The Solitary Envoy by T. Davis Bunn

Author:T. Davis Bunn
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: ebook
Publisher: Baker Publishing Group
Published: 2010-10-28T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter 16

A lovely June Sunday greeted them when they entered the manor’s forecourt. Samuel Aldridge plucked the timepiece from his waistcoat and flicked open the gold face. “I believe we have time to walk. My dear, would you care to take a turn?”

“Nothing would suit me more,” Lavinia replied.

Samuel pushed the perambulator while his wife held his arm. The pram was built with the precision of an elegant carriage. The wheels joined a complex spring system that gentled the baby over rough spots. The apparatus was framed in gilded mahogany and covered with a starched linen skirt that matched the blanket laid over the sleeping infant. Erica walked behind the couple with Abbie attached to her hand like a bouncing balloon.

Abbie’s chatter had a musical gaiety to match the birdsong rising from Green Park. “Winter was ever so long here. Wasn’t it, Mama? We arrived in a storm that lasted for months and months.”

“I wish my daughter were exaggerating,” Lavinia said over her shoulder. “But I must say the weather was quite vile. The worst winter in years, or so we were told.”

“It’s all the little smokestacks,” Abbie confided to Erica. “All the little chimneys, they go all the time. Just puff and puff, night and day, and they feed the clouds. You can see it if you look closely. The clouds eat up all the new smoke, and it comes back down as rain.”

The child looked from one adult to another. “Why is everybody laughing?”

They all grew quiet as they neared a manor, one far larger than the embassy. Sounds of revelry emerged from a number of open windows. Lavinia said uncertainly, “Perhaps we should cross to the other side.”

“Certainly not,” said her husband.

“But Samuel, the child.”

“It’s all right, Mama. I know not to look.” And she didn’t. Abbie kept her face pointed straight ahead as they passed before the high metal fence fronting the road.

But Erica was not so resolute. A peal of female laughter was followed by a shriek and a higher sound—perhaps words, she could not be certain. She looked over to see two women seated upon an upstairs windowsill, glasses and thin cigars in their hands. Erica had never seen women smoke before. Through a downstairs window she could see a large crowd of people encircling a table. A man slapped something down hard upon the table, and there came another great shout of laughter. Gambling, Erica realized. They were gambling on the Sabbath. She was so shocked she would have halted in her tracks had Abbie not tugged her forward.

“It’s not nice to stare,” the little girl reminded her.

“No, we must allow Erica to see this.” Samuel’s tone was as grim and cold as Erica had ever heard it. “Let her observe the state of this realm. It is only right and just that she understand. Is Erica not a valued member of our little band? Of course she must see. Are we not passing the residence of a prince of the realm?”

“Samuel, please.”

“King George the Third was most certainly America’s enemy,” Samuel continued to Erica.

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