Part 5
Hop Sing fussed making sure that the breakfast food was adequate. Master Erick had a prodigious appetite and it did Hop Sing good to see him eat; Hop Sing had known famine in China so the abundance of food in this country amazed him. The night that Mrs. Handley prepared a fat, roast swan left Hop Sing agog. Having never seen a swan until he had arrived at the Cartwright estate, he thought the fowl was far too elegant to eat but when he tasted the moist flesh, he changed his opinion. So Hop Sing left the menu to Mrs. Handley but if there was not enough prepared, Hop Sing bedeviled her. And since Mrs. Handley feared that Hop Sing was casting a "heathen Chinee curse" upon her, she always made certain there was more than enough food.
Adam and Ben were still in their morning robes, their hair hanging loose from the usual tied back style they wore called "clubbed," pulled back in a small tail. Hoss was dressed and ready for a day of hunting; he enjoyed being out in the fresh air and riding across their vast property. He helped himself to more toast and bacon, sausage, beans and kidneys. Adam shook his head. He smiled at the amount of food his brother could put away.
Although Erick had been called by his formal name for most of his life, A few years before, Adam and he had been in a public house and an odd looking man came in. He was dressed in crude clothing of fur and suede, not at all in the fashion of the times, but he did wear a tricorn hat and wore his hair the same way as they. Adam, out of curiosity, offered to buy him a drink and the man accepted, sitting at their table. Adam discovered that the stranger was just back from another lucrative trip to America; he had brought beaver, coyote and fox skins back to England and sold them for a great profit. He regaled both Adam and Erick with tales of the unexplored continent and Adam listened intently. And it was this big mountain man who had nicknamed Erick Cartwright, Hoss. He explained that it was mountain talk describing a big, friendly man and that was what Erick was. So Adam had begun to call Erick, Hoss, since it fit him so well and soon, even Ben called him more often than not by the nickname, Hoss, although in moments of pique, Ben reverted to Erick.
Joseph Cartwright came into the dining room fully dressed in all his regalia, his long curls confined with a ribbon at the nape of his neck. He was a ladies' man, due more to his beauty and charms than the fact that he was a son of the honored Lord Cartwright. He wore a deep red cutaway jacket with a gold brocade waistcoat and a long silk scarf wrapped around his neck-so long that it could have easily muffled his mouth—something, which Adam had told Joe, gave his family something to like about the newer fashions.
"Joe," Adam said, "you need to search out a new tailor; this one has not made your breeches quite tight enough. I do believe that sitting is still within your ability."
Hoss guffawed and Ben cleared his throat while Joe sat down at the table and opened his napkin and placed it on his lap. Being the youngest, he was used to teasing but he felt, now that he was almost twenty, that he needed to make his mark, to find his own identity, and decided to do so with the fashionable crowd who drank champagne, lost money with grace, paid their debts of "honor" immediately and prided themselves on their fastidious adherence to new fashion trends.
"This is where the style is going, Adam," Joe said. "Make fun of me all you care-it is I who receives all the appraising stares and attentions from the ladies, not you."
"That's probably 'cause they mistake you for one of them," Hoss said and Adam laughed with him.
"Very droll," Joe said but his cheeks flushed with anger. His two older brothers always teased him about his dress and that he asked for the cobbler to put extra height on the heels of his shoes. To defend himself from their taunts, Joe said that the higher heels made him a more elegant dancer.
Joe poured himself some tea and began to eat. He reached for the jam jar, stared at it and then exploded. "Hoss, you don't have the manners of a goat! You are to dish out the jam, put it on your plate and then spread it on your toast-not dip the knife in and then dip again. This is a repulsive mess." Joe showed the insides of the jar to him. "Toast crumbs, bit of egg-disgusting."
"Well, excuse me all over," Hoss said. "I just can't see going through all those steps just to spread some jam on my toast. Besides, all the food ends up in the same place anyway."
"All right, you two-enough. And to where are you off today?" Ben asked his youngest son.
"To squire Arabella Fenwick into London. And, Father, I was wondering if I could ask for a bit in advance from my allowance-I seem to have gone through it already." Joe gave a small self-effacing laugh.
"Now, Joseph…" Ben started his daily chastisement of this son who allowed money to run through his fingers as water.
"I know, Father, I know," Joe said, "and I do swear that I shall be more careful but women do like small gifts-it's necessary, and Arabella's father has such a good opinion of me that I believe that when I ask him for Arabella's hand…"
"What?" Ben bellowed. "And since when have you been entertaining marrying her? You're not yet twenty."
"Enough," Adam said, standing up. "I shall have dyspepsia if I have to listen to more of this." Both Ben and Joe looked at him. "Hoss, give me a few minutes and I'll put on my hunting jacket and meet you in the stables. Tell Tom to saddle the bay-I'll ride him out today." And with that, Adam excused himself and went upstairs to dress.
Hoss and Adam were riding over their property with four spaniels in pursuit of deer, their game bags and powder horns on straps across their bodies when Hoss pulled up his horse and Adam followed in kind. The dogs circled around, wondering why their masters had stopped.
"Look, Adam, seems like we may have a poacher-a trespasser at the least." He pointed and off in the distance they could see a rider on a white horse. A small stand of trees blocked their view momentarily as the rider and horse continued in an easy gait and Adam swore to himself that the rider was a woman.
"Let's pursue," Adam said, grinning. He wanted to know what bold—or ignorant-woman would be riding across their estate and doing so alone.
The two men took off, the spaniels ahead of them and they came closer to the rider. Adam could now easily see it was a woman; her skirts flew on the left side as she rode sidesaddle on her horse-seeing the men chasing after her, she had kicked her horse into a gallop. Her hat flew off and it tumbled on the grass. Adam smiled; pursuing a woman in any manner was pleasurable but when it was one who wanted to escape-well, that only added to the enjoyment of the final capture.
Adam split away from Hoss and took an indirect route to come out ahead of the mysterious rider. When the woman saw Adam ahead of her and Hoss behind her, she reined in her horse and sat, looking at the two men nervously as they approached her.
She looked again in front of her as the man came closer and she was taken by the rider on the large bay. He had black wavy hair and a beguiling smile. His dark blue hunting jacket and the tan weskit along with his brown breeches set off his physique. What she didn't know was that part of the reason the man was smiling was because he recognized her.
"And what are you doing on Cartwright property, my pretty Miss?" Adam asked, his horse sidestepping toward hers. Hoss rode up behind them. The spaniels wound their way among the horses' legs and then lay down in the grass, panting.
"I demand to know who you are?" Julia Gosling asked. "And just why were you pursuing me? Are you going to set on me and take what you can?" She was nervous; her mother had warned her about men and how they pursued a woman for only one thing and here were two strangers and the swarthy one had the most dangerous smile. He seemed to enjoy her discomfort.
"Well," Adam said, lounging in his saddle as if he were in a comfortable leather chair in his father's study, "my brother and I wished to know why a lovely wood nymph such as yourself would be gracing us with your presence."
Julia looked at the handsome man with the dark features and felt as if she knew him; there was something about the voice and his smile that struck her. She felt a sudden heaviness in her loins.
"We're Adam," Hoss said, nodding toward his brother, "and Erick Cartwright. You're on our property. You're trespassing."
"Is there a fine to pay or do you just shoot me," Julia asked, glancing back and forth at the two men. She found it hard to believe that the men were related since they looked nothing like one another; one man, Erick, was large in size and his hair was pulled back into a sparse club and the other one, Adam, was swarthy and handsome. "He looks like a pirate," she thought. And she wondered if he would have begged—or taken-a kiss or more from her before he released her if his brother hadn't been along.
Adam laughed at Julia's question. "No fine and we certainly wouldn't shoot such a lovely creature as yourself; you make a better possession alive than stuffed and hanging on a wall as a trophy," Adam said with a smile. "All we ask is the revelation of your name." In the daylight, Adam could see that her eyes were indeed green.
"I, sir, and I am assuming that you are owed the respect of the title, sir, I am Miss Julia Gosling. My father is Sir Gosling and I am out on a pleasure ride. Had I know that I was trespassing on another's estate, I would have turned back which, with your permission, I will now do."
Julia turned her horse's head but Adam reached out and grabbed the bridle stopping it.
"Unhand my horse, sir," Julia said icily, her blond hair having tumbled down since losing her hat, the golden curls tossed about in the breeze.
"Answer me one more question," Adam said. "Why are you not yet married despite your beauty? Is it your unpleasant disposition?" He grinned as he saw annoyance cross her features.
Julia picked up her riding crop intending to lash him across his smiling face for his impudence but couldn't bring herself to do so. "If answering will cause you to release me, then I shall reply; I am not married because my family doesn't own the estate on which we live-we are Catholic-and my family is not of…we have not…" Julia raised her chin. She wasn't one to employ pretense but she didn't care to have anyone know that her family did not have a great deal of wealth and that they employed only three servants, not counting the stable boy and the coachman, Peter. One was a cook and then there was the lady's maid and the downstairs maid. The cook knew how to make two meals out of one chicken and therefore was the most valued.
"Do you live on that small estate between ours and London?" Hoss asked.
"Yes," Julia answered curtly.
Adam released Julia's horse's bridle and the horse bobbed its head. "Be careful that one day you're not mistaken for a deer and find yourself with a powder blast through that lovely bosom of yours."
Julia gave a sound of shocked offense and turned her horse, kicked it and galloped away. Adam and Hoss watched admiringly.
"That's one pretty girl," Hoss said, and then made sounds of appreciation for the female form.
"Yes," Adam said, "quite lovely indeed. I wouldn't mind seeing her again…and again." And then a rhyme from his childhood came to him. "Ride a cock horse to Banbury Cross to see a fine lady upon a white horse. Rings on her fingers and bells on her toes, and she shall have music wherever she goes."
"What's that?" Hoss asked. Adam was looking off in the distance, watching the woman ride away.
"Oh, nothing," Adam said with a small laugh. "Just a rhyme my nurse taught me when I was a child. Just a little sing-song."
"C'mon, Adam," Hoss said and as his horse moved forward, the dogs jumped to their feet, eager to continue with the hunt." "Let's go hunt somethin' we can bring down."
"I would have liked to have brought her down, down to her knees before me. Then her mouth would be full and she wouldn't talk so much." Adam said. Hoss chuckled. Adam kicked his horse and he and Hoss continued after the deer.