered home and sat at his desk, staring at the wall, repeating Miss Margaret’s playful, inviting conversation, his own stupidity clarifying with each reprise. His attention fell on the account books. He may as well take Margaret’s advice and look into them.
Aware that the surge of payments dwindled, he began searching for the cause. Peter thumbed through the ledger, finding Margaret’s handwriting all over it. Few outstanding payments remained.
He turned to the newest page where orders were listed beside calculated payments.
They fell short of the usual monthly income.
He ticked through the work: jackets, suits, breeches, waistcoats, stays, and two gowns.
There lay the discrepancy. In a normal month, he averaged over a dozen gowns, as women traveled from every corner of Gloucestershire to see him.
He glanced up from the page at Margaret’s front door, where two women happened to exit, large packages in hand, parcels that fairly resembled carefully bundled gowns. He watched Miss Matilde smile and flutter around them.
What was Miss Cooper about?
He had entertained the possibility that she would take most of his female clientele once she opened her shop, but his pride told him he was too talented for that. Were the women in Gloucestershire waiting for Margaret to complete her apprenticeship? Or was there something else afoot?
The woman who wrote valentine letters with such tenderness would not strategize to overthrow him.
He knew her, saw the depth of her, the tenderness beneath the protective shell she’d fashioned in the wake of old wounds.
That woman would not betray him. Outside the valentine exchange, they had become friends.
Hadn’t they?
She and her valentine were confidants, but she did not know her master tailor and valentine dwelt in the same frame.
He shook his head and put the ledger away.
There must be a proper explanation, one he would surely receive eventually.
Until then, he must double his efforts to mind the logistical matters of his shop, lest his carelessness lose everything his father had worked for.
He would find a way to manage his responsibilities while laboring over his new dream, the chintz he would gift Margaret one day.