The Firebird

The two men assessed one another in that vaguely measuring way that men did when they met, that all the centuries of civilising influence had not yet managed to erase from male behaviour. Charles was several inches taller than her own companion, and a shade more sturdy, and secure in his advantage he remarked politely, ‘No, I’ve not had the pleasure.’

‘Mr Taylor is a member of the Factory,’ Anna told him. ‘Mr Taylor, may I introduce Lieutenant Gordon.’

‘Sir.’ Charles inclined his head in that distinctive blend of Russian and Scots mannerisms that, together with his accent, marked him as a member of the second generation, born in Moscow to a father who had come across to Russia at the turn of the last century. ‘Allow me to congratulate you.’

Mr Taylor looked perplexed. ‘That’s very kind, I’m sure, but—?’

‘And my cousin. I was not aware she had become betrothed.’

Anna rolled her eyes and looked at Charles in a way that let him know she knew what he was doing, and was unimpressed.

Beside her Mr Taylor said, ‘Lieutenant, I assure you we … we are not … Mistress Jamieson has done me no such honour.’

‘No? You will forgive me, but with you escorting her in public, I assumed that was the case.’

She came to Mr Taylor’s rescue, saying smoothly, ‘I was lately on an errand to fetch letters that had come for the vice admiral,’ she said, showing him the packet she was holding, ‘but the servant who went with me felt unwell, and Mr Taylor kindly offered to accompany me home.’ She did not bother saying that the servant felt unwell because he had stepped into Trescott’s tavern for a half-hour, nor that Mr Taylor’s offer had been more of an insistence, but it hardly mattered now for Charles ignored her.

With a sympathetic look at Mr Taylor, he said, ‘Shall I now relieve you, sir, that no one else should make the same mistake?’

His solicitous expression could not hold. When Mr Taylor, with a reddened face, had quickly taken leave of them, Charles broke into a grin and Anna glanced at him reprovingly.

She said, ‘You’ve embarrassed him.’

‘Nay, I have flattered him.’ Falling into step beside her as she started walking once again, he said, ‘No doubt he has designs of it. You see the way he looks at you.’

She saw. But still she asked, ‘What way is that?’

‘The way a boy looks at a newly shining sword he must not play with, yet desires with all his heart.’

‘Only a soldier,’ she said, smiling, ‘would imagine any girl would find it pleasing to be thought of in the same way as a weapon.’

‘’Tis in truth the highest compliment.’ He steered her round a knot of huddled men. ‘But I did not intend to please you, I was merely stating facts.’ He cast a keen glance at her face. ‘You do not fancy him, I take it?’

‘Mr Taylor is a good man, and a kind one.’

‘Damning words.’ Charles grinned again. ‘You do not fancy him.’

‘I’ve little time,’ she said, ‘to fancy anyone. My days are full.’

‘Ah yes. How is my uncle?’

‘Must you say it in that tone?’

‘What tone?’

She sighed. ‘As though the term were illegitimate.’

His short laugh had no humour in it as he said, ‘Your choice of terms is … interesting.’

Anna said, with little patience, ‘Play your games of words with men like Mr Taylor, not with me. You know I did not mean it in that sense.’

‘No, it was the proper term, I do believe. My grandmother did lie with the vice admiral’s father, and without the benefit of marriage bore his child, which makes our claim upon the Gordon name most illegitimate.’

She turned on him, not caring they were standing in the middle of the street. ‘When has he ever made you feel so? When, in truth, were any of your family made to feel so? Was your grandmother cast out? No. She was cared for. Was your father, as a blameless infant, sent to be concealed? No. He was educated well,’ she said, reminding him of what they both knew was the truth, ‘and sent here with good prospects by the vice admiral’s arrangement. That his sons now think themselves ill-used would doubtless have astonished him.’

She wheeled on that and walked on without bothering to look behind to see if he were following.

He was. His long strides caught her up before she’d reached the tall gates of the Admiralty, and for the whole length of its walls they ventured on in silence. Then he cleared his throat. ‘Am I to then assume,’ he said, ‘my mother has been by, to pay a visit?’

‘Aye, this morning. With her usual complaints.’

‘She asked for money?’

‘She returned what the vice admiral tried to give her, for the purchase of your regimentals.’ Glancing sideways at his new brushed army uniform, its gold braid all intact, she told him, ‘And in truth they do look very dashing.’

‘Thank you.’ With his head bent, he allowed the briefest flash of the old smile that had endeared him to her years ago. He thought a moment then, and added soberly, ‘My mother’s bitterness is not my own.’

‘Your mother is a bitter woman.’ She was judging, and she knew it, but she’d seen Vice Admiral Gordon’s face this morning after Charles’s mother had stormed from his chamber, and she was in no mood yet to forgive. ‘When I first came here, as a child, and you and I were introduced, did he not say, “This is my nephew”?’