Chapter Two
“Rose petal jam sets the soul right.” The Captain passed off the basket to Mrs. Addington.
The lank-limbed housekeeper hugged the basket brimming with shiny jars, her ancient stare severe under her mobcap. “You will not be putting this in my Christmas box, sir. Mind you, I enjoy Mrs. Halsey’s jams, but I prefer you send me off with a juicy roast goose tomorrow.”
Jonas’s ears pricked at the mention of Livvy’s mother. He’d spent the last hour staring out the back-parlor window at the Halsey Tower in the distance. From time to time, a silhouette passed by the tower’s window, and smoke puffed from twin chimneys. In years past, Mr. Halsey would toil for hours in the stone turret, restoring artifacts. Roman pieces were his favorite. He’d written tomes about Rome’s rule over England, all from studying ancient relics he and other antiquarians had dug up from the earth.
“Your request is duly noted, Mrs. Addington.” The Captain tapped his cane twice on the floor before settling into his leather wingback chair to face Mr. Goodspeak.
The housekeeper shuffled off to the kitchen, leaving the men to their entertainments. The Captain and Mr. Goodspeak waged a battle over their chessboard, their fourth today. Mr. Meakin and Mr. Littlewood, both sat nose deep in broadsheets while Mr. Bristow snored on the rust-colored settee. The men, a mix of widowers and lifelong bachelors, had served with the Captain in the Royal Navy and were permanent fixtures in the brown and beige parlor.
Jonas leaned a shoulder against the window frame, keeping an eye on the tower window. The structure was all that remained of a centuries old castle that once sat on Halsey land. The two-story Halsey tower reminded him of Mr. Bristow on the settee—round, squat, and slumping to one side.
In the distance, two arms flung wide the tower windows and a head poked through the opening. It was near twilight, but there was no mistaking the long copper braid dangling over the windowsill. Livvy. She checked the heavens before ducking out of sight and popping up again to toss a rope out the window.
A rope?
He squinted to be sure. Yes. A rope. The thing danced like a snake as Livvy fed it hand over hand out the window.
What secrets did his midnight visitor hide in her tower?
Jonas pushed off his post. “Captain, did you say Mrs. Halsey came to call?”
“Goodness no. Her charwoman delivered the basket.” The Captain nudged his rook two spaces forward. “Mrs. Halsey rarely makes social calls these days. On account of Mr. Halsey.”
“Mr. Halsey?”
The Captain studied the board, his brows beetling. Mr. Goodspeak fiddled with the edge of his moustache, mulling his next move. The hearth crackled nicely and the room smelled of yesterday’s pine boughs and last night’s whiskey-imbued revelry. The Captain and his cronies had been slow to rise this morning, their bloodshot eyes and sluggish steps a sign of last night’s fun.
“Sir?” Jonas prompted. “You were telling me about Mr. Halsey.”
“Yes. Quite. All very hushed family business, I’m afraid. A matter of privacy and all that, but people talk.”
“And what, pray tell, do people say?”
The Captain’s age-scarred hand batted the air. “Some folderol about Mr. Halsey not being well in mind or body. It’s nonsense. I saw him out for a ramble with Mrs. Halsey last summer. He walked with a cane, but so do I. And I’m fit as a fiddle.”
“But not of sound mind,” Mr. Goodspeak said, chortling at his own jest. “My bishop takes your rook.”
The Captain frowned at Mr. Goodspeak waggling the chess piece and plucked his pipe off the mantel. “As you can see,” he went on. “Light shines from his tower where he labors day and night alongside his daughter. The younger, unmarried one.”
“Liv—” Jonas began before correcting himself. “You speak of Miss Olivia Halsey.”
“The very same.” The Captain tapped ash remnants from his pipe into the hearth and began packing it with tobacco he kept in a box on the mantel. “Strange child. Always spouting facts about aqueducts and Roman generals as I recall.”
“Methinks your boy is restless,” Mr. Goodspeak said. “Needs an afternoon at Plumtree’s public house with more lively companionship than the lot of us.”
“Here, here.” Mr. Littlewood peered over the broadsheet, his bloodshot eyes owlish behind his spectacles. “Perhaps a pint and a pretty tavern maid would do.” Knees cracking, his enthusiastic bulk edged forward on his seat cushion. “I’ll accompany you, m’boy. Could do with a bit of conversation with a lively skirt.”
“Thank you, Mr. Littlewood, but I’d rather stroll the countryside.”
“A walk. In all that cold?” Mr. Littlewood’s jowls shook from his distaste. “If you must. As long as our stroll takes us to the Sheep’s Head—”
“Alone, if you please. I wish to walk some of my old childhood haunts.” A hand behind his back, Jonas tipped his head in deference. “I wouldn’t want to bore you, sir, or drag you away from all this warmth and cheer.”
The Captain swiveled around in his leather chair. “Don’t take long. We’ve much to discuss, you and I.”
Jonas fisted his hand at the small of his back. How to let his grandfather down as gently as possible? He wasn’t staying. The old man needed to let that dream go.
“I won’t be long, sir. A walk through the plum orchard and along the canal, perhaps.”
The Captain chewed his pipe, squinting at the back window, wrinkles deepening around his eyes. “Have a good stretch of the legs then.”
Jonas left the parlor to don coat, hat, and gloves. Images of a dancing rope and copper braid played in his head. He exited Braithwaite cottage, the ramshackle barn bearing a sign: Braithwaite Furniture and Sons.
Except there were no sons. Only grandsons…and errant ones at that.
Fixing his collar, he beat a hasty path to his grandfather’s plum orchard. Cold air dried his nostrils, and dormant grass dusted with last night’s snow crunched under his boots. Years he’d trod this way with his brother, leading the village boys from one scrape after another.
The Braithwaites were Plumtree’s upstarts from the beginning. The Captain, a gruff widower, had won his humble plot of land in a London card game against Mr. George Hastings. The deed in hand, Captain Braithwaite had announced that very night to fellow sailors he was giving up the sea, ready to take a turn as a furniture maker. It was the trade of the Captain’s father and his father’s father. But, claiming a piece of Hastings land upset Plumtree’s balance of nature. A medieval king had bestowed the land on the revered Hastings family, and the Captain was a salt-tongued interloper.
Not long afterward, the old man installed his unwed daughter and her rough and tumble twin sons, Jacob and Jonas, in the Braithwaite cottage. Everyone knew the boys were born on the wrong side of the blanket.
It was years before the dust settled on that scandal.
Jonas pushed through the winter bare orchard, following smaller boot prints in the snow. Had to be Livvy’s. She’d taken this path after sneaking out of his bedchamber last night. Livvy Halsey was a puzzle, wearing breeches and wielding a pistol. He grinned.
She’d stolen something. From him or his grandfather.
What a fine welcome home that was. Only their long childhood friendship had stopped him from sounding an alarm.
Pushing past the trees, he spied her family’s tower ahead. Halsey Manor rose behind the tower, a grand garden wedged like a chessboard between the two structures. He hopped over an icy creek, his coat hem flaring around his legs. The single jump renewed him as if he stepped back in time to the agreeable parts of his youth. Of racing horses in green fields. Swimming in the River Trent. And calling on the Halsey girls to fritter away an afternoon of mischief.
He charged up the meadow’s rise, his lungs bursting with rare good feeling since returning home. Livvy leaned outside the tower window, her copper braid swaying as she huffed in her struggle with the rope. A hulking wooden chair swung merrily at the end.
Cupping his mouth, he called out, “Need some help?”
Livvy’s head snapped up. “Jonas? Is that you?”
He jogged to clear the ground between them, cold air biting his cheeks. Red-nosed and determined, she wrestled with rope and furniture.
He grabbed the chair and looked up. “Have a care, or you’re going to fall.”
A pair of lovely breasts jostled against her bodice. “I’ve done this many times.”
“Of course you have. Doesn’t every Englishwoman hang out windows and haul furniture up by rope?”
She stifled a giggle. “Don’t be impertinent. You can see I’m in the middle of something.”
Tufts of snow landed on his face. He made an effort to speak to her eyes, not her cleavage. “What are you doing in your tower? Spinning chairs into gold?”
“In a manner of speaking, yes, I am.” She grinned at him. “You’re in high spirits.”
“It is Christmas Day.”
“So it is.” She focused on the chair and adjusted her grip on the rope. “Well, don’t let me keep you from your celebrations.”
She was giving him the brush-off?
He chuckled quietly against his collar. “I’m brimming with good cheer. So much that I thought I’d bring it here.”
Face reddening, Livvy yanked the rope. He held the chair in place.
Her smile stuck in a stubborn line. “I don’t have time to dally.”
“Even with an old friend?”
He’d seen the same determination on her face years ago. She’d answered a village boy’s dare and waded far into the River Trent. With her skirts waterlogged, the current had dragged her girlish frame underwater. Livvy had bobbled up and down, gasping for air. He’d dashed in after her and dragged her sputtering to the shore. Scrambling up the bank, she’d glared at him through sopping wet hair, announcing she didn’t need a Braithwaite boy to save her.
Nor did she need one now.
Livvy’s breath blew decisive clouds in chill air. Was her resistance about what she hid in the tower? Or him?
“Last night, you asked a boon of me when I caught you in my bedchamber. I gladly gave it. Now I ask a favor of you. Let me come in and—” he jiggled the chair “—I’ll haul this up for you.”
Snow thickened around his boots. Gusts swirled the flakes as if nature itself conspired to get him inside Livvy’s tower.
A little give in her shoulders, a slow sigh, and, “Very well. Door’s unlocked.”
He trotted around the medieval tower, passing an empty hand cart by the door. Iron rivets covered the oak door painted black. He pushed past it and, ducking his head at the low ceiling, took the stone steps two at a time up the narrow, winding passage, a passage too tight for the chair’s odd geometry.
Blazing light and the pungent aroma of vinegar hit him on the top floor. Four plank tables squared off the middle of the round room: each table was covered with mosaics, pottery shards, open books, jars, brushes, rags, and aged metal pieces. Three tall iron stands burned a dozen tallow candles. Two fires snapped a cheery welcome in the hearths. And one skirt-covered bottom fidgeted at the arched window.
Livvy’s head bobbed up. “Hurry. My arms are getting tired.”
He stepped gingerly around glossy mosaic pieces resting on canvas stretched across the floor. Settling beside her, he reached through the opening and placed his gloved hands above and below her chafed hands on the rope.
Big brown eyes fixed on him. “Have you got it?”
Livvy’s side was flush with his and, despite his heavy coat, awareness of his childhood friend struck. Their faces were inches apart with her chin grazing his shoulder. Snow crowned her head and the seriousness in her eyes touched him, eyes that had matured to a mildly exotic tilt above a slender, fragile nose. She was the rare redhead free of freckles. With her prettiness and unaffected candor, Livvy would be the toast of the Marriage Mart, a breath of fresh air for London’s open-minded gentlemen—if she was there.
Why was she stuck in this lonely tower?
Small, feminine nostrils flared. “You’re staring.”
“And you’ve not let go.” His voice was rough and low.
Livvy held on tight, her face turning to Plumtree. The tower’s height and elevated Halsey lands gave them a fine view. The church bell tolled the medieval hour Compline, a Christmas Day tradition. Snow dropped a curtain of innocence on jumbled homes where festive candles shined in windows, the effect like polished gold. Ten years he’d been gone. Nothing had changed except a narrow canal cutting through the land. Centuries would pass, but Plumtree would remain the same rustic village.
“I know you’re here because of my sneaking into your grandfather’s house last night,” she said quietly.
She turned, her brown gaze spearing him as if she’d decided to embrace honesty and expected the same of him. His chest squeezed. He swallowed hard. She’d been the one traipsing around dressed as a man, brandishing a pistol at midnight.
Why did he feel the heat of expectation?
“Curiosity—perhaps concern?—is getting the best of you. I understand.” Her voice was grave. “But, for the moment, we must attend the chair. It’s very, very, very old. A Roman general or magistrate probably sat on it.”
He nodded solemnly. “An ass of great, historical importance.”
Livvy bit her bottom lip, fighting a smile. “I am quite serious.”
“I see that.”
He gave her a sporting smile. This was cozy having a hushed discussion while leaning over a windowsill with Livvy. If he tipped his head toward her, their noses would brush.
Their conversation was a kiss with words.
Her eyes flared wider, and she carried on with an earnest voice. “You must handle this piece with care. All four ivory legs are intact. Do you understand? They are ivory.” She paused. “This chair is worth a great deal of money.”
Outside, he hadn’t noticed the ivory for the heavy dirt smears, but he did catch how the words ivory and money rolled off her tongue, the syllables full of reverence and need.
“At present, snow is falling on your valuable furniture.”
Livvy glanced at snow collecting on the chair. She nodded and, without a word, eased her grip on the rope and backed away from the window. He leaned further out, the advantage of his height, and held the chair away from the wall. Cautiously, he hauled in the rope hand over hand until he set the piece on the floor and untied it.
“Where do you want your prize?”
“If you’d put it there—” she pointed at the east hearth and shut the windows “—I’d be most grateful.”
Another canvas cloth was spread across the floor. He placed the relic on the canvas, catching Livvy watching him out of the corner of her eye. A bucket was tucked against the wall, full of paring chisels, a gimlet, pitsaw, and auger among other furniture maker’s tools.
Had she stolen tools from the Captain?
Livvy stood at a table, her thumb idly brushing the corner of a mosaic. “The chair is a curule chair, unique because it’s intact. A discovery from a Roman campsite a farmer uncovered in Learmouth.”
“I recall reading about the find. Over a year ago wasn’t it?”
“Yes,” she said, not meeting his gaze. “The Antiquarian Society was thrilled. To think, it all started when the farmer’s plow dug up a Roman sandal.”
The Antiquarian Society, or more correctly, The Antiquarian Society for Historical Study and Preservation, was an odd lot of historians who loved digging in the earth for pieces of the past. When he was seventeen, Jonas had shoveled dirt, loads of it, on an excavation with Livvy’s father in Scotland. The treasure hunt would’ve been worthwhile, but Mr. Halsey and his antiquarian friends searched the remains of an ancient Pictish village, ecstatic over a broken loom and textile remnants. He smiled, recalling how he and the other laborers had thought the antiquarians a bit daft. Gold was worth a man’s excitement; moldy cloth was not.
Hands clamped behind his back, Jonas strolled the circular room. He stepped over a rusted Roman gladius, a soldier’s sword, on burlap. Sections of a breast plate rested beside it like pieces of a puzzle to be done. Nothing fit. Mr. Halsey was order itself, yet this room was chaos with artifacts on the floor, a thing the old man would never countenance.
And there was the uncertainty in Livvy’s voice.
He stopped at a scribe’s desk facing the wall. Scribbled pages cluttered the surface. Four books lined the desk’s upper shelf, one name embossed on the spines: Mr. Thomas J. Halsey. Jonas lifted a volume off the shelf.
“Where is your father? Isn’t he coming?” He flipped through pages of Viking art styles.
Footsteps scraped behind him. A feminine hand, the nails trimmed short, skin dry at the knuckles reached for the book. Livvy hugged the tome to her brown and yellow stomacher. Torn lace hung from her elbows. Stains streaked her vinegar-scented skirt.
“You know he’s not coming.”
“I know nothing of the sort.”
Her chin lifted. “You haven’t figured out what’s going on here?”
He drew a patient breath. “Call me dim-witted. Plumtree’s fine folk have done as much.”
“You are nothing of the sort,” she said, her grip relaxing on the book. “You have a quiet strength. Quick to listen and slow to speak, yes. But a dull mind? Never.” Her face tilted as if a new facet revealed itself. “You have always been a man of few words. An excellent quality.”
The room’s glow couldn’t match the glimmer in her eyes. He stood taller, basking in Livvy’s unexpected praise. Candlelight shined on her mussed copper hair. He wanted to stroke the length of it from the crown of her head to the braid’s tip dangling at her tiny waist. The square neck of her bronze-colored gown barely contained plump, white mounds above the book.
“You’re not saying much,” she murmured, closing the gap between them.
Because the sight of her made his mind spin.
His fingers flexed and curled at his side. The country girl of his youth had grown into a provocative woman with an air of innocence. Coppery wisps traced Livvy’s cheek, dangling soft as down on her collarbone. With his gloves still on, he brushed away her loose hair and traced the slanted collarbone to her shoulder and back to the center of her chest. Little goosebumps danced across her breast’s upper curve.
Livvy inhaled fast.
“Do you like what I’m saying now?” he asked.