Chapter 34
Fortunately, Master Blackford was a true ally. On that Sunday, once the family had returned from church, Margaret was making ready to go on a call with her mother to visit Lady Pierce. Hettie was pinning a hat onto her freshly set curls, when her father tapped on the door of her room. He looked a bit sheepish.
“Margery, would you mind not going with your mother? I need you to, er, translate for the Craigs.”
Margaret turned to Hettie, who lifted her palms helplessly. Normally, any doings in the household had spread across the servants’ quarters, and her maidservant knew everything long before she did.
Sir Timothy watched the interplay and smiled. “I apologize, but this was not of my doing. Master Blackford has arrived rather without warning, and he has a number of gentlemen with him. Master Piers has alerted Mrs. Ball to prepare hospitality in the parlor.”
Margaret immediately knew what was about. “Please take my hat, Hettie.”
“Yes, mistress. Shall I attend you?”
She thought for a moment. “Yes. I’d feel more confident if you were there, until we discover which way the wind is blowing.”
* * *
The air was warm in the de Beauchamps’ apple orchard, the breeze smelled fragrant, and he was there with a girl. Life could not have been better, Aaron thought. He glanced up lazily at the green pippins on the branches.
“Sind diese schon reif?” he asked, pointing to the small fruits.
“Rife? No, it’s ripe,” Ivy said. She lay on her back with her head in Aaron’s lap, toying with the ties of his shirt. “And no, they’re not. You eat those, and you’ll be purging out of both ends!”
“Ja, ripe,” Aaron said. He smiled down at her. She wound her hand in the ties and pulled his mouth down to hers. This time, he was ready for her kiss, and made the most of it. Her soft lips drove him crazy, and her boobs were almost visible through the white linen of her blouse—camisole—whatever the women here called the long undergarment. He wanted to feel them, but he kept his hands away from them somehow. With one, he stroked her hair, and the other rested lightly on her bodice.
Suddenly, she grabbed the hand on her waist, and brought it upward toward her bosom.
“Don’t you want to touch me?” she asked, in a teasing tone. “You’re such a gentleman.”
“Nein, I shouldn’t.”
She wound her other hand in his hair and smashed her lips against his again. When she let go, she challenged him with a look. “Why not? We like each other well enough. I give you leave.”
“Was?” he asked.
“It’s what, as well you know,” Ivy said, letting him go with a playful push. “I know you speak English as well as I do. Mayhap better.”
“Nein, I do not.”
She laughed. “Of course you do. You’re a couple of Mistress Margaret’s Americans, you and your dad.”
Aaron stiffened. “Vy do you think something like that?”
She groaned and sat up. “Because you are Americans. Everyone knows it! Well, a lot of us do.”
Aaron began trembling. This was the thing his father had warned him about, what Miz Rita had told him to keep quiet, what everyone was afraid would happen. He clutched his hands in his lap. What was he going to do?
“How?” he asked.
“We’re not fools,” Ivy said, playfully. She put her arms around him and fixed her eyes on his. “Aaron. We know Mistress Margaret met some Americans in London, and came back to tell us all about the explosion. Everyone was talking about it! But instead of seeing them as dangerous or terrible or enemies of England, she was friendly about them. So, that’s how we came to think of them. And when she went off to Hamburg—that’s right next to the United States of Europe, where the Americans are, isn’t it?”
“Well, not right next to it.”
Ivy looked triumphant. “See? I knew you could talk like ordinary folks! All right, not right next to it. But there, close by, with no ocean between them. Anyone could cross from one place to the other, right? And to have you and your father come with such incredible inventions that have changed our life! The Germans have never come up with anything like that, or they’d have been sold here long since. Those must have come from the Americans. From you.”
His mind spun. He ought to get up and find his dad, let him know they had to leave, but Ivy held him tightly.
“But the king hates us,” Aaron said. “Why has no one told him about us?”
Ivy shook her head. “Because we love Sir Timothy and Lady de Beauchamp, and all their family. They are good to us. They are our gentlefolk, running the manor and making sure all is good for us. They secure our future. And we like you and your father. You are truly good souls, beloved of God and working hard to our benefit. Why would we jeopardize your safety? You can trust us.” She laughed. “Well, me. And my father and my mother and my brothers. And most of the folk in the weaving shed, or I’m a fool. We will never do anything to hurt you. You’re safe here. No one will tell your secret. But it’s been as frustrating as can be, teasing words out of you one at a time! I want to know more about your life, what it was like in the future. We hear wild stories told by peddlers and travelers, and we don’t know what is true and what is fantasy.”
He was still frightened, but the look in her eyes was so honest and serene, he had to believe her. She tilted her head slowly. Now she appeared hesitant, waiting for his answer, for anything. Aaron leaned forward and kissed her. With a relieved chuckle, she kissed him back. Then, she planted her hands in the middle of his chest and pushed him down to the grass. Their kissing became more urgent, and Aaron let his hands wander over her body for the first time. Her eyes closed in pleasure, she moved into his touch. He knew she had had a lot more experience than he had. He had been such a nerd that he hadn’t had any real girlfriends, but she didn’t seem to mind.
He felt himself getting hard, and shifted away from her leg so she wouldn’t feel it, but she did. She put her hand on the fastening of his jeans, a wicked look in her eyes.
“How do you undo this?” she asked.
Instead, he pushed her hand away. “We shouldn’t,” he said.
“It’s all right,” she insisted.
“No, please. I…it wouldn’t be right.”
She moved her hand from his pants up to his face and stroked it. In a way, that felt just as intimate, and his cheeks caught fire.
“If that’s what you want,” she said. It wasn’t, but he knew it would be wrong to take advantage of her. Still, he nodded. She nestled against him. He told his body to calm down, that it was nothing, that it should stop embarrassing him. But that wasn’t easy with a beautiful girl in his arms. “Tell me a secret.”
“You know the biggest secret I have,” he said. He still had a big, icy ball of worry in his belly, but it actually felt good not to have to pretend to be someone else after that many weeks.
“Then tell me another,” Ivy said. A thought sprang into his mind, and he laughed.
“Do you want to know a secret?” he asked.
“Yes!”
He jumped up and pulled her to her feet. “Come with me.”
By the carriages in the drive at the front of the great house, the de Beauchamps had company. Instead, he took Ivy in through the kitchen. The amused and indulgent look on the faces of the cook and the scullery maids made him blush again, but there was really no judgement in it. Ivy greeted them all by name, and they asked after her mother’s health.
“She worked here when she was a girl my age,” Ivy explained. “It’s where she learned to cook.”
“Ja,” Aaron said, although apparently all the servants knew the same secret she did.
He and Ivy went up the rear staircase to the annex. He stuck his nose in the other rooms, but no one was there. He gestured to Ivy to sit on the floor next to the box that held his record player.
“What’s this?” she asked, eying it warily.
“I’d love to serenade you, like a troubadour from the past, but I can’t sing,” he said. “So, let me play you some music. From the future.”
She had to lean low so as to hear the speaker, giving him too good a view down her blouse. He had to concentrate on playing her the best songs from the albums. Like Miz Margaret, she seemed to like the records slowed down from 33-1/3 to 16, but that was okay. He was getting used to hearing them like that.
“This is wonderful!” she said, her eyes shining like stars. “Those Beadles are lovely!”
“Oh, yeah, but wait until you hear Pearl Jam. You’ll go crazy for them.”
She leaned into him as he changed the record, and their lips met. They were only half-listening to the music when the door flew open.
“Dad!” Aaron blurted out. Ivy tilted her head back lazily.
“Hello, Master Craig,” she said. “Aaron was just playing me some Pearl Jam.”
To his credit, Aaron’s father didn’t waste time berating his son. Like he’d often told Aaron, he had once been a teenager.
“Guten tag, Fräulein,” he said with his usual friendly smile, and added in Amideutsch. “Aaron, you are needed down in the parlor.”
“Oh, it’s all right,” Ivy said. “I already know you’re American. You don’t have to pretend with us.”
Martin shook his head. “We need to keep pretending, Ivy. It’s not for us. It’s for Miss Margaret and her family. Aaron, Master Blackford is here with a number of other guild masters. Straighten yourself up and come downstairs right away. Ivy, can you sneak out of here without being seen?”
Ivy brightened up, realizing he wasn’t going to scold her. “I know every inch of the house, Mr. Craig.” She turned around and kissed Aaron chastely on the cheek. “See you tomorrow.”
Martin laughed and put his arm around his son’s shoulder.
“Come on, boy. That’s some girl. She’s more than she seems, isn’t she?”
“She sure is,” Aaron said, watching her flit down the rear stairs. “I’m lucky she likes me.”