The Firebird

Sir Harry was the only one among their friends who knew the perfect truth of it, because he knew her father’s family well and had been quick to recognise him when they’d first been introduced, although he’d held the secret close and played along in public with the common version of the tale.

Sir Harry had himself arranged the sloop that was to carry them to Cronstadt, where they were to meet a larger ship to take them first to Amsterdam, and then from there to Ulster, where her parents had their home. And it was now Sir Harry who was personally seeing to the loading of their baggage on that sloop, while he and Moray stood together on the solid timber planks of the exchange, beneath a sky whose sun was hidden behind swiftly running clouds.

‘And how are both your sisters?’ asked Sir Harry.

‘Very well, I hear.’

‘Amelia was always great fun. They did both marry Grahams, your sisters, did they not?’

‘Aye. Our family’s well bound to the Grahams.’

‘We’re all interwoven, I think,’ said Sir Harry. And then, as though that had reminded him, ‘I was sorry to hear that my stepmother, your brother’s wife, had passed on. Has he married again?’

Moray shook his head. ‘No, I’m told Robin manages well enough now, with the children grown older.’

‘It must be very difficult, to not have any contact with them. You were always close, as I recall.’

‘Aye.’ Moray gave a nod so short that Anna knew by now, from watching him these past days, that it hid a deep emotion. ‘My youngest brother, Maurice, knows I live, for I did see him while he was at Paris, but I doubt he does remember that.’

‘I’d heard he was … not well,’ Sir Harry said. ‘So he has not recovered?’

Moray gave a shrug. ‘He is much improved, I’m told, from what he was. But he will never be again the man we knew.’

Sir Harry gave a feeling sigh. ‘Aye, well, the world has turned us all, and which of us will ever be the man that we once were?’

Moray’s eyes grew slightly crinkled at their corners. ‘I do see the world has turned you into a philosopher.’

‘A merchant, if you please,’ Sir Harry said, and smiled. ‘And with much business to attend to.’ While they’d shaken hands the men had shared a brief embrace, like brothers. ‘A safe journey to you, John. ’Tis good to see you look so well. Come, Mr Taylor,’ called Sir Harry to his secretary, ‘it is time we were away.’

As Mr Taylor passed, he gave a final bow to Anna. ‘God speed, Mistress Jamieson.’

‘I thank you, Mr Taylor.’

They had spoken briefly earlier, and Anna had, with some remorse, said, ‘I am very sorry if I gave you cause to hope, sir, that—’

He had not let her finish. ‘Any hopes,’ he’d told her, ‘were my own. Your behaviour, Mistress Jamieson, has always been most proper and most ladylike, and quite above reproach.’

That had been earlier this morning. Now, he only wished her well and bowed and took his leave.

As Anna watched him walk away down the exchange, her mother came to stand beside her. ‘He does seem a nice young man.’

‘He is,’ said Anna. ‘He is very nice.’

Her mother smiled, and straightening the seam at Anna’s shoulder said, ‘If I could give you one piece of advice, my dear, it would be that you should never give your hand to any man unless he also holds your heart.’

What hope for her, then? Anna wondered, for her own heart was already held by one who had no right to it and who did not deserve it, but who would not let it go. ‘Then I suppose,’ she said, in a small voice that did not fully seem to know that it was saying things aloud, ‘that I shall never give my hand.’

Her mother did not make reply to that, but gave her arm a reassuring squeeze and turned away to say farewell to the vice admiral.

Gordon looked most fine this morning, in his uniform with the black armband, and his sword hung gleaming at his side. He raised Sophia’s hand and kissed it in a gallant gesture, and for that unguarded instant Anna saw the longing in his face, as of a man who’d loved and lost and, while resigned to it, had never yet forgotten. ‘This,’ he told her mother, low, ‘I did not do for duty, either.’

And Sophia seemed to understand, because she gave a nod and told him, ‘I am glad that it was you.’

Moray, when he said goodbye to Gordon, was more formal than he had been with Sir Harry.

Gordon handed him the thick packet of letters. ‘You will see that those are properly delivered?’

‘Aye.’

Beyond that, there were no light words, no brotherly embrace; only a silence that appeared to say much more than any words could have attempted, and at last, as though it were a gesture that had been a long time coming, Moray held his hand outstretched, and Gordon took it, and above their solemn handshake Moray gave a curt and quiet nod, and that was all.

When Anna’s turn came, she found, as her father must have done, words seemed inadequate. She looked up at Vice Admiral Gordon, and he looked at her, and she suddenly realised the words did not need to be spoken at all. Not out loud.

He said, ‘I have a parting gift.’

‘You give too many gifts.’

‘’Tis not from me. It was delivered to my hands this morning, from the palace. From the Empress Catherine.’ From his pocket he drew out a parcel wrapped in silk, about the size of his own hand, and strangely rounded. ‘The messenger who brought the gift spoke only Russian, so Dmitri translated. He said that what you hold was made by the late Tsar himself, and was a gift to Empress Catherine in the days before they married. She would have you keep it now, to mind you of the day you gave an Empress back her purpose, and to help you know your own.’ As she took the gift and started to unwrap the silk, he asked, ‘Does that make any sense to you?’