The Anonymous Amanuensis Page 3

  Eve was mystified as to why there should be a list of people from whom Quinton would accept no invitations, but had not wanted to ask about it. She took herself to the library to sort the stack of mail and to reply to the invitations.

  One intrigued her. It was written on fine linen notestock in a flowing feminine hand. The writer signed herself, "Yours ever, Prudence," and requested Quinton's presence at a "dinner à deux." Eve placed it into the pile for Quinton's perusal.

  When Quinton joined Eve in the library, he immediately read her responses to the invitations. A curt "very good" was his only comment. She noticed, when he was looking through the others, that he set the note from Prudence apart before he sat beside her to deliver instructions as to how the business letters were to be answered.

  As the days progressed, Eve gained confidence in her ability to satisfy Quinton's rather demanding requirements. She found that her experience with her grandfather had indeed been good training. It was seldom that Quinton returned a letter to her for rewording.

  She was always grateful for and sometimes amused by his short notes in the margins of his business correspondence, indicating the direction her response should take. She found she enjoyed composing those letters, before, as she frequently had to do, translating them into other languages.

  At first she had to refer to her grammars, for she had forgotten more than she realized. But soon her memory improved and she was able to make fast work of the translations.

  She did not enjoy keeping the household accounts as much, for they were merely tedious. That is, they were until one day in the second week of her employment.

  Eve's usual method was to separate the household accounts into two piles, one that required drafts on the household account to be drawn, the other to be paid directly from the household moneys. She was doing this when she came upon a crumpled invoice from a modiste, a name she recognized from the columns of the Gazette as being dressmaker to many of the ladies of the ton. The amount was staggering and she could not understand why such an enormous sum should be charged to a gentleman whose household contained no women. When she added it to short pile of items to question Mr. Quinton about, she saw written on the back, "Do not pay this! Write a note saying that I am in no way responsible for any of Lady Seabrooke's bills. Make it strong. JQ"

  Not understanding, Eve did as she was ordered and went on with the bills, putting them on Quinton's desk when she was finished with them. He did not come in that afternoon, so she had no opportunity to learn his reaction to her note.

  The next morning, Quinton handed her a slip of paper, telling her it was to be inserted in both the Gazette and the Morning Post that very day. She read it.

  Edward Quinton, Earl of Seabrooke, and Mr. James Quinton wish to remind the creditors of Rachel, Lady Seabrooke, that they do not accept responsibility for her expenditures.

  Shocked, she lifted her eyes to stare at him. His mouth was set in an angry line.

  "As you see, Mr. Dixon," he said. "I much regret this necessity, but cannot see my way clear to avoid it. I had thought my mother had learned her lesson by now."

  "Of course, sir. I had not meant to question you. It is not my place to do so."

  His face softened slightly. "You will no doubt be required, sooner or later, to deal with my mother. You should know that she left my father many years ago and, having obtained control of her personal fortune from him, she agreed never to be a charge upon either of us again. Unfortunately, she needs frequent reminders of her promise, and I am tired of delivering them. This notice should do the trick, for a few months at least."

  "Yes, sir," Eve replied. "But what do you mean, that I shall have to deal with her?"

  "She will be here sometime tomorrow, storming and ranting at me for making public our family affairs. And," he gave a travesty of a laugh, "for refusing to pay her dressmaker's bill. If I know my mother, the latter will infuriate her more than the public notice. If she arrives when I am absent--and I must be for several hours tomorrow morning--you will receive the brunt of her anger. Please ignore it and get rid of her as soon as you can. Bartlett will help you."

  "Could you not simply have Bartlett refuse her admission, sir?" Eve asked. Facing an angry woman on his behalf seemed beyond her duties.

  "No, for then she will contrive to vent her anger on me at some public gathering and I do not want that to happen. There is no need to make so many others uncomfortable. Come, Dixon, all you will have to do is sit here and let her words pour over your head. She will not harm you. As soon as she has emptied her budget, she will leave. I hope to be at home when she arrives but, unfortunately, I cannot postpone my meeting with Captain Sommerset."

  "He sails tomorrow, does he not? Of course, sir, I will deal with your mother." But I will not like it.

  Sure enough, Lady Seabrooke arrived the next morning while Quinton was at the docks. Eve's first indication of her presence came when she heard a screeching from the hall.

  The library door flew open. "Get out of my way, Bartlett! Garfield, I want my son! Where is he?"

  Eve stared at the voluptuous, red-haired woman standing in the doorway. She was no longer young, but her heavily powdered face still held remnants of what must have been startling beauty. "Garfield is no longer here, madam" she said, her voice somewhat unsteady.

  "Who are you?"

  Rising to face the angry woman, Eve drew a deep breath. "I am Dixon, Mr. Quinton's new secretary. May I be of assistance to you, madam?"

  "You may indeed. Give my son a message. Write it down, for I want him to know my exact words." The woman leaned over Eve's desk and glared at her. "Humph. Scrawny little wart. James hires the most namby-pamby secretaries."

  Eve stood straighter and glared back, biting her tongue.

  "Well, sit down and pick up your pen. Don't just stand there with your eyes falling off of your face."

  Eve sat. Waiting with pen in hand, she watched the angry woman prowl about the library, rifling through papers on Quinton's desk, picking up and laying down articles from the tables and shelves. Eve felt the urge to tell her to keep her hands from Mr. Quinton's possessions. Finally the woman ceased her prowling and came back to stand before the desk.

  "Tell my son I will not tolerate his ungrateful, selfish, coldhearted treatment of me. He is a worm, a toad. I would call him a bastard, but unfortunately, I was too naive then to cuckold his worthless father.

  "Yes, yes, put that down, too, boy. It is outside of enough that he feels so little for his filial responsibilities that he will allow his mother to be dunned for a few paltry pounds."

  Eve gasped, for the amount of the bill had been well over five hundred pounds. She saw Lady Seabrooke's eyes on her and bent again over the desk, cheeks aflame.

  "Also tell him that I have reached the end of my patience with his clutch-fisted ways and hereby refuse to advance him or his equally penny-pinching father so much as a shilling toward the comeout next year of that insipid brat, Penelope. Furthermore, tell him..."

  "Mother, I had expected to see you this morning, but not so early that you dispensed with your beauty sleep. So good of you not to disappoint me."

  Eve had never heard a voice so dripping with sarcasm. She looked up to see Quinton standing there, anger writ plainly on his face.

  "That will do, Dixon. You may have the remainder of the day to yourself."

  Eve quickly stuffed the papers from her desk into a drawer and fled the room. Just before the door closed behind her, she heard Quinton say, "Madam, you would advance your cause much the better if you were to cease abusing my staff. Now, what was it you wished to tell me?"

  Bartlett was standing in the hall, his eye on the library door. "I am sorry for allowing her to burst in on you like that, Mr. Dixon. I have orders from Mr. Quinton not to attempt to restrain her ladyship when she is in one of her rages."

  "What a detestable woman. Is she always like that?"

  "Usually, sir. Now, may I advise that you make yourself scarce? Mr. Quinton
will be in no mood for work when her ladyship leaves, but he will probably remain in the library until dinner."

  Eve ran up the stairs, elated at having an unexpected free afternoon. At the same time she was disappointed. The hours she spent with her employer were the best part of each day.

  Chapter Three

  James Quinton was ashamed of himself. Hurrying home from his meeting with Captain Sommerset, he had hoped to arrive before his mother, a notoriously late riser. Bartlett had been unable to keep her out of the library. So Dixon was forced to face her, be abused by her.

  Garfield had been adept at giving as good as he got, but Dixon, for all his competence, was no match at all for a virago like Lady Seabrooke. James had developed a fondness for the slight young man who had proven to be such an excellent secretary, wishing his own brothers, Matthew and Farley, had half the backbone Dixon did.

  As was usual after a confrontation with his mother, James felt depressed and drained. He closeted himself in the library and spent the afternoon reading, trying to lose himself in fiction rather than thinking about the miserable life his father must have led with his mother. James' own overdeveloped sense of filial duty forced him to be polite, but the receipt of the dressmaker's bill had been too much.

  The woman had an ample fortune of her own, damn her grasping soul! Had she not bullied his father into relinquishing control of it to her, he, James, would not now be involved in trade, nor would he have suffered the indignities and snubs of Society. On the other hand, that was a small price to pay for ridding Seabrooke of her presence, for while she had been in residence, life for Lord Seabrooke and his oldest son had been miserable.

  Thank God Penelope had not been exposed for too long to her mother's vicious tongue and unstable personality, for Lady Seabrooke had left her husband when her daughter was barely a year old.

  Matthew and Farley, both unfortunately like their mother, had followed her to London as soon as they were of age. The worst of it was that Matthew was James' heir. If he were to gain control of the estate, he would squander it within a year.

  Bartlett's hesitant knock brought James out of his reverie. "Would you be wanting dinner, sir?" the elderly butler asked.

  "I have little appetite, Bartlett. I think not. But stay! Is Dixon about?"

  "I believe he is in his room, sir."

  "Perhaps he will dine with me. Surely some fellowship will bring me out of my megrims. Ask him to join me in the dining room, if you will."

  "As you say, sir," the butler agreed, bowing.

  Eve was surprised when summoned to dine with her employer. She usually took dinner alone in the breakfast room, her position being enough above that of the servants that she could not dine with them.

  She was still unsure of her position, despite Garfield's telling her he had sometimes joined Mr. Quinton for dinner. But he was more of an age with his employer. Eve, conscious of her youth and worried that too much social intercourse with Quinton would lead to her unmasking, had been well satisfied to avoid him outside of working hours.

  Quinton was obviously making an effort to be sociable. "What did you do with your unexpected holiday, Dixon?" he asked her over the soup.

  "I read most of the afternoon, sir," she answered.

  "You read? A free afternoon and you read? Why did you not go out and have an adventure? That is what most lads of your age would do."

  "Oh, sir, I have had so little time or opportunity for reading these past five years. Gr...Sir Wilfred kept me very busy and his library had few interesting books in it. And when I came to London, I was busy seeking a position. Your library is like a buried treasure to me."

  "And what did you read?"

  "'Songs of Innocence', sir."

  "Ah, Blake. He is not one of my favorite poets, but he does well enough. Have you read Coleridge?"

  "No, sir."

  "I recommend that you do so. His early poetry is magnificent. It is too bad he seems to have lost his creative fires."

  "What of his would you recommend that I read, sir?"

  Quinton spoke of Coleridge and his poetry through most of the meal. Eve felt fortunate that he was willing to expound so, for she was uncomfortable and did not really know what to say to him. Finally she thought of something she could contribute.

  "Mr. Coleridge writes for the Morning Post, does he not, sir? Are you then a Whig?"

  "I have no politics, save that of free trade. Let the politicians play their idiotic games while we merchants keep the country prosperous, if they will only allow us to do so," he answered with some heat.

  "Yes, sir," Eve replied, chastened.

  "Here! Dixon, don't be so downcast. I meant not to shout at you. I do not approve of politics and will not discuss the subject. Let us find another topic of conversation. Tell me about your childhood on the Continent."

  On this subject Eve was able to discourse, for there were few verbal traps into which she could fall. After all, childhood adventures were much the same, whether undertaken by a lad or a lass. She related tales of her parents' frequent moves about Europe, as her father had changed residence often to escape his creditors. He had been a professional gambler, sometimes spectacularly successful, but the odds always caught up with him eventually and they were forced to move on. Quinton expressed his pity she had had such an uncertain childhood.

  "Oh, but you must not believe that, sir," she protested, "My father was a joyful man, always certain that the next place would see him winning enough to set us up for life. And Mama was so good, so sensible, that we never went hungry and always had a clean and comfortable home. Why Papa was even able to put a bit aside so I might have an inheritance, even though it is very small. I was never unhappy, even after Mama died, for I kept..." She stopped, appalled at what she had almost said, that she had kept house for her father after her mother's death.

  "You kept?" he prompted.

  "I kept the...the household accounts, so even then we were not destitute," she said quickly. "But Papa died three years after Mama, of a wasting disease, and so I came home to England."

  "And what awaited you here? Do you have family?" The covers had been cleared and Quinton poured her a glass of port. Eve sipped it while thinking rapidly.

  "None. After Mama's death, Papa wrote to Chas, reminding him of their old friendship, and asking him to look after me. Fortunately Chas was at home to receive my letter when Papa died. I have been at Elmwood ever since."

  "So, Dixon, we have much in common. I, too, was forced to make my own way in the world, for my father had little money, despite his estates. Once my mother--never mind. Suffice it to say that I was forced to leave school and come to London to seek my fortune.

  "But confound it, lad, I cannot continue to call you Dixon. Evelyn is it not? Is that what your friends call you?" Quinton was working on his third glass of port, while Eve sipped at her first.

  She spoke without thinking. "No, sir. I am usually called Eve."

  "Womanish name! I'll wager it caused you to defend yourself often as a schoolboy."

  "No, sir, for I always had tutors. But it has caused confusion a time or two, I admit."

  "Well, Eve it will be. I cannot be so formal with one who is barely out of leading strings. Come, lad, do not look so shocked. I am an old man compared to you."

  "Yes, sir. If you say so, sir."

  "And that is another thing I will not have. You will wear the word out, you use it so often. Or you will have me so puffed up with my own consequence that I will become insufferably proud. You may reduce the 'sirs' to a mere twenty or so a day."

  "Yes, sir. I mean, yes, Mr. Quinton."

  "Better," Quinton said, pouring himself another glass of port.

  Eve's discomfort did not abate, though Quinton became more loquacious as the level of the port decanter dropped. He seemed to relax, to become increasingly less formal as the evening wore on. He was not apparently inebriated, unless his talkativeness could be seen as an indication of his being foxed. She was both glad and
sorry when, near midnight, he sent her to bed with a warning that tomorrow would be a busy day.

  What a nice man! I quite like him, she thought as she settled herself. He is nothing like he seemed at first.

  * * * *

  Eve reveled in the freedom allowed her by masculine attire. She could wander about London with impunity, not subject to the many dangers she had faced as a young woman. Quinton's business occasionally required that she visit the City or the docks. She thereby saw a side of London from which she would have been banned--and protected--had her true sex been known.

  She grew to love the sounds and smells of the docks: voices crying in a dozen languages, the creaking of windlasses, the breeze-borne scents of the East and West Indies, the acrid smell of the tarred ropes, the unpleasant yet somehow appropriate odor of the unwashed, hard-working bodies.

  She grew to know many of the shipping clerks who worked in the dusty, echoing warehouse. Now that she was better acquainted with Quinton, she was not surprised that most of them admired and respected him. He treated them fairly and was willing to overlook a lack of experience in favor of half a lifetime's labor before the mast and familiarity with the seaports of the world.

  Mosely, whose position in the Quinton ménage was unclear to Eve, soon became one of her favorites. He was a short, wide-shouldered man with a decided limp that slowed him not a particle. She slowly prized his story out of him, fascinated at all he had done when even younger than she. He had shipped as a cabin boy on a merchantman out of Bristol when he had been but one and ten. His years at sea had been hard and his hands and face bore the scars of many battles with rigging and the elements.

  Mosely had been forced to retire from the sea forever when his leg was caught in the anchor cable and nearly torn from his body as the ship made port at Rotterdam. Thrown upon shore with a gimp leg and no other means of support, he had been rescued from almost certain starvation and death by Quinton's agent, who taught him the rudiments of writing and ciphering.

  Eve mentioned Mosely to Quinton after her first encounter with him.